“They say I’ll have a suite on the top floor.”
He laughed again. “No kidding?”
“And another for my managers.” She loved having the ability to draw laughter from this man.
“I guess you must be somebody important. Thank you so much for speaking with little old me.”
“Stop.”
“I’ll call Kiki and ask if they can put me in the same hotel. That is, if you want.”
“Very much. I need—” Her voice caught then. Trapped by all the wrong moves she’d made with other men.
Ian said softly, “You need a friend nearby. Just in case.”
“You understand.”
“Yes, Kari. I really do.” A man’s voice called Ian’s name. Sharp and loud. “I have to go.”
Kari cut the connection and sat there. Stroking the kitten. Coming to terms with this shift in the world’s axis. Trying, anyway.
When she was ready, she rose and carried the kitten through the house, out the rear door, and said to Indrid, “I need to paint.”
“Is it done?”
“Yes.” Kari started down the walk, then turned back and said, “If you’re coming, come.”
* * *
There was no question about which painting to work on. It was a decision of the heart, taken without conscious thought.
She painted the man.
A vague portion of her mind sensed Indrid moving about the atelier, inspecting each canvas in turn. Then the woman left and returned, Kari assumed with a chair from the kitchen. But she couldn’t be bothered to check.
The structure came to her so clearly, the work might as well have already been completed.
The borders became a swirling mass of gray flecked with black sparks. Pale and incomplete, like smoke in the wind, cold cinders thrown aloft and spinning with the intensity of dervishes.
At the painting’s heart was the man.
He sat upon a musician’s stool and held a guitar. His face was turned slightly toward the instrument’s neck. But he could not see where his fingers were placed. Because he had no eyes.
A tight golden flame was set deep inside the man’s heart. Despite the tightening intensity of smoke and cinders, his illumination defied the gloomy storm. The light seared outward, so that the man’s right hand, the one playing the strings, was on fire.
Kari then took a metal stylus and began drawing half-formed people in the stormy background. They writhed; they danced; they did all they could to pluck away the man’s flame. Turn him from the music toward the storm. Wreak havoc in his creative life.
As she painted, Kari listened to a softly lyrical internal dialogue. She had witnessed the marvel of true love, but only from a distance. It was there in the shimmering exuberance of a happy child, the gentle affection of a good parent. She had glimpsed it in how longtime lovers cared for one another. She had watched an old man pushing an ailing woman’s wheelchair, his gaze mirroring the sorrow that creased his lover’s features. For Kari, the difference between young romance and true love was night and day. The love she found in such moments pointed toward an elevated state of existence. Far more refined than a simple end to loneliness or the momentary spark of sex between lovers. In her finest pieces, as she painted the last few strokes, she felt she approached a true understanding of love. A softly yearning call to what she feared would never be hers.
Kari had no idea how long she worked. Time’s passage was meaningless. When she stepped back from the canvas, her neck and shoulders and right arm formed one continuous ache.
Kari realized she was alone.
Then footsteps scratched along the path, the atelier door opened, and Indrid entered bearing a tray. “Your cat is very unhappy.”
Kari walked to the house, opened the rear door. The kitchen was filled with the aroma of fresh-baked bread.
“Sienna!”
