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“He painted this while he was here, and he gifted it to Tucker.”
“Amazing,” Hannah said, tracing the thick blue line as it went flying across the canvas. “I love the movement in his art.”
“Me too.” Starr patted her on the shoulder blade and added, “We’ll eat as soon as you come back.”
“Okay, Mom,” Luke said, but he stopped next to Hannah while his mother continued through a doorway into the back part of the house. “She likes you.”
Hannah tore her eyes from the painting to look at Luke. “She does?”
“Mm hm.” He smiled up at the painting. “I’ve never understood abstract art. Like, what is it?”
“It’s energy and movement,” she said, turning her gaze back to the painting. “How do you know she likes me?”
“I just do,” he said. “Something in her eyes.”
Hannah let the information wash through her, realizing she wanted his parents to like her. “Luke,” she said. “My parents…they’re much older than yours.”
“Okay,” he said.
“My mother isn’t the nicest person ever,” she said. “Sometimes my sisters and I get tired of catering to her, and then there’s some fighting. Then my dad starts to cry, and everyone leaves feeling worse than when they’d shown up. We don’t get together for a while, then someone will feel the call of trying to renew the family bond—it’s usually me, to be honest—and we try again.”
Luke released her hand and slipped his along her waist, settling it on her opposite hip. “I can handle your family.”
Hannah leaned into his body, so comfortable with him. She sighed, and he did too. “Hannah,” he whispered, his lips right against her ear.
Shivers cascaded over her shoulder and down her arms. “Hmm?”
He didn’t say anything, but gently indicated he wanted her to turn toward him. She did, and he kissed her, right there in his uncle’s house, with the Jackson Pollock painting standing guard above them.
He’d kissed her lots of times since Jill’s wedding, but this one felt a little bit different. He didn’t go on too long, and when he pulled away, he said, “I am thinking about coming up here to work.”
“Really?” she asked, tucking herself against his chest.
“Just recently,” he said, his voice mostly down in his throat. “I don’t know. It’s an idea percolating in my head.”
“You do that for a while,” she said. “Percolate.”
He chuckled, and she stepped out of his embrace. “I can admit to that.”
Hannah grinned at him too. “Okay, we better go back. It sounds like they’re waiting for us to serve dinner.”
Luke faced the hallway and doorway his mother had gone through, drew in a breath, and nodded. “Let’s do it.”
