Oracle's Moon (Elder Races #4)(56)

Grace sighed. She said bluntly, “I like you.”

The other woman laughed. “I like you too. What’s more, I respect the hell out of you for what you’ve taken on with the kids. A lot of young women your age wouldn’t have done it.”

“I had to,” Grace said. “I love them.” She was also the only one who could pass on to the children what she had been taught about their family and heritage.

“Well, still, kudos to you. If you ever get away from the munchkins, stop by the library some time for coffee.”

Surprised pleasure bloomed. “I’d like that. Thanks.”

Grace and Olivia reached the back meadow. Four men had taken on the chore of mowing and had gotten roughly half of the meadow finished. Brandon was using Grace’s riding mower, and the other three had brought their own, hauled behind pickup trucks and SUVs on small flatbed trailers. At the moment all four mowers were quiet and abandoned, the engines turned off. The men were standing and talking in a cluster near the door to the cavern, which stood open.

Either Grace’s Power bristled again, or she did. She swiped the back of a hand across her warm, damp forehead as she and Olivia reached the men. “That door wasn’t un-locked and open when you found it, was it?” she asked tersely. She had been tired and preoccupied when Don and Margie had come, but she hadn’t been that careless, had she?

“No,” Brandon said as the men clustered around the two women for glasses of iced tea. “We unlocked it. I was going to wait and go down with you, but then I went ahead and checked the tunnel and cavern’s ceiling and walls, myself. It looks fine from the inside for now. Did you notice how much erosion has occurred on this side of the path? It’s developed a fissure down the side of the bluff. You need to keep an eye on this and check the tunnel and the cavern on this side after a strong storm.”

“I think you should put some stones or tree stumps along that,” said one of the other men. “Make the path safer in the dark. If you use the path much in the dark.”

“Well, no,” Grace said. “But occasionally it’s unavoidable, and an accident would not be good.”

She had been aware of the fissure erosion and had been keeping an eye on the path, although it had not occurred to her to watch the tunnel and the cavern from the inside. Brandon could have waited to talk about this until he got back to the house. It wasn’t urgent enough to warrant the effort it took her to make the trek. Probably the whole point behind asking her and Olivia to come out was to get cold drinks brought back while they stood around and talked for a half hour. She felt a surge of irritation, which was totally unreasonable, given how much time they were volunteering. When Brandon offered to haul a truckload of stones over next week to shore up the widening gap, she felt like even more of a bitch.

Olivia and Grace collected the glasses when the men had polished off the last of the gallon of tea. Grace took one last look at the open doorway.

“Don’t forget to lock that,” she told Brandon.

“We won’t,” Brandon said, his blue eyes watchful.

But he was always watchful.

She could still feel him watching as she turned to leave.

The group finished all their projects and called the work day to an end just after five thirty. Everything on Grace’s list had been accomplished and the hole in the backyard fence repaired. Despite whatever personal tensions might have existed throughout the day, she made a point of thanking each one individually when they left.

“Call me sometime next week?” she said to Brandon as he was leaving.

“What?” He looked blank.

“You were going to bring a truckload of stones over?” she prompted.

“Oh, right. Sure. I’ll call you.”

Well, that didn’t sound promising. She stifled another surge of irritation. Dammit, she hated it when people threw out offers but didn’t follow through.

The last to leave, Olivia gave her a quick hug. “Stop by for that coffee,” Olivia said. “Or give me a call sometime if you think you can get away for lunch. I just need a few hours’ notice.”

“Thank you,” Grace said, warming to the older woman all over again. “I will.”

Then Olivia was gone as well, and Grace was left alone with her thoughts.

She didn’t even have to clean up the kitchen. Somebody had already done it for her. The house was clean and silent, and the main issues on the property were taken care of, at least for now. As far as the roof went, she had a few months to try to figure something out. She looked out the kitchen door window. Most importantly, the backyard was trimmed, tidy and useable again.

She would stop at the toy store tomorrow morning before she went to pick up the kids and use the rest of the hundred dollars she had gotten from Don and Margie to buy a small plastic pool and some glow-in-the-dark stars for Chloe and Max’s bedroom.

For now, she could relax. Maybe she could take that bubble bath she had been promising herself for a week, before she called Khalil and went on a date.

Holy gods, a date. With a Djinn.

Grace was almost positive she had hallucinated that part. She thought instead of relaxing, she might tie herself up in knots instead. She knew Khalil had only decided to go on a date on a whim, because the thought had amused him. Whereas she would either get ready for the date in a complete panic or take the smart route and call the whole thing off.