Beneath The Skin (A College Obsession Romance) (22 page)

The faux walls and broken doors divide the room into little vignettes, sort of like the staged showrooms you’d find in a furniture store, except they’re odd and off-putting. In one of them, there’s a desk with no drawers under which rests a big safe. Upon watching someone else play with it, it’s discovered that literally any combination will unlock the safe.
Okay, I get your point Brigand
, I’d say if I had anyone to share my opinion with.
Please, keep knocking me over the head with your message. Nothing is secure. Nothing is safe. Blah, blah, fucking blah.

When I pass into another vignette, I find a pair of giggling bushy-haired guys trying to take a selfie together next to a grandfather clock. Its hands, I find upon closer inspection, spin slowly in opposite directions, and the numbers are all out of order, and instead of a 3 there’s a B, and instead of an 11, there’s an R.
Gosh, I feel so insecure. All my means of security are so unreliable and broken, even time itself.

And Iris accuses
my
work of being obvious?

After passing through a room filled with obnoxious, unhidden cameras that rotate quickly to track everyone passing through—with screens posted in an adjacent room broadcasting everything they see—I happen on a vignette that is downright empty compared to the other busier rooms. In its center is a single pedestal about waist high, and resting upon it is an enormous heart-shaped locket.

I smirk upon seeing the locket. Curiosity gets the better of me, so I cover the three paces it takes to bring myself to the side of the pedestal and I grip the little knob on the locket’s face and pull it.

And it doesn’t open.

I frown, thinking I might be trying to open it wrong. I look for a latch or hook, but there is none. I examine the backside, confused, then try opening it again, wanting to know what’s inside. The cursed thing still doesn’t open.

I scowl at it now, purely annoyed.

Deciding to alter my tack, I use both hands to try and get the damn thing to reveal its contents to me—one hand holding down the body, the other pulling on the dumb knob. Even after a solid minute of grunting and tugging, still the damn thing won’t open, its contents safe from my eyes and utterly unknown.

Then … “Oh,” I mutter to myself, realizing the point.

I sigh, letting go of the thing at last. I almost feel stupid, falling for it. Of course the enormous locket would be heart-shaped. All of the things in our lives that we rely on for keeping us secure and protected, they ultimately fail us, letting in the robbers and thieves and prying eyes and uninvited friends into our most private, precious spaces. And yet the heart …

The heart is just a cold, metal locket that won’t open even if you want it to—the most secure thing of all.

Footsteps shuffle slowly into the space from behind. I turn towards the sound.

Brant stands there with his hands in the pockets of his low-hanging crinkled jeans, his biceps bulging beautifully in the effort and hugged by the sleeves of the green t-shirt he wears, and his bright blue eyes lock onto mine with his forehead wrinkled up cutely. His sexy lips purse, sucking in his cheeks as he watches me.

“Hey, pretty,” he finally says.

I cross my arms. I hate that that’s the first thing I do. “Hi,” I offer back coolly.

Why can’t I be sweet and nice to him? He doesn’t deserve me standing here protecting my own steel-cased heart locket.
Lighten up, Nell.

“Enjoying Renée’s show?”

I take a short breath, then put on a smile. “It’s very moving.”

He tilts his head. “What’s wrong?”

I flinch. “What do you mean?”

“You’re smiling.”

Seriously? You think something’s wrong because I’m smiling?
“I’m fine,” I tell him, unfolding my arms and willing my nerves to chill out. After a moment’s thought, I lower my voice and add, “But if I’m totally honest, I’m … I’m not really a Renée Brigand fan.”

“Really? Maybe you’re just looking at the wrong stuff. Hey, I just saw something pretty cool in the other room. Did you—?”

“Already saw it. Not a fan of hand veins and bloodshot eyes.”

“One of the photos was a bodybuilder’s forearm, actually. But that’s not the one I’m talking about.” He takes a step toward me, his eyes alight. “There’s this other room …”

“Brant …”

“What?” he asks innocently, leaning against the pedestal.

I didn’t realize how close he’d gotten. I can smell his cologne.

I can’t escape it; every breath is now all full of him.

His spice. His shampoo.

His crispness. His minty freshness.

His heat.

His fucking everything.

“I just …” I take a deep breath, preparing myself for what I want to say, and then becoming utterly incapable of saying any of it.
Stay away. I can’t do this. We can’t go through this.

All of that in my head suddenly becomes:
Don’t go away. I need this. We have to go through every inch and second and stroke of this.

He steps even closer, his chest nearly against me as his intense blue eyes bore down into mine.

“You just … what?” he asks softly, encouraging me.

I lick my lips and stare at his chest, unable to meet the intensity of his gaze. “I think … I think it may be best if we …”

“If we …?”

“Just remain friends.”

I see his Adam’s apple gently dance with his swallow. “Friends?”

“Friends.”

His breaths fall on me in gentle waves against my hair. After too long a time, he says, “You sure about that?”

“I think it’s best for us,” I force myself to say.

I feel him staring down at me. Even without looking, I know his hard crystalline eyes that burn like sapphires are burrowing into me from above. It takes everything in me not to tackle him to the floor right now.

“Is this your way of saying … that you don’t want to have sex with me?”

“We went too far the other—” I swallow, perhaps also swallowing the memory that rushes forth of how his face felt between my legs and what
else
of his I’d like between them. “Too far the … the other night,” I finish.

“Look at me.”

“We went too far.”

“Nell. Look at me.”

I hold my breath. Then, with eyes as cold and hardened as the iron butt of a hammer that’s so fucking ready to fall, I lift my chin and allow his bright blue gaze to invade mine.

His eyes are twice as powerful as I was afraid of. They charge into me, tearing through all my carefully built walls and penetrating all my defenses.

There’s no security in my little heart locket; those eyes of his reach right in there and pull all of me out with just a single glimpse.

“You sure you want to just be friends?” he asks gently.

I don’t flinch. I’m paralyzed. My mouth is rendered as dumb and useless as every worthless lock in this room.

“Hmm?” he urges me, his face inching closer. “Just friends?”

The words find me at last. “Just friends.”

“No sexy-sexy?”

“Nope.”

“No kissing, either?”

“Definitely none of that,” I answer defiantly.

He nods slowly, then says, “Alright. I can respect your wishes.” He sighs softly. “But it ain’t gonna be easy.”

I straighten my back, which has the unintended effect of bringing my face even closer to his. “So,” I say, shifting the subject, “you said there was another room?”

“That, I did,” he mutters back smartly.

“Want to show me?”

“It’d be a bad idea now. What with our ‘just being friends’ and all.”

I squint quizzically at him, cocking my head to the side. “Why’s that?”

“Well, if you saw the room, you might understand.”

He gives me a smart smirk that pushes out his dimples. I could kiss him so hard right now. I feel sick to my stomach. I have never wanted anyone as bad as I want Brant Rudawski.

So why do I keep denying myself the pleasure? He’s right here. He wants me too. What’s the harm in having a little fun with him? I mean, other than turning my heart into a soup of agony seasoned by the pepper of my own doubts and crushing talent for self-deprecation.

“Alright,” I say, giving in. “Show me the room.”

Brant smiles, shrugs as if in apology for my impending fate, then leads the way.

I follow him through the maze of unsecured and broken doors to the main gallery room, which has become twice as crowded as it was an hour ago when the exhibit first opened. I follow Brant with little awareness of the people around me, all of my attention suddenly arrested by both his arrival and by my curiosity as to where he’s taking me. I’ve been here for over an hour; I’m pretty sure I’ve seen every piece Madam Renée has to show.

We pass the room of bloodshot eyes, bodybuilder forearms, and hand veins, the doorway of which holds a sign that says “
This Is Where I Draw The Line: Down My Body.
”

He leads me behind the circle of easels which bear paintings of severed heads that seem to stare at one another—some happily, some suspiciously, some bored—and it’s behind that circle where we arrive at a line of four people who wait at a door that has a diamond-shaped sign with a man and a woman on it. As we approach, the door opens and two people leave, bewildered looks on their faces, and the next two enter.

“You sure you didn’t go in there already?” he asks.

I chuckle dryly. “Honestly, I thought this was a line for the bathroom and ignored it.”

“Glad you ignored it.” He grins stupidly. “Because now
I
get to expose you to it.”

“Should I be worried?” I cross my arms and lean tiredly against the wall, trying to feign disinterest while my heart betrays me, thumping in my chest like a toddler throwing a tantrum at what awaits us in that mysterious room.

“A little bit,” he admits with a wink.

The next couple leaves, then the couple ahead of us go in. We’re next in line.

“Doesn’t take very long,” I remark. “Did you know Renée Brigand doesn’t make art? She makes
experiences
,” I inform him mockingly.

“I believe it,” he says, and I’m not sure he caught my sarcasm or my obvious distaste for Renée’s work. “I mean, really. Whether someone’s work pisses you off or invokes some deep dark part of you … or just plain makes you happy, I’d say it’s successful. I wish I could do that to people instead of just … being disregarded all the time.” He smirks, staring off somewhere.

I study the side of his face. He’s blushing. “You have a camera,” I remind him, trying to be encouraging. “Keep taking pictures, Brant. Keep taking pictures until you’re sick of taking them.” He’s like another kid at the Westwood Light whose spirit I’m trying to rekindle. “Then take some more.”

He considers my words. “Well, I
would
, but my camera’s …” His face twists into a wince, then he seems to shake away a thought. “You’re right,” he decides, smiling proudly. “I should keep at it until I get something decent from my big ol’ complicated device.”

I bite my lip at that last comment of his.
That last comment was about you, Nell.
“Listen. I’m …” I don’t know why it’s so difficult for me to apologize. Maybe I spent the first half of my life apologizing so much that now I’m all out of them, and the thought of issuing just one more makes me feel weak again. “I’m sorry for … implying that you were dumb. Or didn’t know what to do with a camera. Or … whatever it is I may have insinuated about you or your lack of intelligence.”

Then the door opens and out stroll the couple who went in before, two girls who smirk at one another as they strut away.

Brant pulls open the door. “After you.”

He didn’t acknowledge my apology, but he’s acting downright cheery.
The apology isn’t meant to make
me
feel better; I said it for his sake. He can take it or leave it.
I nod, surrendering, then slip past him through the door. His scent follows me in as I go, gripping my senses and blinding me to what I’m seeing until he shuts the door behind us, cutting off the light from the main gallery.

“What is this?” I ask dumbly, staring at the image before me.

He’s at my side. “I know, right??”

The room is the size of a walk-in closet or deep elevator, like the one you might find at a hospital. The walls are flat and white, and the only light in the room comes from a video projected on the farthest wall in front of us, filling its entire width and height.

The video is of two attractive people who are slowly and sensuously making out. They face each other, so we observe their profiles as they caress one another’s face tenderly, pushing lip against lip and nose against cheek as they twist and quirk their heads toward one another.