by Elle Pierson
Clearing her throat, Sophy pointed at the page and explained how she would sculpt a raised tattoo of flowering vines over Hades’s torso to signify the presence of Persephone. Her fingernails were cut short and workmanlike, but were painted in pink and white stripes. The smartphone leaning dangerously from the pocket of her loose dress was a similarly aggressive shade of candyfloss, which seemed a crime against an otherwise perfectly decent model. She was the most overtly feminine person he had met since his kindergarten days, when small girls usually came bedecked with bows, ruffles, and sparkly purses.
If he’d previously thought about it, he would have said his taste in women leaned more toward the tomboy type. He couldn’t imagine Sophy sprawled on the couch with a beer, shouting her displeasure at a poor ref’s call. She certainly wouldn’t be able to play sports with her asthma. In fact, outdoor pursuits in general seemed like a hugely bad idea. He could feel his blood pressure rising at the very thought of taking her camping, away from the survival response time for medical assistance.
There was no reason why he should be this attracted.
Shit.
It wasn’t an issue. He had no desire to get involved with anyone at this point. And look at them, for Christ’s sake. It was as if someone had mixed up the casting calls for a flowery chick flick and Terminator 5. He felt three times larger and at least twice as ugly as he actually was just standing near her. The chances of her reciprocating anything other than wary reluctance seemed to hover around zero.
“I’ll just lock up my stuff and then let you get back to work,” Sophy was saying as she stacked together her papers and pencils.
Shaking off his worsening mood, Mick went over and closed the windows, double-checking the lock fastenings out of habit. “The security here isn’t optimal,” he commented. “Any halfway-competent thief could break these locks in less than ten seconds.”
Sophy looked a bit amused and slightly more relaxed, which was a welcome relief after several long minutes of watching her hair all but crackle from the tension racketing up her spine. “We all have a secure office space to leave tools and valuables,” she said. “I don’t think anybody would leave laptops or jewellery or anything behind at night. It’s mostly only WIPs that are left in the studios.”
“Whips?” Mick repeated, taken aback.
“Works-in-progress,” Sophy explained over her shoulder as she led the way down the hall to the cluster of tiny student offices.
They were little more than cubicles, and in Sophy’s case, Mick discovered, could do a pretty accurate impression of a landfill.
“Sorry, it’s a bit messy,” said Sophy absently, lunging to catch a cascade of rolled drawings before they fell on the floor and disappeared into the Bermuda triangle of discarded papers, unused wall planners, and paint-stained drop sheets.
He was not completely inept with women. He knew when agreement was not required.
“This door wasn’t locked,” he pointed out.
“Oh. No. I must have forgotten.”
Mick sighed.
Stepping back to allow her some much-needed floor space, his elbow jostled an object on the shelf by the door. His hand snapped out as it started to fall, and he was still examining it with mild interest when Sophy turned back around.
“That’s pretty,” she said, immediately fixing on the small vase. “Where did that come from?”
She looked at him expectantly, as if it was a conjuring trick and he was about to produce a second vase of flowers from his pocket or start pulling coins from her ears.
Mick flicked a finger at the loosely tied label. “I almost knocked it off your shelf,” he said, passing it over to her. “It has your name on it.”
Looking slightly surprised, Sophy turned the piece of card in her fingers. There was nothing written on it besides the neatly scrawled letters of her name. It was a pretty gift, three pink flowers in a glass vase with a scratchy finish as if it had been made from jelly crystals or coloured sand. It was the sort of fiddly clutter women loved, and that most men never got the hang of buying for them.
“That’s weird,” she said, puzzled. “Why would…”
Somebody giving her pretty gifts didn’t seem in the least strange to Mick, a fact that prompted him to get the hell out of there. Much more time around her, and he would be in serious trouble.
“A friend probably saw the news footage the other night,” he said, shoving his fists deep in his pockets. “And didn’t want to interrupt you while you were working.”
“Oh, right,” Sophy said, her brow clearing and a smile dawning. Christ. Pretty. “That’s so kind. It’s beautiful. And really, really expensive,” she went on slowly, her expression a shade troubled again. “It’s very high-quality pâte de verre. It’s my favourite type of glass art. See how it looks like coloured sugar crystals? I always wanted to have a go at it, but I just don’t have a delicate enough touch to work with molten glass. Or the guts, to be honest. I already get my fair share of chisel scars. I can’t imagine what a glass burn feels like.”
She stroked the petals of the flowers. “Pink gerberas are my favourite too, but I can’t have them because the pollen aggravates my asthma. These are silk. Somebody went to a lot of trouble. I wish they’d left their name, so I could thank them.”
“I should go – ” Mick was starting to say, abruptly, when footsteps behind him brought both their heads around.
A tall, bony man with spirals of blond curls and an oddly seraphic face stood there, beaming at them. It was a bit like a cherub from an old religious painting had stepped off the canvas, grown up, thinned out, and never quite learned how to dress properly. He had buttoned his shirt wrong and knotted his tie incorrectly. He was also vaguely familiar, but it wasn’t until midway through a vigorous handshake that Mick remembered him as Sophy’s art teacher from the other afternoon.
He nodded politely in response to her hasty introductions, and took advantage of the interruption to excuse himself. He was in dire need of a few moments of privacy to clear his head. Between the pitiful lack of self-control and self-preservation he’d displayed, and a lingering sense of frustration, in every meaning of the word, he was well on the way to a filthy turn of temper.
Beeping the lock of the hire car, he was just sliding behind the wheel when his cell vibrated once in his pocket, followed by the opening bars of the Imperial Death March.
He bit out one short, graphic obscenity. As usual, stellar timing.
His knuckles white around the steering wheel, he gazed sightlessly though the windscreen for a second, then let out a harsh breath and yanked the phone from his pocket. “Dad. Hello.”
A few interminable minutes later, he sat listening to the echo of the dial tone in his ear. Flicking through his contacts list, he selected a name, dialled, and waited.
“Yo, my bro.” Sean’s cheerfully unprofessional greeting came through the receiver like a welcome tonic. “I hope you’re out getting down and dirty with something female or alcoholic, because it’s looking to be boring as fuck around here today. I suppose we can’t hope for a bomb scare every day of the week.”
“Did those new plans for the Islington system come through yet?” Mick asked, ignoring the attempt at levity.
“First thing this morning.” Sean coughed. “Uh, you don’t actually have a woman there, do you? Because you sound a bit…”
“We’re going to do a full evaluation of the plans this afternoon. Notify Gale and Hamlin, would you?”
Mick tapped his fingers against the dashboard, staring out the window at a group of passing tourists, all identically clad in cargo shorts and t-shirts, multiple camera straps hanging from their necks.
“You want to do a run-through here?” Sean asked dubiously. “Wouldn’t it be better to –”
“Just do it, would you.” During the silence that followed, Mick pressed the pads of his thumb and forefinger against his eyelids. “Fuck. I’m sorry.”
“Mick.” All traces of humour had gone from Sean�
�s voice. “Has something happened? Do I need to meet you somewhere?”
“No.” Mick exhaled, long and low. His hand still covered his eyes, sheltering an incoming headache. “No. Jesus. Sorry.”
“If it’s fucking Jennifer again…” Sean sounded furious.
Mick snorted despite himself. “No,” he said. “I think I can safely say I will never be fucking Jennifer again.” He paused. “I’ll be putting in for a couple of days’ leave next week. I just had a call from my father.”
“Well, shit,” Sean said succinctly. He had shared the misfortune of acquaintance with Mick’s family since birth, although he was lucky enough to skip the actual blood tie. “I assume the evil is alive and well.”
“It’s not a funeral,” Mick said dryly. “It’s a wedding.”
There was another short silence before Sean let out a disbelieving hoot. “Not Marcus again?”
Mick managed to summon a flicker of amusement. “It has been, what, two years since the last one? Seems about right.”
“Which poor sacrificial lamb have they roped in this time?” Sean asked, making a rude noise. “Ten bucks says she’s the daughter of a politician or oil magnate.”
“Safe bet.”
“And the wedding is next week? Nice of them to give you so much notice. Were they hoping you wouldn’t be able to make it?”
“Apparently not,” said Mick. “Since I’ve been threatened with everything bar legal action if I don’t do my brotherly duty and make an appearance. They do have form for keeping me out of the loop.”
He couldn’t disguise the bitterness.
“So,” said Sean. “Back to Auckland.”
“Yeah.” Mick’s mouth set grimly. “It’s been a while.”
Not bloody long enough.
Chapter Four
“Done and dusted.” Sophy put down her pencil and looked at the wooden floor, which was coated with a layer of fine white stone particles. The chisel dust had a similar appearance to sieved icing sugar, and the same habit of getting all over her skin and clothing when she worked with it. “In a manner of speaking.”
She laid aside the last prep sketch and looked at Mick, who was unfortunately wasting no time in putting his shirt back on. He’d given her four sketching sessions this week, and she thought she had enough to start work on the actual sculpting next week. From this point, she could work from the drawings, the live model requirement fulfilled.
She wasn’t going to pretend that she wouldn’t miss him.
Any lingering self-consciousness when they were alone together had all but vanished. She actually enjoyed talking with him. Only once had she reverted to her habit of listening with one ear while inwardly retreating to her own thoughts, and, frankly, he should have known better than to introduce Motocross into the conversation. She could manage rugby or basketball chat at a pinch. She drew the line at dirt bikes.
She’d also discovered that he religiously watched Game of Thrones, but preferred the books and could state the numerous reasons why with the fervour of a true fanatic. She found the latent streak of geek a hopeful sign for their friendship.
He had noticeably engaged the brakes if the conversation steered near either his family or his love life.
“Are you sure you have everything that you need?” he asked, looking up from the buttons of his shirt. He shrugged his wide shoulders, adjusting the fit.
Sophy nodded. “I can’t thank you enough for this, Mick.”
She ought to offer to buy him drinks or dinner. It would be the polite thing to do. There were limits, however, to her bravery. She wasn’t sure she would ever conquer her anxiety to the extent of being able to ask a man out.
Shy men probably felt the same way, which was likely why she’d only ever had short-lived flings with obnoxious extroverts. And why most of her friends were at least three times more outgoing than she was. If you were too shy to make the first move, you had to wait for someone who could.
Not that dinner with Mick would be a date. It was friendship. They were friends. Of a sort.
“How much longer are you in town?” she asked hesitantly.
Mick slipped his watch back over his wrist. “Ryland has business interests here, so he wants to stay with the exhibition another couple of weeks,” he said. She tried not to look openly relieved, but her spirits dropped when he went on, “But I’m taking leave to head to Auckland next week.”
“Oh,” she said lamely, and prayed that the sinking feeling in her stomach didn’t show in her expression. “Nice.”
She thought she heard a muffled snort, but his face was still lowered to the leather strap. “It’s only for a couple of days, and then I’ll be back until Ryland is ready to move on.”
Having finished dressing, he looked up and presented her with that horrible impersonation of granite. It wasn’t even a legitimate expression. It was a non-expression. “You’ll be getting stuck in with the carving?”
“Mm. I’ll start prepping the stone on Monday,” she said, looking forward to it. She always enjoyed picking up the chisel for the first strike. She nervously picked at her thumbnail, her eyes skating away from his. “Hopefully I’ll get a reasonable amount done before the show packs up, so you can get an idea of what it’ll look like.”
“That would be good.” His voice was non-committal, but when she ventured a peek, his gaze had softened.
“Oh, crap,” she said suddenly, catching sight of the wall clock. “Sorry, I have to go. I swapped my shift at the bar tonight so I could spend the weekend at the vineyard with my parents. My friend Dale offered to drive me out there, but I have to call him before twelve.”
“The vineyard is in Gibbston Valley?” Mick asked slowly. At her nod, he hesitated for a moment and then said rather diffidently, “I can give you a lift if you like. I have to meet my team at Ryland’s estate near the Kawarau Gorge this afternoon. It wouldn’t be far out of my way.”
“Oh.” Sophy stared at him, feeling awkward. “I can’t ask you to do that.”
“I offered,” he said calmly.
“Well…” She hesitated. “I have to stop by my house first to pick up Jeeves and my bag.”
“Not a problem.” Mick paused. “As in Wodehouse?”
“As in a very exuberant dog,” Sophy said, grinning.
When Mick’s gleaming black Lexus pulled to a stop outside her house, Sophy could already see the swish of Jeeves’s tail through the frosted glass window in the hall. She dug out her key and went to let him out, receiving only a cursory wag for her trouble before he shot off to the gate to bark at Mick. Confident that her cowardly pet would never go further than a vocal strop at a creature ten times his size, Sophy left them to it, and went inside to grab her things and leave a note for Melissa.
When she came back out with her bag, Mick was down on his haunches with Jeeves, doing that weird man-canine bonding ritual guys did, where they rubbed the dog down in hard circular strokes like they were polishing their car. Instead of taking justifiable offense at the rough treatment, Jeeves had been reduced to quivers of ecstasy.
Mick stood up and dusted off his hands against his back pockets, smiling at her. He reached for her bags and carried them out to the boot.
“Got your inhaler?” he asked bossily, as he opened the door for her to get back in.
“Yes, Mother,” she said meekly, and he gave her braid a sharp tug.
By the time the car reached the end of the street, Jeeves was leaning over the driver’s seat with his chin on Mick’s shoulder. Fickle males.
Mick reached his hand up and over his shoulder, rubbing the dog’s ears. “I’ve got to get one of these.”
“A dog? Why don’t you? I don’t think I could live without one.” Sophy grunted as Jeeves took that as an invitation to join her on the front seat. His back paws jabbed her squarely in the kidney as he tried to work out where to put his stomach. “On second thoughts…”
Mick grimaced. “Too much travelling at the moment. I have a sixteenth-floor flat
in London, and I’m hardly ever there. Not exactly conducive to keeping a pet.”
“Oh.” Sophy frowned. “Well, there’s always those robotic fish. I’m sure they’re more fun than they look. You’d have to remember to change the batteries, though. And there’s that dog app on iTunes that repeats everything you say. You wouldn’t even have to feed – ”
“Has anyone ever told you that you’re a pain in the ass?” Mick didn’t pull his eyes from the road, but the dimple in his left cheek was a deep smiling groove.
“No,” said Sophy virtuously, resting her chin on top of Jeeves’s head. “Nobody ever has.”
Mick turned through the bustling outer suburb of Frankton, which Sophy remembered as the serene and sleepy setting of her childhood walks. Now, there was barely room to move without bumping into a fast food restaurant or homeware store.
“I only have the vaguest memories of Queenstown from when I was a kid,” Mick said, echoing the direction of her thoughts, “but I can’t get over how much it’s changed. Your house must be one of the last old kiwi baches in central Queenstown.”
Sophy nodded. “There’s hardly any residential housing at all in the centre of town now. The hotel and retail boom has pushed the suburbs further and further back into the hills. My aunt and uncle have been offered a lot of money for the land, but Uncle Peter doesn’t want to sell. Thank God. With the rental market being what it is, I’d probably end up trading a ten minute walk to school for a forty-five minute carpool from Cromwell,” she said, naming the smaller neighbouring town, and then darted a warning look at him. “And please don’t feel the need to chip in with tales of big-city traffic in London and Auckland. You’re talking to a South Islander who can wield a mean chisel.”
“Point taken,” said Mick, amused. He glanced out the side window at the looming Remarkables mountain range, ruggedly beautiful against a clear blue sky. “The development can’t alter the scenery.”
