Page 59 of Not Safe for Work

My heart stops, stutters, takes a moment to catch up.

There’s a sketch of me. Here. Sitting on this balcony, looking out at the water, a pensive look on my face. He’s captured me so perfectly that the air in my chest twists and bends in on itself.

He takes a step closer, hovering in my space.

“I, uh,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck. “I hope you don’t mind.” I flip the page again and find another drawing of me, but it’s from back home. I’m at my desk, one shoe kicked off, a pen tucked into a makeshift bun. I recognize the dress I bought a couple of months ago.

“Why are you drawing pictures of me?” I ask, my voice hushed to a dumbfounded whisper.

Our eyes meet, and the silence between us grows thick and amorphous, ballooning into life-altering proportions.

His brown eyes glow like fall leaves drenched in sunlight, and his lips part ever so slightly. But then a curtain falls over his expression, and he snatches the book from my hands.

“No reason,” he says. “I draw what’s around me.” He stomps into the suite, but I’m not done here. I follow him inside, close on his heels like a misbehaving puppy. “What?” he snaps. “Stop looking at me like that.”

“Like what? You’re the one drawing pictures of me. Can I see it again? Are there more?”

“No. I told you, it’s nothing. People are hard. I was practicing. It’s nothing. I draw random people all the time.”

“Like who?” I cross my arms over my chest, my limbs weak and rubbery for an entirely different reason now. I can’t leave this alone.

He throws up his hands. “I don’t know. Margaret Thatcher.”

I almost choke on my tongue. “Margaret Thatcher?”

He lets out a long breath, pinching the bridge of his nose. “It was the first name that came into my head.”

“So you draw me, your girlfriend, and dead female politicians?”

“No, I… she’s not my girlfriend.” He makes a noise of frustration and begins walking away.

“How was Margaret Thatcher the first name that popped into your head? Do I remind you of an old white lady?”

I continue following him, and he whirls on me.

“No! Of course, you don’t. I was just—I don’t know, okay? Leave me alone.”

His glower is as dark as a midnight sky, and his evil glare is charged to full capacity. He stands before me, towering like a mountain, and the bright flash in his gaze makes my heart stumble.

He takes another small step, moving so close that I’m drowning in the radiant heat of his body. My pulse races, and I go fluttery and hot. My breath saws through my chest like a nest of burrs.

The tension thickens, growing solid, wrapping itself around my hips and chest and limbs. My mouth parts in anticipation because I get the strangest sense that he’s about to kiss me.

And I want it. I want it.

Then he blinks, and his lip curls and my heart sags against my ribs, leaking between the spaces.

“Just leave me alone,” he snarls. “Don’t touch my things again.”

Then he wrenches open the door to the hallway and slams it behind him.

Chapter Sixteen

Rafe doesn’t return for the next few hours. I feel terrible about what I’ve done. I’m a complete asshole, and I owe him an apology. I shouldn’t have stolen his book, and I shouldn’t have threatened to throw it over the balcony. I also shouldn’t have given him such a hard time about his drawings, but I sort of lost my tenuous grip on reality when I found myself in those pages.

The rain falls heavily as I lie in bed staring at the ceiling, my blanket clutched to my chest. The remnants of the storm continue, though it’s not nearly as ferocious. Still, it’s enough to make me anxious. Thankfully, I have a lot on my mind to keep me distracted.

Why are there drawings of me in Rafe’s sketchbook? The one from Hawaii makes a modicum of sense, I suppose. We’re sharing a room and can’t seem to get away from each other. I’m an easily accessible subject. But the one at my desk. What is that about? Why did he draw that, and how did he get all the details so right?