Chapter 4
Four
Matthew was grateful for the silence when the pounding rain came to a stop—but wasn’t that just the way things went? He had just finished loading his supplies into his truck. With a shrug, he turned to close the tailgate when a car drove through a puddle, splashing him with dirty street water.
No good deed goes unpunished.
As his head dropped in dismay, a glimmer of gold caught his eye. Across the way, right where the woman had been standing earlier before she ran off in the rain, a bracelet lay there at the edge of the sidewalk.
Matthew walked over and picked up the bracelet. He was no jeweler but from the weight of it, he could tell it wasn’t cheap. He glanced at his watch. There was no time to look for her. He still had to shower and change, and he couldn’t be late tonight.
He’d ruin the leather seats if he got into his clean truck like this, so he locked the truck and took off into a jog the short way home.
He stepped inside the lobby, knowing he was cutting it close if he wanted to get to the gallery on time.
“Look what the cat dragged in.” Jack, who manned the front desk most evenings and did odd jobs around the building, laughed at the sight of him. “You’re a mess.”
“Yeah,” Matthew said. “Got a towel back there so I don’t track water into the elevator?”
“Good idea… the owner of the building wouldn’t appreciate that.” Jack, dressed in his standard Dickies navy blue work pants and matching shirt, reached under the desk and tossed him a roll of paper towels. “What happened to you?”
“What?” Matthew caught the paper towels. He ripped a length from the roll and wiped his face and then his arms. “Holy cow.” The paper towels were covered in bluish-gray paint. “I must look like?—”
“Like you need a bath.”
“This storm,” he said with an exasperated huff. “I sent the kids home as soon as the temperature dropped. I thought the storm had skirted us when I heard the first rumble of thunder. It wasn’t a minute later that it became a torrential downpour.”
“It did come out of nowhere. Blew the front door wide open.”
“Blew my paint buckets off the scaffold too.” He swept at the back of his arms. “Made a colossal mess on the ground, and as you can see, of me too. I had no idea this much got on me.” Matthew pulled off more paper towels. “And this is after being out in the rain.”
“How will we ever get you married off with you running around town looking like that?”
Matthew laughed. He’d known the old war veteran, Jack, his whole life. He’d been a fixture around the building when Matthew’s dad rented an apartment here years ago. Sometimes the words that came out of Jack’s mouth reminded him so much of Dad.
“Don’t you worry about me. I can handle myself quite well in that department. When the right one comes along, I’ll know it.”
He cocked his head. “You sure about that? Haven’t seen any sign of a woman within twenty feet of you in months.”
“Now you’re keeping track?”
“I call it like I see it.”
Matthew pulled the bracelet from his front pocket. “This make you feel any better?”
“A ladies bracelet. Well, well. Guess I don’t see as much as I think I do.”
Matthew shrugged. “No, you’re seeing it like it is. Lady dropped it on the sidewalk earlier.”
“A lady? You were on a date? I hope that was before the little paint incident.”
“Actually, it wasn’t a date, and it was after the paint incident. I thought I was quite the knight in shining armor at the time, however, that was before I realized I was covered in paint.”
“And yet you’re here alone? You might be a great artist, but you are a knucklehead with women.” Jack shook his head. “Thought I taught you better than that. Smart man would’ve brought the woman back, not the bracelet.”
“I’ll take that under advisement, and I’ll take the maintenance elevator.” Matthew tossed the dirty paper towels over the reception desk into the trash can behind it. “Thanks for the advice.”
“Anytime.”
“Don’t I know it,” he mumbled under his breath as he headed down to the corner where the maintenance elevator was tucked away out of sight. Jack was worth his weight in gold, and everyone in the building adored him. Good thing, too, because he loved giving unsolicited advice. “Good day, sir,” Matthew called as he stepped into the elevator.
Unlike the sleek polished elevators, the maintenance elevator was cloaked in quilted blankets to protect the finish. It lurched into motion with a slight hiccup as it rose above each floor.
The doors opened on the top floor, and Matthew stepped into his art studio. The studio took up most of the floor, which was fine by him because that’s where he spent most of his time. He walked down the corridor decorated with paintings by artists he admired to the one thousand square feet he considered home.
The lights came on automatically as he approached the swinging door that separated his living quarters from the studio. It had been a necessary improvement because he’d grown tired of repainting the door and wall where the light switch was to cover his fingerprints. House painting and artistic painting had nothing in common, it turns out.
He pressed his shoulder to the door and went straight to the laundry room to put his clothes in the washer.
He’d made pretty good progress on the mural today, at least until that storm popped up. It was an extensive project funded by a grant. Four stories tall, the turn-of-the-century brick was imperfect and so thirsty for moisture it required several coats. In other areas, it threatened to bubble and flake, but that was just part of the challenge.
The first murals he had painted for free when he was in his early twenties. He often received grants or city funding for his work. Now, when he was hired to do a mural, he’d design it and bring on students to work with him. For many, it would be the first time they ever received compensation for their art. He still remembered his first commissioned work. If doing these murals flushed one new artist out of the crowd, giving them the confidence to trust their artistic gift, then that was something Matthew could be proud of.
The batch of first-year art students he’d hired to help with the mural this time were already showing great promise. Hopefully, the damage the rain may have caused wouldn’t deflate their enthusiasm for the work.
The paint dried to the touch pretty fast, but it would take a long time before it could survive the kind of pounding rain they’d had tonight. They’d definitely have some cleanup to do.
The washing machine started with a moan. Beneath the clear lid, his clothes swished in a bubbly gray sludge. He hit the button for a second rinse cycle and then headed for the shower.
The paint he used on his murals was the good stuff. He used isopropyl alcohol to get paint out of his clothes with varying amounts of success, but there was nothing special about his work clothes anyway.
That woman’s pretty little slip of a dress was probably a goner if this paint got on it too. He felt bad about possibly ruining her dress, even if it was in the spirit of protecting her.
If she hadn’t screamed, he might not have seen the umbrella in time. She had been a little frantic, but then, she’d just about been Mary-Poppined out of town.
Even soaked to the skin she was pretty, and the hint of something sweet, maybe butterscotch and flowers, filled the surrounding air. He could still almost smell it.
He placed his things on the leather valet on the quartz countertop in his bathroom. The bracelet he’d found was simple but elegant. A single gold bangle angled across a silver-toned cable in a crisscross. It had some weight to it, probably white gold. A single gold charm hung from one end with the letter W on it.
Matthew flipped the multiple lever knobs. The custom shower had so many jets, it was like walking through a car wash. Tiled in deep blue, polished porcelain with sandy gold veins, it was a manly bathroom. Not a girly spa room. When he’d renovated the space, he’d removed the big soaking tub and installed this large, multi-jetted shower with an adjacent steam room. It was a splurge, but when he worked on these huge murals, his aching body needed the relief of those pounding shower heads to chase away the pain. The steam shower brought him back to the real world after being lost in the tiny details of the picture in his mind.
Closing his eyes, he tipped his chin and let the shower spray fine mist across his face. After being caught in that storm, he realized this shower head was nothing like rain at all.
He waved his hand under the shampoo dispenser, and it deposited a perfect, nickel-sized drop into his hand. Briskly lathering it between his hands, he ran his fingers through his hair until they caught on a blob of something. He worked his fingers through it. A gunky hunk of red paint had congealed in his longish hair.
He scrubbed his hands and nails to get the remnants of his craft from his body. Funny that the people who bought his paintings expected him to look like he’d never painted anything at all.
His mind wandered to the woman soaked to her skin in that silky dress. Even with her blonde hair matted from the rain, her blue eyes captivated him. They were wide and round and so familiar.
When their eyes caught, he was lost in the color of a summer sky, a hue that took his breath away. A shade so different that it challenged the artistic part of his mind to imagine mixing that exact shade.
In his mind, he mixed the color on his palette. Oils, since they were more vibrant and malleable. Blue. A little white. He mentally traced the shape of her eye.
He pictured her shoes in one hand, those fancy, red-bottomed kind, and the bag from The Wrap.
Maybe the folks at The Wrap would recognize the bracelet.
The possibility of finding her was appealing. He turned off the water, grabbed a dark blue towel from the heated bar, wrapped it around his hips, and tucked the end tight against his belly.
He towel dried his hair and tied it back neatly away from his face, then shaved the two-day stubble he’d allowed to grow while working on the new mural.
He walked back into the bedroom to pick out something to wear.
Gallery nights required attention to detail. He’d taken note early in his career that people who paid a lot of money for art wanted the artist to look like he was worth the investment. It was ridiculous, really. Looks had nothing to do with talent, but he was no fool. He didn’t mind doing a little extra primping to help them appreciate his work.
After buckling his father’s old Oyster Perpetual Rolex around his wrist, he unfolded a crisp white dress shirt, still in the dry cleaner plastic, then put on his gray suit. He chose a charcoal tie with brilliant green and blue hues. Women always complimented him on how it brought out the green in his eyes.
His ex-girlfriend had given him the expensive tie as a gift. It was too extravagant for the short time they dated. He was pretty sure she’d originally purchased the tie for someone else, and he just got lucky as the next suitor. He’d tried six ways to Sunday to make that relationship work, but she just couldn’t get it through her head that creating art wasn’t a nine-to-five job. She wanted to go out every night and go off every weekend. That didn’t fit into his schedule, and he didn’t like to waste his time on impossible situations, so he’d broken it off.
He made a good living, and it wasn’t something a lot of artists could say, but it took commitment.
He lifted the tie over his head, letting each end settle across his chest, then threaded one end of the tie through the loop and tightened the knot, ensuring it rested perfectly against his crisp collar. He lifted his chin and shifted the knot perfectly into place.
Checking his cuffs to make sure they peeked out from the edge of his coat sleeves, he stepped into his loafers. He never got to enjoy the fancy spreads that galleries put out, so he tossed one of the chicken breasts he’d grilled out on the patio this weekend onto a plate and heated it in the microwave, then mixed a protein shake.
He guzzled the protein shake straight from the shaker cup before the chicken was done.
He’d just popped the last bit of chicken into his mouth when his phone pinged. It was Jack, announcing the gallery car had arrived.
Matthew took the elevator to street level.
When the doors opened, Jack offered an approving nod.
“Good night, Jack.” Matthew patted the desk as he walked by.
“You clean up nice. All that outfit lacks is a pretty woman on your arm.” Jack chuckled at his own ribbing.
Matthew shook his head as he walked outside and slid into the soft leather backseat of the Mercedes. Bringing a date to his own gallery show never worked. One or the other suffered, and either way he came out the loser.
When they arrived at the gallery, he watched the steady stream of people dressed in their finest move toward the building. The driver pulled around to the back entrance.
Matthew got out before he could make it around. He wasn’t one for that kind of special treatment.
The driver met him at the back of the car. “Have a good night, Mr. McMahon. I’ll be here waiting whenever you’re ready to leave.”
“Thank you.” Matthew strode toward the back door, praying the imposter syndrome would subside once he walked inside.
“Good evening, Mr. McMahon.” A woman with a clipboard stood waiting for him. “We have great attendance tonight. I have a list of buyers who’d like to meet you.”
At least the concern that no one would show up could be put to rest. He followed the woman inside, reminding himself that this was the part of the job that allowed him to hire young artists and do the things he really loved.