to build it any-darn-where he wanted to. It wasn’t anyone’s choice but his. And maybe swimming was a good thing for him. Maybe he’d get stronger. Maybe he would be able to climb to the top of the lighthouse one more time.
Or she’d just put a GD elevator in the thing so he could go up there and brood, if that’s what he wanted to do.
She met Ashley’s intense and worried gaze. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I do understand. But I’m not going to walk away from this project. If Topher wants a house, he should have one.”
Chapter Eight
Jessica took the long way back to her car, through the Howland House rose garden, intent on swinging by the cottage to tell Topher that she was ready to try again and capture what he wanted in a house.
But her client seemed to be in the middle of a heated argument with his cousins. His angry voice carried all the way out to the garden.
She certainly didn’t want to interject herself into that scene. So she beat a hasty retreat.
The next morning, she awoke to a minor plumbing disaster. MeeMaw’s house was falling down around her ears, so discovering a leak under the kitchen sink wasn’t all that surprising. A week ago, she would have called Colton and asked him to come by and take a look. But that option was now fraught with danger.
So after drinking a strong cup of coffee out on the porch while simultaneously consulting YouTube plumbing videos, she determined that the problem was a leak in the P-trap. She could fix this herself.
She put a Tupperware container under the drip and headed into the office. She’d swing by Wright’s Hardware on the way back from work to get the supplies she needed.
She settled in at her desk and pulled up her business plan, a document she hadn’t looked at in more than six months. After she’d finished the Akiyama project and it had scored a write-up in a local newspaper, a steady stream of projects had arrived at her doorstep.
But the buzz had died and her prospective clients had dried up. Topher’s project would tide her over, but she still needed to think about what came next.
She worked on her plan for an hour, and then, when ten o’clock rolled around, she picked up her phone and called Topher. Of course she got his voice mail.
She left a message, asking him to call her back to schedule a time when they could meet and discuss where the original plans had gone off the track.
She was about to turn back to her business plan when the sound of her front door opening pulled her away. The door closed and rapid footsteps sounded on the stairs.
So it wasn’t Topher. No way he could climb stairs like that.
Her office suite was a medium-sized loft without any walls at all. She had plans, once funds became available, to partition the space to make it feel more finished and cozy. But right now Blackwood Designs consisted of her desk, an executive chair, a CAD workstation, a plotter, and a small round conference table with four chairs.
She hadn’t hung any artwork or any of her degrees or accolades. In short, her office looked as if she’d moved in a month ago. Which was nothing but the truth.
There wasn’t anything she could do about that now, so she stood up and pasted her best business smile on her face, hoping that the fates had sent her a new client.
But the fates had not done any such thing. Instead, they’d sent her a nightmare.
Caleb Tate reached the landing and turned, his blue eyes running over the space that she’d stolen away from him. What the heck did he want? Was he here to harass her for that?
Or something far worse. A frisson of icy fear climbed up her spine, sending her muscles into fight-or-flight reflex. This full-body terror was nothing like the confusion Topher’s touch had unleashed yesterday.
She’d never been in any danger with Topher. The same could not be said about this situation.
“Nice work stealing this space from me,” Caleb said, plopping down into the side chair and then propping his feet up on her desk.
She wanted to scream at him, but she sat there breathing hard until she could control her voice. “I didn’t steal it,” she said, and then regretted the remark. She had to remember that this man sat on the design review committee for the new City Hall. She was