Total pages in book: 111
Estimated words: 105708 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 529(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 352(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105708 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 529(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 352(@300wpm)
“And me,” I say. “I need someone respected assessing the Reid Winter Winery in Sonoma tomorrow. They’ll need to bring a full team. I need it done quickly.”
“Tomorrow?” she asks incredulously. “No one is going to talk to me today, let alone be there tomorrow.”
“Pay them whatever you have to pay them.”
“That could be hefty.”
“I trust you not to let me get raped.”
“Oh, good grief. I could do without your visuals sometimes, Nick Rogers. Tuesday is more reasonable, even with a bribe.”
“I prefer tomorrow. If anyone can get it done, you can. Text me when you know the details. And yes, I’ll bring the donuts you like in the morning.” I end the call and stand up, walking to my desk, where I stick the money clip in the top drawer. I consider digging through the boxes of materials I have on my father, but that’s risky with Faith in the house. And I’d rather be upstairs with Faith anyway.
With that in mind, I open my briefcase and pull out the sensitive material related to Faith and my father, filing it away in my desk. Selecting several client files I need to study, I seal it up, head to the kitchen where my computer still sits, and, with it in hand, make my way upstairs. The minute I appear in the doorway, Faith turns to face me, a black cover-up over her clothes, her hair piled on top of her head, little ringlets around her face.
She motions to her white Keds, now splattered with black and gray paint. “Maybe I could sell them to some clothing designer?” she says. “They’re stylish, right?”
“Very,” I tell her, walking to the wall behind her, where I can watch her canvas take shape. “It could be an empire.” I sit down and open my briefcase.
Faith removes her cover-up and sits down next to me, her black pants now splattered with paint as well. “Isn’t it going to be hard to work like this?” she asks.
“I’ll manage,” I say, leaning over and kissing her, but it hits me that she stopped painting the minute I showed up. “Unless,” I say, pulling back to study her, “I’m making you feel uncomfortable.”
She covers my hand with hers, a sweet gesture, when sweet has never been my thing. “I like you being here with me,” she says, and when she lets go of my hand, I want hers back. Apparently, I like sweet now. A whole fucking lot. “I just wish you had a better place to work,” she adds. “You should put a desk in here.”
Or I could just buy a new house. A thought that stuns me, but I don’t fight it. I’d buy ten houses for Faith, who is now flushing at her own words. “Not that I’m suggesting I’ll be here often, but—”
“Faith,” I say. “I made this room for you. I want you here all the fucking time.” I don’t give her time to object. I move on. “And I’m fine right here. I have a ton of paperwork to review and emails to answer.”
She rotates to face me, on her knees, her hand on my leg. “Hard limit: One night.”
My lips curve. “That didn’t go as you planned, now did it?”
“No.” She laughs. “It didn’t.” She stands up and heads back to her painting station, and I decide I’ll talk to her about extra security tomorrow morning. She’s had enough hell today, and she needs to paint. She has a show coming up. I watch her cover up before she turns back to me. “We need music.”
I pull my phone from my pocket. “What are you in the mood for?”
“Surprise me, and I’ll see where it takes me on my canvas.”
I tab through my music and choose Beethoven’s “Moonlight Sonata,” and the moment it starts to play, she sighs. “Perfection,” she says, a smile not just on her lips but in her eyes.
I relax into the wall, intending to reach for my files, but when the music lifts with a dramatic chord, I find myself watching Faith. Every stroke of her brush mesmerizes me as I wait for that red streak that she has proclaimed the beginning of a story. To me this symbolizes a feeling of hope—a look forward, not behind.
My mind goes back to the night we met, sitting in front of her fireplace, talking over pints of ice cream:
“Why black, white, and red?” I’d asked of her trademark colors.
“Black and white is the purest form of any image to me. It lets the viewer create the story.”
“And the red?”
“The beginning of the story as I see it. A guide for the viewer’s imagination to flow. I know it sounds silly, but it’s how I think when I’m creating.”
I cringe with the words: the beginning of the story as I see it.