Her Brooding Italian Boss

by Susan Meier

  Panic swirled through him. “Home New York or home Kentucky?”

  “Kentucky.” She raised her gaze to meet his. “I know there’s not much work for an IT person there, but I’m going to have a baby. I need my mom for moral support.” She sucked in a breath. “But looking at one of the pictures, I also realized I had a pretty good childhood.”

  He frowned. “Which picture?”

  She ambled to a picture a few feet away. “This one.”

  It was a painting of three dogs running through the dead brush around a pond in late fall. The colors were cool, dismal. The sky so dark it was almost charcoal gray.

  “This reminds you of home?”

  Gazing at the painting, she said, “Yes.”

  Hoping for the best, he said, “You had a dog?”

  She laughed. “No. We had ugly Novembers. The cold sets in and lingers. But some of my best life things happened in fall.”

  She faced him with a light in her eyes that flicked the switch of his longing to paint. But in a different way than the day he’d found her lying on her bed wrapped in a towel, a different way even than the technical visions of dimension and light that had overtaken him various times that day. This was a serious, quiet need, something that didn’t hurt him or fill him with angry longing. This one was normal.

  Breathlessly afraid to lose this feeling, he quietly said, “What sort of things?”

  “Well, my birthday’s in the fall, so there’s the whole being born thing.”

  He laughed.

  “And every fall we returned to school.” She smiled at him but her eyes were distant, as if she were thinking back to the past. “Going to school meant seeing my friends, getting new clothes, football games, school play tryouts.”

  “Sounds like fun.”

  “It was.”

  “And that’s why you’re going home?”

  She moved her eyes up to meet his gaze. “I just keep thinking I’d like to be around my mom when I actually have the baby. But I also had a great childhood. I want my baby to have that, too.”

  He whispered, “It makes sense,” not sure why the moment felt so solemn, except it meant that their time together was ending. Or maybe because he knew he needed to at least try to paint her and if he didn’t ask in the next few seconds he wouldn’t get the chance.

  “I still think about painting you.”

  “I know.” She stepped away. “You told me it annoys you to think about painting me.”

  He laughed. “Tonight’s feelings are different.”

  She faced him. “Really?”

  “Yeah. Tonight it all feels real, doable.”

  “Well, that’s...something.”

  He breached the space between them. “Actually, it is. The uncontrollable urge might have been a first step, but just as your feelings about becoming a mom are shifting, growing, so are my feelings about painting you.”

  Her breath caught. “You’re serious?”

  He glanced around. “Yes. But this feeling is so new and it’s only cropped up around you.” He caught her gaze. “Can you spend the next few weeks with me? Let me see if I can paint again?”

  “Only if you also let me work as your assistant.”

  Her persistence made him laugh and long to kiss her. In that very second, the need was so strong he doubted his ability to resist it. Her face tipped up to him. Her earnest eyes held his. It would be so easy.

  But he’d kissed her once and it had only reminded him that he couldn’t have her.

  Because he couldn’t.

  “I want the painting to be our focus.”

  “Can I earn my keep by answering the rest of your mail?”

  He laughed. “No. I want to do this right.”

  She cocked her head. Understanding flitted across her face. “Okay.”

  And something wonderful sprinted through his blood. Acceptance. She had needs of her own. Troubles of her own. But instead of bargaining with him, she would simply help him.

  “You know, Tucker wants to hire you when you get home.”

  Her eyes widened. “He does?”

  “He needs someone to work directly with him.”

  “Oh my God. That might mean I could work from Kentucky.”

  Her eyes glittered with happiness and the lure of her lush mouth was as strong as an aphrodisiac. He wondered about his strength, his endurance, if he really could paint her without touching her.

  But his fears melted away when he remembered he couldn’t watch her pregnancy. And now he knew she was going home to her mom and a job from Tucker.

  She would not be around forever. His endurance didn’t have to last a lifetime. Only a few weeks. He had nothing to worry about.

  CHAPTER NINE

  WHEN THEY ARRIVED at Antonio’s country home the next day, everything had a different feel to it. They were no longer adversaries. They were partners in his plan to paint again. The feeling of being on even ground was heady stuff for Laura Beth. She’d always been second-best, plain Laura Beth. Today they were equals.

  Standing in the foyer, she faced him with a smile. “So? Ready to go to the studio?”

  “It’s Sunday.”

  “I thought artists had to work while they were inspired. Do you want to lose your momentum?”

  She could tell from the expression that flitted across his handsome face that he didn’t. Still, he said, “How about lunch first?”

  She caught his hand and tugged him in the direction of the back door that led to his studio. “How about work first?”

  He laughed. “Wow. I have never known you to turn down food.”

  “I had a peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich while you took that catnap on the plane.”

  She turned the knob on the ratty door of the cottage and it gave easily. Surprise almost had her turning to ask why he didn’t lock the door, then she realized he was totally comfortable here in the Italian countryside. Which was probably part of why it drove him so crazy not to be able to paint. This was his sanctuary, and it was letting him down. Since his wife’s death, everybody and everything seemed to be letting him down. She would not.

  Pride billowed through her. She might make nothing else of her life, but helping him to paint again would be her crowning accomplishment. Even if she never told another soul, to protect his pride, she would know simple Laura Beth Matthews had done something wonderful.

  They wound their way through the maze of old paint cans, broken furniture and fabrics to the last room. His studio.

  Happy, she faced him with a smile. “So where do I sit? What do I do?”

  He ran his hand down his face. “We just got off a plane. Give me a minute to adjust.”

  His hesitancy filled the air. He wanted this so much and he’d tried and failed before. She knew that trying again, he faced disappointment again.

  She stepped back, giving him space. “Sure.”

  He glanced around, then rummaged through stacks of paper in the drawer of a metal desk so old it didn’t even have accommodations for a computer. He pulled out two tablets. One was huge. The other was the size of a spiral notebook. He set the large pad of paper on the top of the desk, and opened the smaller one.

  “We’ll do sketches first.”

  “What do you want me to do?”

  “First, I just need to warm up, get the feel of your features, the shape of your body.”

  She nodded eagerly.

  “So, I’ll sit here.” He leaned his hip on the corner of the desk. “And you sit there.” He pointed at a ladder-back chair about ten feet away.

  She frowned. “There?”

  “Yes. These are preliminaries. Warm-ups. Something to get me accustomed to your shapes.”

  Her gaze involuntarily rippled to the chaise near
the windows. That would have been more comfortable. She wanted to sit there.

  But he pointed at the ladder-back chair again.

  She smiled hesitantly. Though she understood what he was saying, something really drew her to that chaise. Still, she sat on the ladder-back chair. Antonio picked up a simple number-two pencil.

  “Really? A pencil? You’re not going to use charcoal or chalk or anything cool like that?”

  He sighed and dropped the tablet to his lap. “I’m warming up!”

  She waved her hand. “Okay. Okay. Whatever.”

  * * *

  By the time Antonio had her seated on the chair, his anxiety about drawing had shimmied away. Praying that she would stop talking and especially stop second-guessing his choices, he picked up his pencil and began sketching quickly, easily, hoping to capture at least five minutes of her sitting still.

  When she wrinkled her nose, as if it was itchy, he stopped and stretched. He’d drawn small sketches of her eyes, her nose, her lips, her neck, her eyebrows, the wrinkle in her forehead, the side view of her hair looping across her temple and one sketch of her entire face.

  “If you need to scratch your nose, scratch.”

  She pulled in a breath and rubbed her palm across her nose. “Thank God.”

  “What? You were sitting for...” He glanced at his watch. “Wow. Ten minutes. I guess you do deserve a break. For someone unaccustomed to posing, ten minutes is a long time.”

  She popped off the chair. Shook out all her limbs. “I know I’ve sat perfectly still for more than ten minutes at a time, but sitting still without anything to think about or do? That’s hard.”

  “I’d actually hoped to break you in with five-minute increments.”

  “Meaning?”

  “You’d sit for five minutes a few times in our first two settings, then ten minutes in our third and fifteen in our fourth...that kind of thing.”

  “So we’re skipping a step?”

  “Which could be good.”

  “Can I see what you’ve done?”

  He handed her the tablet.

  She smiled. “These are great.”

  “That’s just me messing around until I get a good feel for drawing your features. Then we move on to sketches of what I think a painting of you should look like.”

  She beamed at him and everything inside him lit up. He told himself he was happy that she was enjoying the process, happy that he hadn’t yet had an anxiety attack, and motioned her back to the chair.

  “If you can keep doing ten-minute sessions, we’ll do two more, then break for the day.”

  “You’re only working a half hour?”

  He laughed. “Yes. I’m not just indoctrinating you into the process. I’m easing myself in too.”

  She sat on the chair, straightened her spine and lifted her face. “Okay.”

  He sketched for ten minutes, gave her a break, sketched for ten more, then they had lunch. Later, while she sat by the pool, he paid his dad a visit. He expected them to argue like two overemotional Italians about Constanzo stranding them in Barcelona. Instead, his father quietly apologized, told Antonio he was tired and retired to his room.

  The next day, Laura Beth easily graduated to sitting for fifteen minutes at a time. The day after that, she had a bit of trouble with sitting for twenty minutes, but eventually got it.

  He drew her face over and over and over again. He sketched her arms, her feet, the slope of her shoulder. Feeling the rhythm of those shapes in his hand as it flowed over the paper, he felt little bits of himself returning. But he didn’t push. Fearing he’d tumble into bad territory, he didn’t let himself feel. He simply put pencil to paper.

  On Sunday, with Ricky and Eloise in Italy on the last leg of their honeymoon, he forced Laura Beth to take the day off to visit with them.

  Monday morning, though, she arrived in his studio, bright and eager to begin.

  Trembling with equal parts of anticipation and terror over the next step of the process, he busied himself with organizing his pencils as he said, “This week we’re doing potential poses for the painting.”

  “So now I don’t just have to sit still? I have to sit still a certain way.”

  He glanced up. Her eyes were bright. Her smile brilliant. Enthusiasm virtually vibrated from her body.

  “Basically, yes.”

  Knowing how uncomfortable the ladder-back chair had been, he walked her to the wall of windows in the back of the room. He posed her feet, positioned her shoulders, placed her hands together at her stomach and strode back to the old metal desk to get his pad and pencil.

  He worked for twenty minutes, trying again and again to make her come to life in a sketch, but failing. He knew what he wanted. That faraway look. And though he saw snatches of it in her eyes, it didn’t stay and he couldn’t catch it when it was only a glimpse.

  With a sigh, he said, “Let’s take a break.”

  “Wow. Was that a half hour already?”

  “Twenty minutes. I can’t seem to get what I want from this pose, so I figured we’d stop, give me a bit of rest and try again.”

  After a bathroom break and a few sips of water, Laura Beth was ready to go again. Antonio picked up his pencil and tablet. She positioned herself and Antonio started drawing. After only a few seconds, he said, “The light is wrong.”

  She deflated from her pose. “Bummer.”

  He shook his head. “It is a bummer, but we can come back to this tomorrow morning. Right now...” He glanced around. “Let’s try one with you sitting on the chaise.”

  She walked over and sat down. Without waiting for instructions, she angled herself on the chair with her back to him, then looked over her shoulder at him.

  The vivid image of her lying wrapped in the towel on her bed popped into his head, quickly followed by the pose he’d so desperately wanted to paint. Her wrapped in silk, one shoulder and her entire back bare, the swell of her hip peeking out at him, her face a study of innocence.

  His finger itched to capture that. But he was sure the urge was a leftover of an aberration. Watching her at the gallery, he’d envisioned several compelling poses, expressions, little bits of humanity that would result in a painting every bit as compelling. He did not need to go there.

  “That’s not how I want you.”

  “Okay.”

  “Let’s try this.” He wasn’t entirely sure how to position her. He had facial expressions in his mind. Images of her hair falling just the right way. And he couldn’t seem to get it right as he shifted her from one side to another, one pose to another.

  “Okay. How about this? Lie down and pretend you’re daydreaming.”

  “Oh! I get to lie down!”

  He stopped in midstep toward the metal desk and faced her. “If you’re tired or anything, I don’t want you to overdo.”

  She stretched out on the sofa. “I’m fine.”

  Her inelegant movement struck a chord in him again and he eagerly grabbed the notebook. That was part of the essence he was trying to grasp. Beautiful yet impish. Troubled but still hopeful. With the image fresh in his mind, he began sketching. But after ten minutes he realized that pose didn’t work either.

  Neither surprised nor disappointed—today was all about trying and failing—he gave her a break, then sat her on a chair.

  Backing away from her, he said, “Think deep thoughts.”

  Her face scrunched. “How deep?”

  “I don’t know.” Remembering the feelings he’d had in the gallery and their subsequent conversation, he said, “Think about going home.”

  She nodded, and he watched the change come to her eyes. Almost a sadness. Something tweaked inside him. But he didn’t say anything. Though he wanted to comfort her, they weren’t supposed to become friends from this. He
wanted to paint her. She wanted to go home.

  It made him sad. Almost angry. But he got the best sketches of the day.

  After that they stopped for lunch. Rosina had prepared salads and bread, but Laura Beth skipped the bread, insisting she could feel herself getting fat.

  He watched her single out and then dig in to her tomatoes with gusto and had to stifle a laugh. Feeling light and airy because he counted that morning as a success, he didn’t want to upset her in any way, shape or form. But the look in her eyes as he’d sketched her haunted him.

  Casually, as if it were the most natural question in the world, he asked, “Do you not want to go home?”

  Her head popped up. Her gaze swung to his. “I need to go home.”

  “There’s a wide gulf between need and want.”

  “I need my mother. Aside from Tucker and Olivia’s kids, I’ve never been around a baby. And I can’t really count Tucker and Olivia’s kids because I’ve never changed their diapers, never fed one of them and most certainly never walked the floor.”

  “Ah. I get it. You need your mother’s assistance.”

  “More her advice...her knowledge. Which means, since I need her so much, I want to go home.”

  He laughed. “That’s convoluted at best.”

  She shrugged. “It is what it is.”

  But the faraway, sad expression came to her eyes again. He should have yearned to grab his pencil. Instead, that odd something tweaked inside him again. Only this time, he recognized it. It wasn’t a worry that they would get close. He hated to see her sad.

  “What if you got a nanny?”

  She gaped at him for a few seconds, then laughed out loud. “Right. I can’t even afford an apartment. Hell, Tucker hasn’t officially offered me a job yet, and you want me to hire a nanny?”

  “But if he does offer you a job with a good enough salary, it would mean you could live where you want. That you wouldn’t have to go back to a small town that clearly makes you sad.”

  “The town doesn’t make me sad. I told you before. I want my child to be raised there.”

  He frowned. “So what makes you sad?”

  * * *

  Laura Beth fumbled with her napkin. For fifty cents she’d tell him the truth. She’d look him right in the eye and say, “I like being with you. I like the person I am with you. And I am going to be sad when I leave because I know I’ll only ever see you at parties where we’ll be polite like strangers.”