Grace's Redemption, page 1
GRACE’S REDEMPTION
Savvi V
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Be a Vixen
To the guardians among us.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Epilogue
Books by Savvi V
Copyright Page
CHAPTER ONE
Grace
Water slammed into my face with the force of a million tiny bullets. Or maybe pellets. Made of sand. And hatred.
I groaned and raised my hands against the pelting, making noises I didn’t recognize as I tried to buffer some of the onslaught, but the movement was too quick. I had to grab the handicap railing on the shower door to slow the motion in the room.
What did I do?
Nausea rolled through my entire body, if that were possible. Even my toes felt ready to vomit at any moment—my pretty silver-glittered toes that I’d actually paid someone to paint yesterday.
Yesterday.
Yesterday, I’d woken up at home in my boring bed, at my boring house in the Louisiana swamp, and got on a plane headed for insanity, just to make my friend happier on the happiest day of her life. I didn’t even make the bachelorette party because I didn’t want to get stupid.
Irony was kicking my ass because today—was it even today, yet?—today, I woke myself by falling off a couch in my hotel room, then crawling naked to the bathroom to vomit.
Naked crawling.
Classy.
I tasted the sourness as it started to rise in the back of my throat, and my hands started to shake.
Take slow, deep breaths.
Mama’s voice played in my head with her ever-ready trick to battle her own nervous stomach when life became too much. Life for her had frequently been too much—too much of the time.
Count them, girls, she’d tell me and my sisters.
One . . .
Two . . .
You’re the oldest, Grace. Keep a good face—
“Damn it,” I groaned as the water slid down my clammy skin, making me shiver in spite of the steam. “What was I thinking?”
I swallowed hard, trying to convince everything in my body to keep going that direction.
Evidently, I thought I could drink like normal people and still reside among the living. Not that the amount I’d knocked back last night after the wedding was normal . . . and that living concept was still debatable. This sure felt a hell of a lot like death.
The world around me went a weird putrid-green color, and I blinked upward with gritty eyes into the wicked water cannon. “Am I dying?” I whispered.
Nothing answered back, but the color changed again, morphing into a bluish purple. It was like a friggin’ LSD trip. Or so I’d heard.
I hadn’t used the fancy hotel room shower before the wedding. I’d just traded out my glasses for contacts, changed clothes, and freshened up from the flight, trying not to look too closely at the uninteresting woman in the gilded mirror, and left. But I didn’t remember seeing stage lights in here—or all the mysterious shiny buttons next to the temperature lever.
God, this place. Vegas was just weird.
Dixie was lucky that I couldn’t say no to her, because nothing but her giddy begging and paying my way to her crazy destination wedding in Las Vegas could drag me out of the armpit of Louisiana to act like someone I wasn’t and drink till . . . until what? I didn’t even know. Everything I remembered from last night was just gray and loud and smelled like crotch rot.
Which was what my mouth tasted like at the moment—sour, rancid swamp water, steeped in shit and sweat. My stomach muscles clenched at that particular thought and I heaved, my throat burning with nothing but acid.
Coughing and gagging on the hideous nothingness, I let the hot tears mix with the water and took in a few shaky breaths to slow my heart rate.
I had no business being in this crazy place, acting a fool like I was afraid I might have, drinking more liquor than I’d ever—well, I’d never really drank that much. My sisters were better at that than I was. Faith and Hope could both tie one on when they chose to, but I knew the poison that ran in the McMasters genes. I knew better than to play with that particular fire.
But muscles I hadn’t felt in some time screamed at me, telling me I’d done—something.
What did I do?
This wasn’t me. That was painfully clear. My body might clock in at almost thirty, but my throbbing brain was an old woman. I taught twenty-two preschool children every day, trying to show them how to be good people. My pantry was organized by food groups, and my car had a bin in the trunk containing jumper cables and Fix-a-Flat. My dark hair stayed twisted up in a clip most of the time. I wore sensible shoes.
Last night, I hadn’t. I’d had to wear slinky heels with a low-cut dress for Dixie’s “after-five” wedding soiree. A dress that my chest hadn’t known what the hell to do with. My ankles had wobbled. My boobs had wobbled. I’d laughed about that—the boob wobbling—with someone, I vaguely recalled. Someone dangerously cute with hazel eyes and a sexy smile. Who had smelled delicious.
Oh, yeah, right. Because that guy would totally have given me the time of day.
My head squeezed again when I tried to lean over and wash my hair, sending a new wave of cold and nasty coursing through me. I pressed my palms against the cold tiles.
“Hello?” called a groggy male voice, echoing from friggin’ nowhere—and everywhere.
Even my alcohol-soaked brain cells knew that was wrong.
I yelped and froze, his voice slicing through the fiery blaze in my head, sending fresh blood pounding as my heart triple-timed it. To my left, a large, decidedly male-shaped figure darkened the other side of the frosted glass.
What the hell?
I whirled around in search of a towel and nearly hurled with the effort.
“Who’s there?” I croaked, swiping wet hair from my eyes. The words were barely past my lips, however, when the heavy door swung open. “Shit!” I screamed, covering as best I could with splayed fingers.
I saw low-slung sweatpants step back at my scream, a large hand coming out as if to block the noise.
“What are you doing?” I yelled. “Get out of my room before I call the—”
“You mean my room?” the man growled irritably. “Jesus, take it down a notch, will you? My head is self-destructing.”
His image swam a little, but blinking fast brought him into better focus—enough to take in the high points. Broad chest. Scruffy face. Sort of darkish sandy hair sticking up everywhere. An expanse of sun-kissed skin that suddenly made me feel very pale and anemic. Hooded eyes that were glaring at me, but . . .
Holy shit, he was the “cute” from last night. My mouth opened, but all I could do was squeak.
He scrubbed at his face as he averted his eyes. “Sorry. I guess I didn’t expect you to still be here.” He turned to lower the toilet lid and nearly fell as he sat down on it with a groan and leaned over on his knees, his face crumpled with a mix of discomfort and confusion. “Didn’t mean to freak you out. Take your time.”
I stood, unmoving, as the water continued to assault me. One arm over my boobs, and the other hand splayed south, while the shock still resonated. His room? Where the hell was mine? And he didn’t expect me to be there?
I sighed. Didn’t that just sum up my life. Still, that implied that he had some memory of the night.
“Towel,” I managed, flailing at the levers quickly to turn off the water.
He reached blindly to his left, grabbing one and tossing it to me. I wrapped it around myself and tucked in the corner, thankful it was oversized and covered everything. My mind raced, trying to organize all the pieces flailing around in there. This guy didn’t appear to be dangerous. He also didn’t seem shocked or puzzled over my presence, at least not as badly as I was. And he was freaking gorgeous. Like professionally so.
Oh, my God. Had I paid for an escort?
“What did I do?” I whispered.
Stepping onto the fluffy rug outside the shower, I felt more of my muscles complain. Important ones. Southern ones. Shit.
“Did we, um—?” I began, grabbing another towel to wrap my hair.
He frowned and gestured to the shower door. “Were you done?”
“No, but I’m over it,” I said, looking around for anything that might be mine. “Be my guest.” I shut my eyes. “Or whatever.”
Turning, I stumbled straight into him, not realizing he’d arisen from his throne, and he caught me by the upper arms. As I gasped and glanced upwards, I flashed on a two-second memory. Against a wall. My legs wrapped around his waist. His hands on my ass and mine in his hair as he growled against my skin and—
I gasped as heat shot to all things south, and those amazing eyes of his met mine.
“We did, didn’t we?” I said resignedly.
Thick eyebrows raised as his gaze dropped to my mouth. “You don’t remember?”
I closed
“Damn, your eyes are bloodshot.”
I gave a pained smile. “Awesome. Slept in my contacts, so . . .”
“Ah,” he said, the hint of a smile pulling at full lips, even though his expression still looked nearly as worn out as mine. “All starting to make sense, preacher’s daughter.”
He let go of me and turned to find an unused towel, but I just went stiff. My feet rooted right there on the bathroom marble, my skin going clammy for a whole different reason.
“What did you just call me?”
He glanced over his shoulder and casually dropped his sweatpants as he stepped inside the shower and closed the door behind him. I tried not to see the glorious ass that he took with him, but—
Bigger problems, Grace.
“Preacher’s daughter?” he repeated from behind the glass.
My eyes flickered to my reflection in the nearby vanity mirror and I cringed. Not just because of the black rings of mascara around my glowing red eyes, but from the description I chose to forsake every day while existing in the same town I’d grown up in and earned that godforsaken moniker.
“How do you know that?” I asked, gripping the counter.
“Well, you told me every ten minutes for the better part of five hours, so I guess it stuck,” he said. “Clearly important to you. I tried to call you New Orleans Lady with that accent, but you weren’t having it. And I’m embarrassed to say,” he said, pausing. “I can’t remember your real na—”
His words stopped abruptly at the same time I glanced down. At where my left hand grasped the counter. At something that didn’t belong. That didn’t make sense.
“What the fuck!”
That was him, not me.
But I knew why.
The shower door swung open as he bolted out, buck naked, dripping from head to toe and not caring one bit. Reaching for my left hand as I spun around, he held it up, wild-eyed, shoving it closer to my face. Matching silver rings adorned important fingers.
Goosebumps peppered my skin as I looked at our hands in horror, and then at his similar expression.
Keep a good face.
“What. The. Fuck?”
CHAPTER TWO
Mateo
I stared at the dark-haired, gorgeous hot mess of a woman in front of me, who was staring right back at me in sheer, unadulterated panic.
What. The fuck. Had. We. Done?
I dropped her hand as if it burned and stormed out of the bathroom. Disgust rolled through me. Not disgust with her. Hell, I didn’t even know her name.
“Jesus.” I raked a hand through my wet hair as I yanked on a pair of clean shorts.
She cleared her throat from the doorway, and I glanced back at—my wife?
I groaned and dropped my head back to stare at the ceiling, praying for something, anything, from last night to come back to me, to explain why in the hell we had on matching rings.
Maybe it was a joke.
Yes. That had to be it. We were shit-faced. Found these—I looked again—cheap-ass rings, thought they were fun for some fucked-up reason in our drunken state, proceeded to come back to my room and fuck like rabbits, fell asleep, the end.
I opened my mouth to suggest that, but something in her dark-chocolate gaze stopped me cold. There was a haunted and vulnerable quality about her, even now, even hungover and confused as shit. Something I’m fairly certain I would’ve seen a million miles away last night, drunk or not. I never would have taken advantage of that and played games with her emotions by putting fake rings on. Especially not that. Not when I had a life to protect, my own beliefs I’d never betray. Not when I had Olivia waiting for me at home.
“Can I ask your name?” she finally asked in that thick Cajun lilt of hers that I knew had been the beginning of my undoing last night. I was a sucker for an accent. She secured the towel tighter around her chest as if to protect herself. “I don’t remember yours either.”
“That’s fair,” I said sardonically, then tried to lighten my voice. “Mateo.” I lifted a brow. “Yours?”
Her cheeks flushed, and I watched her swallow, but she held herself up remarkably straight. “Grace.”
“Perfect. Now that we have that out of the way, do you want to get dressed?” I flicked my gaze toward the tiny strip of fabric that had passed for her dress last night, wadded on the ground near the window.
She bit her lip, apparently trying to decide if she should run.
“I’ll order us up some breakfast while you do that, then we can talk,” I said, trying to downplay the weirdness.
I didn’t know if that was possible. This situation was definitely fucking weird, and I wasn’t even letting my brain tick off all the potential problems yet.
She turned a little green at the mention of food.
“Coffee? Tea?” I suggested.
She finally relented with a little nod, bent and picked up her dress, then locked herself in the bathroom.
I ordered us some coffee, scrambled eggs, toast, and Tylenol from room service, then pulled on a t-shirt. I glanced at the door. She was still in the bathroom and it was silent. I wondered what she was doing in there. Hopefully I hadn’t ended up attached to some crazy woman . . .
Wait.
Was I attached to her?
We seriously needed to hash that out first.
I grabbed my cell phone to shoot off a text to check on things at home, only to find my screensaver had been changed to a photo of me and Grace grinning like idiots in front of the Graceland Chapel. Our left hands were proudly displayed for the selfie.
Fuck. Clue number one.
And one that made my stomach burn as bittersweet memories of another wedding day—one I could remember all too well—came crashing back, making me feel like the worst kind of fraud. I swallowed, batting back the hot ball of emotion as it climbed from my chest to my throat, and yanked the offending ring off my finger to shove it in my front pocket.
I turned back to my phone, hesitating for only a second before clicking on the camera roll.
“Damn it.”
More photographic evidence ensued of our night of debauchery. Some were innocent enough—smiling selfies, some I’d apparently caught of her grinning sleepily at me, one of her pointing to the cheap silver rings in a case at some little souvenir shop. A couple of pictures that were too blurry to make out. One of her boobs in a lacy bra . . . at least I assumed they were her boobs. Definitely nice. One of us kissing. More of us drinking.
You’d think we were happy and in love, not that we’d just met and couldn’t even remember each other’s names.
I glanced down at the pile of my discarded clothes on the ground. Her sexy black stilettos poked out from underneath my jeans, folded-up papers stuck out of my back pocket . . .
Hold up.
I snagged the papers and unfolded them, my mind not wanting to believe what was in black and white before my eyes. My heart climbed up to my throat. There was no denying it. The proof was in my hand.
The bathroom door swished open behind me.
“Are you from California?” she asked softly, her voice uncertain like maybe she’d dreamed it up.
I spun to face her, the papers still clutched in my hand. “Used to be. I’ve lived just south of Vegas in Green Valley since—” I stopped myself. This stranger didn’t need to know the sad details of my life. “For the last two years,” I finished.
She nodded, and I studied her face, wiped clean of last night’s makeup. She’d combed out her dark, wet hair and put that spectacular little dress back on, reminding me just why I’d had to fuck her twenty ways from Sunday last night. God, she was hot.
“I might be moving soon,” I added, wondering why my mouth was moving. Again, she didn’t need to know that. “Why? You remembering things, now?”
She shook her head, her thumb idly playing with her ring. “No. But that just came to me.”
“Well, it’s a start, I guess.” I lifted the papers in my hand. “So . . .”
She eyed them like they were a snake that might bite her. “What’s that?”
“Wanna sit down?”
“What is it?” she repeated, her face going pale again.
