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Then she picks up the brush she dropped and gestures at the canvas. “Uh, sure, but it’s not done yet. There’s something very interesting about how the light plays with this gym.”
I walk around the canvas to get a proper look at it. She’s captured it perfectly. No, it’s more than that. The gym is just a stone structure in the middle of some greenery and a parking lot, with the cityscape in the background. It’s so familiar to me, but she’s made it look new.
“So, your verdict?” she asks. When I tell her what I was thinking, she smiles in the most captivating, adorable way. It makes me want to lean down, kiss, and hold her. “That’s exactly what I was going for. Familiar but unfamiliar. That’s basically what this whole gym project is about. Taking an everyday space and trying to bring out its special qualities. There are so many special things in places people rarely look.”
I stare hard at her. “I agree,” I say huskily.
She bites her lip again and glances at the ground. I almost reach forward, touch her chin, and guide her gaze back to me.
“Have you painted inside, too?” I ask.
“Yeah. My friend Lexi. I’m not sure if you know her.”
I shake my head. “I don’t think so.”
“Dyed hair? She’s been coming here for almost ten years, I think.”
I think a moment longer. “Yeah, I think I know who you mean.”
“I’ve been painting her,” I say. “Or moments. Snippets. It’s an interesting project.”
“It looks like you’re doing a great job,” I tell her.
“Thank you, Mr. Jacobson.”
“Fletcher,” I say fiercely, hating the idea of us being formal with each other.
She licks her lips as if trying to tempt me, but there’s nothing staged or forced about the gesture. “That’s an interesting name.”
“My dad was a bow hunter,” I say. “He’d make his own arrows. It’s called fletching, hence the name.” It’s far easier to talk to her than with anybody else, including my own family. I wonder what that says about me. Or her. “I guess he wanted me to follow in his footsteps.”
She smiles up at me. We’re standing so close. It would be the most natural thing in the world to reach down and loop my arms around her waist, pull her right up against me, and let the intimacy explode between us. “But you didn’t?”
“In my old line of work, a bow wouldn’t have done much good,” I say.
“You were in the Army, right?” she asks. “Lexi mentioned something…”
“More or less,” I tell her.
She laughs softly. “What does that mean?”
I grin. It feels so easy with her. For a second, I can forget that Loki’s out there somewhere without me. “I was in Special Forces. My job was to sneak around in places I wasn’t supposed to be, doing things I wasn’t supposed to be doing.”
“Does being that tall make sneaking hard?” she asks with a small laugh.
“You’d think so,” I say, “but it helped out a lot of the time. I could pose as a rich American douchebag bodybuilder more than once. You’d be surprised by how many people will approach you in a bar and comment on your physique.”
If somebody approachedherin a bar and commented onherphysique, I’d have to leave the premises or end up catching an assault charge. I know that for a fact, and I know it’s wrong. It’s tough. I never usually experience this lack of control.
“What about you?” I ask. “What do you want to do when…”
When you grow up, I almost say, as if I need to call any more attention to our age gap. I need to remember that just because I feel all this heat and closeness, it doesn’t mean she sees this as anything other than friendly chitchat with the gym owner.
“You leave college?” I finish.
“It’s bad,” she murmurs, “but I haven’t thought that far ahead. I just think about the next assignment, the next piece.”
If I had my way, she’d never have to worry about what she’s going to do ever again. She’d be a mother, an artist, and anything else she wanted, never having to concern herself with money.
