Trifecta (22 page)

She tripped into Russell's arms and turned to Jason.

Jason stood as well, but stood there with one hand over his eyes and one hand out as if he were trying to keep his balance.

"Lauren."  Russell took her chin and aimed her face at him. 

She frowned.  Russell glared down at her, but he was still handsome.  Her executive who loved to be organized.  Would Russell want her after Jason dumped them?  Did she even want to do this without Jason?  "No."

"No?"  He put the back of his hand on her cheek.  "Are you sick?"

She shook her head. 

"Then what's the problem?" 

She tried to look at Jason but Russell held her in place.  "I didn't want you to see what I bought."  No doubt he already processed the receipt.

"Did you blow your shopping budget on Rodeo again?"  He narrowed his eyes.  "Let's see the damage."

Wait.  The receipt was clearly not from Beverly Hills but Hollywood.  On top of that Mr. Assessment, aka Russell, would have read every line item in a nanosecond.  "What didn't you know what to do with?"

"How much did you spend?" Russell stared her down.

She bit her lip.

"What's wrong?"  He put his arm around her.  "Do we have to do that thing where I have to return something for you again?" 

She didn't answer but her mind quickly rewound all the times Russell had gone into various stores and boutiques to return items when she regretted the purchase.  She supposed it was because it was never what she truly wanted.  The few weeks she had been more concerned with getting home then shopping.  Again, she glanced over at Jason, now he was squeezing the bridge of his nose.

"Lauren, what is it!  Tell me!"

"I bought something naughty and I have to return it because Jason hasn't even looked at my boobs once!"  The words spewed out just like her cleavage.

"Liar!"  Jason bolted his head up, causing him to grab the edge of the table for support.  He cleared his throat and blinked several times.  "I always look at her boobs.  In fact, I have been enjoying the view since she sat down."  He directed his statement more to Russell than to her.

Relief made her weak, but now she wasn't sure if she was happy he was gawking at her or annoyed, or annoyed he was gawking and didn't say anything.  She ground her teeth together.

"See, he was looking at your boobs, as was I."  To prove his point, Russell hooked his finger in the neck of her sweater and peeked inside.  "Everything looks amazing from my angle."  He turned to Jason.  "Do you want to get an up close look?"

All she knew was Jason better damn well want to take a look, but he better not gawk, or leer.  Definitely no leering.

"Hell, yeah."  Jason walked around the table, propping himself up on the chairs until he joined them.  "Let me inspect the sites."  With red-rimmed eyes, he stared right at her. 

Fine, she felt better when Jason extracted her from Russell and didn't only look inside, but ran his hands up the bottom of her sweater, cupping both her breasts, and burying his face in her cleavage. 

"Oh yeah."  He kissed the top of each of her mounds and grazed his thumbs across her bra over her nipples.  "I want to know what naughty thing you bought."

Jason's kisses caused shivers throughout her entire being and she put one hand on the back of Jason's head, and grabbed Russell's arm. 

"So, it's not good enough that I look?"  Russell laughed and then dipped his head down giving her kiss.  "You have to have an artist eye you?" 

"Yes, I require many mediums to inspect me."  Though the nagging nausea of worry over Jason wanting out waned, a new concern crept into her being.  Something was still not right with her creative cohort.

"I'm hardly an artist."  Jason trailed his lips up her chest, neck and then kissed her lips. 

"I beg to differ."  Russell stepped back and returned to his papers, shuffling through them.  "What I was asking before is what do I do with this check stub?  Do you have an invoice or anything to go with it?"  He returned and showed Jason.

She straightened up and read the document.  "Twelve hundred dollars."

Russell nodded.  "Twelve hundred dollars."

"Jason!"  She started jumping and flung her arms around his neck.  "What piece did you sell?"  This was a monumental moment.  He sold a piece of art and broke his streak. 

"I say this calls for a celebration."  Russell clapped. 

"Why didn't you say anything?"  She took Jason's face between her palms and kissed him.

He didn't kiss her back.

No, he didn't kiss her back, but not because he didn't want to kiss her.  Only minutes before he had his face in her chest. "Jason?"

He took the check stub and tossed it on the table.  "What naughty stuff did you buy?"  He grabbed her hips.  "I think the vodka is making me especially horny.  Russell needs to catch up so we can see what you bought."

"Jason."  She put her hands over his.  "What did you sell?"

Russell crossed his arms.

He looked beyond her.  "Nothing worth anything."

"It was worth twelve hundred dollars."  Russell picked the check stub off the floor.

"Bette got me some work with a publisher.  Two book covers.  I did the first. I still have to do the second.  Some beach cabana or something."  He scratched his hand through his hair.

Art for hire.  The precise work Jason didn't want.  Without any fanfare she backed away and returned to the table.  Now she understood the competition, the distance, the alcohol, right now she could use some as well. 

"Let me clean up this mess."  Russell picked up the chair she knocked over, bent down and began gathering the papers off the floor. 

"Hey."  Jason put his hand on her back.  "It's no big deal.  We all sell things.  You sell your stuff, Russ sells his brain."

Russell made a noise and came up with a ton of papers every which way.   

"Let's do the bills." She sat down.  Russell may sell his brain, but he loved it.  She may sell her stuff, but it was a means to an end.  Jason selling his art this way was a step back.  He was giving up.  She chewed the inside of her mouth.  Over the last week and a half her job didn't even have a goal.  She gave it up when she crawled through the boxes for an unsure end.  Her stuff only paid the bills, just like Jason's art.

"This all got mixed up.  I say we go find out what Lauren bought."  Russell pulled the plug on the laptop. 

This went beyond their bizarre relationship, breakups and other nonsense she came to this table worried about.  She couldn't try to cookie cutter their situation into anything traditional.  Their friendship and future was interwoven with every decision they made and the thought of being without them made her physically ill.

Yes.  Everything was all mixed up.

Chapter Twenty-One

Jason leaned back in his chair, stared at the paper on his table and shifted his glance to the email from his agent describing what the author wanted for their book.

He rubbed his chin and lifted the paper, turning it ninety degrees and another ninety degrees and even assessed it upside down.  Somehow the cabana on the beach this man described in great detail in his memoir was only a square with rudimentary hooked waves behind it.  All he needed to do was add in a circle for a sun, a smiley face and some birds shaped like flattened 'm's and he would have a masterpiece fit for a preschooler.

"Focus."  He had to learn how to do this.  The look on Lauren and Russell's face at his check told him everything.  Hey, he did fine with the mural and the first book cover.  He put the paper back down.  The page didn't look any better, and trying to redirect his energy he swiped up his pencil, turning the square into a bed, but not any bed.  This bed was decadent, full of pillows and blankets, and a canopy with flowing fabric panes.  His hand took over as if it were directly connected to the creative lobe of his brain.

In less than fifteen minutes he had transformed the picture to a seaside scene.  The waves now had depth, flotsam and jetsam and no sun. Instead, moonlight directing a soft beam right to the canopy spotlighting the bed. 

Once again he sat back.  This time he swallowed to catch his breath.  A good art run was not unlike an orgasm.  There was the anticipation, the build up and the release.  When the art took over, nothing else mattered, and the picture or the sculpture did what it wanted not what it was hired to do. 

This was the image he envisioned, the three of them on a secluded beach, the breeze blowing and tons of blankets because Lauren would be freezing even between them.  He twisted his chair back and forth.  Yes, it was perfect.

Perfect for him.

The printed email from his agent loomed in the corner of eye.  The one with the specs for the picture.

Nowhere in the instructions did it say bed on the beach, or three people. 

Apparently this author never experienced three people in bed because if he did then that would be precisely what the man would want.  He squeezed his eyes shut, not needing to read the email to know what was expected of him.  "Green striped cabana on a white sand beach, shells, water, sun."  Maybe he should get his crayons out.

Still heady and high from creating something with more depth than the shallow ocean they wanted, he turned the paper over, crumpled up the email, grabbed his tools and left the studio. 

He needed a change in venue, a perfect cure for art gone wrong.  Some distraction, and a little conversation and by the time the buzzer rang on Lauren's luscious lasagna he would have worked through his green stripes and blue water.  The picture would be so much better with no stripes and purple water.

He stood in the hallway.

Sunday afternoon at the house had its own vibe.  No matter what happened during the week, or on Friday or Saturday night, Sunday afternoon was different.  After breakfast the chores of the week began.  Even now the hum of the clothes dryer was only overshadowed by the rhythmic beat of the washing machine.  In the background the television whispered with one Lauren's reality shows, and the whole house was permeated with the scent of garlic, onions and tomato from the homemade sauce Lauren started earlier.

On Sunday afternoon the whole house was like one gigantic pillow, soft, welcoming and warm.

He went to the family room and peeked inside.

Where the house might be a pillow, inside this room was like being under a blanket, and he wanted to crawl inside.

Russell looked up from the corner table where he had an assortment of parts and pieces out with one of his vintage toys.  He opened his mouth.

No.  He didn't want anything to break the spell.  Jason shook his head and put his finger over his mouth as he tiptoed to the corner chair and sat down.

Russell shrugged his shoulders and returned his attention to tinkering.

Jason put his feet up, put two pencils in his mouth and turned to Lauren.

She lay on the couch, splayed out on her stomach sound asleep.  One of her cheeks disappeared in the pillow she grabbed from the bed, and her mouth was a little open.  Her hand hung down after falling off the edge, and her ass was nice and rounded, a tight mound in black leggings he wanted to grab on to.

The shapes were amazing, all curves, no straight lines, everything flowing. 

Screw green stripes.

He glanced over at Russell.  The man personified concentration, hunched over his contraption with a metal piece between two of his fingers and a thin screwdriver in his hand.  He had the same expression on his face as when he would study Lauren, wide eyes hardly blinking, maybe a slight smile.

Jason started his sketch and like earlier the world did him the favor of disappearing.  No television, no meat sauce, no emails dictating his art.  Time vanished as well, and he didn't know how long he sketched getting all the details the way his mind wanted them.  At last he erased one errant pencil mark and that indefinable yet definable moment let him know his drawing was finished. 

Now he had his second sketch today, this one was Lauren on that canopy bed on the beach with Russell looking over her.  He even added himself in the background.

He let his head hit the back of the chair and high fived the air.

"Was it good for you?"  Russell chuckled.

If Russell only knew.  He nodded.  "Yeah."  The only problem he was having now was every piece of art centered on the three of them. Yes, their trouple did the job of letting his artwork out, but not in the way he imagined.  He only thought he was blocked, he never anticipated getting a muse as part of the deal.

"Good."  Russell returned to his own art.  "She's cute when she sleeps."

"Yeah."  He repeated, stopping himself from talking about the color of her cheeks or how he wanted to lay down next to her.  "Look at her ass."

Russell put down his screwdriver and tilted his head.  "From this angle it looks good." He lifted his hand as if he wanted to pick a fruit.

"It's hot that she doesn't know how hot she is." 

"Yeah, it’s also hot that she's just laying there sleeping."  Russell pointed at her. 

Leave it to Russell to voice what he couldn't.  "That's cool.  Sunday afternoon is cool."  Things needed to always be like this.

"Better now."  Russell mumbled and bent down to examine his toy.

"What's better now?"  Lauren's voice strained as she stretched.

They both stared at her ass.  It was all up. 

He wanted to say Sunday afternoon with the two of them, or maybe his artwork, but once again redirected himself.  "Your ass."

She reached back and touched her backside.  "Better than what?" 

"Better in those leggings you have on."  Russell laughed.

"Oh."  She turned over and arched her back.  "Did you finish your drawing?" 

Her shirt rode up on her stomach and her braless boobs gave both of them something new to gawk at.  "I finished some art."  He closed the sketchbook, but wished she would stay in that position.

"Can I see?"

He wasn't prepared to show them, didn't know if he wanted to.  They may take it wrong especially since he was starting to have a stack of the pictures and his stomach tightened.  "Not yet."

"I was going to help you with your work." 

"You've already done a lot." 

"I haven't done anything."  She wrinkled her nose.  "Come on, don't we have cabanas we need to be creating? What can I do?"

Yes, he had cabanas, he had a job, but was handed his inspiration.  "Bend your right leg and don't move."  He assessed the points on his pencils, chose one and flipped his sketchbook to a blank page.
             

This was art.  Art wasn't a job, it was a moment, and in this moment with Lauren and Russell and himself was what needed to be shown and what needed to be sold.  Not cabanas, and not agents who did corporate work.  The pressure on his chest lifted.  This is what Victor spoke of.

Without a word she bent her knee and kept her eyes on him.

"Perfect. Don't move."  Shit, she was flipping gorgeous and didn't know it, but he had a best friend who did and that made it? Arousing.  He had to capture those curves.

***

With his oversized portfolio clutched in his hands, Jason scanned the artwork around Victor's office.   He recognized a picture from the woman at the gallery, and a painting from the same artist he and Lauren found at the pop-up store, but among the familiar works were creations he couldn't place. 

He walked over to one of the pieces made from found objects.  Sculptures artists put together from everyday items or junkyards, or wherever their creative muse led them.  The one in the office was made out of medical supplies.  Syringes, those red containers to throw needles into, gloves and even surgical masks.  He bent down and spied an empty box for the filler Lauren sold. 

He wished Lauren would have had to make calls in Hollywood today, but he needed to do this alone, man up and get his career back on track.

"You should see the one he did with musical instruments.  It was inspiring."

Jason straightened up and approached Victor with his hand out. 

Victor shook his hand.  "Enough about other artists, what brings you here?"

He swallowed and let it out.  "When I force the art I end up with stock book covers, when I do what speaks to me I end up with what's in the portfolio." 

"Do I get to see it, or is it secret art?"  Victor motioned toward his portfolio.

"I think it's meant to be seen."  He tightened his hold on his work.

"Do you think or do you know?"  Victor crossed his arms.  "An artist isn't timid of his vision."

"I'm confident in my vision, I never felt more sure of my art, it’s a personal subject." 

"Art is personal, never forget that."  Victor took the portfolio from him.

Jason watched him take his baby to a desk at the back of the office and unzip the leather holder.

He turned away.  Last time he showed his true art to anyone other than Lauren, Russell or his parents he was roasted.  Left to turn to char, turn to ash and blow away. 

Victor's laugh echoed through the space.

At this agent's total disregard for his work, he clenched his teeth and spun on his heel.  Adrenaline pumped, telling him to gather his art, get out and ask Bette for more covers and murals.

Instead he found Victor holding one of the sketches up to the light, smiling and nodding.

"What is it?"  He forced himself to stay put.

"I met your girl that day, and I must say you captured her essence."  He nodded again.  "I wouldn't want to get in her way."

He knew the piece Victor spoke about.  His depiction of Lauren on calls, doctors were merely forms in the background and she stood strong and proud with a syringe in one hand and her cell phone in the other.  "She will run over you."  She was his strength, but he knew she struggled everyday since this relationship started.  Girls, especially Lauren, needed things concrete and solid, and he knew at the moment her world consisted full of shaky fault lines.  Something he needed to address with the other male in their trio.

"I have no doubt."  Victor put the sketch aside and chose the next one.  "She loves you both?"

He inched closer.  This drawing was of the three of them in the front seat of a red 1959 Cadillac. "I was going to give that to her." 

"Your other…"

"Russell." 

"Russell.  He's the serious one.  How is he doing?"  Victor put the sketch down and picked up the painting of Lauren asleep on the couch with Russell in the background.  He wanted Russell to have this piece.

For the man who wouldn't hold Lauren's hand in public only a couple of weeks ago he was making big strides. "He's doing great."

"The three of you love each other?"  Victor tilted his head to take in the painting from another angle. 

He froze, a question and an answer hitting him hard at the same time.  Lauren loved them, she wanted more, but what would Russell want?  What did he want? 

"I don't need an answer." Victor replaced the sketch and flipped through a few until he came to a few of the more racy works. He stopped, put one aside, put another aside, and put a third aside creating an NC-17 patchwork on top of the table.

Jason held his breath his heartbeat loud enough to throb in his ears.

Victor rubbed his chin and paced back and forth in front of the pieces. 

"What is it?" Jason shifted his weight from one foot to the other. 

Victor held up his hand. "Never force a reaction from someone looking at your work.  If we are silent, we are thinking, and if you have us thinking you have done your job."

He bit the inside of his mouth to remain silent, his mind returning to Lauren and Russell.

"The sweet paintings and sketches will have to come later."  Victor started making piles.  "We need to capture our public first.  A little shock, a little romance, a lot of sex."