The Reluctant Nude - Meg Maguire [8]
“Fine, I’ll take a look.”
“When I was a child,” he said, still sketching, “I lived in a place a bit like this. In France, near the ocean. A tiny village in Brittany. Everything rundown, everyone poor. Small houses and clear air. The sea. So quiet.” He sounded far away, thinking of these things.
“It sounds very…idyllic.”
“Like everything in childhood, looking back.”
“I guess.”
He glanced up. “You do not pine for your childhood?”
“Not really. It wasn’t that amazing, to be honest.”
“I am sad to hear that.” His earnest stare held Fallon hostage. “I did not get a very long childhood, myself. Perhaps we only pine for what is taken from us.” His eyes finally released hers and he went back to his work, arm muscles twitching and flexing, distracting her.
“I, um… How long do I need to stay here today? I need to make a couple phone calls. For work,” Fallon lied, desperate for some notion of when she’d be free of this man and his unsettling ways.
“Very well…give me two more hours. I will make lunch and do a quick bust, and then you may go.”
“Oh, good.”
That lopsided smile again. “You do not like me.” He sounded pleased by the idea.
“I don’t know you, yet.”
“But you suspect that you do not like me.”
Fallon sat up straight. “I find you extremely disquieting.”
“That is good. That’s a new adjective. I have not been called that before.”
“And self-important.”
“That one, I have heard.” His hand sketched away. “Though I assure you I am of little importance.”
Fallon bit her lip, flustered.
“I do not think I like you, either,” Max said, suddenly standing. “I think you will get on my nerves very greatly.” He dropped his tool belt with a clatter.
Fallon swiveled her butt on the chair, addressing his long back as he strode to the fridge. “Oh, really? Weren’t you just eager to celebrate my birthday?”
He glanced over his shoulder. “It’s okay. I very much like having my nerves gotten upon. The people I don’t like are so much more interesting than the ones who please me.”
Fallon put her finger on why this man bothered her so much. This was a game to him. And to her it was very, very serious.
“You talk about people like they’re objects, or specimens.”
“To me,” he said, rummaging in the fridge and setting containers on the counter, “they are.”
“That’s terrible.”
“Don’t worry. I am not a sociopath.” He shut the fridge and turned to her. “But you have to understand that for my work, I dissect people. Visually. Spiritually, maybe.” He slid a knife from a block and wiggled the blade in her direction. “It is my job to open you up and see how all of your little gears work, then I put you back together in a piece of stone. And if I can’t stand you, then it will be that much more fun, you see?”
“No, I don’t.”
“Well, I suppose you will just have to take my word for it, then.”
Fallon rolled her eyes and held her tongue. A few minutes later Max handed her a bowl of thick-sliced mozzarella cheese and olive oil, cherry tomatoes and crushed basil from his garden.
“Thanks,” she muttered, still tender from his insensitive conversational style. She wanted to chalk it up to a cultural rift, but she’d met plenty of French people in her life and none of them were half as brusque as this one.
Max gathered utensils, shutting the drawer with a well-placed swing of his hip. He gave her a fork and a napkin and went back for a bottle of wine and a glass. He sat and poured her a healthy measure of cabernet. She accepted it with wide eyes, and he clanked the bottle against the glass and took a swig.
“À la votre.”
“Cheers,” she said dubiously and took a tiny sip.
“So, tell me more about your fiancé.” Max’s smile could only be described as wicked. He licked the red off his lips.
“Well,” Fallon began, feeling nauseous. Why had she bothered lying about that? If she’d known how galling Max Emery would turn out to be, she wouldn’t have wasted her time worrying what he might think of her. “He’s a property developer. And an art enthusiast, obviously.”
“You live together?”
“No. Not yet, I mean.”
He nodded, openly skeptical.