Recluse: Wolfes of Manhattan Two

by HELEN HARDT

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “All right.” Roy smiled. “Food will be here soon. Want something to drink?”

  “Sure.”

  “Beer? Wine? Water? Juice?”

  “I think just water, thanks.”

  “No problem. Come on out. We can eat in the kitchen.”

  I followed him. He had removed his smock and washed his hands. He wore a gray V-neck T-shirt and looked absolutely scrumptious. His muscular forearms were a work of art.

  “Have you ever painted yourself?” I asked.

  “A self-portrait? No.”

  “You should.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you’re so…”

  He grinned. “So…what?”

  “You know exactly how good-looking you are, Roy. You don’t need me to tell you.”

  “What if I want you to tell me?” he teased.

  Embarrassment welled in me. I could actually feel the warmth creeping up my cheeks. I hoped it was disguised by the redness from my recent shower.

  “I’ve told you how beautiful you are, Charlie.”

  He had, at that.

  “You told me you’re an artist,” he continued.

  “An amateur artist.”

  “Amateur? What does that mean? Either you’re an artist or you’re not.”

  “You know exactly what it means. I don’t make any money as an artist, and I don’t paint full-time.”

  “Semantics. Do you think I paint for money?”

  I said nothing.

  He continued. “For that matter, do you think anyone buys my work for any reason other than I’m a Wolfe?”

  “That’s ridiculous. Your work has value beyond your name.”

  “Yes. It does. To me. To you. Maybe to others. But I don’t do it for the money.”

  “Well, you don’t need to. You already have a ton of money.”

  He laughed then. “You’re being purposely obstinate. You know exactly what I mean.”

  I got indignant then. “I don’t buy it, Roy. You can’t be an artist just because you say you are.”

  “Why not?”

  I opened my mouth but then realized I had no answer.

  He laughed again. “You are absolutely adorable.”

  “You tell me, then,” I said, not willing to let this drop. “What makes an artist?”

  “Depends on your definition of artist.”

  Now he was being ridiculously abstract. “What’s yours?”

  “I find art in almost everything. Even my brother Reid, who has taken the running of our business to an art form. Even my father, who, though he was an asshole of the highest magnitude, couldn’t have made billions without knowing the art of negotiation and dealing.”

  “Everything’s an art to you?”

  “In a manner of speaking.”

  “What exactly is my art, then? Dressing up in uncomfortable clothing and doing someone else’s bidding?”

  “You’re obviously good at what you do, or Lacey wouldn’t have brought you with her.”

  “What I do is hardly art.”

  “I say it is,” he laughed. “But we’ve gotten badly off the subject. Which I think was your intention. You’re certainly willing to go to a lot of trouble just to get out of telling me what you see when you look at me.”

  I joined in his laughter then. “Nothing gets by you.”

  “Nothing does,” he agreed. “Sometimes that’s a curse. Trust me.”

  His words were enigmatic, and I wasn’t sure what to say. I was certain he didn’t want to elaborate, so finally I said, “You’re the most amazing-looking man I’ve ever seen.”

  8

  Roy

  I’d made her uncomfortable, which pleased me. Why? I wasn’t sure. I hadn’t meant to mention that my gift of observation could sometimes be a curse.

  I couldn’t be an artist without such an acute sense, but truly, it had been a curse from time to time. One time in particular, which I didn’t want to think about now. Not when I had a luscious woman in my apartment. I opened my mouth to ask her to elaborate on what she found amazing about my looks, when my intercom buzzed.

  “That’ll be our food,” I said, walking to the door.

  I quickly paid and brought the food to the kitchen, where Charlie had taken a seat at my small table. I pushed the newspaper and several books to the side.

  “Sorry for the mess.”

  “No worries. Looks like my place.” Then she reddened. “I didn’t mean… My place is nothing like this. It’s tiny, and—”

  “Charlie, it’s okay. I know what you meant.” I pulled containers of food out from the bag.

  “Is there anything I can do?” she asked.

  “Nope.” I stood and brought some paper plates and plastic utensils to the table. “Not too classy, huh?”

  “Classy enough. No dishes to do. Of course, not a friend to the environment.”

  “These are all recyclable.”

  “Oh. Good.”

  I handed her a plate of food. “I hope you like it.”

  She inhaled. “It smells divine, and as you can tell from my stomach’s behavior earlier, I’m famished.”

  I smiled. Listening to her tummy growl while I was painting her had given her a human side that actually helped me. I’d been thinking of her as this ethereal creature, something above humanity, because of her dazzling silver eyes.

  As I looked at her now, I couldn’t process how she didn’t see her own beauty, which was why I’d wanted her to describe mine.

  If she could see mine and put it into words, maybe she could begin to see her own. She’d called me amazing-looking, and while it was a huge compliment and warmed me—a lot—she hadn’t actually done what I’d asked.

  “Go ahead and eat,” I said. “Later you can tell me what it is about me that pleases your senses.”

  She stared at me then. Stared hard. “There’s nothing about you that doesn’t please my senses—if you’re talking about the five senses, I mean.”

  “Why are you limiting it to the five senses?”

  She reddened. “Well, you were kind of rude when I got here.”

  “It was nine at night.”

  “I know.”

  “Maybe you were rude for showing up at a virtual stranger’s house at that hour.”

  I berated myself inwardly. Why was I reverting to asshole mode? I was attracted to this woman. I liked her. I’d just fucked her, for God’s sake.

  She huffed. “It’s New York!”

  “So?”

  She put down her plastic fork and shook her head. “You know, I’m starving, but I’m not going to sit here and take this shit from you. I can’t believe I let you fuck me. This is not who I am.”

  I had to fix this. Quickly. God, I sucked with women.

  I searched frantically inside my brain for the perfect words to say, but all I could come up with was, “Don’t go.”

  “Why shouldn’t I?

  Yeah, I needed an answer to that. An answer that wouldn’t paint me as an asshole with zilch experience with women.

  “Because you’re hungry.” I said.

  “You’re unbelievable.” She stood. “I’m starving. You’re right. But suddenly the company is making me kind of nauseated.”

  “Don’t go,” I said again, this time more strongly. “Please.”

  “Please? Why? You tell me I’m beautiful. You make love to me. You order me food at midnight. You speak in beautiful words about art and about life…but then you can’t stop yourself from being a jerk. What’s up with you, anyway?”

  If only I could give her an honest answer.

  But I couldn’t. Not now. Not ever.

  “I want you to stay. I want you to eat until you’re full and satisfied. And then I want to take you into my bedroom.”

  “I have work tomorrow.”

  “So do I.”

  “You don’t work there.”

  “Still, I work. Besides, there’s another big m
eeting tomorrow at ten, during which I suspect we’ll get just as much nothing done as we did today.”

  That made her laugh—an adorable laugh because clearly she hadn’t wanted to laugh at all.

  I smiled at her.

  “You’re impossible,” she said.

  “I won’t deny it.”

  “I’m going to finish my dinner. Then I’m leaving.”

  “Have it your way, but you’re not going anywhere until you tell me what you find so amazing about me.”

  She regarded me, an indignant look on her face, and then she shoveled pad thai into her mouth. She was challenging me. Challenging me to make her say something. Challenging me to make her stay.

  Fine. I’d accept the challenge. We sat quietly as we both finished our food.

  When both our plates were clean, I met her gaze.

  She swallowed, placed her plastic utensils on top of her empty paper plate, and returned my stare.

  “Your eyes,” she said. “They’re so dark they’re almost black, and I swear to God they get darker when you look at me as intensely as you are now. I know that’s physically not possible, but they do. Your hair. So long and silky. It’s perfect. Not one tiny bit of frizz. Women would kill to have that hair, Roy. Your nose is perfectly aquiline, reminiscent of Michelangelo’s David. And those forearms… Muscular and corded. You know? Other women can have their biceps and traps. Give me a good forearm any day.”

  I nearly opened my mouth to ask what was wrong with my biceps and traps, but then remembered she hadn’t seen them. I’d been fully clothed when we’d fucked in the studio, and I’d changed my shirt while she was in the shower.

  “Today, when I met you and you were wearing a suit with no tie… I love that look on a man. You could have been walking the runway somewhere alongside your sister. I can’t believe no one ever tried to get you into modeling.”

  Indeed, Riley’s agent had tried to get me into modeling, but few knew that.

  “And,” she continued, “as good as you looked then, when I saw you tonight, your hair up in that stupid man bun—”

  I opened my mouth, but she shushed me.

  “Yeah, stupid man bun. I always thought they were stupid, until I saw you with one. With your hair up like that, paint smudging your chin, an art smock over a casual shirt and then faded jeans and bare feet… You were magnificent. That was Roy in his natural habitat. As good as you looked dressed to the nines, you looked a thousand times better in your element. As an artist. That was the real you, Roy, and the real you is magnificent.”

  I sat, awestruck.

  This woman had seen me. She’d truly seen me, and I wasn’t talking about her description of my physical attributes. I wasn’t sure anyone else had ever seen the real me with such clarity. Of course she’d never see the inside of my head—that part of me that held secrets I could never reveal, that part of me that haunted me when I let it surface. I’d kept it buried so long, and I’d gotten pretty good at it.

  Until my father’s murder.

  That had dredged everything up from the deep recesses to the shore again, things I’d learned to ignore, treat as if nonexistent.

  Charlie Waters didn’t see that part of me. She saw me on the surface and in the shallow end.

  That was a good thing. A very good thing. For what she saw wasn’t an untruth by any means. I was mostly me when I was painting. Business clothes? Maybe I looked good in them, but they weren’t me.

  So yes, she saw and interpreted exactly who I was. On the outside and partially on the inside.

  The only problem was…

  I wanted her to see everything.

  I’d finally found someone who moved me in a way I’d never known possible.

  And that scared the hell out of me.

  9

  Charlie

  My lower lip trembled. I desperately hoped it wasn’t enough for Roy to notice.

  What had I done?

  I’d gone off and rattled out exactly how magnificent he was. Exactly how amazing he looked, but I hadn’t even scratched the surface. I’d touched only on his physical attributes. Roy on the inside was a puzzle. He could say the most beautiful words to me, and then, nearly in the same breath, he could say something completely off-putting.

  “Thank you,” he said softly. “Thank you for seeing me.”

  “Anyone who looks at you sees you,” I said.

  “You know what I mean.”

  I nodded.

  I knew.

  “I’d like you to stay the night,” he said. “I mean, I’d really like you to, but I understand if you need to leave. I understand you have work tomorrow, and you want to make a good impression your first week.”

  “I want to make a good impression always,” I said. “I find value in the work I do.”

  He smiled then, and I nearly lost my breath at his beauty.

  “And you don’t consider it art?”

  “Not in the same way your painting is.”

  His smile faded slightly. “Tell me about your art, then.”

  “I haven’t painted in a while.”

  “Have you lost interest?”

  “No. Just time. Seems there’s always something more important to get done.”

  “Are you passionate about these other things you’re doing?”

  Was I? I enjoyed my work. I liked Lacey, and she treated me well.

  “It’s not art in the way you mean,” I said. “I enjoy it, but no. My work is not my passion. I don’t think any little girl dreams about being an executive assistant when she grows up.”

  He smiled again. “There is art in any job well done.”

  “I can see that.”

  “What is your passion, silver?”

  My insides melted. I’d only met this man today, but when he called me “silver,” something imploded inside me. Something real, and something I’d ignored for too long. Rather, not ignored, but tried to settle for not feeling, if that made any sense.

  “You going to answer me?”

  “Sorry. What was the question?”

  “Your passion?”

  You. The word was on my tongue, and I had to stop it from tumbling out. Roy Wolfe could hardly be my passion. He and I had only just met.

  Still, I longed to say it.

  Instead, “I paint. Watercolors mostly.”

  “A beautiful medium. Not one I ever took to.”

  “I like the transparency of it.”

  “Do you have any work?”

  “A few. There’s one in my apartment. Most of them I’ve given away as gifts.”

  “Why give them away? Why not sell them?”

  “Are you insinuating that I have to get money for something for it to have worth?” I was deliberately pushing his buttons, and I knew it. I couldn’t help smiling.

  “Of course not. But if you can make money from your passion, you don’t have to work.”

  “Most artists never achieve the fame you have.”

  “I’m hardly famous.”

  “People pay for your work, don’t they?”

  “They do. Some more than others.”

  “So maybe you’re not famous, but you make a living.”

  Did he? I had no idea. He could be living off a trust fund, for all I knew. None of my business anyway.

  “No,” he said.

  “No? No what?”

  “I know what you’re thinking. It’s what everyone thinks. The answer is no. I don’t live off Wolfe money. My painting pays my bills. Though Wolfe money did buy this place. But I don’t live off it day to day.”

  “That’s nice.”

  “Nice?”

  “I mean, nice that you don’t need to depend on your painting.”

  “But I do. I just told you. My father hated that I wasn’t interested in the business. He tried to lure me into it at every turn. He bought me this apartment after I refused to live in the Wolfe building, and then he nearly had a stroke when he saw what I’d done to the master suite.”

  �
�Why didn’t you tell him to shove the apartment up his ass?”

  He laughed then. I was growing pretty darned fond of his laugh.

  “You may think my man bun is stupid, silver, but I assure you I am not. Would you turn it down if your parents bought you a place?”

  “It’s a moot point. My mother can’t afford to buy me a place.” My father could, but that was another story.

  “It’s hypothetical. What if she could? Would you turn it down?”

  “It’s a tough question.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I pride myself on my accomplishments. No one has ever given me anything, Roy. I didn’t go to college because I didn’t want to take loans. Instead, I took paralegal courses at a community college, and the job with Lacey is my first.”

  “You’re evading the question,” he said. “Don’t try to make me feel less worthy because I allowed my father to pay for my home.”

  “Why are we fighting about this? Is it really that important?”

  “It is to me.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you’re making me feel…” He shook his head with a sigh. “Never mind. It doesn’t matter.”

  Then I knew.

  He was feeling inadequate. Inadequate because he’d taken money from his father. Money that now belonged to him—as long as Rock stayed at his position as CEO of the company.

  Did that bother Roy? That Derek had chosen Rock instead of him? They were both wayward sons. Roy hadn’t left town, but he was no more involved at Wolfe Enterprises than Rock had been.

  Maybe that was why…

  I shook my head. I was making things up now.

  “All right, Roy. If my mother bought me a home, I’d probably take it. I’m not an idiot. It’s just that the concept is so foreign to me. It’s unreal.”

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “Why? I never wished for a different life.”

  “No. I mean I’m sorry I pushed it. It’s not important. I let my father buy this place. He was trying to bribe me into giving up art. I knew I’d never do that, so I kind of took this place under false pretenses. That made me feel a little better about it.”

  Such an interesting person.

  I’d uncovered a lot about him in the short time we’d been acquainted.