Page 8 of Between Our Hearts

“Don’t.” She stepped back. Everything felt itchy and barbed, and she didn’t want to be touched.

His arms fell to his sides as pain rippled through his eyes.

“It’shorrible. It’s horrible and it’s hollowing and . . .” Sadie felt as if her chest was cracking open. If she didn’t stop now, if she didn’t tamp down the emotions threatening to devour her, she wouldn’t survive. “It’s something I don’t want to talk about.”

He sighed. “Then I don’t know how we’re going to be able to fix this.” His arm swept between them.

A tightness pinched in her stomach. “I just can’t.”

The emptiness she felt seemed reflected on her husband’s face as he ran a hand through his hair.

Several long, extended, excruciating seconds passed in absolute stagnant silence. Her shoulder twitched as she longed for the jarring alarm bells of a surgical case gone wrong—anything besides the silence of their hearts drifting farther apart.

“I need to—” he began.

“Finish a project in the woodshop,” the whispered words were aimed at her feet.

“Sadie.” Her name sounded like pain.

She’d schooled her features before she raised her face. “I should get to bed anyway. I have a lot of things to catch up on tomorrow because I took off early today.”

Clark stared at her for two heartbeats before his shoulders dropped. “All right, love.”

She tried not to flinch at his use of her pet name. It didn’t seem like an appropriate title now.

He cautiously left their room, his footfalls sounding heavy as they descended the stairs. She tried to keep things together while she went through the business of washing her face and getting ready for bed. Only once she was tucked between the covers, her back facing Clark’s side of the bed, did she let the sorrow she’d barely kept at bay swallow her whole.

?Chapter 4?

Lottie babbled from her position in her orange jogging stroller as Clark held the three mid-sized projects under his left arm. He navigated through the crowded market straight to the black-topped canopy tent emblazoned with Thatcher Daniels’ Smithery in orange flamed lettering. Thatcher met him with a broad smile over his thick, slightly grey-streaked beard and once Clark had engaged the brakes on the stroller, a hearty handshake.

“I see you took my advice to heart.” Thatcher nodded to the collection under Clark’s arm.

Clark rotated the stack of inlaid woodwork pieces so the blacksmith could see the top one. He’d started small just to see if this was something anyone would even want, making three rectangular wall art pieces sized at eighteen inches by three feet. The top one had two chevrons coming from the right and left side near the top and the bottom of the frame with horizontal pieces filling the gaps to the point of each chevron. In between the points, he’d laid the slivers of wood at a diagonal. He’d alternated between clear pine and stained knotty hickory to create more visual interest.

This piece had been ridiculously easy, and he’d finished it in mere minutes—a design he could mass produce quickly. It was the third piece under his arm that made an unanticipated unease sweep back and forth between his shoulder blades.

“What do you think?”

Thatcher motioned for him to come around to the back of his tent. “I think I want to see the rest.”

He set the first one down against the leg of Thatcher’s U-shaped display to reveal the next—an intricate mosaic design. This one had taken him slightly more time to create.

“These are great.” Thatcher ran his hand over the smooth, finished surface. “You should talk to Robin about having your own tent.”

“You think so?” Clark asked.

“Definitely. I think you could easily sell these. And this market is one of the better ones. I’ve been at a bunch of different ones over the years that were hostile and not enjoyable to be a part of. Everyone was always jockeying for the best location or trying to steal business from other vendors. I’m too old to put up with crap like that.” He chuckled, rubbing his hand over his messy salt and pepper hair. “I just want to make things and sell them, not deal with drama.”

Clark guessed that Thatcher wasn’t a day over fifty and easily had the chest and arms that any twenty-something would envy. Even being a thirty-five-year-old who exercised almost daily, Clark couldn’t help feeling a twinge himself.

“All right.”

“How much did these cost to make?”

“Uh.” His brow pinched before he laughed. “I honestly don’t know. Most of the wood was leftover from other projects. Why?”

Thatcher grinned. “You should know the cost to help you decide pricing.”

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