He still looks annoyed but more concerned, like he doesn’t know what to do with me. A beat passes, and I long to engage him in silly conversation like we so easily do over text. But I fear asking him about his workplace plant preferences or telling him about Owen’s tacky reality show idea will only annoy him more, given how upset he is. And I need a friend right now.

“You don’t belong here, Marina,” he says, raking a hand through his hair.

Not here. Not anywhere. “Well, until I get to good ol’ England, it’ll have to do,” I say with my British accent.

He’s not amused. He looks as though his million thoughts are hitting him at once. And I don’t know what to do.

A step brings him into my bubble, pinning me to the edge of the desk. He’s close enough to grab and hold on to. Not that I would. Or should.

He looms over me, his annoyance slipping behind what looks like a gentle mix of worry and affection. But that could be me projecting. Truth is, I very much like Tripp Grady Tripp.

His laser-through-my-soul stare makes my breath hitch, and my heartbeat quicken.

“Pretending to be okay won’t make it true. Don’t pretend with me. It goes against our truth policy,” he says, his eyes circling my face like he’s mapping my freckles.

A quiet moment passes between us—I don’t know what to say. Truth is, I like his attention.

But he’s not expecting me to say anything. He smirks lightly before backstepping toward the door. “Don’t get too comfortable here, Marina. I’ll talk to you later.” He doesn’t wait for pleasantries but offers a short wave before leaving.

17. Grady

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Grady

The screen door on Uncle Wade’s double-wide trailer shakes when I pound on it. I know he’s home. His pickup sits crooked in the dirt lane, and the store isn’t open. Still, it takes four knocking sessions before I hear movement inside. The inner door swings open.

“What?” he demands, looking as scraggily as ever.

“It’s the afternoon,” I say. “What’re you still doing in bed?”

“Sleeping, jackass.”

He sweeps his long gray hair back, picks a cigarette from the pack in his pocket, and lights up. “What do you want, Grady?”

Stubborn defiance, a Tripp family trait, rises within me. I don’t want to be here. My father would be pissed. Every family has a black sheep. The Tripps have Wade.

Asking him for a favor goes against everything I know, my very DNA, and all logic.

But I don’t know where else to turn.

He steps out of his trailer—the first in a long string at The Marshes—and blows smoke in my face. “Well? Are you lost, or is someone dead?”