Adrian took another deep breath. “And when we come back from Europe, having had a really wonderful time, I will ask you, very genuinely and sincerely, if I can move in with you. Not because Tom’s apartment is empty of everything except for lost socks, but because after three weeks of waking up next to you, I won’t be able to imagine doing anything other than that ever again.”
Caroline nodded, nearly too overwhelmed to speak.
“I’m going to say yes,” she managed.
“I’m going to be overjoyed,” he said. “Even if it means that I’m moving for a third time in six months. And it’s a good thing you’re very rich now, because after I repaint your walls, it’s unlikely that you’ll get your security deposit back.”
Caroline squirmed in his arms until she faced him. She looped her arms around his neck and hung them there.
“Ilovethis plan,” she said, imagining Adrian painting flowers and trees and gardens directly onto her bare beige walls.
“Good,” he said.
Caroline summoned a deep draw of courage. “I loveyou,” she added.
His dusty-blue eyes crinkled up around the corners as his smile bloomed across his face. “Even better,” he said as he leaned in to kiss her.
His lips were warm, despite the chill of the empty studio space. Caroline could tell he was trying to be delicate and romantic about it, but after three days of very PG-rated cuddling in very public rooms, her heart kicked in to action, fluttering hard inside her chest. She deepened the kiss, smiling as she felt him respond when she plastered herself against him.
She pulled away and took a step back. Adrian moved as though to follow her before catching himself. His brow wrinkled in confusion when she took off her big puffy coat and tossed it over a crate of empty wine bottles.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
Caroline glanced at the plywood door, which could be closed with the tumbler padlock, then over at his futon,which appeared battered but reasonably sturdy. She gave Adrian an innocent look.
“Don’t you want to get started?” she asked.
His brain failed to load that formula. “Started... with the plan? Right now?”
Caroline managed not to roll her eyes as she pulled her fleece sweater off and tossed it with her coat.
“Don’t you think you should? I thought you had ideas for more paintings?”
“Yes, but...” His gaze dipped as Caroline got down to her sports bra layer and wrestled herself out of it as well. “When I said I’d paint you, I didn’t mean you had to take your clothes off.”
“Seems like it would fit that romantic vibe in your old paintings,” she said.
“It was the realists, not the romantics, who mostly depicted the female nude,” he couldn’t avoid lecturing, though he did not look away as Caroline kicked off her shoes and socks.
Caroline gave him asame differencelift of her eyebrows and nodded at his art supplies.
“I still think it would look nice with all those flowers,” she offered as a bold artistic thesis. He gave that due consideration.
“I couldn’t sell a nude painting where you were my model,” he said decisively. He paused. “Well, of course Icould, but I wouldn’t.”
Caroline stripped off her underwear and sat down on the futon.
“Maybe you could, you know, drape me. Strategically arrange the flowers.” She sketched her hand vaguely across her chest.
“I suppose I could,” Adrian said, the artistic image obviously warring with the more basic parts of his brain. He dragged his gaze off her bare breasts with obvious difficulty and turned to his art supplies. “There’s no light right now, but I could just make a few gesture drawings. Think about the composition.”
“That sounds good,” Caroline said, flopping to her back on the futon. It was really cold in the room. This joke couldn’t go on much longer before she was going to need the advantage of some shared body heat. Adrian clipped a swatch of butcher paper to his easel and sharpened a charcoal pencil as she watched him with great amusement.
“How do you want me?” Caroline asked, striking what she hoped was an alluring pose.
Adrian’s face took on an expression of great and noble suffering as Caroline trailed her fingers down her side.
“I—perhaps a more classical position,” he suggested. He still hadn’t lifted pencil to paper.
