Chapter 25
Grant’s House
For a long minute, Izzy stood in the backyard, mountain wind tearing at her hair as the valley stretched endlessly below.
Her lungs burned.
Anger simmered hot beneath her skin, tangled with something far worse.
Humiliation.
Six years.
Six years of ninety-hour weeks, wealthy patrons, gallery openings, artists she’d fought for with her own reputation—and one bloodless investor meeting had erased all of it in a ten-minute phone call.
A sharp sound hitched loose from her before she could stop it.
“Oh my God,” she whispered. “Fired.”
What was she supposed to do now?
Denver suddenly felt fifteen hundred miles away.
Not home. Not safe. Just… gone.
And somehow that hurt even worse after last night.
Because for one reckless, impossible night, Grant Scott had made this mountain feel more like home than her condo ever had.
This morning, he’d looked her straight in the face and treated it like a mistake.
A strangled sound tore from her throat.
Izzy pressed both hands hard against her eyes, trying to force herself back together before anyone saw.
Inside the house, Grant looked up sharply from the kitchen sink.
At first, all he heard was the wind through the open screen door.
Then—a muffled sob.
Grant froze.
Outside, a shaking sob tore out of Izzy, and she wrapped both arms around herself as panic crashed hard through her chest.
No job. No plan. No idea what came next. She missed having one place in the world that felt solid, familiar, and hers. And God, she missed Caitlin being in Denver.
Another broken breath escaped before she could stop it.
Grant stared toward the back porch, jaw tightening.
Something inside him twisted at the sound.
Real pain. And suddenly, he hated himself a little for this morning.
Outside, Izzy swiped angrily at her face and forced herself upright.
No. Absolutely not.
She was not going to fall apart on a mountain overlook over Marcus Halpern and one emotionally constipated cowboy.
She sucked in one last shaky breath and walked toward the house.
The screen door slammed hard enough to rattle the kitchen windows.
Grant looked up immediately.
Izzy crossed through the living room fast, sunglasses still on, one arm wrapped tight around herself like she was physically holding something together.
“Iz?”
She didn’t answer. Didn’t slow down.
She hit the staircase and disappeared upward, the old wood creaking beneath her boots.
Grant stood there, brow furrowing.
Something was wrong.
Upstairs, a bedroom door shut hard.
Grant stared toward the staircase.
Then a muffled sob broke through the quiet.
Grant froze.
Jesus.
Another broken inhale drifted faintly through the ceiling.
Grant shoved a rough hand across his jaw, staring toward the stairs while guilt settled low and vicious in his stomach.
For one reckless night, he’d held that woman in his arms like she mattered more than oxygen.
This morning, he’d treated it like a problem to manage.
Upstairs, something thudded softly against the wall. A drawer opened hard. Then another.
Grant moved.
By the time he reached the upstairs landing, he could hear movement inside the bedroom—closet doors opening, hangers jerking sharply across metal rods. Underneath it, the sound of her trying not to cry.
That was the part killing him. The way she was trying to keep falling apart private.
Grant stopped outside the open doorway, and the sight of her hit him like a punch to the ribs.
Mascara streaked black beneath her eyes. Hair half-fallen from its pins. Bare feet against the hardwood as she yanked a leather suitcase onto the bed with trembling hands.
Devastated.
“Izzy…”
She froze.
Then turned toward him with wet, furious eyes.
“I just got fired, okay?”
“Fired?” he repeated, his rough voice faltering.
Izzy let out a short, jagged breath, dragging a stack of clothes from the dresser.
“Yeah. Apparently, having actual standards isn’t part of the corporate business model anymore.”
Her movements were sharp, efficient, and final as she shoved clothes into the open case.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
She didn’t look up from the zipper. “Packing.”
“For what?”
Izzy shook her head, already moving again, tossing garments into the open case with clipped, frantic energy. “Save it,” she said tightly. “I’m not interested in a lecture right now, Grant.”
“You think I’m trying to give you a lecture?”
“I think you’re about to try to make this easier or more realistic than it is,” she shot back, her voice rising as she faced him across the mattress. “And I am absolutely not in the mood for that either.”
Grant watched her, his shoulders knotting. “Where the hell are you going?”
She didn’t look at him. “Does it matter?”
“Yeah,” he rumbled, his voice dropping an octave, low. “It does.”
That pulled her focus back. She turned, her eyes sharp as flint. “I am not staying somewhere I’m not wanted, Grant. I’m not an inconvenience you’re forced to manage.”
Grant held her gaze, something deep and territorial shifting inside him. He took another step closer, his shadow falling across the bed.
“So that’s it?” he said quietly, his voice rough with suppressed emotion. “You come in here, turn everything upside down… and now you’re just leaving?”
Izzy frowned, her hands freezing over the leather strap. “What are you talking about?”
Grant let out a short, heavy breath. “Burke reopened the case,” he said.
“Wait—what?”
Grant watched her, tracking the sudden confusion on her face. “You didn’t know?”
Her grip tightened on the edge of the suitcase until her knuckles turned white. “He reopened it?” she whispered. “When?”
“This morning.”
A heavy beat dropped between them. Everything she’d been about to say—every defensive wall she’d built since walking through the door—shifted.
“Of course he did,” she said quietly.
Grant’s brow furrowed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
She shook her head once, her expression calcifying into something unreadable. “Nothing.” But it wasn’t nothing.
She turned away from him, zipping the suitcase with one hard pull. She grabbed the leather handle, lifted the weight, and walked straight past his shoulder. Grant didn’t move. He didn’t stop her. He didn’t say another word as the front door opened, then closed with a hollow thud.
Izzy stepped onto the front porch, the vast indigo line of the mountains stretching out in front of her like a wall.
Denver. Gone. Grant. Done.
And now—Clara Vale.
Her eyes closed for a brief, shuddering second. The abandoned cabin. The preserved paintings. That persistent feeling in her gut that something about a simple “walkaway” had never made logical sense. Burke reopening the case this morning—that wasn’t a coincidence. That was structural movement.
Her eyes opened, clear and focused.
Slowly, her fingers loosened around the leather handle. The suitcase rolled back an inch against the porch floorboards. She looked toward the jagged ridge, then back toward the screen door.
Not yet.
Izzy stopped at the top step, her hand hovering over the luggage. She didn’t pick it up.
“Wade Hollis invited me to his house tomorrow,” she said, her voice carrying clear across the gravel. “To look at his private collection.”
The silence that followed was entirely different than the one before. Colder. Clinical.
Grant’s eyes narrowed instantly. “Wade doesn’t invite strangers into his house, Izzy. Not unless he wants something from them.”
“Then it’s a good thing I’m looking for something, too,” Izzy said evenly.
“I’m going.”
Grant finally spoke, his voice a low, dangerous vibration that sounded like it had been dragged over gravel.
“You have absolutely no idea what you’re walking into.”
Izzy held his flint-blue gaze, her mouth curving into a slow, bitter line.
“Funny,” she said quietly. “Now suddenly you’re worried where I end up.”
* * *
Izzy stood on the top step, her eyes closed against the mountain glare.
Gravel crunched at the far end of the drive. She didn’t move at first, her posture rigid. The sound came again—heavy tires easing over stone and dirt, slow and deliberate.
When she opened her eyes and turned, Burke’s truck was already halfway up the approach, dust curling behind the bumper. It rolled to a heavy stop just short of the porch steps.
The engine cut. Caitlin was out of the passenger side first. She took two quick steps toward the house, then stopped dead. Her eyes landed on Izzy, then dropped instantly to the leather suitcase resting against the wood.
Something in Caitlin’s expression shifted, the color draining.
“…okay,” Caitlin said slowly, her gaze moving between them. “What exactly did we just walk into?”
Izzy crossed her arms lightly over her chest, her face a perfect, gallery-honed mask. “Bad timing,” she said.
Caitlin didn’t buy it. Didn’t push it either. Not yet.
Burke came around the front of the truck, shutting the driver’s door with a solid, metallic thud that echoed off the barn. His gaze moved once across the scene—taking in Izzy, the suitcase, the half-open front door, and Grant standing rigid in the shadows of the overhang.
The Sheriff didn’t comment. Didn’t ask for an explanation. He stepped up onto the porch, his uniform star catching the light.
“We officially reopened Clara Vale’s case this morning,” Burke said.
The announcement landed differently this time. It wasn’t like Grant mentioning it in the middle of an argument. This time it was official. Legal.
Izzy held the Sheriff’s gaze. “I heard,” she said.
Burke’s brow shifted, his eyes narrowing. “You did?”
She nodded once, her jaw set. “Yeah.”
He studied her for a long second, measuring the absolute lack of flinch in her posture. Then he gave her a single, respectful nod back.
“Good,” he said.
Caitlin’s shoulders eased a fraction as she stepped closer to the steps, pulling herself back into the moment.
“Okay,” she said, glancing between her brother and her best friend. “Can we maybe slow down for one single second?”
She climbed the steps, stopping right in front of Izzy, lowering her voice enough to bypass the men.
“You want to tell me why there’s a suitcase on the porch, Iz?”