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"Lord, please bring back the zing." Gracie was running out of time. And money. Even with someone renting the dumpy little cabin she'd transitioned into an adorably charming cottage, she was going to need more cash flow. Soon.

Really, what she needed more than anything right now was the second half of her advance—something she'd only receive if her editor accepted her full manuscript that was due two weeks from today. Which meant Gracie should probably come up with a better ending for her rom-com story that was more happily-ever-after-ish, less everybody-dead-on-the-stage-Shakespeare-tragedy-ish.

"Oh, and God?" Gracie squinted toward the sky. "While I've got your attention, can you also get me through the front door without wetting my pants?" At the moment that request felt like a prayer of more miraculous proportions than the zing.

Holy hyssop. Did the front porch always have so many stairs? Didn't seem so when she could bound up and down them without any thought.

Today it was going to take thought. Lots of thought.

And now that she was giving it some thought, Noah really should have gotten around to fixing the porch step railing before she kicked him out of the house five years ago. She'd probably topple right off into the hydrangea bush the moment she put any weight on it.

"Ready to do this?" Mona dropped her phone into her purse with one hand, backhanding a leaf from her shoulder with the other.

If Gracie weren't so terrified about whether she was ready to do this, she'd tease her sister for going all Chuck Norris on a defenseless leaf.

The fact that Gracie didn't, must not have escaped Mona's notice. Her pencil-thin brows dipped in concern. "This is too much for you, isn't it? I knew it would be. We don't even have a walker. There's no way you're going to make it into the house. That's it. You leave me no other option..." Mona sighed and dug out her phone.

"Put that phone away. You are not calling the boys at the firehouse." For as long as Gracie could remember, probably ever since her sister heard firefighters were rumored to rescue kittens from trees, Mona believed all of life's difficulties could be handled by calling "the boys at the firehouse."

One of these days her sister really needed to acknowledge that firefighters weren't all boys. But that was a battle for another day. "Mona, I mean it. Put that phone away."

"Why? Wombat can toss you over his shoulder and carry you inside like that." Mona snapped her fingers.

Gracie whimpered. The thought of her bruised ribs coming into contact with anything, especially Wombat's beefy shoulder, tested her bladder control. "The last thing I need is a bunch of people showing up thinking they need to help me. Next thing you know, they'll be popping in and out of the house all week. I can't have that. Not when I need to be completely focused on finishing my story. Alone."

"Uh-huh, and how are you going to do anything alone when you can't put any weight on your right leg? Or was it your left leg?" Mona began rummaging through Gracie's white patient belongings bag. "What did we do with your discharge instructions?"

"I'm weight-bearing as tolerated on both legs."

"Which would be great if you could actually tolerate any weight.

Here we go." Mona dug out a stack of papers, ran her finger down a page, frowned, and flipped to the next page. "So far it just keeps talking about how pain medicine can cause constipation."

Well, hurrah. One thing Gracie didn't have to worry about then, since she didn't plan on taking a single pill. Pain medicine had always made her nauseous. The only reason she'd asked Mona to swing through Alda to pick up her prescription on their way home from the hospital was to delay getting out of the car for a few extra minutes. Sure, Gracie was anxious to get into the house, but that didn't mean she was anxious to experience the pain of getting into the house. But she'd certainly delayed long enough. Pain or no pain, it was time to finish her story. And she'd finish it on her own two feet.

Okay, her own two feet plus her sister's two feet. But no more feet than that. "I'm ready. Let's do this."

No sooner had the words left Gracie's mouth than the loud rumble of a vehicle approached from behind, drawing Mona's attention a brief second before she dropped her gaze back to the discharge papers. "Who's that?" Gracie asked.

Mona didn't answer. Gravel crunched and popped beneath tires as the vehicle drew closer on the long driveway leading up to Gracie's house. Too heavy to be a car. Sounded more like a tank. Or a...