Page 72 of The Love Ambush
“I’m exhausted,” Ivy says, her head drooping. “Can we talk about this in the car on the way to my bed?”
“Great idea,” I say. I am entirely out of my depth here. “Let’s get on the road.”
I get lost on the way back to the resort, and takes us over half an hour to get there, when it should have taken ten minutes.
Any goodwill I’d gained with Sophie and Emily on the plane is lost by the time we drop off Ivy and head back out to find dinner.
Chapter Sixteen
Gentry
Istare out into the darkness beyond the gallery windows and apologize for the five hundredth time. “I’m so sorry I’ve ruined your evening.”
The gallery owner, Holly, frowns menacingly at me. With spiky black hair that perfectly complements her narrow, fine-boned face and a fierce glare, she can do menacing really well. “Stop apologizing and let me see what you’ve created. If I didn’t want to be dragged out of my house at eleven at night to lock this place up, I wouldn’t have told you to stay as long as you want.”
I completely lost track of time and probably wouldn’t have noticed how late it had gotten if I hadn’t finished the painting. It’s an oil on canvas of the cherry tree in my backyard back in Catalpa Creek, with a few fanciful additions. “It’s just a for-fun painting,” I say. “It’s been over a year since I’ve painted anything and it’s definitely not—”
Holly ignores me completely as she stomps to the back room where I’ve been working for the past ten hours straight. She’s a contradiction with her glares, her stomping, and her consistently kind offers to let me use her supplies and stay all night if I want.
The room spins as I turn to follow her, and I realize I haven’t eaten anything since lunch. I breathe deeply until the room steadies again and hurry after her.
Holly studies the painting without saying a word, tilting her head slightly as she takes it in. “Is that a hedgehog peeking out of that knot in the tree? Hedgehogs don’t climb trees.”
“No. Like I said, the painting is just for fun. It’s not—”
“Is all your work magical realism?”
“Yes. I mean, that was the direction I was headed before I quit.”
“You got anything else finished?”
“A few. They’re at home, but I can show you pictures on my phone.”
She waves a hand. “I’ll hang this one here. What’s a reasonable price?”
“Uh, I’ve never—”
She nods. “Eight hundred’s probably the best I can get for it this time of year. Minus whatever it costs me to frame it. Gallery percentage is twenty-five. That work for you?”
There’s no way this painting I completed in ten hours is going to sell at a gallery full of work far more professional than my own. There’s also no risk for me in letting Holly try to sell it. “That’s great. Thank you.”
“It’s not my taste,” she says, still studying my work. “But it’s unique, and you’ve got great color sense and lines. If this one sells before the spring, I’ll be in touch about acquiring more of your work.”
“More of my—”
“Only magical realism,” she says. “And if you start something new, local Yuletide landmarks and Christmas themes do really well here.”
I seriously doubt my painting will sell, but I could definitely use the extra money. “I don’t have time to paint anymore, but I have a few paintings from years ago that might work.” Paintings at least one art professor found amateurish and mediocre.
That gives her pause. She stops and stares at me like she’s only now really seeing me. “When you have talent like yours, you should make time to paint.”
“I mean, I love to paint, but my professors said my work lacks emotion. I wasn’t able to stay in art school long enough to learn to improve.”
She grabs my shoulders and holds me in place to look at my painting. “Can you actually tell me you can look at this painting and not feel anything? Because I feel all the things. I’m awed by the beauty of the tree and the sunset in the background. I’m curious about the tree-climbing hedgehog and the alligator with the cherry in its mouth. Most of all, I feel lonely and threatened, like that poor hedgehog, stuck where it does not belong with the gator waiting to chomp it in its jaws.”
“You do?”
“What do you feel?”
