Parental Guidance (Ice Knights #1)(62)

Okay, there’s a way to save this. Everything isn’t lost. Not yet.

She pasted on her best everything-hasn’t-just-turned-to-shit smile. “I’m so sorry, but everything is with the Friends of the Library to be auctioned at their charity ball.”

“That’s too bad,” Helene said, the initial interest lighting her eyes dimming as she turned away from the workbench. “I’m flying back to Italy tonight and won’t be able to attend the event as planned.”

“What about the antelopes?” Caleb asked as he handed two of the animals over to Helene, sending a look of apology to Zara.

The other woman gave the pieces a cursory once-over but handed them back to him with only a quiet, “How lovely.” Zara took a shaky step back, her pulse thundering in her ears as she watched the dream she’d nurtured in secret and then taken the first baby steps toward fall apart before her eyes. She knew what how lovely meant. It was half a step above bless her heart when it came to dismissal disguised by pretty words.

She turned to Helene, desperation clawing at her as she tried to stay calm and recover the moment. “I’d been really hoping to meet you at the ball and get a chance to show you my work that will be featured there.”

She flinched at the sound of her own voice. It reminded her so much of every time her dad had promised that this time, this plan, would be different. And he’d been wrong just like she was.

However, the carefully neutral look on the other woman’s face told her just how late it was for that. There would be no recovery. This was it. The best option now was just to accept it.

Fighting to keep her shoulders from slumping in defeat, she lifted her chin and faced Helene. “I’m so sorry for wasting your time today.”

“It’s never a waste to meet someone with a vision.” The other woman traced a finger over one of the planning sketches on Zara’s workbench before picking up a small stack of others and quickly flipping through them. “Perhaps I’ll see your work at next year’s ball.”

Translation: Don’t close your Etsy shop.

“I hope so,” Zara said, managing to keep her voice even.

The word hope left a bad taste in her mouth, and as Helene offered a quick goodbye, saying that her driver was waiting out front for her, Zara had a hard time concentrating on the other woman’s words.

As soon as the door closed behind Helene, Zara sank down onto the couch, her legs too shaky to hold her anymore. “Why did you do that?”

For a big man, Caleb looked so small to her. He seemed to have shrunk into himself. Walking toward her, he opened his arms as if to gather her up.

She stopped him with a look. “What in the hell was that, Caleb?”

“Me helping,” he said, squatting down so they were eye level as she sat on the couch.

“Wow. I’d hate to see what you not helping is like.” The words spilled out of her, harsher than needed, but she couldn’t seem to stop herself. Hurt and frustration churned through her, twisting her insides into thorn-covered knots. “Do you know what just happened? You showed leftovers and commercial dreck to one of the country’s foremost miniatures collectors.” A hot rush of humiliation blasted through her. “My best work probably isn’t ready for Helene Carlyle, let alone a collection of antelopes bound for Peoria.”

“I know it’s not the outcome you want,” he said, taking one of her hands in his. “But she did mention next year.”

How could he still be so damn hopeful? How had she missed that he was just another dreamer like her dad, convinced that something not just better was around the corner but something amazing? What in the hell had she been thinking? It wasn’t his job that had made her hold back or the strangeness of the circumstances that had brought them together—it was the fact that deep down she’d known all along that Caleb Stuckey was another foolish dreamer.

“She was being polite.” Zara pulled her hand away. “She didn’t actually mean it, which you’d understand if you could ever read a room.”

“What the fuck?” He jerked back and stood up in one fluid motion. “I try to do something nice for you—to help you—and you throw reading in my face?”

Hating that she’d said that, hating that she hurt, hating that she’d been wrong about a possible future with Caleb, she reached out for him, but he evaded her touch. “That’s not what I meant.”

“If only I was smart enough to follow along, huh?” he asked, his voice quiet with a ribbon of pure, cold fury wound around each word. “Well let me tell you what I am smart enough to understand. You’re scared and you react by pulling into yourself. You can’t depend on anyone else? More like you can’t stand to let yourself even try to. And do you want to know why you’re really acting like this? It’s not because of Helene. It’s because you finally let down your guard with me, and it scares the shit out of you.”

He was wrong. He couldn’t be more wrong. While his anger might be cold, hers was burning hot, stoking a fire in her that turned the last of her self-control to ash. She stood up on the couch, giving herself enough height to look him straight in the eye.

“Fuck you, Caleb,” she said, her voice trembling with emotion that made her entire body jittery. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. You think you can just waltz in here and tell me what to do just like your mom or your coach does to you? Is there anyone in your life who doesn’t tell you what to do, or is there a decision you can make for yourself that doesn’t fuck something up?”