18. Lyric
EIGHTEEN
LYRIC
By some miracle, I’d crept back into our apartment without my sister noticing. She was hip-deep in a new project and had her door closed.
Honestly, I didn’t know what she did most of the time.
She’d worked for Chapel Enterprises for the last five years. They were based in Seattle and lucky for me, she already worked remotely. Max Chapel, her boss, was fine with her moving across the country only requiring her to fly to Seattle a few times a year for mandatory in person meetings.
I wasn’t really allowed to go into her domain, but I did get kickass internet connection out of the deal because of what she needed to do her job.
I’d filled a massive bottle of water before sneaking past my sister’s room to my own. Sheba’s tail started thumping wildly when I slipped into my bedroom and closed the door.
“Hey, girl,” I whispered as I crossed my bedroom to meet her. She popped up, her tail now a helicopter as she sniffed the holy hell out of me. Did I smell different?
Sex shouldn’t do that, but I couldn’t deny it felt as if my molecules had reformed into a new iteration of me. I shook my head at the fantastical feeling. Then I noticed the pearlescent powder on Sheba’s nose.
Maybe I was.
I gave a soft laugh. “He called me a dragon.” I kissed her nose.
Sheba tilted her head. I glanced down at the side of my hand and wrist where the powder had partially rubbed off.
I pulled out my phone. The urge to look at the photos made my fingers shake. How on Earth had he made my scars seem beautiful? Maybe it had been the orgasm haze.
I braced myself and unlocked my phone.
My heart raced in my chest as I swiped through the photos, taking them all in. The long, curved line of my back and butt with my scars enhanced and highlighted. My shoulder, which had been the second worst area of burns, had healed into a pale silvery tone, but after Jensen had gotten done with me, it took on a pearly hue that enhanced the irregular texture.
When he’d said scales, it wasn’t an insult. I couldn’t even take it as one.
He’d made me sound beautiful and strong. He’d made me feel beautiful again for the first time in so damn long.
Surely, it was just the angles.
He was an artist, after all. He knew how to turn a photo or drawing into exactly what he wanted it to be.
But the visual proof was hard to deny.
And it made me want to wear that shine just a little longer.
Sheba took her place at the end of the bed as I swapped my clothes for a loose nightshirt and slipped between my sheets. It wasn’t even my bedtime, but exhaustion pulled at me.
Unsurprising, since Jensen had pulled more passion and pleasure out of me in a few hours than I’d felt in a lifetime.
I turned out my light and snuggled down into my weighted comforter, the scent of bonfires and chalk chasing me into sleep where dragons flew, and the fire couldn’t quite reach me.
The next morning held a sky full of clouds—not exactly surprising for that time of year. But the temperatures had shifted back down to brutal.
CJ had still been asleep when I left. I’d managed to dodge the questions about my naked date.
Not that she knew it was heading for naked territory, but I had.
Even if Jensen hadn’t brokered it, I’d have pushed him into it. Not that it would’ve required much pushing.
Perhaps we’d been heading here all along.
I’d simply been hiding—as usual.
It was much easier to ignore the hard parts of life. Especially since A Place for All had been an overwhelming project. It had swallowed my life by design.
Tatum was missing when I dumped my stuff in my office. Normally, I’d enjoy the quiet, but my system seemed unnaturally buzzy. Enough that I bypassed my high-octane coffee for a warm chai.
I didn’t need an adrenaline buzz today. I had one going all on my own.
Sheba perked her ears at the sound of life in Trick or Treat. I gave her my release command and she trotted out to con treats out of Nova.
I put on music and headed into my domain. A brown-wrapped package nearly as tall as me leaned against the wall with a handmade envelope taped to it. There was also a sticky note stuck to it in Nova’s handwriting.
This was left near the door this morning.
Can’t wait to see what it is.
xo N
“Makes both of us,” I muttered.
As if the Universe wanted to add a little extra slap, a moody John Mayer song came on that made me think of Jensen. “Slow Dancing in a Burning Room” was a little too on the nose, but it still made me huff out a laugh.
I knew the package was from him.
No one else would leave something like this for me.
I detached the envelope which was simply a cleverly folded note.
Somehow we didn’t swap numbers.
And I couldn’t stop thinking about you last night.
Hope you like it.
Jensen
He signed his name in a slashing script with his phone number beneath it. The paper was smudged with black and the luster dust he’d used on me. A shiver skated down my spine at the memory.
It was probably the piece he’d been working on last night.
I tucked the note into the top drawer of my desk and grabbed my box cutter before closing it to go to the tall, thin package.
I paused before cutting away the paper. The large piece from the night before had been far squarer and probably would have taken up the entire wall of my office.
I peeled back a corner of the heavy brown paper, and my heart thudded so loud it thrummed in my head. I tore more back to find… me.
Well, no one else would probably know it was me, but I did.
It was a faint line drawing of a shoulder and back and the faintest curve of a hip. It came out of the shadows with the sharp highlights showing, thanks to the luster dust I’d washed away only this morning.
But instead of my scars, it was an intricate drawing of a dragon that matched the one tattooed onto his forearm. It was dark and mysterious with only certain scales highlighted with the dust to make it look as if the whole thing was alive.
I stumbled back to my chair and sat down hard.
It was a mix of sketchy illustration and photo realism that I recognized from his sketchbook. I wanted to show it to everyone and at the same time, to hide it away in my bedroom where no one would ever see it.
“Lyric? You back here?”
Nova’s voice came from the outer office, and I jumped up. Did I turn it around?
My door was open, and she stood at the threshold, a big smile on her lovely face. “I was hoping I could see—whoa.”
There was no hiding a five-foot piece of wood. Because, of course, it wouldn’t be a simple canvas for Jensen Turner.
Nope, it was rough and elegant at the same time.
Nova came in and stood beside me. “Holy crap.”
“Yeah.”
“That’s from Jensen, isn’t it?”
I sighed. “Yeah.”
She turned brilliant green eyes on me. “Jensen and Lyric sitting in a tree.”
“Shut up,” I muttered, but there was no mistaking the laughter living in the words.
“K-I-S-S-I-N-G!” Her voice was singsong and sweet.
“You’re ridiculous.”
She clasped her fingers together under her chin. “I knew it. And I’m so jealous. He’s ridiculously attractive.”
“He is. And he knows it.”
Nova shrugged. “Being humble is overrated as long as you’re not an asshole about it. But those dark eyes and that dark hair.”
I arched my eyebrow as I turned to her. “Do go on.”
Her giggle lifted the overwhelm off my shoulders. “C’mon, Lyric. Just have fun with the hot dude who obviously is very into you. This life has enough crap in it, why resist it?”
“He works for me.”
“Technically, he’s under contract. He’s not really your employee.”
“That’s semantics.”
“And so are your reasons not to date him. What could it hurt? What if you fall completely head over heels in love?”
“That’s actually what I’m worried about.”
She reached over to me and patted my shoulder. “I’d say I’m sorry, but I’m not. You deserve a guy who makes grand gestures like these.” She moved closer to the painting and whistled. “Incredible.”
“There’s no doubt he’s very talented.”
She glanced over her shoulder. “If you don’t want to get serious, then just enjoy the wild monkey sex.”
“Who said we had wild monkey sex?”
Nova headed for the door. “The beard burns on your neck,” she said over her shoulder. “Again, I’m so jealous,” she called from the outer office.
I laughed. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to just enjoy what was going on between us.
It didn’t have to be that serious.
I shut my eyes at a memory of the intense way he’d held onto me as he fucked me beyond blind.
It wasn’t just fucking.
I ignored that little voice. It didn’t have to be more than that. Maybe he was just like this all the time. Intense until the fire burned out.
“I’m not going to apologize for wanting you, Lyric. For wanting all of you—for as long as you’ll have me. And if you don’t anymore, I’ll do just about anything to convince you otherwise.”
That was the part that scared me.
He made it sound like the power was mine, but I was pretty sure that was a lie.
Not when there was so much proof that said otherwise.
I touched the drawing. A hint of something alcohol-based wafted up from it and I glanced down at my fingertips to see the chalk or paint—I wasn’t sure exactly what it was. Something unique to Jensen’s art—yet it didn’t transfer to my skin.
Not that it mattered, I was pretty sure his fingerprints were still all over my body.
A phone call came through, dragging me away from thoughts of Jensen and last night. It was well over an hour before I’d gotten a chance to breathe, let alone to think about texting him.
But I couldn’t keep putting my head in the sand.
This kind of gift deserved a response.
My chai was well and truly gone, so I returned to the common area to start brewing a coffee. I pulled out my phone to text him, since I’d added the number while on hold with a distributor.
And okay, maybe I looked at the letter again.
Such a sap.
Hey, it’s Lyric.
I got your gift. How do you make me feel so beautiful every time?
I started to delete the text, but I sent it before I chickened out. There wasn’t an instant response, but I knew he had a number of jobs.
I busied myself with doctoring my coffee with my toffee-flavored creamer in my foamer. I’d forgotten breakfast, snagging a granola bar to hold me until lunch.
Tatum breezed in with a pile of papers, her oversized bookbag, and a Brewed Awakening to-go cup. “Hey, just who I wanted to see.”
“Been a fruitful morning?”
“Beyond.” She swung her bag onto the table, as well as the papers. “I signed on three more businesses today.”
“Three?” I stirred my mug. “Tell me more.”
Tatum frowned at me. “Something’s different.”
“I got a new creamer.”
She took a sip of her own coffee. “Nope, that’s not it.”
“Same shampoo, same perfume.”
She narrowed her eyes. “You had sex.”
“Dude, do I glow a different color or something?”
Tatum cackled. “I mean, a bit. And the beard burn on your neck was a clue, but that could have been a good makeout sesh. But there’s something different. You’re…looser.”
My eyebrow arched as I sipped from my mug.
“Well, not that kind of loose. But you do you, boo.” She chuckled. “I mean, you seem less tense. The kind that only comes from a good headboard bang.”
“There was no headboard,” I said as I sailed into my office.
“Hey, you can’t leave me with that.” She followed me and gasped much like Nova. “Holy moly. Is that Jensen’s work?”
I’d been stupid to lead her into my office with my sassy reply. That’s what I got for trying to be a cool, unaffected woman about sex.
Idiot.
“Yes. But he does more of a graphic line-work style for what we’re going to use in A Place for All.”
Tatum stood right in front of the panel, her fingers tightly gripping her cup. “Wow.”
“Yeah. He showed me one of his practice boards last night. I should have taken a photo of it, but I was…”
“Distracted?” Tatum grinned and hopped on my desk like she always did. “Tell me more.”
“How about you tell me about the three businesses you signed?”
She rolled her eyes. “Come on. I have to live vicariously through you right now. I’m in the middle of the desert of a dating life. My last boyfriend was a firefighter, and he was more interested in playing darts with his firehouse than hanging out with me.”
“You dated a fireman?” Just the thought of it stalled my breath.
She swung her legs. “Yeah. Pax was a nice enough guy.”
“You weren’t worried about him?” I could feel my throat closing at the thought of it. Had he been one of the men who tried to get me out?
“Sure. A little. But Crescent Cove has a really good firehouse. They get lent out to help with big fires in the surrounding area all the time. And let me tell you, Pax volunteered all the time. He and Adam Wolfe are the fire junkies over there.”
“I don’t know them.”
She shrugged. “They keep pretty tight with their own, so that’s not surprising. I do keep in touch with the community liaison over there, though. In fact, Gigi is the one who got me one of my names.”
Happy to switch topics—and to put the anxiety that was building in my chest somewhere else—I pounced. “Oh, really? Who?”
“Gigi Rossi has a massive family. Her brother, Nico, has a pottery studio nearby.”
“Oh, is it part of the studio close by?”
“Yes, actually. You know it?”
“Indirectly. Jensen brought me there to show me?—”
“His etchings?”
My neck went hot. “Har-har.”
Tatum grinned. “Yeah, Tom Caddell owns The Studio—very original.”
I laughed. “It’s a cool place. I didn’t see the pottery studio, but it seemed like a massive space, so I probably didn’t see most if it.”
“Because you were busy?”
“Moving on.”
Tatum rolled her eyes. “Anyway, Nico thought it would be a great way to showcase the Tipsy Glaze.”
“Cute name.”
“Yeah, he got famous for his crazy wine chalices. Fun stuff.”
“Amazing. The kind of thing that would be great to sell for tourists.”
“What I thought too.” Tatum sipped from her cup. “So, that’s one and the other two are from Turnbull. Mama’s Bread is a cool bakery that specializes in various ways to use sourdough. Since that’s all the rage on the socials, I thought it would be fun to have demonstrations, and she’d sell her starter.”
My stomach growled. “I could go for a sourdough pretzel right about now.”
Tatum held up a finger. “Actually.” She ran out to the community room and came back with a white bakery bag. “Exactly what I got from them when I signed her on.” She dug in her hand and unearthed a pretzel as big as my head.
“Oh my God.”
“I know. Want to split it?”
I grinned. “No, but I will.”
We laughed and both moved back into the common area to grab some napkins. I sat at the table where we ate lunches and pulled a hunk off my half of the pretzel before I took a bite. The groan and sigh I let out made Tatum grin.
“Definitely a good sign.”
“Oh, yeah. I’m going to have to hit Rylee’s yoga studio an extra two times a week with all the food we’re going to carry.”
Tatum grinned. “Same, girl. Same.”
“I actually signed on someone today too. Just got off the phone with a glass artist in Syracuse. She had to close her store since she was selling more online than in her physical store.”
“I think that’s happening a lot, unfortunately.”
“I know. But kind of why I thought up A Place for All. Gives people the chance to do temporary spaces.”
“Exactly why I was excited to work here. This is right up my alley.” Tatum pulled her notebook out of her bag. “I think we’re almost full for the March launch.”
“With my last one—a knife maker in Turnbull—we definitely are. Who knew blacksmiths were still a thing around here?”
“I think there are a lot of hidden gems around here.”
“There sure are. And I’m going to ferret out all of them.” Tatum took a bite out of her pretzel with a grin.
“That you are, friend. That you are.”
Tatum pushed out of her chair. “I’m going to go get the contracts written up for the people I’ve talked to.”
“Sounds good.” I followed suit and we both went to our respective offices.
I sat back down at my desk to bang out more emails. Sheba had wandered in sometime ago, and she was curled up under my desk.
My phone buzzed beside me, reminding me I hadn’t looked up from my screen in far too long. God, when had it become three in the afternoon?
I checked the text, and my stomach flipped.
Jensen
Because you are. Sorry I answered so late. I crashed hard. Seeing dawn when its winter means I worked way too late.
You did that whole drawing last night?
Jensen
Sure did. Sometimes it happens like that. Hope that’s ok.
More than. It’s beyond beautiful.
Jensen
Had an amazing subject. Can I see you tonight?
My stomach pitched. Maybe we needed some space.
But I really didn’t want space. I wanted to feel like I did last night.
Yes.
Jensen
Good. When?
I’ll text you my address. Pick me up at six.
Jensen
I’ll be there.
I turned my chair to see the dragon. It was okay to do something just for me.
I had to believe that.