"No matter where I start, I always end up with a struggle, a battle against insurmountable odds."

"Like the small boat in the huge storm in the painting on my mother's wall."

"Yes."

"I'm beginning to understand why your art is so dark."

"It comes from inside my head."

I thought about that, wondering just how dark the inside of Kade's head was. He seemed like a good guy. He'd been nothing but kind to me, but his art showed a very different side. Was he who he appeared to be?

"What about you?" Kade asked, interrupting my thoughts. "What do you do in your real life? I think you said you were sometimes a musician, but then you said something about a store."

"It's complicated."

"Is anything in your life simple?" he asked with a small, knowing smile.

"No, but it should be. I've played music my entire life. I minored in it in college. It was going to be my major, but Dani said I should be more practical. I should get a business degree with her. My dad had always made it clear that he wanted us to be responsible for ourselves. He paid for the first two years of college, and then we had to pay for the rest. It didn't seem likely that I could pay off my student loans with a music degree, so I switched."

"Interesting."

I found his one-word response to be extremely judgmental, but maybe that was because I was judging myself. "I thought I could still pursue music after I graduated, but that wasn't as easy as I'd thought it would be. A series of events sent me down a different path."

"What kind of events?"

"First, my sister got married in Carmel, and she needed my help with the wedding, so I followed her from LA to Carmel. Then she wanted to open a clothing boutique. Fashion was her passion, and she wanted me to be her partner. I didn't have any other great opportunities at the time, so I helped her open the Two Sisters Boutique."

"Appropriate name."

"She needed me to be the second sister. Everything was always supposed to be temporary, but then weeks turned into years. My sister had trouble conceiving a baby, then trouble carrying a pregnancy. She had multiple miscarriages. She was sick. She was hurting. She needed me to stay in the store, so I did."

"There's something to be said for family loyalty," he said.

"Really? You don't think I've just wasted my talent?"

"Do you think that?" he challenged.