Chesapeake Blue
Page 23

"No, and why do you assume I went to a private school for girls?"
"Oh, sugar, it's all over you." He stepped back, nodded at the canvas. "Yeah, and it looks good on you." He reached forward, softened a line of charcoal with his thumb before he looked over at her. "You want to call this a sitting or our second date?"
"Neither." It took every ounce of will, but she didn't cross over to look at what he'd drawn.
"Second date," he decided, as he tossed the charcoal aside, absently picked up a rag to clean it off his hands. "After all, you brought me flowers."
"A plant," she corrected.
"Semantics. You really want the painting?"
"That would depend on how much really wanting it jacks up the price."
"You're pretty cynical."
"Cynicism is underrated. Why don't you give me your representative's name? Then we'll see." He loved the way that short, sleek hair followed the shape of her head. He wanted to do more than sketch it. He needed to paint it.
And to touch it. To run his hands over that silky, dense black until he'd know its texture in his sleep.
"Let's do a friendly trade instead. Pose for me, and it's yours."
"I believe I just did."
"No. I want you in oil." And in watercolors. In pastels.
In bed.
He'd spent a great deal of time thinking about her over the last few days. Enough time to have concluded that a woman like her—with her looks, her background—would be used to men in active pursuit. So he'd slowed things down, deliberately, and had waited for her to take the next step. To his way of thinking, she had. In the form of a houseplant.
He wanted her personally as much as he wanted her professionally. It didn't matter which came first, as long as he got both. She shifted her gaze to the painting again. It was always a pleasure, and a bit of a shock, when he saw desire in someone's eyes when they looked at his work. Seeing it in Dru's he knew he'd scored, professionally.
"I have a business to run," she began.
"I'll work around your schedule. Give me an hour in the mornings before you open when you can manage it. Four hours on Sundays."
She frowned. It didn't seem like so very much, when he put it like that. And oh, the painting was gorgeous. "For how long?"
"I don't know yet." He felt a little ripple of irritation. "It's art, not accounting."
"Here?"
"To start, anyway."
She debated, argued with herself. Wished she'd never seen the damn painting. Then because it was a foolish woman who made any agreement without looking at all the terms, she walked to the easel, around the canvas. And studied her own face.
She'd expected something rough and, well, sketchy, as he'd taken no more than fifteen minutes to produce it. Instead, it was detailed and stunning—the angles, the shadows, the curves. She looked very cool, she decided. A bit aloof and so very, very serious. Cynical? she thought and gave in to the smile that tugged at her mouth.
"I don't look particularly friendly," she said.
"You weren't feeling particularly friendly."
"Can't argue with that. Or with the fact that you have an amazing gift." She sighed. "I don't have a dress with a long, full skirt and a sleeveless top."
And he grinned. "We'll improvise."
"I'll give you an hour tomorrow. Seven-thirty to eight-thirty."
"Ouch. Okay." He walked over, took the painting from the wall, held it out to her.
"You're trusting."
"Trust is underrated."
When her hands were full, he took her arms. He gave her that slight lift again, brought her to her toes. And the door swung open.
"Nope," Seth muttered as Cam strode in. "They never knock."
"Hi, Dru. Kiss the girl on your own time, kid. I don't smell any coffee." Obviously at home, he went toward the kitchen, then spotted the canvas. His face lit with pure delight. "Easiest fifty I ever made. I bet Phil Seth here would talk you into posing before the week was up."
"Oh, really?"
"No offense. Rembrandt here wants to paint something, he finds a way. He'd be a fool to pass up the chance to do that," he added, and the look on his face when he studied the canvas again was so filled with pride, she softened. "He's a pain in the ass half the time, but he's no fool."
"I'm aware of the pain-in-the-ass factor. I'll reserve judgment on whether or not he's a fool until I get to know him better. Seven-thirty," she said to Seth on her way out. "That's A.M." Cam said nothing, just laid a beat with an open hand on his heart.
"Kiss ass."
"So, are you going to paint her, or poke at her?" Cam hooted out a laugh at Seth's vicious snarl. "What goes around comes around, kid. You spent a lot of time being disgusted at the idea of us poking at girls—as you put it—not so long ago."
"Since it is more than fifteen years that's not so long ago in your mind, it proves you're really getting old. Sure you should go up on the roof? Might have a spell up there and fall off."
"I can still kick your ass, kid."
"Sure. With Ethan and Phil holding me down, you might have a shot at taking me." He laughed when Cam caught him in a headlock. "Oh man, now I'm scared."
But they both remembered a time he would have been, when a skinny, smart-mouthed young boy would have frozen with terror at a touch, rough or gentle.
Knowing it, remembering it, Seth nearly blurted out the trouble he was keeping so tightly locked in the far corner of his mind. No, he'd handled it, he told himself. And would handle it again, if and when. HE was a man of his word. When the last of the skylights was in place, he followed Cam to the boatyard to put in a few hours.
Once, he'd thought he'd make his living here, working side by side with his brothers building wooden sailing vessels. The fact was, some of his best memories were tucked inside the old brick building, flavored with his sweat, a little blood and the thrill of learning to be a part of something. It had changed over the years. Refined, as Phillip would say. The walls were no longer bare and patched drywall, but painted a simple, workingman's white.
They'd fashioned a sort of entryway that opened to the stairs leading to Phillip's office and the second-story loft. It separated, in theory, the main work area.