by Allie Burke
“Comein,” her uninterested voice blurred her words together.
A couple seconds of silence, and she thought he had left. She buried herself back in the cushions of the couch. Then she heard the door open. She let out an exasperated breath, and opened her eyes. Her jaw dropped.
He was so gorgeous, standing in her doorway in a long sleeved shirt that did nothing to hide his massive muscular body.
“Hi, Elias,” she said sleepily from under her blanket.
“Jane,” he whispered her name like it was the most satisfying fresh air he had ever breathed. He looked at her barely opened eyes. “I’m so sorry, I woke you up. I can come back—” he turned to leave.
“Don’t leave,” she begged.
He turned back, shoving his hand in his jeans pocket. He was nervous.
“Um. Can you see me?” Jane asked.
He laughed lightly. “Yeah. Finally.”
His voice, so deep, so calm, so peaceful. “Okay.” She closed her eyes. “I’m dreaming. We’ll go in the kitchen and you’ll kiss me and touch me everywhere I want to be touched and— wait,” she opened her eyes to find a very amused smirk on Elias’s face. “No, that’s not how it goes. We wake up in my bed and you make me breakfast and it smells so good—” she blinked at him. “Right?”
He cleared his throat. “I, uh, saw you at the bookstore, and well, I—” he took a deep breath, clearing his mumbles. “I followed you.”
Jane could not stop her eyes from widening as she suffered the deepest embarrassment she had ever encountered. She erupted into loud, uncontrollable giggles. “So this is not a dream, and I just babbled all that—” she laughed some more, and pulled her blanket up over her head as she felt her cheeks burn bright red. She counted to ten, and pulled the edge of the blanket just past her eyes.
“You dream about me?” he asked.
“Yes.” Her whisper sounded almost relieved.
“How often?” His eyebrows lifted a little. Curiosity.
“Every day.” She bent her knees, clearing a spot for him at the end of the couch. “Please, sit.”
He sat down. He slowly took hold of her ankles under the blanket. She didn’t flinch. It felt natural, his hands on her skin. He pulled her feet into his lap, and began massaging them.
Jane made a rash decision to start talking before—well, she didn’t really know what she would do. Fall asleep, probably.
“Are you always this warm?”
“Yes. It freaked my parents out when I was a kid. They took me to the hospital a lot. The doctors had no idea what it was, so we all kind of ignored it.”
“Tell me about them.”
“My parents? I’d rather not,” he said with an embarrassing laugh that wasn’t really a laugh at all. Jane thought about pleading with him, but the grim line that was suddenly Elias’s lips persuaded her against it.
“What about your family?” he asked.
“Um. I don’t—” Jane paused for a moment, trying to word it right. She gave up quickly. There wasn’t another way to put it. “I don’t have any.”
“None at all? What about your parents?”
“They didn’t want to deal with me. Too much for them, I guess. They gave me up for adoption.”
Elias’s mouth gaped open.
“I’m sorry, I’m babbling. You just asked me about them. I don’t know.”
Elias clamped his mouth shut. “No, no, I just don’t understand how they could give you up. Sorry. Go on, please.”
Jane smiled a little proudly. “I lived at a foster center with other children. I kept to myself. They all just thought I was weird, so it wasn’t so bad.
“I snuck out at night to get to the water. It was all I had. I always got caught. Eventually they just stopped introducing me to families. I was a ‘troublemaker’,” she whispered the last word with a dark humor.
Elias didn’t laugh.
“When I was seventeen, a woman came to see me, said she had been hired by my grandmother. She brought me a package. It was filled with contacts and legal papers and money, lots of money. She told me I was emancipated, legally an adult, and free to go.”
“So what did you do?”
“I went,” she laughed. “I walked seventy miles to Jasmyn, and saw my house. It was perfect, in the middle of the woods and a lake within walking distance. I visited a real estate agent in Hazel Grove—the business card was in the package. The owner of the agency, an older man, he told me it was my name. He said that he’d been waiting for me to claim it for ten years.
“I decorated it. I was happy.”
Elias smiled, and then he tilted his head like a light bulb had turned on inside his brain. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a cell phone, pressing the side button to illuminate the screen. “I guess I didn’t realize the time,” he said. “It is a little early.”
“No, I don’t—” Jane looked away, “I sleep during the day.”
“Why? Do you work graveyard or something?”
“Um, no, I don’t work. Why do I sleep during the day,” she pondered, “’cause I’m up at night?”
He laughed. “But there’s a reason for that, right?”
She didn’t answer.
“Honestly, I’m just curious.”
Jane inhaled a deep breath, and whispered to him. She didn’t want him to hear her answer. It was stupid. “Bad things happen during the day.”
“Like what?”
“My parents gave me up in the morning. My grandmother died in the afternoon.”
Shame in his eyes, Elias looked down at his hands.
“Okay, I’m done now, really. You can tell me to shut up, you know.”
Elias looked back up, and stared directly into her eyes. “I like listening. Your voice is beautiful.”
Jane blinked frantically. “Don’t do that.”
“What?”
“That thing you do with your eyes. They get bluer, and I’m lost.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Elias took advantage of the break in conversation to admire Jane’s home. It was purple. Dark violet curtains decorated every window inside. Purple candles and incense ornamented the surfaces of tables and shelves. There were glass vases everywhere, filled with flowers and herbs. Purple glass lamps hung from rods bolted to the ceiling. They were practically sitting darkness; only one lamp next to the couch exhaled a faint glow.
Elias looked at the fireplace, and found Starry Night hanging above it. “What’s your excuse?”
“Huh?” Jane asked sleepily. She had had her eyes closed.
“I always ask people why they love Starry Night so much. It’s always the same answer. ‘It’s beautiful’. They can never tell me why.”
“I often think the night is more alive and more richly colored than the day,” she said immediately.
Van Gogh. He only smiled. She’d rendered him speechless.
She stared at him for a long time.
“What?” he asked.
“You look tired. When’s the last time you slept?”
“I don’t know.” A year.
Jane got up, and tightly wrapped her blanket around her body. “Come sit in the kitchen.”
He grinned.
“Oh, shut up,” she said, and walked away.
He followed. Jane was just standing in the middle of the kitchen, clutching the blanket like it was her lifeline. He walked to her, and said, “Come here.”
She didn’t move. He opened the blanket, and pulled her close, warming her skin quickly. The blanket fell, and she shuddered in his arms. Elias brought her forehead to his lips. Jane looked up, into his eyes. They stayed silent like that for a while, but then Jane smiled, breaking the spell.
“You’re doing it again,” she patted his cheek, and waved him over to the kitchen table. She went to the fridge, and pulled out some plastic baggies filled with herbs and plants.
She crushed them up into a bowl, and added some oil. She walked over to him, and applied a
strip of the liquid to his forehead with a basting brush. She dipped her fingers into the bowl. “Close your eyes.” She lifted her fingers to his temples and massaged them in a circular motion, slowly removing all his tension with her magic. “The ginseng increases stamina. Ginger stimulates the blood flow. Grape seed oil reduces fatigue.”
There were three different plastic bags. She had left one out. “What about rosemary?”
“Good for the mind. It keeps the brain healthy.”
He felt her cool touch disappear, and was aware of a damp towel gliding across his forehead.
“That’s better,” she said.
He blinked, and immediately felt rested. “Huh,” he said.
“It won’t last too long. You should get some rest soon.”
Elias got up and retrieved her blanket from the floor. He grasped her hand in his and led her to the living room. He sat down on the couch, and patted his leg—a place for her to relax. She lied down, her head resting in his lap. He covered her with the blanket, and softly ran his fingers through her hair.
He chatted her up for a while, art, Hazel Grove, movies, but after a while her “uh-huh’s” and “mmmm’s” disappeared. Only soft breathing filled the small cottage. She had fallen asleep. He looked at his phone again. Hours had passed like mere seconds. He had to go. He got up quietly, retrieved her pillow from the other side of the couch, and eased it under her head. He went into the kitchen, and found some paper and a pen. He wrote her a quick note, and placed it on the coffee table with a card from his wallet. He kissed her cheek, and left Jane. He already missed her, even before he shut the front door behind him.
Chapter 10
Jane didn’t have to look out the window to know it was still daytime. She was still exhausted; she hadn’t slept enough. But, she was awake. Elias was gone. She felt too empty to even sleep.
Her dreams were always so vivid and crisp, she had no problem believing that the hours before were a dream. He looked so perfectly gorgeous. She was happy to have had a different dream of him; something new. Conversation, romanticism, sweetness. She wondered if he was as charming in real life.
Jane rolled her head to the side. A surprised breath lunged into her chest. There was a note on her coffee table. Her arm shot out and her fingers grasped it with a supernatural swiftness, like she believed it would disappear if she let it lie there any longer. A business card fell onto her chest as she unfolded it. She felt her lips form a wide smile as she read.
Hey Beautiful,
Are you still dreaming? I am. Sorry I had to go, I have a meet and greet thing. You have good taste (Starry Night). You should come. I know you hate the sun, but who knows? It might be worth the risk.
-Elias
P.S. Can’t wait until the next time we’re in your kitchen.
Jane’s blood danced through her veins so gracefully, she shuddered under her blanket. She picked up the business card. It had a phone number and an address. In bold red letters in the middle, it said, The Valentine. The place was in Hazel. Close enough to walk to.
Jane didn’t have a car. Not that she wouldn’t love to have a ridiculously fast sports car, but she stayed in Jasmyn most days. Necessities like groceries could be delivered; if she needed anything else she could walk.
It must have taken a great amount of courage for Elias to knock on her door early this morning. It wouldn’t be fair if he had built up even more courage to invite her out, and she neglected him. She was nervous about going out at this hour, but her excitement outweighed the fear.
Parker hopped on her belly and sprawled out. “Meow.” Where you going?
She scratched him behind his ear. “I have a date.”
Elias could not have prepared himself for the moment that he walked into that cottage and laid his eyes on her. Her emerald green eyes—the way they gazed upon him like there were no surroundings or time or sounds to distract her, like he was all that existed.
He hadn’t spoken to anyone with that kind of charm since before Liam died. It was so natural, as soon as he was with her, to be—himself. Everything about her entranced him, and for the first time, Elias cursed his artist responsibilities for pulling him away from her.
Elias had walked through Dare Forest and down Lilian Highway to get his car. He was home now, showered and shaved, getting ready for his day. He found himself rushing, though he wasn’t in a hurry or running late. He didn’t really think she would come; he understood vows were like secrets, they shouldn’t be broken, for good reasons. He just wanted to get through his uninteresting day, so he could cross over into the night, and find his way to the red headed light that brightened the black sky.
Jane got up to take a shower. She couldn’t stop thinking about Elias. His hands caressing her feet, his arms around her body, his fingers entangled in her hair—he was so warm. It wasn’t only the temperature, it was some deep connection that ran down to her soul, his touch mollifying the core of her. And his voice—it was no wonder the magic ceased when he spoke. It was so deep, but so level—not even the most kindhearted and loving women deserved to hear such a sexy sound come out of a man’s mouth.
She got out of the shower, put on her soft, white robe, and blow-dried her hair and applied some makeup. She went into the bedroom and slid the two mirrored closet doors to the other side, revealing some clothes and shoes she never wore. She removed a black satin dress and laid it on the bed. She dressed in tiny black lace underwear and put on a matching bra. She removed the dress and carefully fit it over her head. She slipped her feet into low black heels, two crisscrossed thin straps going over the top of each foot, the backs of them open. Jane risked a look in the mirror. Her hair was wispy, her eyes were accented by the smoky black eye shadow clouding them. The dress had thick straps, the front shaped in a v-neck, the back of it low, classily revealing. It went down three quarters of the way, halfway past her knees. The bottom of the dress looked like it was flowing, as if a light wind was breezing against her, gliding the fabric back and forth across her skin. The shoes were simple, an elegant contrast to the obviously expensive dress.
Jane inhaled a long, deep breath, and then she did something she hadn’t done in twelve years. She went out into the daylight.
Elias dressed in black slacks, loose black dress shirt, no tie. He walked into his studio. He halted at the painting of Jane, staring at her on the canvas. He admitted that he had captured her pretty well, her demeanor, the way her shoulders sunk inside the book. He was glad that the setting of it was as it was, because if he had to capture the beauty of her green eyes, he believed that he would have failed.
He removed it from the easel and brought it with him to the car. He made his way to The Valentine. He found himself glancing at the clock every ten seconds. He forced his eyes away from the glowing numbers on the dash, but he was just an arm-lift away from checking the time on the watch fastened to his wrist, so it didn’t make a difference.
Exasperated, he huffed out a breath. He hadn’t been away from Jane for very long, but he missed her so much, it was almost agonizing. He felt a hollowness in his chest, the pain slowly weakening as the seconds passed, the hole slowly filling as time progressed to the point when he got to see her again.
He arrived at the gallery and parked in the rear parking lot. He went inside and to the back of the gallery to Lily’s office. He knocked.
“Come in,” her low voice said, and he opened the door.
Lily was sitting behind her desk with a pen in her hand, studying some paperwork. Lily Cavanaugh was Elias’s age. She was short—her long blonde hair seemed even longer than it was due to her height. She was gay. Not that she had ever told Elias as much, but he had a little experience on the matter.
Lily inherited The Valentine from her father. She spent every minute of the day doing her best to live up to her father’s lively reputation, with the utmost success. She loved the arts. But more than that, she had faith in people, no matter what their pasts were. Just like her dad.
She lo
oked up at him, and her expression twitched happily. “Elias. You’re glowing. You look great.”
He just smiled.
“Ahhh. You’ve met someone. A woman.”
He narrowed his eyes at her unbelievingly. “How the hell do you know that?”
She laughed. “Don’t feel bad. You’re a man. You just don’t know any better.” She winked at him, and looked down at the painting in his hands.
He held it up for her. She didn’t look away for a long time, her head tilting, her hand rising to her mouth, her smile developing. “She’s beautiful, Elias,” she finally said, congratulating him as if he was the creator of the beauty of her.
Elias didn’t say “thank you”, but just nodded. He agreed with her.
“What’s the title?” Lily asked suddenly.
He answered without hesitation. “Jane.”
Lily smiled, gently took the painting out of his grasp, and left him in the office.
Elias felt his jaw tighten with discouragement as Jane’s name floated in the air after he spoke it. He didn’t know why, he had already told himself that she wouldn’t come, he must have had some tiny spark of hope in the back of his mind. That a hundred fans could give this artist their support, but the impact would never be great enough, unless she was here.
Elias yanked at the collar of his shirt. It was suddenly too tight. He was nervous, that was the problem. Being the center of attention, even if it was only for one night, brought him anxiousness. He needed to take a deep breath, relax, have a shot of tequila or something.
Elias laughed at himself. Nervous. Anxious. Yeah, right. Anxious because she wasn’t coming? Or nervous because he didn’t know what he would do if she actually did?
Chapter 11
Elias left the office and went into the front room of the gallery. Lily had set up a stage on the long wall, home to one large tripod and other smaller ones around it. His other pieces from over the last few years were displayed, and Jane was set in the middle.
