by Bella Andre
Holding on tight with her strong arms around his neck, Rosa nuzzled him as he carried her into the water, making him even crazier for her as she ran her nose, her lips, her tongue, over him.
“Tell me if it’s too cold,” he said when her feet and hips were submerged.
“Take me under, Drake. Take me all the way.” Her teeth nipped at his earlobe. “A little cold water isn’t going to break me. Nothing can anymore. Not now that I’ve found you...and you helped me find myself again.”
He took her mouth in a savage kiss, one that captivated.
Enthralled.
Consumed.
All his life Drake had held a part of himself back to make sure that he wouldn’t end up following in his father’s footsteps. But he didn’t need to hold back with Rosa. Not when he knew she wouldn’t break.
And neither would he.
They were only partially submerged when he lifted her hips, then plunged her down onto him, hard and deep. She gasped into his mouth as her inner muscles gripped him in a hot, wet, perfect clasp.
“Drake.” Nothing had ever sounded as good as his name on her lips. Nothing but, “I love you.”
Wet and wild together, they tumbled in the water, their mouths fused even as they momentarily went under. They came apart just long enough to catch their footing and reach for each other again, her arms around his back, her legs around his hips as he braced himself above her, then drove deep again.
On the shore, with the water lapping over their naked bodies, they were shameless in their passion for one other. Reckless in their quest for pleasure beyond anything either of them had ever known. Utterly abandoned and unrestrained as their sounds of bliss rose in the darkness.
And as they gave each other everything, Drake knew that no matter what happened with Rosa’s mother or his father or her TV show—or any other hurdles that might come up in the future—they already had everything that mattered.
Each other.
* * *
Rosa wanted to stay there forever in the lake wrapped all around Drake. Still, she knew he was right to get them out and dressed before a chill could set in. And it felt so intimate, zipping and buttoning him into his clothes, then letting him do the same with hers.
What had begun as a terrible week had ended with such beauty. And more love than she’d ever thought possible.
Rosa suddenly remembered her mother’s email: We can turn something terrible into something amazing.
Earlier that week, when she’d read those words on the burner phone in her Montauk motel room, she’d been sickened at the thought of exploiting the nude photos—and people’s pity—to make more money with their family brand or to build up her fan base.
Tonight, she saw things differently. Clearly.
“I know what I need to do.” To turn terrible into amazing. “I know what to say to all the women who think they need to run and hide.”
The moonlight illuminated Drake’s smile as he paused while finger-combing sand from her tangled hair. “Of course you do.”
“But I need to talk with my mom before I do anything else.” She looked out at the lake, breathed in the fresh scent of the mountains. “I just wish I didn’t have to go back to Miami so soon. I really love it here. I don’t want to leave.”
“You don’t need to. Alec can fly her in—tomorrow, if she can come that fast. There’s a private landing strip a couple of miles away. And we’ll make sure the press doesn’t follow her here if you don’t want them to.”
A zing of nerves hit Rosa, twisting together in the pit of her stomach. She honestly didn’t know how her mother would react to anything she was planning to say. Then again, after sitting at William’s table tonight and seeing what was possible when family wasn’t afraid to open up to each other, she felt hopeful that she and her mother might be able to find their way too.
Still, she needed Drake to know something. “While Alec and I talked, and he did apologize, he warned me not to hurt you. I’m not sure that means he’s ready to lend me a plane for my mom.”
“He’s the oldest, so that’s his standard speech.” He brushed sand from her neck and made her shiver at how good his touch felt. Always. “Trust me, he’s on your side. We’ll call him to make the arrangements as soon as we get back to the house. What else do you need?”
Rosa’s head was still spinning from their extraordinary lovemaking. She’d never given her entire self to anyone before, nor had she ever taken all a man had to give. Her body, her heart, were both still so full. And growing fuller by the second as Drake offered her more and more.
“I’m going to need somewhere big enough to fit a film crew.”
“My father’s house is big enough.”
“He’s a private man, and my staying with him is already potentially invasive for the quiet life he’s tried to build here. I can’t bring a film crew in too. Besides, you don’t even know what I want to film yet.”
“I don’t have to know to be certain that it’s going to be great.”
She threw her arms around him and kissed him. “If I could feel my feet, I’d drag you back into the lake and jump you again.”
“There’s a cottage just beyond these trees. It’s closer than the house so that we can get you warm faster. Now, tell me your plans.”
“I found out that the network wants to do a special two-hour show, but I wasn’t going to do it because I couldn’t stand the idea of using what happened as a springboard for more money, more followers, bigger ad contracts.” They were on the threshold of his father’s small cottage when she said, “But I’ve realized that if millions of people are going to tune in, even if most of them probably think they’re going to see a train wreck, I can use that time to do something good. Something that might help.”
“I know the perfect place. My friend Calvin is the mayor. The city hall building is classic without being stuffy. I’m sure he wouldn’t have a problem letting you film there. In fact, given that he has a ten-year-old sister he would do anything to protect, he’ll probably insist on helping you.”
“Always so confident.” She wrapped her arms around Drake after he fished a key out from under a rock and opened the door. “Once upon a time, I would have wondered how you could be so sure. But after spending some time with everyone tonight, I see now that it runs in your family.”
Rosa had expected the cottage to be a storage room, or maybe a simple guest house. But when he flipped on the lights and she saw the paintings, she couldn’t hold back a gasp.
Because Drake’s mother stared back at her from every single canvas.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“My father has stored the paintings here for thirty years.” This cottage had been the original building on the property and was at least a hundred years old.
While Alec rarely set foot inside the cottage, Drake was never able to stay away. Not only because he couldn’t resist magnificent art, but also because these paintings were his only link to his mother.
Normally, the paintings were hidden beneath dusty tarps, but tonight Drake was surprised to find them arranged on the walls in chronological order. He couldn’t imagine how emotional his father must have been hanging each painting, from the first time his wife had sat for him, through the years when they’d been building a family, until the end of both their marriage and his career.
Whenever Drake had come here before, he’d uncovered only a couple of paintings at a time. This was the first time he’d ever seen all of them together.
Love. Loss. Longing. Passion. Shame. Devotion.
Obsession.
You couldn’t help but feel every moment of joy, each sob of despair. Emotion sang from every brushstroke, every drop of color and contour.
This was why his father’s paintings now sold for millions of dollars—and why people would lose their minds if they knew that more than one hundred William Sullivan originals had been growing damp and dusty in a hundred-year-old cottage in the Adirondacks.
“My God.” Rosa gap
ed at the paintings. “They’re absolutely breathtaking.”
He watched as she followed the painted story of his mother and father’s love affair, first with solo paintings of his mother, then with babies, and then with children growing older often appearing alongside her.
Rosa tugged him over to a canvas in which his mother was looking down at Drake as a newborn. “Look how much she loved you. Whatever happened that sent your mother running, no one could look at this painting and think she didn’t want you, that she didn’t love you. Because she obviously did, Drake. With everything she was.”
“So many times over the years,” he admitted in a quiet voice, “I came and stared at this painting and wished. Wished that she really had loved me.” He’d never bared so much of himself to anyone else, not even his siblings. “But every time I thought she must have, I always thought I must be wrong. Because she didn’t stay.”
“The things your father told you tonight about what her reasons might have been—did hearing any of it help?”
“Some. But it hurts too. Hurts to know that I might have had a mom all these years if only they’d been able to figure out a way to help her.”
“I know.” She wrapped her arms around him. “If it’s too overwhelming to be in here right now, we can go.”
“It always was before, even though I couldn’t ever stay away for very long.” He held Rosa tightly as he made himself look at the painting—really look deep this time, without being afraid of what he’d see. “She really does float without her feet ever quite touching the ground, doesn’t she?”
“She does.”
“It helps to know that she didn’t leave because of me, didn’t take her life because she couldn’t handle another kid. I just wish my father could see that she didn’t leave because of him either. Then maybe he would stop wasting his talent and start painting again.”
“Do you really think he’s wasted his talent all these years?”
Drake turned to Rosa in surprise. “You just said it yourself—how extraordinary his paintings are.”
“They are, no one could ever question that. But he built his own house, didn’t he?” When Drake nodded, she said, “It’s pretty darn extraordinary. You can tell a true artisan built it. And I’ll bet the houses he’s built for people all over the lake are just as thoughtful, just as full of artistic touches that have his stamp on them.”
“You’re right that he’s a brilliant artisan, but it isn’t painting. And painting was his whole life.”
“I don’t think that’s true. I think your mom, you and your siblings, were his life. I know I only just met your family, but I feel like I can so clearly see a piece of each of you in him.”
“How? Where?”
“Maybe, like with Harry and his love for history, painting was your father’s way of really studying the histories of the people he painted from all angles, in all lights and moods. Or he could have used painting the way Suzanne uses a computer program—to create something that would make the world a better place. Or perhaps painting was his ticket into the glamorous life, like Alec’s exclusive private planes. Or it could simply be,” she said as she turned away from the paintings to meet Drake’s gaze, “that he’s called to beauty the same way you are, so deeply, so instinctively, that he can’t walk away from it without needing to try to capture it for everyone to appreciate, even after the fleeting, radiant moment has passed.”
Drake was floored by her insight. He’d always thought he saw past the normal bounds, but now he realized he’d had blinders on his whole life—at least where his father was concerned. “How do you see so much?”
“I don’t know if you should give me too much credit, since I could be way off base.”
“You’re not.” Drake felt the truth of it in his bones. “Me, Suz, Harry, Alec—we are all connected to my father. Even if Alec still doesn’t want to acknowledge that connection, that doesn’t mean it isn’t true. I’m not going to lie and say I don’t wish my father hadn’t stopped painting, but at least now I can see that he probably needed to make that change to survive.”
“I obviously don’t know his reasons for putting down his paintbrush,” Rosa said as she turned into his arms, “but I can understand how after your mother left, he might have needed to capture beauty, to create art and study the world around him, in a different way. Maybe making a huge change that didn’t make sense to anyone else was the only thing that made sense to him. And maybe it was not only a way to survive what he’d been through, but to hopefully come out better on the other side one day.”
“Better.” Drake pressed his mouth to hers, loving the sweet sigh of pleasure she made when their lips met. “Everything is already so much better. Because of you.”
“I was planning to rip off your clothes again once we got inside here,” she whispered, a sexy confession for his ears only. “But your memories of this room should be about your mother, not getting naked with a woman who can’t keep her hands off you.”
“The cottage is bigger than it looks.” He took her through a doorway, past a small kitchen, and into the bedroom that he hadn’t been in since he was a teenager looking for a private place to bring girls.
The first thing he noticed was that the old bedframe and mattress were gone. The second thing was how great the lighting was—gallery quality. The third was the lone leather swivel chair in the center of the hardwood floor. And the fourth?
Well, if Drake had thought the surprises were over for the night, he was wrong again.
“Drake.” Rosa gripped his hand tighter. “These paintings aren’t your father’s.”
“No.” He still couldn’t believe what he was seeing, though more than two dozen pieces of proof were staring at him from the four walls. “They’re mine.”
Chapter Thirty
“He never told me he was collecting my work.”
Rosa could see Drake’s shock as he looked at his own paintings on the walls.
“He’s got something from every show I’ve ever had.”
While she wasn’t sure she’d ever be able to wrap her head all the way around the size of Drake’s talent, in this moment Rosa was most struck by how much he loved the Adirondacks. The paintings on these walls from his many shows over the years made it clear that he had always been deeply inspired by these mountains, lakes, and forests. By the Adirondack wildlife and the wide expanse of sky that seemed bluer and brighter than anywhere else.
There was no question that he enjoyed his cottage in Montauk. But if not for his fraught relationship with his father, would he have chosen to paint—and to live—at Summer Lake instead?
Drake did another slow scan of the walls. “Why didn’t he tell me?”
“Ask him. Tonight.” She took his hands. “Now that the ice is finally broken, don’t let it freeze over again.” It was obvious to her just how much William Sullivan loved his kids. The private gallery he’d built to honor his son’s talent only reinforced it. “And when you’re done talking, I’ll be waiting.” She moved his hands to her hips. “Waiting to make you mine, and for you to make me yours any way, every way, you want. Waiting to tell you I love you again.”
He kissed her until she could barely remember why they weren’t already naked and making love. “There are so many ways I want to love you,” he said, “it could take a lifetime. The shower this morning, the beach tonight—they were only a start.”
Every nerve in her body felt impossibly, wonderfully alive as she went to her tippy-toes to kiss him softly. “Let’s go so that you can talk to him, one-on-one this time. Something tells me he’s probably waiting up for you.”
Their walk back to his father’s house held different but equally wonderful sounds, smells, and sights from those she’d appreciated during her earlier walk with Oscar. Holding Drake’s hand, she drank in the fresh, sweet scent of the forest, the faint splash of the lake water against the shore, the way the moonlight found its way in between branches.
As they headed for the house, fatigu
e finally set in. And no wonder, given that she felt as though a million revelations had been made today.
Still, Rosa knew that tomorrow would be the biggest day yet for her. Not only because she would officially come out of hiding, but also because she so badly wanted to break through the wall of ice that should never have been allowed to freeze between mother and daughter.
Her heart beat unsteadily behind her breastbone as she made yet another silent wish that her mother would even want to come see her and talk to her at this point. Her brothers too. Because what if fleeing and shutting everyone out had done permanent damage to her relationship with the people she loved most?
No. She couldn’t let herself think like that.
But as they walked back into Drake’s father’s house, the last thing she expected was to find William Sullivan standing with a woman she knew.
Knew better than anyone else in the world.
* * *
“Mom?” Rosa was as shocked to find her mother in William Sullivan’s living room as Drake had been to see his own paintings on display in the small cottage. “What are you doing here?”
The last word was barely out of her mouth when her mother leapt across the room and threw her arms around Rosa. “Oh, honey, I’m so glad you’re okay. We were all so scared.” She started sobbing, her arms tightening so hard around Rosa’s rib cage that she could barely breathe. All the while, Oscar stuck to her like glue, as if he knew she needed him now more than ever.
Rosa’s sudden onslaught of tears made it hard to tell her mom, “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have left like that, I just didn’t know what else to do. But I knew you’d be worried, which was why I emailed so you’d know I was okay.”
“That was days ago.” Her mother wiped away Rosa’s tears, even before her own. “Anything could have happened since then. I’ve imagined a million horrible things. Thank God William called me.”