Taking Turns (Turning #1)(17)
“What the f—” It’s Smith Baldwin. I look around nervously, but my staff is too busy with the delivery—and Matisse, who has finally showed up—to be paying any attention to me. I take my attention back to Smith and whisper through clenched teeth. “What the hell are you doing here? You need to leave. This is my job.”
Smith smiles a smile that says he has all the answers, trust him. He’s wearing a charcoal-gray suit with a crisp white shirt and a light gray tie. His broad shoulders make the line of the suit taper down to his hips.
I don’t know very much about Smith Baldwin, but I do know he’s weird. I think everyone can agree on that. The man never went to school, and yet he has honorary degrees from seven institutions. Not just colleges, either. Elementary schools gave him a diploma. Do elementary schools have diplomas? I guess in the world of elite boarding schools, this might be the case. His high-school diploma is the same way. Never earned, only honorary. And just from the casual research I did on him at Rochelle’s insistence, I know he has three graduate degrees. One of them is from the Wharton School of Business.
Does he even have a job? Smith was not the reason I agreed to Rochelle’s plan. I barely looked into his past at all. So, I don’t know. But I think he ticks the box with the word unemployed on his census surveys.
He is rich. But he is also beyond rich. I’m rich. My father is rich. Elias Bricman and Quin Foster are also loaded with more money than they can probably ever spend.
But Smith Baldwin is disgustingly, excessively wealthy.
“I’m here with Matisse,” Smith says. He waves a hand over his shoulder to indicate the internationally famous recluse of an artist. “We’re practically best friends.”
I can only blink. Three times in quick succession.
Is he f*cking with me?
No, apparently not. Because Matisse is calling his name from across the office. He’s at the gallery’s professional version of a coffee machine, trying to make it work. “Help me with this, Smith,” Matisse calls.
I realize Smith is still gripping my upper arms, so I break away and walk over to the artist, who is concentrating very hard on trying to make the machine spit him out some coffee. “Hi,” I say, startling him.
He whirls around and backs up. Except he can’t back up, there’s a granite countertop there. So instead he is forced to lean back at the waist, like I’m some kind of disease he needs to be as far away from as possible.
“Sorry,” I say in a calm voice. “I’m Marcella Walcott. I’m the Benton Gallery manager. I’m here to make sure everything goes off without a hitch.” He says nothing, so I keep going. “We’re going to unload in the basement, map everything out while it’s still in crates, and then we’ll unpack and deliver each piece up here, in the gallery, using the freight elevator. We’ll do that last part tomorrow.”
He says nothing.
“If that’s OK?” I add. “If you’re prefer it done another way, I’m happy—”
“No, no,” Matisse says, finally leaning forward again, relaxing. “Do it your way. I don’t want to interfere. Just don’t scratch anything.”
“Right,” I say, letting out a long breath with my word. “We won’t. I promise. We’ll take very good care of your sculptures, Mr. Matisse.”
“Just Matisse,” he says, taking my hand and squeezing lightly. “Just call me Matisse, tell me how to work this stupid machine so I can get a cup of coffee in me, and we’ll be just fine.”
I do that and when I’m done, Smith has disappeared. But I have a job to do, and so I take the stairs down to the loading dock and get to it.
The rest of the day is nothing but standing over my crew, worrying like a schoolmarm about the bronze sculptures we’re unloading. I try not to hover because the dock manager, Kathryn, has it all under control—she’s been working here longer than I have—but I don’t entirely succeed.
Matisse is in and out over the course of the day. I have a feeling he’s doing his best not to hover as well.
Smith hangs out, leaves, comes back, leaves. I try to ignore him but I have to wonder what exactly I got myself into last night.
He took me home, so he knows where I live. And then he shows up here, pretending he’s only interested in Rochelle because of Quin. Please. But this second appearance has me rattled. I guess he really is a long-time friend of Matisse. And I can see it, now that I’ve had a chance to meet the artist. They are a lot alike. Both of them are weird.
At some point in the late afternoon they disappear for lunch, but my assistant, Michell, has sandwiches brought in from a restaurant across the mall and we all stop to eat and talk about what a great show this will be.
It’s called Backstage. And when we are done with the installation, the entire gallery will look like the backstage of a ballet theatre. There are seventeen life-size bronze sculptures of ballerinas. Eight women, four men, and five children. Plus life-size sculptures of the stage hands and everything else that goes on behind the scenes.
This Thursday night will be one of the biggest nights this gallery has ever seen. And it’s going to run for three months, so actually, the Charles Benton gallery might never be the same after Matisse leaves his mark on Denver.
We are going to sell every single piece. I know it. I’ve had my eye on two of the children for months. They are laughing, their expressions frozen in happy excitement.