imagination went a step further as she pictured herself doing just that.
The computer screen glowed in front of her unfocused eyes as she was jolted back to reality by the loud bell that signaled the end of the period. Looking back at the blank screen, the cursor blinked tauntingly at her. She let out the breath she didn’t know she’d been holding, then grabbed her things and headed for her locker. It wasn’t a shocker to find Zeke outside the classroom, waiting for her to come out.
“Hey,” he said, as she walked up to him.
Grace avoided his eyes as she spun the combination on her locker and released a small, exasperated breath. “Hey, yourself.”
He hitched his backpack over one shoulder and leaned his other arm against the bank of lockers as he looked down at her. “Are you sure nothing is wrong?”
She nodded. “Yeah.” She shook her head. “No.” Her final answer was a very breathy “I don’t know,” accompanied by an exaggerated shrug of the shoulders.
Zeke cocked an eyebrow. “Oh.”
Grace laughed, knowing he was completely stumped in that male kind of way, not exactly sure how to respond. “I’m fine, really. I just have a stupid meeting at two that I really don’t want to go to, and I didn’t get jack done in class.”
“Well,” he said, folding his arms across his chest. “I reckon you picked the perfect class to be a slacker in then.” His grin went slightly sideways.
“You reckon? Did you seriously just say that?” she asked, arm still in the locker as she looked up at him.
Zeke laughed. “Yeah, I guess I did.”
Grace laughed too. “For the record, I’m not a slacker. I told you, I have a lot on my mind. I have a mee—”
“—meeting,” Zeke finished for her, as Grace cocked her head at him. “I’m sorry you’re having a bad day that doesn’t look like it’s going to get any better for you until after your meeting. Look, if you’re feeling up to it later, give me a call and we can go grab a coffee or something.” He handed her a slip of paper.
“Yeah, sure.” Grace glanced at the scrap to see his cell number written on it, then slipped it into her jeans pocket.
“I’ll talk to ya later. I have to get to class. You going to be alright?”
She smiled. “Yeah, I think I’m just going to go home. If I don’t talk to you later, I’ll see you in class.”
After school, Grace parked on the street under the fringe tree and walked up her driveway, peeking in the garage window to see if her mother’s car was inside. Not surprisingly, relief washed over her when she saw it wasn’t there.
Inside, she dropped her backpack against the corner in the foyer and sauntered to her room. It was still two and a half hours until she needed to leave for the attorney’s office.
Grace flopped on her bed, covering her head with the blanket. The anxiety she was feeling was becoming overwhelming. The dread of loneliness crept back over her as she thought about being crammed in a room with a bunch of people who couldn’t give a rat’s behind about her. Her family hated her, and her mother was…well, not very motherly.
The whole thing was rather depressing. Her tears couldn’t agree more, they slowly trickled down each cheek. It had been twenty-four hours since her last cry, the longest she’d gone since her grandfather died. Grace pulled the covers over her head a little more, and pushed her face harder against her pillow. She let her tears flow freely, not worrying herself with tear-induced snot. Instead, she focused on sleeping. If she could just go to sleep, she could forget about how much her life sucked for just a little while.
Quentin struggled to relax, which was nearly impossible with Grace’s angst coursing through his veins. He lowered the binoculars from his eyes and put the front two legs of the wooden chair back on the ground, stepping away from the window. The second-story one-bedroom apartment across from the bank was the perfect location for a minor stakeout. Cameras were housed all around the bank and up and down the street, providing the extra security needed until Grace made it there.
Walking to the bedroom, he pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and checked the time. It was eleven o’clock, just three hours until Grace’s meeting at the estate attorney’s office. The low hum from the network of computers could