Read Between The Lines: Business of Love 6

by Parker, Ali

  I bit my bottom lip. “Maybe.”

  “Nora!”

  “I didn’t know it was him!”

  “It didn’t occur to you that the very hot and artistic-looking dude in the most expensive suit in the place was the artist?”

  Julie covered her mouth with her hand and started giggling.

  I shot her a dark look. “It’s not funny, Julie.”

  She tried to stop and failed. “I’m sorry. It’s a little funny.”

  I groaned.

  Grace snorted. “Well maybe this will teach you a thing or two about the things you say to strangers. Lucky for you, he seems unbothered by your criticisms. But I doubt I have a shot at getting a discount now.”

  As we walked around the studio, I kept one eye on Walker, who stayed in the middle of the room near the large gold piece where he was being peppered with questions by the man in the tweed suit. The man’s wife appeared to be growing more and more irritated the longer they stood there. Presumably, her husband had his heart set on hanging the picture up in their home and she didn’t like that idea very much.

  I tried to gauge how Walker felt about selling such a piece to someone who liked it and someone who would find it a burden. I couldn’t read the expression on his face.

  I was horrified all over again when he caught me watching him.

  Walker clasped tweed-jacket man’s hand, clapped him on the shoulder, and started making his way toward me and my roommates.

  “Oh no,” I whispered. “He’s coming over here.”

  “Good, maybe you can apologize,” Grace muttered.

  All three of us turned as Walker drew up in front of us and offered us a charming smile and his hand. Julie shook it, followed by Grace, and last, he extended it to me.

  I blinked down at his hand and noticed the paint under his nails and on the inside of his wrist.

  I shook his hand. He had a warm firm grip.

  Blushing furiously, I forced myself to meet his green stare. “I’m sorry about what I said in the gallery. I was just being—”

  “Honest,” he said as he released my hand. That cheeky grin of his never left his handsome face. “It was a refreshing change of pace if I’m being honest. A guy can only take so much praise and flattery before he begins to wonder how much merit is in it or if people are just stroking his ego and blowing smoke up his ass.”

  I tried to laugh to diffuse the tension, but all that came out of me was a pitiful croak.

  Walker seemed to take pity on me because he turned his attention to my roommates. “How have you been enjoying the evening?”

  I could breathe without his gaze on me.

  “It’s been wonderful,” Grace said. “At the risk of being one of those tiresome people praising you, my friend Julie and I really love your work. Do you, um, do you sell prints or offer any pieces for your less wealthy fans?”

  “Not presently,” Walker said. Grace and Julie deflated like balloons in front of him. “But there is something in the works to get that going. That’s probably a year or so away at least. So, on that note, feel free to pick whatever you want. It’s yours for a hundred dollars. I’ll cover the balance for the charity.”

  Grace blinked at him like he’d just swept her off her feet and kissed her. “A hundred dollars?”

  Walker nodded. “Yep.”

  “Any piece?” Grace asked.

  “Yep,” he said again. “All of you. Pick whatever you want. I trust your judgment not to choose some of my most expensive works. But anything in the gallery is fair game. I suggest you get to it before some of them sell.”

  Julie and Grace looked at each other before they grabbed each other’s hands and rushed out of the studio and back into the gallery, leaving me alone with the devilishly handsome artist.

  I peered up at him. “Why did you do that?”

  He clasped his hands behind his back. “Maybe I wanted to show a certain someone that I’m not the money-hungry pretentious swine she thinks I am.”

  “Is that so?”

  He slid his hands in his pockets as his right eyebrow quirked up. “Is it working?”

  Chapter 10

  Walker

  I felt bad for making her blush so much—but only a little.

  “I’m sorry.” The word tumbled out of her and she looked everywhere around the studio but at me. “Those things I said… they were stupid. I was just bitter because I wanted to be at home comfy on my sofa and my roommates wanted to come here and…” She trailed off and shook her head. At what, I wasn’t sure. “It’s been a rough couple of days and bitching about things that have nothing to do with me tends to be a coping mechanism I often lean on.”

  “That’s very self-aware of you.”

  She glanced up at me and quickly away. “Well, when you have overbearing parents and start therapy because you don’t know who you are without them telling you every morning, you learn a thing or two.”

  I smiled. “Vulnerable, too. I like that. You’re a breath of fresh air…”

  I realized I never got her name.

  She finally smiled at me. “Nora.”

  “Nora,” I said, liking how her name felt on my lips. “It’s nice to officially meet you.”

  “I’m sorry again for all that stuff I said.”

  “Don’t be sorry. You were right. Artists can be pretentious clowns. Believe me, I’ve met my fair share of them. Do you know what’s even worse than artists, though?”

  “What?” she asked, leaning forward like I was about to tell her a secret.

  “Art connoisseurs.” I winked.

  Nora laughed. It was a bright, joyful, carefree sound, and it danced around my studio until she clamped a hand over her mouth and snorted into her palm.

  A breath of fresh air indeed, I thought.

  I wanted to hear her laugh some more, so I hooked a thumb over my finger at the couple who were considering buying the canvas painting of Aayla. “Take those two, for example. He wants to buy that because he thinks people will sit with him in his cigar lounge and take him seriously because he has ‘real art’ on his walls. His wife sees my work for what it is: beauty. I don’t get caught up in the themes or symbolism, as you so brazenly put it out in the gallery. I see an image in my head and I put it on the canvas. He’s there with his thumb up his ass telling her about what all the shadows and darkness on the canvas means. Meanwhile, I don’t have the heart to tell him there are only so many shadows because the painting is unfinished.”

  Nora snickered again, this time drawing curious looks from those around us. “Who wears tweed anymore anyway?”

  “I was wondering precisely the same thing.”

  Nora ran her fingers through her mane of dark brown hair. It tumbled down around her shoulders and certain pieces stuck out every which way, making it look like she’d just rolled out of bed.

  That thought made me genuinely curious how wild that hair of hers was in the morning.

  “You’re not as bad as I thought you’d be,” Nora said with a humble nod.

  “Happy to break stereotypes for you.”

  “I still feel bad for being such a jerk.”

  “Well,” I said slowly, stringing her along as she watched me intently, “there is one way you could make it up to me.”

  “Really?”

  “Meet me tomorrow night for dinner.”

  Nora blinked. Her baby blues narrowed. “Dinner?”

  I shrugged nonchalantly. “Yes. You don’t have to agree, but I will feel permanently snubbed if you turn me down, and I don’t know if I can take that kind of rejection, especially after all those colorful things you said to me in the gallery.”

  Her eyes narrowed even further but a smile tugged at the corners of her full pink lips. “You’re a smooth talker, aren’t you?”

  “Is that a yes?”

  Nora sighed and looked imploringly up at the ceiling, like there might be something up there that would tell her how to let me down easy. Finding nothing up in the rafters, she resigned
herself to her fate. “Fine, dinner tomorrow. Give me your phone.”

  I fished my phone out of my back pocket and pressed it into her open palm. She added her number to my contact list before giving the device back to me.

  “I don’t like fancy restaurants.”

  “Okay,” I said.

  “And I don’t like museums.”

  “I gathered as much.”

  “And I don’t like—”

  “What do you like, Nora?” I asked.

  Her eyes searched mine. “I’m going to go collect my roommates before they try to take home more than they can handle.”

  I grinned. “You do that. I’ll text you in the morning.”

  She didn’t say anything as she turned and made for the door to the gallery. I watched her go until she vanished around the corner, after which Briar sauntered up behind me, crossed one ankle in front of the other, and leaned into me with one hand on my shoulder.

  “Two dates lined up just like that, huh?” she teased. “You went from zero to a hundred pretty quickly.”

  From the outside looking in, I could see why she would think that. After all, less than twenty-four hours ago, I’d been adamantly claiming I wanted nothing to do with the dating life. Now here I was making plans with two women.

  “My date with Aayla was strictly to appease Wes,” I said.

  “That hardly seems fair to Aayla.”

  I grimaced. She wasn’t wrong.

  Briar sighed and let her hand fall from my shoulder. She moved to stand in front of me. “And the date with this new girl? Surely, you didn’t ask her out just to prove a point to Wes, too?”

  “I didn’t,” I said truthfully. I’d asked Nora out because I wanted to. There was something about her that stood out to me. Could it have been her brazen disregard for my feelings when she’d torn into my work? Perhaps. I liked to be kept on my toes and Nora certainly did that.

  She made me curious. Racking my brain, I couldn’t recall the last time a woman had left me with so many questions.

  “Where are you going to take her?” Briar asked.

  “I’m not sure.” Where did a guy take a girl like Nora who had an easier time saying what she didn’t like than what she did like? “Maybe a nice restaurant?”

  Briar’s lips pursed into a fine line.

  I scratched my chin. “Bad idea?”

  “Boring idea.”

  “Well, what would you do then?” I asked.

  “If you want to take this girl out and make it count, you shouldn’t get ideas from someone else, regardless of how brilliant that someone else might be.” She smiled.

  “Wow, thanks.”

  She patted my shoulder. “You’ll think of something. Just pay attention to what she told you. She probably likes something low key and simple. No pressure. You can handle that, right?”

  “Uh…”

  “Sure you can,” Briar said confidently. “I’m going to check in on everyone in the gallery and see if we can close any last-minute sales with any stragglers. I think the rest of us might head out and grab a drink once we close up. You should join us.”

  There were still ticket holders hanging around the studio. The man in tweed and his wife were still speaking in low tones to each other in one corner.

  “Ask me again at the end of the night,” I told Briar. “If I can clear these people out of here, I might sit down and trace out a new painting.”

  Briar gave me a knowing smile. “Feeling inspired?”

  “Yes.” I was. Nora’s snarky look and the sharpness of her eyes beckoned to be put onto the canvas. Admittedly, I hadn’t spent nearly enough time soaking up all the curves and angles of her features or the depth of her gaze. I needed significantly more time before I could entirely commit her to a painting.

  But the impulse was there to start something and I never ignored that tug at my gut.

  Briar returned to the gallery and I rejoined the softly arguing couple to ask if they’d made a decision. They had not. I assured them there were no other interested parties in the picture and they had time to think about their decision.

  This allowed the couple to leave, still at odds, and the remaining couple in the studio also departed after making a purchase of their own.

  I locked my studio door and left Briar up front to handle the shutdown of the evening. I could hear her laughing with her and Wes’s friends once all the guests had left and I knew she was probably buying me another fifteen minutes in front of the canvas before she came back in and pestered me to join them.

  A night out with new friends would do me some good. I knew that.

  I spent too much time in solitary in front of a blank canvas. Tonight didn’t have to be that way.

  Before she came back to retrieve me, I’d managed to sketch out the silhouette of a woman. I wouldn’t be able to take it much further than that until I spent more time with Nora. Even then, the image in my head might still be fuzzy and far from solid. It wavered and danced, like an oil spill on the surface of a dark puddle, and it wouldn’t harden and take shape for some time yet.

  It was all part of my process.

  Briar convinced me to abandon my charcoal, put my suit jacket back on, and leave the gallery with the group to head across the street to a liquid lounge, where we ordered martinis with extra olives.

  Chapter 11

  Nora

  Grace and Julie sat on the end of my bed while I sifted through my closet looking for the right outfit for my date this evening with Walker.

  Last night, he’d seen me in a minimal effort outfit. Tonight, I wanted to step up my game but only a little bit. I wasn’t going to show up with a full face of makeup on or in a dress. That wasn’t my vibe. But I couldn’t deny that I wanted to leave some sort of impression on him when he saw me, even if it was a unique and very Nora impression.

  You already gave him one of those when you talked out of your ass for ten minutes straight last night, I thought as my fingers grazed the sleeve of one of my favorite graphic tees. I hesitated before pulling it off the bar to hold it in front of myself in front of the floor-length mirror hanging on my closet door.

  “No,” Grace said stiffly. She shook her head. “You can do better than that, Nora. Come on.”

  “I love this shirt,” I said.

  “It’s not a date night shirt,” she insisted.

  Grace and I both looked to Julie, who blinked wide eyed at both of us. “Don’t look at me. I play it safe when it comes to fashion. Hence all the blazers.”

  At least she could admit it.

  “I can spice this up,” I said.

  Grace groaned.

  I stripped out of my oversized sweatshirt and pulled the graphic tee on. It was a black cotton shirt with a single stemmed red rose in the middle. It was a bit oversized on me but I knew how to play with it to show off my shape a bit better while still being comfortable all night long.

  Next I found a skirt I hadn’t worn in a long time in the very back of my closet. It had a thick but comfortable waistband and was made of faux leather. A gold zipper up the back added some flair, and after I pulled it on, I tied the front of the tee in the middle and tucked it under.

  Julie looked me up and down. “I actually like this.”

  I ran my hands over the tight skirt and nodded approvingly at my reflection. This would do. It was me—the edgy sharp version of me Walker had seen at the gallery. I could be soft when I wanted to as well but I wasn’t in the mood for that tonight. He struck me as the kind of man who could handle this. He wasn’t expecting a pretty dress and pink painted nails.

  He was expecting me.

  At least I hoped he was.

  My palms were sweaty. Why was I so invested in this? Why did I care about what my outfit said about me? Normally when I went out with guys, I hardly put any thought into my outfit or my hair and makeup. Admittedly, the only guys I’d dated recently had been sexy Europeans whose company I enjoyed for a couple of weeks until I left their city never to see them again
. It was easy to fall into a travel whirlwind romance because I knew it was temporary.

  I hadn’t dated someone in my home city in ages.

  “You’re so lucky that he asked you out,” Grace pouted. “He’s super hot.”

  “And talented,” Julie added.

  “Not to mention rich,” Grace said.

  I stepped into a pair of pointed-toe black pumps that made me feel a bit better about my bruised legs. Travel had not been kind to them and I bruised like a peach.

  “You should wear nylons,” Grace said, nodding at said bruises.

  I frowned down at myself. “I hate nylons.”

  “You’re going to give him the wrong idea.”

  Julie nodded her agreement. “I’m with Grace on this one.”

  Disgruntled, I fished through one of my dresser drawers until I found a pair of black sheer nylons. They hid the bruises nicely and looked good with the outfit, too.

  “What do you think you guys are going to do tonight?” Julie asked.

  “No idea,” I said as I fixed my brown curls and doused them in hairspray to scrunch and mess them up. “I’m assuming dinner?”

  “Probably a really nice dinner,” Grace said enthusiastically.

  “Hopefully not too nice,” I said.

  “Could you be any less excited?” Grace pouted. “I’d be over the moon if I was the one going on this date, but no, he had to go and ask you, the woman who openly talked about how much of a money-hungry dickwad he is.”

  “It’s part of my charm, I suppose,” I said.

  “Maybe he’s a glutton for punishment,” Julie said.

  Grace laughed. “Well if that’s the case, be careful, Nora. He might fall in love with you.”

  I rolled my eyes. “That’s not likely.”

  “What if he’s the one?” Julie teased. “You never know.”

  I finished off my look with a glossy nude lip and turned to face the two women. “You two are getting ahead of yourselves. This is nothing. Just dinner. Chances are we’ll sit and talk for an hour or two and then go our separate ways. What on earth could I possibly have in common with an artist? He already knows I think he’s… well, you know.”