“See Jesse?”
Pain, sharp and fresh, stabbed at her heart as she said, “No, sweetie. We’re going to the day care. You can play with your friends…”
“See Jesse. Horsies.” Mac’s little mouth turned mutinous.
“We can’t, baby.”
“Mama, Jesse.”
“Jesse can’t play today, baby, so we’re just going to go to work, okay?” Please be okay with this, Jillian pleaded silently. She hoped Mac stopped looking for Jesse soon, because she hated the thought that her daughter was in as much pain as she herself was.
One tear rolled down Mac’s cheek, and Jillian scooped her up for a tight hug meant to comfort them both.
Of course, it hadn’t. How could it, when they were both missing the same man?
Sighing, Jillian went back to stacking the order of pie plates that had been delivered just that morning. For now, she was going with standard, aluminum pie plates. But one day, she wanted to invest in personalized pie tins with the name of the shop stamped on them. Then she could offer people a discount on their next pie if they brought in the used tins.
She could see just how the shop would be and Jillian really wished she was more excited about it. She’d thought about doing this for years and now that it was here, it was shadowed by the loss of Jesse.
“Stop it,” she ordered grimly. “Stop wishing and thinking and start doing.”
With that thought firmly in mind, Jillian continued stacking the plates and let her mind wander to everything else that still needed to be done. She had her tables and chairs—she’d found them at an outdoor living shop. Wrought-iron, the tables had glass tops and were just big enough for two or three people to share comfortably and the matching chairs were perfect. Getting them set up in the front of the shop had made everything feel immediate. Real. The walls were painted a cheerful pale yellow and there were baskets of flowers hanging from the ceiling in the corners of the room.
Her supplies were ordered along with the kitchen tools she’d need to make this dream a reality. Without Jesse’s help, she wouldn’t have been able to do this and she knew it. She only wished he were there to see it happen. But it seemed you could only have part of a dream.
Jillian made lists of her lists just to keep everything in order. She kept records of every penny spent on her laptop along with projections of what would need to come next. There was so much to buy, not to mention the employees she’d have to hire. But that was a worry for another day. Right now, she had to set up the kitchen just the way she wanted it.
Since Jillian was still working half days at the day care—at least until they found someone to replace her—she was able to leave Mac there while she worked at the shop.
“Thank God,” she murmured, because trying to work while keeping Mac out of trouble would have been impossible.
As she finished with the last of the pie tins, Jillian gave herself a mental pat on the back. And a second later, she heard the front door open and Lucy’s voice call out, “Hey, Jill, are you in here?”
A sinking sensation opened up in Jillian’s chest. She hadn’t spoken to Lucy since the breakup with Jesse. Avoiding her friend hadn’t been easy, but she hadn’t wanted to put Lucy in the middle. And now, she didn’t have a clue what she would say to her. But there was no way to elude Lucy today. “In the kitchen.”
Lucy bustled in, carrying a cardboard tray with two cups of coffee and a bag from the diner. She wore jeans, boots and a dark red top. Her choppy brown hair was wind ruffled and her eyes pinned Jillian. “Hi, stranger! Thought you could use a break. I brought doughnuts.”
“God, that sounds great,” Jillian admitted. She hadn’t had much of an appetite the last week, but a doughnut was always good.
“Good. Let’s go try out the new chairs and table out front.” Lucy turned around and headed out, talking as she went. “I love them, by the way. I’m devastated that I was not included in the shopping trip, but I can forgive—as long as you call me for the next excursion.”
“I know I should have called you,” Jillian admitted. “It’s just—”
Lucy set the coffees down and spread some napkins on the table before laying out the doughnuts. “No problem. Well, of course there’s a problem, but I know it’s not me. It’s undoubtedly my brother.
“Plus,” Lucy added, breaking off a piece of rainbow sprinkle doughnut and popping it into her mouth, “said brother has spent the last two days with the lovely personality of a bear with a jagged thorn in its paw. He’s infuriated so many people, all of the cowboys are avoiding him and Carlos is threatening a walkout if Jesse doesn’t stay away from the stables.”