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by Lea Griffith

  “No need,” Ruthie hurriedly said. “Tobias knows.”

  She didn’t feel an ounce of angst over the small omission. He knew Sol wanted a painting, but he’d been very specific when he told her to stay away from the man. Oh well. Tobias needed to learn he couldn’t control everything she did.

  “If you’re sure,” Hoenig said, doubt in his tone.

  “I’m sure. Send him in. Should be no more than an hour or so,” she said confidently.

  The lock on the door disengaged and Ruthie walked around her canvas to meet Sol. He grabbed her hands and kissed the back of one. Old-school charm in spades, she thought.

  “Thank you for seeing me, Miss Copeland. I had doubts you would after Mr. Edwards so eloquently told me to stay away,” Sol said in a grave voice.

  “Yes, well, Tobias doesn’t own me. I’ll take the clients I want,” she told the man firmly.

  He laughed, and there was that note of joy she’d heard buried under layers of pain and fatigue the other day at the offices of Copeland Shipping. It drew her in. Made her want to help him find that joy so it sounded all the time.

  “You’re sad?” he inquired.

  “For you,” she answered truthfully, and then wanted to sink through the floor at her honesty.

  “Yes, well, I can think of many people you should be sad for. I am not one of them,” he said brusquely.

  Ruthie wondered if she’d pissed him off. Not a great way to start off a session. “Well, as the sadness is mine I can give it to whomever I want, right? Now, let’s talk about this mysterious woman you want me to paint.”

  Silence reigned, and she became uncomfortable until she realized he was being silent on purpose. “You did come to me for a portrait, correct, Mr. Dinapoli?”

  “Sol,” he demanded softly.

  Ruthie inclined her head. “Sol.”

  He sighed, and in it was defeat. “I did come to you to paint a woman I have seen only once, but see every day in my mind.”

  “Once?” she asked in confusion.

  “Yes, on the streets of Naples. It was the space of a heartbeat, but her face is etched in my mind as surely as if I’d seen her every day of my life. She made quite the impact, you see.” His voice was a myriad of contradictions—soft, bitter, angry, defeated.

  Above all of those emotions was pain. “Who was this woman?” she inquired, feeling as if she were dealing with a wild animal who might bolt at any second.

  Sol Dinapoli was a mass of inconsistencies. She instinctively recognized he was a predator, capable of resorting to great violence. Though he’d never harmed her or directed that intent toward her in the two times they’d met, it hung in the air between them. Ruthie’s mind and instincts had evolved to such a degree that she recognized things most others either didn’t see or didn’t want to see.

  And though he was a predator, he was also a man so deeply entwined with the memory of a single woman that his heart was bleeding.

  “Who is she, Sol?” Ruthie questioned again, softly.

  “I don’t know her name, but she might well be my heart,” he answered. He cleared his throat suddenly and Ruthie recognized his time for sharing those parts of himself was over.

  He reminded her of Tobias. So closed off, so remote. How long had he kept this pain inside him locked away? She might never know.

  “Then your heart should have a portrait, yes?” She turned and walked to her workbench. “Have a seat, Sol, behind and slightly to the left of the middle easel so I can easily hear your voice.”

  She heard him move a folding chair to where she’d instructed and then he took a seat.

  “Why must you hear my voice so well?” he asked.

  She cocked her head. “Because sometimes the picture in your head becomes more when I hear the tone of your voice. It probably makes no sense to you, but to me, it is a guide. Where to soften the chin, how her hair falls over her brow, how her lips wet when she licks them—these are all important to the entirety of the picture. Remember, I am depending on you to give me her face. I cannot see her and I cannot see the picture in your mind. I am an artist blind to the subtle nuances, but I can glean them from your tone.”

  “I will not believe it until I see it,” he stated, arrogance in his voice now.

  She laughed, the need to give this man his lady overriding the fears of yesterday and obliterating the specter of Vessi Gallo. “Then I will show you.”

  Ruthie felt as if she was on the precipice of something huge. It was exhilarating and slightly cathartic. And so it began with a single question, “Where did you first see her?”

  “Naples, Italy.”

  “I need more, Sol. What was the day like? Was the sun shining? Was it overcast? Were there buildings around you throwing shadows? How far away were you from her?”

  He was silent for long moments, then took a deep breath. She had him now.

  “It was July twenty-third, a Thursday. I was home on business, my boss having called me to Naples to sort through a particularly large mess with some, uh, buyers. Anyway, I pulled up to the main offices in the heart of Naples, running opposite the Piazza del Plebiscito. The sun was shining high in the sky, bouncing off the white buildings that dominate Naples, and the moment I saw her, the wind had picked up.” He stopped abruptly and she pictured him lost in his recollections. There was awe and no small amount of loss in his tone.

  Ruthie rubbed her chest. She actually hurt for him.

  He sighed and began again. “The sun was cream on her porcelain skin, reflecting off the auburn of her hair and highlighting her heart-shaped face. Her eyes were like a cat’s, tilted at the outside corners and such a startling green they took my breath. Her lips were the red of a rose in full bloom, the bottom lip fuller than the top, a perfect, delectable piece of flesh I wanted to sink my teeth into.”

  Another stop, as if the words held a weight he could bear for only so long.

  “The sun disappeared behind a cloud and her gaze met mine. I had begun walking to her without realizing it and my approach startled her. There was a man with her, holding her arm tightly. She’s a tiny woman, probably reaching no higher than my sternum. I don’t remember the color of her clothes; it was inconsequential when all I could see was her eyes. Lushly fringed with auburn-colored lashes. And there was fear in her eyes. I remember that well,” he said in a cold, hard voice.

  “Was she classically beautiful?”

  “No, her face is very stubborn. Her chin set in a mulish cast and her cheekbones are high. I remember thinking she needed to put on some weight—that perhaps that would fill out the gauntness of her facial structure.”

  She began peppering him with questions, her hand moving on the canvas with sure, determined strokes. How she managed to never deviate from the lines of her pictures she couldn’t say. It was as if the picture in her mind communicated through her hands to the canvas perfectly.

  Ruthie gave Sol’s woman life based off his recollections. Every question she asked furthered the picture of his woman in her mind, and her hand was the tool to bring it to canvas.

  “What is the one feature you noticed first?” she asked finally, taking a breath. Her hand was cramping slightly, but it was a small inconvenience.

  “Her eyes,” Sol said with zero hesitation.

  “Good,” she murmured, filling in small things here and there. “Now we fill in the colors.”

  The second part began, more tedious but infinitely more pleasing to Ruthie. The smell of her oils as she dabbed them on her palette in a certain order, whites to blacks, with other colors she pulled from the ones Vince had mixed for her in between in alphabetical order. By the time her palette was ready, she moved back to the easel and began again.

  “Her hair, Sol, was it blowing in the wind?” she asked.

  “The instant I saw her, yes. But when the man pushed her into the car, it was lying against her shoulders, the cut brutal and uneven,” he answered, and there was the note of death once again in his voice.

  Ruthie
stopped. “She wasn’t going with him willingly?”

  “No.”

  That was it. Just no. And his tone made it clear he would tell her no more. Ruthie had no idea why he wanted this woman who clearly belonged to someone else, but it was secondary to her objective. She’d give Sol his joy if she could.

  Her soul eased as she began filling in the painting with colors. The porcelain of the woman’s skin, the jade of her eyes, and the rose of her lips and cheeks. Ruthie didn’t excel at shadows but for some reason in her mind, the clouds moving over the woman’s face in Sol’s memory formed, and she was painting the moment as if she’d been the one to witness it.

  It was freeing, the feel of her brush in her hand and the smell of the paint in her nostrils. A few more questions and her brush flew over the canvas, bringing to life the picture now cut in both of their minds.

  The woman was a redhead, more auburn, hints of gold and brown, and her natural ivory skin and green eyes were impressive. Her chin was stubborn, with a slight cleft that Sol said he remembered he wanted to skim his mouth over. Ruthie had shivered at the imagery, wanting Tobias there with her in that moment so she could sink into him.

  Sol Dinapoli had a vision in his mind, a memory contingent on time and distance, and yet she didn’t doubt that the woman taking life on her canvas was a woman he would never stop searching for.

  She reached the end of the portrait and stepped back, placing her palette on the workbench and setting her brush in the cleaning solution to be dealt with later.

  “I may see it?” he inquired politely.

  She shook her head. “Not yet, Sol. A few minutes, please, and a few more questions.”

  He sighed. “Have you not asked me enough for a lifetime?”

  “Perhaps, but this woman is important to you and it’s important I get her just right. Now tell me, why did you not go after her?”

  “She was not mine, and I had…obligations,” he replied miserably.

  “Was she afraid of the man she was with?”

  “Yes,” Sol answered in a monotone. “And I couldn’t reach her in time.”

  “Will this picture help you find her and get her to safety?” Ruthie asked, her stomach somersaulting.

  “That is my hope. Since I heard about your talent, you have been my only hope, sorrellina.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Little sister,” Sol replied instantly.

  “Come here, Sol,” Ruthie encouraged. “Take my hand, but close your eyes first.”

  “My eyes are closed,” he said as he grabbed her hand.

  “Good. A man who does what he’s told. Could you give my Toby lessons?” she asked. “Probably not a fair task, eh, Sol? Okay, here’s what I want you to do—go back to that day in your mind, feel the wind and the sun, see the light bouncing off the walls around you, hear the horns barking and the cars speeding all around you.”

  “Okay,” he responded.

  “Now open your eyes, Sol, and tell me what you see,” Ruthie urged.

  There was silence and it stretched taut. Ruthie wondered if she’d gotten it heinously wrong, until Sol lifted her hand to his mouth and kissed the back of it reverently.

  “It is her, sorellina. You have given me my heart.”

  Sol’s words had Ruthie breathing a sigh of relief. “Way to make me sweat it, Sol, geesh!”

  “I had despaired that I would ever see her again, but you’ve given her to me and now, Ruthie? Now I will find her because I have her picture and it will guide me,” Sol said in a deep voice.

  “What the fuck is going on here?”

  Ruthie felt her own joy break over and through her at the sound of Tobias’s voice. She turned to him and moved around her easels to get to him. He met her halfway, pulling her close, and she burrowed into him as his arms wrapped around her.

  “I missed you,” she said, her voice nearly cracking as emotion washed over her.

  “What’s wrong, baby?” he asked at her lips.

  “I just told you,” she answered, and pressed her face into his neck, inhaling his cedar scent deep and holding him there.

  She knew she was experiencing a small letdown after such an intense session of painting. There was nothing to be done for it. Just as a submissive experienced sub drop after play, she experienced the same. Endorphins fled after intense artistic creation, and she was left emotionally drained and tired.

  Tobias had shown up at just the right time.

  “What did you do to her?” Tobias demanded of Sol. “I thought I told you to stay the fuck away from her.” There was menace rolling off him. Ruthie sensed a disaster looming.

  “I needed a picture and your lady has given it to me,” Sol responded.

  Tobias made to step away from Ruthie, but she held on tight and she could sense his frustration.

  “I’m not okay with this, Dinapoli. Your kind bring shit to my door I don’t like. Stay away or suffer the consequences,” Tobias warned.

  Ruthie gasped and stepped away, endorphins surging back through her as her anger reached epic proportions. “How dare you, Tobias! I told him to call on me. You don’t tell me what to do or whom to do it with, are we fucking clear?”

  “He’s a bad man, Ruthie,” Tobias bit out.

  “He’s no worse than you. I’ve seen his heart,” she said furiously.

  “Yeah?” Tobias’s voice went whisper cold. “How’s that?”

  Ruthie took another step back, not liking this side of Tobias at all. “He doesn’t want me. He wants a woman he doesn’t even know. That’s who I painted for him today. If anything, Tobias, you should pity him. After all, his lady is lost.”

  Tobias literally growled. “I don’t give a flying fuck about his lady.”

  “I’ll be leaving,” Sol announced. “Miss Copeland, you have my eternal gratitude. If there is ever a need in the future, you call on me. I owe you a favor for today.”

  “Keep the canvas safe until it’s dry, and then have it framed,” she told him, turning her back on Tobias before she said something she couldn’t take back.

  She heard Sol leave and felt Tobias move to her back.

  “Why would you do that, Tobias? As if I’m a child who needs protecting?” she questioned harshly.

  “Do you not remember what happened in this goddamn studio yesterday, Ruthie? You’re vulnerable, and assholes like Dinapoli will take advantage of that. I can’t believe Hoenig didn’t call me!”

  Ruthie turned to him. “I told him not to. Sol meant no harm to me or mine.”

  “You don’t know that,” Tobias responded in a deadened voice.

  “I beg to differ, Tobias. There are many things I don’t know, but that isn’t one of them. The man is in love with a woman he can’t find. I was able to give him the picture; in his mind and in his words was the truth of the man. Now here’s a conundrum for you, Tobias. How the hell am I supposed to trust you with all of me, if you won’t trust me in the same way?”

  “It’s not the same thing, Ruthie—”

  She snorted, effectively cutting him off. “You say toe-may-toe…”

  He didn’t say anything for a long time, and Ruthie gave up trying to get him to see reason. She began cleaning her brush and putting away her paints, finding solace in the mundane activities.

  She heard him sigh deeply, and then his arms were around her again, pulling her against his large frame and just holding her there.

  “I’m sorry,” he said at her neck. “I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you now.”

  “You’d go on, Tobias, as you’ve always done without me.” Those words hurt her to say, and it wasn’t until she voiced them that she realized that was how she felt.

  He turned her in the circle of his arms and lifted her chin. “Is that how you feel?”

  She nodded.

  “I haven’t gone on, Ruthie. I’ve existed without you, that much is true. But I’ve been half a man at best. When I sent you away, you took everything that was good and right about my life w
ith you. I don’t want to exist. I want to live. With you,” he declared.

  Her heart melted in her chest. Could she believe his words? Trust the conviction in his tone?

  She needed to think this over. Trust had to be earned; he couldn’t demand it. Her body trusted him but her heart wasn’t taking the cues. It had been broken to pieces by him before and needed time.

  “I’m sorry, Ruthie.”

  “Me too, Tobias,” she whispered. “Now where have you been and why?”

  “Chasing Gallo,” he said around a yawn. “He’s out there, waiting for me to fuck up and leave you alone. I’m done with that shit. Are you finished here?”

  She rolled her shoulders, trying to ease the tension. “I am. It was good to get some painting in, but yeah, I’m ready to go home.”

  His finger stroked her cheek, across her lips and over the bandage on her neck. “That sounds so good from your lips, Ruthie. Let’s go,” he said gently.

  So home they went and after they both showered, they climbed back into bed, though it was only early afternoon. Tobias fell asleep quickly and she held him, feeling his heart beat and stroking his skin.

  Her last thought before sleep claimed her once again was that she hoped he woke up in a good mood, because her body needed him in all the ways he’d promised her. She needed to purge completely the thought and feel of Vessi Gallo, and what better way to do that than under Tobias’s dominance?

  Chapter 17

  Ruthie woke before Tobias, easing out from under his arm and gently sliding off the bed. She reached for the Braille clock at the bedside and noted it was pushing eight P.M. She journeyed to the bathroom, closed the door gently, and started a nice, hot bath.

  Her neck didn’t sting anymore and Ruthie knew it was healing just fine, so she removed the bandage, noticed the Steri-Strips were peeling away, and pulled them off as well. It didn’t hurt, so she knew the scratch Gallo had given her was truly nothing more than a warning. She’d bled far worse than the wound deserved. She’d slap a Band-Aid or two over it when she got out of the tub.

  Her body was restless and she was hoping the bath soothed it. She reached for the left ledge on the side of the tub and found her oils. Tobias had really thought of everything. Ruthie poured a small amount of peppermint and lavender into the water and stepped into the enormous sunken Jacuzzi tub, moaning at the immediate release of her muscles.