She smiled. “Thrilled. Grateful. Relieved.”
“Do you wait at home for him or go to the ship?”
“He’s too busy to see me for a while. I take a bath, dress in something feminine, make sure there’s something to eat. For afterward,” she added. “He’s hungry for me first.”
“When he comes through your front door, what happens?” He flipped another page. The clean sheet would capture a new impression.
“I fly into his arms. He whirls me around and around. I press my nose against his neck and he smells wonderful. Like him. Like no one else in the world. Then he kisses me, and the long, lonely months melt away. He carries me upstairs.”
Gabe watched the changes in her expressions. She had become the fictitious captain’s wife. Her imagination had taken her away and planted her firmly in the scene. Her muscles were tense, her body taut Her nipples pressed at the fabric covering them.
He tamped down his own reaction, one that shocked the hell out of him. He’d thought himself immune to innocence, to purity, to sweetness. He much preferred an equal partner, one who led, who took, who demanded. He didn’t think that defined Cristina.
Seeing her start to relax, he began sketching and questioning again. “Are you faithful while he’s gone?”
“Absolutely.”
“He’s a good lover.” A statement, not a question.
“Beyond good,” Cristina said, a smile forming.
“Why? What makes him special?”
“It’s not what he does. It’s why he does it.”
“Why?”
“He loves me.”
Dead silence. His pencil skidded, seemed to dig a hole in the paper. Cristina watched his focus shift as he absorbed her words. She was enjoying his game, which tempted her, dared her, excited her—more than any man had done with actions. Part of his allure was the danger, she knew.
“What he does is also important,” he said.
She moved a shoulder. “Maybe. More important is how I feel afterward.”
He continued to sketch, his thoughts well hidden.
“You want to comment,” she said. “What’s stopping you?”
He hesitated. “You might change your mind about posing.”
“You’ve demanded honesty from me. You’ve managed to pry some of my secrets loose from moorings I didn’t think anyone could. Don’t deny me the same insight into what drives you.”
“Men view sex differently. Women like to fantasize that it’s different when she’s the right woman for him. It’s not true. It still comes down to physical satisfaction for men, not emotional.”
“Always?”
“I suppose I can’t speak for all men. We don’t discuss the point as women do. But I believe it’s so.”
She rolled her head, easing kinks settling in her neck, feeling sorry for him because he was so disillusioned about love.
“Tired?” he asked.
“A little.”
“Let’s stop for now. I’ll order lunch.”
He watched her shift her shoulders as he asked his housekeeper to serve lunch on the screened porch facing the garden. He hung up the phone just as Cristina put her hand on a stack of paintings leaning against a wall.
“May I?” she asked.
He had a decision to make, quickly. After a minute, he nodded. Then he waited.
At first she simply seemed caught up in the images she was examining, then something changed. She slowed down. Concentrated. Focused. She turned toward him, accusation in her eyes.
“These paintings are signed Marquez. But the style... It’s so distinctive. I couldn’t see it in the photographs. You’re—You’re not—”
“I am Gabriel Alejandro De La Hoya y Marquez.” And I am descended from kings.
The tag came automatically to mind, an old game he and his mother had played. She’d always made him say the whole thing together. He’d stopped when he was fifteen and knew better.
“I don’t understand,” she said, looking around. “There’s no curtain. No two-way mirror. There’s just—”
“Me and you. The ridiculous rumor is just that, Cristina, started by someone who thought it would be diverting to say that is the way De La Hoya works. It’s part of the mystique.”
“Why?”
“Why the secrecy? Because it places a higher value on the work.”
“And you’re only interested in making money.”
He watched her expression close up. He’d disappointed her. “I make a very comfortable living. I don’t need what I get from my art, but I enjoy the game, one I have to play out now because I’m too far into it to stop. But that doesn’t mean I don’t love it. I do. I also love the challenge of taking a losing company and making it successful. Or helping a determined immigrant start a business. Or endowing an artist. Painting feeds my soul. It also puts food on the plate of some starving artist, giving him or her the freedom to pursue their dreams full-time.”
They faced each other like duelists in the streets of the Old West. Cristina intentionally moved toward him, needing some kind of action, some forward momentum. The shock had immobilized her. “And you’ve already decided that I’m worthy of your trust. You don’t think I’d tell anyone the truth,” she said, studying his expression.
“I know it for a fact. We have a connection. That connection is only going to get stronger by your knowing the truth. Alejandro De La Hoya is a known quantity. Gabriel Marquez is not. Not as an artist, anyway. I want you to have confidence in me to do what’s right for you in this portraits. I think you would trust De La Hoya more than Marquez.”
“Well, you’re wrong.” She stopped in front of him. “I don’t think it will make a difference, except that I like knowing the truth. Your secret is safe with me.”
“I know.”
She smiled. “You were the tiniest bit worried, though, weren’t you? I could see it in your eyes.”
“It’s always a leap of faith.”
“I knew there was something you were keeping hidden.”
“Did you?”
She liked the arrogant lift of his brow. He was a complicated man who had just made himself more so, therefore more intriguing, and more dangerous. She would have to open up to him now in ways she hadn’t anticipated.
“Tell me, Gabe—Is that what I call you?”
He nodded.
“Tell me. Do you have affairs with your subjects? Jen was sure by looking at the paintings that you do.”
“Is that what you’re looking for?”
“I asked you first.”
He hesitated. “I choose my subjects carefully. Sometimes I’ve chosen to paint someone I’m involved with. Usually, it isn’t the case. Certainly the older I’ve gotten, the less the two mesh.”
“Thank you for your honesty.”
Gabe reached behind her and loosened the ribbon, pulling it slowly across her neck. “Now you must answer my question.”
She pressed a shaky hand to his chest. “If my father had his way, I’d be engaged to Jason