Thirty
The gallery is packed to capacity, overlapping conversations rolling into a steady roar. The lighting is bright and focused, hitting every frame on the wall.
This is what Rowan wanted.
A packed show. Buyers. Collectors. People standing in front of her work and seeing it.
I walk the perimeter of the room, cutting through groups of strangers. I haven’t seen any of these pieces finished, but I recognize her style.
The wall plaque reads: Distance Studies.
There’s no one-way mirror or recognizable furniture, but I know what I’m looking at.
One person leans forward, the other turns away. Two sit side by side but face opposite directions. Another pair looks almost connected until you notice their hands never quite touch.
Rowan translated months of watching the group into this.
She kept her word. No clear faces, no defining features, nothing that could identify anyone. Still, I recognize pieces of them. The slump of a shoulder, a crossed ankle, a hand gripping the side of a chair.
But the longer I look, the more obvious it is that isn’t really the point.
She painted the space between people. Everything they’re trying to say and everything they can’t.
Red dots sit on four of the tags.
Already sold.
A man beside me tilts his head at one of the paintings. “It feels lonely,” he says to the woman with him.
She nods. “But not hopeless.”
I look at the canvas again.
No. Not hopeless.
Looking around, I find her standing in the center of the room, surrounded by people.
Her dress is dark green and simple, fitted at the waist before falling to the floor. Her hair is loose tonight, red against her shoulders, and every time she turns beneath the lights, I catch flashes of gold at her ears.
She looks different. Maybe it’s because she isn’t trying to shrink herself. She stands in a room filled with her work, taking up every inch she’s allowed.
She looks beautiful while doing it.
I keep moving until I reach the back wall, where her centerpiece hangs.
The two submerged figures.
The piece is stunning under the gallery spotlights, with its deep blues and murky greens pulling you straight into the water. But what stops me isn’t the painting. It’s the woman standing in front of it.
Donna stands completely still, her hand pressed over her mouth, tears streaming silently down her face as she stares up at the two fractured shapes reaching for each other beneath the surface.
Rowan steps away from what looks like a member of the press, stands beside her mother, and takes her hand.
“Are you looking at the art, or my sister?”
I turn around to see Noah standing beside me.
I shake his hand before I answer, “Both.”
Rowan and Donna laugh at something.
“It’s good to see them like that,” Noah says quietly. “My mother loves all of us, but there’s always been this guilt with Rowan. Neither of them ever talks about it.”
“I’m not her doctor, Noah. The house call was just a favor to Beckett, and I answer questions when I can.”
“I’m not telling you because of my mother,” he says plainly, staring straight ahead.
I look back at Rowan. I think about her crashing my research room. Inventing a dead husband named Roger. Calling me from a dark street after a rough night. Painting until her joints gave out.
Noah turns to face me. His voice stays quiet, but the tone leaves no room for misunderstanding.
“She’s my baby sister,” he says. “Which means I’m obligated to tell you once: if you hurt her, we’re going to have a serious problem.”
I hold his gaze and nod once. “Understood.”
Noah checks my face for a second, satisfied, then pats my shoulder and walks off toward the rest of the family at the bar.
When I turn back, Rowan is looking directly at me, her expression changing the second our eyes meet. She whispers something to Donna, who turns, locks eyes with me, and smiles. Rowan presses a quick kiss to her mother’s temple, then weaves through the crowd straight toward me.
Why the fuck is my chest pounding?
“You came,” she says, smiling at me.
“Why wouldn’t I?”
Her wineglass rests loosely between her fingers, but I’m pretty sure it’s filled with water.
“I don’t know. Emergency consult. Psychological crisis. Stanley the Stapler having abandonment issues.”
“Stanley is stable.”
She brightens as I nod toward the red dots behind us. “You’re selling.”
She pulls a face. “Yeah.”
“You don’t sound happy.”
“I am. I’m happy people are buying them.”
“But?”
She turns her head toward the underwater painting. “That one sold online an hour before the doors opened.”
“And that bothers you?”
She sighs. “I was going to steal it back. I think there’s a piece of my soul in that paint. But Alistair said the buyer paid a lot of money for it, so if I steal it now, it’s a crime.”
I glance past her shoulder toward the bar. “Your family is watching us.”
“They’ve been watching since you walked in.” She grimaces. “Piper and Madison still think we’re sleeping together.”
“Still?”
“Long story.” She leans in and drops her voice. “And they definitely told Noah, so brace yourself if he comes over.”
“Too late. He already gave the speech.”
Her eyes widen. “He did?”
“Very direct. I respect it.”
“Jesus. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. He cares about you.”
Her expression softens before she hooks her arm through mine. “Come on. Let me walk you through the rest before Alistair makes me talk to another collector.”
She leads me toward a quieter wall, past several smaller pieces. She explains them as we go, pointing out details in the brushwork and sharing quick observations from those Tuesdays in the observation room.
Then we stop in front of a canvas tucked near the back corner.
Unlike the dark blues and heavy grays of the other pieces, this one is warmer.
Two figures stand close together in a small, shadowed room, her back nearly to the wall, his hand curved at her hip like he’s been holding her there a while.
It isn’t a painting of two people together.
It’s a painting of the second right before.
I don’t know why it stops me the way it does. Nothing like that has ever happened between us, but something about the tilt of her chin and the set of his shoulders feels unnervingly specific.
“You painted us,” I say.
“I painted people.” Her chin lifts. “Not us.”
“Really.”
“Yes. Really.”
The blush creeping up her throat calls her a liar before I can.
“Interesting,” I say, tipping my head at the canvas. “Because that’s a very specific hand for someone you made up.”
“It’s just a hand.”
“It’s my hand, Rowan.”
“Don’t get cocky. It could be anyone.”
I huff out a laugh. “You’re terrible at lying to me. You always have been.”
“I’m an excellent liar. Ask anyone.”
“I’ve watched you fumble a fake dead husband. I’m not asking anyone.”
“I’m leaving now,” she says, turning away.
I catch her wrist. “Not yet. I have questions.”
She glares at me but doesn't try to leave again. “Go on.”
“What was the inspiration?”
“Do you want the answer I practiced for guests tonight or the real answer?”
Well, color me intrigued.
“The real answer.”
Then, as always, Rowan goes and surprises the hell out of me by saying, “I had a dream about you.”
“And here I was thinking you were coming on Tuesday nights for the group.”
She opens her mouth to fire back, but a waiter tries to cut between us with a tray held high, murmuring an apology.
Rowan steps out of his way, right into me, her spine meeting my chest.
Naturally, my hand settles on her hip.
“Sorry,” she whispers, breathless, but she doesn’t move.
I nod toward the painting, my fingers flexing against her dress. “Is this where I touched you? Right here?”
She turns her head just enough to look up at me. There’s no panic in her eyes. The confidence I’ve watched her wear all night settles right back into place.
“Maybe,” she breathes.
“Maybe.” I let the word sit between us, my grip tightening just enough to keep her flush against me. “Where else?”
Her breath shudders out, but she still doesn’t step away.
“You want an inventory?”
“I want the truth. You started this conversation the second you hung that thing on a wall.”
She turns fully in my grip until my hand slides around to the small of her back. We’re closer than two people at a crowded gallery opening have any business being.
“Fine,” she says, her chin tipped up. “It wasn’t just your hand.”
A sudden wave of heat rolls straight through my gut. “No?”
“No.” Her gaze holds mine without a trace of flinching. “It wasn’t that kind of dream.”
“What kind of dream was it?”
Her mouth curves wickedly, like she’s decided that if she’s already caught, she might as well enjoy watching me sweat.
“The kind where you didn’t keep your hands to yourself,” she whispers, leaning in. “The kind where you had me backed up against the glass in your little observation room, your hand slid under my shirt, and you didn’t stop until I couldn’t breathe.”
The air gets sucked straight out of my lungs. My pulse hammers violently in my ears, every blood cell in my body rushing south.
Jesus Christ.
I stare down at her, my jaw locked tight as I picture her against the glass, my hand on her skin, her breathless, ruined sounds filling that small, dark room.
For three months I sat inches away from this woman and told myself the distance was clinical. Necessary.
I don’t feel a single shred of clinical restraint right now.
“Rowan! There you are!” Someone’s booming voice shatters the moment.
We both snap back, the sudden intrusion breaking the spell.
Rowan smooths down her dress with shaking hands as the gallery director bustles over.
“The collector from Chicago wants to meet you before her flight,” he says, gently taking Rowan by the elbow. “Come, come.”
Rowan glances over her shoulder at me, her cheeks still flushed. That dangerous spark is still burning in her eyes.
I stay right where I am, watching her go as I try to settle the heavy ache throbbing beneath my belt.