The Finished Masterpiece (Master of Trickery Book 3)

by Pepper Winters

  “Why?” My stomach churned. “Surely, a day’s delay won’t make a—”

  “It’s over.” His lips snapped shut, stark fear seeping into his face. Coughing, he straightened his shoulders and hid any trace of terror. “It had to be done today. This afternoon.” Anger tinged his tone. “I couldn’t deliver because my canvas was off earning minimum wage working for someone else.”

  I froze. “The alcohol is making you crueller than normal.”

  “Or allowing me to be honest.”

  “I don’t believe that. I also don’t believe you’re truly blaming me for this.”

  “If you’d been here sooner, I might’ve—”

  “I had commitments, Gil,” I snapped. “I told you that.”

  He growled under his breath, burying his face into his hands.

  I promised I’d be there for him.

  No matter what.

  Not able to bear the tension between us, I touched his shoulder. “Do you need money? I don’t have much. In fact, I barely have anything, but it’s yours if you need it.” My rent was due tomorrow. My electricity bill the next day. My pantry was empty and my fridge might as well be switched off to save on power because it never held much these days.

  I wouldn’t be able to help much monetary wise, but I would share whatever I had.

  He jerked away and shook his head, dropping his hands to stare down the long expanse of warehouses and their looming façades. His lips pressed together as if holding back so many awful things. His hands balled as if wanting to fight imaginary beasts. “Even now, you’re willing to offer me everything you have.” He didn’t make eye contact, talking to the night. “You’d give me your last penny without hesitation.”

  I nodded. “Only because you’d do the same for me.”

  “Are you so sure?” He laughed coldly. “I’m not as good as you, Olin. I never was.”

  “It’s not a matter of being good or bad. It’s a matter of helping those you lo—” I snapped my mouth closed.

  His gaze caught mine, endless and aching. “Please, don’t.”

  My heart squeezed, scrambling to hide my almost-confession. “Tell me what you need the money for and I’ll get as much as I can.”

  I’d loved him as a girl.

  I’d loved him while apart.

  And I still loved him, even though I wasn’t sure he deserved it.

  He snorted as if I’d asked the saddest, hardest question in the world. “Your money is worthless.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it can’t buy what I need.”

  “What do you need?”

  He looked at the stars, his biggest lie slipping from his lips. “Nothing. I need nothing.”

  Too bad the truth echoed in the void, howling with the opposite of what he’d just said. Gil needed something. He needed everything.

  Money.

  Safety.

  Help.

  I pressed against him, hurt to my core when he sidestepped away before I could hug him. My fingernails dug into my palms as I did my best not to cry. “You forbid me from talking to the police, but you’re in trouble, Gil...you need to tell them. They can help—”

  “Help?” He rolled his eyes, the haze of alcohol evaporating a little. “They’re about as much help as I am.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It means I’m fucking useless.”

  I sucked in a breath. “Why would you say that?”

  “Because it’s true.” He sighed with his entire body. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter now. It’s too late.”

  Gil had always been a melancholy type of boy. At school, his smiles were few and far between. His laughter was priceless because it was so rare and whatever reaction he gave was always overshadowed by a taut wariness and cloudy distrust.

  But tonight, thanks to alcohol blurring his walls, he struggled to hide.

  “What’s too late, Gil?” Worry sat thick and cloying in my chest. I wanted to touch him. To hug him. To hold him in my arms and tell him he could tell me because if he didn’t, the poison inside would ruin him.

  “Everything.” He sighed again, swaying a little as tiredness mixed with drunkenness. “Go home, O. Time to forget about me.”

  I swallowed back my urge to tell him that was an impossibility. That I couldn’t stop thinking about him before. Now that we’d had sex, I was doomed to being his forever.

  My voice was level and kind as I said, “I’m sorry I couldn’t help you with the commission earlier.”

  He sniffed, glowering at the dark world around us. “Yeah, me too.”

  Looking toward the empty street, I clutched my handbag closer. The thought of leaving him like his sent warning bells all over my skin. Turning to face him again, I did my best to change the subject. “Was it hard painting me? Did you...want me like you wanted me tonight?”

  His face hardened. “I’m many things, Olin, but lusting after a canvas when I’m working is beneath even me.”

  “Can I be honest and say having you paint me was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done? Being with you tonight? God, I needed that so much.”

  My admittance did what I’d intended. It wrenched him from black thoughts, painting his features in surprise. He cleared his throat. “Having me paint you was hard?”

  “Very much.”

  His muscles tensed for all new reasons. “Because...”

  “Because you were so close, after being gone for so long. Because your brush felt like a kiss and your airbrush felt like...” I blushed. “Like your tongue.”

  He swallowed, his throat working. “I...” His eyes glowed as if he wanted to confess a thousand things, but those awful shutters slammed down again and he muttered, “Tonight only happened because I had compromised self-control and you had pent-up need from the previous commission. That’s all it was. Basic instinct to find a release.”

  He effectively threw cold water in my face, slapping away yet another attempt to drag him from the darkness.

  He’s lost, O...

  No, he’s just being a jerk.

  And frankly, I’d used up my quota of kindness tonight.

  There was only so much patience I could offer. I wasn’t a saint. I was hurt. I’d been hurt for seven long years. And that hurt became harder to ignore the more he fought me. “Time truly did scar you, Gil. I’m trying so hard to bring you back, but no matter what I do, you just keep pushing me away.”

  His eyebrows turned into jagged lines. “I grew up, O. We both did. Whoever you knew is no longer a part of me.”

  “It’s so easy for you? To shove aside the parts of you that made us family?”

  He shuddered as if I’d stabbed him in the heart. “Nothing about this is easy. You’re not making it easy because you refuse to listen to me.”

  “I’m listening now.” I didn’t look away. “And I think you’re forgetting why I refuse to obey you. Last time I did, you broke up with me. Last time I didn’t fight with everything that I have, you just...disappeared. You keep acting as if you’re trying to protect me by keeping me away, but in reality, I think you’re just trying to protect yourself.”

  “I am trying to protect you.”

  “Do it some other way. Don’t push me away this time, Gil. Don’t be that selfish.”

  “Selfish?” he roared. “You think I’m being selfish by doing everything I can to keep you safe?”

  “I think you’re choosing the easy way out—”

  “I never had it easy. Fucking ever!”

  My voice rose to meet his, uncaring if people heard our domestic. “You broke it off with me. That was the easy option. You moved on. You made the choice to leave. I was never given that option.”

  Why did I say that?

  What’s wrong with me?

  I’d forgiven him for everything. I didn’t want to punish him by bringing up the past when it was nothing compared to what he dealt with now.

  “Look, I’m sorry, I—”

  He crowded me until our ches
ts touched. “You think I chose to leave you?”

  I couldn’t breathe properly. “You did a pretty good job of making it seem that way. You walked out of my life then vanished from school. No one had a clue where you’d gone.”

  “I didn’t have a choice.”

  My anger rose again, ignoring my desire to stay calm. “Of course, you did! You could’ve talked to me instead of ripping out my—”

  “I told you.” His chest rose and fell with agony. “I had my reasons.”

  “And those reasons weren’t good enough.” Pain bolted through my blood, unravelling my will to keep this fight from happening. I couldn’t stop myself from spilling everything I’d held inside. “Nothing you could tell me would excuse you breaking my heart.”

  I’d done what I could to stop blaming him. I’d focused on helping him, not on fixing what went wrong.

  But...I’d reached my limit.

  He was too wrapped up in secrecy.

  Too isolated in misery.

  I had to know.

  I had to understand at least something before I went insane.

  We’d slept with each other tonight. We’d let our bodies do the talking and it’d been the first honest conversation we’d had.

  I wanted more of that.

  Gil’s gaze landed hotly on my lips. “You broke mine too. I’d say we’re fair.”

  “What?” The starlit darkness crackled with instant electricity. My nipples pebbled and my breath caught as his hand lashed out, looping around my throat.

  “You heard me. You went out with Justin. You flaunted your relationship in my goddamn face. Tell me why I should’ve stuck around at school to watch that?”

  I tried to break from his hold, my fingers scratching at his arm. “You’re seriously going to make me the bad guy? You pushed me away! You wouldn’t speak to me! I spent every night crying, wondering what I’d done wrong. You wouldn’t even look at me.”

  “I had reaso—”

  “No, you didn’t!” I ducked and twisted from his hold. “No reason you could have ever given me would justify the coldness you delivered.”

  “Apparently, you were justified enough to kiss Justin in our spots, though. I saw you. He had his hand up your shirt behind the gym.” He punched his chest. “That was our spot, O. Ours. No one else’s.” His eyes glistened with agony. He spun and stormed away, both hands digging through his hair. “Fuck!”

  With his overwhelming heat and power gone, I sucked in oxygen. How had this fight happened? Why were we tearing each other to ribbons?

  I spread my hands in surrender, exhaustion crushing me fast. “Look, none of that matters now. You and Justin are friends, and we’re...we’re—” I smiled even though my heart felt like shattering. “We’re friends, too...even if you’d rather not be.”

  “You can’t be friends with someone who doesn’t deserve it.” The light went from his eyes, any softness from before deleted from his mouth. He turned to stone as he pointed into the darkness. “I don’t deserve you, O. And you don’t deserve to suffer. You need to leave. You need to obey because it’s the only way I can keep you safe. Leave and never come back.” His gaze danced around the open, empty night. “Promise me.”

  “You don’t need to be afraid of him.”

  I expected him to growl. Instead, his response sent glaciers oozing down my spine.

  “I do, and...I am.” He nodded with conviction, causing my tummy to flip. His voice echoed with uncurable disaster. “Deathly fucking afraid.”

  “Of what?”

  “Of everything.”

  I reached for him. “Gil—”

  He stepped away. “Go.” Gritting his teeth, he gave the industrial area a searching, scathing look as if warning goblins and night terrors to leave me the hell alone before stepping through the pedestrian access to his warehouse. “Goodbye, O. For the last time.”

  With a final splintering look, he slammed the door and locked it.

  Chapter Eighteen

  ______________________________

  Olin

  -The Present-

  FOR TWO DAYS, life tried to convince me things were normal.

  I ate, showered, went to work, and travelled home each night. All the mundane tasks of living alone and fending for yourself in a large city dragged me along in some resemblance of normalcy.

  Only, it wasn’t normal.

  My body knew that. My heart knew that. Even my mind knew it, because it struggled to stop thinking about Gil for a moment, let alone switch off to sleep.

  Starting a new job and falling into bed with the boy I never stopped loving weren’t a good combination.

  I caught Shannon’s eye as she smiled at me from across the floor. Even though my thoughts were far from work, I did my best to perform well. The phone was always answered politely, my emails replied to promptly. I’d learned my role fast, so no one had to breathe down my neck.

  Yesterday, when I’d messaged Justin that Gil was back at his warehouse, I’d bit my lip in case he went over there and figured out that we’d slept together. My cheeks heated as Justin replied, asking if I knew where Gil had been and what state I’d found him in.

  Luckily, I’d had to duck into a team meeting, so I brushed him off and told him to go see Gil if he had any more questions.

  That was over twenty-four hours ago, and I was tired. The clock showed just past four, and I begged for the rest of the time to disappear so I could go home, drink some cheap supermarket wine in a futile attempt to stop reliving the delicious, emotionally-dangerous sex we’d indulged in, and plead for sleep.

  “Hi, Olin.” The guy from the coffee room who’d flirted with me on my first day smiled over my cubicle wall. His dark skin and darker eyes were highlighted by a white shirt and silver tie. He held a bunch of papers under his arm and his gaze travelled over my similar attire of cream blouse with navy pinstripe skirt. “You up to much this weekend?”

  I stopped typing an email about a laptop that needed a factory reset and shook my head. “Not really. You?”

  He grinned. “Not much.”

  “Cool.” I smiled awkwardly. “Well, I hope you find—”

  “I was gonna see if you wanted to do something, actually.” He interrupted me in a rush. “I mean...if you’re not doing anything.”

  I stilled. My roller chair creaked as I sucked in a harsh breath. “Oh. Um...”

  “We could do lunch? Or a movie? Even just a walk. I’m easy.” He hoisted the papers higher. “Say, Saturday?”

  My heart bumped into ribs in its haste to refuse. It’d been a while since I’d been on a date. I didn’t think I’d even remember the rules and etiquette required.

  You had sex two days ago.

  I scowled. Yes, I did. But that couldn’t be classified as a date.

  Sex with Gil was the opposite of a date. Unplanned, ill-advised, and stupidly spontaneous.

  The guy inhaled, waiting for me to puncture his hope.

  I fiddled with my pen on the desk. “I don’t even know your name.”

  He slouched in relief that I hadn’t shot him down straight away. “It’s Hamish.”

  “Hamish.” I nodded with a small smile. “Nice name.”

  “Olin is nice too.”

  I tilted my head. “It’s strange.”

  “Strange is always better than normal.”

  “I’m not so sure about that.” I sighed, mainly to myself but smiled brighter as Hamish cocked an eyebrow. “Look, Hamish, I—”

  His entire body deflated. “You’re busy, after all?”

  I couldn’t exactly lie after I’d told him I had no plans, but I didn’t know what else to say. Lying had never come easy to me, and I’d used up what little talent I had lying to the cops on Gil’s behalf. And besides, I didn’t want to fib to a new colleague who I might end up working with for a long time. “I can’t go out with you because...”

  I don’t want to date work friends.

  I don’t mix business and pleasure.

  I’
m...eh...a lesbian.

  Good one, O.

  “She’s in a relationship with me. That’s why.”

  My head shot up at the chilly, commanding voice as Hamish spun around.

  I blinked, not believing who stood in my cubicle.

  My heart instantly sat up and glowed. Gratefulness that he’d sought me out after our fight. Insane relief that it wasn’t truly over, no matter the fierce words we’d thrown at each other two nights ago.

  I’d done my best not to contact him. I’d forced myself to give him space.

  It worked.

  Hamish scowled, looking Gil up and down. “You’re her boyfriend?”

  Gil stood tall and impenetrable, hands balled by his sides, hair cascading over his forehead. His black T-shirt and tan jacket held no paint, mud, or blood for once, and his jeans were semi-presentable. His boots, on the other hand, were a colourful, dirty mess.

  Gil looked at me, then back at Hamish, his jaw working hard as if chewing his lies, doing his best to make them sound believable. “Yes. Since high-school. She’s the love of my life.”

  My chest ached at the way his voice gruffed with honesty, even while masquerading as falsehoods.

  Hamish looked at me. “You didn’t say you were with someone.”

  To be fair, I’d only worked here a few days. And I wasn’t the type of person to share such personal details with strangers. I smoothed my minor annoyance away, saying kindly, “I’m rather private about stuff outside of work.”

  “Which is why she kept me a secret.” Gil strode forward, broaching the smallness of my cubicle and placing a possessive hand on my shoulder.

  My skin instantly conducted electricity, sprouting goosebumps as if lightning forked from Gil’s touch. I hadn’t slept in days, yet all my sleepiness vanished just having his hand on me.

  My legs bunched to haul me upright. I didn’t want to be sitting while Gil towered over me, but his fingers latched into muscle, pressing me firmly down.

  I shot him a dirty look as I smiled as normally as I could at Hamish. “Anyway, thanks so much for the offer. I hope you have a great weekend.”

  Hoping Hamish got the clue that he was dismissed, I kept my smile pasted on my face, waiting for him to go.