Rumor Mill, page 2
I had only been working there for a week, but already I felt like I was getting the hang of things. A typical day started around nine in the morning. I swung by a coffee shop and picked up a few cups for the staff. It wasn’t part of my job description, but I wanted coffee for myself, and it only seemed friendly to pitch in for everyone else. After doing that three days in a row, one of the other women took the initiative to surprise us all with morning coffee. I felt like I’d started a ritual that everyone appreciated.
After arriving at work, I would walk through the gallery to make sure everything was clean and there were no problems. Having to toss a paper napkin or empty a trash can, I would then settle behind the counter and handle the customer service for the rest of the day.
It was always a pleasure to sell a piece. I knew that the customer would be happy with their selection, the gallery would be happy, and the artist would get a commission. While there were a few more expensive pieces from established painters, there was an entire room devoted to rising stars.
These were artists like me who hadn’t had a chance to launch their careers yet. Annie, the gallery owner, made it part of her mission to help young people get established. A showing at her place could be the beginning of something life-changing, and anytime a customer connected with one of the lesser-known works, I always felt a surge of pride.
Not only were we supporting up and coming artists, but we were introducing our clientele to new and amazing works of art. That was something that made the gallery stand out from the rest, our ability to recognize talent before it arrived on the world stage.
“No coffee today?” Annie asked on Monday morning as I arrived a little bit early.
I was distracted, thinking about Brad and his meeting, and hadn’t remembered to swing by the coffee shop. “No,” I admitted, feeling like I had let her down.
“It’s fine,” she responded easily. “There’s a pot in the office. We just haven’t had to use it since you came.”
“I can go out now if you’d like,” I offered.
“No need,” she said. “We’ve got a lot of work to do. I want to change the exhibit in the green room.”
Annie had three rooms in her gallery, and they were all organized by color. The green room featured a large window in the back and a few strategically placed plants. The white room was completely empty, and with the exception of the artwork, there was nothing to draw the eye. The blue room had a few water features that created a kind of mountain stream effect. Annie used the backdrop of each of the rooms to better highlight whichever collection she was focused on at the moment. The cash register was in the back, in an alcove between the green room and the blue room. The staff area lay just beyond that and was full of painting supplies and artwork waiting to be hung.
“Can I show you something?” I asked timidly.
“Of course,” she said.
I walked into the back, leaving the cash register untended. It was early enough in the day that there wouldn’t be a lot of customers. And if someone walked in the door, the chime would alert us.
I sat down at the computer and called up Retro’s website. There was something new that Brad had been working on before I left. It was still in beta but available for anyone to use. A search engine that could help interested collectors and gallery owners locate one-of-a-kind pieces all over the world, it contained an ever-growing database of artists and artwork.
I knew that if a purchase was made over Retro’s platform, that Brad would get a commission. But that’s not why I wanted to show Annie. The fact was that it was the easiest way I had found to connect with unknown artists.
Functioning somewhat like a social media site, it allowed artists to upload thumbnails of their latest work for people to bid on. There was a huge amount of information, and people could spend hours just sifting through the offerings. I thought I could get Annie started, and if she liked it, it would be another way to expand her collection.
For galleries, there was a showing option, where you could interface with the artist and agree to display their work. Of course there were fees, but Annie could potentially expand her exhibits without paying full price. When something sold, there would be a reimbursement to the artist, and Retro would recoup a percentage for facilitation.
I explained this all and left Annie to glance through some of the offerings. She was intrigued, having never seen such an eclectic collection of artwork. I was pleased to have been able to provide her with another tool she could use to promote her gallery.
“This is great!” she said enthusiastically.
“Thanks,” I replied, blushing. “I had a hand in designing it.”
“Really?” she said, paging through a few sheets of thumbnails. “It’s a great idea.”
“It’s a work in progress,” I admitted. “But if we can get some more customers—” I stopped myself. There was no ‘we’ anymore. I wasn’t a part of Retro. I needed to reacclimate myself to working for someone else and divert my focus from Brad to Annie. As much as I wanted to help my previous employer with my new connections, it wasn’t my primary goal anymore. “I’ll be up front,” I said, leaving her to it.
I spent two hours behind the cash register, working my way through the hardcopy book of client emails she kept. It was an old-school, low-tech way of organizing the communications. There were handwritten notes on a lot of the entries that had to do with the customer’s likes and dislikes. The idea was to let someone know if a particular piece arrived that they might be interested in.
I found a few leads and made a few phone calls. One person was home, and I let her know about a new piece from her favorite artist. She agreed to come in later that week and take a look at it.
There was one gentleman who came in looking for a housewarming gift for his daughter. I walked through the gallery with him, chatting about his daughter’s aesthetics before we decided on a lovely watercolor of a park bench.
“This will look beautiful in her bathroom,” he decided.
I kept my mouth shut. It seemed a shame to relegate an original piece of artwork to the bathroom, but everyone had their own preferences. The artist would be happy to have sold a painting, and the money would go a long way toward paying the gallery’s expenses. Where the client ultimately decided to hang it wasn’t any of my business.
“Great choice,” I approved, removing it from the wall.
We went up to the cash register, where I wrapped the painting in brown paper and handed it over. It was a smaller work and didn’t need any kind of professional packaging. The customer just took it with him, and I went back to leafing through the notebook.
“Teddy?” Annie said, coming out of the back.
“Yes?” I asked.
“I arranged for some new acquisitions to arrive on Thursday. Can you come in early to help with the staging?”
“How early is early?” I asked, hesitating because Thursday I had a nine a.m. appointment with my lawyer. Brad wasn’t the only one being sued, and I had a responsibility to my own pocketbook.
“Seven?” she asked.
“I can come in at seven, but I’ll have to leave at eight thirty,” I said. “I have to take my cat to the vet.” It was the best excuse I could come up with on such short notice that would explain the urgency of a nine a.m. appointment. The only problem was, from now on, I would have to pretend to have a cat.
“Oh,” Annie said, accepting the falsehood quickly. “Well, that’s okay. I don’t want you to make the drive all the way down here just for an hour.”
“Are you sure?” I asked, pretending that I had a choice.
“I’m sure,” she responded. “I’ll see you when you get in.”
.
I hated lying, almost as much as I hated stealing. If only I had stuck to my guns when Nikki suggested breaking into Brad’s office, we wouldn’t be in this situation. My thoughts drifted back to that fateful night.
I had been dressed up in one of Nikki’s miniscule clubbing outfits: a tight miniskirt and a halter top designed to show off my curves. We were dancing and drinking, having a great time, when I stupidly mentioned that I thought Brad might know something about the missing severance checks.
Nikki immediately suggested breaking into the office to investigate, and her friends were only too eager to comply. I mumbled something about not wanting to break the law, but I was too quick to allow her to take control.
In the days since being served, I replayed the incident over and over in my mind. Why hadn’t I tried harder? Why hadn’t I gotten out of the car and walked the other way? I would kick myself for the rest of my life, for all the good it would do me. If I had just kept my mouth shut, Brad and I would be perfectly fine.
But that’s not the way it went down. And I had to live with that. I had contracted with an attorney that my brother knew, someone different than the person representing Brad. It didn’t seem fair to rely on him for everything, especially since the entire debacle was my fault.
Thursday I would get some answers. I just hoped that they were the answers I wanted, instead of the beginning of an even bigger mess. It was interfering with my ability to do my job. No matter where I went, the lawsuit was at the forefront of my mind. I did my best to shove it aside and focus on the gallery for the next six hours.
By the time I clocked out, I was exhausted. It was difficult to pretend that everything was fine. At least with Brad I could be myself and worry about the thing that was looming over both our lives.
I realized that I had forgotten all about his meeting with Nikki. Since texting him early that morning, I hadn’t even bothered to wonder how things had gone. As soon as I walked out the door, I was intensely curious.
How did it go? I texted him on the way to my car.
Not good, he responded. Are you coming over tonight?
I sighed. That wasn’t the answer I’d hoped for. It seemed stupid in retrospect, but I had been holding my breath that the whole thing would go away. If Brad couldn’t come out ahead, what advantage did I have? He was the one with all the money and influence. I was nobody. Worse, I was a co-conspirator.
I drove home, knowing that Brad would be at the office for at least a few more hours. I kept my curiosity at bay by telling myself that things couldn’t be as bad as they seemed. Maybe by ‘not good,’ he meant that Nikki asked for more money, and he didn’t want to up the offer. It didn’t have to mean that she was pursing her lawsuit against me, or that we were going to court. I held on to the hope that things weren’t as dire as they seemed, until I reconnected with Brad at his place later that evening.
He met me at the door, and we kissed like a married couple. There was no passion, only a tired affection that reminded me where I belonged. I loved Brad, and I wanted to spend as much time as possible with him. This whole crisis was interfering with our romance in ways that I didn’t even want to contemplate. I felt responsible and with good reason.
“How did it go?” I asked, peeling my coat off and hanging it by the door.
I had clothes and toiletries already in his home, so I didn’t need to bring a bag with me. I’d assumed I would be spending the night since that was our habit recently. He didn’t offer, nor did he ask me to leave. Instead, he walked me into the kitchen, where he had set out two glasses of wine. I could tell from the way he was dressed that he had just come home. His tie hung open, and the top button of his shirt was undone, revealing a hint of his collarbone.
I felt the light of passion ignite inside me. He was so sexy, even without trying. He didn’t even realize how attractive he was, especially in the late hours of the evening when the workday was done and the night had yet to begin.
“We couldn’t reach an agreement,” he said. “She’s taking me to court.”
I put my hand on the fluted glass without picking it up. “What does that mean for me?”
“I don’t know,” he answered. “When is your meeting?”
“Thursday,” I said.
“I guess you’ll just have to see.”
“What did she ask for?” I wondered, picking up the glass and walking to the kitchen table.
“More money than I wanted to give her,” he responded, following me.
Before either of us sat down, he wrapped his arms around my shoulders, tugging me close. I put a hand on his arms, feeling the comfort of his presence. I needed him that night, maybe more than I’d ever needed him before.
It was selfish. I wasn’t worried about his lawsuit or how Nikki’s drama had affected his day. I just wanted to crawl into his arms and let him tell me that everything was going to be okay. But he couldn’t do that because he didn’t know. Instead, I did the only thing I could think of. I turned around and kissed him.
Chapter 3
Brad
SHE FELT SO GOOD IN my arms, so warm and alive. I realized that I had been putting off my feelings about the morning’s meeting all day. It wasn’t just that Nikki wasn’t playing by my rules; it was more what her refusal to deal with me meant for Teddy. I could weather whatever storm came my way. I could tie up her case in litigation for years, throwing money at it until Nikki exhausted her resources. But Teddy was another story. If Nikki managed to get her claws into Teddy by way of a civil lawsuit, then she could ruin my girlfriend.
Teddy had just started a new job. She didn’t need a legal decision weighing on her future. I knew she felt responsible, but in a way, I was equally to blame. My brother Alec had pointed out that if I had been upfront with Teddy from the beginning, explaining what I had uncovered about Retro’s previous owner, she wouldn’t have felt the need to snoop. I could have avoided the whole incident altogether by just being honest.
We had already had that conversation, so I didn’t feel the need to bring it up. I just hoped she wasn’t accepting more of the blame than she should have. Despite the fact that we were both partially culpable, the reality of the situation was that Nikki bore 90 percent of the responsibility. She was the one who’d encouraged Teddy to break into my office. She was the one who’d spouted such vitriol when I confronted her that the only logical recourse was to fire her. And she was the one who refused to accept my offer of six months’ salary. So I wasn’t going to absolve her of any guilt, and I definitely didn’t blame Teddy.
When she kissed me, I could feel the tension transfer from her body into mine. She was like a little ball of energy, wound up so tightly she couldn’t contain it. She needed intimate contact to sleep that night, and I was more than happy to oblige.
Without words, I understood all this. We were past the point of having to communicate every little thing verbally. In the few short months we had known each other, we’d progressed swiftly to friends and then lovers. I cared about her more deeply than I had ever cared about anyone before. She was more than a girlfriend. Eventually I wanted to propose to her, though I hadn’t mentioned that yet. There was plenty of time, and I didn’t want her to think I was jumping the gun.
But a ring wasn’t what she needed right now. What she needed was a deep tissue massage, and a rough, sweaty roll in the sheets. That would eliminate all thoughts of Nikki and allow both of us to concentrate on what was really important.
I didn’t want to rush it. “Drink your wine,” I instructed her, finishing off my glass in one swallow.
“I want to go upstairs,” she whispered, licking her lips.
“I know,” I said. “But I have something much better planned.”
“Better than sex?” she asked, obediently drinking from her glass.
“Almost,” I said, taking her by the hand.
She finished the wine and followed me without a word. I led her upstairs to the bedroom, but instead of pausing at the bed, I drew us both into the bathroom. We had a massive spa-like ensuite with a shower enclosure and a soaking tub. I knelt before the bathtub and turned the water on, testing the stream until the temperature was right.
Adding some bath crystals, I lit a few candles. She watched me do it with a kind of stunned amazement. I realized it probably was the first time she’d seen a man draw a bath. Though I had all the necessary implements, it wasn’t something I often did. Most of the time if I was using the bathtub it was for a muscle soak after a workout. In that case, the water was cold, and there was no ambient lighting.
My mother was the one who’d outfitted the bath with candles and bath salts. I didn’t even know how old they were, probably from the open house I’d thrown when I first purchased the property. Teddy didn’t need to know all that. If she thought I’d bought the luxury items with her in mind, that was fine by me.
I turned the overhead light off, and we were transported back in time. She sighed happily. I could see my bid was working. She was already letting go of some of the stress in her shoulders and upper back. I walked around behind her to help her remove her clothing.
Steam from the tap escaped toward the ceiling, filling the room with a thin fog. I couldn’t wait to get her naked and in the tub. There was plenty of space to stretch out and roll over each other. Unlike the hot tub that was outside, this vessel promised an abundance of privacy.
I undid the buttons of her blouse, sliding one hand beneath the fabric to cup her breast. She stretched her hands up to circle my neck, kissing my jaw as I worked her free of all coverings. Peeling the shirt apart at the center, I eased her arms out, revealing the curve of her shoulders and the arc of her back.
With nimble fingers, I unhooked the clasp that held her bra together. Removing that as well, I placed both items on the hanger behind the door. Before I got any further, she turned around to kiss me, planting her palms on either side of my face. Her touch was hungry, and I knew that I wasn’t going to be able to draw the encounter out as much as I had planned.
Sliding my hands around the expanse of her back, I felt the unbroken skin all the way down to her waist. She was everything I wanted in a woman, and I was lucky to have her. Dipping my hand beneath her skirt, I slid the remaining garments off, leaving her completely naked.
