“Heaven forbid if anyone around here gets the idea you’re a softie,” Sarah teased.
Jaye squeezed Veronica around the shoulders. “Don’t worry, your secret is safe with me.”
“You need to come back so I can win some more money,” Veronica complained. “I still haven’t made enough to buy a new set of dishes.”
Jaye grinned. A new set of dishes was already sitting on Veronica’s front porch. Sarah had a similar surprise waiting—a new stroller stuffed with baby clothes. Those gifts were Jaye’s way of thanking these wonderful women for taking her into their hearts out of pure friendship. “I’ll come back, but I’m not guaranteeing you’ll win anything from me.”
“You’d better get going. The drive to Syracuse will take hours. We’ll clean up.”
“Thanks for the goodbye party.” Everyone from the factory had stopped by to say farewell, except for one person.
Sarah slid a glance toward the hallway. “Will you see Mitch before you go?”
Jaye didn’t want to face the painful reality of saying goodbye, but leaving without one last glance into his eyes would hurt even more. “Where is he?”
“Try the studio.” Veronica sighed. “He always ends up there when he’s miserable.”
By the conference room’s threshold, Jaye hesitated. “Take care of him for me.”
“We will.”
She took her time getting to the studio, lingering to look into her small office one last moment. The room looked bare after she’d removed Mitch’s map from the wall. His drawing was carefully stored in her suitcase, ready to go with her. Too bad she couldn’t take everyone from Blake Glassware, too. Strolling down the hall, she glanced into Nick’s office. In the lobby, she tipped her gaze to the vaulted ceiling and remembered watching the helium balloon float up into the rafters. Near the studio’s steel door, Jaye stopped by one of the vivid paintings hanging on the wall. She studied the swirl of color, gathering her courage.
This last goodbye would be the most difficult.
She opened the steel door. No matter how often she came into the studio, she never got used to the wave of heat and sound when she walked inside. Not spotting anyone in the cavernous room, Jaye remembered Mitch had an office tucked between the studio and shipping. With a determined stride, she headed down a hallway leading toward the back of the building.
His office looked more like an art studio than an executive’s suite. Steel shelving along one wall contained glass sculptures, stemware, and tableware that glistened in the dim light radiating from the desk lamp.
Unlike his father’s desk, the surface of Mitch’s desk was neat and in order. His empty inbox sat at the corner and his computer screen was blank. The only unusual item on the desk was a clay sculpture.
She walked forward to get a better look and recognized the unmistakable shape of a woman draped on a couch. The figure slept on her belly with a knee pulled up, a bare foot hanging off the edge of the cushion. The hem of an oversized sweatshirt skimmed the curve of her butt and her face was half buried under an arm. Jaye took a closer look and cold shock splashed into her chest, hanging icicles on her lungs. She was staring at herself asleep on Mitch’s couch, the way he’d found her right before they kissed.
Had he crafted this sculpture to remember that night?
This must have been what Phil wanted her to see when he urged her to visit Mitch’s office. She lifted her gaze to Mitch, who stood beside a window. Just the sight of him shot a throb of want into her empty heart. “Did you make this?”
He nodded and glanced at something behind her.
Jaye looked over her shoulder at a large tablet of drawing paper propped on an easel. Were there drawings of her hidden beneath the scuffed cover? She’d never know. Grief stuck in her throat, thick and poignant. “You blow glass, sculpt, and draw. What else can you do?”
“Is that why you’re here? To talk about my art?”
She resisted the urge to pretend. Lately, the truth felt so much better. “Forgive me. I’m a little nervous. When you didn’t show up to say goodbye, I wasn’t sure you wanted to see me. I couldn’t leave without saying thank you.”
“For what?”
“Well, for rescuing me when I had a flat tire and for allowing me to stay at your house. For not kicking me out when I told you I was a Patriots fan. For not getting annoyed when I almost spit cheese on your lasagna and couldn’t stop laughing. For tolerating my experiments every time I dreamed up a way to get you and your father together. For letting me take pictures of you.” Squaring her shoulders, she took a deep breath. “For showing me how to talk about what really matters.”
The muscles in his neck worked in a deep swallow. “What would have happened if we hadn’t fought, Jaye? What if I hadn’t said such awful things? Would you’ve let me come see you this weekend?”
Fighting off the urge to cry, she looked down at the concrete floor. “A long-distance relationship isn’t possible, Mitch. For the next few months, I have to work seven days a week. We wouldn’t have had any time to see one another.”
“Not to mention that even though we share a number of similarities, there are big differences.” He leaned against the window sill. “You work with your head, I work with my hands. You travel all over the place, I stay in one spot. You process things quietly, I talk things out.”
“We’re trapped.” She acknowledged, her insides twisting in misery. “Neither of us can leave our family’s businesses.”
“Another similarity,” he observed grimly.
Their similarities should’ve rattled her, but their differences ripped her apart. Tired of processing everything inside the confines of her lonely heart, she longed for someone who’d reach into her solitary abyss. This man was the only one who ever had. Jaye let
