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  Dangerous words ahead. Reality slammed into Jenna. The daytime meeting. His distancing behavior. The freaking light lunch in a public setting. “You’re breaking up with me.”

  “I just feel like I need more time to focus on my career.” Daren pivoted away from a direct answer. “We both do. Surely, a career-oriented woman like yourself can understand that.”

  Jigsaw pieces assembled in Jenna’s thoughts, and she didn’t like the picture they showed. Sure, they’d been going through a bit of a rough patch lately, and they’d both been so fixated on the Terrace Pines pitch. But breaking up? This was not the outcome she’d anticipated. “Wait, you’re breaking up with me because we lost the Barrington deal?”

  “I just think we need to slow things down. Take our time.”

  Jenna licked her lips, tasted salt, and snapped. “You mean because dating for four years is rushing things?”

  Darren rolled his eyes, sat back in his chair. “We just don’t have the right foundation laid. Terrace Pines would have been a year’s worth of living for both of us. We would’ve been able to put a lot of equity into our relationship bank.”

  Seriously? Jenna could understand how Darren’s preoccupation with his rising trajectory in real estate might be more important than his relationship with her. She could also understand, however, that he’d held on just long enough not to land the large commission Terrace Pines would have brought in. If she’d landed the Barrington deal, would Darren have still cut her loose? If she’d hit that ten percent mark, would they be setting a date right now instead of breaking up over lunch?

  Did it matter?

  “I’ve never really thought of our relationship as a checking account. I always thought love should be surrounded by little heart emojis, not dollar signs.”

  “Well, maybe dollar signs are a better measure,” Darren shot back. “This is the rest of our lives we’re talking about—not exactly something we should be winging as we go along.”

  “How romantic.” Jenna picked at another piece of bread. Nothing said true love like finances. Had they always been so far apart on how they measured their relationship? She was also fairly certain she’d never winged anything, other than her eyeliner.

  “Now you’re being flighty.”

  Jenna stood from the table and slung her bag over her shoulder. “No, now I’m being done, Darren.”

  “That’s not what I’m asking for.” The words were right, but the way they sounded coming off Darren’s lips wasn’t. Mostly it sounded like he didn’t really care—he’d just prefer she didn’t make a scene. “Not an end, a pause.”

  “Either way is a stop, Darren, and putting a relationship that’s going nowhere on hold just doesn’t make sense to me. What are we waiting for? I hope you get the life of your dreams. I really do. But I see now, it’s not with me. I need heart emojis, Darren. The dollar signs aren’t anywhere near as important. Not to me.”

  With that, Jenna excused herself from the table, taking the last bit of complimentary bread—and her dignity—along with her.

  

  Jenna had been staring at the model of Terrace Pines, but she’d long since stopped seeing it. She’d turned over the framed photo of her and Darren on her desk, too, so she didn’t have to look at it either. Things had started off so promising this morning. A little uneasy, sure, but she’d still had hope about her pitch and a boyfriend. Now it was mid-afternoon, and she’d managed to lose both her potential client and her future husband.

  “Way to go, Jenna,” she mocked herself with a dry laugh. “Really bang up job. Way to go.”

  A soft knock on the door turned her attention. It was Patti, coffee in hand as always.

  Whatever the woman had intended to say died unspoken on her lips. “You’re not still upset about Barrington? Seriously, let it go.”

  Jenna shook her head, not ready to bump Orville Barrington back to the top of her list of things to beat herself up over just yet. “I just blew up my life over avocado toast.”

  Patti grimaced. “What’s avocado toast?” She blinked. “I mean, I’m so sorry. Why?”

  “Darren invited me to lunch. I wasn’t going to go, but Aunt May cheered me up and it’s been weeks since he and I spent any time together that wasn’t work related. On the drive over, I thought everything was going to be okay.” The threat of tears stung behind Jenna’s eyes, but she blinked them back. Her voice trembled. “Instead, he told me I’m distracting him from his career—and that we’re not adding enough equity into our relationship account.”

  “Relationship account?” Patti grimaced. “Oh boy. Even I wouldn’t use that line.” She grabbed a tissue from a nearby box, took a second, appraising look at Jenna, then thrust the whole box over.

  Jenna covered her face with her hands and mumbled into her palms. Her breath came out of her in waves, pulling up from her toes. “I know. I was the one who officially called it quits, but I still feel like he left me a long time ago.”

  Patti’s hand landed on Jenna’s shoulder. “I’m not really the hugging type, but we’ll get you through this. Just ... take some deep breaths.”

  Jenna nodded and took a gulp of air. Tears had muddied her contacts and her vision was blurry, but even so, she could see Patti staring down at her, her expression a mix between professional frustration and friendly empathy.

  “Take the rest of the day off,” Patti instructed. “Call it a day.”

  No mascara appeared on Jenna’s fingertips when she wiped at her eyes. A small victory. “I have work to do. I can’t come in late and leave early.”

  Patti rolled her eyes. “Yes, you can. We all have those days. Go home and focus on you. Darren is just one tiny fish in a sea full of—”

  “No more metaphors, please,” Jenna groaned. Sports she’d never liked, but she was still a fan of seafood.

  Patti started. “I’m sorry, you’re right. Let’s call a spade a spade. Darren Taylor is a jerk, plain and simple. I never liked him for you.” She turned from the office but stopped in the doorway. “Look, Jenna, I know I don’t seem like the pajama-wearing, gallon-of-ice-cream-eating, rom-com-watching type of girl, but when a man breaks my heart ... I break out the Häagen Dazs. It’s absolutely essential in recovering from a breakup. So go home, stop at the store and pick up something bad for your waistline, and if you need me, please let me know—and take the afternoon off. I don’t want to see so much as a single email.”

  On her desk, Jenna’s cell phone rang, and Patti used the opportunity to evacuate herself from Jenna’s office. Jenna groaned when she saw her sister’s name on the screen.

  She thumbed the button to pick up the call and forced a smile into her voice. “Hi, Sarah. How are you?”

  Her sister’s voice on the other end of the line came across muffled. It sounded like she’d been crying. “Jenna, how fast can you get here?”

  A feeling of impending disaster crashed into Jenna for the second time that day. She braced for the worst. “Why? What’s happened?”

  The muffled quality in Sarah’s voice was tears. “It’s Aunt May. Her heart ... it finally gave out.” Sarah made a hiccupping sound, sniffling twice before responding. When she spoke again, her voice cracked. “She’s gone, Jen.”

  The world stopped around Jenna as an image of her aunt, ready to take her fellow retirement home friends for all they had in midday bingo, flashed through her mind. “No! That can’t be possible. I just talked to her this morning!”

  More sniffles from the other side of the line. “Can you come home?” There was a pause, heavy with the worry. “Please?”

  Jenna was already gathering her purse, Darren and Terrace Pines all but forgotten. “I’ll be there tomorrow. I’m on my way.”

  Despite Patti’s insistence she not do any more work for the rest of the day, Jenna clicked open her inbox, ready to fire off a quick email she’d need to take a little longer than the afternoon off, but the swirling pinwheel of death flashed onto the screen, freezing her in place. There was no time to
waste on an email. Jenna shut her laptop, shoved the machine in her backpack, and headed to Patti’s office.

  Chapter Six

  Jenna resisted the urge to tap her heels impatiently as Patti wrapped up a call with client.

  It was only a few minutes of waiting, but things had a way of stretching on forever when a person was busy trying to keep their heart from spilling out through their eyes. Jenna was doing this now, doing her best to focus on Patti’s uplifted index finger—the one which promised she’d be just a minute longer and to hang on tight—and keep the tears from rising past the waterline.

  Jenna Burke, you will not cry at work, she scolded herself. Not over boyfriends, bad pitches, or even upon hearing news she’d known was coming but had not at all been prepared to hear. It was one of her top rules as a professional businesswoman. Emotions were for anyplace other than the office. They had all known Aunt May’s days were short, but such knowledge provided little comfort now—not that it ever would. What would Jenna do without her?

  “This is not the first time we’ve planned a library,” Patti was saying into the receiver, her tone as knowledgeable and reassuring as it was definitive. “I can show you what we’ve done in the past and we can incorporate what you like into your plan.”

  Patti’s uplifted finger swam in Jenna’s watery vision and she adjusted her stance in the doorway, forcing her expression to remain smooth and her body—which wanted very badly to tremble—to stay still.

  Be a statue. Jenna did her best to listen to her own instructions. It wasn’t easy; even in the best of times, Jenna had never been very good at standing still. She needed to move, to create. It was part of why she’d become an architect—so she could channel all that energy into building something from nothing. It hadn’t taken her very far yet, but she was still a long way from giving up hope it eventually would.

  “And we’ll figure out a way to keep the nostalgia of the old town while bringing modern amenities worthy of a state-of-the-art library. This building is the centerpiece of your town, and it should be grand but welcoming,” Patti said dramatically. She stopped and listened for a beat as she waited for the client on the other end of the line to come around to her way of thinking.

  The speech was so convincing that Jenna momentarily was able to look beyond her troubles and remember how much she admired Patti Murray. If, in a few years, she was half the architect—and the businesswoman—Patti was, then all of the bumps along the way would be worth it.

  If.

  A beat of silence passed while Jenna forced her thoughts to wander to anything other than Orville Barrington, Darren Taylor, and now Aunt May. In the space of just a few hours—the blink of an eye, really—she’d lost them all.

  Patti smiled as she resumed control of the conversation. “I’m glad you agree. I look forward to meeting with you.”

  Another beat.

  “Okay, great.” Patti nodded and leaned in the direction of the phone’s cradle, ready to drop the receiver in as the matter had apparently been sorted. “We’ll talk to you soon.” She shifted her attention to Jenna. “What’s up, Jenna?”

  Jenna opened her mouth to speak, but everything she’d been working to hold back rushed out and she sagged against the doorframe, bawling. Hands over her face, tears pouring out of her eyes, mixing with the wetness on her cheeks until the whole mess soaked through her fingers and left wet blots on the sleeve of her blouse. Her mascara was ruined, that much was sure. She could only hope her reputation as a professional businesswoman would remain intact. Surely one crying episode wouldn’t damage that? Not when it was over something so serious.

  Jenna hoped not.

  It took longer than she liked to stop the flow of tears, and through her fingers, Jenna saw Patti jump out of her chair. She grabbed a tissue from the box on her desk, then tossed it to the side, pulled Jenna inside the office, and shut the door behind them. If one was to cry in public, best to do it behind the safety of a closed door—even if Patti’s executive office was a window-walled fishbowl.

  “Oh my goodness, girl.” Patti managed to sound sympathetic and not pitying. “I told you there’ll be other accounts. Jenna, you really need to pull yourself together.”

  Jenna sucked in a ragged sob. “It’s not that.”

  Patti’s brows knit together. “The Darren thing? Honey, he’s not worth it. I know he’s handsome and successful and he kills it at parties—”

  “Are you trying to make me feel worse?” Jenna wailed, having forgotten entirely about Darren’s good qualities. Now that Patti mentioned them, maybe she should allocate one or two sobs for her ex, not that he deserved them.

  “He’s also selfish, self-absorbed, and a total jerk,” Patti finished as she fed Jenna another tissue from the box. “He doesn’t deserve you!”

  “It’s not him either,” managed Jenna, finally able to speak without the interruption of sobs and hiccups. Her tears were stopping, but an empty achiness was setting in their place, the kind that burrowed deeper than botching a pitch or being dumped. It felt like someone had carved a hole inside of her, sucking out every scrap of the optimistic outlook she’d started the day with. “It’s my Aunt May. She’s ... gone.”

  Patti blinked a few times, her expression playing catch-up with her thoughts. “I thought her health had been on the uptake. You didn’t mention ... You just celebrated her birthday?”

  “She was going better for a while, but her heart...” Jenna shrugged. May had looked tired this morning on their video chat. Tired and old. Why hadn’t Jenna noticed something was wrong? She knew why—she’d been too busy wallowing in her own self-pity.

  “Oh, honey, I’m so very sorry for your loss.”

  Jenna sighed. “Thank you. I think she was ready.” A fresh well of tears rose into her eyes, blurring her vision again. “But I’ll miss her.”

  Patti laid a cool palm against Jenna’s shoulder. The gesture felt unpracticed but was still appreciated. Jenna used a tissue to wipe at her runny mascara and sniffed her way back into control of her emotions.

  “I feel like she was preparing us all for it—at her birthday, I mean. Don’t they always say you know when the time is coming? I guess Aunt May knew. That’s why she had the whole family get together, even if we could only be online.”

  Jenna smiled, reflecting. Beside her, Patti relaxed a fraction as she sensed Jenna calming down.

  “Aunt May was like a second mother to me ... but one who didn’t give me a curfew or make me do my homework,” Jenna said, laughing a little at the memory. “She did all the things good aunts are supposed to do, like let me eat sugary cereal like Golden Puffs and Choco Krispers.”

  “I loved Choco Krispers!” Patti exclaimed, finally finding a thread of conversation she could latch onto. “They turned regular milk into chocolate milk. So delicious.”

  “I know, right?” Jenna’s sobs had turned to giggles. Emotions were funny like that—they didn’t always come out as expected, and rarely ever linearly. Losing Aunt May hurt, but she’d given Jenna so many wonderful memories it was hard to stay sad in the presence of all those beautiful moments. “And when my mom died—I was only sixteen—my sister had gone off to college and it was hard, but Aunt May was there for me. Always. She stepped right in and helped me get through those teen years. Helped my dad get through them, and he definitely needed her as much as I did. Being a teenager was hard.”

  Patti gave Jenna’s shoulder a little squeeze as she pulled away, taking what remained of her tissue box with her to her position behind the relative safety of her desk. “Teenage years are awful years,” she commiserated. “I don’t think anybody comes through them unscathed. Myself, I’ve erased all memory of high school.”

  Jenna bit back a laugh. She’d never considered Patti as anything other than what she was today. It was hard to imagine the savvy leader of Avery Architects as an awkward girl with a bad haircut, doodling her name in hearts on her school notebooks.

  Balling the black-smeared tissue in her fist,
Jenna took a deep breath, collected her thoughts, and, eyeing her favorite bubblegum pink heels, pushed herself to her feet. Her outburst had been unfortunate, but it had had the added benefit of clearing her head. Confronted with the loss of her aunt, everything else seemed trivial.

  “I need to go home to Maui.”

  “I totally understand.”

  “I’m sorry for crying,” Jenna added.

  Patti shook her head, widening her eyes with relief. “Just don’t let it happen again,” she joked. “I’m kidding. Sort of. Is there anything I can do?”

  “No, but thank you.” How long would it take for the hole dug inside her to fill? “A little time with my family is all I need.”

  “Take as much as you need,” Patti said, then added, “Just check your email when you can.”

  Chapter Seven

  Sarah Maxwell, Jenna’s older sister, lived in the suburban part of the island, in a two-story Cape Cod.

  The house was two tiers of creamy white edged in butter-yellow trim and surrounded by the kind of flowerbeds that people either had to stay home to maintain or employ meticulous landscaping services to service. During the holidays, Sarah’s husband Mike strung thousands of twinkling mini lights from the house’s eaves and over its box hedges; in spring, everything sprang to life in colorful shades of pink and red. The overall effect was a sweet, quaint home—the kind found on the covers of home decorating magazines. The colorful, birthday cake house was especially fitting for Sarah, who, besides sharing Jenna’s love of landscaping, was the only real baker in the family.

  Jenna’s taxi had just pulled in the driveway when the front door of her sister’s house opened. Sarah came rushing out as Jenna retrieved her luggage from the trunk and made her way to the front porch. An old man in an even older car idled down the street. He smiled and waved at Jenna as he passed, and she returned a half-hearted gesture. When was the last time someone had waved at her in LA?