Which was the oddest thing to admit as I’d never felt cherished, even when delivering fashion-changing designs and bringing the Weaver name to even greater heights. No, that wasn’t true. I felt beyond loved and adored by my father and brother, but it’d been the everyday reporters, models, and shop owners that’d made my career a hardship.
Away from the toil of work, I found no drive to return. No urge to create.
It was scary to have that part of my identity taken away but refreshing and almost medicinal, too.
Bizarre to say, the same men who’d licked me had somehow become my...friends. I didn’t know how, but I did know I healedfaster because of their friendship and found sanctuary for my heart.
Just like Kestrel had said I would.
Just like Cut had said I’d be welcomed into his house. I should’ve been colder, less easy to win over, but I was tired of overthinking everything and peering around corners for the next trick.
There was only so much fear a person could live with before the brain gave up and accepted.
The days stretched unnervingly...normal. If I wasn’t in Kes’s saloon, I was wandering down pristine corridors full of priceless artwork and tapestries. I strolled in gardens surrounded by manicured hedges and even took a nap beneath the dappling leaves of an apple tree in the orchard.
Not one person stopped me from entering a room or leaving. Not one person raised their voice or gave me any reason to fear.
If I bumped into a man dressed in leather and stomping in fierce-looking boots, he would smile and ask after my health. If I bumped into Cut heading to a meeting, he would bow and smile cordially, continuing on his way as if I had total right to be sneaking about his home.
The only person I didn’t bump into was Jethro.
It was as if he’d disappeared, and with his disappearance went my torment.
I began to wonder if I’d been forgotten.
Not forgotten.
Justforgiven...
They’ll never forgive.
I had to admit the Hawks were diabolically clever. With their welcome came a relaxation I would never have found if I wasn’t permitted to explore on my own. A self-centred acceptance that only came from settling into a new environment with no duress.
I truly felt a part of their household. As sick and as twisted as it seemed.
By the end of fourteen days, with nothing to keep me occupied but reading and exploring, inevitably, my mind turned to what it had always known.
Sewing.
Not designing under pressure or rushing to deliver the next big thing.
Just sewing.
The epicentre of my craft.
I commandeered a writing pad, thanks to interrupting a business meeting. The lined paper only lasted me a day before I hunted Kes down and requested a sketchpad with no lines. The moment he’d given me one, I couldn’t stop the drive to draw, to pluck the rapidly forming ensembles from my mind and transcribe to paper.
That evening, Kes had four additional sketchpads delivered to my room.
I found the passion I’d lost with overworking and stress. Enjoyment and creativity came back with a vengeance. My hands turned black with lead from sketching well into the night. The pages became littered with rainbows and the barbaric sensuality of diamonds. I embraced a carnal wardrobe of want and inhibitions, creating my most daring collection to date, pulling ideas from my imagination like silver threads, splashing them onto the paper thanks to my trusty pencil.
When my mind was blank of artistic drive, I would turn to the large volume of Weaver history and read my ancestors’ scattered thoughts and notations. I wasn’t gullible enough to write things of importance—the Hawks would only read it. A diary was the window into someone’s soul, and I had no intention of them seeing into mine.
But I did scribble two questions.
Where the hell is Jethro?
What weapons are best used against ice? A chisel or a candle?
