Chapter 8
“Because I owed your father an apology.”
Grace’s fingers tightened around mine.
“No.”
Arthur’s expression softened.
“I did.”
“You already sent the letter.”
“What letter?” I asked.
Grace closed her eyes.
I turned toward Arthur.
“What letter?”
Arthur seemed surprised.
“Three years after your parents died, I wrote to Grace. I offered to cover household expenses and establish education funds for you and Annie.”
I looked at Grace.
She wouldn’t meet my eyes.
“You never told us.”
“You were eight,” she said. “Annie was five.”
“What did you say?”
Grace took a breath.
“I said no.”
Annie blinked.
“To money?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Grace looked at Arthur.
“Because we didn’t know him.”
“That wasn’t the only reason,” Arthur said.
Grace’s eyes sharpened.
“Don’t.”
But he stopped.
For the first time since meeting him, Arthur obeyed without argument.
Helen broke the silence.
“Grace needs rest.”
“I want to know,” I said.
Grace squeezed my hand.
“And you will. But not tonight.”
Arthur reached into his coat and placed a card on the bedside table.
“My number.”
Grace gave a tired laugh.
“You think I lost the previous four?”
“You still have them?”
She looked annoyed at herself for revealing that.
Arthur’s face softened.
“Yes,” she admitted. “I still have them.”
That confused me almost as much as everything else.
If Grace wanted nothing to do with Arthur, why had she kept his cards?
Arthur left soon afterward.
But before he did, he bent toward Annie and me.
“The garden remains unfinished.”
I thought he was joking.
“Do you still want us to work?”
“When your sister is well and only if she agrees.”
“For food?”
His mouth twitched.
“We’ll negotiate.”
Grace kept us home from school the next day.
Not because she wanted to.
Helen insisted.
Grace returned to our apartment that afternoon and spent most of the day asleep.
Someone delivered groceries.
Grace knew immediately who had sent them.
She called Arthur and made him take half back.
He argued.
She won.
That impressed me.
For the next week, Grace recovered while Annie and I watched her like suspicious nurses.
May you like
Every morning, Helen called.
Every afternoon, food appeared from somewhere.
