Page 30 of Dangerous Strokes

This time he laughs, and it makes me pause. He’s a beautiful man, but when his eyes crinkle from laughter and smile lines crease his cheeks, he’s godlike.

“Go on, tell me,” he pushes.

“Both my parents are artists.” I take little bites of the delicious food, so I can still talk. “My mother is a free soul. Always painting these extravagant modern pieces that most people don’t quite understand. My father is the lover of the ancients, the classics, the renaissance… everything that stopped being painted two hundred years ago. He dedicated his life to restoring art, traveling the world, and sometimes taking us with him. I learned everything from him.”

“Is he as successful as you are?”

I give him a knowing look.

“Definitely not in the same way. As far as I am aware, my father doesn’t forge famous and lost paintings for a living.”

“You certainly do have quite a talent. You fooled so many appraisers, so many people…” he trails off with a look on his face that looks a lot like pride. “I’m not sure I’ve ever heard of anyone like you. You’re a genius with a paintbrush, little witch.”

My cheeks burn, and I bow my head, stuffing another cherry tomato in my mouth to keep from saying something stupid. I appreciate compliments, but there is something about them that makes me want to run and hide while shoutingthank you, but I don’t deserve it, or maybe just a little bit.I wish my mind would make sense.

“Out of curiosity, was it true? The story you told us about theoriginalLady in White painting.”

“That great-grandpa took it?”

He nods.

“Yup. All true. Only it wasn’t exactly saved. About a third of it was burnt. I have it in storage, which is why I was so sure I could forge this one with minimal risk. I studied it thoroughly over the years and there was never a risk of anyone finding the original.”

“It’s ironic that this is the one you decided to screw up intentionally.” He smiles, shaking his head.

“None of this situation has made any logical sense to me.” I admit.

“Weren’t you worried that your dad would find out that this painting was on the market?”

“No. He doesn’t know about the painting. Grandpa told me that my dad’s a bit too honorable and would end up returning it if he knew. Why he thought I wouldn’t do the same… I don’t know. Plus, black-markets are not my dad’s playground.”

“Your grandpa must have seen something in you. Where are your parents now?” he asks.

“West Coast. In a small fishing village, living in this crazy split-personality cottage, that literally looks like they built it at the same time, but separately. Half the house is all mom, colors splashed everywhere, almost psychedelic with a touch of bohemian, while the other half is neat, in elegant, neutral colors and fine antiques. Somehow, it works… just like them.”

He laughs lightly, the way that emotion once again pulls at his lips and crinkles his eyes, making me melt. I’ve seen plenty of beautiful men before, but none hold a torch to Ronan. He wears his looks with such nonchalance, like he’s barely aware of how stunningly attractive he is, yet he’s utterly comfortable in his own skin.

“With their combined lifestyles, it sounds like it could get intense between them,” he jokes.

“It does. They’ve been together for almost thirty years, so they’re used to each other. But it also means that they love getting on each other’s nerves. They’re a weirdly beautiful couple,” I say, rolling my eyes at the memory of their house and life together. But I catch a tinge of longing in Ronan’s eyes. For a moment there he loses himself.

“What do your parents think you do for work? Especially with all this traveling?”

“The same thing as dad—restoration—which is great since it’s normal to travel a lot in this job. However, I told them I work for private collections, so they can never to see my work out there. Unlike my dad’s work, which is public since he works on monuments, churches, and other public buildings.”

“That’s quite interesting, straightforward, since you didn’t have to put too much effort into the cover.”

He has this sparkle in his eyes that looks a lot like respect.

“Considering that neither he nor your mom know of your job,” he continues, “do they actually know how talented you are? Or the fact that you probably surpassed your father’s skills?”

I shrug, swallowing another bit of food.

“I never thought about that, to be honest. Proving myself to them was never really on my mind, and they were quite relaxed in their parenting. They didn’t make my talent a competition. And in terms of my dad, I would never say I surpassed him. Our talents have just been specialized differently. He restores, and I like recreating. I’ve been doing it since I was young enough to hold a paintbrush.”

“What made you start?” he asks as he grabs another piece of salami, pushing my way the mozzarella he can see I’m obsessing over.

“Emotions. I looked at a painting, and I could see the expression of the subject. Even in those posed portraits, you could see how they clutched the fingers, the tension in the shoulders, or the love in the eyes. But recreating it… it makes me experience it myself. The first time I did it well, I cried. I was painting loss, a mother holding her dead son draped limply in her arms, as she stared at the sky, begging God for a miracle. When I look at a painting, I can admire how it depicts the emotions we’re all supposed to see, but when I paint it myself, I can feel them.”

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