around for you to decide you want to try a loveless marriage again? So I can bake you another cake? Maybe I’ll help the bride pick out her dress this time, because, hey, I’m always here to do whatever you need done, right?”
“Does it bother you? The thought of another woman marrying me? Then you marry me.” He reached behind him and took the ring off the desk, holding it out to her, his hand shaking. “Marry me. And stay.”
She recoiled, her stomach tight, like she’d just been punched. “For what purpose, Zack? So I can be the wife you don’t love? Your stand-in for Hannah, different woman, same ring. Doesn’t matter, right? You’re still doing it. You’re trying to keep me from leaving, trying to keep control. You’ll even marry me to keep it. That’s not what I want.”
He took her hand in his, opened it, tried to hand her the ring. She pulled back. “Don’t,” she said, her voice breaking. “Don’t. I’m going to clean my desk out now.”
“Clara.”
Zack watched as she turned away from him and walked out his office door, closing it sharply behind her. Everything was deathly silent without her there, his breath too loud in the enclosed space. The ring too heavy.
Had he truly done that? Offered her Hannah’s ring? Begged her to marry him just so she would stay?
He had. She had gone anyway and there had been nothing he could do to make her stay. All of his control, all of his planning, hadn’t fixed it. He had lost the one person in his life who had given things meaning.
He’d been pretending, from the moment he’d met Clara, that she was only his friend. Only one thing. Because he’d known she could very easily become everything. How had he not realized that she’d been everything from day one?
Pain crashed through him, a sense of loss so great it stole the breath from his lungs.
His chest pitched sharply, his body unable to take in air.
He dropped the ring and it fell to the floor, rolling underneath his desk. He left it. It didn’t matter.
He’d just broken the only thing in his life that did matter.
Control. She spoke of his control, how he tried to control her, keep her in his life on his terms. And she was right. Because he’d known instinctively that if he ever let go of that control she would take over.
She had. His control was shattered now, laying around his feet in a million broken pieces he would never be able to reclaim.
And if finding it again meant losing Clara, he didn’t want it, anyway.
He hadn’t chosen to lose his son, it had been a tragedy, one that had painted his life from that moment forward. He’d let Clara leave, because he’d been too afraid to give. Too afraid to let his barriers down.
Because he’d been certain he couldn’t live with the kind of pain love would bring, not again. But now he was certain he couldn’t live without it. Without Clara. He loved her so much his entire being ached with it.
And if he had to lay down every bit of pride, every last vestige of control and protection to have her back, he would.
CLARA had looked at nine buildings in the space of four hours. She’d hated them all. The idea of having her own bakery … it had been so great before. But she realized now that when she pictured it, when she saw the image of a shop filled with people enjoying her cupcakes, Zack was there. At a table that she knew, in her imagination, anyway, was the one he sat at every day.
And she would come and sit with him when she took a break. And ask him what his favorite confection was. How his day had been. If he’d run in to any mimes. Because in her mind, in her heart, she’d never truly thought he would be gone from her life altogether.
The truth was, a life without him had been impossible to imagine.
In the three days since she’d walked out of Zack’s office, it had changed. She didn’t have a vision when she viewed the potential bakery locations. She saw nothing more than brick and wood. There were no visions. No warmth.
There was no Zack.
When he’d handed her the ring … the temptation to say yes had been there, and it had sickened her. That she would continue to be the void filler in Zack’s life, while she let him be her everything. It was wrong. And she knew it.
Still, a part of her wished she could go back and say yes. She despised that part of herself.
She sighed and walked up the narrow staircase that led to her apartment. She hadn’t taken the elevator in three days, either. Because it reminded her of the elevator rides with Zack, the ones rife with sexual tension. It was almost funny now.
Almost. She’d discovered a broken heart made it mostly impossible to find things funny.
When she reached her floor she walked slowly down the hall. She was exhausted, but going back to her apartment wasn’t a restful thought. Because he was everywhere there. Memories of him. On her couch, in the kitchen, most recently, in her bed.
She stopped midway down the hall, her eyes locking on the small pink and brown box placed in front of her door. She eyed it for a moment before making her way to it, kneeling down and lifting the lid.
Her breath caught in her throat when she saw the contents. Cupcakes.
The ugliest cupcakes she’d ever seen. The frosting was a garish orange, the cake a sort of sickly pale gray. There was a note tucked into the side and she took it out and unfolded it.
I know I said I don’t bake. I did, though. For you. Because it means something to you and I wanted to try it. It made me feel close to you to do it. Please don’t eat them, they’re terrible. I miss you.
Zack
She traced the letters with her fingertips, his handwriting so familiar. So dear to her. The note was scattered, funny. Sweet. She could hear him reading it to her.
A tear slipped down her cheek. “I miss you, too,” she said. “But I couldn’t let things stay the same.”
“Don’t cry. I know they’re awful, but they aren’t that bad are they?”
Clara looked up and saw Zack standing in the doorway of the elevator. He looked tired, the lines around his mouth deeper.
She wiped her cheeks. “They’re pretty bad.”
“Almost as bad as their creator.” He took a step toward her. “I’m sorry. About the other day. About the past few weeks.”
“Zack can we not do this? I don’t think. I don’t think I can.”
“Well, I can’t walk away. I won’t. So if you don’t mind me camping out here in front of your door until you’re ready, then I can wait.”
Clara crossed her arms beneath her breasts, curling her hands into fists, trying to disguise that
