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When she sniffles and reaches up under the frame of her large glasses to wipe her eyes, I take a step forward, stomping my foot a bit harder than normal so she knows she’s not alone.

“Oh, sorry.” She turns and smiles, but there’s pain in her mossy gaze.

It guts me to see it there.

“I’m still not sure how to process all of this. Normally, I would call my grandfather, and he’d tell me that everything was going to be okay. That God’s plans for me are far greater than my own, and there’s not a single thing in this world that can derail them.” She pauses a moment. “He died three months ago.”

Ouch. Hit after hit. “Were you two close?”

“Thick as thieves,” she replies. “We were all we had. I know it’s been a few months, and he’s with Jesus now, but it still feels so fresh.”

“Loss doesn’t really have a timeline,” I tell her as I shove my wallet and phone into my pocket, then grab my jacket from the back of the chair. The best thing I can do for the both of us is figure out the truth and get her safely back in her own life so I can return to mine.

Because this connection—this intense pull I feel toward her—can only end one way. And not the happily ever after kind.

Dinner tonight.

Then tomorrow, we start searching.

“I hope you’re prepared to answer a million questions tonight,” I tell her as I open the front door, then lock it behind her.

“Can’t be any worse than that detective that grilled me yesterday.”

“That bad, huh?”

“Let’s just say that Captain Leopold had to step in and tell him to back off more than once.”

I can’t help but laugh softly as I picture the man doing just that. “Alan is a good man.”

“He definitely seems to be.”

Unable to help myself, I open her door, then close it once she’s inside my truck. I walk around to the driver’s side and climb in before starting it and pulling away from my house.

“I understand that you can’t remember the last two weeks, but was there anything prior that seemed odd? Out of the norm?”

She’s quiet for a moment, and I spare a glance in her direction to see that her brows are drawn together, her nose slightly scrunched as she contemplates.

Warmth burns in my gut.

Get it together, Granger.

“Not that I can remember. Everything was pretty typical.”

“No new residents, family members, staff—anything like that?”

She shakes her head. “Pine Meadow is on a wait list, so there was a man that moved in the month after my grandfather passed. He was a resident there,” she says. “It’s actually why I left the hospital and went to work at the retirement community.”

“Because your grandfather was there?”

“He was so stubborn.” She smiles softly. “He’d refused to go into a place like that for years, and I was happy to keep him home with me because he was my best friend.”

The warmth in her voice warms my own heart.

So much love.

“I came home from my shift one night and found him on the floor in the kitchen. He’d forgotten that he had a pill organizer and had already taken his blood pressure medication, so he took it straight from the bottle and passed out. He’d been unable to get up on his own.”

I spare another glance right as she wipes a tear from her cheek, then turns to look out the window.