Perry arrived late. He seemed distinctly put out on finding the front door partially blocked by the delivery. “Leave it,” he snapped when Ben offered to set it out of the way. “Where’s Ann?”
“She made the coffee, but she was sniffing and sneezing. She’s probably gone back to the room,” said Suzy. “Have you had breakfast yet?”
Instead of replying, he stalked off in the direction of the room the three youngest class members shared. Maggie nearly scorched the eggs, wondering what was going on. It wasn’t the first time she’d noticed the interaction between Ann and the instructor. She’d even asked about it, but Ann had brushed off the question and asked, instead, what being a reporter was like. Not that she’d seemed particularly interested in the reply, but then, when Maggie got onto a topic that interested her, she tended to lapse into essay mode.
Janie and Georgia offered to help clear up after breakfast so that they could all get started on today’s assignment, which was painting on location. “I’m sorry, dears, but they’re predicting rain starting late tonight, so I’ve decided to push things along a bit,” Perry had said by way of explanation.
“I could’ve told him it was going to rain. My bones gave me fits last night, I couldn’t sleep a wink,” remarked one of the retired teachers.
Maggie had had trouble sleeping, too, but more on account of painful thoughts about Ben than painful joints.
Painting on location turned out to involve dragging all their gear from the studio outside. A few students produced clever contraptions that appeared to be a combination stool and easel, but most, including Maggie, were assigned card tables which were neither large enough nor steady enough to be practical. The second time her water pail sloshed over, Ben suggested she either dig holes for two of the legs or prop up the other pair.
“Smart, aren’t you?” She flashed him a nasty look that had him grinning. “I already thought of that.”
It would probably have occurred to her sooner or later, but she enjoyed sparring with him. At least it helped dispel the awkwardness after last night.
Ben helped Georgia find a place that was more or less level, helped her set up her equipment, and then helped Charlie wrestle a heavier picnic table into the shade for the two librarians. For all he looked like the hero of one of those action movies—rough, ready and more than slightly dangerous—Ben Hunter was a genuinely kindhearted man. He would make some woman a wonderful—
Don’t even go there.
“Ann’s going to work inside today,” Suzy said when Maggie asked about their roommate. “Pollen count’s too high.”
One of the blue-haired ladies mentioned that the coming rain would probably help reduce the pollen count, never mind how it affected various joints and sinuses. Soon they were all busy rendering the mountain scenery in a medium that had Ben cursing and Maggie muttering about paint with a mind of its own.
“Look at that!” she snarled after some twenty minutes had passed. “The blasted paint refuses to stay where I put it! The sky keeps washing away my mountain and when I try to push it back up where it belongs, the darned stuff fights back!”
“Here comes Perry, he’ll tell you what you’re doing wrong.” That from Georgia, whose sky was behaving the way a sky should instead of trickling down the mountain where there wasn’t even a valley, much less a blasted waterfall.
“This is for the birds,” Ben growled. He stepped back, hands on his hips, and glared at the buckling sheet of thin watercolor paper.
“That reminds me, we’d better watch out for dive bombers.” Charlie nodded toward a flock of grackles squabbling over a stand of pokeberry bushes.
“Purple, right? Couldn’t hurt. Might even help.” Ben happened to catch Maggie’s eye. He winked and gave her a thumbs-up, his thumb stained with what she now recognized as alizarin crimson.
Where the dickens did he see anything red out there? Was he color blind?
Wearing a crisply ironed smock and his usual beret, Silver meandered among his students offering a word of advice here, a compliment there. He went lighter than usual on criticism, which in Maggie’s estimation was a good thing. It wouldn’t take much for her to throw everything into her hatchback and head home, mission or no mission. Suzy had reluctantly agreed to cooperate, but so far Silver had shown surprisingly little interest. Today he ignored her completely, probably figuring that like Maggie and Ben, she was beyond help.
Instead, he spared most of the time and attention for his older students. Not Charlie—not Janie or Georgia, either, but as they were all adequate painters, they didn’t really need him. Janie, in particular, had a style Maggie liked. She called it her “who gives a hoot, I’m having fun!” style.
Silver spent most of his time with a small group of students who lapped up his every word as if it were nectar. Ben caught her eye and nodded at the cluster of appreciative women. At least his mission appeared to be on track.
A few minutes later Silver moved to the edge of the rough lawn, stepped up on a low granite outcropping and clapped his hands for attention. “All right, children, lunchtime is critique time. When you’re finished here, make sure your work’s dry and take it in to the studio.” He glanced at the sky. “Leave everything else outside, we’ll try to squeeze in another hour after lunch before the rain starts.”
There were a few groans, but the overall response was muted excitement. Evidently artists were masochists, willing to endure everything from gnats to glaring sunshine to swollen ankles and aching feet for their art.
Ben tucked something in his shirt pocket, rolled up his morning’s work, dry or not, and joined Maggie, who was scowling at the mess she’d made on a perfectly good piece of white paper.
She said, “Is there some secret to keeping your skies from wandering downhill and messing up your mountains?”
“What you have to do, see, is learn to go with the flow.” He draped a companionable arm across her shoulder. The magic was still there, but today there was an added quality. A sort of best-buddies warmth that was almost—not quite—as potent.
“I read that on a T-shirt somewhere.” It had been her mother’s T-shirt, worn with a long, flowered skirt. Come to think of it, long flowered skirts were back in style again. Going with the flow never would be, not as far as Maggie was concerned. She had too much ambition. Too many people depending on her. If she went with the flow the way her mother had done, her dad would end up living on junk food and clogging his arteries and Mary Rose would probably end up broke and brokenhearted.
“What’s that in your pocket?” she asked, watching the rocky terrain carefully so as not to trip. She didn’t have a whole lot of dignity left; she’d just as soon hang onto whatever she could salvage.
“Show you later,” he promised, which only perked up her curiosity.
Seven
It was devastating. Maggie laughed aloud at the caricature of a willowy man in a beret and a flowing smock. His long, thin nose was exaggerated, his eyes baggier and too close together, but the resemblance was striking. “I thought you said you didn’t have any artistic talent.”
“I don’t. A friend of mine is a police artist and she taught me a few things. Mostly she used composites in her work, but she had a great eye when it came to summing up a particular set of features.”
Maggie tried to see Ben through the eyes of a caricaturist—or a police artist. The way his thick, dark hair grew, with that bit he was always shoving back off his forehead. The winged curve of his eyebrows, the angular cheekbones, a nose that was not too big, but not too small, either—and the shape of his mouth.
Oh my, yes, the shape of his mouth…
She wanted to ask what else the woman had taught him—if he’d had a special relationship with her and if so, what had happened to it.
None of your business.
She had her own past, such as it was; he had his. If there was one thing she’d learned over the years since she’d first noticed that boys were a different and rather interesting species, it was tha
t the really good-looking ones were usually vain and immature. Not that many of the really good-looking had given her a second glance, much less asked her out on a date.
Suzy was setting out sandwich components when they reached the kitchen, “Where’s Ann?” Maggie asked. She got out a pitcher of iced tea and opened the freezer compartment. “She said she’d help.”
“Dunno. Her coffee mug’s missing, so maybe she’s back in the room.”
After filling a bucket with ice, Maggie slipped away to check on the missing member of the team, trying to remember anything she’d read about allergies that might be helpful. Ann wasn’t in the room they shared, nor was she in the studio. Maggie dashed upstairs to check the bathroom, called a few times in both directions, then hurried back down to do whatever else was needed. Lunch was usually a do-it-yourself meal, but the team-of-the-day was supposed to make the process easier.
“Maybe she drove into town for a prescription or something.” Suzy was layering cheese, onions and peanut butter on a poppyseed roll.
Maggie stared at it and shuddered. “If she’s smart she’ll have lunch while she’s out. Who did the grocery shopping for this place? Why isn’t there any low-fat mayo?”
“How about rye bread? Next time anybody goes to town, how about picking up a loaf?” Charlie asked.
Bumping elbows, begging pardons and discussing everything from arch supports to the best source of ready-cut mats, everyone pitched in before wandering away, sandwiches and drinks of choice in hand.
Suzy and Maggie remained in the kitchen, finishing off leftover slices of cheese and a box of stale vanilla wafers.
“I might as well clean out this peanut butter jar. We can open a fresh one tomorrow,” Suzy said.
Maggie picked up wafer crumbs with her thumb. “Wonder what Perry meant when he asked if we could touch our toes. Was he trying to be cruel? I mean, just look at this class—most of the women probably wear support hose, and the men aren’t much better.”
“Charlie might wear support hose, but I betcha Ben doesn’t.” Suzy grinned, leaned back in her chair and stretched her arms. “Be glad to check it out for you, though. Wasn’t that what you were wanting me to do? Check out the guys?”
“One guy only,” Maggie reminded her.
“Oh, yeah, I keep forgetting.”
“Surrre you do,” Maggie teased.
Once the kitchen was put in order, the two women joined the others in the studio where the morning’s efforts had been laid out on the tables, ready for a critique. Maggie pointedly didn’t look at Ben, but her peripheral vision was excellent. He stood, feet braced apart, hands on his narrow hips, silently challenging Perry to do his worst.
Perry was just hitting his stride when someone near the window noticed that it had started to sprinkle outside. In the rush to rescue whatever had been left behind after the morning’s session, Maggie heard Ben tell the two women at his table to stay put, that he’d collect their things.
And that was another thing—he was so darned decent!
She beat him to the front door by half a step and was headed down the wet steps when he caught her by the waist and swung her to the ground. Over her protests he said calmly, “Crazy shoes, slick steps, sure recipe for disaster.” He set her down on the broken concrete walk, then jogged off to gather up anything the rain might damage. Staring after him, Maggie had a sinking feeling that the kind of trouble she was in had nothing to do with slick steps and three-inch platforms.
“What about your boots?” she called after him.
Without turning around, he waved a dismissing hand and began gathering up painting equipment. Maggie glowered. “Talk about vanity, there’s not a horse within fifty miles of this place.”
Suzy dashed past her, both arms full, a knowing grin on her piquant face. “Oh, shut up,” Maggie grumbled. Grabbing the supplies she’d left on her rickety card table, she glanced around to see if anyone needed help. The rain was falling harder now, plastering her hair to her head, her shirt to her back. Dodging others on the same mission, she collected whatever she saw that looked in need of rescuing and hurried back inside.
Charlie helped her unload and distribute materials, then Ben came up behind her, laid a big, warm hand on her shoulder and said, “You get everything in? Need me to go back out and bring in the rest?”
“Thanks, I’m fine,” she said, sounding breathless and hoping he put it down to exertion. “I guess we don’t need to worry about the tables.”
Charlie grumbled, “Maybe I should’ve left my morning’s work out in the rain. Couldn’t hurt—might even help. Did I tell you about the time I was painting on a dock down in Southport and a gull flew over and made a deposit on the seascape I was working on? Actually, it didn’t look too bad. I had to wash off some of the texture, but the gray cloud worked out pretty well.”
Ben chuckled and placed his hand on Maggie’s back, ushering her into the front hall where the others were examining their belongings for rain damage. A rash of goose bumps shivered down her spine, radiating outward from his hand. She ducked away and was considering dashing back to her room for a dry shirt when a loud thump sounded from overhead. Several people looked up. One woman fingered her hearing aid.
Someone said, “Thunder?”
Charlie said, “Perry dropped his attitude?”
“Sounded more like he dropped a load of bricks,” offered a woman whose work Maggie had admired in yesterday’s critique.
Before anyone could go investigate, Perry appeared at the head of the stairs, attitude intact. “No problem, dears, just some paper I had delivered.”
So that was what was in that carton. Maggie had heard all about the advantages of three-hundred-pound watercolor paper over the cheap pad she’d bought at the discount store. She hadn’t thought it meant the stuff literally weighed three hundred pounds.
Rubbing his hands together, Silver beamed down at them. “Everyone finished with lunch? Good, good—shall we get on with the afternoon session then?”
“Do we have any choice?” Ben muttered softly.
“Amen,” Maggie echoed. Considering how much it was costing her, she really should try to get something out of it. So far, she hadn’t collected a speck of evidence that would convince Mary Rose that this skunk was risky marriage material. All she’d learned was that she had the wrong kind of paints, the wrong kind of brush and the paper she’d paid nearly ten bucks a tablet for was barely a step up from newsprint. Evidently imported was the only way to go.
Add to that the fact that she was highly susceptible to slow-talking, slow-walking Texans who were also totally out of their element, and she was in so far over her head she needed a snorkel just to breathe.
Ann slid into place almost an hour into the afternoon lesson. Maggie didn’t hear her approach, as the rain that had started shortly after noon drummed steadily on the roof so that it was hard to hear anything at all.
“Hi. We missed you this morning,” she murmured, noting that the young brunette looked even more tired than usual. “I set up your stuff there on the end of the table. We’ve been working on graded washes. You’ve studied with Perry before, haven’t you?”
Without answering, Ann said, “I think I’ll pass. My hands are—that is, my head’s really stopped up.”
At the other end of the eight-foot table, Suzy swiped a wet brush across the streak of burnt sienna and tipped her paper up the way Charlie had shown her. After his opening demonstration, Perry had spent most of his time with a retired dental technician and the two librarians.
“Hey, you know what?” Suzy whispered. “I figured it up last night. Not counting room and board, each one of these so-called classes is costing us eighteen dollars an hour. Multiply that by fifteen. What I want to know is, how much is overhead and how much is pure profit?”
“Are you sure you don’t want to manage your father’s office?” Maggie teased. “I can probably name one of the operational expenses—liability insurance. My dad does that sort of thing.”
/>
“How’s your wash coming along?” Ben joined them after glancing over at the instructor, who was still holding his elderly students in thrall. “Hi, Ann, you feeling better?”
Ann’s gaze slid away. She mumbled an excuse and left the room. Ben shrugged and looked after her. “Was it something I said? Suzy-Q, this little place right here’s not working.” He waved a big, square-palmed hand over what was supposed to be a graded wash, but looked more like a fallow field after a deluge.
Suzy struck a pose, batted her lashes and thrust out one shapely hip. “Do me a favor, Texas—stuff it in your saddlebags.”
Ben grinned, flashing that not-quite-a-dimple again. “Yes, ma’am.”
Something that felt uncomfortably like jealousy churned in Maggie’s stomach. But then, with Suzy’s figure, she could have read the label on a can of motor oil and made it sound like the Kama Sutra.
Maggie didn’t have a figure. She’d reached the pinnacle of figurehood at the age of thirteen and been stranded there ever since. With enough makeup she could improve on her face, but she drew the line at enhancing her bustline, surgically or otherwise. Occasionally she used a temporary rinse, but it was hardly worth the effort as the result was simply ordinary Maggie with different colored hair. Unadorned, at least she blended into the scenery, which was a definite advantage for an investigative reporter. Beauty faded. Brains only grew sharper. She’d been telling herself that for years.
Janie wandered over and tucked her arm through Ben’s. She’d ponytailed her hair, making her look like a teenager whose face had inadvertently been left too long in the water, causing it to pucker.
“I’m thinking of adopting him, ladies. What do you think? I can’t talk him into eloping with me, but I’m not about to give him up.”
Driven to Distraction (Silhouette Desire S.) Page 8
