Chapter Twenty-One
IT’S POURING. NOT A LIGHT SHOWER BUT A FULL TROPICAL TANTRUM, sideways wind, soaked palms. It’s been coming down for the last hour at least.
I pace through the house, hair twisted on top of my head, coffee clutched like a lifeline. The hall is lined with paintings, leaning against walls and door frames. My work, my voice, all of it ready to be transported into town to be framed and hung under lights for strangers to examine and judge.
I step back, heart racing, doing quick math I can’t make work. Even if I wait a little longer and I double up trips, there’s no way to keep everything dry. And these are canvas. Water is not part of the palette.
“Damn,” I mutter, opening the front door and gazing out at the water pouring off the porch roof. My stomach knots. I’m halfway back inside to start gathering towels when I hear the soft crunch of tires.
I stare, and through the sheets of rain make out a large white work van pulling into my drive.
The windows are fogged slightly, windshield wipers thudding.
It’s pouring so hard that I can’t see who’s sitting behind the wheel until the driver’s side door opens and out jumps Jack.
He’s wearing a rain jacket, hood half off, dark hair dripping at the edges.
He lifts a hand like this is all very normal.
“Morning,” he calls over the monsoon, stepping onto the porch. “Figured you weren’t planning an art baptism today.”
I stare at him, stunned. “Whose van is this?”
“Jay’s. I called him when I saw the forecast this morning and asked if I could borrow it.”
I gape at him, rain dripping from his sleeves, my heart doing something weird and fluttery.
“You didn’t think to text me?”
He shrugs. “I figured if I asked, you’d refuse the help.”
I open my mouth. Then close it, holding back a grin. “I don’t know. I was starting to feel a little desperate.”
Jack walks past me and opens the door wider. “Well? Shall we start loading?”
The air leaves my lungs in a shaky rush. “Yes. Please. Let’s load her up.”
We load quickly, working in rhythm, barely speaking. He handles everything like it’s second nature, covering, stacking, securing, shielding. He even brought towels.
By the time we close the van doors, we’re both dripping.
I run around to the passenger side and climb in, slamming the door behind me as thunder cracks in the distance.
The rain drums hard against the roof of the van.
I push wet hair off my face, breathing hard, my heart still racing from the chaos, from memories of the last time Jack and I sat next to each other in the middle of a storm.
Jack turns the key, and the engine rumbles to life.
“All set?” he asks, glancing over.
I nod. “All set. Thank you, Jack,” I say quietly.
He smiles, fiddling with the windshield wipers.
The rain is still pouring when we pull up in front of the gallery. Jack backs the van into the parking spot right in front of the entrance and hops out. He opens the back carefully, stepping in to shield the canvases from the storm as I run ahead and push open the gallery’s door.
Helen appears a moment later, her black hair pulled back in a low twist, glasses slipping down her nose. “There you are,” she says, clearly relieved. “I was hoping the rain wouldn’t throw off the morning.”
“Never,” I say, sneaking a grin at Jack.
We work quickly. He moves each piece with careful precision, like they’re museum grade. No dragging. No tipping. He holds them like they matter. When we reach the last canvas, the one I finished late last night, he pauses after he sets it down.
He doesn’t look at me, just keeps staring at the painting. His expression softens. “This one. It feels like you.”
I nod, feeling a prickling behind my eyes. “I finished that one last night.”
“Okay, thank you dream team,” Helen says, reappearing with her measuring tape.
“Now let my team do our thing. Lucy, I’ll see you Saturday night at Graham’s.
Don’t forget to come early so we can get some photos.
” She pauses, folding her arms in front of her.
“I still can’t believe it’s happening. All summer I’ve been waiting for the other shoe to drop.
But it really does seem to be coming together.
” She starts to shoo us out the door. “Okay, you two go be cute somewhere else so I can get to work.”
I blush, flustered. Jack smirks but doesn’t comment. He just wipes his hands on his jacket and heads for the door.
I’m curled on the couch in dry clothes, and the rain still hasn’t stopped. The house smells faintly of paint and honeysuckle from the candle I lit an hour ago. The quiet feels like it might split open if I move.
I keep replaying the morning in my head, the moment I opened my front door and Jack was just…there. Like this was the only place he could have possibly been.
The thing that keeps getting me is how he knew exactly what I needed before I even understood how stressed I was. He saw the problem, obviously the Jolly wasn’t going to cut it, and literally saved my day.
That’s when it hits me, really hits me, that this isn’t the Jack who missed my Charleston art show because of a client meeting. This is someone different. Someone whose first instinct now is to show up, not apologize for why he didn’t.
And I don’t know whether that makes me relieved or terrified. Because if he’s changed…then I have to consider the possibility that we didn’t fall apart because we weren’t right for each other.
We fell apart because he wasn’t ready.
And now he might be.
The thought steals my breath all at once. And something inside me is suddenly waking up.