The Colors of Love (11 page)

"By painting," she said tonelessly, deliberately rubbing her thumb over the rough texture of the dinner roll. "Are you Alex, or Alexander?"

"Usually Alex." His brows drew together, making the brown even more intense. "When did you decide to become a painter? It's not a very practical choice."

She tore the roll into two pieces and reached for her butter knife. She felt him watching as she spread the butter. The recklessness still pounded in her veins, even though she knew he was married. She wouldn't see him again, but she decided that she would enjoy this meal, and that she would know more about this man before he left her life.

"Do you think practicality should be the primary reason for a career choice, Alex?"

He took one of the rolls and divided it with surgical precision. "Many people choose art as a hobby, but it has distinct disadvantages as a career choice. Of course, if your father's willing to subsidize—"

"You think I need a subsidy?" She remembered the flaming battle that had ensued when she'd told her father her decision to quit and go to art school. She put her roll aside and leaned closer to Alex, her arms resting on the heavy linen of the tablecloth. "You don't think much of me, do you?"

He watched her warily, as if she belonged to a strange and dangerous species. Why had he asked her out, she wondered with sudden anger, if he regarded her with such suspicion?

"Tell me what you think of me, Alex."

He picked up his knife and placed a precise amount of butter on his roll, spread it evenly over the surface. "You're impulsive," he said flatly. "Passionate, artistic, beautiful, charming, selfish, irresponsible, and shortsighted."

She pushed herself away from the table until she was pressed back against her chair. She gulped for air, found anger instead.

"My turn now. You're handsome, intelligent, conventional, judgmental, and cold. Look at the way you handle your dinner roll. You don't tear it apart; that would be too impulsive, too uncontrolled. You might actually
feel
the texture of the bread. You cut it precisely, coldly. That's how you deal with life, with reason and formal intent. Instead of living, you
handle
life; instead of feeling, you judge."

"Is your way better?" he demanded. Tearing things apart without thinking first?"

She picked up her roll, noted the uneven distribution of the butter with a perverse pleasure. She could have told him that she had a showing at Northern Images right now, that she'd earned enough last weekend to keep her for a year. As thrilling as her success was, this was a familiar battle. Her father had so often dragged the god of practicality into their arguments. She'd never succeeded in fighting his logic to the ground, yet couldn't give up now.

"I'm an artist because it's my passion, but if you believe you're a doctor because it's practical, you're lying to yourself."

"You know nothing about me."

"Right back at you, Dr Kent. You watch me tear a dinner roll, and to you it's evidence that I'm destructive, even dangerous. When did you first want to be a doctor, Alex? How old were you?"

"Twelve," he said.

"Why not a CPA, since we're speaking of my father—or we were. A doctor earns good money, but there's always the risk of being sued, all that life-and-death stuff happening. A CPA can get filthy rich—my father did—but nobody dies. Wouldn't it be more
practical
to be a CPA?"

When he leaned forward, for a crazy second she felt fear.

"You haven't a clue in hell what you're talking about," he said harshly. "When I was twelve years old, my brother died of insulin shock. I'd have done anything to save him, and there's no
practical
way in hell that a CPA could have done anything but count the cost of the medical bills."

"I'm—Alex, I—"

"He died because the people around him were careless of his welfare—just as you're careless with that dinner roll, with Sara herself." His eyes were hard walls of anger, his voice so controlled she reached to touch his hand.

"It wasn't your fault," she said impulsively. "You were a child. It must have been terrible to lose your brother at that age."

The trauma must have formed the part of him that became a dedicated pediatrician. She wanted to touch him, but his hands had disappeared from the table. Suddenly Eduardo's with its generously sized tables seemed the wrong place, and she wished they'd gone somewhere smaller, more intimate, with undersized tables where a hand could stretch out and touch warm flesh.

"Here's our salad," he said, as the waiter appeared.

With two plates of salad between them, conversation seemed impossible, but she asked, "Why did you bring me out to dinner if you dislike me so much?"

He didn't reply.

"You said I was selfish, impulsive—I didn't know
impulsive
was a sin, but to you it must be. Why did you want me to come out to dinner with you?"

He speared a piece of lettuce with his fork. "Are you always so intense?"

"Another characteristic you disapprove of? Yes, I am intense. Why did you take me out?"

"We need to talk about Sara."

"No, we don't." She matched his action in spearing a tomato wedge. "We could have talked about Sara at my house. There's no
practical
reason for us to have dinner together when you don't approve of me. If you really thought I was incompetent to care for a child, you'd have turned up this afternoon while Sara was with me. You'd have
watched,
looking for signs of my unfit nature while I talked to her."

His eyes flared with an intensity that brought heat to her cheeks, then it was gone and his eyes were only brown, the color so deep it showed nothing. Like a black hole, she thought. She could fall into it and never escape. Swirling, brown deep into black.

"The world doesn't center around you, Jamila. I was with a sick child."

"That's a line designed to put me in my place."

Suddenly, she felt exhausted by their struggle. She wanted to ask about the child, but his eyes forbade it. She'd
felt
so close to him, but he had told her so little. He'd mentioned his brother's death, but he regretted sharing that. Conventional, she'd called him, and of course he was.

"Jamila—"

"Don't call me Jamila. It's Jamie."

"You told me your name was Jamila."

"It is, but I never use it, except professionally. It's the name I sign on my paintings." Her earlier anticipation was gone. She wanted out, away. She stood abruptly. "Excuse me, Alex."

He rose when she did, his manners faultless. She grabbed her purse and hurried away to the ladies' room, determined not to look back. If she had any sense at all, when she came out of the washroom, she'd head for the door instead of returning to his table.

Chapter 7

Why the devil had he told Thurston they were discussing a patient? It was true, or almost true, but Alex knew he'd sounded as if he were hiding something, as if this dinner with Jamila were somehow deceitful.

As if he were cheating on Diana, the widow of Thurston's grandson. Not that he and Diana were a couple in that sense—at least, not yet, although Thurston evidently believed they were.

Why had Jamila told Thurston she was an artist? Damn the woman! He hadn't once managed to see her without his agenda for the meeting going all to hell.

Sara, he reminded himself. This was about Sara, not about Jamila. Not about the stupid attraction he couldn't seem to suppress whenever he thought of her. Was she ever coming back from that washroom, or would she disappear, leaving him with two dinners coming and his guest nowhere in sight?

Yes, he thought, she would.

Perversely, she appeared just as he settled into anger over his certainty that she'd walked out on him. Not that it mattered, he'd told himself. Better if she left, better if he never saw her again. He could watch Sara from a distance. He certainly didn't need to take Jamila to dinner to keep an eye on the kid.

Jamie. Ridiculous name, as if she were ordinary, tame.

Jamila...

When he spotted her, she was walking slowly, almost hesitantly, her skirt swaying as she glided down the stairs. Her hair seemed to give off energy as the red curls brushed over her shoulders. That green dress, something silky, slipping over her skin so lightly, leaving his heart pounding in his mouth.

He saw the moment when she became aware of him. He couldn't see her eyes, but knew they narrowed as her step quickened and the subtle sway of her silk skirt became more brisk.

She reached their table and he stood to pull out her chair. Her hair brushed lightly over his hands when she sat, sending tension straight to his gut.

"I thought you weren't coming back."

"I considered leaving."

"Why did you come at all?"

Her eyes met his, and he wanted her against all reason. He lifted his glass and sipped the water, working for common sense. He would finish this dinner and take her home, shut her door behind her, and keep himself firmly outside. He would remind himself of everything he wanted, and all the things he
didn't
want.

Then, if he had any sense at all, once he had the pro forma statements in the bag, he'd clear the rest of the week and fly to Venice. Diana hadn't suggested it, and he hadn't thought of it until just now, but it made sense. Diana made complete sense, a woman who knew his goals and sympathized with them, who would stand at his side as a partner, and work with him to achieve everything he'd ever dreamed.

"I came here tonight," Jamila said, "because I believed we would be lovers."

He choked on his water and set his glass down sharply. At her throat he saw a pulse beating and fought a sudden hunger to touch it with his lips. Damn the woman!

"That's before I realized you were married."

"Married?" He twisted and found himself staring right at old man Thurston. Could Thurston hear any of this? Jamila's voice was clear, not loud, but it could easily carry. "What makes you think I'm married?"

She gestured toward Thurston's table. "You looked guilty when he saw you here. You tried to pretend we were talking about a patient."

"We are. We're here because of Sara." What was it about Jamila that always left him feeling he'd lost control without really knowing how? "I'm not married," he said, "but I am seeing someone."

"A woman."

"Of course, a woman."

His eyes were glued to the black lace that peeked out from her dress at the bodice, the way the sensual fabric moved on her flesh with each breath. His mind filled with fantasies of touching that lace, tracing the soft border between flesh and fabric. She would breathe in sharply with sensation when his finger slipped under the edge of the lace, seeking deeper, sinking into her softness.

He cleared his throat abruptly. "Her name's Diana."

"Diana," she echoed, and he saw her breasts rise. "Mr. Thurston told you to say hello to Diana when you talk to her. When will that be?"

"Tonight." It would be morning in Venice when he got home, or perhaps early afternoon. He'd have to check online to figure out time zones, but tonight he needed to talk to Diana and remind himself of everything Jamila
wasn't.

"Where did you study art?" It help to remind himself that she was an artist.

"What makes you think I studied?" Her green eyes had cooled. "Perhaps I just chucked everything and bought a paintbrush to commune with."

I came here tonight because I believed we would be lovers.

He mustn't think about that, and he wouldn't. "You're skillful. I expect you studied somewhere. Your father probably insisted; probably paid."

"My father believed I was throwing my life away. He said if I wanted to become an artist, I was on my own."

"But he buys you lunches?"

"Yes, do you think I'm taking advantage?" The tension seemed to leave her as quickly as it had come, and she said, "I studied at the Emily Carr College of Art and Design. Scholarships, loans that I'm still paying off. I worked in an art gallery to help pay the bills. I do know about bills, and believe it or not, I pay mine on time."

"I didn't say—"

"Yes, you did.
Irresponsible
and
self-centered
. If you'd thought about it, you would have assumed I'd be negligent with my bills."

He wondered what would happen if he actually shoved the table aside and took her shoulders between his arms, if he shook her... kissed her.

"Tell me about school," he muttered, determined to get through dinner with his sanity intact.

"I took business admin before art school."

"Business? But—Why?"

"Because it was
practical.
Because my father expected it of me and I love my father, although I've wanted to be an artist since I was twelve years old." Her smile was quick, flashing and gone too soon. "Odd that we both fixed on our passions when we were twelve years old. Mine was also because of a death."

"Tell me."

"My mother died just before my twelfth birthday, and I—thanks to a friend, I discovered art. I believed that somehow, if I could create pictures like those I saw in Liz's gallery—it seemed as if my mother would be back with me. You'd label that irrational, but it felt very real to me. But of course, I couldn't paint like the artists I saw hung in the gallery."