“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 pictures 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 article, 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.”

“I understand that.” She kept her voice gentle. “And I don’t hate you. Please don’t worry about that.”

He scrubbed his face with his hands. “I spent the last week combing through records of the foundation’s incoming and outgoing donations, making Google spreadsheets and desperately searching for another smoking gun so I wouldn’t have to use your story. I didn’t sleep. I lived on coffee and pizza and Chinese takeout.” He dropped his arms to his sides. “I found dozens of inconsistencies and red flags in the records, but no clear examples of malfeasance I could use as a replacement for your Napoleon paintings in my article. Not yet. I wanted to wait, but the election is coming up so soon, and my editor—”

She couldn’t watch him flagellate himself anymore.

Rising from the couch, she walked to within a hairsbreadth of him and framed his face with her hands. His words stuttered to a stop, and he turned his cheek into her palm.

“It’s okay, David. I understand.” She waited until he opened his eyes and looked at her again. “You did the best you could.”

“Every time we talked…” He shook his head, his scruff scraping against her hand. “I got more and more worried about how you’d feel if I couldn’t make everything right. About whether you’d think I sacrificed you and our relationship on the altar of my ambitions.”

In those words, she heard the echoes of accusations she hadn’t made. Accusations she would never make. But someone obviously had, and she could guess the source. “Is that what your ex-wife said you’d done?”

He sighed. “Yes.”

“I can see why you’d be worried, then.” She paused. “There’s a lot of shit coming my way, thanks to your article.”

“I’m so s—”

She didn’t let him finish. “I don’t blame you for any of it. I’m the one who decided to tell you my story, and I’m the one who gave you permission to share that story with the public. You don’t need to apologize for honoring my decisions and doing your job.” She stroked his cheekbone with her thumb, noting the gold sparks the table lamp struck against the rich brown of his skin. “But you should apologize for something else.”

The lines bracketing his mouth deepened. “What’s that?”

“Because of you, I felt alone this week. I deserved better than the cold comfort of stilted conversations with uber-professional David, especially if you didn’t intend to kick me to the curb.”

His mouth dropped open. “You thought I was going to end this?”

“Well, what was I supposed to think?” She gave his face a little shake. “By the end of the week, you were barely talking to me. And when you did talk, you didn’t say anything personal. Or affectionate. Or…” Rising on her toes, she pressed a brief kiss on his mouth. “Or sexy.”

His lips felt warm and soft against hers. Welcoming.

And if she understood everything that had just occurred, he wasn’t about to disappear on her. Not at all. In fact, he’d torn himself to shreds the entire week in fear of how she’d react if he couldn’t save her from the consequences of his article.

God, he was a good man.

Still, she needed to know he wouldn’t withdraw like that from her a second time. Given the physical distance between them, she couldn’t handle unexplained emotional distance too.

“Please don’t do that to me again,” she whispered.

He closed his eyes again and let out a slow breath. “I’m sorry, Jenny. I was so tired and desperate and worried, I wasn’t thinking straight. And I’ve been alone for too long. I just…” His arms closed around her, squeezing her tight. “I fucked up. But I won’t do it again. I promise.”

As far as she was concerned, that settled the matter. “I forgive you.”

“Are you sure?” His brow remained furrowed. “Because I’d understand if you didn’t.”

She stroked his cheek again. “I’m sure.”

“At least let me make it up to you.” His hand lifted to cover hers, pressing it closer to his face. “Just tell me how.”

She stepped back, and he let her hand slip away from his. A quick scan of his face and body language told her everything she needed to know.

“First, we wash up and go to bed.” When his eyebrows arched, she clarified, “To sleep, David. You’re obviously exhausted, and so am I. But when we wake up…” She looked him up and down with an exaggerated leer. “I want to see what that decathlete’s body can do.”

For the first time since his arrival, he grinned. “If I weren’t so tired, this is where I’d make some joke about vaulting my pole or the length of my javelin.” His eyes, bright once more behind his glasses, met hers. “And maybe I’d add something about how I’m not eighteen anymore, so you shouldn’t expect ten events in quick succession.”

She snorted, and he looked pleased with himself.

“Fair enough,” she said. “But you can guarantee me a long jump?”

He laughed and slung an arm over her shoulders. “I think you’ll find my final measurements more than satisfactory. Get me on the field tomorrow morning, and I’ll prove myself to you.”

“Ooooh.” She bumped her hip against his. “Promise?”

He began guiding her toward her bedroom. “Promise.”

She’d never been so excited by the prospect of a track meet in her entire life.