“I did.” He didn’t move to leave, though. “Your technique is remarkable. The way you’re handling the light?—”
“Please don’t.” She cut him off, finally turning to face him directly. “I don’t need your professional assessment or your compliments or whatever this is.”
“I wasn’t offering compliments. I was making an observation.”
“Same thing.”
“Not really.” He shrugged. “A compliment is about making someone feel good. An observation is about recognizing what’s actually there.”
Emily wanted to argue with that distinction, but she couldn’t quite find the words. She turned back to her painting, acutely aware of his presence just behind her. The wind picked up suddenly, strong enough that her canvas shook on the easel. She reached out to steady it, but Grant was faster. His hands caught the easel’s legs, holding them firm against the gust. He moved with the easy familiarity of someone who’d steadied plenty of easels in his time, adjusting his grip to compensate for the uneven sand.
“You paint.” The words came out before Emily could stop them.
Grant’s hands tightened slightly on the easel legs. “Used to. I used to create…”
“Used to?”
“A long time ago.” He released the easel once the wind died down and stepped back. “Your canvas is still wet. You should probably get it inside before the breeze picks up again.”
“I’m not finished.”
“Then you should finish quickly.” It was practical advice, the kind any experienced painter would give. But his tone suggested he was talking about more than just the painting. Emily studied his face, noting the tension in his jaw and the way his eyes had shifted from her work to the horizon.
“What did you create?” She didn’t know why she asked. It was none of her business, and getting personal with Grant Stone seemed like a terrible idea on multiple levels.
“First, it was painting. But then I fell in love with sculpture using found objects from urban environments.”
“But you don’t create anymore?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
His jaw tightened, and he looked past her toward the water. “Because I run a gallery instead. Someone needs to support other artists’ work.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the only one I have.” He took a step back, creating distance between them. “I should let you work. The light’s changing.”
He was right about the light. The sun had risen enough that the golden quality she’d been trying to capture had shifted, becoming harsher and more defined. She had maybe ten more minutes before she’d need to either commit to the new light or pack up.
She nodded in agreement, then he was walking away, his long strides carrying him down the beach toward town. She watched him go, and her mind raced with questions she had no right to ask. A sculptor who’d stopped creating. A gallery owner who handled easels with ease. A man who looked at her painting with recognition rather than judgment.
She turned back to her canvas, but the moment had broken. The absorbed flow she’d been in earlier felt impossibly distant now. She could see the painting with new eyes—Grant’s eyes, maybe—and noticed the way her color choices betrayed her emotional state. All those muted blues and grays. The hesitant lighting. She was paintingexactly how she felt. Anyone paying attention would see it.
The thought should have terrified her. A week ago, it would have. But standing there on the beach with her feet sunk into the sand and her hands covered in paint, she couldn’t summon the fear she expected.
She mixed a new shade of blue, something slightly brighter than what she’d been using. She added it to the sky where the clouds were beginning to break apart, letting more light through.
She worked for another fifteen minutes before the changing conditions forced her to stop. By then, she’d captured enough of the composition that she could finish the details in her studio if she wanted. But she liked it as it was. It was unfinished, uncertain, and honest in a way that felt both uncomfortable and necessary.
She packed up her supplies and walked back to her cottage slowly. Inside, she set the wet canvas on the drying rack in the studio, positioning it where she could see it from the doorway. The painting looked different in the softer interior light and more complete than it had seemed on the beach, but still obviously a work in progress.
A work in progress who’d just survived having someone see her in the middle of creating. Someone whose immediate response had been to protect her work rather than judge it.
She wasn’t sure if surviving the encounter was good or just exhausting.
Chapter11
