Page 12 of Sin of Love
7
Poundingon my front door wakes me sometime in the night. I jerk upright, wincing as muscles in my neck and back twinge. They don’t like it when I sleep on cement.
I passed out on the floor of the studio again, a habit I attribute to the series of oversized canvases dominating the entirety of one wall. Seven paintings for seven sins, all of them facets of Deirdre. Their presence makes it difficult to leave, no matter how tired I am.
I stumble-walk to the front door, flipping on lights and muttering. “I’m coming, just stop fucking knocking.”
Whoever they are, they don’t stop, and by the time I wrench the door open, my blood is boiling and I’m ready to bite someone’s head off.
“What the—” I shake my head, squinting at the unexpected guest under my glaring porch light. Tall and slender, he has distinctive, white-blond hair framing his face, and the bone structure of a fashion model. “Nate?”
“Your doorbell doesn’t work,” he says, nodding toward the jagged hole in the stucco.
After the disastrous gallery opening—and my subsequent refusal to sell any of the Seven Sins paintings—people could not take a hint. Some asshole reporter trailed me home and broadcasted my address. For a straight week, the doorbell rang constantly. So I pried that offending fucker right off.
At least 40 percent of me wants to slam the door in Nate’s face. When I really needed him—weeks ago right after Deirdre’s disappearance—he dodged me like the plague. But 60 percent of me recognizes the desperation in his eyes, as well as the possibility he’s finally pulled his head out of his ass.
“What do you want, Nate?”
He bites his lip, gaze slipping from mine. But not before I see the guilt swimming there.
“She should have come back by now,” he murmurs. “Something’s wrong.”
Everything inside me goes quiet and still. Then, before my mind gives permission, my hand grips the collar of his T-shirt and drags him forward until we’re up close and personal.
“You know where she went, don’t you?”
Breath hitches in his chest as he nods. “I have a good idea.”
This close, I see the pain and fear in his eyes—all for Deirdre. My stomach turns leaden and drops.
“We have to find her,” he whispers.
I yank him so close our noses almost collide and hiss into his face, “You don’t-fucking-say. She’s been gone over a month! Why are you only here now?”
“Because of this.”
A piece of paper appears in front of my nose. Releasing Nate, I grab it. No, not a piece of paper—a polaroid. At first, I don’t understand what I’m seeing.
“Who—”
“It’s her, Gideon. Someone left that in my P.O. Box. No envelope.”
“But…” I trail off, my voice shredded by what I’m looking at.
Deirdre. Oh, Deirdre.
After a brief glance over his shoulder, Nate leans forward and lowers his voice, “Can we take this conversation inside?”
The hairs on the back of my neck lift. I look into the dark street, noting a car parked in front of my neighbor’s house. Is it empty? I can’t tell.
I step back into the house, holding the door open. “I’ll make coffee.”
* * *
Two hours later,I’m chugging black coffee in the passenger seat of my car. It’s three in the morning, so traffic isn’t the standard Los Angeles nightmare. I’m still stunned by how many cars are on the road.
I make the mistake of speaking the thought.
