The Mad British (33 page)

“When I met you, I thought you were a cocky bastard, another yuppie who didn’t have an ounce of real in him. You proved me wrong that night. You wanted nothing other than to get to know me. The
real
me. It was like you valued what you saw and not because you wanted to hang it off your arm like cheap eye candy.”

He is quiet, his eyes a brilliant blue. The only light I can see through all the darkness.

“If I’m honest, the real reason I left that morning wasn’t some kind of payback, not really. I was scared of getting hurt again because I saw something in you.” My lips release a quiet sigh. “I only knew you for a little while, but it’s the little things that catch you.”

No matter what, a fake is a fake, and no matter how much you try to paint over it, the real thing always wins.

“Ever since I was a little girl, I’ve seen individuals as paintings. Some are dark, some are light, some have too many colours, some not enough, some are copies of copies, and some are so detailed and complex in their construction, it would take a lifetime to appreciate it—that was you, James. You turned out to be an original painting. You were my real. There’s nothing fake with you. You never pretended to be something you weren’t to get me to love you. You openly admit you’re a vain corporate know-it-all who knows nothing about art—God, I love that about you.”

I squeeze my eyes shut for a second and feel a tear escape down my cheek. I take a deep breath to calm my trembling body and look at him again.

“Remember when you told me I was being judgmental the night we met?” A trace of a smile on his lips pops out one dimple in recognition. “You were right. I judged you, a man in a suit with too much money to burn. But how was I any different to those who judge my paintings at first glance and then move on without looking deeper?”

His head is slightly tilted to the side, and he says nothing for a beat, watching me with something that looks almost like admiration. “You’re something else.”

I smile ruefully in return. “You were so determined, James, you wouldn’t let me move on, you kept making me look at you. And once I started I couldn’t stop. Didn’t want to stop. I kept looking at this rare walking real-life painting and it started to blend into my own canvas, like two colours that should never have been mixed but the result was out of this world.

“I wanted to frame you and hang you up in the sky, high above, and shout to the world about this man in a plain black suit with a colourful heart and layered soul. And have heads turn to you and worship you like a Picasso painting, because to me, you are one.
You’re
the one who’s extraordinary.”

“And then I lied to you.”

I try to swallow the golf ball in my throat. “It felt like all the colours we created together bled out.” I let out a shaky breath. I don’t want to ask him why, afraid of the answer. But it’s time to stop hiding. “Why did you—"

"Christ, Adelaide, don’t ask me that. I don't have a better explanation other than I'm a bastard who doesn’t deserve you.” My chin drops slightly but he places a hand under it, directing me to look at him. “But a bastard who won’t give up on you either.” His whole face lights up; it’s infectious, and my smile gets bigger and bigger, along with his. “Because I won’t.”

He brushes my hair round my ear. “You never mentioned Ethan, never told me what he did. Deep down I was terrified there was something still there with a man who was a part of the world you live in; a world so far away from mine.”

I can’t stop the harsh laugh that escapes. “Really? You really think I would choose
him
over someone like you?”

He lets his eyes fall shut for a second before opening them again; they’re as dark and dynamic as storm clouds. “I don’t know what to think but none of it matters because I’ll fight for you, Adelaide. And I won’t lose because I know you better than any man ever will.” He stops and takes a breath.

“If you don't get that, Adelaide, if you don't get that none of it matters more than you do, then I'm a bloody idiot for not telling you every damn day how important you are to me. I should never have let you think for a second that you are anything less than amazing. You make me. . . "

He falters and clasps his hand round mine, holding it up to show the rock still nestled inside my palm.

"You make me wonder, Adelaide. I could have gone my whole life seeing nothing but rocks, but now, sometimes, I see something and I wonder. You take things that are lifeless and colourless and you make them come alive. You did that to me."

He was putting all his cards on the table. I realise then, the only way to put us back together again is if every broken piece is laid out on the table.

“I was scared one day you wouldn’t need me any more and then I would be left with nothing again.” With his thumb, he wipes away a wayward tear from underneath my eye, and reaches out to hold my hand. His is as warm as I remember.

“I get it now,” he says, squeezing my hand. “I didn't listen. All the signs were there but I didn't listen and I did what I wanted without thinking how it would make you feel, thinking I knew better than you did. Christ, I wagered you thinking it was a harmless bet, my ego saving the helpless girl.” He smiles at me. “Turns out, you’re the one who saved me. You painted the mad and the crazy beautiful in my dull existence.”

My other hand finds his free one, clinging to him, never wanting to let go. “I’m scared, James.”

“Don’t be scared. . . I’m right here.”

“If this is going to work, then you have to let me look after myself. I don’t want to depend solely on you.” I can feel the rock between our embrace digging into my palm.

“What do you want?

"I want to be your equal."

“You are."

"I haven’t felt that way."

"So we'll change it."

"How?" I swallow, my head lowering to the ground, but I don’t let go of him. "I mean, I can't give you anything—"

"Please stop doing that," he cuts me off, drawing me in closer to his body, his warmth enveloping me like a blanket. "There isn’t a creative bone in my body. My mind works with analysis and numbers, not interpreting feelings into visualizations.” He nods up at my painting. “Christ, Adelaide, I could never do anything like that. But what I can do is take care of the other things so that you can keep making these works, because it's what you love and it's what makes you happy. And I want to see you like that."

"But why would you do that?"

"Because I bloody love you, all right? That's the only reason why I do anything. Because I love you and I want you to be one of the very lucky few who get to live their dream because you gave me mine.”

My heart is beating wildly in my chest. “I did?”

“You did.” I see something flicker across his eyes.

It’s hope.

“You, Adelaide, can make a blob of blue paint come alive and become the ocean. When I'm at work I stare at Untitled 23, and I feel myself, right there in the office, suddenly diving naked into the deep blue ocean, exploring the unknown. I never knew I had that dream. Until you painted it. There used to be only one picture I looked at. You know what I pictured?” I shake my head slowly, my mind trying to process all his hidden secrets.

“Working a lot, probably taking over the whole shit-bag one day, drinking a lot, dating girls but never falling in love, buying something completely outrageous just because, like chunks of real estate, eventually dying without retiring and never stopping to catch sight of. . .” He lifts his hand out and holds up the pebble. “This.” His eyes glint with light when he looks back at me.

“I asked my junior account exec if he ever had a hobby, like writing novels, or building tree houses. At first he looked at me like I should be in a mad house, but then he told me he used to play the violin when he was thirteen and that he always wanted to be a famous violinist. I asked him why he’d stopped playing—he said his parents told him playing the violin couldn’t pay the bills.

“He is going to die with his dream forgotten—but you won’t. You pour your heart out for your art. You’ll do anything so you can keep true to yourself. And I respect you so much, Adelaide, I didn’t mean what I’d said. I’ll cut my own leg off if it will get you to believe me, because I have more respect for you than I have for myself for doing whatever it takes. You’ve got guts to do what you do, so screw them. Screw those who try to stop you, who tell you you’re not good enough because you keep showing everyone”—he points up to Victory—“every goddamn day, just how bloody brilliant and talented you are and that you’re a cut above the rest because you just do it. Victory is my way of saying to those dream killers: This is my girl’s victory, so screw you.”

I didn’t think it was possible for a heart to smile. But I can feel my own curving up at the top. . . Suddenly I'm inspired to paint that very image. All because of my James.

My
James.

“You told me I was a bitch once. I think in this circumstance you’re half right.”

“I am?”

“Half. I said half.”

We were easily slipping back into old times.

“When I left, I was angry that you’d lied to me, that you betrayed my trust. But I wasn’t being fair to you. This is all my fault, I know that now. I’m the one who didn’t trust you enough to tell you about Ethan. From day one I've been punishing you with my past, secretly waiting for you to slip up in the slightest so I could have an excuse to run away, and that’s exactly what I did because what Ethan did. . . it. . . it nearly killed who I am. But you were my breath of life. You made me feel like I could do anything if I just believed in myself, and that scared the hell out of me, James. It was too good to be true. I was scared of dying all over again so I kept you at a distance. I didn’t let you in. But I was wrong. I should have trusted you enough to open my heart completely. And for that, I’m sorry.”

He leans in closer. “I’m not an artist and you're not some corporate shark. But we work. You know why?” I shake my head, my eyes pleading with him to clear the fog in my head. “Because we're the same, Adelaide.” He cups my face and I feel tears of happiness tumble down my cheeks. “Where it matters. . . We. Are. The same.”

My heart swells. Four words linked to the ghost of my past. Four words that had chained me down and made me lose myself for a little while. Four words. Four tiny words. That's all it takes for James to help me find my way home again
.

“When you left, Adelaide, it stopped my heart.” He presses his forehead against mine. “Not loving you is a struggle.” He crushes his lips against mine and kisses me, and the whole world disappears. The doubts, the worries, the troubles, the pain. . . it all disappears.

I can’t think. I can’t feel. A roaring silence fills my ears and blocks out the sounds of everything but my own heart hammering in my chest.

He breaks the kiss and in a voice that is low and heavy, he begs, “So come back to me.”

And just like that, the white empty space in my world fills with colour.

I take his hand into mine and squeeze as if my life depended on never letting go.

"Take me back, James. Take me back to
our
home."

I PICK MY head up from the floor and look around, trying to catch my breath.

"You took down my paintings."

James plants his hands on either side of my head and lifts himself up from the floor. "I was packing everything away. I want to sell this place so we can find a place together. We’re a team now, love. It should be both of us agreeing on a home, not just me."

I rock into a sitting position, trying not to wince at the crackling nerves in between my legs. "I want to stay here."

“You do?”

I nod. “This is where we had so many of our firsts, James. I don’t want to leave them behind. I want to create more.”

I pull him over by his tie and into a kiss. He kisses back, a little too hard, his hand bunched in my hair as our lips tangle together. Despite the fact that we had spent the last twenty minutes writhing, partially clothed, on the floor in the dining room, flushed and panting as we shagged each other into a frenzy, the kiss heats and spreads until he’s sucking on my neck, and I’m fumbling with the damn knot of his tie to get it off. We go for another round, and after we’re done, I’m surprised I can walk in a straight line.

Later that evening, I fumble for the remote that turns the light up and click it. It’s getting dark and my stomach is rumbling. A movement in the corner of the hall catches my eye and I venture over.

James squints behind his glasses as he straightens the third painting. I tap my pencil against my lips. I had agreed to let him hang any painting anywhere he wanted, and now it seems I may be regretting that decision.

"That last one is part of a different series."

"I know," he says. He takes his glasses off and rubs them against his boxer shorts to get them clean. "I like how the blues match up."

I use my pencil to point at the painting in the middle. "James, that one's purple."

"It’s blue, love."

"No, it's really purple. Believe me, I painted it." I poke him in the side, and I’m immediately swept up in his arms, my back pressed up against him. He plants a kiss on the crown of my head.

"It’s blue," he insists.

I turn my head and let my cheek rest against the warm skin of his bare chest. "You're colour-blind."

"I’m not."

I grin and snake my hand round to grab a handful of that juicy arse of his. "How about you let me be the judge of that?" His eyes are shining as he twists and bends my body until I’m thrown over his shoulder. "
OW.
My hip." He shifts me round but keeps walking. "Where’re you taking me?" I giggle, my hair obscuring the view.

"I'm going to prove that it's not purple and that I’m always right." We pass through a doorway and the light flicks on.

I know the room solely by the smell. I inhale. My parents' house has a familiar, heavier scent to it, like dryer sheets and baking food, but the smell of turpentine and linseed oil is the most comforting of all. My world flips round as James settles me on my feet.

"Here," he says, picking up a tube of paint. "I remember you using this one. Ultramarine blue."

"Mmm." I cross my arms in front of my chest. "I mixed it with magenta."

He brings the tube closer to his face and squints at it. "That's right. You can mix them."

The way his face is stuck in wonderment makes me giggle, and the space between us closes as I sidle up and wrap my arms round his neck. "Sometimes you get the best results when you mix colours."

He bends his head and presses his forehead to mine. A buzz starts in my throat and spreads down across my breasts, then my tummy, before settling in my lower extremities, fluttering away like a butterfly. I can feel myself swaying slightly as I brush my lips against the side of his jaw.

"Do you want to know more?" I whisper.

"Yes." His fingers play through my hair, brushing it over my shoulder to expose my neck. I feel his breath hot against my ear before moving downwards, tickling the sensitive skin on the side of my neck. My heart pumps in time with the gentle pressure on my throat as he trails tender kisses to my collarbone.

It takes a moment for me to find my voice. "The magenta is a warm colour." He kisses my chin, and then my mouth. My lips part under his, and then wider as the kiss deepens. "And the blue is cool. But when you mix them—"

His hand pulls at my knickers and begins dragging them down. "Okay."

I gasp as his finger slides between my legs and into my wet warmth. My body tenses against his as another sensation hits, deep in my core, and spreads over my skin like slow fire.

"It. . . makes it. . . " I try to swallow against the rise of tension as he pushes deeper, slowly rotating his hand against my clit. It feels like a tidal wave. "Please."

"Please what?"

My nails dig into his arm as I squeeze my eyes shut. It’s hard to breathe, to think. "Please keep going."

He pulls back to look at me. "I won't stop." His mouth closes on mine for another deep kiss.

At those words, my hands reach up to drag my fingers through his hair, my teeth clenched. I want to scream, or cry, or some other burst of irrational emotion that will match the waves of pleasure wracking my body. There is no way this should feel this good, or this natural.

"I—" I gasp in between moans. "I love you."

James pulls his head back again. I press against him, never breaking eye contact. "Do you?" he whispers against my face.

"Yes."

"I love you." He brings my hand up and kisses the palm. "Always."

It doesn’t take me long to pull off his clothes, considering he’s only wearing a pair of boxer shorts and glasses. I start giggling as the fingers of his free hand get tangled in the straps of my vest top when he pulls it over my head. He pulls his hand free and picks me up to carry me to the old, broken sofa against the wall.

"I couldn’t come in here when you were gone," he admits, lowering me down. "There was too much of you in here. It hurt too much."

To my ears, it still sounded strange to hear his secrets. But the good kind of strange. "I’m not going anywhere." I pull his head down for another kiss. We’re moving faster now, deeper, and suddenly his mouth is moving down to suck the tip of my breast.

My hand curls round the sofa as I arch my back, his tongue tracing circles round my tip. I feel more wetness spread between my clenched thighs.

"Oh God. . . James." A twinge of pleasure and pain shoots through me as he gently nips at me. My nails rake down his back, leaving red scratch marks behind, but I’m too far-gone to care.

I reach down and take him in hand, gripping him, as I swirl my fist up and down his length. His hand comes to my breast and he rubs it gently, his lips trailing soft kisses down my neck. I shudder at his touch and slowly guide him to my opening, teasing him, and myself, by running his head up and down my moist slit. I hear him grunt softly in pleasure as his hands tighten on my breast.

He enters my wet tightness slowly, and I gasp aloud, starting to slowly thrust with him. He feels deeper for some reason, filling me to the brim and stretching me again.

"I love you," he murmurs. I feel the edges of my control start to weaken, the same familiar hot coil of pleasure twisting up tight deep inside me and I whimper. At the noise, his hand slides from my breast to my centre, and rubs my nubbin as he teethes my neck, still thrusting into me deeply but slowly. “I missed you,” he says in a ragged breath.

I move my hips with him, faster than before, encouraging him to pick up his tempo, but he presses into me, demonstrating his strength and dominance, letting me know that this time, this time we are taking it slow. He draws my nipple into his mouth as my pleasure rumbles deep inside me. The slow, deep thrusts are driving me to madness in the best possible way, my pleasure slowly stretching out.

When I finally come in a shuddering, gasping rush, the ripples of my orgasm extend long and lingering as he slowly and deeply rides through my aftershocks, leading me into a rapidly approaching second peak.

I whimper through it, wordlessly pleading with him, and feel the sharp sting of his teeth dig into the tip of my breast as he comes, pouring his hot seed inside of me, and then we stare into each other's eyes as we struggle to catch our breaths. I lie there, underneath him, panting, trembling, as I struggle to regain control of my sanity.

Did you ever have someone who turned you around, someone who mad
e
you look at something in a whole new way? James Hatter is my someone. I didn’t
see
the beauty in the black and white and the endless blue; the mind can play tricks and lust can consume. I
felt
it. I felt what lies beneath and it became a part of me.
He
became a part of me.

Ever since I fell in love with him, I dream him. And then I paint my dream.

This is love.

I let my head fall back as I allow myself to receive the kind of love I deserve, that all women deserve, and it’s all because of one word.

Always.

“I love you,” I tell him, breathless, looking into the blue. Nothing else matters when I sink into those eyes. Nothing but what I see in them.

“I love you more.”

“That's impossible.”

“You know I’m always right.”

I trace the edge of his powerful jawline and guide my fingers over his cheekbone to his handsome, well-formed mouth
.
“Are we really fighting over who loves the other more?”

“Polar opposites attract, right?”

“Yes, why—?”

“We fight, Adelaide, because, likes repel. We’re the same. . . so we repel each other.”

I open my mouth to disagree but then close it. I think on that idea for a moment. “You could be onto something there, Hatter. There was a
lot
of repulsion coming off of me in waves toward you when we first met in that lift.”

“Hmmm. . .” He angles his head down to mine and feathers a kiss on my lips. “I think I know where I'm taking you next Valentine’s.”

“Where?”

“The lift in Wonderland.”

“How romantic.”

“Yeah, but this time, love, I'll make sure they don't fix what isn’t broken.”