The Reluctant Nude - Meg Maguire [4]
“She is more than just shy,” he said to the cat. “She wants this just a fraction more than she hates the idea of it.” She’d hate the process too, Max could tell already. “It would be a kindness to drive her away now.” The cat purred its agreement and Max pressed his lips between its ears. “I won’t blame you if you stay away for a while.” He dropped it gently to the floor as he heard the water run.
Fallon emerged, face pale. She took her cardigan off and tucked it into her bag and approached.
“Is this okay?” she asked, sitting again on the folding chair. She had on a cotton camisole that revealed her long arms and neck, a slender waist leading down to a far more voluptuous lower half.
Max scrutinized her openly, trying to gauge how rude he could appear without risking cruelty. Trying to give her every chance to change her mind.
“That will do. For now.” He poked around in the compartments of his tool belt and selected a soft charcoal stick.
“Should I…pose?”
“You may do as you wish. I just want to get a preliminary look at you.”
She crossed her legs and clasped her hands on top of her knees, focusing her eyes out the front windows.
“Your hair,” Max said, starting to sketch.
“What about my hair?”
“That is going to be a fantastic challenge.”
She touched a hand to the mess of auburn curls brushing her shoulders. “Sorry.”
“No no, that’s a good thing. I love a challenge.” Max smiled at the easel, where his hand was struggling to capture his first impressions. The sketch felt as rigid and labored as its subject’s affected calm.
Fallon cleared her throat. “How close to my fiancé’s picture is the statue actually going to be?”
Max caught her stumble on the F-word again, as though she’d hit a piece of gristle.
“I cannot tell you, yet. I will get to know you very well in the next couple of weeks.” If you make it that long. “Hopefully by then I will have a posture in mind. He will not be disappointed, even though it will not be his ridiculous vision. That photo…” He shook his head. “All it tells me is that he wants something sexual. I don’t do butcher-block sex. I do sensuality, like I said. Some people can’t see the distinction. If your fiancé is as simple a man as I suspect, I promise you it will have the same effect.”
Fallon cringed but said nothing.
Max smiled deeply and met her eyes. “You do not defend your beloved’s taste?”
“I wasn’t pleased with that photo, either.”
“But no words in defense of his character?”
She frowned. “I’m not an argumentative person.”
Max suspected it was one of the most bald-faced lies he’d ever been fed. “I find that difficult to believe.”
Fallon changed topics as though veering to avoid careening off a cliff. “The woman who left when I got here—she’s very beautiful.”
“Yes.” He paused his sketching to stare thoughtfully into the middle distance. “She has the most extraordinary scar.”
Fallon’s brow bunched. “I see.”
They fell silent for a long time. Max worked feverishly, trying to catch all the little details of his model before his opinions gelled and he lost objectivity. It was a relief to give himself over to the process. Fallon probably didn’t realize he was as uncomfortable with this partnership as she so clearly was.
After an hour or so she adjusted, leaning forward and crossing her arms atop her knees, hands dangling.
Max grinned. “Oh yes. That is so you.” The charcoal scratched enthusiastically across the pad, a connection finally sparking.
“How can you tell if something is ‘me’ so soon?”
“You do sadness very well.”
She seemed to consider her defeatist body position. “I’m not sad.”
“This pose begs to differ,” he said, feeling energized. “You wear malaise like a silk gown.”
Fallon narrowed her eyes, looking fed up with him. Excellent.
“What is it you do for money,