Free Saving Sara (Redemption #1) by Nicola Marsh Page A

on the table.
    When her fingers wrapped around the solid-point tool, some of the tension in her stomach dissolved. She pulled it out of the box, staring at the state-of-the-art, electrically heated implement, whose temperature could be adjusted to produce a greater range of shades. Subtle. Bold. Various tones achieved by changing the temperature, pressure, type of wood and tool point.
    After her earlier reticence, she couldn’t wait to get started.
    Her hands drifted over the wood until she settled on a piece. Birch. And as she waited for the tool to heat, she flipped open her wallet and extracted the picture she would attempt to burn into the wood.
    Lucy, with her chin resting on her hands, smiling at the camera, fairy wings protruding over each shoulder in the background. It was Sara’s favorite picture. Whimsical and cheeky and happy. Lucy a ll over.
    Tears slid down her cheeks as she picked up the tool and swept it across the wood. Again and again and again. She didn’t stop. She couldn’t. All her pent-up helplessness and frustration and sorrow flowing through the soldering iron onto the wood until she sat back, exhausted.
    She stared at the piece of birch, stunned. She’d captured Lucy’s likeness in a way she’d never thought possible after being away from her craft so long.
    The quirk of her lips. The tilt of her head. The glint in her eye.
    Lucy .
    Drained yet exalted, she rested her forearms on the table, laid her head on top, and bawled.

12.
    I met Sara,” Jake said, helping Cilla hoist two baskets brimming with herbs onto the bench in her work shed. “What’s her story?”
    Cilla cast him a funny sideways glance as she slipped off her gardening gloves. “If she has a story, it’s hers to tell.”
    She turned her back on him, busying herself with firing up the burners to simmer or boil or do whatever she did to the herbs to make her concoctions.
    Her evasiveness piqued his curiosity. “She definitely has a story, then?”
    “Don’t we all?”
    Eager to learn more, he propped himself against the workbench so he could see his aunt’s face. “She got pretty upset when Olly asked if she had any kids he could play with.”
    Cilla dropped the pipette in her hands and it hit the bench with a clatter. “Olly was with you?”
    Jake nodded. “We were exploring the garden. He found a hole in the hedge and climbed through. I was content to let him go ’til I heard him talking to someone. When I followed, that’s the question I heard him ask and she looked like she was about to burst into tears.”
    Cilla sighed, rested her hands on the bench top and hung her head. “Sara had a daughter, Lucy, who died about a year ago. Sara’s grandm other Issy owned the place. Then Issy died last month and left the house to Sara, and she moved in earlier this week.”
    When Cilla raised her head to look at him, her sharp gaze skewered him. “That girl needs time to heal. Seeing Olly probably isn’t the best thing for her, so keep your distance.”
    Jake gaped at his aunt. Was she warning him off Sara because she sensed his hidden motives for asking questions?
    If so, then damn, she was good. Because Jake did have other reasons for asking about the ethereal blonde who had captured his attention from the moment he’d poked his head through that hedge and caught sight of her staring at Olly like she’d seen a ghost.
    Losing her daughter must’ve been tough. But the stark fear h e’d gli mpsed in her eyes spoke to other demons and he’d felt a connection . Tenuous at best, but still there, linking them in th eir . .  . sadness?
    Because that’s what he felt every day when he opened his eyes, an all-pervading sadness that tainted everything he did. Food didn’t taste the same anymore. Jogging had lost its appeal. Reading or movie marathons did little to distract. But he did them all anyway, moved through his life by rote, unable to dodge the constant guilt that gnawed away at any potential he had for