Page 3
I glance past him, around him, over his shoulder. My brain, ever helpful, supplies the possibility that maybe he wants to draw the tree and my head is in the way.
Then I look at the angle of the sketchbook.
Nope.
Not the tree.
I drag my eyes back to his face. “And what exactly makes you think I’m going to cooperate?”
One corner of his mouth twitches, not quite a smile. More like the idea of one. “Because you’d look better in profile.”
“Excuse me? Every fucking angle of my face is perfect.”
His gaze drops lazily over my face again, invasive in a way that should piss me off more than it does. Then he clicks his tongue softly and lifts the sketchbook a little. “Hold still.”
I bark out a laugh because I genuinely think I misheard him. “I’m sorry?”
“I was drawing you,” he says, like this is an ordinary thing to say to someone. “Then you moved.”
I stare at the sketchbook, then at him. “You were drawing me,” I repeat.
“Yes.”
“Without asking.”
“Yes.”
“And now you’re giving me instructions.”
His head tips the other way this time, curious. “Would you prefer praise first?”
There is a brief and terrible silence in my head where several possible responses line up, all of them unfit for civil society. “I’d prefer you develop a survival instinct.”
That almost-smile appears again. “There it is.”
“There what is?”
“The face I was trying to catch.”
I should tell him to go to hell. Actually, no. I should tell him to go to hell and then help him get there.
Instead, for some reason that will haunt me later, I ask, “You just walk around ordering strangers into poses?”
“Only you.”
My brows pull together harder. “You don’t know me.”
“I don’t need to.”
My grip tightens around nothing at all. “That’s creepy.”
His eyes flick over my expression, unbothered. “Creepy would be drawing you from behind a bush.”
“How comforting. So this is the ethical version?”
“If it helps, I came over because your face was distracting.”
I laugh again, but there’s no humor in it this time. “Is there a filter in that head of yours?”
