Chapter 4
CHAPTER
FOUR
MOLLY—FIVE DAYS BEFORE THE WEDDING
Five-year-olds don’t care that your wedding is supposed to happen in five days.
They don’t care that you found your fiancé with a half-dressed woman in the living room you share.
They don’t understand that sometimes a person can have her entire future ripped away and still be expected to show up at eight o’clock with a smile and explain why glue sticks belong on paper instead of in someone’s hair.
They care that the blue crayon is missing. They care that Ava got the sparkly scissors first and that the class caterpillar—which is actually a moth caterpillar, despite what the label on its plastic habitat claims—still hasn’t built its cocoon.
Today, I am grateful for every tiny emergency. They keep me from thinking. Mostly.
I cried while I sat on the edge of a hotel bed and stared at the patterned carpet. I cried in the shower, where I could pretend the water on my face came from somewhere else. I cried when I took off my engagement ring and placed it beside the cheap plastic cup on the bathroom counter.
“Miss Molly!” Lily shouts from the reading rug. “Someone’s at the door.” I turn. Grayson stands in the hallway. My breath catches before I can stop it.
He’s wearing dark jeans and a gray work shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows.
The name of his garage is embroidered over one side of his broad chest, and a pair of sunglasses hangs from the collar.
His hair is dark with silver at the temples, slightly mussed as though he’s been dragging his hands through it.
There’s grease along one forearm. He looks completely out of place surrounded by construction-paper flowers and finger paintings. He also looks like the one person I’ve been trying not to think about all morning.
“Grayson.”
Twenty-two small heads turn toward me. Then they turn toward him.
“Is that your boyfriend?” Ava asks.
My face catches fire. “No.”
Grayson’s mouth twitches.
I glare at him before facing my class. “Everyone, please keep working on your pictures.”
“Who is he?” Ethan asks.
“He’s a mechanic.”
“What’s that?”
“He fixes cars.”
“Is he your dad?”
“No.”
“Is he a policeman?”
“No.”
“Is he a superhero?” Lily asks.
Grayson steps into the room. “Definitely not.”
The children stare at him. He stares back.
“This is a superhero dog.” Ethan says.
Grayson bends slightly to examine it. “I can see that.”
I press my lips together. Traitor.
“He flies with fire,” Ethan explains.
“Looks fast.”
“He fights aliens.”
“What kind?”
“Green ones.”
Grayson nods gravely. “Those are the worst kind.”
Ethan grins. The other children immediately abandon their work. Within seconds, Grayson is surrounded by brightly colored drawings and excited voices.
“I drew my cat!”
“This is me at the beach!”
“My mom says dragons aren’t real, but I think they hide!”
“I can do a cartwheel!”
Grayson looks at me over the tops of their heads. There’s something kind and patient in his eyes.
I bite back a laugh. “You walked into their territory.”
“Can you call them off?”
“They can sense fear.”
“I’m not afraid.”
Ava grabs his hand. “Come see my unicorn.”
He allows her to pull him toward one of the tables.
“You look afraid,” I say.
His gaze catches mine. For the first time since I met him, Grayson smiles. A real smile. Slow and warm, cutting through every rough line in his face. It changes him. Or maybe it changes something in me.
Because suddenly I don’t see Carter’s intimidating father. I don’t see the man everyone lowers their voice around or the former prisoner whose past no one discusses.
Carter told me early in our relationship about his past, though he never explained exactly what happened.
Whenever I asked, he became defensive and accused me of judging his father.
After that, I stopped mentioning it. I filled in the blank spaces myself.
In my mind, prison meant violence. Anger.
A man who lived by rules I couldn’t understand.
It explained Grayson’s silences and his hard expressions. It explained the muscles beneath his work shirts and the scar near his jaw. Now I see someone handsome enough to make my heart forget it’s supposed to be broken. The thought sends a nervous flutter through my stomach.
Knowing about his past made me cautious. But watching him now makes me ashamed of that caution. Whatever he did, the man crouching on my classroom carpet isn’t frightening. He’s gentle.
I turn away quickly.
“What are you doing here?” I ask.
“Bringing back your car and checking on you. Carter said you didn’t stay at home last night.”
“You fixed it?.”
“I want to make sure it isn’t leaking. It drives perfectly.”
“You didn’t have to come all the way across town.”
“I was in the area.”
I glance through the windows. His garage is at least fifteen minutes west of the school. He wasn’t in the area but I don’t call him on the lie.
“Miss Molly,” Ava says, “can he read us a story?”
Grayson immediately stands. “I need to check the car.”
“You said you came to drop off the car,” I remind him. “You didn’t say you were in a hurry.”
His eyes narrow. “Whose side are you on?”
“Theirs.”
The children cheer. I laugh. The sound surprises me almost as much as it surprises him. Grayson studies my face. His expression softens, and my smile slowly fades beneath the intensity of his attention.
For one dangerous second, we’re no longer standing in a room filled with children. There’s only him. The man I’m not supposed to want near me.
I break eye contact. “One story.”
He glances toward the reading rug. “I don’t know how.”
“You read the words on the page.”
“I know how to read.”
“Then you know how to read a story.”
“To children?”
“They’re less judgmental than adults.”
“That hasn’t been my experience so far.”
“They’ll love you.”
The words slip out too easily. His gaze returns to mine. Heat creeps up my neck.
“I mean, they already seem to like you,” I add.
“Please?” Ava asks, clasping her hands beneath her chin.
“Please?” the others echo.
Grayson exhales heavily. “All right.”
The children race to the rug. He turns toward the bookshelves, scanning the colorful covers as if selecting a story is more complicated than rebuilding an engine.
“Choose something short,” he says.
“You’re very demanding for a guest.”
“I have work to do.”
“You could have stayed at the garage.”
His gaze holds mine. “I could have.”
My heart stumbles. I turn to the bookshelf before he can see what those three words do to me.
I pull out one of the class favorites, a story about a grumpy bear who refuses to share his cave until a storm forces several woodland creatures inside.
“Try this.”
Grayson takes it.
Our fingers brush. Neither of us moves away immediately. His hand is warm and rough, the pads of his fingers callused from years of physical work. Mine look pale and small beside his. I think about what those hands could do. Fix an engine. Cup my face. I snatch my hand back.
“What?” he asks quietly.
“Nothing.”
Grayson lowers himself into my reading chair.
It’s built for an adult, but it still looks too small beneath him.
His knees spread wide, his heavy work boots planted firmly on the carpet.
The children gather around his feet. I take a seat at one of the tiny tables and fold my hands in my lap. He opens the book.
“The Grumpiest Bear,” he reads.
“You have to show us the pictures,” Ava says.
Grayson turns the book toward them.
“You’re holding it too low,” Ethan says.
He raises it.
“Now it’s too high.”
Grayson looks at me.
I smile sweetly. “Less judgmental.”
His eyes promise revenge. A shiver runs through me that has nothing to do with fear. He starts again.
At first, his voice is stiff, every sentence delivered in the same serious tone. The children listen anyway. Then he reaches a page where the rabbit begs to come inside the bear’s cave.
“You have to do voices,” Lily tells him.
“I don’t do voices.”
“Yes, you do.”
He gives in.
“Please, Mr. Bear,” he reads in a high, squeaky voice. “The storm is going to blow my house away.”
The children erupt into laughter. So do I.
Grayson pauses. His eyes meet mine over the top of the book, and the corner of his mouth lifts. He makes the bear’s voice deep and growly. The fox sounds suspiciously like a cowboy. The owl speaks in a strange accent that seems to travel through three different countries before the end of the page.
By the time the storm reaches the cave, every child is leaning toward him. So am I. There’s something about seeing such a large, imposing man holding a picture book in his grease-marked hands. Something about the tenderness he tries to hide beneath gruff words and impatient glances.
Grayson’s voice changes near the end. It becomes quieter. Almost reflective.
“And for the first time,” he reads, “the bear understood that a home feels warmer when someone else is waiting inside.”
His eyes find mine. My throat tightens. I wonder if he knows I’m thinking about him.
A second later, Principal Hargrove appears in my doorway.
She looks from Grayson to the children gathered around him, then to the book in his hand. Her polite smile tightens.
“Molly?”
My stomach drops.
“Mrs. Hargrove.” I stand so quickly my knee strikes the underside of the table. “I didn’t hear you come in.”
“I can see that.” Her gaze returns to Grayson. “Good afternoon.”
Grayson places the book on my desk. “Ma’am.”
Principal Hargrove waits for an introduction. I know I need to give her one. My mind should be able to produce a simple sentence. Instead, all I can think about is the volunteer policy.
Every adult who spends time in a classroom must complete an application.
The school conducts a background check before adding the person to its approved visitor list. We reviewed the procedure at the beginning of the year, then again after a parent walked into the second-grade hallway without signing in.
Grayson isn’t wearing a visitor sticker. He isn’t an approved volunteer. And he has a criminal record.
“This is Grayson,” I say. “He’s…he fixed my car.”
Principal Hargrove’s eyebrows rise. “Your mechanic? The one from two days ago?”
“Yes.”
“Why is your mechanic reading to the class?”
The question is reasonable. Unfortunately, I don’t have a reasonable answer.
“The children asked him,” I say.
“I see.”
Her tone says she doesn’t. Grayson steps forward. The friendliness he showed the children disappears behind a guarded expression.
“I came to drop off her car.”
“Did you sign in at the front office?”
“No.”
“Are you on the approved volunteer list?”
My pulse pounds in my ears.
“No, ma’am,” he says.
Principal Hargrove folds her hands in front of her. “All classroom volunteers must submit an application and complete a background check before interacting with students.”
“I’m sorry.” Grayson nods once. “I haven’t submitted my volunteer paperwork yet, but I’ll get right on that.”
The statement lands like a brick in my stomach. He says it so calmly that for a moment, I almost believe it’s possible. Then I remember Carter telling me his father spent years in prison. He can’t submit the application. Or he can, but he’ll never pass the background check.
Worse, if Principal Hargrove discovers I knowingly allowed a convicted felon into my classroom, I could lose my job. My teaching certificate might be questioned. Everything I’ve worked for could disappear.
The children have gone silent.
Ava still stands beside Grayson, clutching the edge of his shirt. He looks down at her and gently loosens her fingers.
“Miss Molly didn’t do anything wrong,” he says.
My heart beats harder.
She looks at Grayson. “You’ll need to leave now.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
He turns to the children.
“Goodbye, Mr. Gray,” Lily says.
“Bye.”
“You’ll come back tomorrow?” Ethan asks.
Grayson glances at Principal Hargrove before looking at me. The expression in his eyes is unreadable.
“I don’t think so.”
Disappointment crosses every small face. It hits me harder than it should. As the classroom door closes, all I can think about is how much I wish he hadn’t left.