Page 28 of Remember Me
His jeweled eyes travel down my body and then darken with fury. “Shit! The bastard hurt you.”
Suddenly, I’m aware of a twinge of pain and the sensation of warm liquid trickling down my palm.
As I glance down at my bloody hand, he yanks off his scarf.
“Hold up your hand.”
My heart hammering, I do as he asks and watch as he wraps the scarf around it, forming a makeshift bandage.
“I’m going to ruin your scarf.” Tingling all over, I can barely get the words out.
He smiles a sexy, dimpled smile that turns my bones to liquid. “Don’t worry. They’re a dime a dozen. You can buy me a new one on the street tomorrow.”
Tomorrow?
“There... all done.” He knots the scarf. “How does your hand feel?”
“Good. Thanks.” The truth is I can barely feel it, so numb from the tingles that shoot through my body, my senses dulled by my overpowering attraction to him.
He cups my shoulders again. As I grow weak in my knees from his touch, another heart-melting smile fixes on his lips.
“Do you know you’re beautiful?”
Me, beautiful? I stay speechless as he leans into me, his warm breath dusting my cheeks. He smells divine of leather and pine.
“What’s your name?” I stammer.
“Finn.”
“As in Phineas?”
“As in Huckleberry.”
He whispers in my ear.
“Let’s get out of here.”
***
One hour later, we’re in Brooklyn, at his painting-filled loft, butt-naked on his one piece of furniture—a micro-suede futon that’s sprawled out on the butcher-block floor next to his worn guitar. Our bodies are entwined, a mad tangle of arms, legs, and tongues. Exploring each other as if we’re two conquerors discovering new lands. Springsteen’s “She’s the One” plays on his sound system.
So in the moment, my very skilled, generous, rough around the edges lover brings me to places I’ve never known before. Making me forget about what happened at Christie’s. And my now expired V-Card.
We spend the rest of the night opening our hearts. Bearing our souls. We’re bathed in each other’s scents, twined in each other’s limbs, wrapped in each other’s dreams. I tell him about my nomadic, magical childhood, traveling across the globe while my parents filmed award-winning documentaries. And then about their untimely, tragic death. TheCliffsNotesversion of my education. Followed by my dreams and aspirations.
My past seems happily-ever-after as he shares his. I learn he’s a product of the system. The son of a crack whore mother who abandoned him at birth, leaving him alone to drift from one foster family to another. A talented artist from an early age, he turned to painting as a means to both escape his hardships and express himself. It was the only constant in his ever changing, challenging life. His passion when love was nowhere to be had.Two years older than me—twenty-five—he tells me he won a full scholarship to the prestigious Pratt Institute, from which he graduated.
“What were you doing at Christie’s?” I ask, my head resting on his chest, his arm wrapped around me.
“Networking with collectors and dealers, hoping to jumpstart my painting career. What about you?”
“After my depressing job interview at NBC, I went inside on a whim to warm up and get a drink.”
A chance encounter.
He affectionately flicks my nose. “They should have hired you.”
“One of your paintings should have been hanging at Christie’s.”