“Please let me know if anyone else expresses interest,” Jack mutters to her as I push my way outside.

He doesn’t take my hand as we resume our walk to dinner. I expect a barrage of questions, a litany of reasons why I should lease the space, why I should push myself and go for it. But he stays quiet, letting me burrow deep into my own thoughts.

It’s exactly what I need.

We grab a table at the small pizza restaurant, ordering wine and a pie to share and not saying anything to each other until we each have a full glass of red sitting in front of us.

“How much?” I finally relent, letting the question burst from me, knowing I won’t be able to focus on anything else until I can fully write off even the remote possibility of this happening.

Jack sits back in his chair. “It’s not cheap, but it could be worse.”

“How much?” I hold up my hand and gulp down half of my wine. “Okay, now tell me.”

“You’d need at least a hundred to secure the lease for a year. Plus whatever else you’d need to spend to get the space set up how you want it.” He watches me over the rim of his glass as he takes a much smaller sip of his own wine.

A genuine smile spreads across my face. “I’m actually kind of relieved.”

His brow furrows. “You are?”

“Yeah. I mean, it’s not an unexpected number, but it’s definitely high enough that I don’t even need to think about it any further. I can’t afford anything close to that, so we can just put the whole thing to bed.” If I let myself think on it, I could start to get really pissed that he made me see the space even though I told him it was too much. Because now I know how awesome it could be. Now I’ll spend the next few weeks thinking about what kind of shelves I’d buy and how I’d create the window display.

I’ll be thinking about how gorgeous Jack’s paintings would look hanging on that stupid brick wall.

I never should’ve gone in there. But at the same time, it somehow feels like I was meant to see it.

Jack crosses his arms, leaning on the tiny table, putting his face a foot away from mine. “You do realize that number is a pittance to many investors, right? You could get that in a heartbeat, Sade.”

I purse my lips so I don’t take him to task for referring to over a hundred thousand dollars as a pittance. “I don’t want an investor, Jack. I don’t want to be beholden to anyone but myself.”