“Can’t this wait?” he asked.
“From my perspective, yes,” she said. “But something tells me it has something to do with why Delia’s so upset. I won’t ignore that.”
“Since when did you get so protective of Delia? She’s my aunt,” he said, not yet ready to acknowledge the real relationship.
“She’s my friend.”
“And I’m your what?”
She regarded him archly. “That remains to be seen.” Her expression sobered. “Come on, Kevin. Spill it. How can I help Delia if I don’t know what’s going on?”
“Maybe Delia’s not the one who needs help. Maybe she’s the one who threw a curve at me.”
“Now you’re talking in riddles.”
Thankfully, before he had to explain what he meant, Jessie came back to take their order. He chose the biggest breakfast on the menu—eggs, bacon, home fries, and toast. He couldn’t answer questions if his mouth was full. He noticed, however, that Gracie ordered an English muffin. Obviously, he concluded grimly, she didn’t intend to let food hamper her cross-examination.
He sat back stoically and waited for the onslaught of questions to begin.
It didn’t take long. Jessie had no sooner left for the kitchen than Gracie was studying him intently.
“Okay, Kevin. Let’s hear it.”
“You realize, of course, that this is none of your business.”
If he’d thought—or hoped—she would take offense at that, he was very much mistaken. She merely smiled and regarded him patiently.
“Have you ever found out something about yourself that changes everything?” he asked.
“As a matter of fact, yes,” she said.
“What?”
“We were supposed to be talking about you.”
“Humor me.”
“Okay, I found out after years of roaming around the globe that what I was really looking for all along was a home.”
“You had a home in Pennsylvania. You sold it.”
“I meant one that fit my image of what a home ought to be, complete with a whole community of people who cared.”
The response took him aback. “And you found that out here?”
“Here with you,” she amended with total sincerity.
All that advice to ask her to marry him came flooding back. He pretended it hadn’t.
She studied him worriedly. “Is that what happened to you? You found out something about yourself?”
“Yes.”
“From Delia?”
“Yes.” He regarded her ruefully. “You’re not going to give up on this, are you?”
“Nope.”
Resignation sighed through him. He might as well blurt it out and get it over with. Maybe Gracie could offer some perspective he’d missed, solidify his own conclusions. “She told me that she’s my grandmother.”
Gracie’s eyes lit up. “She is? Oh, Kevin, that’s wonderful.” Her expression turned worried. “It is, isn’t it? You adore her, don’t you?”
“Of course I do.”
“Then I don’t see the problem. I’d give anything to suddenly discover I had a grandmother and it turned out to be somebody I love.”
“You’re missing the point,” he groused.
“Which point is that?”
“Aunt Delia was the one person on earth I thought I could trust. Now I find out she lied to me and to my mother. All these years, she lied to us. Isn’t that important?” he asked, even though he’d already concluded it didn’t really matter in the larger scheme of things.
“I might not have known your aunt very long, but one thing I know about her is that she worships you. If she kept this a secret, there must have been a very good reason for it.”
“I suppose.” He repeated the whole, sad story. “She thought she was protecting my mother.”
“Well, then, that explains it.”
“Gracie, it’s not that easy. Okay, maybe for me it wasn’t a tragedy, even it did shake the trust I thought we shared. I had my dad and, for a while anyway, my mom. But my mother lived her whole life with a bitter old woman, thinking that she never did anything right, not understanding that there was a reason for that resentment.”
Gracie reached for his hand. “I know that must have been awful for her and for you, but did you ever consider that it might have been worse if Delia had kept her.”
“How so? What could possibly have been worse?”
“You just sat here and listened to the gossip about us and about Bobby Ray and Marianne. At least none of that was vicious. Can you imagine what it would have been like fifty or sixty years ago to be a pregnant teenager with no father in sight? Can you imagine what your mother would have had to endure being called a bastard back then? She might never have married a man like your father because of the stigma. Wouldn’t that have been a hundred times worse than the problems she had with the woman she thought of as her mother? At least she had Delia in her life. You said yourself that your aunt provided a safe haven for both of you.”
“I see what you’re saying. It’s just…”
“A shock,” she supplied.
He nodded.
“Do you love Delia any less?”
“Of course not. I just don’t know if I can ever trust her again.”
“Kevin, there’s never been anything else she lied about, has there?”
“No, not as far as I know.”
“Just this one thing and you know she had her reasons. Maybe you should concentrate on understanding her side and tell her that you haven’t stopped loving her.”
“I thought I had.”
“But then you left town, probably after making some enigmatic remark about needing time to think,” she suggested, making him wince. “It obviously terrified her. I’m sure she’s scared to death of losing you.”
“It’ll never happen. That old lady is too much a part of me.”
“Tell her,” Gracie repeated. “Don’t let something that should be fabulous news end up splitting you apart.”
“Has anyone ever told you you drive a hard bargain?”
“All the time. One of these days I’ll take you to France and you can talk to the asparagus farmer,” she teased. “Will you go to Delia?”
“Okay, okay.
