Double Jeopardy (8 page)

“Cheers.” Ben lifted his glass to her. “How was Gemma this evening?"

Like a crazy person, Sera wanted to say. Her sister had thrown things, cried, torn up notes before anyone could read them. “She’s pretty scared about the operation,” she finally said, realizing now that was the real reason for Gemma’s tantrums. “She’s afraid you won’t be able to make her look the way she did. Afraid of being scarred and disfigured, of having people stare at her and feel sorry for her. She hates not being able to talk, having to write everything down.” Being able to verbalize the things she instinctively knew were bothering her sister helped. It dispelled some of the irritation and utter frustration that Gemma’s behavior caused. The wine helped, as well. It was cool and tart, smooth and refreshing.

“Gemma always cared more than I did about how she looked,” Sera reflected. “She’s used to getting a lot of male attention.”

Ben nodded. He listened well, and that was comforting. “As I told you, there aren’t any guarantees, but I think Gemma will be pleased when I’m done. In the meantime, of course, it’s really tough for her, and being in the hospital doesn’t make it any easier. She’ll feel better when she goes home.”

“When will that be?” Gemma had an apartment of her own, but she’d agreed to stay with their parents until she’d fully recovered. Sera felt a stab of sympathy for her mom and dad; her sister wouldn’t be an easy patient.

“Within a couple days of the operation, providing all goes as planned.” He smiled at her again, a relaxed, warm smile that put her at ease. “So what’s it like being an identical twin, Sera?”

She took a few moments to reply; it was a question that had no easy answer. Usually, the person asking wasn’t interested in an in-depth response, but she sensed that Ben really wanted to know.

“I guess it’s like everything else in life, part good and part not so good,” she finally said. “You’re never really alone, since even when you’re not physically together, there’s this deep sense of connection. But you miss being an individual, too. Not now so much, because I moved away, detached myself, but when we were kids everyone thought of us as one unit, sort of Gemma and Sera. And that was hard, because we are separate people, with a lot of differences.”

He nodded. “I understand.” He paused a few seconds and then added, “When I first met you, I’m afraid I was guilty of exactly that, thinking of you only in conjunction with Gemma, since having a living model to work from was convenient for me. But I don’t think that way anymore, Sera.” He was quiet for a long moment, looking at her, and something in his scrutiny this time made her fully and uncomfortably aware that he was an attractive man and they were alone together.

Flustered, she searched for a neutral topic. “You said you’ve lived here a year. Where were you before that?”

‘‘Oh, in Vancouver. This city’s my home. I doubt I’ll ever leave. A friend and I had bought a beachfront house as an investment as well as a place to live, but then he got married. So I sold him my share of it and moved into a furnished suite for a while. This area was just starting to develop. I happened to know one of the owners of this building, and I got first choice in apartments. Wanna see upstairs?”

“Yes, please.”

He and Grendel led the way up the spiral stair- case to the loft. There was a king size bed, neatly covered in a brown and green striped duvet. Beside it was a packing case that served as a bedside table. Grendel made his way over to a plump brown doggy mattress next to the bed and flopped onto it. Here, as downstairs, no rugs covered the plank flooring, and there were no closets, either.

Ben had suspended two long rods from the ceiling and hung his clothing on it. He used a stack of pullout baskets in a steel frame as drawers. The only real furniture was an elaborate sound system on an oak stand, a matching CD holder, filled with disks, and a makeshift brick and board bookshelf.

“You like music.”

“Can’t live without it.”

“Me, either.”

She examined the books he’d left strewn on the bedside table. “You like mysteries?”

“English ones, yeah. What do you read for fun?”

“Stephen King.”

“Hey, me, too,” he admitted. “And poetry. I read a lot of poetry. It’s relaxing.”

“We took it in school, but I haven’t ever thought of reading poetry to relax.” He’d surprised her again.

“You play a lot of sports, Ben?” She remembered file pile of equipment downstairs.

“My work’s pretty sedentary. I need to get out and do physical stuff in my off time.”

“What sports do you most enjoy?” She was very aware of being alone with him in his bedroom.

“Oh, biking, swimming, skiing. Soccer. I’d like to coach a kid’s soccer team if I could ever find the time. And fishing. I love to fly fish. Again, I don’t get much time to do it.”

Sera moved to the area of the loft that had been partitioned off to form a large and lovely bathroom. It had an enclosed shower and an immense oval tub, elevated and facing the window that formed one wall of the room. He’d stapled a blue striped sheet to a pole to serve as a window covering.

“Practical,” she remarked, not trying to hide her amusement.

“Well, I didn’t want the entire waterfront watching me have a bath.”

“Of course not.” She fantasized for a guilty delicious moment about him in a bathtub.

Get a grip, Sera
. She glanced at him. He was eyeing her, and again she felt a prickly sort of awareness between them.

“Shall we go back downstairs? I think I’ve seen enough up here to have a feeling for what needs to be done.”

He stood aside so she could lead the way. Grendel also politely waited for her to go ahead. “This staircase is really effective. I can see it being used on a set. Staircases are great props. Actors love them because they can make grand entrances and exits.”

She was babbling. She stopped herself and took a deep breath as she reached the bottom of the stairs. “How the heck did you end up without any furniture if you shared a house?”

“The house was furnished by a decorator. Several decorators. I never liked the stuff very much. Lots of flowered couches and tiny tables and beds with tops on them. It suited the house, so I gave my share of it to Greg and Lily as part of their wedding gift. They’re the parents of Stanley, the kid in the drawing you admired at the office.” He got up and went over to the worktable. “I’m doing him in clay now. Then I’m going to cast the piece in bronze and give it to them for Christmas. Come and see what you think.”

Sera went over to the table as he carefully removed the coverings on the clay sculpture, revealing the image of a boy so real and vibrant it made her smile and exclaim softly in admiration. “It’s alive, Ben. Oh, it’s marvelous. You’re very talented.” She reached out a tentative hand and stroked the boy’s hair, which stood up in wild clumps.

“Did you ever think of becoming a sculptor instead of a doctor?’ ’

“For one insane moment when I was sixteen, yeah. But my mother very wisely arranged for me to meet a well known artist, a carver, and he told me how long it took him to begin to eke out a bare living. He didn’t try to discourage me, just told me the facts, and I decided it would make a great hobby. I knew even then that I didn’t have the dedication to spend years doing something that might or might not earn me a decent living.” He shot her a deprecating grin. “There’s this greedy side of me. I like good transportation and nice restaurants. So I sold out.”

He was looking at her again with that focus that was becoming familiar. Maybe it was just the way he looked at everyone. Maybe it was because he was an artist. Maybe it had nothing to do with attraction. She hoped she was wrong.

“I’m impressed all to hell that you’ve made a career out of your ability as an artist, Sera. I know it’s not an easy thing to do.”

“If it hadn’t been for my father, I’d probably have given up and gotten a job as a receptionist or something after I left university. But Papa always made certain I had money and a credit card and a decent place to live, so I was able to volunteer for theater projects, and that gave me valuable experience that came in handy when I applied for paying jobs. I was lucky, too. In L.A. a set designer for one of the major television studios took me on as an apprentice. Her name’s Maisie Jones. I’m now her assistant designer. It’s a big thrill to get paid good money for what I was happy to do free.”

She’d also gained a friend in Maisie, which seemed an incredible bonus.

She was talking an awful lot.

“You’re talented. They’re lucky to get you.” He had such honest admiration in his voice that she flushed and shrugged. “I tell myself that to keep my confidence up. The truth is, I have some ability, but there are lots of people around with far more talent who never succeed. A lot of it’s being in the right place at the right time.”

And meeting someone like Maisie Jones
.

“Luck.” He sounded thoughtful now. “I guess plain old luck has a lot to do with success, all right.” He smiled at her again, and the seriousness was gone. “I figure meeting you was lucky, Sera. I might otherwise have gone on living without furniture for the rest of my life. That is, if you think you can steer me toward what this place needs.”

“I’m sure I can make suggestions. You just have to decide whether it’s what you want.” Something puzzled her. “How come you didn’t just hire a decorator, the way you and your friend did with the house?”

He shook his head. “Oh, we didn’t hire Belinda. She was an, um, sort of a close personal friend.”

A lover. Sera speculated about how many women there were in Ben’s past. A long line of them, she’d guess.

“Anyhow, she offered to do the house for us. Greg was the same as me, not a clue when it came to decorating. But she nearly drove us both to suicide. Fabric samples, carpet samples, paint colors, this kind of look, that kind of look.” He actually shuddered. “By the time she was half done, she and I weren’t speaking and Greg wouldn’t come home if she was there. She finally quit on us, with everything in such a mess we had to do something. So we hired this other decorator. Really tall, middle aged, very solid, a big lady, maybe 350 pounds.” He shook his head, and the horrified expression on his face made Sera laugh outright.

“She was far worse. She changed the color of the living room three times, she had a carpenter knock out walls, she turned us out of our bedrooms for weeks. We fired her eventually. Drew straws to see which of us had to do it—we were both scared as hell of her—and I lost. Anyhow, we were in an even worse mess than the first time. The next per- son we got was better, but the process was still like having surgery without anesthetic, in my opinion. I wouldn’t ever get myself into that situation again.”

Sera was still giggling. “What makes you think I won’t be the same?”

“You won’t be, will you—because you’re not an interior decorator?” There was a hopeful, insanely plaintive note in his voice.

Sera loved it. Ben was a genuinely nice guy. And sexy as hell with those jeans and big bare feet.
Don’t go thinking this is something it isn’t
, she cautioned herself sternly. This guy is a mover when it comes to women, way out of your league, more Gemma’s type.

And a broken heart wasn’t exactly high on her list of priorities. Not that she’d had one since high school; she’d never ventured that far again.

But he wasn’t breaking her heart at the moment; he was making her laugh, instead. He was doing everything he could to amuse her, to take her mind off Gemma, and she appreciated it. There hadn’t been a whole lot to laugh about since the accident.

Ben loved the way her smile lit up her whole face. There’d been that amazing electricity upstairs when they’d mutually recognized each other’s sensuality. He’d savored the moment, but he sensed that afterward she was a little on edge, and he wanted her to unwind, to enjoy the evening as much as he was. He’d been so right about her; she was enchanting.

“Okay, Ms. Cardano, tell me what you think needs doing here. Don’t hold back. I’m a big strong guy. I can handle it. But first—” he reached for her wineglass and refilled it along with his own “—a little anesthetic to dull the pain.” He took a hearty slug, grimacing as if it were medicine. “Better, much better. Now I’m ready.”

She was grinning at him, her brown eyes twinkling.

“First of all, paint. The size of this place, gallons and gallons of paint.”

“Oh, curses, I knew you’d say that.” He clutched his heart and feigned cardiac arrest, “Paint, my worst nightmare.”

She pretended to ignore his antics. "A deep, sultry taupe is what it needs, I think. There’s all this light pouring in. We need to soften it a little. And the ceiling gets done, as well, two shades darker than the walls. Unless you have an aversion to taupe?”