Chapter 12 Grace
Grace
Grace woke to the sound of glass breaking.
For half a second, her brain refused to make sense of it. She lay there, blinking up at the ceiling, disoriented by the pale gray light seeping through the curtains and the quiet weight of morning. Then her brain processed what had woken her.
Her stomach dropped.
Grace swung her legs out of bed and stood, listening carefully, heart already starting to race. She didn’t hear anything else. No shouts. No movement.
She tiptoed down the hallway, bare feet skimming the rug, and froze at the edge of the kitchen.
The back door window was shattered. Cold air leaked through the broken pane.
For a moment, she couldn’t move.
Her house. Her quiet little street. Her carefully held-together life.
Glass littered the linoleum. And there, right in the middle of it, was a folded piece of paper weighed down by a stone.
Grace’s pulse thundered in her ears.
“Eli,” she called, her voice sharp but steady. “Eli!”
Footsteps thudded from the living room. He appeared in the doorway a second later, hair rumpled. He took one look at the door, the glass, the stone, and swore softly.
Grace’s breath hitched. “You said—”
“I know,” he said quickly, holding up a hand. “I know. Stay back.”
He disappeared, then returned moments later wearing his boots, laces still untied and loose.
He crossed the kitchen in three long strides, boots crunching on glass. He crouched, careful not to touch the shards of glass, and reached for the note.
“Eli, don’t—”
Too late.
He unfolded it, eyes flicking over the contents. His jaw locked.
“What does it say?” she asked.
“Nothing,” he said too quickly. He crumpled the paper in his fist. “It’s nothing. Just some idiot trying to scare us.”
Grace stared at him.
She jammed her feet into her sneakers and stepped into the kitchen, glass crunching under her soles. She held out her hand. "Give it to me."
He hesitated—just a fraction too long—before letting her take it.
The message was short. Blocky letters, written with a marker that had bled through the paper.
FOUND YOU
Her stomach turned over.
This wasn’t random. This wasn’t kids. This wasn’t vandalism for fun.
Grace looked up at her brother, voice steady only because she forced it to be. “This is about you.”
Eli dragged a hand down his face. The bravado drained out of him, leaving something older and heavier behind. “Gracie—”
“Don’t,” she said softly. “Don’t lie to me. Not now.”
He exhaled, slow and resigned. “I didn’t think they’d follow me here.”
Grace wrapped her arms around herself, suddenly aware of how thin the glass between inside and outside really was. How easily someone had crossed it. How quietly.
“We’re calling the police,” she said.
Eli stiffened. “Grace—”
“No.” She shook her head, already reaching for her phone. “This is my house. You don’t get to decide what risks I take.”
He looked like he wanted to argue. Then he looked at the broken window again—and nodded.
“Okay,” he said quietly. “Okay.”
Grace dialed with fingers that trembled despite her effort to keep them still. As the phone rang, she stared at the shattered glass, at the empty street beyond the door, at the place where safety had cracked without warning.
She didn’t know what trouble her brother was in.
She only knew that whatever this was—it had found her.
"—and you're sure you didn't hear anything before the glass broke?"
Grace forced herself to meet Mercer's gaze without flinching. "I was asleep. The sound woke me up."
He nodded slowly, pen tapping against his notepad in a rhythm that felt deliberate. Skeptical. "Right. And your brother just… showed up a few days ago. Out of the blue."
"He's family," Grace said evenly. "He doesn't need a reason."
Mercer's mouth curved—not quite a smile, more like he'd just proven a point to himself. "Course not."
He was standing in her kitchen, his heavy boots crunching over glass she hadn't been allowed to clean yet. The broken window gaped behind him and the cold air that made her want to wrap her arms around herself. She didn't. Wouldn't give him the satisfaction of seeing her rattled.
Eli sat at the table, silent and still in a way that made her nervous. He'd answered Mercer's questions with the bare minimum—yes, no, don't know—and now he was just… waiting. Watching. Like he expected this to go badly and was already three steps ahead.
Mercer flipped a page in his notebook. "You get a lot of visitors lately, Miss Hart? Anyone unusual hanging around?"
Grace thought of the dark sedan. The tinted windows. The way it had been parked just a few doors down before disappearing.
She should tell him.
She opened her mouth—
"No," Eli said.
Both Grace and Mercer turned to look at him.
"No one's been hanging around," Eli continued, voice flat. "It's probably just kids. Bored teenagers looking for trouble."
Mercer's eyebrows lifted. "Kids who write threatening notes?"
"Kids who think they're being edgy," Eli shot back.
The silence stretched.
Mercer's gaze slid from Eli to Grace and back again, something calculating settling behind his eyes.
"You know," he said slowly, "it's funny.
Vandalism's been pretty quiet in Crystal Lake since you Harts moved out.
Now you're back—" He gestured vaguely at the broken window.
"—and suddenly we've got property damage again. "
Grace's eyes narrowed. "Are you saying my brother did this to my own house?"
"I'm saying," Mercer replied, tone pleasant but sharp underneath, "that trouble follows certain families."
Eli stood abruptly, chair scraping against the floor.
Mercer didn't move. Didn't even blink.
Grace stepped between them before either could say something that made this worse. "Officer Mercer," she said, voice carefully controlled, "someone threw a rock through my window. With a threatening note. I called because I thought the police might want to investigate that."
Mercer's expression didn't change. "We'll file a report. Patrol the area. But honestly, Miss Hart?" He clicked his pen closed. "Best advice I can give you is to be careful about the company you keep."
Grace felt heat rise in her cheeks—anger, humiliation. She'd called for help. She'd done the right thing. And this was what she got.
"I think we're done here," she said quietly.
Mercer tucked his notepad into his belt. "I'll take a drive around, see if I can see anything unusual. In the meantime—" He glanced at Eli one more time. "—lock your doors."
He walked out through the front, boots heavy on her porch steps.
The second the door closed, Grace sagged against the counter.
Eli moved toward her. "Gracie—"
"Don't." She held up a hand, eyes burning. "Just… don't."
She stared at the broken window, at the glass still scattered across her floor.
This was her home. Her safe place. And in one morning, it had all cracked open.
Grace pressed her palms flat against the counter and breathed.
In. Out. In.
She would clean up the glass. Board the window. Get through the day.
She would survive this.
She had to.
Because no one else was coming to help.