that goes far beyond your talent for architecture. I’m not letting you go that easily. You want to be in Waterford?” She waved a hand at the people still milling about the town hall. His people. His town. “Fine.”
Sawyer didn’t know what to say. He just stared at her, dumbfounded. He’d been ready to give up everything to build a life in Waterford…to stay. And now Dana was telling him he might not have to give up anything at all. It seemed too good to be true.
“You have to be here while the project goes forward, anyway. Afterward, we’ll renegotiate. And I anticipate that it will go very well.” She gave him a rare, broad smile. Coming from Dana, it was all the assurance he needed. “For both of us.”
Then she patted his shoulder and walked away, finally leaving him free to find Jamie—except he still couldn’t catch a glimpse of her angelic smile or her halo of blond waves anywhere. He thought for certain she’d be busy chatting with her aunt or Lucy and Rick, who’d been making googly eyes at each other for two days straight, but the three of them stood off to the side together, watching him in a way that gave him pause.
He tucked his hands into the pockets of his suit jacket and strolled over to them, taking the bait. “Where’s Jamie?”
Anita gave a little shrug. “She’s not here.”
“Okay.” Sawyer glanced from one of them to the next. They looked like three identical cats who’d swallowed the canaries. “Where is she?”
“She told me to give you this.” Lucy pulled something from her pocket and handed it to him. A red envelope with his name written on it in Jamie’s swirling, romantic script.
He took it, tracing the distinctive handwriting with the pad of his thumb. It looked like something from Jane Austen’s day. So perfectly literary; so perfectly Jamie. “What’s this?”
“It’s a red envelope on Valentine’s Day. It’s a Valentine,” Rick said, because apparently he was an expert on romance now that he’d gotten his girl.
Sawyer laughed, shook his head and opened the envelope. It contained a square card— vintage, of course—with a single letter written in the corner. J for Jamie. He turned it over in his hands, wondering what he might be missing, but then he realized the envelope still felt weighted down by something else inside.
He turned it over, and a flash of silver fell into his palm. A single, shiny key on a sterling heart-shaped keyring. Fresh energy filled him. He felt light on his feet all of a sudden, as if maybe Olga could actually turn him into Prince Charming on the ballet stage. The key in his hand wasn’t just any key…
Jamie had given him the key to True Love, the one and only key to her heart.
He closed his fist around it, holding it tight.
Rick winked at him.
And as Sawyer all but sprinted for the door, Anita called out, “Have fun.”
He ran all the way to the bookstore, his wingtip shoes pounding the cobblestones for the entire three blocks. The moon shone high overhead, casting a soft glow over Waterford, as pink as a bouquet of cotton candy carnations—a Valentine’s moon, a moon for sweethearts. The old oak’s branches swayed as if the tree were dancing to some invisible music, and Sawyer was so hopeful, he could practically hear it. It was lilting and lovely and reminded him of the song he and Jamie had danced to at their senior prom.
That night seemed so far away now, and at the same time, it felt like yesterday. He could still remember the scent of Jamie’s bluebell perfume and how soft and delicate her tulle princess dress had felt against his palm when he slid his hand onto the small of her back. He’d felt invincible then, so full of dreams and plans for the future. How had it taken him so long to find that feeling again?
It no longer mattered. He was here now, for good. His pulse roared in his ears, and he squeezed the silver keyring so hard that when he reached the threshold of True Love Books and unclenched his fist, the shape of a heart had pressed itself into his flesh.
He stood at the door, breathless in the cold of a pine-scented, Pacific Northwest night. The windows of the shop were darkened, but flickering shadows of candlelight waltzed across the shelves of books. As he reached to slide the key into the door’s lock, he