Five Stolen Rings

Chapter 21

STELLA

Vowing to find a new job is much easier than actually finding one.

I don’t know where to look, for starters. I never thought I would move back to Lucky, Colorado, but now that I’m here…I don’t hate it.

So do I find a job here? Do I look back in California? Do I try a different part of the country completely?

There are a lot of decisions to make before I actually upload a resume.

And that’s another thing—any future employer is going to ask why I left Smith and Sons. What do I say?

“Tell them the truth,” India says in a scathing voice when I ask her. “That the skeevy son of the company’s founder hit on you and?—”

“No one is going to believe that story,” I cut her off, sighing.

After telling Jack what happened at Smith and Sons, it was somehow easier to tell India, too. She immediately put the company on her blacklist—not that she ever would’ve had business with them anyway—and she’s been scowling all afternoon, especially after I filled her in on all the other things that have happened too, like the eggnog disaster.

“I’m just saying,” she says now. The pompom on her knitted beanie flops back and forth as she shakes her head. “I’d throw him under the bus first chance I got.”

I can’t stop my smile. “And I love you for that.” Then I lean back in my seat, a deck chair on the back side of the house India shares with her sisters. We’re out here even though it’s snowing, because as much as I love the Marigold women, I really don’t want an audience—not when I’m feeling so tangled and confused.

I’m going to get a migraine if my ears get too cold out here, but I don’t want to move yet.

“Indy,” I say abruptly. “I think?—”

“Hmm?” she says, her eyes on the snow she’s smoothing over with her boots as she sits in the chair next to mine.

Say it, I tell myself. Put it out in the universe and let it blossom. “I think I might like Jack.”

“I think you definitely like Jack,” she says matter-of-factly, and I look at her, stunned.

“What?”

“I think you like him,” she repeats. Then she turns to me, abandoning the snow patterns she’s been making with her feet. “I mean, look, Stell, I’m not a relationship expert,” she says, tucking a few strands of her red hair behind her ear. “But your eyes do this thing when you talk about Jack where even if your mouth is frowning or scowling, your eyes get really big and bright and excited. So…” She shrugs. “I figured you probably had a thing for him.”

And for a moment, all I can do is gape at her, until she laughs.

“Come on,” she says. “This can’t possibly be news to you.”

“It’s not news , but—I’m not even sure I do like him. I just think I could. Maybe.”

And I feel like a teenager again, sitting here with my best friend, having a conversation about boys and who likes who.

“Well, does he have feelings for you?” India says. Her voice is practical, reasonable, and it’s one of my favorite things about her, especially when I’m feeling flustered or confused; she’s always level-headed and logical.

“I don’t know,” I say with a sigh.

“You’ve kissed,” India points out. “Twice. Isn’t that what you said earlier?”

“We have,” I say, and I’m suddenly grateful for the cold, because my face warms just thinking about it. “But I got the sense that he was kissing me against his better judgment or something.” It hurts to admit. “I think he likes me on some level. But I also don’t think he knows what he wants.”

India wrinkles her nose, and I nod.

“Yeah. Exactly,” I say with a snort. “I don’t want to get involved with that situation.” I pause and then speak again. “Can I tell you something, though?”

“Obviously,” India says. “Tell me anything. Everything. All the things.”

I watch the flurries around us as they fall lazily to the ground, listen to the faint sound of cars on the main road in the distance. It feels monumental, speaking these words out loud .

“I think,” I say slowly, “or at least I’m pretty sure…the phone call was Jack.”

For a second, India just blinks at me; I see the exact moment she catches on to what I’m talking about, because her eyes widen.

“ The phone call?” she says, the words rushing out of her. “The one after the earthquake?”

“That one,” I say with a nod.

Her jaw drops. “How do you know?”

I lean back in my chair and cross my legs. “Jack has a friend that went to Windsor with us—Benny. He was at the brunch I sort of crashed”—India’s nose wrinkles with dislike—“and he mentioned it. He was pretty tipsy, but he was definitely lucid. I forgot he said it at first, but I’ve remembered.”

More specifically, I remembered last night, halfway through hanging all the gaudy ornaments on Maude Ellery’s Christmas tree—and halfway through my conversation with Jack. There was a sparkly martini ornament, which made me think about my unfortunate eggnog incident, which made me think about what happened at Petit Déjeuner. It came back then, what Benny said—and I was shocked to realize I wasn’t even surprised.

I think part of me has known it was Jack, even when he said it wasn’t.

I haven’t told India what else Benny said— Jacky was obsessed with this girl— because I don’t know what to make of it yet.

What I do know is that something an awful lot like excitement flooded through me when those memories returned. I was excited to learn that Jack was the one who’d called me, and I think I would have been disappointed to learn it wasn’t him after all .

“Have you told him?” India says now, and I shake my head.

“No,” I say. “I kind of want to see if he’ll tell me himself.” I don’t explain further than that, and India must be able to sense I don’t want to, because she doesn’t ask.

I don’t know what I would say, anyway. I just know that if Jack tells me himself that he made that phone call, it will mean something.

“What are you going to do, then?” India asks instead. “With Jack, I mean.”

“I’m going to be the best friend he’s ever had,” I say, a little smile curling over my lips. “I will be perfectly friendly. He can see if he’s happy with that, or if he wants more.” I take a deep breath and then let it rush out of me in a gust. “And in the meantime, I guess I’ll start applying for jobs.”

“Here?” India says quickly, jerking her head so suddenly toward me that her hat slouches down over her forehead. She pushes it up, looking impatient. “Because you could totally move in with us if you need somewhere else to stay. Jules and I share a room, but I bet?—”

“I’m not living with you and your sisters,” I cut her off, laughing. “But…” I shrug, looking around their backyard—at the little clump of trees, the snowy lawn, the flakes still falling from the sky. “I have to admit, I do like Lucky. And I think I would like it a lot more if I had a job somewhere other than my parents’ market.”

“You would,” India says with a nod, her voice matter-of-fact again. “It would be very different, and if you got your own place, you would like it even more.” Then she flashes me her most winsome smile. “ Please stay here. I want to live in the same town as my best friend. ”

I smile back at her as something like affection blooms warm and bright in my chest. “I’ll see what I can do.”

STELLA

Even though Jack and I said we wouldn’t talk every day, I answer his call when my phone rings later that evening.

“Yes?”

“So…I need to tell you something.” His voice is grim, so different from what I’m expecting that my heart drops. I sit up straighter, propping up my pillow behind me and setting my book on the bedspread.

“Okay,” I say as my pulse picks up speed. “But you’re making me nervous.”

“Yeah, well,” he says. “In light of our new, official friendship”—he puts faint stress on the word—“it feels dishonest to keep this to myself.”

My eyes narrow as I’m struck by a sudden suspicion. “Did you take the rings?”

He clears his throat. “Maybe.”

“ Jack! ” I throw the covers off, trying to untangle my legs. “I’m reading in bed; I will be?—”

“Ah,” he cuts me off, and I can hear the grin tugging at his lips in that one syllable. “I’m flattered, Princess, but don’t you think it’s a little soon for us to be chatting from our beds?”

“ Friends , Jack,” I grit out even as heat tries to creep into my cheeks. “Don’t flirt.” I kick the rest of the covers off and hurry out of bed.

“Sorry,” he says after a beat of silence, sounding disconcerted. “Won’t happen again.”

Sad.

“I’m coming to you. I want to see the rings, and then we are going to put them back. I will watch you place them exactly where you found them. Understood?”

“See, it’s not that I don’t understand,” he says evasively. “I just think we could come up with a better plan?—”

“Ten. Minutes,” I say as I hurry around my little basement unit, grabbing my keys and my wallet and shoving my feet into the nearest shoes on my shoe rack. “Maude is coming back tomorrow , Jack. We’re taking the rings back now. ”

And nine minutes later, I’m thumping my hand on his door with more force than necessary.

It opens after the a few seconds, swinging wide to reveal a not-at-all-penitent Jack; he doesn’t even have the decency to look ashamed of himself. His gaze just skates up and down my body before his face twists into an expression of disapproval.

“What are you wearing?” he says, stepping back and gesturing for me to enter. “Good grief, Princess. At least put on a coat.”

“I sort of just hurried out as fast as possible,” I admit with a shiver as I close the door behind me and then toe my flip-flops off.

Jack shakes his head, looking irritable. “Come here,” he says—and the next thing I know, his hands are on my shoulders, tugging me close.

His arms band around me as my body collides with his, firm and muscular and warm. He rubs his hands up and down my bare arms, his breath hot against my ear as he speaks.

“Little icicle,” he mutters. “Don’t you have to be smart to be an architect?”

“Just about as smart as a doctor who broke into someone’s house,” I say, pushing him away. “Friends don’t touch each other like this.”

For a second he just glares at me, his hands clenching into fists at his sides. “Fine,” he finally says. Then he turns around and disappears down the hallway by the kitchen—the hallway I now know leads to his bedroom. He returns one minute later holding a hoodie.

“Here,” he says, tossing it to me.

I slip it over my head gratefully. It falls to my mid-thighs, just covering my pajama shorts; Jack stares for a second, a muscle jumping in his jaw, before he shakes his head.

“Nope,” he says under his breath as he eyes my bare legs. “No good.” He storms back down the hall and comes back once again, this time throwing a pair of sweats at me.

I’m not going to complain. I pull them on and tie them tight.

These clothes smell like him, spearmint and something sharp; it’s a smell that’s always felt like home to me. I pull up the neck of the sweatshirt and inhale deeply. Then I let go and nod.

“All right,” I begin, but I fall silent at the look on Jack’s face. It’s a soft expression, one he rarely displays—a private little smile, eyes full of humor, like he’s enjoying a joke only he understands.

It’s the same expression he wore when he told me I was delightful after I removed myself from his stupid bedroom window, and it does things to the butterflies in my chest. They flutter madly, swoop and dive and soar?—

And I like him. I really, genuinely like this man. I think I could even love him, in time.

So I inhale deeply and then speak. “You are not looking at me like a friend looks at another friend,” I say, dropping the words into the space between us.

That soft expression vanishes, replaced by a furrow in his brow. “I know,” he says, his voice musing, unsettled, as he eyes me. He folds his arms, still taking me in, and he almost seems to be thinking out loud as he goes on, “I can’t quite seem to help it.”

“Try harder,” I say. I fold my arms too, leaning back against the front door. “Or admit that while we might not be lovers, we’re not just friends, either.” I raise one brow at him, challenging. “Am I wrong? Are your feelings for me purely platonic?”

His shoulders fall, and he runs one hand down his face. “No,” he says, exhaling the word. “They’re not.”

I let my gaze flit over him—the sag of his body, the circles under his eyes. Rather than pressing the issue, I change the subject. It’s enough for now that he’s acknowledged this truth. “You look tired,” I say softly.

He huffs a laugh and runs one hand through his hair. “I’m always tired, Princess.”

My answering nod is slow. Then I tilt my head. “Tell me what happened.”

His eyes jump to mine, and I know that he understands—that while to anyone else this might appear out of the blue, it’s not at all. He senses, like I do, that we’ve reached a rare moment when the time is right for this conversation. We’re alone, we’re quiet, we’re stripped down to our deepest selves. We’re not flirting or joking or bantering or arguing. We’re simply two people who used to be close, existing in the same place at the same time.

“Tell me,” I say again, straightening up now. I force the words out even though I know the answer will hurt. “I know I said something or did something, so tell me. Tell me where we went wrong back then.”