“He rocks the kitchen, that’s for sure.”
“I was going to make sandwiches. Something fast so we could get to those e-mails.” Gracie and Jonas both pouted. Wade rol ed his eyes.
“Fine, but you two are on cleanup duty.”
25
After lunch—rather, after she’d completely stuffed herself with more of Wade’s divine cooking—Gracie and Jonas had cleaned up as promised. She had to admit, working side by side with the flirtatious man had helped dispel some of the nervousness she’d been feeling toward him ever since he’d walked in on Wade spanking her. Oh, God, her rear stil stung when she sat. It was an erotic reminder, one that sent little pulses of heat to her pussy.
It was impossible to stay upset with Jonas, she realized, and she had a feeling Deanna was going to have quite a job on her hands if she meant to keep him at arm’s length.
As Gracie sipped her second cup of coffee, she watched as Wade and Jonas careful y read each e-mail—for what seemed like the fourth time. “I don’t see how we’re going to find anything new, Wade. This is getting ridiculous. No name. No indication of where he met me.” She threw her hands in the air. “There’s nothing! He gives no real details about himself or his life. It’s al about me.”
Wade pointed at the computer screen. “Here,” he said, his voice low and even, “the first one.”
Gracie leaned toward Wade, attempting to read the e-mail in question. It was the first e-mail her stalker had ever sent her. “What about it?”
“He says: I saw you for the first time today.”
“Yeah, so?”
“And the next one is dated a whole week later, Gracie. On another Monday, when he writes: I’ve missed you, Gracie Lynn. It’s been too many days since we last spoke.”
Jonas rubbed his hand over his jaw, frowning at the computer. “It’s not another employee at that office she works at. He wouldn’t just see her on Mondays if that were the case.”
Wade shook his head, pinning her with a look. “Go over your schedule for me again. What do you usual y do on Mondays?”
“I get to work at about eight in the morning. Lunch at my desk usual y. I get off at five in the evening and go to the store.”
His eyes narrowed. “And that’s it? You go to the store and then head home?” Wade prodded.
Gracie didn’t even have to think. Her schedule was so routine that she could probably go through the motions with her eyes closed. “No, I go to Charlie’s. That little market I told you about.”
“To get lunch meat and cheese. Only on Mondays.”
“Yeah, I—” Oh, God. Horror struck as Gracie fol owed Wade’s train of thought. “He works at Charlie’s Market.”
Wade covered her thigh with his hand and squeezed. “I don’t want to get too ahead of ourselves, sweetheart, but that’s what it looks like to me.” He tapped the screen. “For the first several correspondences he e-mails either on Monday night or Tuesday morning. After he’s seen you.
It’s only after that when he begins the everyday thing.”
Jonas sat back in his chair and drank the last of his coffee, before standing and bringing it to the sink. “Who do you talk to at that market, Gracie?” he asked, as he rinsed out the cup and placed it in the drainer. “And not just the people who stand out. This guy, I don’t think he’s going to be obvious.”
Wade nodded. The hand he had on her thigh began to caress and stroke, sending her thoughts scattering. “Jonas is right. I’m betting this asshole is someone you’ve barely even smiled at.”
Gracie stood, needing the distance to think straight, and tried to bring up the image of each employee at the little meat market. Stopping there after work on Mondays had always been the bright spot in her day. She hated to think of her stalker tainting that too. “It’s a smal store. A mom-and-pop type place. The owner, Charlie, who always cuts my meat for me, is a seventy-eight-year-old man who flirts way too much for his own good.” Gracie smiled when she thought of the ornery old man she’d come to think of as a friend. “His wife, June, usual y works in the office, but she’l pop her head out to say hi whenever I come in—and to chastise Charlie for his flirting. A few stock boys, high school kids, I think. I think their granddaughter is the cashier.” Gracie shook her head. “No, there’s no one there capable of doing this, Wade.”
Wade stood—his hard, powerful body drew her attention like a moth to a flame—and came toward her. “Don’t bet on it, Gracie. The world is ful of seemingly normal people who lead wicked lives when the sun goes down. Some of the shit Jonas and I have seen since hanging our shingle would have you losing faith in mankind real quick.”
Gracie stood stil as Wade’s gaze took her in from head to toe, stopping for a heart-pounding few seconds on her breasts. She’d slipped his T-shirt on and gone without a bra. Could he see her nipple rings? A part of her hoped he could. It would serve him right to feel as turned on as she was. A part of her, the more reasonable part, hoped he couldn’t. After al , if he could see them, so could Jonas.
“We need to go to that market,” Jonas said from behind them. He was in the same room, but he might as wel have been in another county for al the attention they paid him.
Wade raked his fingers through his hair, a muscle in his jaw jumping in agitation. “Feel like visiting Charlie and June today?”
Gracie wrapped her arms around her chest, hoping to chase out the chil those words evoked. Would she final y come face-to-face with the man who’d tormented her for two months? It seemed so impossible. That it could be so easy seemed almost anticlimactic.
Gracie turned and headed toward the stairs. “Just let me change. I’l only be a few minutes.”