Love Inspired June 2021--Box Set 1 of 2 Read online

  “I have friends,” she said with a serious look. “If that’s what you’re worried about. I just don’t have a best friend yet. But Mom says I will, someday. I don’t think she had best friends, though.”

  She was probably right about that. Avery had always been smart. Smart and quiet and never part of the popular crowd. She’d spent her time alone, studying and ignoring their taunts.

  He’d been the bully. And yet, secretly in love with her, as much as someone like him could love anyone.

  “Tucker was always her friend,” he admitted with no small amount of chagrin. He wasn’t proud of the person he’d been. He should have been more like Tucker. Kinder. More decent.

  She cocked her head to study him, and looking far too grown up. “Yeah, he and my mom are still friends. He sits with us at church. Tucker and Shay.”

  “Do they?” Jealousy washed over him, and he cringed. Time to change the subject. “We could start making deviled eggs to go with our burgers. Want to help me?”

  “Sure. Do you know how to cook?” She hopped up to follow him into the house.

  Grayson held the door open for her.

  “I do. It’s healthier than eating out and I enjoy it.”

  “My mom doesn’t like to cook. She can but she says it takes a lot of time and planning. We make stuff together. Or we did, until we moved in with Nan. Nan is the best cook ever. She’s better than a restaurant.”

  He grinned. “I bet she is. I always loved her casseroles on Potluck Sundays at church.”

  “Is Nan bringing a casserole?” His dad shuffled into the kitchen, leaning heavily on his walker until he slid onto a chair.

  “No, I’m doing the cooking tonight.” Grayson watched as his father got settled. Quinn had taken a seat on a bar stool next to the counter.

  “I guess you won’t poison us,” Mathias grumbled, then he winked at his granddaughter. “What do you think? Should we go ahead and order from Tilly’s just in case?”

  “I think he can do it,” Quinn said, defending his cooking abilities. Then she flashed her dimples at her grandfather. “But I’ll keep an eye on him.”

  “You do that, short stuff. He needs supervising.”

  “I’ve been cooking for you for several weeks now,” Grayson reminded his father. “You seem to be surviving just fine.”

  Mathias waggled his shaggy gray eyebrows at his granddaughter. “I suppose he isn’t too bad.”

  Grayson had boiled eggs the previous day. He took them from the fridge and sat the bowl in front of his daughter. “This is your job. Peel the boiled eggs.”

  She set to work cracking eggs and peeling the shell off. Grayson rinsed and cut the eggs in half, scooping out the boiled yolks and putting them in a separate bowl.

  “What do we do after this?” Quinn asked.

  “Smash them, add mayo, a little mustard, salt, sugar and some secret ingredients.”

  “What’s the secret?” She watched as he cut more eggs in half.

  He leaned toward her. “You have to promise you won’t tell.”

  She crossed her heart. “I won’t.”

  “French dressing. Just a little.”

  “California,” Mathias grumbled. “That’s why he thinks he’s a cook. He can’t make us just a burger and fries.”

  “I’ll make fries,” Grayson promised.

  “I can help,” Quinn offered. She hopped off the bar stool and moved to his side where she watched him work on the deviled egg mixture. “Can I spoon that into the eggs?”

  Mathias chuckled, the sound taking Grayson by surprise. “You look like a skittish colt about to dart off. Where do you get all of that energy?” his dad asked.

  She smiled and leaned down to give her grandfather a hug. “You’re not so bad.”

  “You’re young yet. You’ll learn more as you get older.” Mathias gave her back an awkward pat.

  “Are you going to help?” Grayson asked his daughter.

  With a nod she moved to his side. “What do I do?”

  “A spoon of this in each egg.”

  She took the spoon, scooped up some of the yolk mixture, then lifted it up to her mouth as if she planned to take a bite. He gave her a warning look and she giggled as she filled the hole in the boiled egg half.

  The dog began to bark and Grayson could hear the low hum of an engine. He glanced out the kitchen window. It was Avery and Nan. They were early.

  “We have company,” he said.

  “It’s Mom and Nan.” Quinn scooped up another bit of filling. She handed him the spoon.

  Mathias shook his head as she ran out the door. “That one will keep you busy,” he said with a twinkle in his eye that took Grayson by surprise.

  “Yes, she will. I wish I had more time with her.”

  “Make the time,” his dad warned. “You can’t get those ten years back, and for that, I apologize. But you have the rest of your life to be her dad.”

  “From two thousand miles away.”

  “I guess that’s something you’re going to have to figure out,” Mathias said, craning his head to see if the women were on their way. Grayson did the same.

  Grayson agreed with his father but didn’t continue the conversation because it would mean admitting to his own fears. What if he let Avery and Quinn down? What if he couldn’t be the person they needed?

  His track record at being someone Avery could count on was pretty shaky.

  “I’ll be back,” he told his dad as he walked out the back door.

  Quinn was helping Avery and Nan haul a basket out of the backseat. Nan smiled at him as she wrapped an arm around Quinn, who was quickly explaining the process of making deviled eggs.

  “Grayson, for the life of me, I couldn’t remember your dad being here at the farm. When did he move back?”

  Grayson started at the question. Avery looked just as confused.

  “We’ve been here for a few weeks,” he responded.

  “Well, that’s part of getting older.” Nan brushed it off, waving her hand as if it was nothing. “I have to make lists and notes all the time, just to keep myself on track.”

  “Don’t feel bad,” Grayson told the older woman. “I have to set reminders on my phone. That’s how I keep myself on schedule.”

  “I’ll have to look into that.” Nan grabbed up her basket. “Come on, Quinn, let’s go inside. You can show me those deviled eggs you were making.”

  Quinn seemed about to argue but Nan gave her a look.

  “Okay, fine. And my grandfather is in there, too.” Quinn gave them a curious look but she went on to the house with Nan.

  “That wasn’t too obvious,” Avery said as she came round the front of her car with a smaller basket. “Nan insisted on making her green beans. I didn’t object. They are the best.”

  He remembered. They were cooked in bacon grease with a touch of mustard and brown sugar.

  “I won’t object, either. I’ve tried for years to replicate that recipe. It’s never the same as Nan’s.” He walked next to Avery. “I’m glad you came.”

  “I considered standing you up. Payback.”

  The look on her face wavered between teasing and hurt. He had stood her up? He tried to remember but it was a long time ago and those hadn’t been his best days. His memory had holes like Swiss cheese. That didn’t usually bother him, but this mattered. He had hurt Avery. He’d left her alone to have their child.

  Avery looked up at him, her eyes narrowing to green slits. She wasn’t angry, just confused. Then she sighed. “You don’t remember?”

  “I don’t.”

  “I used to think I was so unimportant that you couldn’t be bothered to pick up the phone and call. Now I see that I wasn’t even worth remembering.”

  He needed to tell her, but how? How did he explain his addictions, his past and where life ha
d taken him? He worried that opening up that can of worms would make her doubt his ability to be a father. Make her never be able to trust him or want him in Quinn’s life.

  “How about if I give you the short version?” she whispered, her gaze shifting to the back door. “Eleven years ago I had just graduated from high school and you’d finished your first year of college.”

  “I know that,” he said. He did remember the time they spent together. Driving back roads, going to the lake, picnics in secluded places.

  “Right, of course. You didn’t want people to see us together. But I was insistent. If we were going to go out again, you had to have dinner with me at Tilly’s. You had to let people see us together in public.” Pain ravaged her expression. Eleven years and she still felt hurt by him, by his actions.

  “I didn’t show.”

  “You didn’t show,” she confirmed.

  He brushed a hand through his hair, wishing he could take back that night and everything that had happened afterward. He hoped that going forward, he could make it up to her. She was the mother of his daughter. She deserved his very best.

  * * *

  “I’m sorry,” he said, and she heard it in his voice. He was sorry. That didn’t take away the pain.

  “Why didn’t you show up?” What had happened that would have made him forget?

  “Bad choices,” he admitted. “A lot of bad decisions, careless actions, and then my parents bought me a ticket west. They sent me to California.”

  He hadn’t stood her up. Not in the way she’d always imagined. She’d spent years picturing him sneaking out of town, ashamed of their relationship. The teen version of herself had been hurt by his imagined rejection.

  “I’m sorry for your bad choices,” she managed a smile. “But I spent several years hurt by your rejection.”

  “It wasn’t a rejection,” he assured her.

  She didn’t know how to feel now, with the truth between them. Most of the truth. She felt he was still hiding something but whatever it was, she told herself it didn’t matter. Or she hoped it didn’t. As long as he didn’t hurt Quinn.

  “Mom, are you coming in?” Quinn stood on the covered back porch. Hands on her hips, she eyed the two of them.

  “Yes, Quinn, we’re coming,” Avery assured her daughter. Then she looked back at Grayson. “We can talk more later.”

  “Yes, later.”

  Before long, Grayson was out in the backyard, cooking burgers on the grill. Nan sat next to the judge, the two talking about the old days of Pleasant and the Stone family home in town. The house had new owners two times over now and it didn’t look at all the way it did back when the Stones owned the place.

  Avery sat off by herself, watching as Grayson cooked the burgers all the while talking to their daughter. It was a scene that had never played out in their lives. The family, the parents, the laughter. They’d lived a solitary existence, she and Quinn, until coming to Pleasant.

  When the hamburgers were ready, they all moved inside. They all sat together in the small dining room of the old farmhouse. The table they ate at was scarred from years of use. The chairs were mismatched. It was not at all the picture of the Stone family that Avery had conjured as a young girl. In her dreams the Stones had eaten in a large dining room in the large brick house in Pleasant. Every meal had been served on china and their tea would have been served in crystal goblets.

  She’d often imagined what his parents said to him, and as a child the images had been filled with praise and laughter. As she’d gotten older and learned more about the judge and Mrs. Stone, she’d realized how far off course her imaginings had been. The Stones had acted like they were the perfect family but their home had been anything but happy.

  “I heard there are going to be storms in the next few days,” Mathias Stone said into the heavy silence that hung over them.

  “I’d heard that, too,” Nan spoke up. “Of course it’ll storm. I’ve been working on my garden. That never fails to bring a hard rain.”

  “Like washing a car,” Mathias said.

  “My art project won an award,” Quinn chimed in as she polished off her burger.

  “That’s amazing. Congratulations.” Grayson put an arm around Quinn’s shoulder and gave her a quick hug. The gesture warmed Avery’s heart. It was the way a father should treat his daughter. And having a father was important. Avery should know, because she’d never had one, not really. As much as she’d dreaded this moment, when Quinn would turn to Grayson, Avery knew how much it meant. She realized how much she’d kept her daughter from having what she’d always wanted for herself.

  “I always loved art. I use it a lot in my business, just not in the same way as I did in art classes,” Grayson told their daughter.

  “I can’t even draw stick figures,” Avery admitted. “So now we know where she got her artistic ability.”

  “Where do you work?” Quinn asked him. “I mean, I’m your daughter and I don’t even know what you do or where you live. That’s kind of weird.”

  “I work on buildings.” Grayson hadn’t thought about the empty spaces in their lives, in their relationship. She loved art and horses and he worked on buildings. They should know these things about each other.

  “Buildings?” Quinn prodded.

  “When I left Missouri, I had an opportunity to get my life on track. After I figured some things out, I went to work for my uncle in California. He was a Realtor but also a contractor, building homes and designing housing developments. I went to school and became an architect.”

  Mathias made a face. “Don’t let him fool you. He’s a big builder out there in California. Bought himself a ranch outside Monterey.”

  “A small acreage,” Grayson corrected.

  He’d gotten his life on track? What had happened to Grayson when he left Pleasant? Yes, he’d alluded to trouble but it seemed he’d left out some details. Avery glanced out the window, her thoughts wandering down lonely paths that made her question herself, question Grayson and even question what they were doing here together.

  Suddenly, out the window she noticed something moving. “There’s a llama in your yard,” she said.

  “Uh-oh, it’s Tony Llama!” Quinn scooted her chair back and hurried out the door.

  “Wait for us,” Grayson warned.

  “You can’t say those animals haven’t livened the place up,” Mathias cackled. “You can’t get rid of them now. My granddaughter likes them too much.”

  Nan started clearing the table. “You all go chase animals. Mathias and I will watch from the back porch. We’ll try to save you a piece of pie.”

  “I can help clean up,” Avery offered. It didn’t come easy, backing off and giving Grayson this time with their daughter. “I’m sure you and Quinn can get them all in just as easily without me.”

  “I don’t know,” Mathias spoke in his halting speech. “The llama doesn’t like men.”

  “That’s okay. I’m not too fond of him, either.” Grayson headed for the back door. “I think we can get them. If we’re not back soon, come check on us.”

  After she’d gathered up the plates, she found herself smiling as he stood with his hand on the door handle, about to go out. He’d shoved a white cowboy hat on his head and he was watching her, his cheeks dimpling. The plates wobbled and she tightened her hold on the stoneware and on her emotions.

  This would never do. Having feelings for Grayson had never gotten her anything but heartache.

  “Go,” she told him.

  “Right,” he said. “We’ll be back for pie.”

  Fifteen minutes later Quinn returned without Grayson. Nan had washed the dishes and Avery had dried and put them away as Mathias entertained them with stories from his life in the retirement community in Springfield.

  “Where’s your dad?” Mathias asked as he handed Quinn a package of cookies. “
You look like you might need these.”

  “We chased them,” she said, out of breath. “But we finally got them in.”

  “That’s good,” Nan said.

  “They’re all in but the llama has a cut on his side, from going through the fence. My dad is doctoring him. Or trying.”

  Avery got stuck on the word dad. It literally took her breath. Nan elbowed her, reminding her to breathe.

  “I’ll go help him,” Avery said. She didn’t know a thing about doctoring animals, but she did know that she needed a moment to come to grips with the reality that Quinn would, of course, call Grayson “Dad.”

  “I’ll go, too.” Quinn took a cookie from the package and started to follow.

  “Not so fast, kiddo.” Nan tossed her a towel. “You can help me finish up.”

  Avery walked out the back door and followed the worn path out to the barn. The basset hound trotted along next to her. She smiled as it suddenly hit her that this was Grayson’s life for the time being. His family farm with his father, a group of runaway animals and a slinky of a dog.

  “What are you smiling at?” Grayson asked as he came out of the barn, his hat tipped low, blocking the late-afternoon sun.

  “The dog, the llama and the miniature duo.”

  “Ah, I can see how that would be funny.” He took her hand and led her into the barn. “Tony doesn’t like to be doctored.”

  “It probably stings him,” she offered. “Does he need stitches?”

  “No, he’s fine. I sprayed it with some antibacterial medicine and turned him loose. I’ll doctor him again tomorrow, to make sure it doesn’t get infected. I guess Doc Lincoln is still around if it needs more than the spray.”

  “I came out to help, but I guess you don’t need any,” she said, suddenly embarrassed by her quick escape to the barn. To him.

  “Thank you.” He pushed the hat back and surveyed her with a steady look in his autumn-brown eyes. “We haven’t talked specifics, but I guess this is as good a time as any to discuss the fact that I want to be a part of Quinn’s life.”

  “I know you do.”

  He stood there silent for a moment. Then asked, “What if I mess up?”

  She found the question puzzling. “I’m not sure how you would mess up. I mean, as parents, one thing I can guarantee you is, you will always mess up. I’ve obviously messed up.”