Page 13 of Dangerous Strokes

“Fuck…?” I trail off as the puzzle pieces don’t fall, but crash into place. One by one, they shake my very core, and I don’t know if I should be angry or impressed.

“What?” Vin questions, raising an eyebrow.

“This, it’s a self-portrait. They’re not just selling forged paintings.”

I look to Finn, who’s now standing beside me, and I can see the exact moment realization strikes. They’re making them.Sheis making them. I just fucking know it!

Shepaints.

I knew she was fucking special, but this is way beyond anything I imagined. And the surprises seem to keep coming. I can’t wait to tell Anthony that the painting he appraised and concluded it’s the real deal, not only is fake, but it was painted by the woman who stood right before him the whole time he was analyzing it.

What now, though? My partners expect me to shove this information away and focus on business, on… payback. How can I when my need for this woman has just reached different heights? I have to know so much more about her. Discover her. Her name. Find out what else she can do with her delicate, talented hands and her beautiful brain.

I can’t take my eyes off of her. I’m drawn in like a moth to a flame, and even though I know I’m going to burn, I can’t choose to stop flying. This is how I know she’s a witch. Otherwise, I can’t explain why I have it in my mind that if I touch her painted cheek, I will feel the softness of her skin under my fingertips instead of the surface of the canvas. I’m almost certain that if I get close enough, I’ll even smell her perfume.

Her natural one, seeped in wildflowers and rain.

There’s no denying this—I’m fucked. Slowly and painfully, I’m being ripped apart, split in two; one side has to fulfill a duty, treat them… her, like any other person we’ve done business with. The other side, though, it needs to chase her, take this challenge, and find out just where she’ll lead me. It’s aimed at me, there’s no denying that.

She quite literally propped herself on a pedestal for me.

“I’m slightly confused. They’re mocking us, but why like this? Why a portrait of herself? I don’t get it,” Vin says, crossing his arms over his chest.

“I think I do. If I’m right, it has nothing to do withus,” I say, raising my gaze for a moment, enough to see him cocking his head and an eyebrow.

I thought it was a mistake at first, those blue-gray eyes replacing The Lady in White. It was all deliberate. Perfectly planned. If not for me, then for whom?

There’s a tint of jealousy springing up inside of me. It’s fueled by the knowledge that there’s no way she painted this self-portrait so quickly… since the moment we met until now. No way.

Maybe, maybe it wasn’t for me after all.

When I realized the painting they sold to us was forged, it wasn’t the prospect of getting back what we are owed that thrilled me. No. It was seeing her again. An excuse for more time. I know I’m supposed to get some sort of revenge for her deceit, but the only punishment I can think of executing will make her beg for more.

Somewhere not that deep inside, I have already decided—she’s mine.At least until this chase is over.

“Wait. Can you read that again?” Finn asks.

“By the old cottage, deep into the woods, where the water runs warm from the hills above, one night a year they…”

“I know what it means! Fuck, we all do!”

Vin looks at him like he’s lost the plot.

“Midsummer night!” I continue, the ball dropping.

“The Falls!” he hollers.

The younger residents of Queenscove have a party once a year in the woods, next to a natural pool fed by a waterfall. It’s a keg party, but amongst the ancient trees that surround the clearing, dancing under the fairy-lights they drape in their branches, it feels different. I haven’t been in a few years.

“When is it?” I ask, sounding much too eager.

“Tomorrow,” Vin replies.

When I look at him, I’m met with a grave expression.

“We’ll get the money back.” I straighten myself, wiping whatever trace of enthusiasm off my face.

“If they were men, would we spare them with just arefund? What about the damage to the reputation we’re so carefully trying to curate for our organization?”

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