CHAPTER 8
GRACE
Dinner with Dottie last night was delightful. She’d made a roast with potatoes and carrots in the slow cooker and built a cozy fire in the fireplace that crackled while we ate by candlelight.
“Do you have some extra space, Dottie?”
“Got several more bedrooms upstairs,” she said. “Why do you ask?”
“I thought I might stay a little longer. My partner, Ryder, and my brother, too, might join me. Might stay for a while, if you don’t mind, while I do some writing.”
“Absolutely,” she nodded. “The more the merrier. Although, I still don’t understand why you don’t move on. This town is as boring as watching trees grow.”
“It’s charming,” I said. “I like the slow pace.”
“Where are you from, sweetheart?”
“We live in Tillamook,” I replied. “In the forest.”
“Oh, how lovely!” she exclaimed. “I love the cheese factory there.”
“Yes!” I replied. “Squeaky cheese!”
“I used to go there with my sister, Evelyn, she loved it, too,” she said, sighing. “It’s been a long time, though.”
“You should go back sometime,” I replied.
“I don’t get out much anymore,” she said, showing me her hands, the blue veins showing through like faded tattoos. “It’s hard to drive for too long. Arthritis…”
“That’s too bad,” I said.
“I keep threatening to move somewhere warmer, but I can’t give up the trees. Have you seen all the brown in Arizona? It’s enough to make a woman shrivel up and die.”
I laughed along with her as the fire sputtered. Before long, we were done with dinner and I was snuggled under a hand sewn quilt in a real feathered bed upstairs. Ryder called me before falling asleep to let me know that he’d recruited Fury to help out and they’d be arriving this morning.
“Fury?” I asked. “Are you sure?”
“I think he could use some time away. He’s a lot more mellow than his name suggests.”
“Up to you,” I replied, trusting him to make the right decision.
I slept like a baby, waking up with a sense of determination. I’d had dreams of Molly and Benji, two terrified kids living in a world that was supposed to protect them.
I knew that world.
I’d lived in it myself.
Despite knowing plenty of kids still lived in it today, even in our evolved world with helicopter parenting and parenting classes and countless educational resources to teach parents otherwise, it pained me to think of a child being hurt, with nobody to turn to for help.
This case may be a little out of my wheel well, but it was just as close to my heart as any other.
I wouldn’t leave until I knew that little girl was safe. I didn’t care who her father was, he could be the President of the United States, for all I cared. His status was irrelevant to me. He was an abuser, plain and simple, and he deserved no amount of sympathy, as far as I was concerned.
What kind of person breaks his daughter’s arm?
What kind of community covers it up and allows it to happen, over and over again?
I looked around Jenny’s Diner this morning, a steaming mug of coffee in front of me, soaking in the faces of the community, a few I even recognized from yesterday. I peered into their eyes, wondering which ones knew what Green was doing.
Did they all know?
Were they all complicit?
Or, did Green have them in his clutches, too?
By all appearances, they looked like nice people, but I knew you couldn’t judge a book by its cover. This town has secrets, you could feel them as much as you could feel the cold hovering over it.
I heard the boys before I saw them. The window next to me began vibrating, the loud rumbling sound of their engines approaching from around the corner caused everyone in the diner to look up from their breakfasts and out the window. I repressed a smile when I saw Ryder and Fury round the corner and park their bikes on the corner.
Heads turned and stretched to get a look at the strangers as they removed their helmets and paused to look up and down the streets. They spoke to each other quietly as they made their way to the front door of the diner. When they entered, a hush fell over the room and Jackie, who was standing by the counter with a pot of coffee in her hand, looked almost star-struck, her eyes wide and her lips turning up into a delighted smile.
When they saw me waving, they walked over and joined me, their heavy boots shuffling across the scratched linoleum floor. Fury slid into the booth across from me while Ryder sat next to me, planting a kiss firmly on my lips.
“Hey, babe,” he said, his warmth enveloping me. I couldn’t help but smile as my heart fluttered, my body’s usual reaction to the love of my life.
“Hi, guys,” I said, smiling over at Fury. I’d grown quite fond of him in the short time he’d been hanging around with us at the clubhouse. He was the strong, silent type, with tattoos covering every inch of his skin that was visible. His broad shoulders gave him the look of a linebacker, even though he’d insisted he’d never played the game. His hulking frame and quiet demeanor lent an edge of mystery to him, but when his ruggedly handsome face broke out into one of his rare smiles, you couldn’t help but wonder if it was all a facade.
I’d caught him, late one night at the clubhouse, all alone on the front porch with Oliver and Olivia — the two owls that hung around our place that had become the unofficial mascots of the club over the years. Oliver was sitting on his knee and Olivia had snuggled up close to his thick, black beard as he gently stroked her head. She was blissed out, as always, but the look on Fury’s face had stopped me dead in my tracks. His usual sharp features had softened, his eyes gazing lovingly at the two of them, his huge, rough hands lightly running across Olivia’s feathers.
Everything I thought I knew about this rough and tumble man flew out the window in that moment. And when he looked up at me as I approached, he didn’t flinch, he didn’t change his expression because someone else was watching, he didn’t puff up his chest to display his tough masculinity — he simply let me see the vulnerability and humanity in his eyes as if it was the most natural thing in the world for a hardened man like him to be so open and gentle with such fragile creatures.
In that moment, his strength shined through more than any other.
That’s what I’d learned after spending years with the Gods. There was strength in their vulnerability. There was strength in their kindness, in their ability to love and feel and relate to every other living thing around them. I’d witnessed it first hand with Ryder. I’d seen the way the Gods looked at the women they loved with awe and respect, the way they treated them as partners, not possessions.
These were the kind of men the world needed more of. These were the traits that made a man, a man. Not how much they could bench press, or how many women they could convince to drop their panties on cue, not how quickly they could take down an opponent.
It was their simple, honest humanity that made them men. Their desire to be kind and gentle and loving and stand up for people who couldn’t stand up for themselves. The men who knew that doing the right thing might not always be lawful, but when someone needed help and love, no matter who they were, no matter their gender, or the color of their skin, or whatever else sets us all apart from one another — we all need love.
The ability to live in that knowledge was what made them good men.
As I stared at the two of them, here with me now, I was filled with an overwhelming sense of appreciation.
“Thank you for coming,” I said.
“I missed you,” Ryder said. “We haven’t spent a night apart in a while.”
“And look, we survived!” I teased him.
“Barely,” he grumbled.
“Fury, how are you?” I asked, beaming over at him.
“Couldn’t be better,” he said, his voice quiet and serious. “Happy to be of service, Grace.”
“I reserved a room for you at the bed and breakfast around the corner. We might be here a few days. I’m not sure how to approach this situation, but I have some ideas.”
Ryder looked around at the diner, repeating my trick from yesterday by meeting the eyes of each of the gawkers, instantly causing them to turn away.
“Small town, huh?”
“Eerily small,” I nodded. “Green seems to have his thumb in everyone’s pie.”
“Have you seen him yet?” Ryder asked.
“No. I think I might go to his house soon. See if I can get a meeting with him.”
“Seen Molly yet?”
“Nope, not yet. The principal at her school was no help, though. She talked about Green like he was some sort of God or something.”
“Well, maybe it’s time to show them what a true God looks like,” Ryder said, winking at me.
I laughed softly and nodded.
“Thanks for leaving the cuts at home. Like I said,” I nodded, “everyone’s staring enough already.”
“They sure are,” Fury said, just as Jackie walked up with a huge smile on her face.
“Hello, gentlemen. Coffee?”
Fury and Ryder nodded as she sat two cups down and began pouring from the antique percolator in her hand.
“Grace, I didn’t know you were bringing such handsome men into our town. I like you even more now.”
“Boys, this is Jackie,” I said, smiling up at her. “Jackie, this is Ryder and Fury.”
“Nice to meet you,” she said, nodding at Ryder quickly, then turning her big blue eyes on Fury. “Fury, huh?”
“That’s me,” he said, his voice gruff as he nodded.
“Are you angry?” she asked, a slight teasing lilt to her voice.
“Not at the moment, ma’am,” he replied. She laughed, a little too loudly, causing all those eyes to turn back our way.
“Well that’s good to know,” she said, putting menus in front of them. “Let’s try to keep it that way. I’ll be back in a few minutes to get your order.”
I watched as Fury’s eyes trailed her around the room curiously. There was a sparkle there I’d not seen before but I kept quiet about it.
You never know when or where romance might bloom.