“There,” he said, finishing the lacy hem of her veil. “That look about right?”
He held it up, and I found myself smiling—really smiling, not that fabricated stretch of lips I’d been wearing since I walked into my apartment last night.
“It’s perfect,” I answered, my voice softer than I’d intended.
And then he was smiling too, an expression to match mine, genuine and earnest. It did something to his eyes, which were a shade of blue so bright and dense and deep, I was surprised I hadn’t noticed before.
“Thank you,” I said. “For coming here and measuring for me.”
“Even though I undermined your clients?”
“Client. Charles isn’t allowed to have opinions.”
“Poor sucker. Gelded already, and he hasn’t even walked down the aisle.”
“Well, we can’t all be lucky in love, now can we?” My tone was cool, bitter.
And he instantly knew. I could see it on his face, which disguised nothing.
“I suppose not,” he mused without pressing. “But I’ve seen enough of love to know if you hold out, it’ll find you whether you want it to or not.”
I chuckled, folding my arms. “In all your worldly experience, that’s your take?”
“You have a different one?”
One shoulder flicked in an impatient shrug, my heart a tight, closed thing. “That everyone’s hiding something, and it’s only a matter of time until the truth is exposed.”
At that, his lips turned down at the corners. Broad forearms fanned across the tops of his knees, dusted with dark hair, threaded with veins like rivers running down to square hands. “You don’t think honesty is possible?”
“People conceal what they don’t want you to see, to control what you know, to manipulate you. Everyone does it. It’s just human nature.”
Dark brows held together with a crease over those striking blue eyes. “Ivy and Dean?”
“They’re different,” I snapped dismissively. “Most of us can’t expect something that honest.”
He stood, so much taller than me from his perch on the step. His brow smoothed, his smile easy, but I saw something behind his eyes, a challenge maybe. A sadness but not pity.
“I like to think we accept the love we think we deserve, like the old adage says. If you meet as equals, there’s nothing to hide. And if you’re so certain everyone’s out to hurt you, you’ll probably end up hurt.”
I shifted, stepping back with a derisive laugh, affected by his nearness. “If only it were that easy.”
Kash bent, snagging the handle of his bag, slinging it across his body. “It’s only as hard as you make it.”
I wanted to scoff, to tell him exactly why he was wrong and argue my point until he agreed with me, or at least pretended to. But more than that, I wanted to exit the conversation, my hurt too close and sharp and new to defend or dissect.
“Whatever you say, Kash,” I said on another laugh, hoping I sounded carefree.
“I like the sound of that,” he teased.
I rolled my eyes without any heat. “Send me the quotes as soon as you have them so I can get them approved.”
“You’ve got it,” he said as he passed, pausing just beyond me. The scent of him—earth and flowers and knotted pine—slid over me. “Walk you out?”
“I’ve got a little more to do before I go.”
A curt nod of his head, that square jaw of his hard, wide lips angled. “All right. See you later then.”
With the tip of an invisible hat, he turned for the door. And shamelessly, I watched him until the massive doors closed, leaving me alone.
For a moment, I sank into that solitude, embraced by the quiet of the room. I’d been unkind to Kash, treated him like the help, just like he’d said. And all he’d ever done was lend a hand with the offering of that smile, letting whatever I threw at him bounce off like he was made of rubber.
It was shame I felt, and I wondered over what had trained me to be so severe. Years of failed group projects, perhaps. Lack of trust that anyone could perform to my standards. Dating men like Brock, who berated waiters and complained over wine lists. I generally thought myself a kind and gracious woman, but I wondered if I looked it to the average eye and had my doubts.
But I’d entered into a season of change, a new era, one rife with possibility. And I’d do my best to embrace it.
Starting with Kash Bennet.
6
Nine Lives
KASH
My pencil moved of its own accord, directly connected to the vision in my brain, my hand and fingers nothing more than a conduit, a channel with which to broadcast.
The light in my childhood bedroom was low, but the old reading lamp hooked to the bunk slats shone on my page, illuminating the graphite sketch, black against white. I’d used my 8B pencil, the softest and blackest, to cover the page, all but for the shape of Lila, long and white, in the negative space. She stood exactly as I remembered her in front of the onyx wall of the venue, shocking and bright against the darkness. She jumped off the page, the angle of her shoulders, the curve of her waist, her legs. The point of her heels to the point of her chin. Her eyes were scaled too small for the definition I wished I could give, but the line of her brows and the shadows they threw were enough.
She was strength and power, determination and will.
I wished for my oil pastels, needing just one color—the red of her hair. But the color didn’t exist. Nothing could be quite right—not quite red, not quite orange. Not burgundy, nor was it copper. It was a singularity, a thing that only existed in her. She was a tree aflame with autumn. The strike of a match, embers and sparks. A sunset that set the sky on fire.
Since we’d parted ways, she’d slipped in and out of my thoughts. Quietly, gently, she would be there in the replay of a moment, the vision of her at one point or another through our meeting. But always, my thoughts came back to this moment, when I’d seen her standing in front of the building like a feather on black sand.
I’d had to draw her. It was my only hope to get her out of my head.
It was said that everyone was the hero of their own story, and the reason was context. Everyone, regardless of honesty or truth, showed people what they wanted to see. In that, Lila was right. But every heart had a story to tell. A reason. A series of events that, when strung together in the right order, created a person’s self, their motivation and fears.
For instance, take my brother Luke. As the baby in our indelicate family, he was naturally the family jester, the exhibitionist, the one who would do anything for a laugh, because how else would anyone see him in the Bennet fray? Jett and Laney were twins, but Laney had adopted the role of the eldest. She was a force of nature, headstrong and prickly as she was loving and giving, especially when it came to our family. And Jett was her converse—quieter, gentler with a penchant for self-sacrifice—because no one could compete with Laney.
Granted, Jett could still beat the shit out of me, but that was just Bennet conditioning. One had to be able to scrap with five children so close in age.
Marcus, the middle child, was reserved. Where Jett and Laney had each other and Luke and I were an inseparable unit, Marcus had gotten lost in the shuffle and decided that was fine by him. He retreated to books, was the silent partner to my father, the two of them content to never make a sound when the rest of us couldn’t shut up.