Chapter 12
Grace lay low for the next few days recovering, while Isaiah checked up on her every so often, and by the third day after her accident, she was feeling well enough finally to start her job.
Armed with some cleaning supplies she’d found under the sink, she headed with Jacob to the office to give it the cleaning it needed and deserved. New starts all around.
As they set out, she decided she was feeling determinedly optimistic.
The weather helped; spring had finally sprung, and under sparkling sunshine, Lighthouse Cove Island looked like a picture postcard, with its sweeping hills and smooth, silvery stretches of beach, the woodland ringing the striking cliffside dotted with rainbow-hued banks of crocuses and daffodils.
Even Grayhaven seemed less gloomy on a bright spring day, or maybe that was just because she felt she knew the place better now.
Grace had considered stopping by to offer her thanks to Noah for his care, or maybe just to leave a note, but she hadn’t yet, both because she did and didn’t want to see him again.
He was clearly a complicated and even troubled man, and she was a just as complicated and troubled woman.
And while that could, she supposed, be the basis of some kind of friendship, he made her feel too uneasy to attempt even a simple conversation, at least at this point.
Maybe later, she told herself as she let herself into the dusty office and while Jacob took charge of the broom, Grace started to scrub.
It felt good to clean something—the physical work, the intentional effort, the instant result.
She even enjoyed the ache in her muscles, the sweat that beaded her forehead, the grime under her fingernails, all evidence of success.
It felt like a long time since she’d had to do anything but be beautiful—and silent. Almost as silent as Jacob.
She glanced at him now, diligently sweeping, wondering when he would—and more importantly, what would make him—speak again.
It had been six months since he’d said a single word, which seemed an endless amount of time.
He’d always been a quiet child, but this selective mutism, apparently common in children who had experienced trauma, was extremely worrying to Grace.
As far as she could remember, it had started right when she’d told him she was leaving Brad; his mouth had parted but he hadn’t said a single word—then or since.
She wondered if he was traumatized by essentially losing his father; Brad hadn’t made any effort to spend time with his son since she’d walked out of their Park Avenue apartment.
Not that Grace had wanted him to. Their divorce wasn’t finalized yet, and the temporary custody arrangement in place gave him parental access that he’d chosen not to use.
When she’d told him she was taking a six-month position in Maine, Brad hadn’t even replied to her text.
By that point the online smear campaign had done its dirty work.
Now, looking at Jacob diligently and silently sweeping, Grace wondered if she should take him to a therapist again, but the couple of attempts she’d made back in New York had been disastrous, with Jacob refusing to engage and once even trying to run out of the room.
The therapist had advised her to wait to try again, and she understood that, because if she wasn’t ready to talk about everything that had happened, why should her six-year-old son be?
And yet it was hard to be patient with someone else’s process, never mind her own.
And what about Noah? Grace had been thinking about him more than she was comfortable acknowledging, even to herself.
She’d considered all the disparate bits of information she’d collected about him—he’d saved her life, of course, but he was also a chess master, a venture capitalist, had been close to his twin brother, and had been living like a hermit for a year and a half.
He suffered from nightmares he didn’t like to talk about, and was reserved, gently mocking, surprisingly kind—and a stranger.
And one, Grace reminded herself, that she’d probably never see again, no matter that they lived about half a mile apart.
With the office looking a little more presentable, she and Jacob had a picnic on the rocks outside, and they spent a pleasant half-hour going over a log of all the animals and birds that had been seen on the island.
“A meadow jumping mouse,” Grace mused as she flipped through the pages.
“And a woodland jumping mouse. What do you suppose the difference is? Just their habitats?” She flipped to another page.
“I’d like to see a river otter. Don’t they have the cutest faces?
And what about a blue whale? Aren’t they enormous!
” She kept up the monologue while Jacob scanned the pages with interest, occasionally pointing to an animal that caught his fancy, but never saying a word. Grace had learned not to mind.
“Maybe you can make your own log,” she suggested when they’d finished. “So we can see what animals are still coming around. I’m sure it changes with the seasons, too. Wouldn’t that be fun?”
She was determined to start her regular walks of the island, to monitor the various populations, check on the feeders and nesting boxes.
That was the one part of her job that was truly necessary, and it was within her wheelhouse, thankfully.
At least she hoped it was. It had been a long time since she’d studied marine biology, but the interest, although dormant, was still there, and she liked to think, despite twelve years of dormancy, she was a capable person.
Grace packed away their picnic as Jacob went searching for sea glass.
In the distance, she glimpsed the smudge of a boat—Ned’s ferry or Becca’s trawler?
She was glad she’d gotten to know her neighbor a little the other day.
She hoped she and Becca might be friends.
There weren’t that many options on this island, after all, which perversely had her thinking about Noah Lawrence yet again…
“Jacob!” Grace called as she stood up, the picnic basket looped over one arm.
“We should head back.” The tide was coming in, and she wasn’t going to make that mistake again.
Jacob came running toward her, his hands full of bits of colored glass—green, blue, even purple.
His face was alight with enthusiasm as he showed Grace his treasures and she exclaimed over them all, so grateful that he seemed so happy, like any normal little boy.
“I think you have quite a collection now,” she remarked as they started walking back toward home.
“We need to find a good place to put it. What do you think—a box, or maybe a jar? If it was a jar, you could see all the colors.” She glanced down at him, willing him to answer even though she already knew he wouldn’t.
Was she enabling his silence, Grace wondered, far from the first time.
Yet what else could she do? “A jar?” she asked, as if for confirmation. “I think maybe that’s a good idea.”
They walked companionably toward the lodge, which after just one week was already feeling like home.
More of a home, even than the penthouse apartment on Park Avenue she’d lived in for over a decade and had never felt as if it had belonged to her…
but then, of course, it hadn’t. Everything had been in Brad’s name, with a watertight prenup that had left her with very little, save for child support, which he’d at least agreed to pay, if grudgingly.
Not that she even minded the lack of alimony.
The last thing Grace wanted was to be financially dependent on Brad Bellingham… or anyone.
Grace’s steps slowed as she caught sight of a figure on the back porch of the warden’s lodge. As she came closer, she saw it was Isaiah Hawksworth.
“You’re very kind to check up on me.” She greeted him with a smile as she came onto the porch.
He’d been by several times already, always asking what he could do to help, and often bearing some kind of gift—a basket of oranges, a box of herbal tea.
“But I’m much better now,” she assured him, fearing she’d put him out enough. “I don’t want you to worry.”
“Oh, I’m not worried,” Isaiah told her with a twinkling smile. “I’m actually here on another errand.”
“Oh?” Grace raised her eyebrows in query as she opened the back door, ushering Jacob in and then Isaiah. “And what’s that?” she asked as they headed into the kitchen. She went immediately to the kettle. “Tea? Or coffee?”
“Oh, I won’t stay,” Isaiah replied with a wave of his hand.
“I came to let you know that Mr. Lawrence—that is, Noah—was wondering if Jacob would like some chess lessons up at Grayhaven. I don’t know if you’re aware, but Noah is a chess master.
He and his brother competed internationally for some years, when they were much younger.
” He paused, while Grace tried to get her head around this unexpected offer.
Becca had told her Noah was a chess master, but she’d hardly expected him to offer lessons.
“He noticed that young Jacob seemed very interested in chess,” Isaiah continued, “and he believes he has a lot of potential. If you’re interested… ”
“Oh, well I… ouch!” Laughing a little, Grace glanced down at her son, who had yanked hard on her arm and was now staring at her intently.
She knew what that meant. He wanted lessons.
He loved chess, and it was probably the thing he missed most about the expensive prep school he’d gone to, back in New York. Maybe the only thing.
“I think Master Jacob may have something to say about the matter,” Isaiah remarked with a small smile.
“So it seems,” Grace returned wryly. Why had she even hesitated? Here was an opportunity for her son, one he actually welcomed. Of course she would accept. Even if it meant seeing Noah Lawrence again.
Especially if it did.