Page 44 of What Remains of Grace

“Headed to the beach again?” Jenna asked the second time she rushed in.

“Movie night at Casey’s. Might hit the pier after.”

“Which pier?”

“The one with food,” Emmie said with a grin.

Jenna rolled her eyes. “Okay, be smart.”

“Always,” Emmie lied, leaning down to kiss her cheek before dashing back out.

The door slammed behind her in that exuberant, teenage way, and the house settled into a calmer version of itself. Jenna stood there for a moment, her cheek still warm from Emmie’s quick kiss. Grace used to say that raising a teenager was half instincts and half improvisation, and Jenna felt both in equal measure. Every small victory, a laugh, a plan, a night out with friends, it all felt like a thread tying the girl back to the world.

Cole watched from the porch as she left, hand braced against the post. “She’s doing better,” he said quietly.

“Yeah, she is.”

“You too,” he said. Jenna froze, but he just nodded toward the bakery behind her. “The work’s paying off.”

She smiled too tightly. “Right. The work.”

Cole wiped his hands on his jeans, glancing toward the roof tarp as thunder rolled somewhere in the distance. “We’ll need to keep an eye on that if it rains tonight. I’ll swing by later to check it.”

“You don’t have to,” she said quickly. “You’ve already done enough for one day.”

He shook his head. “Doesn’t take long. Besides, I’d rather make sure it holds than have you worry about it.”

Her chest warmed despite herself. “That’s thoughtful of you.”

“Part of the job,” he said with a small shrug. “You’re easy to work with. Makes it simple.”

She laughed softly. “You too.” He gave a soft grin like they were both in on a secret before she added, “Drive safe.”

He tipped his cap. “Always do.”

She watched him go, her smile holding longer than it should have.

And when his taillights finally disappeared, she realized she’d spent the whole day waiting, hoping, for even a sliver of the compliment he’d given her yesterday. But it never came.

* * *

Maybe she’d imagined everything. Maybe he was just being polite. Maybe he smiled like that at everyone.

It didn’t matter. Cole was her contractor, not a Tinder date. He had a crew to run and a reputation to protect. And she, God help her, was too old to be standing in a window like a teenager, waiting for him to look back.

Inside the house, she brushed her teeth, lingered in Grace’s doorway a moment longer than she meant to, and sat on the edge of the bed until the stillness wrapped around her.

He doesn’t like you, she told herself. He’s just kind.

Biscuit jumped up beside her, curling tight against her hip. “Yeah,” she whispered, staring at the ceiling. “That’s worse.”

She must’ve dozed off, because the next thing she heard was a sound outside, a low, clattering thud that didn’t belong to the house. Rain lashed against the windows, steady and hard, the storm that had been threatening all day finally breaking loose.

Jenna sat up, listening. Another thud. A metallic scrape. Then a voice, low and familiar, barely audible under the rain.

She moved to the window and looked out through the blur of water on the glass. Cole was out there, on the roof, soaked, wrestling with the tarp. His T-shirt clung to his back, plastered to his skin, water streaming down his arms as he knelt to secure the edge against the wind. Lightning flared in the distance, painting him in white for half a heartbeat.

For a second, she couldn’t move. He’d driven here. In the middle of the night. In the rain. To fix a tarp.