Page 62 of Brazen Deceits

Once I let him catch me, he drags me in for a long, toe-curling kiss. “Mmm. More of that would be delicious. Sadly, I think it’s time,” he says, pulling back, keeping my body flush to his.

I link our hands together, skipping out of the sculpture terrace, Walker snatching my waist, pulling me back to nip my neck. “Do you have a plan?”

I laugh, walking backwards toward the stairs, my hand still linked with his. “I’m sure I’ll think of something.”

Usually, I’d be overplanning this kind of thing. But the muse is addicting, and the urge to just go with whatever stupid idea pops into my head is overwhelming.

We troop down the stairs to the first floor and dip into the prints and drawings exhibit. Walker and I begin a slow circle, Walker explaining the difference between woodcut prints, etchings, and lithography as I prance beside him. We circletoward what must be the Rubens. It’s tiny, tucked into an unobtrusive spot, and no one else in the gallery is giving it more than a passing glance. I study the series of swoops and circles that make up the study of a tiger, lion, and leopard.

Why this piece? Who will pay these guys buckets of money to steal a notebook-sized sketch of big cats when there are so many gorgeous pieces everywhere else?

“That’s it? That’s all?”

“Art isn’t about perfection, Clara, it’s the glorious imperfections that make beauty.”

Walker drops my hand, our signal, and I skip past him, heading to the door. My brain works in overdrive as I calculate how his muse would distract the three other people in the room, plus the guard I see coming down the hall.

A glimpse of my tulle skirt decides for me. I pull out my phone, navigating to the peppiest playlist I have, and press the volume to max. With a shuddering breath, I hit play, sliding my phone across the floor, far from the open space in front of me. Leaping into the entry of the gallery, I stretch my arms high, the beat picking up, tinny through my phone’s speakers.

Twisting, jumping, and spinning, I frolic across the open floor space on this side of the gallery, careful not to get too close to any of the art, the music directing my impromptu dance recital.

The three people in the gallery drift closer, two more people joining the guard in the doorway, some scanning for other dancers to join me. But this is just me, no flash mob.

For the first time, I regret not continuing with dance lessons past age twelve. But that was the maximum age fordance at the community center, so here I am. I need some crazy pirouette to distract people, seemingly effortless leaps to wow them. Instead, I just rock my hips and wave my arms, hoping I look like I know what I’m doing.

I make it through the first chorus before the guard decides I’m just one crazy chick, not a choreographed group doing something cute that might go viral and make the museum bunches of cash. “Ma’am, I think it’s time for you to stop,” he says.

I pause, blinking like he’s pulled me from a trance. “Oh. Oh my. I was just so moved. I’m so, so, so sorry,” I say, wafting over to my phone, Walker still absent from my audience.

Fiddling with my phone, I pretend I can’t get the music to stop, watching out of my corner of my eye for him to return, to tell me he’s done inspecting the small sketch.

The guard inches toward me, and I’m running out of wrong buttons to press. “Oh no!” I cry, my hands flying to my chest as I let my phone slip to the ground.

The guard’s almost to me, obviously wanting to yank my phone from my hands and stop the cheerful bop from echoing through the gallery, so when I bend down to pick it up, my hips still twitching to the beat, my ass is nearly in his crotch. I’m not putting a lid on any of my crazy today, so I continue to shake my ass, as if blithely inappropriate dancing is just another thing the muse might do. Here’s hoping it’ll buy Walker a few more seconds.

A strangled yelp escapes the guard as he leaps back from my “accidental” lap dance, barely audible over the blaring of the music.

I whip back up, flattening my tutu (like that works with tutus), running out of ideas of how to stall for more time.

Walker strolls toward me a second before I berate the poor, innocent guard for grabbing my ass. Whew. Tapping the pause button, the silence rings through the gallery. “I’m so sorry! I’m so embarrassed. I hope I didn’t break any rules. The art here, it’s transcendent.”

The guard’s cheeks are bright red, his hands firmly in his pockets. “Just don’t do it again, ma’am. This isn’t a dance club.”

“Of course not, of course not,” I sigh, Walker slipping an arm around my waist.

He plants a kiss on my cheek. “Are you getting into trouble, princess?”

“I didn’t mean to,” I say, melting into his arms.

“You never do. I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t mean to misplace her. We’ll get out of your hair now,” he says, nodding at the guard as he pivots us to the door.

“Did you get what you needed?” I whisper into his ear, a dreamy smile glued to my face.

He maneuvers us toward the exit. “Yup.”

“In that case,” I nip his earlobe, a touch harder than playful. “Youmisplacedme?” I hiss, keeping my face pleasant.

The rumble of a stifled laugh sits in his chest. “Do you have a better way of putting it?”

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