The Color Of Grace (33 page)

“I think it’s about time you pull out those big green eyes
of yours,” I suggested dryly from behind him.

I thought Ryder would throw me a dirty look or tell me this
was not the time to make jokes, but instead, he threw back his head and
laughed, the same melodic laugh that had hooked me the first moment I’d met
him. From that point on, I knew I could deal with whatever happened when my mom
arrived—that was, until my mom actually did arrive.

The Yates’s doorbell rang, and my mood dropped flat. My
hands went clammy and my throat bone dry as my breathing grew choppy.

Mom did not look happy when Mrs. Yates swept open the door.
Not that I expected her to be all sunshine and roses with a big encompassing
hug and exclamation of, “I’m just happy you’re okay; that’s all that matters.”

But honestly, from the look on her face, I could see she was
going to skip the whole “why” portion of our conversation and dive right to the
outraged tirade.

Thank goodness, Ryder’s mom waylaid the tirade, probably
diffusing it altogether. Even as she ushered both Mom and Barry inside, she was
already apologizing.

“Mrs. Struder, I am so very sorry about this. I had no idea
your daughter was here. I hope you believe me when I say I never, never
would’ve allowed such a thing to happen under my roof if I’d known what was going
on. And Ryder is usually such a good boy. He’s never done anything like this.”

My mom looked skeptical as she sent a pointed scowl toward
Ryder’s swollen and bruised face. Mrs. Yates paused, glancing toward him as
well. She flushed lightly when she took in his injuries.

“Well, okay, he got into his first fight at school this
week,” she allowed with a guilty cringe. “But we grounded him and—”

Letting out a gasp of outrage, she
rounded fully toward her son and set her hands on her hips. “Oh, my God. You broke
your grounding.”

Ryder rolled his eyes. “Yeah, like I would’ve been allowed
to have a girl stay the night if I wasn’t grounded. Seriously, Mom.
That’s
why you’re mad?”

Beginning to tap her foot against the floor with a growing
fury, Ryder’s mom frowned like a pro. Heck, I even found myself slinking a step
away from her.

“This is not the time to make smart aleck comments, young
man. What has gotten into you lately? First we receive a call from the school,
telling us you’ve gotten into a fight…with your best friend.”

“Ex-best friend,” Ryder muttered.

Mrs. Yates narrowed her eyes. “Then you get out-of-school
suspension. And now, now we find some girl in your bed! A girl we’ve never even
met.”

“Yeah, but I wasn’t in bed
with
her.” Turning to my mom, Ryder seemed to want to make it
perfectly clear that, “I was sleeping clear across the room…on the couch. You
can ask my mom; that’s how she found us.”

“That doesn’t excuse the fact you had a guest in your room,
of the opposite gender, without our permission while you were
grounded
,” his dad growled, entering the
conversation.

Ryder glanced from one parent to the other, looking more
irritated than he did rueful. “You know, I’m not really the issue here. We’ll
all here because
Grace
is here. This
is about her.”

My mouth fell open as I gasped. But what a traitor, shoving
all the attention toward me.

It worked too.

Both his parents and my mom jerked their gazes away from him
and turned in unison to send me probing stares. I glowered at Ryder, condemning
him with a vile scowl.

He winced, at least looking apologetic. “You can’t keep
running anymore.”

The crushing weight of doom pressed against my chest.

“What is he talking about?” Mom demanded, pinning me with a
pointed look. “Running from what, Grace?”

Five pair of eyes zoomed in on me, and I got stage fright.
My mouth opened, but no words came out. My face heated with humiliation because
I just couldn’t admit the truth with Barry standing right there, practically
hanging from my mother’s side pocket.

Clearing his throat, he took Mom’s hand to gain her attention.
“Honey, I think I know what’s wrong.”

Mom blinked, crinkling her face into confusion. “
You
 
do? How can you know what’s wrong with my
daughter, when I clearly don’t?”

He sighed sadly as if he were ready to confess all the sins
of the world. Thinking he really was going to admit to what he’d done, I let my
shoulders relax until he glanced my way and quietly reported, “The other night,
when we were watching that movie, Grace…well, she kissed me.”

“
What?”
Three of us—me,
Mom, and Ryder—shouted out the question, each carrying our own variety of
shock.

Barry nodded sadly. “I stopped her immediately, of course.
And I tried to let her down easily, but she only got upset, ran to her room,
and refused to talk to me for the rest of the night. I think she might
be…embarrassed because…well, I don’t know. She’s only a girl, and was probably
just experimenting.”

“Oh, my God,” Mom said, covering her mouth. “Why didn’t you
tell me this earlier?”

My lips fell apart as I gaped at her. She believed him. She
truly believed him. I couldn’t—well, I couldn’t understand. Why would my own
mother think I’d kiss her husband? Eww.

I swallowed convulsively as I tried to keep the tears from
falling. What was I supposed to do now?

“I can understand you’re probably confused.” Barry turned to
me, his eyes filled with so much fake sympathy, I wanted to gag. “But running
out and sleeping with some other boy isn’t going to fix anything, sweetheart.”

“We didn’t—” Ryder instantly said, his teeth clenched as he
stepped to my side in angry support.

But his dad reached out and grabbed his arm. “Not right now,
son.”

“No,” Ryder growled, ignoring his father. Pointing a deadly
finger Barry’s way, he charged, “He’s lying. She did not kiss him.”

His unquestioning belief in me is probably what helped hold
me together throughout the rest of the conversation. If Ryder hadn’t been
there, I probably would’ve shaken myself right into a nervous breakdown.

He was so intent to defend me, he whirled toward my mother
and demanded, “How can you just stand there and believe that jerk over your own
daughter?”

Mom gave Ryder a surprised look. “Believe her? She hasn’t
told me anything contrary to what he’s said.”

“She hasn’t said anything to me either,” Ryder snapped. “But
she doesn’t have to either. I already know she would never do what he said.”

That’s when I started to bawl, the tears pouring down my
cheeks in a gush from the first drop. My fingers, my hands, my arms and legs
shook so hard, my bones actually hurt.

When kind hands slipped around my shoulders, I jolted away
until I realized it was Ryder’s mother, giving me a supportive hug.

It made me cry even harder. Once again, a complete stranger
was showing me more kindness and concern than my own mother. With the slightest
of prodding, Mrs. Yates turned me until I was facing her and could bury my face
in her shoulder as her hug encompassed me. She smelled like vanilla and aloe,
so soothing and comfortable.

“What exactly am I supposed to disbelieve here?” I heard Mom
ask in a hesitant voice.

“Just look at her,” Ryder charged. “She’s scared to death.
And I seriously doubt she would’ve run away from him if she was trying to hit
on him—which is what she did. She ran here. Wouldn’t she want to stick around
him while you were at work? Just think about that. She came to me, crying and
too upset to tell me what was going on. That makes me think she doesn’t want
anything to do with your husband, not that she’s upset because he turned her
down. She’s
scared
. And why in God’s
name would she suddenly stop wearing his necklace if she was trying to come
onto him? The only reason she came over here tonight was because she was too
afraid to stay at home alone with
him
.”

I lifted my face from Mrs. Yates’s shoulder to find Mom
glancing at me with questioning eyes. Tears burned my cheeks like hot talons
clawing out my very soul.

When my mother’s gaze fell on my bare neck, she stared a
moment, her face crinkling with uncertainty. Then she turned toward her
husband. “Barry?”

He took her arm. “Don’t listen to him, Kate. I don’t even
know who this kid is. Grace kissed me, and that’s the truth.”

I shook my head, buried my face into my hands, and sobbed.
Mrs. Yates hugged me harder. “If you don’t believe her, then she’s not going
anywhere with you,” she told my mom.

“That’s for sure,” his dad agreed.

Mom pulled herself upright with indignation. But she never
told the Yates to mind their own business. Instead, she set her jaw and finally
turned to me, looking me straight in the eye. “Grace?”

It hurt that she even had to ask me.

“What happened between you and Barry?”

“Just tell her,” Ryder encouraged, his gaze silently saying,
‘Don’t be the glove in the snow. Fight for what you know is right. Be the
coat.’ “You’re not lost and alone on this.” He motioned to his parents
physically standing behind us, backing us up.

No one had ever asked me to be brave and defiant and stand
up to an adult before.

But the thought of having to live in the same house with him
until I could legally escape spurred me to wipe at my wet face and stare my mom
straight in the eye.

“He kissed me.”

“What! That lying little—”

“Don’t even finish that thought,” Ryder’s dad warned as he
stepped in front of me to face off with Barry.

Barry shied away from the other man, but he still turned to
my mom with a pleading look. “Kate, don’t believe her. For God’s sake, she’s
been with two different boys in the past week. It’s like she’s in heat or something.”

“Oh, that’s it,” Ryder exploded, charging toward Barry, and
right into his father’s restraining arm. “Don’t you dare talk about Grace like
that.”

“Ryder,” his father growled, grunting as he put his entire
body into keeping his son from physically rushing Barry. “Just shut up.”

“No. I don’t know who this jerk wad thinks he is, or which
two guys he thinks she’s been with, but I can tell you I never touched her. And
neither did Todd; he complained to me about it
every
day.”

“Stop!” I screamed, covering my ears as if there were a
million more voices in my head. “Please stop.”

Barry pulled my mom around to face her. “Kate?”

Mom jerked her arm away from him. “How could you?” she
hissed.

He actually looked shocked she didn’t believe him. “I
didn’t,” he said, but Mom came at him as if she was going to hit him.

He retreated away from her.

“You touched my daughter, you sick, sick—” If Mrs. Yates
hadn’t let go of me to catch her around the waist, she probably would’ve
attacked.

“Whoa,” she said in a steadying voice. “Please try not to
kill anyone in my house. It tends to leave nasty stains on the carpet.”

“How could you?” Mom repeated, straining against Mrs. Yates.

“It’s her fault,” Barry accused, pointing at me. “She was
begging for it. Every time she walked around the house in those tight little—”

“Get out!” Mom boomed. “Get out right now.”

Barry gaped. “You can’t throw me out; this isn’t your
house.”

“I’d listen to the lady if I were you,” Mr. Yates advised.
“Before I let my son loose on you.”

Barry eyed Ryder and promptly surged toward the door,
slamming it as he fled. For a moment following his departure, no one moved.
Then my mother wilted, slumping against Mrs. Yates with these great, heaving
sobs.

“Mom?” I said, my voice all wobbly and hoarse. I hurried to
her and she let go of Mrs. Yates long enough to reach for me and clutch me
hard.

“Oh, Grace. Grace,” she moaned, rocking me back and forth,
making my own tears start up again. “My baby. Why didn’t you tell me?”

Lifting my face from her shoulder, I wiped at my drenched
cheeks. “After all the fighting and the doctor’s office, I…I didn’t know if
you’d believe me.”

Gritting her teeth, she closed her eyes and pulled me close
again. I rested my cheek against her neck as her tears saturated my hair,
wetting my scalp. “I’ll always believe you,” she said, making the insistent,
whispered promise. “Always.”

I nodded, holding her close. “I’m sorry.”

“No.” She tightened her grip. “No, don’t be sorry. I’m the
one who’s sorry. I’m so, so sorry. I brought that man into our lives.”

I closed my eyes, melting into my mother’s warmth, inhaling
her familiar fragrance. Standing there in her soothing embrace as she rocked us
gently back and forth, I listened to Mr. Yates’s quiet voice as he called the police
and Mrs. Yates as she lectured Ryder for not telling them about my situation.

Then my mom said something I’ll never forget. She sobbed
against my temple as she moaned, “I want Daniel.”