CHAPTER SIXTEEN
MAYBE PLOPPED INTO her seat across the small, rickety table from where Rachel had settled with her sketchbooks.
Cora wouldn’t be at their weekly lunch date because she was visiting her boyfriend down in Portland so that day it was just the two sisters.
“Are you going to let me look yet?” Maybe asked as she cracked open her orange soda.
Rachel had been working on the pieces for her calendar project proposal for the last three weeks. Maybe had been trying to sneak a peek pretty much that entire time because that’s how she was.
Of course Vic was equally bad. Especially as he was so used to women falling over themselves to give him whatever he asked for. Normally she was on board with that too, as he had a fantastically dirty mind and asked for all sorts of filthy sex stuff.
But her art was different. No one saw her first draft.
“Probably. I think I’m done with the twelve pages for the project.”
She slapped Maybe’s grabby hands away.
“These aren’t the originals. They’re just sketches and you can’t see them. Also? We’re in a restaurant where there’s food and drinks all over the place. Sheesh. And you want to know why I’m so touchy.”
Maybe rolled her eyes as she forked up some of the potato salad that came with the sandwiches.
Cora rushed in with a flurry of scarves, coat sleeves and several layers of clothing she got rid of before sitting with a sigh.
“Uh, hi,” Rachel said. “I thought you were in Portland.”
“I was. I broke up with Stephen so now I’m here in Seattle.”
“Wait. What?” Rachel spun on her friend. Cora’s boyfriend was doing his medical residency in Portland and over the last year their relationship had been long-distance.
As far as Rachel was concerned, it was always doomed for failure because he was all about Stephen. The way he spoke about art—which was an integral part of Cora’s life both professional and personal—had been a long-term sore spot. He had naturally assumed Cora would move to Portland when he’d begun his residency because her job was just art.
Though he worked incredibly long hours and even when he wasn’t working he was either sleeping or doing something with the other residents. Cora, by contrast, had a life in Seattle. Not just one job, but several. A big family who loved her and who she was connected to.
He always made it seem like his life was more important and Cora should fit into it.
But Rachel and Maybe, while disliking him, certainly wanted Cora to be happy and in love.
“You never liked him anyway.”
“That’s not the point,” Maybe said. “We like you. And you seemed to like him. So that’s what counted. What happened?”
“He told me I should institutionalize my mother. Oh, and he has a girlfriend now. I mean, other than me.”
“How the hell does he get the time? I thought residents were supposed to be working all the time? How does he have the place in his schedule to cheat on you?” Rachel threw her hands up a moment. “Also, fuck all the stuff he says about your mother.”
Walda was kooky and unpredictable in many ways, but she was Cora’s mother. And Cora loved her family. Eccentric artist instability wasn’t the same as put-her-in-an-institution instability.
“Is it weird I’m more offended that he’d tell Cora to put her mom in a mental institution?” Maybe asked. “I mean, look, I’m not surprised he cheated. But I did think he cared about you in his way. And he has to know how you feel about that sort of stuff about your mom.”
Rachel sighed and leaned back in her chair. “What a gross, awful creep. How did he tell you both things?”
“Well, you both know I drove all the way down there because he had two days in a row off and we had plans. But I get there and he’s not even there and he makes me wait another half an hour before he shows up and then he picked a fight. I guess cheating was fraying his precious nerves. Anyway, we’re sitting in his apartment and talking about his life and he’s saying I should move and I’m like dude we’ve had this talk, you still have years left and you may not even end up in Portland. I remind him I’ve got a job here and all the same stuff and suddenly he’s saying my mother is crazy and dangerous and how she should be in a home and how she manipulates us all and I was like, no dick is worth this bullshit and then he’s trying to say let’s have sex and make up and dude there were a pair of panties in his bed. Not mine.”
“For fuck’s sake. He didn’t even change the sheets between girlfriends? Ew. Not sanitary,” Maybe said with an offended sniff.
It was the right thing to say because Cora started to laugh.
“Anyway. I’m single again and I’ll be spending way less money on gas and way less time on I-5. Don’t tell Finley about the stuff with my mom. My family doesn’t like him either and there’s enough tension between everyone without bringing more to the table.”
“That’s all on him. Your sister knows that. But I’ll keep it to myself,” Rachel said.
* * *
VIC WAS TIRED. So tired he should have turned left to walk up his own front steps. Instead he turned and at the sight of her light on in her room, he asked and was invited over.
“Hi.” She opened the door to admit him, her hair held back from a face clean of makeup that only emphasized the size and beauty of her eyes.
He was so fucking glad he’d chosen this over his own bed. “Good evening, tigryonak. I would very much like to share a cup of tea with you and to take you up on the offer of looking at your pieces for the project.”
“I just finished making a pot of tea. Come up to my room and after you look at the drawings, you can have a cup. Your mother sent over salmon if you want some.”
As he found out when he poked in the fridge, his mother had also sent over cucumber salad and pickled veggies as well.
“I need to talk with her about not giving you all this food without me. I like to be useful to you in procuring all the delightful things she makes.”
She laughed, a hip propped against the counter as she watched him make plates for them both.
“How is everyone?” she asked.
He’d been at the pub with his buddies, thinking about her the whole time. They were all curious about her so he ended up talking about her the whole time too.
They wanted to meet her and he realized she was someone he could bring into that crew pretty easily. They were all about the outdoors and often hiked, biked, camped, boated, kayaked and the like together. She had the strength and stamina to fit right in with even the most extreme of their group.
“All still full of shit,” he told her, following her to her room, she with the tea and him with food. “Trying to talk me into doing the STP next year.”
“The bicycle ride from Seattle to Portland?” she asked, toeing her door open for their entry.
“Yes. I want to see your art first. Then we’ll have tea and food.”
The smile she gave him made him glad he’d shown his impatience to see her work.
But the work. Jesus.
It wasn’t just that she liked birds. That much was apparent from the way it was featured in so much of her life. Not just on her body, but in the art she created. On her coffee mugs and soap dishes, on sheets and the pillows on her couch.
There was such a sense of intimacy in the way she saw them. And the way she drew them. Movement of wings, a flash of gold and black as a goldfinch left a branch and burst into flight. He wasn’t sure how, but she’d been able to give real sass to its eyes.
The Northern flicker’s flash of red at the back of its head against the white snow and evergreen bark. The fat little Western bluebird sitting on a branch next to a black-capped chickadee looked like a grumpy old man.
A few lines about each bird helped give a sense of why they were chosen for whatever month she’d assigned them.
Beautiful.
The entirety of the project was stunning. Life breathed into every line she’d put on the paper. There was so much of Rachel’s heart and soul in it he found himself—yet again—humbled that she shared it.
He turned to her, touched that she tried to react as if she hadn’t been nervously watching him. “This is fantastic. If they don’t choose you there’s clearly something wrong with them.”
“I don’t even know if this is what they really want or if I’m off base and missed the point. But it was what I was compelled to do. I’m proud of how it all turned out,” she said.
“You should be proud. You’re amazing and I’m so impressed. Beauty and brains. I’m lucky.” He gave her a grin and she blushed again.
“Thank you. I’m taking my submission down before I go in to work tomorrow. I’m nervous. Drink your tea.” She pointed at his mug.
He wasn’t sure if she was nervous about him or the process. He guessed the latter, but oftentimes when she revealed some deep personal thing—as he’d realized her art usually was—she’d get a little shy.
It got to him in a way that was nearly painful.
He ate with her, listening to music, just being together, but at ten thirty she gave him a look. “Go home and get to bed. You look tired. I’ve been keeping you awake with all my relentless sexual demands. Recharge or you’re useless to me. Especially since I can get food from your mother without you.”
Though he’d slept over once since the first night when she’d had that nightmare, he usually went back home or she left his place.
It wasn’t an issue. He understood why. Was willing to put in the time so she would be comfortable with it.
Still, mornings were way better waking up next to her.
He snorted. “Keeping you sexually satisfied is draining,” he said, tone dry.
She walked him downstairs and they paused near the front door where he then backed her to the closet door. “Are we still on for that hike tomorrow afternoon?”
Wordless, she nodded, her gaze locked with his.
Even though he was tired, just being there with him seemed to ease the edges of the weariness. The scent of her, jasmine and spice, floated between them, settling into him.
She went to her tiptoes and he bent his knees, their mouths meeting in between. It was the way she sighed into him, her body melting against his, arms wound around his neck as she slid her tongue along his, that dug in with claws. Her taste, still like a miracle, was also something he was getting used to, though he craved her as much as he had before they’d ever touched.
Outside on the street he could hear someone out walking a dog. Probably the Swede with the husky. He worked a late shift at a senior center and often was out late with the sweet, blue-eyed dog.
But what seemed to thunder through his head was his own pulse, the one that pounded along with hers against the palm he held against her throat. She stole his breath as well as his heart and when the kiss broke, he leaned his forehead to hers a moment.
“I’ll call you tomorrow,” he murmured.
“Okay.”
“If I don’t walk out the door right this moment I’m going to stay to fuck you for at least an hour. Maybe two. I’ll be super tired tomorrow morning, but it’ll be worth it.”
She snickered as she pushed him back, a hand at his chest. “I’m torn over which thing I should argue for. My pink parts are cheering for fucking me and being tired. But my heart and brain say go home and rest so we can have enthusiastic sex after the hike. I mean, let’s be real, we could do both but you’d be more tired. So. Go home. I’ll take a fuck-me rain check.”
“I think I should be offended by half of what you say. Instead it turns me on. What can I say? I’m messed up.” He dipped to steal one last very quick kiss and then managed to get out onto the porch where the bracing wind helped rein in his cock. “Sweet dreams, Rachel.”
He left, her scent still clinging to his skin as he hurried through the cold, wet weather back to his bed. His cold, lonely bed where he passed out about five minutes after he flopped into it, pulling the blankets up high.