Dark Masterpiece (Serendipity Series 3) (6 page)

“Goodnight to you,” he said.

She turned down the hall, her fingers still
toying with her belt loops nervously.

“Miss Austin,” he called.

She turned back to look at him.

He hesitated. “You were right.”

She frowned. “About what?”

“My painting.” He looked down for a moment
before meeting her eyes again. “No one’s ever understood it. No
one’s ever seen it.”

“Seen what?” She didn’t quite understand
what he was talking about.

His pale eyes fixed on hers. “The screaming
man. The one in pain. No one’s ever seen it until…you. Until
tonight.”

Her eyes widened. “You mean…?”

“Hundreds of people claiming to be art
connoisseurs, art teachers, other artists. None of them saw. You
did.”

She stared at him in shock and awe. She
opened her mouth to speak, but she couldn’t. She had been right
about that painting? When everyone else much more experienced than
her had said something different? She shook her head. “Mr.
Whitelaw, I—”

“Goodnight, Miss Austin.” He turned and
strode up the hall, disappearing into the room at the far end and
closing the door. She stood there in stunned silence for a long
while before turning mechanically and walking back to her bedroom,
trying desperately to process what had just occurred.

Chapter Five

Evie was going to die. She was sure of it.
How did people clean houses for a living? She had already been
cleaning for seven hours. That was an entire day of work. Her back
was screaming at her. Luckily, she only had Traevyn’s wing left to
do. His office, bedroom and bathroom. She had been given strict
instructions not to touch the studio, which she could
understand.

When she’d lived at home her parents had
always been irritated at her cluttered mess of art supplies and had
always cleaned and organized it while she was at school. She’d
hated it. It would take her a week just to figure out where
everything was. For the most part, creative people were organized
in a very disorganized way, and she knew that Traevyn probably had
a system that she didn’t want to mess with.

With a heavy sigh, Evie faced the hallway
and lugged her tote of cleaning supplies with her. She was greatly
surprised as to how many rooms the house actually had. She had been
unaware of the fact that there was an entire basement until that
morning. There was a den in it, as well as a wine cellar and
another bathroom. The basement was darker than the rest of the
house, which was hard for her to believe, and it creeped her out.
Though outward appearances suggested it was a room like any other,
it really did remind Evie of a dungeon.

The rest of the house had been pretty self
explanatory. Kitchen, dining room, living room, three guest
bedrooms, two guest bathrooms and his bedroom and bathroom. She had
never seen a bigger house in her entire life.

She pushed open the office door, plunked her
tote down, and set to dusting, taking a moment to study his wide
array of books again. She wondered if he’d let her read any of
them, or if he would tell her to keep away from his things. Many of
them she had read already, but there were many more she would like
to.

Her eyes drifted as her hand mechanically
dusted things. His Masters in Visual Arts hung framed on the wall,
and there was a picture directly under it. It showed a younger
Traevyn in cap and gown, apparently at his college graduation. Next
to him stood a young boy who looked somewhere around fourteen or
fifteen. He had shorter black hair that waved nicely to frame his
face, and he had several piercings in both of his ears. On the
other side was another young man whose hair looked like liquid
gold. It was quite a contrast to Traevyn’s dark beauty, but his
features resembled Traevyn’s greatly. The thing that stood out the
most to Evie was the fact that Traevyn was smiling. Grinning, in
fact. It looked foreign to her since she had only ever seen his
black scowl. His smile was beautiful. It lit up and softened the
harsh lines of his face.

Evie let her eyes scan over a picture
directly under the one she had been studying. This one was of the
same three people, but it was apparently more recent as the young
boy was much older and had tattoos running up the length of one of
his arms. It appeared as if they were at a party of some kind, but
Traevyn didn’t seem happy like he did in the graduation picture. He
was smiling, but it looked forced and pained, like it had taken all
of his effort just to muster it.

She moved on, dusting his desk. There were
several pictures turned face down and curiosity nagged at her. She
cast a fleeting glance toward the door to make sure no one was
around, then picked up the pictures and started to flip through
them. They were all of a staggeringly beautiful blonde woman and an
adorable little girl who looked somewhere around five. Her hair was
golden and her eyes were light like Traevyn’s. She gave a
thoughtful frown. This must be Traevyn’s daughter and wife. She
suddenly felt like she was intruding and carefully placed the
pictures back where she had found them.

The book he had been
reading the night before was sitting on the brown leather chair and
she glanced at the title.
Les
Miserables
.
Geez,
that was an undertaking. She finished dusting and went to clean the
glass on the French doors. After making sure they were streak free,
she vacuumed the rugs and swept and mopped the hardwood
floors.

The master bathroom and bedroom were her
next project. She knocked on the door, just to make sure, then went
in. Her eyes nearly bulged out of her head. The bed was a
king-sized, four poster made of dark, molasses-colored wood. The
posts stabbed up like carved spires and the bedspread was black
with a black brocade pattern on it that shimmered in the right
light. The pillows were large and dark blue in color. There was
another pair of French doors and dark blue crushed velvet was
wrapped around a silver curtain rod and hanging down on either side
of the doors. A nightstand sat on either side of the bed draped in
black lace, and a beautiful Celtic dragon tapestry hung on one
wall. There was an entertainment center, but with no television in
it. Instead, a huge vase full of dried roses sat where the TV
should be and more books adorned most of the shelves. The top of
the entertainment center was draped in the same crushed velvet as
the French doors, and dried rose petals were spread around three
large pictures of the little girl she had seen in the office. A
sharp pain stabbed at Evie’s heart, and she had to look away.

She continued her surveillance of the room,
noticing that there were candles everywhere of various shapes and
sizes, as well as a large fireplace at the far end of the room. She
went into the bathroom and was not greatly surprised to see that
everything was black marble. The bathtub was the most enormous
thing she had ever seen, and she didn’t look forward to cleaning
it. With a sigh, she set to cleaning it anyway and moved on into
the bedroom once the bathroom was finished.

When she reached the French doors, she
stopped for a moment to peer out at the ocean and fog-encompassed
trees. She smiled a little. There was no denying that he had picked
a beautiful place to build his home. She looked away for a moment
to glance at the clock so she could tell him how many hours she had
worked. When she returned to the door, he was standing right in
front of her on the other side. She screamed and stumbled
backwards, falling directly on her butt.

Traevyn casually stepped into the room,
trying not to show his amusement. It bothered him that he even felt
amusement, but it was impossible not to be amused at his petite,
outspoken apprentice flailing her arms and falling promptly on her
backside.

“What is the matter with you?” Evie
cried.

He raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t do anything.
I was merely enjoying the sanctuary of the sea from my terrace. I
didn’t even know you were in here. It’s not like I planned to
frighten you.” He extended a hand to help her up.

Evie looked surprised at his display of
courtesy, but she took his hand and let him pull her into a
standing position. “You were out there the whole time?”

He nodded and his lips turned up slightly at
the corners as he took in her haggard appearance. She was sweaty
and her brown hair was straying from its ponytail. She reeked of
lemon cleaner and it was apparent that some sort of bleach
substance had streaked across her otherwise dark blue t-shirt.
Something about it warmed his dead heart in a strange way. He was
used to rich, spoiled women. No one he’d ever met would have been
willing to get their perfectly manicured hands dirty. It was nice
to see a woman not afraid or too proud to work hard. He had come
from an average family, a middle-working class family. He and his
brothers had all worked very hard to get where they were in life.
He admired hard work in all its forms. “How much do I owe you?” he
asked.

“Two-hundred dollars,” she stated.

He nodded. “Very well. I will give you a
check tonight at dinner.” He started to leave the room.

“Mr. Whitelaw?” Evie called.

He glanced at her over his shoulder.

She swallowed. “The books in your office…
Are they off limits, or would you mind horribly if I read one?”

He turned back to face her, intrigued. “My
boring classics fascinate you?”

“Oh yes.” She grinned. “I love the
classics.”

He studied her for a moment. “Do you?”

She nodded. “They are the foundation on
which all modern literature was built. A lot of people think
they’re boring, but I find them very interesting.”

He regarded her for a moment longer, then
nodded. “You are welcome to read anything on my bookshelf, Miss
Austin. Also, as it seems you enjoy the view, you may use the
terrace in the office at your leisure. It is a good place to read
and draw.”

She grinned. “Thank you.”

He gave a ceremonial nod and continued out of
the room.

Evie gathered her supplies and slipped back
out into the hallway. The first place she headed was the shower,
which was immediately followed by a trip to her bed, where she
slept.

* * * *

Seth watched Evie cook with boredom and
sighed. “It is really dull around here,” he muttered. “There’s
absolutely nothing to do.”

Evie rolled her eyes. “You brought enough
video games to entertain a small planet.”

He wrinkled his nose. “Yeah, but still.” He
yawned.

“You could have helped me clean today,” she
suggested. “That would have been nice.”

He shrugged. “You did fine without me.”

She scowled and bit her tongue to keep from
saying something very rude. Her back hurt so bad she could hardly
stand and her arms felt like noodles from scrubbing. It was all she
could do to set the food on the table. She glanced at her watch and
groaned aloud when she saw that Traevyn was five minutes late.
Great. Now she’d actually have to exert effort to hit the stupid
gong.

“This looks good,” Seth commented absently as
Evie set the food on the table. “I love chicken fried steak.”

Evie trudged into the living room and lifted
the mallet. She was just getting ready to wallop it when Traevyn
came all but running down the stairs. “I’m here!” he shouted. “I’m
here, all right?”

Evie smirked and set the mallet down. Traevyn
handed her a check and continued into the kitchen. She followed and
sat down to eat. She was not all that surprised when Traevyn loaded
up his plate and headed out again, leaving Seth and her alone.

It took all her energy to clean up the
kitchen. Especially when she had just cleaned it. The thought of
doing it twice in one day utterly disgusted her. When she had
finally finished, Seth went to his room to watch television and she
found herself heading to the office with her sketchpad. She turned
the light on and went out onto the terrace, shivering as the foggy
ocean air drifted over her. She pulled on a sweater she had brought
with her and sat in a chair with a sigh. She couldn’t see the ocean
because it was dark, and fog covered everything like a surreal
blanket, but she could hear it pounding against the cliffs and she
could taste the salt in the air.

Evie leaned back in the chair and closed her
eyes. She rubbed at a huge knot in one of her shoulders and relaxed
to the sound of the waves.

“Peaceful, isn’t it?”

She jumped and turned to see Traevyn leaning
nonchalantly in the doorway. He was holding a glass of red wine and
looked so old world aristocrat to her that she almost smiled. She
nodded. “It is.”

He sighed and walked out to the railing. “My
house looks spectacular. Thank you.”

Evie stared at Traevyn’s back. She couldn’t
help but marvel at how statuesque he was, so tall and proud. “I
think I died somewhere around the second guest bathroom,” she
grumbled. “My spirit cleaned the rest of the house out of sheer
pride.”

He gave the faintest of chuckles, but kept
his back to her. He seemed to lapse into thought and continued to
sip his wine in silence.

Evie opened her sketchpad and started to
draw him. He made a spectacular sight standing there, his long hair
shining down his back, the fog drifting around him. She gave a
little sigh. Even though he was rude and surly, his beauty was
undeniable. And he was always dressed so elegant. She’d never seen
him in jeans or a t-shirt. He was always in slacks and silk,
button-down shirts that hugged his lean frame. He always looked to
Evie like he had stepped directly out of a different time and
somehow got stuck in the twenty-first century.

“Do you like wine, Miss Austin?” he
asked.

She looked up at him. “I do.”

He turned to face her, the movement more
like an elegant ripple of his body than a turn. “Red or white?”