Grace Anne - By Kathi S. Barton Page 0,62

pieces, and spread them all over the front lawn. But she couldn’t, not yet. The plan had to be followed or it would be bad for them all. But getting into the gated area was where they’d fallen short on ideas. Then she’d happened upon a solution by trying to hire a limo to take her to the house.

She’d found the driver at the Ride in Style limo service. In fact, she’d met him once or twice before when some event had the family using the same service for events. She’d tried to remember his name when she’d walked up to him earlier and had it not been for his name badge, she wouldn’t have had a clue. But Bob had been very happy to see her and more than happy to give her a ride to the “big house” when her own car had broken down.

“Can’t have the boss’s mom walking back to the ‘big house’ now, can we? You just hop your little self inside of that cool ride and I’ll take you to the front door.” She wanted to throw up at his flirty ways, but simply smiled and got into the front. They were on their way when he told her he was to pick up Grace and take her to the airport to get her man. “They seem like a nice couple. Took them both to the house with his little boy when they landed yesterday. Real polite kid. Didn’t get stuff all over the seats like some of those rich people’s brats do when they ride. Nope, sat there talking to his daddy and Miss Grace like a real good boy.”

Like she cared, but nodded all the same. Verrie hated kids. They were messy, loud, and couldn’t have a single function that she could think of that made them worth nine months of being a cow and then years of putting up with their shit. Then to have them turn on you…well, that shit was going to be laid to rest right now. They were pulling off the main road when she thought of how much fun she was going to have.

~~~

Grace was exhausted. After talking with her family for over three hours and then the tense fight she’d had with Trace she just wanted to close her eyes and sleep for several days. The frantic call from her employees made her grind her teeth. The nerve of the man moving her offices into his building and not telling her. They were going to have a nice long…conversation when he got back.

Margo had called to say that her office wasn’t set up and the redecorators weren’t listening to her. They were hanging the pictures in the wrong order and the mural she’d made wasn’t among the things they’d packed up.

“What decorator and what office? Take a deep breath and tell me what’s going on.” Grace had closed the door to Cain’s office to speak to her in private. “What do you mean my mural isn’t among the packed things? Who is packing things and why?”

“Michael came by with some guy the other day. He said that we were moving to another building and he said you knew.”

She knew she was moving, but thought it was to a storage shed, not to some place that had an office.

“The place is awesome, by the way. We even have off street parking and there’s a cafeteria on the second floor that—”

“Focus, Margo. What is going on? Why are our things being put away in a building?” Grace’s head hurt even after an hour of talking to her. “Tell me where we’re moved to.”

An hour later, she still didn’t have a clue where her mural was because Margo had gone back to the warehouse to look for it. It had been sandblasted off the walls, she’d said. As was, she went on to tell her, most of the floors on the main level. The men had gotten to work on the building the moment the last piece of her business had been moved out.

Grace pulled out the sheet of paper of things she was going to talk to Michael about and the first was doing things without her being aware of them. She might have had some say in the move if for no other reason than to tell him she appreciated it. The limo driving over a particularly hard bump had her bumping her head on the window she was next to. Grace looked out the window