Total pages in book: 24
Estimated words: 21802 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 109(@200wpm)___ 87(@250wpm)___ 73(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 21802 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 109(@200wpm)___ 87(@250wpm)___ 73(@300wpm)
But as I rolled off him and lay on my side, he trapped me in his arms and squeezed me tight against him, molding our bodies together in an intimate embrace. I didn’t feel interchangeable as I had with my husband. How strange was it I had more connection with this artist in a single encounter than the man I'd spent years with?
Luke’s fingertips skimmed over my arm. Up and down in an infinite loop, causing goosebumps to lift on my skin. We’d ceased moving, and my sweat-dampened skin cooled enough that I shivered.
His phone buzzed again from the pocket of his discarded jeans and he retrieved it. He glanced at the screen and sent it to voicemail, but the interruption broke the spell of the moment. I sat up and reached for my bra with unsure hands.
Luke sat as well, climbed to his feet, and pulled his pants up around his hips. I dressed as he disappeared through a doorway, and I heard what I assumed was the lid of a trash can. Awkwardness descended on us when he returned, his jeans done back up. He bent at the waist, picked up his shirt and tugged it on. I scrambled into my clothes and pulled myself to my feet, looking anywhere in the studio but at him.
Luke Rafferty. My new partner, and technically my new lover.
Footsteps carried him to the wall, and a light switch snapped on. I blinked against the harsh, artificial light. Everything was less sexy now, and much more real.
As if he sensed my trepidation, he closed in and cradled my face in his palms. It forced my gaze on him. His eyes were curious. It seemed like he wanted to peer inside me and see what I was thinking.
“Don’t,” he said softly.
“Don’t, what?”
“Don’t overthink what just happened. I enjoyed it. I’d like to do it again sometime, but not if it’s going to make it difficult to work together.”
I swallowed a breath, worried about the deal I’d struck with this blue-eyed devil. Collaborating with another artist was complicated enough. I knew I should keep the sex separate. “Do you already have a project in mind?”
He shot me half of a smile and tilted his head to the side. It was . . . strange. “Tell me how you’ll fix my sculpture.”
I was two-thirds of the way through my explanation before an odd sensation prickled through me. Luke was too busy nodding to notice I’d trailed off. He seemed to understand my thought process.
“You’ll flip both petals around,” he said, “and paint them as the fronts. That would work. It’ll hide the imperfections of the seam.”
“Yes,” I said.
He stared at the sculpture. “It would be exactly as you intended it.”
My heart raced, hyperaware at the clinical tone in his voice. “Yes. It’d be perfect.”
Time slowed as he stalked toward the sculpture and hooked a hand around the stem. Before he was about to do it, I sensed it. I felt it in the marrow of my bones. Luke’s gaze trapped mine.
“No,” I pleaded.
He ignored me. His bicep flexed as he yanked the stem forward, pulling the sculpture down. I stood dumbfounded as the yellow orchid pitched through the air and whooshed toward the hardwood. Like a fool, I tried to stop it, but I wasn’t close or fast enough.
The yellow petals were the first to impact the ground and exploded into a thousand pieces with a loud skittering of ceramic sliding across polished wood. The force thundered up the stem and it broke in three places, followed by a significant portion of the base. My spine cracked along with it, and I sank to my knees.
The moss I had painstakingly recreated was reduced to broken lumps of painted stone, and it exposed the chicken wire mesh beneath it. I couldn’t breathe. My eyes wouldn’t blink. A guttural wail of anguish reverberated from my chest.
Luke glanced at the destruction between us with indifferent eyes. He didn’t care that he’d just fucked me and destroyed me on the floor of his studio. I stared up at him, one hand clutched to the hole in my chest where he’d ripped out my heart.
“You said”—I forced it out between painful breaths—“you weren’t going to destroy it.”
His shoulders lifted as he took in a deep breath, and his feet crunched on the carnage as he strolled to me. He stared at me with confusion. “And I haven’t. You and I are going to make it even better.”
I shook my head in utter disbelief. “Are you insane?” I put my palms on the floor, gathering a handful of broken pieces. They clinked in my trembling hands. There was no way to fix what he’d done.
“Sometimes,” he said, “damaged things come out stronger in the end. This sculpture lacked restraint. What we’ll build together will be so much more. It’ll be perfect.”