Chapter 3 Gracie #2
Dodging other guests who stare openmouthed at the room’s frescoed, velvet-draped splendor, I position myself behind a tall, tropical-looking plant near the bar Jude is headed for.
It’s the wrong move. The line moves surprisingly fast, and before I can extricate myself and casually sidle up to the bar, Jude is being handed a drink and turning away.
He’s moments from being greeted by another group of guests, and I stumble quickly from where I’m lurking.
“Jude?”
He turns at the sound of his name, but naturally the spiky plant I’ve brushed against in my haste decides it wants to hold on to me forever. The long, blade-shaped leaves catch in my carefully swept-back hair, and I rear back a step. Something sharp jabs into my scalp.
“Shit,” I curse under my breath as I reach up and discover razor-edged leaves that are fully capable of ruining both hair and lives.
Desperately trying to unsnarl myself while somehow looking completely chill, I execute a spectacular double-fail.
I’m the picture of grace, half bent over with my arms over my head as Jude abandons his drink at the bar and strides toward me.
“Here, let go, you’re going to—”
“Ow!” I cry as one of the leaf edges slices across the pad of my thumb.
“Hurt yourself,” Jude finishes. I automatically suck the shallow cut between my lips, and then he’s standing right next to me.
Close enough that I can smell his cologne, which reads explicitly like a fall breeze rustling the crisp pages of a book beside a glass of whiskey.
Which is ludicrous and— “Do you mind if I try?”
His voice is deep and soft. Like the kind of feather pillow that seems like a good idea until it swallows your head whole.
I release my hurt thumb and raise my eyes to his.
As my gaze travels up—and then up some more—I clock every detail of his suit.
The expertly cut wool, the elegant roll of his lapels, the perfectly dimpled gray tie.
A small, bright pink feather rests on his collar.
It nearly makes me smile despite the plant situation, but when my gaze reaches his face, all brain activity dissolves.
Because Agatha’s grandson is beautiful. From a distance, it was hard not to stare.
Up close, it almost feels awkward not to comment on.
Like when you’re faced with a friend’s terrible haircut, only the exact opposite.
My gaze stutters up to his eyes, but they’re half-shaded as he makes his own curious perusal.
It takes me way too long to realize he’s politely waiting on my answer to his question. Dear lord.
“Um, yes,” I manage. “That would be grelpful. I mean, helpful. And also great.”
Kill me now, Agatha. Take me with you to that infinite bubble bath in the sky and then drown me for good measure.
A corner of his mouth pulls upward, right along with the blood rushing to my face. I want to explain that I don’t get out much. That some exposure therapy to handsome men who love their grandmothers would probably do me some good.
“Okay, hold still,” he instructs, before lifting his hands to gently explore my tangled strands with a touch I feel in my toes. He sinks perfect white teeth into his bottom lip.
“I’m sorry, there’s no saving it,” he says after a moment, looking down at me. “Do you mind if I take your hair down?”
I am a guppy. Unable to do more than blink and open my mouth several, pointless times. Finally, I nod, but it pulls at my scalp, and I wince.
“Don’t move,” he murmurs, eyes back on my hair.
He takes a step closer, and then his hands are pulling pins from my chignon, one by one.
The bottom half falls heavily around my shoulders, where it isn’t caught by spiny leaves.
He hesitates a moment, and then his fingers are sinking into my hair, scraping my scalp and freeing the bladelike leaves.
I try not to moan. I’m at a funeral. But in my defense, the last person who touched me like this was my hairdresser, and her face doesn’t make my brain feel like melted cheese.
“Oh my God, thank you,” I say, when I’m free.
“Anything to be grelpful,” he responds with a smirk, holding out his hand.
At first, I have the bewildering impression that he’s about to twirl me into a dance.
But then I see the bobby pins in his palm and flush.
Right. Because I’m not an eloquently spoken debutante at a ball.
We’re at his grandmother’s funeral, and I’m a woman who gets caught in potted plants and invents brilliant new words.
I take the pins and put them in my clutch.
“I’d say you surpassed grelpful,” I tell him, feeling no choice but to lean into my word vomit. “That was almost neroic.”
One of his dark eyebrows lifts. “And that’s some variant of… neurotic?”
“No!” I blurt. “No, it’s a combination of nice and heroic. Neroic,” I repeat, like saying it again might somehow make the situation any less humiliating. It doesn’t.
He smiles kindly at me. Like maybe he’s used to people completely losing their ability to speak naturally in front of him. “And here I thought you already had an accurate read on my personality.”
It pulls an unexpected laugh from me. “I’m sure you can’t be too bad,” I tell him. “You’re Agatha’s grandson, after all.”
His smile falters and my heart trips over its feet. “You knew her well?” he asks hopefully.
Behind my eyes is a quicksilver montage of my most cherished moments with Agatha.
The day she insisted I move into the guest cottage and stop commuting from Providence.
The first time she excavated the story of Calvin and assured me that Every great life needs at least one great heartbreak, darling.
The last time she hugged me, when I missed my chance to tell her how much I loved her.
A tear slips down the side of my nose. “Yes,” I whisper. “I knew her.”
The step Jude takes toward me is almost imperceptible.
“I could tell,” he says quietly. Fervently. “When you laughed at the church.”
My shoulders creep toward my ears. “I’m so sorry about that—”
“No, don’t be,” he says, eyes wide and earnest. “It was such a relief to know I wasn’t the only one who—”
“Knew she would have preferred to be scattered at sea on a Chicago-themed booze cruise?”
This time, he blows past all the smirks he’s given so far and blasts me with a smile so wide and warm, I feel like a cat curling into a patch of sunlight.
It cuts smile lines into his cheeks and creases around his eyes, and I’m…
perfectly fine. Ambivalent, even. Totally neutral over these face-related developments.
“Exactly,” he says with a laugh that turns into a soft gaze.
“I should have known from your dress that you were close with her.”
I look down at my careful copy of the world’s most iconic little black dress, and a warm buzz begins building inside me. “You recognize it?”
“Of course. Nana made me watch Breakfast at Tiffany’s anytime I was in a shitty mood.”
“It was Roman Holiday for me!” I beam, half joyous, half bereaved.
This. This was exactly what I’d hoped for—a connection with someone I could share my memories of Agatha with.
What I didn’t expect was this constant fluttering in my chest after years of whatever the opposite of fluttering is.
Sputtering, maybe. His gaze skates over my silhouette.
“It’s a lovely replica,” he says, eyes lingering on the high neckline resting just beneath my collarbones.
I brush a nervous hand through my bangs. “Thank you,” I say. “It was fun to sew.”
His eyes snap to mine. “You made your dress?”
I lift a shoulder. “I’ve always loved to sew. It seemed like—” I pause, calming the upsurge of emotion. “Like a good way to honor Agatha.”
Jude swallows. “She would have loved it. But you’re missing your pearls.” His gaze traces down one of my bare shoulders, all the way to my hand, and I suddenly feel like a repressed Victorian, scandalously flashing a little too much elbow. “And your gloves.”
Something small and shameful squirms in my stomach. I don’t want to admit that after buying the fabric, I couldn’t afford the costume jewelry or gloves. “I thought people might take offense if I showed up looking like I’d come for a costume party,” I say instead.
“I’m honestly surprised Nana didn’t stipulate that everyone come dressed in costume.”
My eyes drop to the tiny pink feather still on his collar, and before I can think better of it, I reach up to pull it off, my fingers grazing the soft wool of his jacket.
I hold it between us, heart thrumming from my daring move.
Since when have I made moves? The only moves I make are from the safety of my own mind when I’ve had a little too much wine and think about drunk-dialing Calvin.
Calvin. With a jolt, I realize he hasn’t crossed my mind once since Jude saved me from hell’s houseplant.
It must be a record, but I suddenly realize I’ve managed to forget not only my ex, but also where I am—at my dear friend’s memorial.
Guilt is like a hard pinch to my heart. There’s got to be some kind of karmic penalty for flirting at a funeral, right?
But then I think of Agatha, and a tingle at the back of my neck makes me feel like she’s here, eyes sparkling with delight as she watches us.
If anyone would approve of me flirting at their memorial, it would be her—especially if it was with her grandson.
And so, gathering my courage, I twirl the feather between my fingers as I raise my eyes to Jude’s. “I think your costume would have stolen the show no matter what.”
He looks dazed, absently raising a hand to where I removed the feather. Then he shakes his head. “I’m so sorry. You know my name, but I haven’t gotten yours.”
I smile. “Is this when I tell you I have to leave, and then accidentally-on-purpose lose a glass slipper?”
“That depends. Do you have any scary stepsisters? Because you should know, as an only child, I’m completely unqualified to handle an evil stepsibling dynamic.”