Emma's Arc

Chapter 2 of 2

Emma spent the morning at the guest house window, watching the main house across the yard. Grant stood by the stone fountain in the garden, coffee in hand, eyes on her door. He didn't wave. He didn't leave. He just stood there until the sun climbed and burned him back inside. Emma couldn't tell if he wanted her gone or was making sure she stayed. She didn't know how to ask. So when Jenna knocked at six and said, "Dinner. Come eat with us," Emma said yes before she could talk herself out of it. She walked over at seven. Jenna had set three plates and poured wine. Grant wasn't there. Jenna checked her phone, frowned, then set it face down. "He's late. He's never late." They sat. They ate bread. Jenna's phone buzzed. She read it and stood up fast. "I forgot something. A thing I said I'd do tonight. I have to go." Emma started to rise. Jenna waved her down. "Stay. Eat. He'll be here." She was out the door before Emma could argue, keys already in her hand. Grant came in ten minutes later. He stopped when he saw only Emma at the table. He looked at the empty chair, then at her, then sat down without a word. He ate. She ate. The clock on the wall ticked. Emma reached for the salt at the same second he did. Their fingers touched over the shaker. Grant went still. Something moved across his face, quick and hard, the way it had on the porch that first night. He stood up, walked around the table, took her jaw in his hand, and kissed her once. It was not a soft kiss. It was a man who had found something and could not put it down. Emma froze. Then she pulled back, chair scraping, and stared at him. "I don't—" She didn't finish. She grabbed her sweater off the back of the chair and walked out. Halfway across the yard she started running. She locked the guest house door and stood with her back against it, breathing hard, one hand pressed flat to her mouth. Grant sat alone at the table with the salt between them. He didn't chase her. He put both hands flat on the wood and stared at the door she'd gone through. After a long minute he stood, walked out to the fountain in the dark, and stayed there. Emma watched him from her window with the lamp off. She didn't know what had just happened to her. She only knew her hands were shaking, and she was not going to open the door again tonight. Whatever the man across the yard wanted, she hadn't come here for it. She had come here to be left alone.