Chapter Four Mercy #2
“Of course. We spoke last night, so she does know you’re awake. She’s been quite sick, so she can’t come visit just yet. The plague going around the school, unfortunately.”
“Can I use yours?”
Grant paused, indecision flickering over his features. “I’m not sure that’s—”
“Please.”
Grant stared for a moment, then reached into his pocket and removed a phone in a sleek black case, extending it in my direction. His fingers brushed mine as I took it, and his brow pinched briefly before his expression smoothed out again.
Before I opened his contact list, I stared at the photo icon.
“What is it?”
I glanced up, surprised by the intensity of his gaze.
“Oh, um, just something Nell mentioned. That hearing stories and looking at pictures might help, but . . .” I rubbed at my chest with my free hand, pressing against the pressure building there.
“I don’t know how. It feels . . . feels like it’ll just make me anxious. I don’t like that feeling.”
“I know.”
My throat tightened at the careful warmth in his answer. But when I looked up at his face, it wasn’t visible. Just icy-gray eyes and a firm, unsmiling mouth.
“Maybe . . . maybe you could tell me something, or show me something. Just to see how it feels.”
Grant nodded, motioning for his phone again, and I was careful to avoid any incidental contact.
Even fingers touching fingers felt inappropriate.
He scrolled through the pictures, his expression slightly pinched, like he was fighting a wave of pain that he couldn’t control. “This was our wedding day.”
“Oh good, why not jump in the fucking deep end.” My cheeks were flaming as his eyebrow arched. “What about a first date? Or is that too much to ask for?”
“We didn’t go on any dates before we got married.”
My mouth fell open. “Was I drunk?”
“If you were, you did a remarkable job of hiding it.”
“I’m not sure I enjoy the sarcasm.”
His gaze never wavered. “Sober as the judge who married us.”
“Well, maybe he was drunk too.”
“I assure you, he wasn’t.” The phone was still in his hand, and I couldn’t bring myself to take it.
“Or I could show you something else. When you dragged me to a football game. Made me put paint on my face.” He said it with a tinge of good-humored disgust, and my brain stalled at the mental image of Grant with a block M on his cheek.
That was what Connor and I always did. That was our thing.
Games at the Big House. And I stared at this man, wondering how he’d found a place in my life where the thing with my brother became a thing with him.
Grant kept speaking, oblivious to what this was doing to me.
“Our first Christmas, maybe. You made me help you decorate the Christmas tree and said I was terrible at it, even though you have no concept of spatial awareness with ornaments and broke no less than three. We baked cookies and—”
“Stop,” I whispered. I ran my hands into my hair, wincing when I hit a tender spot.
Stitches. There were stitches in my fucking scalp.
I withdrew my hand, trying to hide the shaking by gripping the blanket again.
Panic crawled under my skin, skittering like invisible bugs I couldn’t swat away.
He paused, slowly bringing the phone back to his lap.
“I’m sorry,” I gasped. “I just . . . I can’t. It’s too much.”
I couldn’t look. I didn’t want to see. What if we were happy and smiley and kissy and I looked at him like I was ready to rip his suit off with my teeth? Or what if we looked tense and uncomfortable because we’d gotten married for some weird legal reason that I didn’t quite understand?
My eyes snapped to his. “Oh my God, is this a green card marriage?”
Grant looked disarmingly patient. “No. My mother was born here. I have dual citizenship. She moved to the UK when she was six.”
“Are you blackmailing me?”
“Are you being entirely serious?”
“I don’t know. Yes? Maybe I caught you doing something illegal and—”
“That would mean you were blackmailing me, darling.” He tilted his head. “Do you think you’re coercing me into marriage now?”
“No. I’m not that desperate for a husband.” I picked at the edge of the surgical tape where it was curling up on my forearm. “I didn’t even want a boyfriend. Let alone you.”
“Thank you,” he said dryly.
I sank into the bed. Well. That would’ve been too easy. I rubbed my temples, and Grant sat forward, concern in his tight expression.
“Are you all right? Should I get the nurse?”
My hands dropped back to my lap, and I shook my head. “No. It’s fine. I just . . . I think maybe being overwhelmed with information isn’t the best idea.”
“Of course.” His phone buzzed, and his brow furrowed as he stared at the screen.
“I don’t mind if you answer it.”
His jaw clenched, and the itch of curiosity intensified because a part of me wanted him to answer it so I could glean something about him.
About us, maybe. Was it a friend? Did he have other friends besides Connor?
Did all the rich old men who trusted him with their money care that much about a wife with a bump on her head?
“No, it can wait.” He tucked his phone away, unable to meet my gaze for a moment. “How about starting small, then? Ask me one thing.”
“Just one thing?” I repeated.
Grant nodded slowly. “I think we can both manage that, can’t we?”
It was impossible to try to narrow down all the questions whirring in my head. I was missing a year of my life, and I still didn’t really know what that meant in terms of this relationship.
I sucked in a breath and let it out through my mouth. “Okay. How long have we been married?”
Starting with a softball seemed like the easiest way out of this conversation. I would gain context. He’d be able to share.
But Grant paused for a surprisingly long time, his jaw working before he finally lifted his gaze and leveled it on me. He was searching for something, and by the look on his face, I could tell he couldn’t find it.
“Just shy of twelve months.”
“What? How?” I blinked, unable to process a single bit of this. My softball question turned out to be a fucking bowling ball to the head. “How? Where did we—”
“That’s two, darling.” His face softened.
I sat up. “Then tell me two things.”
“I don’t want to overwhelm you, Mercy.”
The sound of my name on his lips, even in that reluctant tone, made me shrink back. He never called me Mercy. It was always Kincaid. Somehow even the pet name was safer. “Please tell me this. It’s . . . it’s connected. A sub-question to the main topic.”
He didn’t seem convinced, but Grant sighed and sat back in his chair, his unrelenting gaze traveling over every inch of my face. “We saw each other at the cemetery on the first anniversary of his death. You were standing outside your car.”
“Sitting inside my car,” I whispered. “That’s the last thing I remember.”
Grant’s eyes burned. “Is it, now?”
I nodded, letting out a weary sigh. “So you’re telling me that I saw you there, and within two weeks we were married?”
“No.”
“Oh goodie.”
“It took us less than a week.”
Just one thing, my ass.