Page 22 of Nailed

“Your story just broke my heart,” she said.

“That’s why I’m so passionate about getting more women into trades. So we can do whatever work we choose in a supportive environment.”

“I’m going to talk to my daughters about trades alongside other college options,” the woman said.

The crowd cheered, and my heart sang.

I turned back to Sam, one of the few men in the crowd. “How about you, Sam?” I’d been so happy to see his face in the front row when I first stepped up to the podium.

Sam stood. “I’ll remember what you said about male allies. That we need to step in when we hear other men saying stuff on the job we’d never say to our wives and sisters and girlfriends.”

“Woo!” Several women cheered to that, and several more looked at him like he was some kind of hero for being there with all of them. I would have rolled my eyes, but I knew Sam was being genuine. He was an antidote to dicks everywhere.

I made my closing remarks, and when I was done, the crowd’s applause filled the room. Just like Jamie said, I was swarmed with women telling me how my talk had inspired them, how they were going to go back to work next week thinking about how they could be a part of the change they wanted to see. My stack of Heartbreaker Trades flyers disappeared fast. Several executives handed me their cards, too, telling me if I was ever looking for new opportunities to call them. One in particular offered me a job on the spot—a gorgeous woman in an expensive cream-colored suit and a sweep of dark hair in a chignon who introduced herself as Natasha from Empire Building in Charlotte.

“I’m not going to beat around the bush, Sarah. I’ve been looking for precisely this type of innovative thinking at Empire. I’m creating a new role focused on encouraging young women to join the building industries. Do you know about us? We build everything from eco-yurt villages to skyscrapers, focusing on sustainable materials and ethical employment practices.”

“You’re speaking my language,” I said, trying to keep my cool. Of course I’d heard of Empire. They were huge, and they were featured frequently in all my favorite design magazines.

Natasha handed me an embossed card thicker than a book cover. “Do you like to travel? We’d be looking for someone up for occasional travel—on our company jet, obviously. We have offices in twenty cities stateside and a burgeoning presence overseas, particularly in Europe and East Asia. Japan, primarily. Of course, our salaries and benefits are outstanding, too. The remainder of the time, you could work from home, based anywhere you like.”

I was stunned. I didn’t think I’d ever heard “Japan, primarily” uttered in a sentence, least of all from someone in a position to hire me and send me there. And I thought about that image I’d had this morning of living somewhere quiet and peaceful, waking up to birdsong. Somewhere I could have a workshop, too. I didn’t know if I liked travel. I hadn’t done much of it, except around the East Coast. Richard had hated it when I went on work trips, always sure I was going to have more fun on them than I did on our annual trip to the Hoover Dam. Which I always did.

At first, all I could think to say was “great.” Then I remembered what Jamie had said last night.Do you believe in what you’re saying?

“We have some global plans for Heartbreaker,” I said, finding my voice again. I told her a few details about the longer-range plans Winona and I had been working on. Schools. Guidelines and policy for major contracting companies. Talks just like this one.

“That’s precisely why I want you, Sarah.” Natasha smiled warmly. “Unfortunately, I’m catching a plane to Zurich tomorrow morning though, so I won’t be able to chat further in person. Unless you’re able to meet first thing?”

We made arrangements to meet in the morning, then she breezed out of the room, leaving me buzzing. Luckily, the next person in line just wanted to gush about how much they loved my talk.

I was beyond humbled. It had been an amazing day.

As the crowd thinned out, I realized I’d done exactly what I came here to do: I’d killed it at my presentation, gotten a million sign-ups for Heartbreaker Trades, and, most pressingly, had job opportunities—one huge one in particular—that would take me far away from Jamie Reilly.

And yet, a cloud hung over me, dampening the joy I should have been reveling in.

It didn’t matter that he hadn’t shown up; I’d gotten what I needed from him last night. In fact, he was the one who’d knocked my success into the stratosphere. I should have thanked him.

People lingered into the break, and it was fifteen minutes before the crowd finally began to thin. Just as I was heading to the table to collect my things, a woman came up, smiling. I braced myself to chat—I was exhausted and just wanted to head back to my room to process everything.

But I lit up when I saw who it was. “Ellie!” I exclaimed, genuinely delighted to see an old friend. Ellie James was a petite, slightly curvy woman with tan skin, a mess of curly brown hair, and big brown eyes with thick black lashes. She and I had been the only women working at a big contracting firm in our early twenties—me as a carpenter and her as an electrician, and we’d become close friends. But she’d been fired shortly after she discovered she was pregnant. The company staunchly denied it was because of her condition, and lawyers said she didn’t have a case because she hadn’t told anyone—except the father of her child, one of the company’s executives. I’d quit in solidarity, and we moved to a new town a few months later. We weren’t as close as we used to be, but kept in touch a bit over social media.

I gave her a hug that was maybe a bit too long, because she pulled away and said, “Honey, are you okay?”

“Fine,” I said, my voice slightly wobbly. “Just tired.”

“Are you sure?” She held my shoulders and inspected me.

I looked up, willing myself not to get emotional. “Just a little overwhelmed.”

“No shit! Did I just see the VP of Empire Building hand you a card?” Ellie was agog.

“She offered me a job.”

Ellie beamed. “You deserve it, Sarah. You’ve worked your ass off to get here, and that was an incredible talk. I’m so glad it replacedMulti-unit Wood Frame Development.”

I let out a big, tension-loosening laugh. “Hey, I would have gone to that! And Seamus is awesome. But when he bowed out, I figured there were enough talks on that kind of thing. So, y’know, I risked pushing my own personal agenda.”

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