I left The Pier and walked along the beach for a while, then climbed up over the scrub-covered dunes and headed back up toward Main Street. The air smelled of salt and seaweed, and the breeze was strong. Sea birds cried above as waves crashed behind me. Only a handful of cars passed me as I made my way up the hill, and once again, I was filled with yearning.
I loved it here. These days of lonely wandering had been peaceful—the first bit of rest I’d had in years.
My phone buzzed. I pulled it out of my pocket, half-expecting more annoying texts from the family group chat. But it was a call from an unknown number. As a general rule I didn’t answer those, but something made me swipe.
“Hello?” There was a silence, and then a click. I pulled the phone away and saw that the call had ended. Strange. Probably spam. I put my phone away and kept walking.
I passed Knead More Bread, dark and closed at this hour, and looked across the street at a small hardware store, but my feet took me where they wanted to go.
A shop a few doors down from the bakery had plastic stuck on the windows to darken them, with one corner of it peeling down enough that I could see inside. A round sign hung above the sidewalk, showing a logo of a needle and thread surrounded by curved writing: Life’s a Stitch.
The vacant seamstress’s shop still had two sewing machines on a long work table, a couple of dress forms, and big cabinets lining the back wall. On the window was a sign that said, “FOR RENT,” with a phone number handwritten in the blank space beneath the words.
I’d walked by every day this week, stealing glances inside, wondering, wishing. It was a good space. I probably wouldn’t be able to afford it—the only reason I could afford my life right now was that I had no housing expenses while I was here—so it was pointless to even consider it.
But it was a huge space, and it was already set up for sewing.
Shaking my head, I made my way to my car and drove back to the cottage. As I crossed the garage toward the interior door, my gaze snagged on the cardboard box full of work stuff I hadn’t bothered to bring inside. Impulsively, I opened it up and grabbed a sketchbook, then went inside.
The pencil scraped across the thick paper as I drew the familiar proportions of a female figure. A dress appeared on the page, draped and gathered to flatter the body. I’d drawn a million of these before; I already knew it wouldn’t ever get made—but it was the first time I’d put pencil to paper since I shut the doors on my studio in Manhattan six months ago. My movements were stiff and awkward at first, and soon became easier. I flipped to a fresh page and drew some more.
That’s how Gideon found me: curled up on the couch with a sketchbook on my lap, drawing pretty dresses that only existed in my imagination.
For some reason, I was embarrassed. I slammed the sketchbook closed and sat up. “Hi.”
His gaze flicked to my lap, then up to my face. “Am I interrupting?”
“I was just sketching dresses,” I said, shrugging.
“A new client?”
I shook my head. “No. Unfortunately.” I huffed a laugh. A new client would definitely help my bank account right now.
He grunted, then headed to the opposite couch where he’d made his bed. His sheets were neatly folded on top of the pillow, and he dropped into the seat, propping his leg on the coffee table that separated us. “Can I see?” he asked, nodding to the sketchbook.
I slammed my hand on top of it. “No!”
Gideon blinked. “All right.”
“It’s not... They’re not good.”
“Last I checked, you had an entire business designing wedding dresses. They can’t bethat bad.”
“Key word:had.”
The bitterness in my tone made him tilt his head. “What happened?”
I chewed my lip before answering. I didn’t want to tell him about the shame of my failure. But if this was going to work between us—if we were going to coexist, maybe become friends—then didn’t I owe him at least a piece of me? So, hesitantly, I said, “My target market was wealthy brides. I charged a lot, but I provided a luxury service. My overheads were too high, and eventually I just couldn’t sustain it. For a while, the business was propped up by…”
“By?”
My chest burned, but I told him anyway. “By my ex. He owns this really popular wedding venue. He got to meet a lot of brides who were right at the beginning of their wedding planning journey—his place gets booked out years in advance. So he’d send them my way.”
“And once you broke up, that ended.”
I touched the edge of my sketchbook, running my thumb along the corner of the cover. “My turnover dropped to about a third of what it was before we started dating. I guess I’d gotten lazy about finding clients for myself. And then everything fell apart really quickly.”
“And now you’re here,” he murmured. I flicked my gaze up to meet his, and Gideon lifted his palms. “Hey,” he said, “I get it. No one signs up for an arranged marriage unless they’re at least a little desperate.”
