Текст книги "Near and Far"

Автор книги: Nicole Williams

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Текущая страница: 3 (всего у книги 20 страниц)

She was in a black and silver beaded dress, the one she’d found at an antique store on Queen Mary Hill last month when I’d been over. She’d glommed onto that dress like it was a homing beacon. After admiring it for a while, she announced she was confident she must have owned the dress in a former life—apparently she’d been a flapper in the ‘20s—and that she had to buy it. Then she checked the price tag, frowned, and put it back. We walked out of the antique store without the dress, and Rowen headed for the nearest cafe to drown her sorrows in a cappuccino and a croissant. I’d excused myself to go to the restroom, returned ten minutes later to find her picking at a second croissant, and set the dress in her lap.

The look on her face that rainy afternoon? Yeah, it was one I’d never forget.

Other than the night I’d purchased it, I hadn’t seen her in it. Even that night, the dress didn’t exactly stay in place for long. Tonight, though, seeing her in that dress, smiling, talking, and showing off her artwork, so obviously in her element . . . She stole whatever fraction of a piece of my heart I might have still possessed. Rowen Sterling had every last piece of me, and I didn’t want any of them back.

That magnetism jolted back to life in a staggering way. I couldn’t not go to her. I’d gone two steps in the hundred left to go when my journey came to an abrupt end.

A man who made the guy guarding the front door seem like a kitten stepped in front of me. “This room’s for V.I.P.s only.”

I might not pour milk over my steak for breakfast in the morning, but I wasn’t a weakling. When Big Boy rammed his chest into mine to stop me, I kid you not, I bounced back a good five feet. Okay, so manhandling hay bales, feed bags, and hundred-pound calves doesn’t hold a candle to benching small SUVs. Noted.

The dude might have been Goliath’s offspring, but Rowen was a mere dozen yards away. I wasn’t going down with one warning. I advanced again, trying to step around him. That time, he grabbed my shoulders and shoved me back.

“V.I.P.s” he said slowly, half looking like he was hoping I’d try to charge past him again. “Not V.U.I.P.s.”

I lifted an eyebrow. It seemed a lot of people didn’t speak the same language as me around there.

“Very un-important people,” King Kong clarified.

I let that insult roll off my back. I’d never cared about what strangers thought about me. Glancing over his shoulder, I caught another glimpse of Rowen. “My girlfriend’s in there. She’s the one whose art’s on display.”

Kong cracked his neck to one side, then the other. “Son”—I don’t know where he got off calling me son. He couldn’t have been more than a couple of years older than me—“even if that was your wife in there, your wife of twenty years who you’d just found out had been fucking your best friend in your own bed and you wanted to run in there and chew her a new one, you are not getting past me.”

I inhaled. I exhaled. Something fired to life inside of me, something I generally did a good job of repressing. That act-first-think-second instinct. I took another full breath, set my hands on my hips, and tried to keep my voice level. “Would you please just go tell her”—I pointed at Rowen with my eyes—“that Jesse is outside? I’m sure she’ll figure out a way to get me off of the V.U.I.P. list.”

The bouncer twisted to look at Rowen. His look stayed locked on her long enough that my hands started to curl into fists of their own accord. “That’s your girlfriend?” His eyes ran over Rowen in a way every guy could decipher. He was imagining her, right there, without her clothes on.

“Yes,” I managed through a clenched jaw. That fire inside of me grew, spreading to every nerve.

He made an mm-mm-MMM sound, and that’s when I felt it; that fire had just exploded past the point of my restraint. “Now that’s a woman who’s fucked her fair share of men. I wouldn’t mind getting in that line.”

I saw red. I felt red. I was a ball of emotion. I was a ball of . . . rage. One part of my mind still worked just enough to know I wasn’t the type to swing first and ask questions later, but it was quickly and easily overpowered by the fury. “Wrong thing to say, big guy.” My arm reached back automatically. “Way wrong thing to say.”

It would have been a solid hit. The guy was still running his eyes all over Rowen like they were his hands—he didn’t have a clue he was about to have a meeting with the business end of my fist—but someone ducked out from behind the curtains and stepped between us so casually I doubted he knew fists were about to start swinging.

“How’s it going out here . . . ?” The new guy looked between the two of us, giving us both such condescending looks, he did little to unclench my fists. “I didn’t catch you boys in the middle of anything, did I?”

Since it sounded like more of a rhetorical question, I ignored it. “Could you go get Rowen Sterling for me, please?”

The new guy inspected me closer. From his expression, it didn’t look like he approved. “She’s kind of in the middle of an art show right now. Not really the best time.”

The guy had barely said three sentences to me, and everything about him grated on me. I generally wasn’t the kind of person who found other people “grating.” “I’m her boyfriend. Could you please just let her know I’m here?” I slid my phone out of my back pocket again to check it. Still no reception. Either we were so deep below the surface the cell towers didn’t reach that far, or jamming devices had been installed in the club. I hadn’t seen a single person with a phone to their ear or typing out a text.

“So. You’re the boyfriend with a girl name.”

I slid my phone back into my pocket and forced myself to bite back the fire begging to be released. After a moment, I felt mostly certain the words about to come out of my mouth wouldn’t be ones I’d regret. “Yep. That’s me. Jesse. Rowen’s boyfriend. The boyfriend with a girl’s name.” Each word extinguished a bit more of the fire. Each “self-deprecating” word brought me back to the person I knew. Unlike the quivering rage machine I’d morphed into moments ago. Talk about bringing the Hulk out of the cowboy.

A smile broke out on the guy’s face. I guessed he was pleased I’d agreed with the gender distinction of my name or that I didn’t take myself too seriously. “Hey, I meant no offense. Or no real offense. I like getting under Rowen’s skin, and mentioning her boyfriend with a girlfriend name really, really gets under her skin.” He shrugged and gave a quick check over his shoulder. “I forgot she wasn’t here glued to my hip the way we have been all day.”

“You’re Jax,” I said.

“The one and only.” He shook my hand when I extended it. I didn’t make it a point to notice a man’s handshake, but Dad had always told me that a man’s handshake was an extension of himself. A two-second elevator speech without using words. He said the key was to make your handshake firm enough that the other person knew you were strong, but not so firm that it was a dead giveaway you were only pretending to be strong.

Jax’s handshake was so damn firm, I felt like I was shaking a piece of wood.

He didn’t hide his smile at the completion of our handshake. I did. His dad obviously hadn’t taught him the finer points of the handshake. “Forget about the ‘glued at the hip’ comment. Don’t worry about it. We weren’t glued together at both hips.” Jax chuckled and slapped my arm. He had a bad handshake and a bad sense of humor.

“I wasn’t.”

“You wasn’t what?” Jax asked after waiting for me to elaborate.

“Worried. I wasn’t worried when you made that comment.”

“Oh?” Jax studied me again. I don’t know what he was studying me for, but he didn’t look like he was arriving at any answers. “Why not? You don’t know anything about me. Maybe I’m the kind of guy who lives for going after other guys’ girls.” He was still smiling, like he was just messing with me, but something about Jax’s eyes led me to believe he wasn’t joking.

“You’re right. I don’t know you. I don’t know what kind of guy you are.” I stepped closer, making it obvious that I had Jax by a good three inches and thirty pounds. “But I don’t need to know. Because I know what kind of girl Rowen is.”

Jax waved off the giant who looked like he was ready to play hacky-sack with my head. “Rowen told me you were deep.”

“That’s great. Would you mind going and telling Rowen her deep boyfriend is fifty feet away?” I peeked inside of the room. She was still by the same painting, talking to a new couple. I smiled.

Jax followed my gaze. “Sure, once I can pull her away for a moment, I’ll let her know you’re out here.” His gaze lingered on Rowen too, but I didn’t see the same flash in his eyes that I’d seen in the bouncer’s. There was something else, something that almost made me as uncomfortable. “I’d let you in myself, but”—Jax hitched his thumb at the bouncer as he backed into the V.I.P. room—“rules are rules.”

I flashed Jax a wave as he disappeared behind the curtains, and I waited for him to pull Rowen off to the side and tell her I was out there.

I was still waiting an hour later.

WHERE WAS HE?

Those words consumed my mind as I smiled at strangers singing my pieces’ praises. That night, career wise, pretty much defined epic, but I couldn’t fully enjoy it without Jesse. The highs of life were always doubled when he was beside me experiencing them at the same time.

Alex had been texted the invite, so as long as Jesse was with her, he’d be able to get in. From there, all he’d have to do was ask around, and he’d be pointed in the right direction. If Jesse was at the Underground, he wasn’t just leaning into a bar counter or sprawled out on one of the posh chairs waiting for me to come to him.

Jesse always came and found me. I’d grown so used to it, I’d almost started taking it for granted. I might not have been lost anymore, but I still liked Jesse Walker finding me. Even if it was only in a room of people.

“What was your inspiration for this one? It’s exquisite.” The woman of the couple I’d been tuning out for . . . how long? interrupted my thoughts.

I don’t know why I glanced over my shoulder at the painting they were staring at—I knew exactly what was back there—but I still did. “Um . . . well, I guess you could say . . . me.” I studied the painting for another moment then smiled. Displaying a picture like that, one that felt like such a window to my soul, made me feel like I was the naked person standing in the middle of a room of people staring and pointing. I didn’t do transparent, I didn’t like transparent, but I’d learned a lot about it from Jesse. I still wasn’t big on it, but for him, I worked at it.

“How much is it going for?” the woman asked, lifting her expensive clutch like she was ready to fork out the dough right then and there.

“You’d have to check with Jax on that.” I pointed at Jax, schmoozing it up with some richie-riches, decked out in his standard Jax attire. The guy dressed like he was an honorary member of the Rat Pack. He lifted his champagne glass when he noticed me. “He said there are several interested buyers, so he’s taking bids. Or something like that.”

Truthfully, it was beyond me. When I’d painted that picture, I’d never intended it for anyone else’s eyes but mine and Jesse’s. The painting was more therapy, a healing journal entry, than a piece to be displayed and sold off to the highest bidder. When Jax and I were searching the art rooms in a crazed state earlier, praying we’d unveil some extra pieces I could display, he’d found it stuffed into the back of my storage area in the oil studio. He said it was brilliant and would have none of my pleas that it not be on display.

Jax always seemed to get his way. Or maybe I just never did. Whatever it was, the painting I’d wanted to stay hidden was the highlight of the night.

The woman grabbed her husband’s arm and nearly bolted in Jax’s direction.

I loved art. I loved studying it, pondering it, and creating it. I didn’t, however, enjoy selling it. Or rubbing elbows with a bunch of people who’d spent more on their shoes than some families lived off of all year. It was part of the deal, though. Wealthy people didn’t want to buy just a canvas; they wanted a story to go with it. They wanted to meet, shake the hand, and share the story with the artist behind the canvas. They wanted a story to tell the rest of their country club friends when they came over and coveted the canvas hanging on their wall.

Once Mr. and Mrs. Eager had scrambled over to Jax, I grabbed my phone and checked it. I didn’t know what I was expecting—there never had been or probably never would be any reception in that place—but that didn’t stop me from checking it for the four dozenth time in the past few hours.

No signal. Big surprise.

I blew out a frustrated breath and tried not to let my thoughts run away with me. The ones that suggested something had happened to him. That the brakes in Alex’s piece of crap car had gone out and they’d runaway down the streets of Seattle until the car sped into the dark water of the Sound. Or that Alex had taken a wrong turn, confused another old warehouse with the Underground, wandered inside, and been jumped by a gang of street kids.

My mind was a runaway worry train. Loving someone as much as I did Jesse meant the darkness of the world seemed so black I never wanted to walk out the front door. Around every corner was some terror threatening to take away what I held most dear. I knew it probably shouldn’t be that way, but the world had become scarier since I’d let love back into my life. Scary because of the fear of loss. Of losing him. Of waking up to discover the one light shining bright in the dark night had been extinguished.

“Where are you, Jesse?” I whispered, chewing on my lip as I bit back the worst case scenario thoughts leaping to mind.

Then I felt him. Like he’d answered my question without using words. Jesse was close by, and everything inside of me heaved a sigh of relief. Scanning the room, I saw he wasn’t there, which meant . . . My gaze shifted toward the entrance. The sheer red curtains were drawn closed, and I saw the shapes of two men standing behind them. One was the size of a damn tractor and the other was . . . a very familiar shape.

I rushed toward the entrance, avoiding eye contact with everyone I passed. I could not, I would not, answer any more questions about inspiration, where I saw my career in five years, or if I’d be interested in doing a nude of their wives. I burst through the curtains, trying to go slow since I was wearing heels. Heels and I weren’t exactly copacetic. I should have gone slower.

I somehow managed to catch my toe on the floor, perform a clumsy spin, and was about to crash land face first when a lithe and strong pair of arms caught me. Those arms, or more like the owner behind them, had saved me from so many falls I’d lost count.

“You know I love it when you go and fall into my arms.” Jesse righted me but kept me close. “It really feeds that hero complex I try to repress.” He grinned the one that had made my stomach drop the first day we’d met. Almost one year later, my stomach did the same damn thing.

“And I kind of like it when you’re around to catch me from falling. Because, don’t tell, it really feeds that distressed damsel complex I try so hard to repress.”

“Our secrets and our repressed complexes are safe with each other.”

I was going in to tap the rim of his hat when I stopped short. There was no hat. Lowering my hand to his hair, I ran my fingers through it. Did Jesse have product in his hair? I would have bet my left kidney Jesse didn’t have a clue what product was. When my eyes went lower to find him in a long-sleeved henley with the couple top buttons undone, I wasn’t sure who’d walked into an alternate reality: me or Jesse.

“What happened to you?” I ran my hands around to his back. They moved lower, and when I felt loose material around his backside, my eyes widened.

“Alex got a hold of me.” Jesse shook his head then jolted when I slapped his butt. It didn’t make the same sound, and it certainly didn’t feel the same. When it came to Jesse Walker, it was tight jeans or no jeans.

“Alex,” I said, followed by a sigh. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have left you alone with her.”

“No worries. It was an adventure, for sure, and I learned at least a dozen new phrases and words related to the acts leading up to, the parts involved, or the actual making of sex.”

“Oh, God,” I groaned. Jesse wasn’t a prude, no where near it, but he was . . . wholesome. That was a rare trait and something to be protected. Spending an hour with Alex Diaz could obliterate that. “Next time, I promise I won’t leave you behind with her. Wait. What am I saying? There won’t be a next time. This whole night was one giant, unexpected surprise.”

That was the first time I’d had a few minutes to take a deep breath and let the last twelve hours catch up with me. Jax and I had pulled it off, barely, but sliding into the artist-of-the-month spot at the Underground as a college freshman wasn’t the kind of thing that saw an encore.

“It looks like things are going great in there. I couldn’t count how many people who stopped and stared at one of your pieces for five, ten, fifteen minutes at a time. One guy looked at one for so long, I started to wonder if he’d turned into a statue.” Jesse looked at me with proud eyes. Genuine pride. I’d convinced myself for years that I didn’t need anyone’s approval or pride, but that wasn’t the truth. I did care about those things, especially when they came from someone I loved and admired.

“It’s been a good night,” I replied, experiencing such an intense urge to kiss him I couldn’t ignore it. So I didn’t. Lifting up onto my tiptoes, I pressed my mouth to his until I felt it: the instant my whole body melted into him and I could no longer tell what part was Jesse and what part was me. I wasn’t losing myself to him; I was finding myself in him. “And now it’s a great night.”

“Mm-hmm,” Jesse hummed, smiling with his eyes still closed.

The bouncer shifted behind Jesse, reminding me of where we were, or rather, what side of the curtains we were on. “What are you doing out here?” I asked Jesse.

Jesse rubbed the back of his neck and looked to be searching for the right words. “Um . . . I wasn’t exactly on the V.I.P. list.”

“What?!” I made a face as I let out a mini shriek. “You’re the only person I actually want to see, and they didn’t put you on the V.I.P. list? Are you kidding me?”

Jesse still looked like he was trying to choose his words carefully. “No?”

The anger I felt had nothing to do with him and everything to do with whoever’s fault it was that Jesse’s name hadn’t been put on that list. “Why didn’t you tell someone?”

Jesse indicated at the monster-sized bouncer. “I tried telling Kong, but I don’t think he speaks. He just throws down the pain.”

I sent a glare “Kong’s” way, grabbed Jesse’s arm, and marched through the curtains. When Kong stepped forward, I gave him a do-it-I-dare-you look. The only thing he did was step back and look away.

“God, Jesse, I’m so sorry. How long have you been waiting out there?”

He lifted a shoulder as he scanned the pictures. “Not long.”

“Can not long be quantified?”

His gaze locked on one picture before guiding us toward it. I’d seen a lot of that picture already. “I don’t know. An hour? Maybe two? It wasn’t that long.”

“An hour? Or two?” I was back to a mini shriek. “Why didn’t you just bust through and come find me?”

Jesse stopped in front of the painting with a thoughtful expression. “I didn’t want to make a scene. Tonight’s all about you. Plus you’ve got a little too much faith in me if you think I could have gotten past Godzilla with tree stumps for arms.”

I laughed and squeezed his hand. No one could shift my moods like Jesse. Anger one second, laughter the next.

He took a few steps closer, leaning in until it looked like he was studying each individual brush stroke. After a few minutes, he stepped back a few feet and took in the painting as a whole. His forehead was lined, his eyes curious, and his mouth flat, giving away nothing.

Dozens of people had inspected the same picture, and not once had my heart pounded the way it was then. Transparency was tough with anybody, but if a stranger saw into the depths of me and didn’t like what they saw, brushing it off was easier. When someone I cared about, someone I cared about more than myself, saw into those same depths, their conclusion was everything.

Jesse knew the good, bad, and the ugly of me. He had for a while, and he’d never once turned his back and walked away. That felt different though. Those had been words, stories I’d told him, flashes in time I’d given him a front row seat to. He’d never seen the good, bad, and the ugly on canvas in paint form. I couldn’t exactly tell you how it was different, but it was.

Right when the anxiety felt like it was about to rip me in half, Jesse’s mouth lifted in a familiar way and his hand dropped from mine only to wind around my middle. “You’re beautiful,” he whispered, sweeping a kiss into my temple.

I choked on a laugh as a tear escaped my eye. “Which one?” I studied the picture with him.

His mouth moved from my temple to my ear. “Both of you.”

Just like that, the anxiety was gone, chased away by the all-encompassing acceptance Jesse showed me. He’d accepted me as I’d been last summer, he accepted me for the woman I was today, and I knew he’d accept the woman I was in the future. His acceptance didn’t come with an expiration date.

A figure slid in front of us. “Ah. You got in. Good for you.” Jax lifted his champagne glass at Jesse before taking a sip.

“Wait. You knew he was waiting out there?” I managed to hold back the flood of emotion until I received his response.

When Jax just lifted his eyebrows at me, I stopped holding the flood back. “And you didn’t invite him in or, I don’t know, tell me?” I crossed my arms and stepped toward Jax. I don’t know what I was thinking, it wasn’t like five foot not-a-whole-hell-of-a-lot in two-inch heels was intimidating, but I wanted to be in a position to intimidate. Jax Jones knew how much I wanted Jesse to be a part of the show, and apparently Jax Jones had also known Jesse was waiting just outside those curtains.

“It wouldn’t have been right of me to invite him in, and you’ve been busy all night.” Jax did that shrug of his that had never really bothered me before. If he did it again, I was going to go nuclear. Leaving my goddamned guest of honor outside for a couple of hours warranted a hell of a lot more than a shrug.

“Busy? Busy!?” I said, because once just wasn’t enough. “Let me show you something. Pretty basic stuff here.” Marching right up to Jax, I tapped his shoulder, lifted my eyebrows, and motioned toward the entrance. “‘Hey, Rowen. Your boyfriend, you know, that guy you’ve been waiting for all night, is just outside. Why don’t you go invite him in?’” My voice wasn’t trembling—yet—but it was close. Jesse came up behind me and dropped his hands on my shoulders. It wasn’t a calm down gesture. It was an I’ve got your back assurance.

Dammit, I loved that man, and he’d been left to just hang outside all night thanks to the guy in front of me with an amused expression that made me want to slap it off. Made me want to punch it off.

“I’ve dropped the ball on that basic stuff my whole life. Sorry, Rowen. Sorry, Rowen’s Boyfriend.” Jax lifted his champagne glass again and, that time, drained the entire thing.

My eyebrows came together. I’d met Jax in September, and we’d never had a problem. In fact, in a lot of ways, he’d seemed like the male version of me. Artistic, naturally cynical, dry sense of humor, same taste in music . . . but that night, he’d pissed me off big time. From that smug smile, he knew it, too. No apologies about it.

“That was an asshole move to pull.” I glared at him, reaching for Jesse’s hand to keep from shoving Jax.

“You know my reputation on campus?” Jax replied, his brown eyes darkening. “Why would you expect anything more than an asshole move from an asshole?”

I flinched like his words had been a slap. “What the hell is wrong with you? Did a wire trip in your brain in the past fifteen minutes?” Jesse’s hands were still attached to my shoulders, but instead of holding me back, they were holding me steady.

“Yeah. A wire did trip in my brain.” Jax drilled his index finger into his temple. “Forgive me for being human. I’m not your infallible, perfect cowboy.” Without so much as a good-bye, Jax sped away from Jesse and me like we were radioactive.

“What in the hell is wrong with him?” I said more to myself than to Jesse.

“Long day. He’s just tired. I’m sure tomorrow he’ll wake up his usual Jax self—whoever that is—have a cup of coffee, call, and apologize. Then you two can get back to putting together kickass art shows.”

My anger shut off like a switch had been hit. “Do you always have to see the good in everyone?”

“No, I don’t have to. I just choose to.”

I stepped into Jesse’s arms. There wasn’t a single wrinkle of concern on his forehead. Mine felt like it was pinched together with hundreds. “And you’re with someone like me because . . .?”

“Because I’m supposed to be with you.” His answer came easily, effortlessly.

“What if tomorrow morning you wake up and supposed to be flies out the window?”

“No worries,” he replied with a lift of his shoulder.

“‘No worries’?” I rolled my eyes. “Really?”

“Really. Because whether supposed to be flies out the window tonight, or tomorrow, or fifty years from now, I’m not going anywhere because I’ll always want to be with you.”

I rested my head against his chest as a smile formed. “I feel like I should keep arguing because it’s too soon to forfeit, but I think no matter what I argue back with, you’ve kind of got me on this.”

“Yeah. You’re right. I’ve really got you.” One of Jesse’s arms circled my waist as the other reached for my hand. “Dance with me.” It wasn’t a question. He was already moving to an imaginary beat.

“What? There’s no dance floor. There’s barely any music. There’re bored millionaires wandering around just looking for something to lift their noses at.” I liked dancing with Jesse. I might not readily admit it, but dancing with Jesse was one of the few things that gave me hope that the world wasn’t eminently doomed.

“Come on. Dance with me.” When he used that tone, the just-above-a-plea one, I’d learned months ago it was useless to put up a fight. I lost every time.

“Fine,” I grumbled half-heartedly.

Staying right where we were, in front of the painting that made me as transparent as one person could be, he led me in a dance I knew I’d never forget. That was one of those moments that would be tattooed into my memory forever. I’d been living more and more of those since meeting Jesse Walker.

“You know I love to dance with you,” he whispered, rubbing his thumb over the beading at my lower back.

“Remember our first dance?”

I felt his smile against my forehead. “How could I forget?”