Total pages in book: 116
Estimated words: 112249 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 561(@200wpm)___ 449(@250wpm)___ 374(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 112249 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 561(@200wpm)___ 449(@250wpm)___ 374(@300wpm)
She produced the item she’d been keeping behind her back to confirm Gracen’s suspicions—a bottle of red wine.
“Nothing better than poutine and wine on Sundays,” Margot said, grinning wide.
Mouth already watering, Gracen reached for the bag, asking, “From the dairy bar?”
“They’re the only place in town that uses shredded cheese, so ...”
Right.
And Margot hated curds.
The chewiness was an acquired taste. Gracen preferred the curds, to be honest, but it was her friend’s Sunday to buy, so she chose. It didn’t really matter. At the end of the day, the cheesy, gravy-soaked fries all went down the same way.
Especially with red wine.
“Are we waiting for Delaney?” Margot asked, falling into the matching sunchair across from Gracen’s.
She didn’t answer right away, instead focusing on pulling the larger of the two poutines out of the bag on her lap—two handy packages with salt and pepper, utensils, and a napkin on the small deck waited on top for her to grab first. Usually, she’d split the poutine with Delaney, but she made the unfortunate mistake of forgetting a detail when Margot called earlier to say she was picking up the wine and food.
“Uh,” Gracen started, dumbly. Frankly, she didn’t know how to say what she needed to without adding some attitude on top of it all, so she didn’t even try to hide it. “Well, she’s with her family tonight, anyway.”
Margot didn’t miss it. “What—Jesus, are you two still fighting about her cousin?”
“It’s not about her cousin,” Gracen corrected.
“Sonny getting married, then?”
That made Gracen cringe. “I don’t care if he’s getting married.”
Not really.
Or she was pretty sure ...
After thinking about it for a couple of days.
Margot chirped a laugh, and slapped her bare thighs below her jean shorts before asking, “So, what is the problem? I’m lost, and considering two days ago you told me there wasn’t any problem, maybe you could see how I would like to be filled in.”
The wooden railing was the only thing to keep someone from walking right out from the door off the roof. It didn’t permit more than the chairs and a small table between them for decorating room, but Gracen still loved it.
It could have been because the deck was only accessed from Gracen’s bedroom. In a way, it felt like her private space in—well, outside, technically—the house. Whereas Delaney’s bedroom had the windows facing the river, something she liked more than rooftop relaxation.
“Well?” Margot asked, reminding Gracen that she wasn’t ready to move on from the conversation. Unfortunately.
Gracen fiddled with the utensil package as she explained, “I’m only a little mad that Delaney didn’t tell me she had agreed to do something for her cousin—not because of the Sonny situation, but because of how her family has treated her for the last five years.”
Margot nodded. “That’s fair.”
“It just so happened that Sonny is involved, and considering the last time I spoke to him was when he ended everything ...” And couldn’t even give me the respect of telling me why while he did it, she added inside her head as it sounded too pathetic to be said out loud. Gracen shrugged. “I feel like I’m, justified in also having unresolved shit to deal with there.”
Delaney’s family and Gracen’s situation with her feelings toward her ex could be two separate things that existed outside of one another, but also intertwined because circumstance made it so. Gracen wasn’t in control of what the universe dropped in her lap. Wasn’t that her whole entire life in a fucking nutshell, anyway?
It seemed like the universe had been having a good laugh at her expense since forever. Starting with the untimely death of her parents. Thank God her paternal grandmother had been there to support the broken girl who came out of that experience—the best and only way she knew how until she couldn’t, anyhow.
“But that has nothing to do with the Delaney thing?” Margot asked, putting their conversation back on track.
Like a hound after a bone, Margot clearly had questions she intended to get answered. That’s how Gracen knew Margot was probably still considering her place at the Haus in relation to her bosses’ current issues.
What could she say?
Sometimes, friends fought.
It wasn’t that deep.
Or ... it shouldn’t be.
Gracen shrugged. “That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.”
“But she—”
“Might have a different opinion,” Gracen muttered, interjecting the final truth about the whole Delaney situation before Margot could muse on it further. She might as well get things set straight, and deal with what it all meant. “It’s fine, we’ll figure it out. The last time we had a spat like this, it lasted a month before we could stand to sit together in a room without yelling.”
This wasn’t new. No, they’d simply gotten better about it.
Over the years ...
Gracen didn’t bother to mention that, though.
“Well, if it helps,” Margot said, suddenly more interested in studying her cuticles than taking the bag with her food that Gracen tried to hand over.