“David…” Resisting the pressure of his palm, she tilted her head back to look at him. “There’s plenty of time. You can still have that dream.”
He spoke with quiet emphasis. “So can you.”
Her lips pressed together, and she blinked up at him.
“I’ll ask my editor to include one of your regular paintings. I swear to God, Jenny, I’ll argue until I’m blue and she shoves me out of her office to get rid of me.” Lifting his arm from her waist, he tucked a curl behind her ear. “But even if I can’t convince her, your need to earn a paycheck doing Napoleonic portraits and penis-filled Michelangelo frescoes doesn’t make you less of an artist. It doesn’t invalidate your talent or erase over a decade of amazing work. And I have to believe that someday, someone will recognize that talent, want that work, and give you another shot.”
That wide mouth curved into a smile. “Maybe.”
“Not maybe.” He hiked her even closer, until she was standing between his legs. “Definitely.”
He didn’t make rash declarations like that. Ever. But he believed his words, believed in Jenny and her talent and her potential for greatness, just as she was.
She didn’t need to change. There was nothing wrong with her or her work. The world simply needed to catch up with her, and he was going to do his best to give that world a nudge.
That said, he should back away from her. Impose some distance before he compromised himself and his story. But how could he ignore that mobile mouth and those bright eyes? How could he not react to the way she fit against him, her softness cradling him, her hands tight and steady on his back? How could he resist the way she coaxed some sere, parched corner of his heart to life?
He couldn’t. So he didn’t try.
Any attempt at a relationship might end in both personal and professional disaster. They might or might not find a way to maintain their connection while living hours apart. That connection might wither for a thousand other reasons.
But his reticence wouldn’t be one of them.
Tonight, he planned to blow his narrow, constricted life wide open.
“I don’t kiss sources.” He whispered the words into her ear, running his nose along its fluted rim. “I don’t mix business with pleasure. Ever.”
She shivered, and for the first time in years, a rush of masculine confidence washed through him, erasing his doubts and all hope of holding back.
Fuck it. If she was willing, he was able and ready.
Her soft, small earlobe fit perfectly between his teeth, and she made an odd, choked sound at the gentle nip he gave her. He licked the spot, and her entire body rocked against his, moving closer, seeking friction and heat.
“Funny.” Her voice was breathless. “It kinda feels like you’re doing a fuckton of mixing. Unless you’re getting no pleasure out of this. Which would be a shame, since I’m enjoying the hell out of myself.”
Cupping the curve of her bottom with one hand, he rubbed against her. “I think that answers your question.”
She giggled, the sound airy and bright. “Yes, indeed.”
He trailed his mouth down the side of her neck until he could feel her pulse throb against his lips. Once he reached the right spot, he licked her soft skin and nibbled as he sucked lightly. Not enough to mark her, but enough to leave her sensitive and tender.
“Oh, that’s lovely.” She tilted her head to offer better access. “Feel free to do that for a year or two.”
He gave it more like a minute. And then, unable to wait any longer, goaded by the way she sighed and pressed against him, he used his hand on her neck to tip her face to the right angle. Her eyes were so damn bright, he couldn’t see anything else. But he could feel her smile as he covered her mouth with his for the first time.
She tasted like crab cakes and oranges and a sweetness the likes of which he’d never known before. Her lips parted, and before he could do more than groan his appreciation, she took the initiative, slicking her tongue along his.
One of her hands lowered to his ass, and she squeezed with her strong artist’s fingers. At that, he took over the kiss, making it hard and wet and deep. She hummed her pleasure into his mouth, and he hiked her leg up over his hip so he could get pressure where they both needed it.
Before he knew what he’d done, her coveralls were unzipped to the waist, and his hand was cupping her breast. He brushed his thumb over her nipple, and it furled beneath the thin fabric of her tank top.
He spoke against her mouth. “Come to bed with me.”
“Shit.” She arched, thrusting her breast into his hand as he flicked her nipple again. “Shit, that feels amazing.”
Lowering his mouth to that tight point, he licked the fabric until it turned wet and the flush of her areolas became visible. Then he sucked her into his mouth, fabric and all, and she moaned.
He lifted his head, but he could still feel her under his tongue, could still hear the way she’d whimpered at his mouth on her nipple.
“Come to bed with me, Jenny,” he repeated, his voice hoarse. “I’ll make it good for you, I swear.”
“I…” Her hands were clutching him, her fingers digging into his sides. “I don’t doubt that. And God, I want you above me. Inside me.”
Even through his haze of lust, he recognized that tone. “But?”
“But…” Her throat bobbed as she swallowed hard. “But that man and his minions already think you’re biased. If you slept with a source before a story…”
His professional reputation would take a beating. He knew it. At the moment, he didn’t much care.
“It’s okay.” He bent down and captured her mouth once more, letting his lips cling to hers. “I can handle the uproar.”
She eased back an inch, and even though every cell in his body was screaming to hold on to her, he didn’t close the distance.
“You say that now.” Deep vertical lines had appeared between her brows. “But what happens when I go back to Virginia tomorrow? When Bigelow checks the hotel surveillance footage from tonight, and your affair with a source becomes public knowledge? When Bigelow’s cronies use me and our relationship to cudgel you?”
He shook his head impatiently. “They’d say the same thing if we got involved after the story. There’s no pleasing them, Jenny. There’s no way to convince them of the truth when they’re determined not to acknowledge it.”
“But at least you’d be able to say with honesty that you didn’t have a sexual relationship with your source when you wrote your article.” Her blue eyes, the sincerity in them, speared him. “You’d know you were telling the truth, even if no one else did.”
She was right. Damn it, she was right.
But he still didn’t plan to let her go.
“Then I’ll give my notes to a colleague and let her write the article.” Handing over such an explosive, important story would hurt, but he’d do it. Right now, he’d do anything to have Jenny in his arms. “I’ll contact her tomorrow.”
“No, David.” Jenny shifted another few inches away from him. “You’re the best person to tell this story. And I won’t let myself be the reason you didn’t.”
He dropped his head to his chest and tried to breathe.
“Let me go home and finish the paintings. Let me forward you pictures of them hanging in Bigelow Tower.” She laid a hand over his heart. “Then write your article and think about what you want. If you decide what you want is me, you’ll know where I am.”
He tried to laugh, despite the new ache that had bloomed beneath her touch. “I don’t have your address.”
“You’re the Washington Chronicle’s ace reporter.” She patted his chest, her smile wide and sweet and full of faith in him. “You’ll find me.”
5
“Did you get the photos?” Jenny checked her sent mail, just to be certain she hadn’t hallucinated clicking send a couple of minutes ago. “I attached them to my message just now.”
A brief pause. “I got them. Thank you for forwarding the p
ictures so quickly.”
David sounded distracted. Distracted and distant and…professional. Just like all their recent phone calls, and in contrast to those first late-night, long-distance talks they’d had. The ones where they’d laughed and swapped stories about their childhoods and hung on the line way too long.
But the newsroom wasn’t the place for a truly personal conversation, even if he’d seemed interested in such things anymore. Which he didn’t. So even though she wanted to know the status of their new—and possibly abortive—relationship, she kept the conversation on business.
“Now that you have the photographic proof of self-dealing, when do you think the story will run?” She picked a fleck of paint from her thumbnail. “Tomorrow?”
“Or the day after, maybe. I’m still talking with my editor about…things.”
She wanted to know what things. The inclusion of one of her personal portraits? How to handle any accusations of professional impropriety once Bigelow discovered their connection? Something else?
In the face of his indifference, however, the courage to ask escaped her. “Okay. Just let me know, so I can brace myself for the messages and phone calls. And possibly the rotten produce thrown at my apartment door.”
“Will do.” A muffled conversation in the background. “Look, I need to go. I’m sorry. I’ll contact you soon.”
She’d heard that before. “Okay. Take care of yourself.”
The odds of him calling her again were about fifty-fifty, she figured. He was a good man at heart, so he might. Then again, he might simply e-mail her instead to let her know the story would run in the next day’s Chronicle. Maintaining a careful distance would prove easier online, as he surely knew.
Since she’d last seen him a week ago, the chasm between them had widened day by day. She no longer expected him to show up at her door. She no longer expected anything from him, period. Not even the attempt to convince his editor to help her. He hadn’t mentioned that particular effort in a while.
“You too.” He paused. “Jenny, I don’t…”
He didn’t finish the sentence, and she didn’t want him to. From his tone, she knew whatever he’d been going to say would hurt. And until he wrung those words from his throat, she could keep pretending he wasn’t going to dismiss her at the first available opportunity.
So she feigned good cheer. “I’d better go. I need to put some kid’s face on Warhol’s soup cans. I explained to the client it would look like someone had cooked and canned their baby, but no one listens to a hack painter creating derivative art.”
“Don’t say that.” For the first time in days, his voice snapped with attention and emotion. “You’re not a hack.”
She made a noncommittal noise.
He let out a breath and lowered his volume. “Did you get paid the second half of your fee from Bigelow’s personal funds yet? Should I wait a few days longer before running the story?”
“You can run it anytime you like.”
Silence on the other end. “That’s not an answer.”
Jesus, misleading an ace reporter was harder than she’d hoped. And she was out of patience and about to cry, so this conversation needed to end.
“It’s all the answer you’re going to get.” She put some bite into her own words. “Like I said, I need to go. Talk to you later.”
She tapped the screen of her cell, ending the conversation.
He didn’t call back.
Navigating to her bank’s website, she confirmed her dwindling savings. As expected, Kristi had refused to make the second payment from non-Foundation funds, and Jenny sincerely doubted the other woman would feel obligated to pay for the portraits at all once the Washington Chronicle story broke. Unless Bigelow’s assistant had a sudden, inexplicable change of heart that afternoon, Jenny was utterly and completely fucked. Again. Still.
So much for a financial cushion. Jen the Joyful Clown would be making the rounds of local kids’ birthday parties once more.
But first, she needed some rest. Consumed with finishing Bigelow’s portraits—and then hand-delivering them to Bigelow Tower so David could run his story as soon as possible—she’d barely slept in days. Her bed was beginning to look more and more tempting.
Fuck it. She was taking a nap. Canned babies could wait.
And maybe when she woke up, her life wouldn’t seem quite so much like the right panel of a Hieronymus Bosch triptych.
Her cell rang just after 2 a.m., interrupting a late-night painting session in her guest room.
After wiping her hands, she reached the phone just before the call went to voicemail. “Hello?”
Silence on the line.
The nap had eased her fatigue just enough to stop her from sleeping at her normal bedtime. So instead, she was working on one of her private portraits, created solely for her own pleasure and unsullied by the opinion of others. The process had wiped her worries about money and men and the art community from her mind, and she didn’t intend to interrupt her flow state and invite those worries back.
She didn’t want to talk, and she didn’t want to deal with prank callers.
She wanted to paint and forget.
“If you don’t identify yourself pronto,” she said, “I’m hanging up.”
After another short pause, she heard someone clearing their throat. “Jenny, it’s me. David. Please let me in.”
“David?” She blinked at the phone. “Let you in where?”
“Your apartment. I’m outside your door, but I didn’t want to scare you by knocking so late at night.”
He’d been in D.C., hard at work, only hours ago. No way he’d driven all that way to see her in the meantime. And why would he come so far just to tell her they were through?
“You’re not outside my door,” she told him.
A hint of humor lightened his tone. “I don’t mean to be contrary, but I really am.”
She frowned. “You really are what? Contrary? Or outside my door?”
“Both, I suppose.” His voice sounded hoarse and rough. Exhausted. “May I please come in?”
She rushed to the door and rose on her tiptoes to glance through the peephole.
Yup. Sure enough, there he was, his shoulders bowed and his eyes ringed by dark circles.
After unlocking her door, she flung it open. “What are you doing here?”
“I’d rather have this conversation indoors.” His mouth was tight. “Although I’d understand if you didn’t want me inside your home.”
She still didn’t comprehend what was happening, but it didn’t matter. He appeared on the verge of collapse, and only a churl would make him wait longer outside.
She stepped aside. “Don’t be silly. Come inside and have a seat.”
“Thank you.” His voice was so quiet, she could barely hear him.
When he trudged into her small foyer, she closed the door behind him. “Do you want something to drink? Or a snack? I have canned soup.” She forced a smile. “The non-baby variety.”
His answering smile appeared as false as hers. “Thank you, but no.”
He didn’t sit on the couch, not even when she waved him toward it, and he didn’t move closer to her. Didn’t take her in his arms and apologize for the distance he’d created between them. Didn’t say anything more. Instead, he just held her gaze, those dark eyes pleading with her. For what, she had no idea. And she was too tired and heartsick to play games.
“Maybe you should explain what you’re doing here.” She lowered herself onto the couch. “Since I had no clue you were coming.”
“I’m sorry to intrude.” His chin tipped toward his chest. “But you should know that the story will run tomorrow morning in the Chronicle. It’s already up online, and it’s our most-read article at the moment.”
She snatched her phone and navigated to the Chronicle’s website. Sure enough, there was a new byline by David Redi, a story entitled “Bigelow used money from his charity to buy self-portraits.” And when she skimmed the artic
le, she saw everything she’d expected and nothing she hadn’t. Like, say, an image of one of her personal portraits.
“The Napoleon portraits somehow look even more pretentious and ridiculous online.” She clicked to enlarge the pictures and checked how the colors appeared. Good enough, she supposed. “I didn’t think that was possible.”
His jaw worked. “I tried to fix it, Jenny. I argued for days about including one of your non-commissioned paintings, but my editor wouldn’t budge.”
“It’s okay.” She couldn’t doubt his sincerity. In her memory, she’d never seen a man look so forlorn over a promise he hadn’t even broken. “You warned me that would probably be the outcome.”
He turned his face away from her, staring into the darkness of her kitchen. “You must hate me.”
She blinked at him, stunned. “Why would I hate you?”
“I’ve received congratulatory phone calls from a dozen of my colleagues and requests for interviews from five separate television programs. Probably because Bigelow lost several prominent endorsements after the article went live, and I’m getting credit for that. The story you handed me last week will raise my profile and increase the respect I receive as a reporter, no matter how he tries to smear me.” He spread unsteady hands. “You, on the other hand, stand to lose the money he owed you. You forfeited commissions from his cronies to help me break the story as soon as possible. From what you’ve said, my decision to publicize your paintings will probably cost you friends, as well as your reputation in the art world. And I couldn’t even manage to get one small picture of your true work into the fucking article.”
His throat bobbed as he swallowed hard. “You’ll suffer. You’re already suffering. All because you chose to help me, instead of yourself.”
“I wasn’t helping you.” When he began to protest, she talked over him. “Or maybe I was, but that wasn’t the immediate goal. I wanted to do the right thing, David. And the right thing was helping you get this story in the public eye.”
For some reason, that response seemed to deflate him even further. “I know. I know you were trying to do the right thing. I was too, I swear to God.”
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