Ironically they seemed to amass the biggest attention. And not necessarily the kind she cared the most for as their author.
“That’s something, Catalina.” A man’s voice startled her and she turned around to look into the solemn eyes of Gabriel Mercer.
He was a thirty-two-year-old Lieutenant in the Santa Monica Police Department, a man about town after hours and Cat’s friend. He was a tall, athletically-built male and no matter how vulgar Florence Bennett found his occupation to be, she still saw him as a suitable man for her granddaughter.
Sometimes Cat felt he silently agreed with Florence and although she enjoyed his company, she didn’t see him in that way. Maybe because despite his unquestionable merits, he was trying to find someone who would look good on his arm to complete his image. He didn’t care much about anything beyond that, too reminiscent of most of the men that Florence was pushing her way along with her own expectations toward Catalina.
Looking at his impeccable grey suit paired with a burgundy tie which drew out the chestnut hue of his hair and a hundred dollar haircut, it was hard to believe he was an average law enforcement officer.
But Mercer’s family was well known in the elite circles and he had an image to maintain, she thought. In Cat’s opinion, it was only an uncompromising gleam in his keen blue eyes that spoke about the police officer within.
“Thank you.” She said simply and accepted a kiss on the cheek.
“Where was it taken?” He pointed toward one from the fighting club where she let the sharp light mercilessly bare the rawness of the ring while letting fighters fade into the background.
“You know I never reveal my sources.” She smiled brightly knowing she was talking to the cop in him, not the friend.
It wasn’t the first time he had tried to get her to talk but Catalina was very adamant when it came to work ethics.
“You are going to get yourself in trouble, Catalina.” He warned her and she tried not to show her irritation.
Someone might have taken his words as proof of caring, and perhaps there was some of that in it. Yet she knew that he saw her as someone not fully capable of taking care of herself. At times her delicate looks worked in her favor but this was hardly one of them, she thought ironically.
“I’m a big girl, Gabriel,” she told him and felt his arm winding around her waist in a little too possessive manner.
“That you are and looking exceptional tonight.” His hot gaze skimmed over her.
‘Wear something that will make people stare.’ Jonah Richmond’s words came back to taunt her. He was the gallery’s owner and someone Cat didn’t hesitate to call a friend. As much as she trusted his taste and respected his opinion, she didn’t exactly heed his advice.
Tonight she wore a long black dress that plunged to a deep, wide V in the back and was so tight she was afraid that one not-careful-enough breath would render her naked in the middle of the crowded room. She knew Jonah would prefer for the dress to be red or at least much shorter, but the open back was the only compromise she agreed to.
Instead of tying her hair in some complicated way, she left it loose hoping to cover as much of the bared skin of her back as possible. Apparently not enough because now she could feel Gabriel’s hand gliding up and down her spine in an intimate way she didn’t approve or give him permission to.
She hated being displayed in this way, she thought. People were supposed to judge photographs made by her, not the way she looked in this attire or another. She wanted to point out the simple truth of it but she knew it wouldn’t do her much good and all she could gain was a scowl or a pitying look.
This was not the way things worked but the fact she was aware of it didn’t mean she had to like it, Cat told herself. Her face felt like cracking from a smile that after long years of donning had become her second nature.
But for some reason it felt foreign to her tonight.
Her skin, exposed by the dress, was itching, and the feeling was slowly turning into a burn from all the gazes boring into her, people talking and speculating. That was exactly what she wanted to avoid, knowing it for the impossibility it was at the same time.
To a photographer the exhibition was a dream come true, something to be proud of, the kind of event which could result in making her more noticeable on the scene, drawing more clients in. She appreciated it and was happy for the opportunity of course. But personally it was forcing her to relive all that she was trying to escape from and didn’t want to be a part of anymore.
“Thank you Gabriel.” She said finally because she supposed his words were kind of a compliment even if not very subtle. “I’m very glad your duties didn’t stop you from coming tonight.”
“You know I always have time for you.”
“I appreciate having a friend like you.” She tried to put a distance between them with this statement and saw his brow furrowing.
He was ready to protest but Catalina didn’t want to get into it right here and right now. “Please excuse me; I see Jonah is giving me the sign to mingle. Duty calls. I am sure you can understand it perfectly.” She smiled brightly at him and was relieved when he nodded and let her go.
Guilt forced her to find Jonah and she saw him putting a discreet card under one of her photographs sending the loud and clear message that it was sold and her heart sang. Tonight’s profit was fully intended for charity purposes.
“Quite the crowd.” She said approaching him and got a dazzling smile in response.
“You did well my dear.”
Catalina knew that no amount of praises could rival those simple words.
Jonah wasn’t the kind of a man to make florid remarks in order to pay tribute to artists. That made his comments all the more powerful and important.
“We did well,” she emphasized, going to her toes and kissing his shadowed jaw.
She would never forget he was the one who was interested in her for what she could do, not who she was and what her connections were.
He was the well-mannered forty-year-old owner of the gallery with a no-nonsense attitude and an utter devotion to art. Einarr was his project and a very successful at that. The name itself betrayed his fascination with Norse mythology and meant ‘lone warrior’, which Cat supposed was a somewhat fitting description for him as well.
Jonah’s temples were a little bit more frosted now than when she had first met him, giving him even more distinguished look. His dark eyes were able to assess something and someone’s value or lack of thereof in a matter of crashing seconds.
His first impressions were hardly ever wrong.
“I saw you with the Mercer guy. How long do you think you can keep up your balance on this wobbly path you’ve taken?”
“As long as it’s necessary.” Her answer held more conviction than she felt at the moment.
Jonah chuckled and didn’t continue the subject deciding Catalina had enough on her plate tonight.
“I hope you will handle Florence at least half as well as him.”
“Is she here?” Cat looked discreetly around, not realizing the hand she had on Jonah’s forearm clenched.
He felt the nervous and betraying gesture and laid his own hand on her trembling fingers, offering silent comfort she greedily wanted to take, but her pride didn’t allow her to lean on it and on him too heavily.
“You are her only granddaughter; of course she would be here.” He didn’t add that Florence’s absence would be too widely commented on otherwise, but they both knew she wasn’t here for Cat’s work.
“I promise I won’t run away if I see her.” She said and he coughed to cover up a chuckle.
“I suppose it’s something. I think we will have another buyer soon, let me make sure he won’t slip away.” He winked at her and accepted a glass of champagne from a passing waiter.
“Go and look pretty,” she told him with a serious expression but mischievous sparks in her eyes belied her intent to look solemn.
He sent her a reproachful look but had to
fight his own amusement. They both knew he uttered a similar statement in her direction on more occasions than either of them could count.
Catalina’s fingers, wrapped around the fragile glass of champagne, were shaking a little when she decided to take another tour through the crowd. She had her duties and was well aware some people always wanted to talk to artists, ask questions.
Those were the moments she usually liked because they were allowing her to focus on the technical side of her work and forget about being displayed along with her photographs.
She knew on the surface she looked cool and professional, and that was exactly what she wanted people to see, she reminded herself, when the thought annoyed her for some reason. Nobody was supposed to slip underneath the layers of her icy demeanor and recognize even the sliver of emotions she was feeling.
She heard words like breathtaking, stunning and uncommon entwined with her work and each time it overfilled her with a chill of satisfaction, sparkling inside of her like the champagne she was slowly sipping.
But she still wanted for the night to be over.
She was only half way through her drink when she finally stopped in front of one of snapshots of Xan and her stomach sunk the same as every single time she had been thinking about the night of the fight and… him, she admitted.
He was occupying her thoughts too much for someone as merciless as he turned out to be.
“I would love to know who that is, could you tell me?” She heard a woman’s voice and turned slightly to look at her, detecting nothing but an ordinary curiosity behind the question.
“I’m sorry but I don’t know.” The lie slipped from her lips so easily she was astounded.
But then what was her answer if not the accurate response?
She didn’t know him and the bits and pieces she made out based on what her lens showed her didn’t make sense and didn’t go along with his pitilessness.
As much as her first instinctive response was to explore it, learn and capture the truth with her camera, she knew better than that now.
The thought of her camera made her sigh again while another wave of defeat seized her.
That was the reason she regretted the whole thing, even after the promise of success this night held.
The joy coming from the exhibition was laced with a thick layer of bitterness.
She hated his random act of vandalism, hated the reminder that people acted on whims alone without the smallest consideration of how it might affect others. Hated that despite it all, she still felt the need to keep his name a secret, but what she told Gabriel was the truth; she never revealed her sources no matter the circumstances.
“How did you find yourself in a place like that?” The woman’s head was slightly tilted to the right, still focused on the same picture. “Did you try to approach the man? I would love to see more of your work regarding the same model.”
Catalina looked at her more closely, trying to put a name to her face, remembering her from a few other similar enough events but her memory wasn’t cooperating with her.
Finally she shrugged, not seeing any harm in answering, still not sensing anything sinister behind her curiosity.
Sometimes, she thought, there was nothing wrong with it, unlike other times when inquisitiveness demanded a high price to be paid.
“I like to think I was meant to find myself there at the time. I approached him and tried to get his consent for a session but… he was not interested.” Sometimes, she thought again, lies were much better solution than the truth no matter they ran in completely opposite directions.
“It’s a shame.”
“I agree.” It was a real pity there was no question about it even if she had something else in mind than the obvious.
She stayed a moment longer in front of the image after the woman left her. Cat thought that perhaps she looked like one of those artists in love with their own work and themselves.
It should have made her walk away and mingle yet again. Smiling and sipping at compliments like she did with the champagne with an ease of someone who had heard it all before. But her feet refused to carry her away just like her lips rejected the idea of curving into another fake smile.
Duties, duties, she reminded herself and sighed softly deciding it was time to get back to it. She could indulge herself after all was said and done.
She swiveled on her heels ready for another performance but a professional smile froze on her face and she blinked convinced she overdid it with champagne.
For one insane moment she entertained the idea that Xan simply stepped out of the image she was just talking about and somehow materialized next to her. Her lips parted slightly but no sound emerged.
“What are you doing here?” She managed to ask, terrified he had decided he hadn’t punished her enough before and came here to fix this oversight by ruining the event tonight.
CHAPTER 10
Xan kept wondering what the hell he was thinking when he decided to find Catalina at tonight’s exhibition. He had never deluded himself that fancy events were his cup of tea, but he was still not prepared for the reality of it.
The gallery located on Ocean Avenue was impressive itself and the crowd inside even more so. He was curious as to how many people gathered in the spacious place under the pretenses of admiring art actually cared about it to begin with.
He decided that luck was his bitch tonight since he didn’t need a special invitation to enter the Einarr and so far nobody behaved as if he didn’t belong there. But then he took some effort to fit in and even if he succeeded in fooling everybody around, he knew better than to believe that himself.
He tried to shake off the feeling of unease when he spotted one of the pictures from the club and decided that even after seeing them before, he was not fully prepared for the effect it would have on him.
When she threw them on the table in the café they were small and he could try to pretend that was making them less dangerous, less recognizable.
Now every detail was magnified, purposefully emphasized.
Yet it still managed to conceal the true identity of the place and the participants of the event.
At least he hoped it did. Xan didn’t think he was capable of being impartial any longer.
His outfit allowed him to enter the gallery, walk through it incognito, and he felt as if he spied for Tony, assessing the damage those pictures could bring them.
Except… Tony had no clue the damn images existed since Xan told him he had taken care of them personally. He swore viciously under his breath, ready to turn around and walk out when he spotted her flowing through the crowd like water.
She wore a black dress clinging to every curve and hollow of her body in a way that stirred his blood. Judging by the looks she was receiving, he was not the only one to notice. Yet she seemed unaware of the interest, moving around as if she were in her private world inaccessible to anyone else.
That or she was too used to it to care.
She looked artsy, sexy and completely untouchable, which of course made him want to get closer and touch her so much more.
His victory-driven mind portrayed her like a challenge and any other male ogling her as a hindrance.
What the fuck was wrong with him?
He shook his head, trying to dislodge the strange thoughts.
Since Catalina didn’t notice him, Xan decided to use the opportunity to observe her in her natural environment while she was unaware of his presence.
He didn’t think she would welcome him with arms wide open. Not after the way he acted toward her so far, no matter how justified his actions felt to him at the time.
Now… now he wasn’t sure what to think and it was a highly unwelcomed realization for someone like him who had always had a clear picture of where things stood, he thought.
Xan moved closer, close enough to hear her hushed conversation with another woman while he did his best to ignore his own body displayed on one of the damn photographs. He hated the hollo
w feeling settled comfortably in the pit of his stomach usually heralding trouble.
His gut kept telling him to make a U turn and leave before the situation could get more out of hand but he stayed instead, barely able to stifle the need to chuckle when one lie after another slipped out of Catalina’s enticing lips.
It wasn’t that she was the worst liar he had ever come across; apparently she was good enough for the other woman to swallow her words as if they were the only and final truth. It’s just that he was used to much bolder ones, but then in the world he lived in the stakes were much higher, he supposed.
Instead of mingling again, she stayed as she was for a while and he wondered what exactly she saw or thought when she peered at those pictures. He was about to ask her that when she straightened her spine, turned around and gazed straight up at him.
‘What was he doing here?’ Well, that was an excellent question, Xan thought, and he would have answered in his usual snippy way but she paled and there was no mistaking the look of fear in her blue eyes.
He liked when people felt a healthy dose of unease before him, but as much as it felt utterly right to inspire agitation in his opponents, it was a complete opposite thing to witness the nervousness in her.
What did she expect him to do? He wondered but didn’t really want to know the answer to it since it was obvious that it couldn’t be anything good.
“So you tried to get my consent, huh?” He asked her and was surprised when a faint blush covered the alabaster skin of her cheeks.
For the life of him, he couldn’t remember the last time he witnessed the phenomenon.
“I tried to get you agree there was nothing wrong with the pictures.” Catalina said carefully surprised she found her voice at all.
Nothing, but absolutely nothing remained of the dangerous male ruling the ring while most people slept peacefully tucked in their beds. He didn’t remind her of the man who faced her in the café either–the one pitilessly attacking her in every way except physical assault.
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