She guessed that their association was coming to a close. He was completing the task he’d agreed to do, and what had she given him in return? Nothing but one friendly interaction at the hardware store.
The decent thing to do would be to pay him, except for one problem: her business was going up in flames. Yes, it was time to face facts about that. The only reason the school board hadn’t contacted her, she suspected, was that everyone was away on summer holidays. The festival gig was gone, though she still intended to be there, whether she received the rest of her payment or not. She wasn’t about to let a beloved civic event go undocumented, just because someone at city hall had their knickers in a knot.
Ethan had done his best to keep her dirty little secret hidden. It wasn’t his fault. No, the responsibility lay with her. Why, she wondered again, had she allowed those photos to jeopardize her livelihood?
Was Ethan right? Did she still secretly yearn to do the work she’d once done? But what did it matter, if she did? She swallowed, remembering her mother’s disappointment. Her grandfather’s quiet words. The looks of those people in the cafe.
Then, those grim faces were displaced by another. Ethan, as he’d looked just before he’d kissed her, right here in her office. When he’d held her and stroked her hair and told her everything would be okay. She’d felt so very safe.
Cared for.
Don’t think about that.
But like a rotating album, images floated in and out, this one of Ethan’s face in the mirror as he’d wiped blood off her chest, first caring. Then tortured. Then closed. Shut down. Like he’d made a mistake and didn’t know how to undo it.
“Shake it off, Carrie,” she told herself. Whatever seemed to have been starting with Ethan had stalled out as abruptly as her career. Which, she told herself, was probably a good thing. She couldn’t afford to get into a relationship – or whatever – with someone like him. If she had any chance of resurrecting her business, pairing up with the local recluse was hardly the way to do that.
Carrie dragged her attention back to the projections for the next quarter, trying and failing to see how she’d be able to make ends meet.
Bethany Kyle’s cancellation was proof that people were no longer willing to trust their precious memories to Forever Yours Photography. Carrie understood now that the decision hadn’t been Bethany’s, and that Bethany in fact had felt terrible about cancelling. But the fact that the girl had chosen to let Carrie think the wedding was off, rather than own up to the truth still stung.
Sadness washed over her. Why was it so difficult for young women to set the direction of their lives? Why was it so easy for others to pick up that compass, certain that their route was the safest, the smartest, the best, the only way to go?
How rarely was advice given, without benefit to the giver?
The phone rang, jostling her out of her bleak thoughts.
Not another cancellation, please.
“Forever Yours Photography. How can I help you?”
“Oh, hello. Is this Carrie?” The woman’s voice was hushed, hurried.
“I’m Carrie Logan, owner and operator. Are you looking to schedule a sitting?”
“I’m Trish,” said the woman, sounding strangled now. “I was told… that is… are you the woman who does… the goddess pictures?”
Carrie blinked. She hadn’t had a query about this in years. “I used to,” she said cautiously. “May I ask who referred you here?”
“Her name is Donna Abbott,” said Trish. “She said you might not remember her.”
Bittersweet memories washed over her.
“Of course I remember her.” Donna had been one of Carrie’s first clients and the motivation for Carrie to start Forever Yours Intimate. Donna had been preparing for a mastectomy and wanted a record of her body before surgery and radiation changed it. Carrie had been impressed by her forethought, and deeply touched to be part of her process.
After the surgery, she learned that Donna was also a clinical psychologist. Within months, Donna had sent several clients to Carrie.
But she’d made sure Donna knew that returning to Cherry Lake meant the end of all that.