Commissioned In White (Art of Love Series) (14 page)

Jillian and Chelsea were both sobbing, sniffling, and madly looking for tissues in the living room.

Shane just continued to hold a now sobbing Reesa as he laughed.

Chapter 8

During the following week, Ellen called every day with questions about ceremony preferences and to get decisions on colors, flowers, and the reception location. The daily hour Reesa spent on the phone with her mother-in-law was wearing her out, but it was good to have someone other than her doing all the hard work. So far, it really was looking like there would be nothing for Reesa to do but show up in her dress and walk down the aisle.

Two days into the planning, she was finally starting to think she could do it.

On Wednesday, she hadn’t taken two steps inside the art gallery before Carrie and Jessica descended on her with hugs and congratulations. Reesa turned pink at the attention, not feeling like a real bride yet, but also feeling immediate empathy from the two women who had married the other two Larson men. They were the only allies she had in understanding the risks of the situation.

“You look so much better than you did at Jessica and Will’s wedding,” Reesa said kindly, studying Carrie’s glowing face.

“A caring husband and great nausea medicine,” Carrie said easily, patting her as-yet flat baby belly.

“Let’s not talk about medicine,” Jessica said with a mock shudder.

Carrie laughed at Jessica, but took Reesa’s hands in hers. “So? We’ve been dying to find out how Shane talked you into it,” she whispered. “If it was kinky and sexual, at least give us the PG-rated version.”

Reesa giggled at Carrie’s intimate question, the sound startling her. She still wasn’t used to anyone but Jillian teasing her that way, but Carrie was a lot of fun.

“It was nothing like what you’re imagining,” Reesa said, thinking that at least nothing sexual had swung her final decision. He hadn’t tortured her again after the one night, but he had never stopped asking her to marry him again until she’d said yes.

“Well, Ellen is beside herself excited to get another chance to do a big production. I’m guessing you’re sicker than I am these days thinking about your wedding. You didn’t sound like you wanted one when you argued with Shane about it at the church,” Carrie said matter-of-factly about Reesa’s resistance, which even Michael agreed was sane and reasonable.

Reesa laughed and slipped her hands from Carrie’s. “Actually, my best friend convinced me I needed a real wedding as much as Shane did. Jillian’s been talking me into doing the right thing since we were in middle school.”

“Well I hope my wedding didn’t put you off wanting one,” Jessica said sincerely, hugging Reesa’s shoulders. “I should have skipped taking the sedative, but I didn’t want to embarrass Will by passing out during the vows. He said I didn’t do too bad. I haven’t watched the video yet.”

“Don’t,” both Reesa and Carrie said at the same time.

“That bad, huh?” Jessica asked, smirking at the warning in their expressions that spoke volumes about what she should expect. Brooke had simply refused to talk about it.

“You weren’t really
bad
,” Carrie said carefully. “You were just really girlie and giggly. You’re going to hate seeing yourself that way.”

Reesa giggled then herself, remembering Jessica ignoring the minister and laughing instead with Will over her vows. It was funny every time she thought about it, but Reesa definitely hoped she held it together better when her time came.

“Oh God,” Jessica said, mock shuddering again and putting a hand over her face. “I bet Will loved that embarrassment, especially if I was laughing and giggling.”

Reesa laughed for real then. “Will was the captain of cool,” she said firmly, quoting Shane.

“That’s Will, alright,” Jessica conceded. “When we were dating, he didn’t even lose his cool when Ellen and I were fighting over him like a couple of bitchy high-school girls. He just pushed us apart like a referee and was as calm as could be the whole time.”

“You had a fight with Ellen over Will?” Reesa asked, too shocked to censure the personal question.

Carrie grinned and swung her gaze to Jessica to see how she would answer. She’d stopped the fight between the two older women, but had never really gotten the story from Jessica’s viewpoint. Or from Ellen’s for that matter. Now the rare embarrassed flush on Jessica’s face made Carrie grin.

Michael had filled her in on Will’s stunned reaction, which had of course been typically male and egotistical, but also completely understandable in the circumstances. It had to have been very flattering at his age to have two great-looking women fighting over him, especially when one of them was the woman he loved so madly. Carrie had seen the depth of his love in the bust he’d carved of her.

So had Jessica, eventually, when she’d finally calmed down enough to notice. And that was the power of art, Carrie thought. It made emotions like love both tangible and visible.

Jessica laughed and shook her mane of curly hair, still ashamed at the memory of attacking Ellen. If she had gotten her hands on the beautiful blonde woman at the time, there was no doubt in her mind that she would have hurt her. Now that she knew Ellen better, Jessica could only be grateful that it hadn’t come to that.

“I caught Ellen hugging Will and sort of overreacted. She called me some bad names, got huffy as hell, but then afterwards made Will promise to convince me that I’d been wrong about the situation. I think I started liking her that day. She’s not nearly as proper or as cool as she appears to be,” Jessica said.

Reesa laughed. “Your friendship with my mother-in-law makes my brain hurt. You’re not supposed to like your husband’s ex.”

Jessica laughed. “Who says?”

Then she looked sheepishly at both younger women.

“Okay, it makes mine hurt too,” she agreed. “Now enough about me. How did Shane react to the wedding news? I bet he’s floating on air.”

“More like gloating over his beer, I suspect,” Carrie said sharply. “He and Michael are both bad about that. Will is the least arrogant among those three men. I’m hoping Michael mellows with age.”

“Gloating is pretty much right,” Reesa conceded, biting her lip. “I don’t know what Shane thinks is going to change though. A wedding is not going to make us more married.”

Carrie hooked her arm through Reesa’s. “Don’t make yourself crazy trying to figure out how he views things. Just try to enjoy the roller coaster ride that comes with marrying a Larson. Focus on the upsides.”

Reesa laughed. “Okay. Sounds like good advice. I guess I’ll pick up the receipts for this week and head to the conference room to get started. I know you want to get the bookkeeping caught up before the gallery opening on Friday.”

“Actually the conference room needs to be cleaned out before you can work. I’m currently using all the tables for one last project,” Carrie said, then got an idea. “And you are the perfect person to help me get that finished, since I can’t seem to get your husband to make time in his busy schedule to help me.”

“Shane? What does he need to do?” Reesa asked, feeling guilty over taking her husband’s attention so completely from his original family lately. She let Carrie walk her to the conference room with an easy arm across her shoulders.

“Your absent-minded research doctor slash artist husband was supposed to help me pick twenty pictures from all his drawings for my collage of his work,” Carrie said.

Reesa looked at the four modular conference tables slid together in the middle of the room. The outer surface was covered with drawings all around the edges.

Reesa walked to the nearest table and scanned the surface in shock. Then she walked slowly along the first side, stopping after ten drawings to stare at Carrie in bewilderment.

“Are they
all
of me?” Reesa asked, her voice a whisper. It was just so hard to take in that Shane had drawn so many portraits of her.

Carrie bit her lip. It had never occurred to her that Shane hadn’t shown Reesa the drawings.
Too late now
, she thought, chagrined as she watched true shock bloom in Reesa’s face.

“Yes. They’re all you. Some are—well, let’s just say they belong in a private collection. They’re quite beautiful, but now that I know you, I’m even more sure they don’t need to be on general display,” Carrie said.

The words had no sooner left her mouth than Reesa gasped in shock and picked up a drawing. It showed her open-mouthed and heavy lidded, carnal pleasure overtaking her. Color flooded through Reesa’s face at what she was seeing.

“Oh—how could he. . .” she stammered, speechless with shock.

Reesa clasped the picture to her chest, hiding it from herself as she continued her trek down the line looking at the others.

“How many. . .how many are there?” she asked softly, picking up another one, which while not as emotionally revealing, still was quite provocative. In this one, she was wide-eyed and laughing, her eyes full of disbelief. Which, as she realized, hadn’t lasted long in her relationship. Shane had definitely fulfilled every sensual promise and made good on every passionate threat.

“Fifty-six,” Carrie said, watching Reesa closely as the number bounced off the disbelief of the woman who was the inspiration for each and every one of them.

“Fifty-six? Shane made fifty-six drawings of me?” Reesa parroted, hearing her own surprise at the large number in her voice.

She continued walking, examining each drawing. No two were exactly alike.

“I had no idea these existed,” Reesa said finally, her confused gaze seeking Carrie’s as she tried to get a grip on the reality laid out before her.

Carrie seriously hoped Reesa wouldn’t destroy the art over her surprise at it. She was the object, but the drawings were still technically Shane’s. Carrie was responsible for them, but also she thought they were amazing. She couldn’t tell yet if Reesa thought they were amazing or not.

“How could Shane draw all these pictures of me without me knowing it? I saw him working on the novel, and drawing test pictures with Sara, but I never saw anything like most of these,” she said, trying to make some sense of it in her brain.

“Honey,” Carrie began softly, biting her lip again as she walked to Reesa. “Shane drew these during the two weeks he looked for you. He didn’t even know your name when he created these. The morning after you were together, he drew the one he carries in his pocket—and this one.”

Carrie walked to the first table and picked up the first one she’d marked with a tiny star in the corner. She handed it to Reesa.

“He drew them both in like fifteen minutes. I think this looks just like you. But he drew the superhero one first.”

“I saw that superhero one the morning after. . .the morning after we were married,” Reesa said, her voice drifting off as the overwhelming truth was finally sinking into her brain.

“He drew all these before he found me?” she asked breathlessly, her heart swelling at the thought.

Carrie nodded. She turned to Jessica, who was now leaning in the doorway.

“Ask Jessica. She was there when he drew the first two pictures. We were having pancakes and Shane. . .” She looked back at Reesa, wanting to make sure she was hearing it. “Shane told us he was in love with you. Then he drew the first picture and cried in relief when he saw your face on the page. He was really upset when he woke up and you were just gone.”

Reesa eyes filled and tears overflowed. She blinked furiously, wiping them away with her hands as she continued to walk around the table. Now and again, she picked up one or two that she wouldn’t want the whole world commenting on, but it was evident from the realism in each drawing that Shane remembered their first night together with every bit as much clarity as she did. Looking at the drawings was like reliving practically every moment of it.

When Reesa finished one pass of all of them, she came back and started over again, calmer and more objective this time as she studied each one. Her only problem was that she kept having to wipe the tears from her eyes to see them clearly.

Reesa’s attention got pulled away from the art only when Jessica strode past Carrie to press a wad of tissues into her hands.

“Thank you,” she said gratefully, using them to mop the wetness from her face. “You always hear about people falling in love quickly, but it’s overwhelming when it happens to you personally. I never told him, but I cried all the way home in the taxi when I left Shane that night. And it was all I could do not to go back to his house during those two weeks. I convinced myself it hadn’t been all I thought it was, that he was too young, that I was too. . .busy with everything else in my life to fall in love. And all that time. . .I can hardly take in that Shane was doing this and looking for me.”

Jessica patted her shoulder and walked away, leaving Reesa to walk around by herself.

Carrie stood and patiently waited for Reesa to gather up all the drawings she wanted, which by her count was only eight or nine. Reesa had chosen to reserve a lot fewer than she thought she might have in her place. When Reesa finally walked over to her, there was a newly acquired serenity in her gaze.

“I’ve pulled out the ones that should go in a. . .a private collection,” Reesa said, using Carrie’s words. “You can use any of the others as far as I’m concerned.”