Page 5 of Selling Innocence

“So you’re smart? Good to know. Dumb, vapid girls are fun for a while, but they get boring fast.” He shut the book, then handed it over. “You have nice lines, but make sure you focus on your perspective. You forward fill your pictures too much and ignore the background—it’s a pretty common shortcoming of newer artists.”

I stormed over to my bag, then shoved my book back inside with enough force that a tiny ripping sound suggested I’d torn the lining. Just great. “I didn’t ask you for your opinion.”

“Smart people accept good advice whether it’s asked for or not.” He smirked, his expression losing the luster it had before. Out there, he’d played the part of gentleman, but here?

He reminded me of a lion, lazy and arrogant and so sure of his own superiority. His blond hair appeared more yellow because of the fluorescent lights, and his blue eyes were almost shockingly bright. A five-o’clock shadow covered his cheeks, the presence of it enough to make him look a little less boyish than he would otherwise. One of his eyebrows was slightly higher than the other, as though he always had that one cocked up just a bit.

“Polite people don’t go through another’s things.”

“Polite?” Vance waved that off as though unimportant. “Politeness is something for boring people. It’s a set of rules I have no intention of following—and I’d suggest you do the same. So, I’ve given you advice and my favorite shirt. I think that earns me your name at least, doesn’t it?”

I gave him the sort of look I’d learned from Rune, one meant to encourage him in no uncertain terms to back the hell off. I’d never really mastered the look, but I could only hope it gave him some pause. “That feels like another one of those politeness things, and since you don’t believe in them, I think I’ll follow your lead. I’ll have the shirt cleaned and left with the receptionist for the art department tomorrow.”

“No need.”

“I thought you said it was your favorite?”

“It is, but why don’t you keep it until I come get it back from you?”

“I don’t plan to see you again.”

“We’ll see,” Vance said with a laugh, the sound far too confident for my liking.

Instead of arguing anymore—it didn’t seem that would get me anywhere—I left the room, slamming the door behind me.

This day was just getting weirder and weirder, wasn’t it?

* * * *

“Where are you?” Jarrod’s voice on my phone was hardly a surprise and neither was the way he went straight for the heart of the matter, forgoing any small talk.

“I’m busy.”

“I didn’t ask if you were busy. I asked where you were.” His question came out as a warning, as though to challenge me to just try lying to him. Then again, Jarrod never asked a question he didn’t already know the answer to, and he knew damned near everything.

I gasped as I was struck by a hundred and twenty pounds of teeth and fur. Because I’d been focused on the call rather than my surroundings, I hadn’t even braced myself for it and ended up sprawled out on the linoleum floor.

“Kenz?” Panic bled into Jarrod’s voice just as a long, hot tongue dragged across my face.

I pushed the overly excited mastiff puppy off me then scrambled to my feet, managing to save the phone before one of the retrievers took it and ran off. “Sorry, dropped the phone,” I said, worried that he was already getting on a plane from just that moment.

The man really was that paranoid. Despite not having much of what I’d called a fatherly influence in most of my life, Jarrod—my sister Nem’s biological father—had taken that role for me as well. He liked to show up unannounced, usually with food and money, then leave just as quickly. It felt like always having a shadow ready to swoop in should I need it.

“What was that?”

“Just an overeager man who doesn’t know his own strength.”

Silence met me, and I had to remind myself just who I was talking to.

“It was a dog. Well, he’s a little over a year, so he’s more of a puppy.”

“So you’re finally going to admit to getting a job?” Which meant Jarrod knew damned well that I was working part-time. It shouldn’t have shocked me—it was pretty stupid for me to ever think I could hide something like that from him.

It made me sigh, feeling like a kid who thought I’d gotten away with something only to find out the adults had just been humoring me. “I didn’t lie or anything.”

“No, you aren’t the type to lie. Of course, you learned the talent of misdirection very well.”

“How long have you known?”

---