The Path to Sunshine Cove (Cape Sanctuary #2) - RaeAnne Thayne Page 0,68

with good memories of a place or a moment. It’s completely natural to want to hold on to that.”

“Thank you for being so understanding. You’re a dear. I think your job must be equal parts cleaning and therapy.”

Jess had to smile, charmed by the description. “I hope both are helping.”

“More than you will ever know. I’ve felt better these past ten days than I have since Jack died. Thank you for putting up with me.”

“It’s been my pleasure,” she said, and meant every word.

Eleanor looked around her kitchen, which looked fresh and new, almost as if they had applied a coat of paint.

“This looks like a new room. I honestly don’t know how you managed it.”

“We managed it. You’re the one making the final decisions.”

“You’re helping me every step of the way. What would I have done without you, my dear?”

“I should run this next load to Goodwill.”

“They must cringe when they see you coming. Here comes that nice girl with all of Eleanor Whitaker’s junk again.”

“I doubt that. Just because you don’t want it anymore doesn’t mean your things don’t have value. Someone else might have been looking for that mismatched china you’ve decided you don’t need.”

“I hope so. I always hated that china. But thank you again for working so hard on your birthday. Do something special to treat yourself this afternoon. You have more than earned it.”

How about sleep with your son?

The totally inappropriate thought made her blush. She could only be grateful Eleanor, as sharp as she was, couldn’t read her mind.

“I’ll see you this evening at your sister’s house.”

She was not sleeping with Nate, she told herself sternly. Even if it was her birthday and Eleanor told her she deserved a treat.

“I’ll see you there.”

She kissed the older woman on the cheek, thinking how dear she was. Of all the clients Jess had worked with over the past five years, Eleanor had quickly become her favorite. She was sharp, kind, funny, generous. She had embraced Jess from their first interaction, treating her with warmth and welcome.

Jess would miss her when she left Cape Sanctuary.

And Nate. And Sophie.

All of them had impacted her life. This job would leave its mark.

She frowned as she carried the box of mismatched china to her truck.

That wasn’t the plan. She was supposed to be the impersonal hired help who swept into town, took care of business, and then hooked up her Airstream and moved on to the next job.

She didn’t need or want to make connections. Connections only led to heartbreak. That lesson had been imprinted on her psyche after years as a military brat, moving bases and schools just as she started to form one or two solid friendships.

It had always seemed more intuitive for Rachel, somehow. She always loved easily, gathering friends around her like Eleanor collected cookbooks.

Jess struggled to say goodbye each and every time, until she decided when she was about twelve or thirteen that she was done trying. She had Rachel. She didn’t need other friends.

And then Rachel had betrayed her, too.

The ugly thought poked up like a noxious weed.

She didn’t like thinking about that time, how lost and alone she had been after Rachel chose to remain here in Cape Sanctuary with her new foster family instead of coming to live with her once Jess turned eighteen and aged out of the system.

Intellectually, she knew her sister had made the right choice. Rachel had bloomed like never before when she finally found a home with Kurt and Jan Miller. She had been thriving in school, had friends, played the flute in the marching band. She even had a boyfriend, Cody, whom she would later marry.

The Millers had been wonderful to Jess’s sister, giving her a safe, supportive home to finish high school. They loved Rachel and she loved them.

Even after she married Cody, Rachel had stayed part of their family. Jess knew Rachel’s children considered them their grandparents and wrote to them weekly on their church mission working at a South American orphanage.

She couldn’t blame her sister for making the mature choice to stay in a stable home here in Cape Sanctuary instead of leaving it all behind to live in a crappy studio apartment in a bad neighborhood in Sacramento.

Any sane person would do the same.

It still hurt.

When they had been separated after that first miserable foster care experience, Rachel had sobbed and sobbed, worse than the night their parents had died. Jess had vowed she would figure out a way for them