"It kind of does." She looked up at him through a curtain of long dark lashes, grinning again. "But don't worry, Tarmek Stonefist. By the time I'm done, you're going to love this mural. I promise."
He didn't respond. He couldn't.
Because she was looking at him with that enormous smile, paint on her face and chaos at her feet and absolutely no regard for proper floor safety protocols—and something in his carefully constructed world had just cracked open.
Attraction, his brain supplied unhelpfully.This is attraction.
No. Absolutely not.
He was attracted to order and discipline. Not to red-haired artists who sat barefoot on dirty floors and spoke about feelings like they were something to be chased rather than managed.
"Seven-thirty," he said again, and turned on his heel.
Her voice followed him across the lobby. "Nice meeting you too! I'm sure we'll be great friends!"
The doors swung shut behind him. His hands were shaking.
Control,he reminded himself.This changes nothing. She's temporary. She'll paint her mural and leave and life will return to normal.
Behind him, through the doors, he heard the faint sound of humming.
Something cheerful. Something bright.
He picked up his pace and didn't look back.
CHAPTER TWO
Enormous.
She'd called himenormous.To his face. As a greeting.
Edie shoved a handful of glitter pens into her tote bag, her cheeks still burning from the encounter. The lobby echoed with her frustrated muttering as she gathered the last of her scattered supplies, cramming paint samples and charging cables into bags without any regard for organization.
Not that she ever had any regard for organization.
But still.Enormous.Like she was describing a particularly impressive vegetable at a farmer's market. Oh yes, look at this zucchini. Very enormous. Ten out of ten would plant again.
"Get it together, Edie," she muttered, yanking a stubborn charcoal sketch free from where it had somehow gotten wedged under a radiator grate. "He's just a hockey player. A very large hockey player. With very intense eyes. And forearms that could probably crush a watermelon."
She paused, the sketch dangling from her fingers.
Why was she thinking about his forearms?
The morning light had shifted while she worked, the golden streams through the eastern windows now climbing the walls in lazy arcs. She'd lost track of time—she always lost track of time—but her stomach was growling and her coffee had gone cold hours ago and she needed to regroup.
She slung the overstuffed tote bags over her shoulders, grabbed her sketchpad, and headed for the side exit. Her bare feet slapped against the terrazzo because she'd forgotten to put her socks and shoes back on, but she couldn't summon the energy to care. The morning air hit her like a slap when she pushed through the doors.
Greenwood Hollow in early autumn was all golden leaves and crisp breezes and the faint scent of pine from the surrounding forest. The arena sat on the edge of town, backed by a sprawling parking structure that cast long shadows across the employee lot. Her camper was tucked into the far corner, where Sam had given her permission to park for the duration of the project.
"Just don't let anyone see you," Sam had said, with the air of someone who regularly bent rules for convenience. "Technically we're not supposed to have overnight parking, but what my father doesn't know won't give him palpitations."
The camper looked exactly like Edie felt—slightly battered, cheerfully defiant, and held together by optimism and duct tape.
She'd bought it three years ago from a retired couple in New Mexico who'd decorated the interior with turquoise accents and dreamcatchers. Since then, she'd added her own touches. There were fairy lights strung across the ceiling, a patchwork quilt she'd sewn from fabric scraps collected in every townshe'd visited thrown across the bed, and postcards taped to every available surface. The tiny kitchenette was cluttered with mismatched mugs. The built-in couch was currently buried under a mountain of half-finished sketches. The walls were covered in paint swatches, reference photos, and a poster of a cat that said "HANG IN THERE" in aggressive pink letters.
It was chaos. Beautiful, colorful, chaos.
She dumped her bags on the narrow stretch of open floor space and immediately stubbed her toe on a stack of art books she'd forgotten she'd left there.
