“Helen, do you have time to do the measuring and then order what we need?” Gracie asked.
Helen looked pleased by the request. “Of course. I was hoping you’d ask. I haven’t had this much fun in years.”
“Speaking of fun,” Delia began, studying Gracie with open curiosity, “why don’t you tell us how your evening went.”
“As productive as ours?” Helen inquired, a mischievous gleam in her eyes.
“That remains to be seen,” Gracie said enigmatically. “By the way, how far along are they upstairs? Has anyone checked?”
“I was up there first thing,” Delia said.
“And guess what?” Abby chimed in happily. “Daddy’s here.”
“Oh, really?” Despite the previous night’s activities, Gracie was startled by that particular turn of events. She’d figured Bobby Ray was going to be laid low for days with a monumental hangover. “What’s he doing?”
“He and Uncle Kevin are painting.”
“And so far they haven’t turned the brushes on each other,” Helen said. “You have no idea what a triumph that is.” She regarded Gracie curiously. “How’d you manage it?”
“Manage what? I had no idea they were going to be here.”
“But you were behind their peace treaty,” Helen said. “You must have been. Nobody else has ever had any luck. I actually heard them laughing a while ago.”
“It’s true that Bobby Ray came by the house last night and we all talked,” Gracie conceded. “I wasn’t expecting this, though.”
“I was thinking, since it’s Saturday, maybe I should call Mom and ask her to come over and help,” Abby said. “Is that a good idea or not?”
Seeing the longing in the child’s eyes, Gracie squeezed her hand. “I think it’s a very good idea.”
“You do?” Helen and Delia said in unison. They both sounded skeptical and more than a little worried.
Gracie opted not to explain about Sara Lynn’s departure. That was Bobby Ray’s revelation to make. But she didn’t see any harm in throwing him and Marianne into close proximity.
“Call your mom,” she repeated to Abby.
“But for heaven’s sakes, don’t tell her your father’s here,” Delia warned. “She won’t get within twenty miles of the place.”
“I know that much,” Abby said. Ignoring the phone on the wall, she practically ran from the room to use the phone Gracie had had installed in the foyer.
Delia chuckled. “I guess she figures we’re better off not hearing what sneaky schemes she uses to lure her mother over here.”
“Well, I for one am glad she left the room,” Helen said. She turned to Gracie. “What on earth went on last night when Bobby Ray came by?”
“Don’t tell her, Gracie,” Bobby Ray said, coming down the back stairs into the kitchen. “She’s been snooping in my affairs since the day I was born.”
“Somebody had to keep an eye on you, for all the good it did,” Helen muttered. “I’m your big sister and I want to know what happened last night. At this very moment, your daughter is trying to lure her mother over here. What’s that all about?”
Bobby Ray looked sheepish. “I can’t speak for Abby’s motivation, but I’ll have to admit I’m glad she’s taking the initiative in this particular instance.”
“Why?” Helen asked suspiciously.
“Because I’m not sure how long it would have taken me to work up the courage to go over there or what Marianne would have done when I showed up.”
“Whapped you upside the head with a frying pan, if she had any sense,” Delia commented.
“Thank you, Aunt Delia. You never did have much patience with my shenanigans, did you?”
“Not since you got old enough to know better,” she agreed. “And that was many a year ago, young man.”
“Thanks to Gracie, I’m a reformed man,” he announced.
“We’ll see,” Delia retorted.
“Bobby Ray, stop gabbing with the women and get the hell back up here,” Kevin shouted just then from the top of the stairs. “I’m doing more than my fair share.”
“That’s the way it’s supposed to be,” Bobby Ray shouted back. “You’re the responsible one.” He winked at Gracie, grabbed a couple of sodas out of the refrigerator and bounded back up the stairs.
Gracie chuckled, then realized that Helen and Delia were staring at her as if she were some sort of miracle worker.
“Okay,” Helen said seriously. “I want to know exactly what went on last night.”
“From the beginning,” Delia chimed in.
Gracie thought of the beginning, in her bedroom, in her bed, and concluded that neither of them needed to know every detail about that. Nor about the way the evening had ended.
“Well, you see, Bobby Ray called…” she began, and told them the basics of the conversation she and Kevin had had with him the night before.
“Marianne won’t take him back on a bet,” Delia said when she was done. “Not if she has any sense.”
“Oh, come on, Delia, she adores him. She always has,” Helen said. “Despite everything he did to her, all of it lousy, she still loves him.”
“I’m sorry,” Delia said. “I’m afraid I’m with Kevin on this one. It’s going to be a disaster and Abby’s the one who’ll pay the price.”
Gracie was shaken by the older woman’s fierce declaration. Had she been wrong to try to get Bobby Ray and his ex-wife back together? Had she jumped feet-first into something she knew far too little about?
“Stop looking so glum, Gracie. Delia’s just worried about Abby,” Helen said. “The kid’s been to hell and back, thanks to her father’s foolishness. That hasn’t stopped her from loving him. I don’t think it’s stopped Marianne, either. And if the changes I’ve seen in my brother this morning are any indication, it could just work this time around.”
“I hope you’re right,” Gracie said.
For all their sakes.
21
Abby came bounding back into the kitchen, beaming.
“Mom said she’d be here in an hour, as soon as she’s done with the laundry. I told her we needed her to stop and pick up lunch. She’s gonna do ham and cheese and tuna sandwiches from the coffee shop. I called ahead
