Page 83 of What Remains of Grace

She drove home, showered, and put on a dress that didn’t look like anything special. She pulled her hair back. She put on the face of a woman ready to impress an inspector.

She hoped no one could see the tremor under it.

* * *

Cole woke slowly, chasing the warmth still lingering on the sheets. His hand drifted across the mattress, instinctively searching for her. When it hit nothing but cool fabric, his eyes snapped open.

She was gone.

His stomach dropped, sharp and instinctive, with the kind of hurt he wasn’t prepared to admit out loud. He pushed up on his elbows, scanning the room: her shoes are gone, her blouse missing, and the delicate chaos of last night erased, except for the ill-defined imprint of her head on the pillow beside his.

He scrubbed a hand over his face, trying to piece together the night.

He didn’t even know why he’d asked her to the bar in the first place. It had tumbled out of him before he’d had time to think. Maybe because it had felt like his last chance, his last evening with her, where the job still gave him an excuse to be near. His last shot before the bakery belonged to her, and his place in her orbit disappeared.

And he sure as hell didn’t know why he’d asked her to dance. Or why he’d asked her to come home with him. He hadn’t walked into the night planning any of it. But every time he’d looked at her, laughing, leaning in, letting her guard down a little more, it had felt like that night was the only moment he’d ever get to cross the line he’d been tiptoeing for months.

It all felt inevitable. Right. Necessary.

He just hadn’t expected to wake up alone.

But maybe, maybe it didn’t mean what his gut was screaming it meant. Maybe she’d woken early to get ready for the inspector. Maybe she didn’t want to wake him. Maybe she thought slipping out quietly was the polite thing to do.

He swallowed hard.

Maybe she hadn’t run.

Maybe she’d just . . . left.

There was a difference, and he prayed like hell she hadn’t erased it.

He lay there, staring at the ceiling, while his brain tried to assemble all the pieces of last night in order.

He kept replaying the way she’d kissed him at the door, like she’d finally stopped fighting something.

Cole hadn’t imagined that part. Hadn’t imagined the way she’d held onto him, or the way she’d looked at him afterward, almost startled, like she couldn’t believe she’d crossed the line either.

He couldn’t stop thinking about the trust of it.

The way she’d wrapped herself around him without hesitation. The way she’d let him carry her like she already knew he would.

Her hands had been everywhere, his shoulders, his chest, the back of his neck, like she was discovering him and steadying herself at once. Each touch had wrecked him a little more.

He remembered forcing himself to slow down, wanting to savor every second of her choosing him back. The sound of her voice. The feel of her holding onto him. The look she’d given him just before they fell into bed, something soft and open and almost wondering, like she hadn’t expected this any more than he had.

It had been better than he’d let himself imagine.

Which made the empty space beside him feel all the more brutal.

Sometime between the last kiss and the first grey light of morning, she’d gotten up, dressed, and walked out without waking him.

He didn’t know what, exactly, he’d expected. Some sleepy kiss goodbye. A whispered, “I’ll see you at the bakery.” At the very least, a note on the nightstand.

His body still remembered the shape of her against him, the fit, the heat, the way she’d held on like she’d meant to stay.

His phone buzzed on the floor where it had slid off the bed. He reached down and grabbed it.

A calendar reminder flashed up: The Blue Cypress Inspection—10:00 a.m.