“Are you trying to protect her? Or are you protecting yourself?”
“Both of us, maybe.”
The corner of his mouth curled slightly, more sorrow than smile. “Do you feel like if you just wait long enough this will be over, and you’ll get away with not saying anything at all?”
“I suppose that’s a possibility, isn’t it?”
He held my gaze, serious. “I’m still very much here…”
“So it appears…”
“Come here,” he said, tapping the duvet beside him.
My expression was beyond incredulous. There was not a chance in hell I was going to lie on Isabelle’s bed with Hayes. “Absolutely not.”
“Sorry.” He sat up. “I suppose that’s awkward.”
The doorbell rang. I had not been expecting anyone. “All of it’s awkward. I’ll be back in a sec.”
There was a fine art delivery service at the gate. I recognized them from the gallery. I had not arranged to have anything shipped, but Marchand Raphel was on the work order, so I signed for the package and led the two handlers in. The guys carefully positioned the large piece against one of the walls in the living room and cut away the cardboard packaging at my request. Josephine’s name was on the attached paperwork, but when the tableau was finally revealed my heart leapt. There, in my living room, was Ailynne Cho’sUnclose Me.
I began to shake.
“Hayes!”
It took him a moment to appear from the corridor, an impish grin on his face.
“Did you do this? Is this from you?”
“You said it was the one piece you loved.”
I nodded, and then, unexpectedly, I began to cry.
Hayes saw the embarrassed handlers to the door, and then returned to me, holding me in his arms. “Shhh.” He was kissing the side of my face. “It’s just art, Solène,” he teased.
I laughed. Through the tears and the waves of emotion and the realization that what he’d done was huge, I laughed.
“Thank you. You didn’t have to do this.”
“I know that. But I couldn’t give up the opportunity to make you feel—what was it you said?—‘everything.’”
My heart was melting. “You.”
“Me?”
“This is why they love you, isn’t it?”
“Who?”
“Everyone.”
He smiled. “Yes, everyone.”
I stood there for some time, losing myself in the seductive image. The garden, the woman, the light. The rush, the idea that it was mine. The realization: this was what it was like to be high, on art.
Hayes made his way back to the walls of glass to admire the vista. The sun was beginning to lower, casting the room in an apricot light. “Are you happy?”
“I think you know the answer to that.”
