Free Saving Gracie by Kristen Ethridge Page A

In fact, he wished he could have turned the clock all the way back to their earlier drive down Gulfview Boulevard, before he decided to take the detour to the beach.
    That’s what he got for listening to all that church nonsense. Feeling moved to walk in Gracie’s shoes had gotten him nothing but the verbal equivalent of a blister. God probably thought it was funny that Jake got Pastor Ruiz’s message so wrong.
    Jake would not give God, Gracie Garcia or anyone else the ammunition to point out his mistakes again. No more church, no more benefits of the doubt. Only a few days remained until he would prove he could be the CEO Peoples Property Group needed. No mistakes from his time in Austin, no more mistakes in his time with Gracie. No more mistakes, period.
    His future depended on leading Peoples Property Group. Not on a teacher in Port Provident today—or one from Jerusalem two thousand years ago.
    * * *
    Tossing and turning all night left Gracie’s back sore and her head with a dull pain just over her right temple. She’d never before experienced a nonkiss that made her lose sleep.
    She’d never before dreamed about a man who wanted to steal her life’s dreams.
    She lost track of the number of times she’d awakened last night. Nothing helped. Not even counting sheep. All she’d wanted to count was the number of beats her heart skipped when Jake’s hands had brushed her arms.
    Even now, hours after waking, every time her thoughts wandered to last night’s walk on the beach, Gracie lost the battle. But this month’s budget and bill paying called, and conquering the pile of papers covering the left side of her desk would take focus, not flights of fancy.
    Gracie pulled out a pen and a book of stamps and set them alongside her computer keyboard, then opened her small business accounting software.
    Before she could start, she heard a knock at the office door.
    “Come in,” Gracie said, distracted once again from the task at hand.
    “Holá, hermana!” Gloria’s voice blew a beam of sunshine into the room. “It’s a beautiful day outside. Why are you sitting in the middle of a sea of paperwork? You should be dipping your toes in the water instead.”
    Dressed in a floppy turquoise straw hat, a light cotton blouse and shorts, and a pair of matching rhinestone-bedecked flip-flops, Gloria looked ready for the beach.
    “Because I didn’t build my business by slacking off. I may only be treading water right now, but if I stop, everything I’ve worked for will drown.”
    “Gracie, don’t you think you’re being overly dramatic?”
    If her sister only knew about that turn of events at the beach last night.
    “No, Gloria, I don’t. Jake told me he has to complete this stupid condo project in order to get the company’s board of directors to confirm him as the permanent CEO. If he doesn’t shut my school down ASAP, he’ll lose his job. Do you really think he’s going to let that happen?”
    Gloria shook her head. “No, I guess not. When did he tell you this?
    “Last night after church.” Gracie pulled another bill out of the stack.
    “I thought you said you weren’t going to talk to him.”
    “I wasn’t. Then my car wouldn’t start. He helped me out.”
    “I see.” Gloria slowly leaned back against the door to the office. Gracie could tell her sister picked up on something unspoken. “So he told you his life story while he jumped your battery?”
    Oh, he’d given her a charge last night, for sure. But Gloria didn’t need to know about that. “Well, no. We had to go to his nana’s house to pick up a part for the car.”
    “He took you to his grandmother’s house?” Gloria crossed her arms. Gracie started to feel as though she sat on the stand, not behind her desk.
    “I stayed in the car while he got the part from her garage,” she answered.
    “So, when did he tell you about his job? I know where the Peoples estate is. It’s not far from the church. You’d barely have time to have a good