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But that was not news to her, and she was not going to allow it to get her down.
“Well, then, I’m safe. Because it might be my birthday, but if the person who’s trying to steal my information doesn’t know what it is, it doesn’t matter.” She gave him a triumphant grin, pulling out her happy spirit and her desire to be friends with everyone. If not friends, at least on good terms. She hated it when relationships weren’t well received.
“You’re not safe. Because you didn’t hear me. I can find out when your birthday is.”
“But you’re not going to take the time to do that. Not for the art in this tent, painted by an unknown and unrecognized artist, in the middle of a small town in the middle of nowhere. There’s nothing worth stealing.”
“I just paid fifty thousand dollars for the merchandise inside this tent. To most people, that’s not nothing.”
She couldn’t argue with that.
Chapter 4
Alexander stood inthe tent, projecting an air of confidence that he really didn’t feel.
Clara had shocked him more than a little with her artwork. He wasn’t an expert in it, but he’d gone to his share of art shows, had artists as friends, and even had extensive artwork hanging in both his condo and his residence outside of Chicago.
He didn’t think Clara’s art would ever hang in a gallery in New York City, but it was definitely work that pulled at his emotions, feelings, made him long for something he didn’t have and didn’t even realize he wanted until he looked at her pictures.
Those were feelings that made him uncomfortable but that he could also recognize in others who were looking at her work.
She had a gift. Maybe not a gift of classic art, but a gift of reaching people through her painting.
He was happy for her in a way. But that feeling was overshadowed by fear. Fear that he actually would lose her. No wonder she wanted to quit. She probably wanted to open her own art gallery and do what she was born to do, which was paint.
He put that thought aside. He could offer her more money. Offer her less hours. And if he were in town working, she could paint on the job even. They would figure something out. He was an expert at figuring things out and making them work. That’s how he had become successful at everything he had done.
“Is there someplace to eat around here?” he asked, watching her fingers as they fiddled with her purse that sat on the desk in front of her.
“Well, there are lots of food vendors up and down the street right now. But the best place to eat is probably the diner. Griff has been making some really great strawberry tarts, although there’s so many people that he sold out of those.”
He wasn’t sure who this Griff person was, but he didn’t like that Clara spoke about him with such admiration.
Still, he had a philosophy that it was better to face a person’s adversaries than run from them, so he said, “All right. Let’s head to the diner. You have to be hungry.”
He wasn’t used to thinking about people other than himself, but to his eyes, Clara looked exhausted, with circles under her eyes and possibly her fingers were trembling a little as well.
