by Linda Kage
I shook my head. “But…he helped her out again, paid off the rest of her debt and…” I stopped talking when Isobel began to shake her head.
“Last year, he helped your mom out. This year, I think you were the candidate he chose to help.”
My mouth fell open. I started to shake my head, except I really couldn’t deny it. It made sense. Except…why? Why would he help me? I wasn’t—
“He was going to help someone anyway,” Isobel murmured, answering my unspoken question. “I guess he saw something in you he thought needed it most.”
I gulped, not sure how to deal with this honor but also growing more determined than ever to prove myself worthy of it. “Wow,” was all I could manage to murmur.
Fully dressed, Isobel approached me and took my hand before going up on her toes to kiss my cheek. “Come on. Let me show you everything.”
Half an hour later, I was even more staggered by Porter Hall than when I’d initially laid eyes on the place. Turned out, the cherub statue that had nearly impaled me that first day had once sat in a garden in Rome. And the fountain in the foyer had belonged in a spa house in ancient Bath, England.
I soaked in every word Isobel said as she showed me around, telling me who’d painted which portrait and from which exotic location they’d purchased each rug. Even the crown molding in one room had been removed from the home of some Russian monarch.
“And this,” she said, leading me into a new room where the only centerpiece seemed to be a rickety, ancient school desk-looking thing covered in peeling green paint, “…is Henry David Thoreau’s writing table. He’s Dad’s favorite philosopher. So he was excited to purchase it from the Pratchett Museum to keep them from going out of business when they had some trouble with funding. He only paid eight thousand for it.”
I shook my head as I gave a low whistle. “That is so crazy. I can’t believe one dinky, ugly little table could be worth so much. Looks as if a stiff breeze could blow it to pieces.”
“Meh. It’s sturdier than it looks.” She grabbed it by both sides and gave it a healthy shake. When my eyes bulged from my head and I swear my heart tried to pound its way out of my chest over her rough treatment, she laughed. “Oh my God. The look on your face when I did that was priceless.”
“Yeah,” I wheezed from winded lungs. “About as priceless as the table you just tried to shake apart.” Turning away from her, I wandered around, studying the pictures on the wall, most of them photographs of Henry David Thoreau or facts about him.
“God, this place is amazing,” I murmured, running my finger over a framed biography. “All the history, the stories, the different cultures. When I first came here, I thought all this gaudy shit was just a rich-people thing. But to learn the meaning behind each item…” I shook my head in awe as I gazed in wonder toward Isobel.
She wrinkled her nose. “A rich-people thing?”
I swallowed. Shit. I hadn’t meant to insult her.
“Yeah, you know…” I shrugged, only to realize, nah, she really didn’t know. Flushing, I sent her a wince. “It’s hard to describe the jealousy and declining self-worth a guy like me feels when he enters a house this…” I spread my arms to encompass the room, not sure how to properly define it. “This grand.”
Seemingly unoffended by my try at explaining myself, Isobel faced me seriously, before she leaned against Thoreau’s desk. “If you could decide between being poor but beautiful and popular and loved by everyone, or rich beyond your wildest imagination but so hideously disfigured to the point no one wanted anything to do with you, which would you choose?”
I stepped toward her and set my hand on her waist before murmuring, “We make ourselves rich by making our wants few.”
Her lips parted as if that was the most profound thing she’d ever heard. And it might’ve been, since it had originally come from the lips of Henry David Thoreau. Which was why I couldn’t continue to take credit for it.
I pointed past her toward the wall with my free hand. “At least that’s what Thoreau says.” She glanced back to find the quote printed and framed above the desk.
“Oh.” Scowling, she whirled back to poke me in the gut. “You cheated. That’s a cheater’s answer.”
I laughed and leaned in to kiss her temple. “Then I’d choose whatever option brings me back to you each day. Rich or poor, I don’t care. I just want you.”
The breath rushed from her lungs. Lifting her fingers, she drew a piece of my hair between her fingers and gently brushed it out of my face, whispering, “I like that choice. Even if it’s a cheesy line you just came up with.”
“I like you. And it wasn’t just a line.” Setting my other hand on her waist so I could grip her and pick her up, I scooted her further onto the desk until she was sitting on it fully and I was nudging my hips between her thighs. “Is it bad that I want to take you right here on Thoreau’s table?”
“No, but that might be a little more of a workout than it could survive.”
I sent her a wolfish grin. “Hell yes, it would.”
She laughed and gave my chest a little nudge to get me to back up. “I know a better place we could go.”
“Oh yeah?” I backed away, letting her hop off the table and take my hand before she led me to a closed door. Opening it, she stepped inside, bringing me with her. But I barely cleared the entrance before I halted abruptly, my mouth falling open…again, for probably the twentieth time today.
“Holy shit. Is this…?” I turned to raise my eyebrows at Isobel.
She nodded. “A recreation of van Gogh’s bedroom? Yes, it is.”
“Wow.” I reverently stepped deeper into the room, gaping at the red blanket and white pillows and high footboard on the bed to match the one in the famous van Gogh painting of his bedroom. The chairs, side table, and the window looked exactly as they should. I swear, even the vases on the table and clothes hanging from hooks on the wall were spot-on. The color of the walls, floors, and doors had me shaking my head in awe. It was as if I’d just stepped into the painting itself.
I wandered deeper into the room, pausing in front of one of the van Gogh art prints on the wall, where I let out a low, impressed whistle. “I wonder how much all this cost,” I said without thinking.
Isobel hooked her arm through mine and rested her chin on my shoulder as she pointed to the picture. “Much less than this painting right here alone, I imagine. After Dad won this thing in an auction, he had the entire room designed this way to hang it here.”
“Wait.” I jerked an instinctive step back. “You mean…” Now I was pointing at the framed picture in front of us. “That’s an original van Gogh?”
Isobel’s blue eyes danced with mischief as she grinned. “Yep. One of the less popular ones, of course. It’s called Iron Mill in The Hague, but it still cost nearly half a million, I believe.”
“Half a mill…” I took another step in reverse. “I’ve been working in a house with an original van Gogh painting in it, and I had no idea? Holy shit, I just breathed on it.”
I’d just breathed on something Vincent van Gogh had breathed on.
Isobel laughed. “You’re so cute.”
I was so out of my depth, that’s what I was. If I’d worried I was below her status before, now I was convinced of it. I touched her cheek, my fingers resting against soft, warm flesh, and I wondered how I was ever going to be able to keep such a prize. I didn’t deserve this. I didn’t deserve her. It couldn’t last. I was more certain of that than I was of my next breath. Being with Isobel could only be fleeting.
I should’ve backed away from her then and embraced my doomed fate. But she was standing here now, smiling at me, accepting me. So, from the words of Richard Bach, via Black Crimson’s graffiti art:
The best way to pay for a lovely moment is to enjoy it.
I decided to enjoy this beautiful moment while it lasted. I leaned in and pressed my lips to hers, tender at first until I became hungry and seeking. She wrapped her arms around my neck and arch
ed against me. I backed her toward the bed and toppled her onto the mattress.
Eyes wide, she clutched my shoulders and blinked up at me. “But you’re still on the clock.”
Since I was the only one in the room who actually cared about that, I knew I was pleasing her when I growled, “Fuck that. I need to be inside you. Now.”
Pleasure bloomed on her features. Lips spreading into a grin, she tugged at my clothes, her hands on the zipper of my jeans. I began to unbutton her blouse but didn’t have nearly enough skin revealed when the muffled voice of Kit startled us.
“Shaw! Shaw, where are you?”
It sounded as if he was in the next room over with Thoreau’s desk, so Isobel and I jerked upright and immediately started buttoning and zipping everything back into place.
“Mom needs some help in the kitchen,” the kid hollered. “Shaw?”
Isobel and I climbed off the bed, still breathing hard. Since we were as respectable as we were going to get, I called back, “In here.”
The door flew open, and Kit bounded inside. “Mom sent me to get you. She needs help with the dishwasher.” But he’d already forgotten about me, his gaze on Isobel. “Oh! Hi, Miss Isobel. Whatcha doing in here? Whose room is this?”
As she explained to him who Vincent van Gogh was, her gaze met mine over his head.
Tomorrow, I mouthed. We were so going to finish what we’d started in here on our date night.
Her cheeks brightened and eyes warmed with agreement, but she turned back to Kit, giving him all her attention.
Even though I was uncomfortable as hell with my arousal refusing to die a quick death, I whistled as I made my way toward the kitchen.
Saturday couldn’t come soon enough.
chapter
TWENTY-FOUR
By the time Saturday arrived, I was nervous.
I’d never been to a fancy restaurant before, and everyone said Urbane was the crème de la crème of eateries in the area. I didn’t want to do anything to embarrass Isobel. Shit, I wondered if I should’ve taken one of those lessons to learn which silverware went with which course.
I was totally going to bomb this.
But at least I was going to look good doing it. Driving Henry Nash’s truck and wearing Ezra Nash’s suit, no one would be able to tell I was a nobody. A fake.
Henry had set the reservations for seven thirty. Since I got off work at four, I went home to spend a couple hours with Mom before I dressed. She gave a low, impressed whistle as soon as I exited the bedroom, trying to figure out the cuff links.
“My goodness, don’t you look handsome?”
I glanced over to where she sat in her worn-out chair, wearing a floral muumuu and watching Wheel of Fortune on TV with her walker sitting next to her. An ache rippled through me. How many evenings had we sat in here, eating in our chairs and watching this show together? I felt as if I were abandoning her to go off and try to be something I wasn’t.
For a moment, I wanted to call the whole thing off. I didn’t belong with Isobel. I was their handyman, their charity case. I belonged here with my mother, making sure she stayed safe and healthy. But then I remembered the excitement on Isobel’s face when she’d kissed me goodbye only hours ago.
She had brushed the backs of her knuckles along my jaw and murmured, “See you at seven,” and there was no way in hell I could disappoint her.
“Does my tie look straight?” I asked Mom.
“You look perfect,” she answered, something bright and satisfied glittering in her eyes before she added, “I’m so proud of you, Shaw. This is the kind of life I always wanted for you.”
I paused, not sure exactly what kind of life that was. The one where I felt stuck between two worlds, spending all day in the high life and taking luxury showers, only to come home to my one-room apartment that more often than not stank of the litter box for my neighbor’s cat. I felt like a poser.
I think that was all my mom saw, though. The suit I wore and the hair I had combed back. So she assumed I’d turned into some kind of suave, well-to-do man, or something.
“You like this girl, don’t you?”
And that was all it took to calm me down. This was about the girl, not the suit.
I nodded. “Yes. Yes, I do.”
Mom grinned. “Then bring her by sometime. I want to meet her.”
More nerves filled my gut as I imagined Isobel here, seeing the way I lived, meeting my mother who never brushed her hair and rarely showered. I wasn’t sure what she’d think of me. Of us. And then there was Mom. I knew she’d never be openly rude to Isobel, but what if she said something about Isobel’s scars or money to upset her? I wanted the two to meet and like each other. It made me stress and worry something would go wrong.
“I’ll see what I can do,” I said as I crossed the room to bend down and kiss Mom’s paper-thin cheek. “You’re staying in tonight, right?” I asked. “I saw the janitor mopping on the main floor, he’ll probably do the stairs before the night’s over. I don’t want you slipping and falling.”
Mom tsked and patted my arm. “Don’t worry about me. Just go, have fun.”
“Okay, then. I love you.”
I left with another kiss to her forehead and a glance at the television where a man was spinning the wheel and the crowd was clapping. It was nearly seven by the time I reached the truck. With a half hour to pick up Isobel and make it to Urbane in time for our reservations, I started to Porter Hall, humming under my breath as I nervously tapped my fingers against the steering wheel.
The gate opened as soon as I pulled into the driveway and before I could even push the button to announce myself. Someone had been waiting and watching for me. Hopefully Isobel. The idea that she was anxious for tonight made my blood race and my own anxieties rise. I didn’t want to disappoint her.
I almost expected her to open the door and step outside as soon as I rolled to a stop in front of the entrance. But she didn’t. I parked and turned off the engine. After alighting, I skirted the bumper, took ten steps up the front steps, hurried between the lane of solar lights that looked like hanging lanterns and stepped under the overhang before I rang the doorbell.
Henry answered, his gaze probing and curious when he let me in. But after a single once-over, he nodded in approval.
“I knew Ezra would find you something nice. You’ll match Izzy perfectly.”
I glanced around for her, but she wasn’t in the foyer. Hoping she wasn’t going to skip out on me, I gulped, my palms growing damper.
“The silly girl wanted to race right out to you,” Henry told me on an eye roll. “But I made her wait until you were inside so she could make an entrance.”
Snickering, I glanced over. “It’s not the prom, you know.”
With a scowl, her dad muttered, “Well, it might as well be. She never did make it to her prom.”
I started to respond, but he bumped his elbow into mine and pointed up to the second level where the staircase began.
The vision that stood there took my breath away. In a black, ankle-length gown, Isobel began to descend.
“Holy shit,” I breathed.
She looked stunning. The dress was nice, with shiny black sequins on the tight bodice, one-inch straps over her shoulders and a silken skirt that flowed out from the cinched waist. But she was the one who made it look good, not the other way around. Her hair was pulled up and her arms were delicate and bare. She did nothing to hide her scars. I loved that.
Her blue eyes met mine, and I could only shake my head, unable to think up the proper words. “You look so…” She’d finally reached us, and I still couldn’t say anything sufficient, so I reached out, snagged her waist with one hand and pulled her against me to press my mouth to hers.
“Okay, enough of that,” Henry announced, slugging me in the arm, even though he was laughing good-naturedly as he did so. “I had to tug some tricky strings to get this reservation for you.”
I dragged my lips from Isobel’s but still didn’t loo
k at her father. Lifting the single blood-red long-stem rose I’d been holding behind my back since I’d come inside, I said, “This will never be as lovely as you, but at least you can be comforted in the fact I stole it from the best rose garden in the state.”
Her mouth fell open before she cracked off a laugh. “You stole one of my own roses to give me.”
I wiggled my eyebrows. “And I took off all the thorns too.”
Not the least bit offended by my thievery, Isobel reached for one of my hands only to turn it so my palm faced up. When she caught sight of the scratch marks I’d given myself, she shook her head and smiled. “Still can’t accomplish it with gloves on, I see.”
“Never,” I admitted, grinning back.
Henry glanced between us, clearly having no idea what we were talking about. “I swear, you two speak your own language.” Then he let out a sad smile. “Annalise and I used to do that.”
“Oh, Dad.” Isobel turned to hug him. “Don’t get sentimental. I didn’t bring any tissues.”
Her teasing worked. He sniffed out a laugh and motioned us toward the door. “Eh, enough of that. Get out of here already. Have fun. And be safe.”
She kissed him on the cheek and opened the front door. I lingered a moment to send her dad a serious nod before murmuring, “Thank you, sir.”
He clasped my shoulder. “Thank you.”
At the truck, Isobel was already reaching for her door handle. I shouted her off it, dashing down the steps until I was at her side and could open the door for her. “You gotta give me my moment here,” I said, holding out a hand to help her climb up into the cab of the truck.
With a laugh, she shook her head. “You and my dad, I swear. We’re not going to the royal ball, you know.”
Well, it certainly felt like it. It felt as if I’d just helped a princess into my truck. To me, we might as well be in some kind of freaking fairy tale.
When I climbed behind the wheel, she was flipping down the visor to check her lipstick. I winced. “Sorry. I guess I didn’t think about how I would mess up your lipstick.”