Page 15

FIFTEEN

Everything felt wrong. Staying silent when everything in him screamed made Jake’s skin crawl. Being scrutinized by Hélène like he was back in his first glassblowing class and she was the toughest teacher at art school had the hair standing up on the back of his neck. And Rafe still hadn’t forgiven him for anything, not really.

“What are you doing now?” Hélène asked, moving to stand behind Rafe’s shoulder as he prepared for the next fold in the technique he and Jake had worked out.

“It’s to bring the illusion of movement to the sky,” Rafe explained. “Blocks,” he directed Jake.

Jake stepped in front of the work and applied the heavy wooden paddles they’d custom shaped to manipulate the molten glass just right and held them while Rafe turned the pipe to make the fold. It was an unconventional method, but that was the point.

“I see, I see,” Hélène said, moving to observe the whole process from Jake’s angle. “This is unique.”

Something was definitely off. The light of interest in Hélène’s eyes was a little too bright. The tension Jake felt from here wasn’t that of a top-level glass artist observing her inferiors. He could have chalked it up to intense interest and an artistic temperament. God only knew that enough people in the art world were completely bonkers, but this felt different.

“Show me again,” Hélène said with a no-nonsense nod when Rafe finally carried the finished plate to the annealer. “Something else. A bowl, perhaps? I want to see how you create a curved shape.”

“Certainly,” Rafe said, moving back to the furnace to prep for making the second piece.

Jake fought the conflicting urges that made his feet leaden and his stomach heavy as he joined Rafe by the furnace. There was a huge risk that anything he said would set Rafe off and make him think he was trying to butt in and steal his sunshine again. But he couldn’t deny his instinct that something was off.

“I’m not sure this is a great idea,” he murmured as he stood close to Rafe.

“What’s not a good idea?” Rafe asked as he slipped the blowpipe into the furnace to gather glass.

Jake glanced back to Hélène, who had gone to view the collection of their English countryside work again. His back bristled as she picked up a small vase and turned it over.

“How about making something else for her?” he asked, turning back to Rafe. “You’re brilliant at Venetian-style goblets. Why not make one of those for her?”

Just as he’d feared, anger immediately clouded Rafe’s expression. “No one on Hélène Rénard’s level was ever impressed by just a goblet.”

“I know,” Jake said, shifting from foot to foot, “but something isn’t right here.”

Rafe pulled his gather out of the furnace and moved to the marver, Jake following. “I’ve just been handed the chance of a lifetime, we’ve been handed it. One of Europe’s most renowned glass artists is here, in our hot shop, interested in our process, and you think this is a bad thing?”

The tension pulling Jake’s insides apart melted a little. “Our” hot shop. “Our” process. The idea of being a team with Rafe was everything Jake wanted and then some. But with his instincts pinging like a smoke detector that needed its battery replaced, that beautiful vision seemed just out of reach.

“I want this to be your big break, too,” he whispered, watching as Rafe moved back to gather more glass. “But one liar recognizes another liar.”

Rafe twisted to glare at him as he slipped the pipe back into the fire. “Are you accusing Hélène Rénard of being a liar?” he hissed in return, sending the woman a quick glance past Jake’s shoulder.

Jake grimaced. Yes, he was, but he had no idea how to explain his feeling. It was all gut and no evidence.

“We ran into her last night in London and less than twelve hours later, she shows up here at Hawthorne House,” he whispered. “Don’t you find that at all suspicious?”

“She wanted to come see the arts center and our work,” Rafe argued, quiet and tight. “Maybe she had another engagement this afternoon and is returning to Paris soon, so this is the only time she could fit in a visit.”

Jake let out a breath, half admitting defeat. That could be true. But every instinct he possessed said it was something more. He had to be on his guard.

“Please,” he said as Rafe moved to the marver to work and smooth the glass again. “Just make something else, a sculpture, a vase, anything.”

“No,” Rafe said. “Grab the rods.”

Jake sighed and moved away to set out the green glass rods for another English countryside piece. He didn’t want to demonstrate their technique to Hélène a second time. It felt like they were inviting trouble.

“Have you shown anyone this work yet?” Hélène asked halfway through Rafe’s efforts to make a bowl.

“Yes,” Jake lied, his heart pounding furiously against his ribs. “We still have friends in Corning. I sent them pics and had an entire conversation with the director there about the technique.”

“When was this?” Rafe demanded. Jake could practically see his anger rising again, like watching the mercury in an old thermometer.

“Um, last week,” Jake said, his stomach sinking all over again. He wasn’t supposed to be lying. The health of his relationship with Rafe depended on him being completely truthful at all times. But this particular lie felt like a matter of life and death.

“When last week?” Rafe asked, angrier still.

“It was…you were…I think….”

Shit. For once in his life, he couldn’t come up with a plausible lie. His conscience was too much in the way and Rafe was glaring at him like he’d never forgive him if he bent the truth now. It was one of those rare, frustrating occasions when the truth was the thing that would make someone like him and a lie would tangle things to the point where he wouldn’t be able to fix it.

“I meant to send pics and call Karol and tell her about it, but maybe I got distracted,” he said.

Hélène nodded, and for a brief moment, a sly smile touched her lips. “So nobody else knows about this brilliant work of yours yet.” It wasn’t a question.

Jake wanted to scream with paradoxical victory. It was suddenly as clear as day what she was up to. Even the biggest names in the art world weren’t above stealing ideas from relative unknowns. They were about to be fucked royally, and Rafe was so eager to please and make a name for himself that he couldn’t see it.

When Rafe needed him, Jake slipped into place to work the glass with him. For a few agonizing seconds, Jake thought about messing up the piece on purpose. It would throw Hélène off the scent, but it would also reek of all the things he’d done in Corning to upstage Rafe and ruin his chances with Hero Yoshito. He couldn’t do that again, not if he wanted to have any chance at a future with Rafe.

He could only stand there, helping when Rafe needed help, and letting Hélène watch every step of their technique. He just knew she was taking notes in her head. His only hope at that point was that she’d forget a step or two in the process and be unable to replicate it in her own studio. As far as he could tell, she wasn’t writing notes and she didn’t have her phone up to record and document the process.

They were just about done with the bowl when Janice stepped into the hot shop, looking fresh and happy.

“Yoo hoo,” she said, looking straight at Hélène. “I’ve come to see how everything is going and to tell you Robert and I have prepared a picnic for you in the rose garden.”

“That sounds fantastic,” Jake said, hoping beyond hope that the more time she spent around Hélène, the more Janice would see the woman as the fraud he was certain she was.

“Everything is going splendidly,” Hélène said, stepping away from where Rafe was ready to take the bowl off the pipe and transfer it to the annealer. “Your son is exceptionally talented.”

“Rafe is a wonder,” Janice agreed, batting her eyelashes at Hélène as Hélène moved to retrieve her bag. “His technique is so innovative and his glassware is beyond compare.”

“Thank you for saying that,” Janice said, beaming. “We’ve always prided ourselves on the exceptional talents of our children. Robert and I have raised them to be free spirits, just as the two of us are.”

Rafe grunted as he stood to take the bowl to the annealer. Under any other circumstances, Jake would have found Rafe’s discomfort at the way his mom flirted hilarious.

He followed Rafe to the annealer, but before he could express his concerns again, Rafe turned to him and snapped, “What? Are you here to tell me you think my mum is a corporate spy and that she’s planning to sell the plans for this hot shop to your FBI or something?”

Frustration pounded through Jake, burrowing into his head for the beginnings of a headache. “No,” he said. “I just want you to be careful. That’s all. I care about you and I want you to be careful.”

“Is that so?” Rafe shut the annealer and walked away, pulling off his gloves and goggles.

“Hélène and I are just going to head up to the garden, dear,” Janice called from where she and Hélène were already halfway out the door. “We’ll meet the two of you there once you sort this out.” She gestured around the hot shop, but Jake was certain she was talking about the two of them.

“Alright,” Rafe called after them, returning to his workbench. “We’ll be there shortly.”

Jake raised a hand to wave and smiled weakly. As soon as they were gone, he rushed to catch up to Rafe.

“Please, Rafe,” he said. “Get rid of her as fast as you can.”

Rafe pivoted to glare at him. “First you dangle the possibility of an assistantship with Hélène over my head as some sort of prize for marrying you. Now you’re telling me to run away from her as fast as possible? What next? Will you decide against the UK after all and chase after Hélène so you can get a French visa?”

The accusation hurt enough to blast Jake’s thoughts in a different direction.

“I want to be here with you,” he said, raising his voice. “Screw the visa. All I care about is being with you and keeping you safe. No one has ever made me feel the way you do, Rafe. Yes, I want to stay here, and yes, I need to marry you to do that. But I want to marry you. I want to work with you and sleep with you and spend the rest of my life here with you. But I’d give that all up in a heartbeat if it meant I could keep you safe from a liar and cheat.”

“What, like you?” Rafe asked.

It hurt. It hurt even more when Rafe walked past him toward the door. He was so eager to get away from him that he wasn’t even going to clean up his hot shop.

Jake did the work for him, moving quickly through the shop to put away tools and to secure the furnace. He’d never worked so fast to secure things and he’d probably done a shit job of it, but it was more important to protect Rafe than to have a clean shop.

By the time he caught up with Rafe in the rose garden, the picnic was already underway. Most of the Hawthorne family was there, including Nick and Bax with the kids.

“I never wanted children,” Hélène said, her nose turned up as she leaned away from where Macy was making a mess of her lunch. “They are a distraction and they are too messy for me.”

“I never thought I would enjoy children either,” Rafe said, his focus completely on Hélène to a degree that made Jake nauseated. “But I love Jordan and Macy and I would give my life for them.”

Jake let out a breath of relief as he sat on the edge of the blanket, close to Rafe. At least Rafe hadn’t been completely bewitched by the Frenchwoman.

Interestingly, Janice seemed cooler towards Hélène now than she’d been just half an hour before. “I raised seven children and was surrounded by their cousins as well through all of their childhoods. There is nothing in my life that I’m prouder of than my family.”

“And what about you, Jake?” Hélène asked, turning to him with a cold, imperious air. “What do you think of children?”

“I….” Jake glanced at Rafe, instinctively trying to gauge his mood so that he could figure out what he wanted to hear. Rafe was clearly still angry with him, though, which made it feel like he couldn’t win no matter what he said. “I’ve never really given it much thought,” he said at last, trying to smile at Hélène.

“You seem to give everything else a great deal of thought,” Rafe muttered as he picked up a sandwich from his plate. “One might call it overthinking.” He stared hard at Jake as he bit the sandwich.

The coil of frustration pulled tighter in Jake’s gut. He couldn’t win no matter what he did. If he was charming and fun he was stealing focus and getting in the way. If he was honest and careful, he was overthinking and trying to spoil Rafe’s good thing.

He did the only thing he could think that might possibly help. He turned to Hélène and asked, “So, what are you working on these days, Hélène?”

It felt like the right track, especially when everyone in the family turned to Hélène with interest.

“Oh, you know, this and that,” Hélène said, gesturing to brush the question away. She flushed slightly and avoided everyone’s gazes.

“But surely you must have some exciting new collection in process,” Jake pressed. “Your last new exhibit was last summer, wasn’t it?”

“It was,” Hélène said, narrowing her eyes at him.

“Undoubtedly, you have something new in process,” Jake went on. “Are you working on a conceptual piece or something more practical?”

“Jake,” Rafe hissed, his face pink with irritation.

“Is there a meaning behind these questions?” Hélène asked, sitting straighter and looking offended. “Are you making some sort of accusation?”

Jake nearly gasped in triumph. No one who was completely innocent reacted with so much offense to a simple question about their work.

His buzz was dampened a moment later when Rhys Hawthorne said, “Come on, Jake. There’s no need to give the woman a hard time.”

Just like that, Jake was back to feeling like a hunted animal in the crosshairs of someone’s family.

“I don’t understand why she can’t answer the question,” he said. “Unless she has no ideas of her own and has come looking for them somewhere else.”

“What are you saying?” Hélène snapped. She brushed crumbs from her lap and stood. “Are you making accusations?”

“I might be,” Jake said, standing as well.

“Please, sit,” Robert appealed to them, distress lining his face. “This is meant to be a friendly picnic.”

“Friendly? Ha!” Hélène barked. “I have been insulted.”

“Jake didn’t mean it,” Rafe said, standing and looking like he would step between Jake and Hélène to physically avert a fight. “We were out late last night and I’m sure he’s just tired.”

Jake’s eyebrows lifted incredulously as he stared at Rafe. “I’m trying to help you,” he said.

“I will go now,” Hélène said, picking up her bag from the grass and carefully slinging it over her shoulder. “I have not been so insulted in years.”

“Please don’t go,” Robert said. He started to stand, but Janice put a hand on his leg to stop him. “I’m sure we can sort this.”

“Jake should be the one to go,” Rhys said. “He’s the one being inhospitable.”

“Maybe that would be a good idea,” Nick agreed, wrestling a wailing Macy into his arms. “The kids are upset.”

Jake wanted to protest that he had nothing to do with that since he’d just arrived, but it seemed futile. He’d been a fool to get comfortable with the Hawthorne family. Families had always turned on him, starting with his own. He had to protect himself. It was him against the world, just like it always had been, and as usual, he was losing.

He was about to open his mouth and invent some elaborate story custom-designed to turn the Hawthornes against Hélène when Rafe raised his hands and said, “Jake isn’t going anywhere. He’s just being curious and cautious.”

It was like finally being able to breathe after being underwater for a long time. So much so that he didn’t know what to say.

“This whole thing has been blown out of proportion,” Rafe went on, shifting to stand closer to Jake. “Hélène, I am grateful for your interest in our work and I look forward to working more with you in the future. Today hasn’t been the best day for a visit since Jake and I were out late last night and neither of us are in best form today. I understand if you need to leave.”

Hélène looked slightly appeased. She shrugged her free shoulder, hugged her bag, and said, “I have to return to Paris this afternoon anyhow.”

“It was wonderful to have you here,” Janice said, her smile not quite as enthusiastic as it was earlier as she stood. “Do you need someone to show you to your car?”

“That would be lovely,” Hélène said with a smile. Now she was the one flirting with Janice. Jake would have given anything to know what the conversation between the two women had been like when he and Rafe had been bickering.

A round of goodbyes was said which seemed tenser than it should have been and unsettled the kids, and then Janice and Hélène walked off.

“I’m not sure that went well,” Rhys said, giving Jake the side-eye as they all sat down again.

“Everything is fine,” Rafe grumbled. “Don’t worry about it.”

Everything was not fine and the rest of the Hawthorne family seemed to know it. They continued with the picnic, but it was the least fun and most fraught picnic Jake had ever been to. He could barely eat his sandwich as he sat silently by Rafe’s side. Neither of them said a word to each other, but Jake felt like there was so much that needed to be said.

He glanced at the corner of the house, waiting for Janice to come back and dreading what might happen if Hélène was still with her for some reason. Hélène was gone, but Jake still felt the threat that the woman represented. If she tried to hurt Rafe in any way, Jake didn’t care how big of a name or how important she was, he would bring her down.