The Reluctant Nude - Meg Maguire [0]
Thanks to MB, who read it first. To Amy, who made it stronger. To my mom, who loved it, predictably. And to Liz, who corrigez’d my terrible français.
Thanks also to my editor, Anne, who chiseled away the excess and polished up the rough bits.
Biggest thanks of all to my husband, for suggesting we visit Nova Scotia. Near-moose-maulings aside, I couldn’t have asked for a finer honeymoon. You are truly a guillemot among herring gulls.
Chapter One
You’ve got to be frigging kidding me.
This was where she’d be getting naked?
Fallon halted so abruptly her sneakers kicked up two clouds of dust, making it feel as if she’d arrived early for a shoot-out in the Wild West. She gawked at the studio fifty yards farther down the long, gravel drive. It was a saltbox-style house, or had been—less a house now than a solarium. As she approached, Fallon found she could peer clear through the front windows to the backyard, as though it had been gutted of its rooms. Gutted and given more facelifts than an aging D-list celebrity. Dozens of mismatched windows had been installed, so many that the roof looked to be held up more by glass than by walls.
Perfect. She might as well strip and ride naked on a float through the town center for all the privacy this place offered.
“It’s worth it,” she whispered, forcing herself to believe the words. “Do it for Gloria.” She conjured her aunt’s smiling face. She conjured the memory of every kind thing Gloria had ever done for her, and she steeled herself.
She mounted the front steps and studied the little brass door plaque a moment.
M.L. Emery, Malcontent
And world-renowned classical sculptor, or so she’d been told. Fallon had been picturing a grandfatherly sort of figure…eccentric but benign. Preferably warm and charming, though she was in no position to be choosy.
The fist clenching her tote bag prickled, begging for circulation. With an almighty exhalation, Fallon put her finger to the doorbell and gave it a push, hearing the chime through the open windows.
“A moment,” came the shouted reply.
She shifted uneasily on the doorstep. Above her the wind folded and refolded a Canadian flag with aggressive snaps. It was late summer in Nova Scotia, and the breeze coming off the ocean felt icy and unwelcoming, like a warning. She glanced beyond the rolling green hills to the craggy cliffs, the dark blue of the Atlantic crashing at their feet.
Another curt shout. “Yes, come in.”
She took a breath and pulled the screen door open, surprised to walk in not on the sculptor himself but two models—an elegant young woman and a striking man. The man was just zipping up the woman’s dress and Fallon hoped she hadn’t interrupted a tryst.
“May I help you?” the male model asked in a difficult-to-pinpoint accent, snapping his dark eyes to Fallon’s.
“I’m looking for the artist. Mr. Emery.”
“What do you want that bastard for?” He handed the young woman her purse from the floor.
“I have an appointment. Could you tell him Fallon Frost is here? If he’s in.”
His eyebrows rose with curiosity or realization, and he addressed the young woman with a hand on her lower back. “Excellent work today. I will call you.”
She nodded and smiled, and they exchanged double cheek kisses before she exited with a polite nod to Fallon.
“He’s in.” The man wiped a hand on his filthy pants and extended it.
Fallon shook it, understanding with a small start. “You’re M.L. Emery?”
His hand was warm and strong, coated in a dusty film. “Max is fine.”
Fallon’s insides did a somersault. This man was not what she’d been expecting. Not even remotely. Max Emery was too young, for starters. And he looked more like a rock star destined for a sensationally tragic and premature death than a classical sculptor. He stood six feet tall or close to it, slender but not skinny, with unruly black hair long enough to tuck behind his ears. Clay dust and paint coated his jeans, and he wore an untucked black T-shirt, also filthy. His muscular arms belied something beyond an artistic vocation. A laborer’s arms, Fallon thought, and swallowed.