Page 24 of Painted

The funny thing was, it wasn’t Early’s nudity that had turned him on, it was the languid way they’d draped themself over the block, the ease of their breathing, and the way Rhys had felt their attention following him everywhere, even though over a dozen other eyes had watched them.

Maybe Early wasn’t the lost, vulnerable young person he’d always assumed they were. Age was just a number, after all. Maybe they weren’t completely out of bounds for a sexy fling.

“No,” he told himself, shaking his head and forcing his eyes back on the landscape. “Don’t go playing with fire.”

He pulled the rolling tray that held his palette closer and reached for the small bottle of linseed oil in the corner. He needed to think of something else besides the fact that Early either shaved or waxed his chest, or didn’t grow much hair at all. He needed to concentrate on mixing his paint to just the right color and consistency to get the highlights on the trees in Raina’s landscape right.

Half an hour later, he’d barely dabbed any paint on his canvas at all, and he’d had to breathe through more than one erection that had tightened his jeans as he’d thought about Early’s easy laugh, and the way they’d taken to wearing that ratty old pair of heels.

Rhys let out a sigh and dropped his hand away from his painting. It wasn’t working. Nothing was working. Now he couldn’t even think without his thoughts turning dangerous.

“This is stupid,” he hissed, throwing the brush he held against the wall in a fit of pique.

It was just his luck that his mum was walking past his studio door as his outburst hit.

“Whoa,” she called out, rocking back a step and heading into the studio instead of moving on. “An artist never throws their brushes,” she scolded him, but went right into, “Unless they have a very good reason to.”

Rhys instantly felt stupid for letting his emotions leak out. “Sorry,” he said, stepping over to pick up the thrown brush and then on to the counter to grab a paper towel to clean it.

Instead of letting things be, his mum hummed and came over to stand against the counter, crossing her arms. “Having a bout of artistic temperament, are we?” she asked.

Rhys glanced briefly sideways at her before walking back to his palette and setting the brush down. “Just letting frustration get the best of me is all.”

“Yes, well, we’re artistic types, dear,” his mum said. “If we didn’t let frustration in, then we wouldn’t create half the masterpieces that we do.”

“And what have you been working on lately?” Rhys asked, knowing that if he didn’t do something, he’d be in for a motherly talk.

It was too late to avoid that fate.

“I’m experimenting with mixed media,” his mum said. “Don’t change the subject.” Her gaze at him was downright piercing.

“I wasn’t aware we had a subject,” Rhys said.

He still hoped to avoid any sort of hippie-dippy discussion about feelings, which his mum was a big fan of, so he picked up another brush, swirled some of the pale yellow-green highlight color he’d mixed on his palette with a drop of linseed oil, then turned to his canvas. He had no idea where to put the highlights, though.

“The subject is your frustration,” his mum said, as if she were teaching a class. “Now, is it artistic frustration, fundraiser frustration, or sexual frustration?”

“Mum,” Rhys groaned, sending her a look that he hoped she would see meant she should stop.

“Sexual frustration it is, then,” she said, grinning broadly.

“Would you stop,” Rhys said, laughing unexpectedly at her teasing.

“No. I’m your mother. I have a contractual obligation to embarrass you until the day you die.”

Rhys shook his head and smirked before turning back to his canvas. Although weirdly, his mum’s silly mood was quickly rubbing off on him.

“I can’t get this damn painting right,” he confessed, throwing her a few crumbs.

“Then stop working on it,” she answered quickly, as if she’d already formed an opinion about the work and had been waiting for an opportunity to share it.

“It needs to be finished,” he argued. “Dad said something about hanging it in the front hall in honor of Raina, and since it’s oil, it’ll take at least six months to fully dry and cure before it’s ready to be hung.”

“Because it’s oil, it won’t dry out tomorrow, which means you can set it aside and come back to it in a few weeks once you’ve had a change in perspective,” his mum argued straight away.

Rhys sighed and stepped back from the canvas, more annoyed than ever. “I need to finish it. I need to…I need to move on.”

He sent his mum a look that showed far more grief than he was comfortable showing.

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