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If he’d had his way, he would have made love to her then and there. The smile she gave him, letting him know that he’d passed her test, made him feel like a caveman. He wanted to say “You’re mine” and throw her over his shoulder and take her away. He didn’t want other men looking at her in a dress that showed off her every curve. It hadn’t been easy for him to hold back from her.
The best he could do in a modern society was dance with her. He’d loved holding her in his arms, loved the way she so easily followed him around the floor.
When the people crowded around them after the dance, it was easy for him to lead Jecca and Nell out of there. If Nell hadn’t been with them he would have taken Jecca straight home. But he didn’t want to rush her. He wanted to make sure that what happened between them was what she too wanted.
At Al’s Diner Tris knew he’d acted like a high school kid. He couldn’t keep his hands off of her! He’d never felt such desire before. Just to touch her, feel her leaning against him, was all he could think about.
They’d spent the best night of sex together that he’d ever had. He awoke once to her curled up against him, and he’d felt such tenderness for her that he never wanted her to leave.
And therein was the problem. There was nothing he could do to stop Jecca from leaving in just a few months. He was anchored in Edilean as firmly as the big oak in the middle of town. His roots went down as far as the tree’s. Even the last hurricane hadn’t dislodged that tree, and nothing was going to make Tristan leave his hometown either.
Tris checked more plants for mealybugs and red spider, then made sure the mister was working. It was all in order, and he left the conservatory. He knew he should probably help the women load the Rover but instead he went to find Jecca and Nell.
He hadn’t been upstairs since Jecca had moved in. Her doord ie Rover b was open and he looked inside, but they weren’t there. Just as she’d done to his house, he wanted to see the way she lived. He wanted to learn more about her.
He went into the bedroom first. On the bed was a green canvas suitcase, the kind that opened at the top, a Gladstone bag. It was half full of Jecca’s clothes. He could see jeans, T-shirts, and a sweater to the side. Everything was nea
t and tidy. He knew the room well, as it was where he stayed when he was a child and his parents went out. He knew which pictures had been changed. Jecca must have gone around the house and selected the ones she liked best, then rehung them in her apartment. He’d always liked the scene of the river in Scotland better than the portrait of old man Wingate that used to hang over the bed.
Smiling, he went into the living room. What most interested him was the art area that she’d set up by the big windows. There was a drafting table, custom made, and beautiful, and on top was her big sketchbook. As Tris opened it, he couldn’t help glancing over his shoulder to see if he was going to be caught. No one had to tell him that looking in an artist’s sketchbook was as invasive as reading a person’s diary.
But he couldn’t resist. The first pages were sketches of flowers from Miss Livie’s garden. She’d colored some of them with pencils; some were just outlines. He could tell she’d drawn them quickly, but she’d managed to capture the shape of the flowers.
There were several pages of his orchids and that made him smile. It looked like she’d liked the paphiopedilums the best—and he did too. Their exotic shapes, both seductive and forbidding at the same time, had always fascinated him.
She’d experimented with color on them. There were a few drawings that were close to reality, but a couple had colors as fanciful as a 3-D movie.
The next page had sketches of the flowers both from the garden and his orchids, with bits of jewelry around them. Rings, necklaces, and bracelets twined around stems, peeked from behind petals.
Tris was sure Kim would be pleased with Jecca’s ideas.
He turned the next page and drew in his breath, for there was a drawing of him—and he was wearing wings.
He could see that what she’d drawn was ultimately for Kim, but it still took him a moment to get over his shock. He could see what she’d done. She’d made a composite of photos from Miss Livie’s albums and added the veined and clear wings of a dragonfly. She had portrayed him as Cupid.
Smiling, he turned to the next page, and again he was stunned. There was a picture of him holding Nell.
He was drawn from the waist up and Nell, about two, was in his arms, curved around, her head on Tristan’s shoulder, and she was asleep. He was looking down at her, and all the love he felt for the child was in his eyes and in the way he was holding her.
There was no such photo ever taken. Tris didn’t doubt that he looked at Nell just like that, but no one had captured it on film. But as he studied the drawing, he could see where Jecca had seen the parts she’d used. He had seen Miss Livie’s albums often and knew the photos well.
There was a picture of Nell sleeping in Addy’s arms and looking as angelic as she did in Jecca’in ight="0em;s drawing. Only in that photo, in the background were half a dozen relatives holding cans of beer. And Addy had been talking, not looking at her daughter in adoration.
The source for his expression was harder to figure out. But then he remembered a picture taken when he was nine and he’d had a baby rabbit on his lap. He’d been looking at it with love. She’d used that old photo and the one of Nell asleep in her mother’s arms to create something utterly new.
Tristan had never had any artistic ability, and he marveled at people who did, but these drawings that Jecca had made were better than anything he’d ever seen. That she could take the face of a nine-year-old boy, age it to thirty-four, then add a child from another photo was, to him, magic.
His first thought was that he wanted to ask Jecca if he could take the last two drawings to have them framed. But of course he couldn’t reveal his snooping.
Reluctantly, he turned the page, and the sketches of the playhouse began. She’d written notes about each color variation. He liked the look of her writing. It was half schoolbook perfect and half calligraphy.
He heard a noise in the hallway and guiltily closed the sketchbook. He half expected Jecca to be standing behind him, but the room was still empty.
“I wonder where my girls are?” he said aloud—then smiled at the term “my girls.”
He found Jecca and Nell sitting on the floor of the closet in Lucy’s sewing room. There were half a dozen photocopied drawings of the playhouse scattered about, each one of different colors, and several bolts of fabric by each drawing.
“I like the green one,” Jecca was saying. “What about you?”
