Now You See Her Linda Howard(53)

"I don't see the attraction." The words were so stiff, they would barely come out of her mouth.

"You mean other than those big blue eyes and all that hair? Well, her tits are nice. They aren't very big, but they don't sag at all, and her ass is fine—"

"I don't need a rundown," Candra snapped, whirling away from the desk and going back into her office. Kai laughed softly. He was turned on, he realized. He liked baiting Candra, and envisioning Sweeney's body, imaging her naked, was exciting.

He kept that pleasant heat all during the morning, even while he was assisting some tourists from Omaha who wanted some "real art," in their words, to take back to Nebraska with them. Knowing instinctively what they wouldn't like, he steered them away from the abstract and modern, and smiled to himself as he showed them the last piece Sweeney had in the gallery. Candra would be furious if they bought it.

They did, to his delight.

At twelve-thirty he left the gallery and walked the eleven blocks to his apartment. A hotel would have been more convenient, but the woman he was meeting was afraid she would be recognized at a hotel.

He had given her his key and knew she would be waiting for him. He would probably be late getting back to work, he thought.

She was cautious; she had relocked the door. He knocked once, and watched the peephole darken as she put her eye to it. She opened the door.

"Kai, darling, you're late."

Kai smiled. She had already taken off her clothes and was wearing his robe, the one he himself never wore but kept because women seemed to think they looked sexy in it. The belt was loosely tied, of course, and the robe open just enough to show most of one breast. She was in good shape, for a woman old enough to be his mother. There was no telling how many lifts and tucks a cosmetic surgeon had done on her.

"You look beautiful," he said as he took her in his arms and undid the robe, pushing it off her shoulders. Margo McMillan arched her fashionably thin body, offering him her breasts, and Kai performed as expected.




Chapter 13


? ^ ?

The damn painting was calling her. It wasn't anything as overt as "Here, Sweeney Sweeney Sweeney,"

but nevertheless, she couldn't get it out of her mind.

She'd had a wonderful afternoon. Breakfast with Richard had been so relaxing she was able to push the ugly scene with Candra out of her mind. Not being a dummy, she realized Richard had intended exactly that. It was almost eerie, the way he seemed to read her every mood and anticipate exactly what she needed, but at the same time she couldn't stop reveling in his care. Having someone take care of her was such a novelty she wanted to enjoy every minute.

After Richard had brought her home from the diner and left her at the building entrance with a quick, domestic peck on the lips, having made a date for breakfast again tomorrow, Sweeney had gone humming up to her apartment. The scene with Candra, despite its awkwardness and nasty drama, had been a relief. Breaking her ties with Candra. and the gallery would be so much easier now, with no regrets. She made a mental note to call the gallery and make arrangements to pick up the new pieces she had left there a few days before, as well as whatever old paintings were left.

Then she began to paint.



For the first time in a long while, it was joyous. She didn't worry about the colors being too lavish for reality; she simply let her instincts carry her. After doing a quick charcoal sketch on a canvas and brushing it off so that only the outline was left behind, she lost herself in the creation of a chubby toddler with dandelion hair, staring in awe up at a brilliant red balloon. She played with technique, completely smoothing and blending the colors she used for the baby, softening the outlines, so that he took on the realism of a snapshot. Everything around him, though, was an explosion of color and movement, intensified, slightly exaggerated, so that his surrounding world was a fantastical place begging for exploration.

It was the technique she used for the baby that jarred a memory of the shoes. She had used the same realistic technique on the shoe painting. Her concentration broken, she stepped back and wiped her hands on a cloth, frowning as she glanced over at the other canvas. She didn't want to think about it, but now all her former feelings about it came roaring back, like water that had been seeking a crack in the dam so it could burst through.

The woman the legs and shoes belonged to was dead, or would soon be dead. Sweeney knew that with every cell in her body. Her theory that these paintings were triggered only when someone she knew died was a bit thin, since she had only one instance on which to base it, but instinctively she knew she was on the right track. She would know this woman. But perhaps she wasn't dead yet, perhaps that was why Sweeney hadn't finished the painting, hadn't put a face to the woman. If she could hurry and finish the painting, anticipate the future, maybe she could do something to prevent the woman's death. Warn her against crossing the street, maybe. There weren't enough details in the painting yet to give any hint of location, not even whether it was indoors or out, but if she could consciously finish the painting instead of waiting for the night muse to move her—

The responsibilities of this new gift hit her like a runaway bus. Yes, gift. Not inconvenience, though it was damned inconvenient. Not a nuisance, though it could be annoying. For whatever reason, she had changed or been changed, and been given gifts. The traffic lights, the lush plants, the ability to know lines of dialogue on a television show before they were spoken, even seeing the ghosts—all that had been a prelude, a sort of building up, to this. It was as if the door to another world had opened slowly, perhaps because she wouldn't have been able to handle everything rushing at her at once.