by Hart, Taylor
Walking back through the apartment, he found a window that had a clear view of her. She was still immersed in the painting. He grabbed his uniform and hung it up in her closet, then took his wallet and went to fetch coffee.
When he got to Charlie’s, it was everything he had imagined it would be: distressed furniture, heavy smell of coffee, plants everywhere. Hipster, yuppy. Non-military types.
As he walked into the coffee shop, he saw it doubled as a small used bookstore. The line wasn’t long, and after he got the coffee, he passed a shelf of the greats. He paused at the story of Romeo and Juliet. It irked him he’d paused. He wasn’t a reader, but maybe this new version of him was. Maybe this version of himself would buy that used copy of the play and read it while she created. So that’s what he did.
When he got back to her place, he put in the code for the elevator like he’d been here a thousand times. Of course he knew it; he’d watched her push it in last night. He noticed things. It was natural now, just something he did after years of training.
When the doors opened to the apartment, he walked in and had the sudden sense that this wasn’t his last time. No, it felt like this could be the rest of his life somehow. He stopped as he thought of coming home from … what? He didn’t know. Some job, some civilian job. He thought about how he would walk in after work, and he’d find the coffee pot full because she’d started it and then got busy working. He looked at the mess in the kitchen from eating pancakes late into the night and grinned. He’d liked sharing stories with her last night. He liked that he’d told her about his dad and the key, and he liked that she’d told him about her mother, her father, and Antonio. Annoyance flitted through him as he thought about the guy who’d proposed last night.
None of this felt real, but he quickly brushed all those feelings away and focused on the fact that he was here, right now, holding coffee. Being here, in her world, was far better than being on his own. He opened the door and moved out onto the patio. This time, she turned, expecting him. She dunked her brushes into the bucket of water, then took a rag and wiped them off. Flecks of paint still clung to her hands.
As he got closer, he smelled paint and turpentine. Then he was lost in those fiery green eyes. He held the cup out to her. “At your service, ma’am.”
Her mouth twisted up as she took it. “Really? You’re at my service?”
He caught the mischievous glint in her eye as she hesitantly sipped the coffee. His heart raced. How had he lived his life without this woman? “You bet I am.”
Timidly, she got on her tiptoes and leaned up to kiss his cheek. “Thank you.”
His skin turned warm where she’d kissed him. He wanted to take her by the waist as he had last night and kiss her again, but he didn’t. This whole reality was nothing like he’d ever experienced before, and it had him off his game. Not that he really had game. Just ask Creed. He always teased Blaine about not being the ladies’ man he could be if he tried. “Thank you for letting me stay.” He ran a hand through his hair and admitted, “I hate my dad’s apartment.”
She pointed to the book in his hand. “Some light reading?”
“I’ve never read the whole thing. I thought it might be fitting after last night.” He knew he should be embarrassed about all this sappy stuff, but talking to her about it came naturally. “A guy and girl meet and fall in love.”
The chemistry between them ratcheted up a notch. “Do you believe in that kind of thing?” she asked.
“What’s that?”
“That you can fall in love?” She snapped her paint-stained fingers. “Just like that?”
Lifting and lowering one shoulder, he confessed, “Never have, but maybe stranger things have happened.” Was he really arguing for this?
She blushed. “Hmm, I don’t think I believe in love at first sight.”
He squinted at her, wanting to interrogate her about this Antonio, the man who had asked her to marry him. At the same time, he didn’t want to press. What right did he have? So he did one of the hardest things for any SEAL to do. He retreated a bit. “You’re probably right. I mean, who would believe in that? That’s foolish.”
She winked at him. “Irresponsible, really.”
Was she teasing him? It frustrated him that he didn’t know her well enough to know if she was toying with him or not. “Yeah,” he said, a breath pushing out of him. “To kill yourself over a woman you barely know. That’s taking it a bit too far.”
She let out a light laugh. “I guess.”
“Listen,” he said, taking a step back. “No pressure. If what we had was only the one night, it was nice.” What an understatement. He wished he had a better command of the English language so he could say something as poetic as Shakespeare.
She didn’t say anything right away. Just as he was considering apologizing, she cracked a grin. “One night? Is that all you want?”
Blaine’s heart hammered inside his chest. Dang, this woman was good. “I didn’t say that’s all I wanted.”
Elena looked him up and down. “Hmm.”
“And again, thank you for letting me stay. I really didn’t want to go back to that apartment.”
“Thank you for saving my painting. I believe you walked in at the right time.” With a soft laugh, she said, “I was kind of in a not-so-good state of mind last night.”
Who was he to judge?
“Are you speechless, soldier? I mean, you did save my favorite painting.”
“Not speechless. I was just wondering how I could buy that painting.”
She jerked her gaze up at him, then shook her head. “Sorry, that painting will never be sold.”
He let out a low whistle. “Too bad. The painting is almost as beautiful as you.”
Chapter 3
Embarrassment set Elena’s cheeks burning, and she turned back to her canvas. The man standing in front of her unnerved her. And he had saved her from a complete and utter meltdown last night. She winced and sucked in a deep breath. This whole thing was getting to her. “Nice clothes.”
He was a lot more “physical” than Antonio and completely filled out the T-shirt, making it stretch in all the right places. And the jeans were snug. She had to force herself not to look at his rear.
“Umm, thanks, I guess.” He rubbed his head. “This is weird.”
She chuckled. It was weird. She yearned to know more about this man. After last night, she hadn’t anticipated that hearing his story and sharing hers would forge such a strong bond. The things she’d told him about her mother and everything else. She picked up her coffee and took a sip, wondering what he was going to do and what his plan was. Did she dare ask?
“So how come you have his clothes at your place?”
She shrugged. “Because he left the bag a couple months ago and kept forgetting to take them.”
“Hmm.”
His suspicion made her slow her brushstrokes, and she let her gaze rise up toward him “He was on a business trip with my father. They stopped to have dinner. He kept them here while we all went out and then forgot them.” She didn’t like feeling like she had to explain to him.
He only nodded.
She wanted to ask about his father again. Antonio always told her she rooted into problems too much. She was too serious. She asked too many hard questions. Questions most people didn’t think about. Questions politicians didn’t need to be asked or have others asking around them. So she asked a different question. “Will you read to me while I paint?”
Surprise washed over his features. He took a sip of his coffee, weighing the question like she could imagine him weighing the perfect shot. He’d said he was a sniper. Wouldn’t he think about the exact, precise thing he should do? He would see through his scope just as she looked at a canvas, right? Lifting his eyebrows, he said, “I’d like that.”
Blaine found a lawn chair propped by the jukebox, brought it out, opened it up, and read. At first, it was regular reading. As the book progressed, so did his interpretation. He gave e
ach character a distinct accent and a different way of speaking. The narrator’s voice was also different. It made Elena smile and want to know more about him.
Elena went back to the canvas. The canvas she hadn’t been planning on working on today. She’d just finished her show, and the week before she’d been nervous and worried and had nearly gnawed all her nails off. She hadn’t been able to paint because she’d felt like there was too much pressure and too many little details to sort through. For the most part, Marissa handled it, but she was trying to make a splash with this show. She needed to show the art world she was back. Not just for herself, but for business. Even though she owned the gallery, the cost to run it was substantial, and she needed to be re-establish her reputation—well, her mother’s reputation—for dealing in fine art.
She let all of that go for now, knowing she probably had ten texts from Marissa already. But she didn’t want to think about all the problems at the gallery today. No. Today, she wanted to paint. She focused, loving the feel of paint on her hands. Loving the methodic way Blaine’s voice flowed through her as she painted him. It wasn’t hard; she just painted Hercules—Hercules Blaine. It was early on and could be any man at the moment. The canvas was as large as the man himself. She quelled the desire to demand answers with the same zeal with which she painted. How long had it been since a painting had come so easy?
Since her mother had passed. That’s how long it’d been since she painted this easily. She sculpted clouds around his giant feet. Feet worthy of a soldier, a Viking type of shoe. One that was metal but was still a sandal.
“Elena?”
Her name on his lips broke her concentration, and she turned, realizing he wasn’t reading the play anymore. How long ago had he quit reading? “Yeah?”
He was leaning back, the book propped open on his chest, his hands behind his head, his eyes closed. There was a smile on his face. “Were you thinking about the makeshift shoe on the huge guy’s foot, or were you thinking about something else?”
Deciding to tell the truth, she said, “I was thinking I haven’t painted this easily since my mother died.” She kept her focus on the canvas, not able to face him when she admitted this so easily to what should have felt like a complete stranger.
“Interesting,” he said noncommittally.
For a few moments, they were quiet.
“Do you like Romeo and Juliet?” she asked lightly.
He chuckled. “Not really. The guy, well, he’s pretty dumb.”
“Not a romantic?”
“I don’t see anything romantic about what Romeo did.”
“Don’t you?”
“Taking his life? No.” He scoffed.
This intrigued her. “I guess I can see your point, but what about true love?”
He mulled over his next words. “Well, I guess I don’t know anything about that.”
“I don’t think I do either.”
Their eyes met, and warmth surged inside of her.
Blaine shook himself. “So do you want to find out about a key with me?”
This question felt so random that she did pull away from the canvas and turn to face him. His eyes were open now, but he still sat so comfortably. She imagined it was not how the man usually sat. Her curiosity was piqued. “What kind of key do you think it is?”
“I think it’s a safe deposit key.” He wagged his eyebrows at her. “Maybe I’m a rich soldier guy now. A treasure hunt. Are you in?”
She had to laugh at the way he seemed so free at the moment. So unlike the man who had come in the gallery and wanted to help disable a bomb or something. Turning to her bucket, she put her hands and her brushes in the water, noting the water needed to be changed. “Romeo, if you’re going on a treasure hunt, then Juliet ought to go too, don’t you think?”
Glancing back, she caught his eye. There was something on his easy, happy face that turned serious. “Are you my Juliet?”
Flippantly, she sloshed the bristles through the water. “I don’t know yet. I guess it depends on what you buy me for lunch.” She winked at him.
He sat up, shaking his head as if to clear it. “Honestly, I don’t know what I’m doing here.”
She stared at this man, who had come for a funeral and ended up on a lawn chair, sprawled out reading Shakespeare, and wondered what he was doing here too. She wiped her hands on a towel. “Actually, you came at the perfect time. I was about to go crazy thinking another second about how to pay the bills at the gallery. I needed a day to paint, and I could definitely use a treasure hunt.”
The edges of his lips tugged up. “Let’s do it.”
“Let’s do it,” she agreed. She rushed on, feeling nervous. “So you can stay on my futon if you want.” She knew he was probably supposed to figure out his dead father’s possessions. “You mentioned you didn’t want to go to your dad’s apartment.”
His face had gone blank. Back to the soldier look.
“I mean, if you don’t want to stay at your dad’s. I don’t care or anything.” She moved to the door that opened to her apartment and pushed it open.
“Let’s go on the treasure hunt.” He caught the door behind her. “Let’s go on the treasure hunt, and we’ll sort out the rest later, okay?”
“Okay.” Nervously, she rushed to her bedroom and grabbed a sundress out of her closet. The apartment was a bit messy, but it didn’t bother her. She rushed into the bathroom, feeling happy and excited and completely free. It didn’t matter that she didn’t know what was going on exactly. A treasure hunt. A key. Lunch.
Would he stay with her, crash on her futon? Again, why had she offered that? She wasn’t the kind to ask men to stay. One reason Antonio always got so upset with her was because she wouldn’t let him stay. Last night, it had all felt different. Now, the thing was that the guy didn’t seem like he was in a hurry to go anywhere.
She took her time showering, making sure to scrub the paint off her hands thoroughly. Then she washed her hair. Normally, she skipped washing her hair, but she wanted the paint out of it, and there was that blue-eyed soldier out on her roof sunning himself.
More nervousness buzzed through her as she got out, dressed, blow-dried her hair a bit, and put on some gel to keep her normally curly hair from kinking too much. She put on a bit of makeup and evaluated herself.
The summer dress was nice. She felt, well … She felt like an artist in it. Flowing. The way her mother used to look. The thought took her by surprise. She’d never figured she looked very much like her mother. No, her mother reeked of refinement most of the time. Even though their features and hair had been the same, her mother was pulled tight. Until the end, anyway. Until those last days in the hospital. Strange what less than twelve hours could do to a person.
Just as she was heading out to the main room, she heard the elevator open. Then she heard cursing.
Elena froze. She’d thought Antonio had already gone to Washington, but he was here.
Chapter 4
Blaine had lain out on the deck for a few more minutes before going inside and tackling the messy apartment. He started with the futon bed he should have made when he’d gotten up. He always made his bed first thing.
After that, he moved on to the kitchen. It didn’t take him long to wash the dishes, scrub the counter, and put everything away. He noted there wasn’t that much food in her fridge. It looked like she didn’t eat that much. She had half a dozen eggs and a couple of apples. There was some expired yogurt he threw away. If he were going to stay here for a couple of days, he would need to stock the fridge with a couple of things, especially food he couldn’t get on a military base.
Wait. Had he decided he was staying?
He took a quick inventory of the cupboards, feeling a bit bad he was going through her things. Could he really stay with her? This guy proposing thing sort of bothered him, but if she’d turned the guy down, they weren’t together, right? She wouldn’t have offered for him to stay if there was something with this guy, right? She wouldn’t
have kissed him like that.
The thought of going to his father’s apartment brought on a mild headache, so he banished it from his mind and decided to think of Elena instead.
Taking advantage of this time alone, he went around the loft apartment and stared at all the canvasses hanging on the walls. It baffled him that she was this talented. He’d never liked art until now.
He heard the shower run, then Elena blow-drying her hair. The way her skin had smelled last night of that expensive perfume wafted from the bathroom and flooded his senses.
Adrenaline pulsed through him. Who was this woman, and how had he ended up in that gallery last night? Moving around the room, he went from painting to painting, feeling like each one symbolized something about her. What was the theme? Some were of city skylights. Some were people, in all forms—dressed and not dressed, alone or together. Some were of flowers.
He was about halfway through the room when he heard the elevator ascend to his floor. On alert, he wondered who would be coming. He froze, wishing he had his sidearm. He should have taken one to the funeral, but he’d put it back at the last minute.
The elevator came back up, the doors opened, and a brown-skinned man in a suit walked out. Both of them stood staring at one another. The man looked confused.
“You must be Antonio,” Blaine said, going into an utterly calm, SEAL mental state.
The guy had dark hair, wore a suit, and looked like he was about to prosecute a criminal. His top lip curled up into a snarl. He cursed in Spanish. “Who are you, amigo?” He had a slight accent—must be Mexican American.
Blaine didn’t move. He knew he could look intimidating. Sizing Antonio up, he saw they were close to the same height, though Blaine had probably twenty pounds of muscle on the guy. He shrugged, forcing a casualness he didn’t feel. “I’m a friend of Elena’s.”
The distaste remained on Antonio’s face. “Why are you wearing my clothes?” His eyes darted around the apartment. “Where is she?”
