Donovans 03 - Pearl Cove

the family was gone most of the time. At the moment, her twin brothers, Justin and Lawe, were in Africa, Hannah and Archer had just gotten back from a pearl auction in Tokyo, and Jake and Honor lived outside of Seattle.
    The fun of having most of the family under one roof might have had something to do with the fact that this was the third dinnertime “summit meeting” in a row.
    And here she was, still wearing old jeans and covered with fine, mud-brown grit when she should have been cleaned up and helping to fix dinner for seven. Ten if you counted the babies.
    She would get stuck with the dishes for sure.
    With a sigh, she yanked off her dust mask and goggles. Her short blond hair stuck up every which way. Running gritty fingers through it probably didn’t help, but the nearest comb was waiting for her in her suite at the condo. The nearest bath, too. Personally, she thought the tripoli streaks on her jeans, forearms, and hands added an interesting, finger-painted effect to her entire lack of ensemble, but she knew Kyle would tease her mercilessly about reviving the Seattle Grunge look.
    Well, tonight her siblings would just have to take her as she was, dusted by polishing grit and hollow-eyed from too many late nights at work. If she hadn’t gambled and begun casting the thirteen segments of the necklace without final approval of the sketch, she never would have made the deadline. But luckily the patriarch, Davis Montegeau, had approved the sketch without any changes.
    Thank God. Davis was an indulgent future father-in-law, but he had left things until the last second. If the future bride hadn’t been Faith’s best friend in college, she would have refused the commission despite the allure of working with such fine gems—and getting to keep the smallest one as her fee. If Davis hadn’t agreed to gold rather than platinum, she wouldn’t have been able to meet the deadline at all. Platinum was the most unyielding of all the metals used in jewelry. While she worked with platinum occasionally, because nothing had its icy shine, she much preferred the various colors of gold.
    Standing, Faith took off her leather apron. Like the long wooden workbench, it bore the scars of much use. The process of creating jewelry was as grubby as the result was elegant. That was something her ex-fiancé, Tony, had never understood or wanted to understand. He was lazy by nature, so the idea of someone spending her life wearing goggles and hunched over tools that marked her hands as often as the workbench offended him. Especially when her parents were wealthy enough to carry her around on a silk pillow fringed with diamonds.
    Faith shoved aside the unhappy memories. Anthony Kerrigan was the worst mistake she had ever made. The important thing to remember was that Tony was right where he should be: in her past.
    Sooner or later, he would get the message. Then he would stop calling her and “accidentally” bumping into her. But until then . . .
    With a muttered word she reached for the phone and punched in a familiar number. Kyle answered on the second ring.
    “Sorry,” she said hurriedly. “I know I’m late. Do you want me just to lock up and come home?”
    “Alone? Not likely, sis. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”
    “It’s not necessary. I could just—”
    She was talking to herself. With a disgusted sound she hung up. She had fought having a Donovan International guard assigned to her shop, but she had lost. Part of her understood that it was a sensible precaution, if not for Tony then for the rash of muggings and burglaries that was plaguing Pioneer Square.
    But another, less sensible, part of her resented being dictated to by large, overbearing males. Even if they were her brothers instead of her bullying, ham-fisted ex-fiancé.
    “No, don’t go there,” Faith told herself through her teeth. “You already know that you made a mistake. Beating yourself up about it won’t teach you anything new.”
    Sleet spattered and clung to the windows, sliding down in streaks of winter tears. Faith watched the random trails for a few moments and thought about what life would have been like if she had found a good man to love, like her twin sister Honor had. She wondered what it would be like to hold her own child during the day and be held by a man who loved her at night.
    “Don’t go there, either,” Faith said aloud, because the silence was overwhelming.
    Maybe she would get lucky someday. Maybe she wouldn’t.