Another ten minutes passed. Their own pizza came. They devoured it, and still she didn’t appear.
He checked the hall once again. Nothing.
“Why are you so preoccupied?” Buzz asked.
“I’m not,” he said, but he’d been thinking about the topless woman he’d seen in the window earlier. Now he knew who it was. Grace. She had to be staying at Evonne’s place. There couldn’t be two women with a body like that.
But why was she renting a house when she had a mother, a brother and a stepsister in town who each had plenty of extra room? What was it with that family?
They polished off another pitcher of beer—no sign of Grace. “Where is she?” he asked Buzz.
“Who?” Tim responded, overhearing.
“Never mind,” Kennedy grumbled.
“Looks like Grinding Gracie’s left her pizza for us,” Ronnie said. “You guys think I should take a piece? Wouldn’t that be funny, to have her come out and see her pizza half gone?”
“Do it,” Joe urged.
Ronnie’s chair raked the carpet as he stood, but Kennedy caught him by the arm. “Sit down.”
“Come on, Kennedy, it’s just a joke.”
“Forget it. You know she had a rough childhood. Give her a break, okay?”
Joe arched an eyebrow at him. “I never knew you had a thing for Grinding Gracie. The way I remember it, you wouldn’t touch her with a ten-foot pole.” He lifted his nose. “You were an Archer.”
“I was with Raelynn,” he said evenly.
“Yeah, he had a girlfriend,” Buzz added.
“So did I,” Joe replied with a careless laugh. “Grinding Gracie didn’t interfere with that. It wasn’t as if I’d ever like her or anything.”
Kennedy had known these guys since grade school, but sometimes they got on his nerves. Especially Joe, who in situations like this seemed to bring out the worst in everyone. If not for what Joe had done for him when they were only twelve years old, Kennedy doubted they’d even be friends. “I don’t want to hear it.”
At the irritation in Kennedy’s voice, they stared at him for several seconds. A few muttered about the pressure he was under. But after a while, the tension eased and they started talking about the Jaguars and what kind of football season they could expect.
Kennedy listened until he couldn’t stand wondering about Grace anymore. Then, with a silent curse, he got up and went to the woman’s restroom. “Grace?” he said, knocking on the door. “You okay in there?”
No reply. Just the sound of the fan whirring inside.
“Grace? If you don’t answer, I’ll have to come in.”
Still nothing.
He began to enter—and caught a brief glimpse of her staggering to her feet. But then she hit the other side of the door and held it closed with the weight of her body.
“I—I’m…fine,” she said. But her words were broken as though she had to gulp for the air to speak.
Judging by the unusually pale face and saucerlike eyes he’d seen in the mirror, he knew she couldn’t be fine. She was sick. He could smell it.
“Do you need a ride home?” he asked.
There was no response, but she was leaning against the door, and he didn’t want to force it open.
“I could give you a lift right now.”
“No, you…you go on back to your friends. They’re pretty funny…I—I wouldn’t want you to miss anything.”
Shit. She’d heard them, just as he feared. He tried to open the door again, but it wouldn’t budge. “The guys—they can be idiots sometimes, you know? I often wonder if they’ll ever grow up. Forget about them, okay? They don’t mean half the things that come out of their mouths.”
The sound of fabric brushing against the wood led him to believe she’d just slid to the floor.
“Grace?”
“Leave me alone.” Her voice was more strident now, but it came from much lower, confirming his suspicion that she was on the floor. “I—I’m not one of your many admirers, so…do us both a favor and go.”
Go. With a sigh, Kennedy told himself to do just that. But he couldn’t; the words he’d heard his friends say, and how deeply he suspected they’d hurt her, wouldn’t let him. He paced the short hall several times. Then he realized that Joe and the others were still waiting to see what would happen, and decided to take Grace out of the spotlight by returning to the table.
“You get anything good?” Joe asked and everyone laughed.
“He’d be smilin’ if that was the case,” Tim said.
Kennedy scowled. “You guys can be real ass**les, you know that?”
Hunching over the sink, Grace dabbed a wet paper towel to her forehead. She needed to gather the strength to walk out of the pizza parlor. But she was hoping Kennedy and his friends would leave first. She’d face them all later, when she was better prepared.
Breathe deeply. In and out. In and out. She’d be okay. She’d survived a lot worse than this. It was just the surprise, the throwback to old times that bothered her.
Forget them. You don’t need them. You never did….
The voice of a little boy heading into the opposite restroom rose in the hallway, and she decided to make her move. The approach of the dinner hour meant there were probably a lot more people in the restaurant. Even if Kennedy Archer and his friends were still around, maybe she could slip by without being noticed. Even if they saw her, she didn’t care. The initial shock was over. What more could they do?
She splashed some water on her face and patted it dry, then marched into the dining area. Beer mugs, paper plates and silver pizza pans littered the table where Kennedy and his friends had eaten, but the seats were empty.
Allowing herself a small sigh of relief, Grace ignored the food that had grown cold at her own table and went swiftly outside. She dug through her purse for her keys while she walked, telling herself she’d be back at Evonne’s in a matter of minutes. But the moment she glanced up, she saw that Kennedy Archer wasn’t gone, after all. He was leaning against the front bumper of a Ford Explorer that was parked next to her Beemer.
It looked as if he was waiting for someone. She hoped it wasn’t her.
For a few seconds, her footsteps faltered. She’d have to walk around him to get in. But she wasn’t about to let the sight of him stop her. She wouldn’t let him or his friends hurt her ever again, she thought, and picked up speed.