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Sawyer
When we got back to the house, the girls took the boys inside and I managed to undo the infant car seat, bringing Brielle in. The entire ride back from the restaurant, Sydney talked while Grace sat all the way in the back in the third row, completely quiet.
Not that quiet was new for her, but I worried about what was going through her head.
It was probably an asshole move for me to make, but I couldn’t stop myself from putting my hand on her back earlier. Or holding her hand.
And as brief as that contact had been, it had been electrifying. I knew without a doubt in my mind that if distance weren’t a factor, Grace could easily be a woman I’d spend my days and nights with. But distance was a factor and it was best if I tamped down on the urges coursing through me that simply holding her hand gave me.
Six hours in her company and it was more than evident that regaining her complete abandon was going to take longer than this weekend but I was going to put forth the effort. If I couldn’t have her in my bed, I at least wanted her in my life in some smaller capacity.
I lowered the car seat to the floor in the living room and debated taking my niece out. Would she wake up? She was only a month or so old, so she should fall back to sleep, right? And really, how comfortable was sleeping in a bunch of straps?
I kneeled in front of the car seat and carefully removed her, then stood with Brielle curled into my chest. I looked around, unsure where to put her when the girls came back downstairs.
“I can take her,” Sydney said as she cleared the stairs, walking over with her hands out. Easily, she took Bri from me. “She’ll want to eat soon anyway.”
“Do the boys nap this often usually?” I asked, moving to the couch to sit. Grace walked to the kitchen and I watched as she found a glass and filled it with water. She was incredibly comfortable in this house and it made me happy that she still had some sort of peace in her life.
“Brandon doesn’t usually take a morning nap, but he woke up at five so I wasn’t surprised he napped when I went to pick you up. They both normally nap now though, yes.” Sydney sat at the other side of the couch I was on and Grace came back into the living room area, sitting in the armchair that was near Sydney. She pulled her legs up and sat with her legs crossed under her, one hand on her lap and the other holding her glass on the arm of the chair. I wish she were sitting nearer, but I took pleasure in the fact she was comfortable. She may not be one hundred percent there when it was just me and her, but her sitting there, comfortable right now while I was in the room, was a far cry from the closed off Grace I encountered when I first walked into the house this morning.
We were getting somewhere.
Slow and steady.
“What are you doing the rest of the weekend, Grace?” I asked, hoping it sounded casual. From the corner of my eye, I watched as Syd grabbed one of those apron blanket things and put it on over her head. I shifted in my seat, uncomfortable about what was going to be happening, but I wasn’t about to leave the room. Hey, if she wanted to pop out her boob with her friend and brother in the room, she must be ok with us here.
“I’m not sure. I usually take the weekend off from Sweet Grace things so probably just lounge. I do have to go through inventory tonight yet though, to close out the week.”
“You don’t have the store open on the weekend?” I asked, curious. She fought hard to open up a store front, wanting to do more than hide behind a computer and sell the items she loved.
Grace’s eyes flickered to Sydney before back to me. “I stopped using the store front as an actual store about six months ago. I use it now for storage and photos for the site.”
I frowned. “Why?” When she opened Sweet Grace three years ago, she simply had the internet presence, but she leased a space in a boho-chic area downtown and I thought she’d been doing well.
“I just.” She paused and shrugged a shoulder before offering me a smile. “It was too big of a step for me,” she said honestly. She glanced back at Sydney and I sensed there was more to the story and that Sydney knew all about it.
I’d have to ask her later.
“But the store’s still doing extremely well online.”
I rested back into the corner of the couch and crossed my arms over my chest, at ease, and considered Grace. She didn’t shift under my watch. Score one for me. Slow and steady.
“Will you consider opening up the store front again?”
“Sawyer,” Sydney warned, protective of her friend.
I glanced at her, trying not to think about what was going on under the white and gray cloth draped over her chest. “It’s just a question.”
“It’s ok, Syd.” Grace took a sip of her water. “I’m not entirely sure. But the store front is still great advertisement and it allows me to have a place to put everything. That and if people do need to return items, they have an address that’s not my home to do so.”
Put it that way, and I completely agreed. Not that I heard of many disgruntled boutique shoppers, but people could get pissed for literally nothing and if that anger was brought to her doorstep, I’d be livid.
Yes. Her having a separate place for the business made a lot of sense.
“Has your department had a lot of strife with the whole cop-hating thing going on lately?” Grace asked me and while the question was said with confidence, I could hear the ever-slight waver in her voice.
Just like I cared about her, she cared about me.
