“Take a breath, Mr. Gunther,” Charlotte interjected. “Your face is turning red.”
He leaned forward, waving his extravagantly ringed fingers like an excited auctioneer. “Now, she’s no lightweight, you understand. She sells her work through some of the best stores in New York City and Los Angeles. I mean, movie stars have bought her jewelry.”
“How about Madonna?” Charlotte asked. Her only noncooking idol.
“Shhh,” Mom said.
“Marie needs to put together a real slick portfolio of her best pieces for a distributor over in Europe. She needs somebody to model the rings and bracelets for the photographer. So I told her I knew a gal with hands like an angel’s.”
“That’s all there is to it?” Sam asked. “I put on some jewelry and let a photographer take pictures of my hands? And I get a hundred dollars?”
“A hundred dollars an hour,” Mr. Gunther corrected her. “I did some checking. That’s what professional hand models get, and Lord knows their hands couldn’t be any prettier than yours. Marie’s rolling in money. Didn’t bat an eyelash when I told her what you’d cost.”
Sam was flabbergasted. “You’re serious. There are people who get big money just for modeling with their hands.”
“Well, it makes sense when you think about all the ads where all you see is a pair of hands holding something.” He gazed at her eagerly. “Marie’s got the photographer lined up for next week. She works out of her house, so he’ll set up there to do the pictures. Do you want the job, Sammie?”
“I was planning to close the shop on Sammie’s birthday,” Mom said wistfully. “She needs a day off.”
“Mom, I don’t need a day off. I need this job. Besides, it won’t take very long.”
“It’s a deal, then!” Mr. Gunther beamed at her.
Sam lifted her hands and studied them curiously. She was a spider, and she’d discovered a way to spin gold.
The weather was mild, particularly for January, when cold winds curled between the mountains more days than not. The photographer liked the clear afternoon light outdoors, and had set up his equipment on a stone patio in Marie Path Walker’s sprawling, unkempt backyard.
Mrs. Path Walker’s house was a huge restored Victorian full of paintings by Indian artists, ceremonial masks, fine English antiques, and Cabbage Patch dolls belonging to her numerous grandchildren. Marie was a tall, thin woman with a flat face, vibrant black eyes, and long black hair shot through with gray. She strode around in loafers, jeans, and a long black sweatshirt.
When Mr. Gunther introduced Sam to her, she examined Sam’s hands as if they were disembodied set props and pronounced them perfect but too pale, so Mr. Gunther was dispatched crosstown to the home of a black lady who sold beauty supplies for women with dark skin. He returned with a tube of chocolate-brown foundation, matching powder, and a cosmetic brush. Then he disappeared upstairs to watch television with Marie’s husband.
Sam sat on a folding chair on the patio, the tube of makeup clasped nervously in her lap, as she squinted in the bright gleam of the photographer’s set lights. Mrs. Path Walker and the photographer scurried around her as if she were invisible, adjusting a blue backdrop strung on a clothesline and endlessly discussing a vast array of beautiful turquoise and silver jewelry laid out on a card table nearby.
It was her birthday. Eighteen. The world’s definition of an adult finally agreed with Sam’s self-image. She was responsible for her own decisions, free as a bird, but not free at all. This work might pay well, but it made her feel restless. She’d never thought of her hands as being valuable merely because of their looks; it was hard to keep them still.
From where she sat she could see the edge of a paved driveway between holly shrubs, and she heard the sound of a car pulling in. Probably someone bringing neon-pink nail polish for me to wear, she thought grimly. She scrubbed her damp palms on the legs of her loose black trousers, distractedly running her fingertips over the expertly stitched seams of the pockets.
Neither Mrs. Path Walker nor the photographer had asked her anything about herself—whether she had skills, or deep thoughts, or wanted a glass of water. Apparently, she was expected to sit there like a mannequin, and keep quiet.
A car door slammed. A few seconds later Jake walked between the hollies.
There was a moment of sinking alarm, the recognition of sensitive parts of her body she’d ignored for a long time, and the primal jolt of gratitude and confusion. Mr. Gunther set this up, she thought. My birthday present. The one I’ve waited for so long. The one I can’t accept.
Jake was brutal-looking, handsome in the manner of big, brawny men who considered a decent haircut a luxury and a bar of cheap soap a cologne. Sunlight glinted on reddish-black hair as glossy as a new penny and long enough to brush his rumpled collar in back. Oddly enough, the hair suited him, making a sweeping counterpart to a serious, straight-edged face. If she drew her fingertips along that face, she’d find angles hard enough to trace a line by. The rest of him would have made an outline of startlingly masculine proportions, a bulge here, a long perimeter there.
He walked toward her with long, determined strides. And then she understood. He’d promised to come for her when she was old enough. But you can’t, she told him silently. Not yet.
She started to turn away, but her eyes were riveted to him. Of all things, a large, ugly bloodhound followed him. The dog had an incredibly long tongue, spilling drool on the neat grass, as pink as a nipple.
Samantha stood, fumbling with the top to the tube of makeup, dropping the top heedlessly, and shooting furtive glances at Mrs. Path Walker. Mrs. Path Walker waved at Jake. “How’s your mother, Jake? Sold any more of her watercolors lately?”
“She’s fine, thank you. Sold a few.”
Now I get it, Sam thought, stunned. Mr. Gunther knew we’d be safe, meeting here. But nothing has changed.
Smoothing dark foundation on the unblemished perfection of her hands and lower arms, she frowned and refused to look up, but every nerve was tuned to the approaching sound of Jake’s soft, undeterred footsteps on the patio stones.
She heard the photographer ask in a prim tone, “Does that animal always slobber that way? Shouldn’t he be put on a leash?”
And Jake answered in a deep, drawling voice that sent waves of warmth across Sam’s skin: “You go ahead and try it. The rabies test hasn’t come back positive—yet.”
Then, abruptly, Jake was beside her. She frowned and continued working on her hands, feeling his gaze on her, absorbing her, making her light-headed with the tension. “You afraid to talk to me?” he asked. “You can throw an expensive present back in your aunt’s face, but she’s got you so nervous you won’t even admit I’m here?”
The tube of makeup clamped in one hand, she turned and stared up at him. There was no moment of polite evaluation. Instead, her gaze locked immediately on his. The sudden intense connection was like hitting a wall and instantly passing through it. Before she could blink, she was inside his territory. “Pretending you don’t exist is easier than pretending there’s anything I can do about it.”
She clenched her fist. The tube gave a rude burp. A blob of foundation shot out, made a neat arc, and landed on his cheek.
His eyes flickered with astonishment. Sam watched him raise a broad hand to his face. A forefinger as delicate-looking as a wooden peg scooped the drop of brown goo off the end of a leathery crease beside his right eye. He rubbed the makeup between his finger and thumb. Their tips were so thick-skinned, the cream stayed on their surface for several seconds. He seemed to be considering the sensation.
As if he could feel anything through those calluses, Samantha thought. She realized she was staring at his fingertips. Hypnotized. Now, those were hands that belonged in pictures. Given a good manicure to civilize nails that appeared to have been cut short with a bowie knife, they would cause women to fan themselves. Sam could imagine his hands draped in the lacy cups of an empty bra, offering female magazine readers a dose o
f fantasy along with their underwear needs. Oh, yes, Jake’s hands would look great under her bra. A bra. Someone’s bra. Not hers. Oh, God.
“I’ve seen women who could spit tobacco juice thirty feet and hit a dime,” he said slowly, each word like a dollop of honey, his disturbing gaze still locked on Sam’s startled one. “But I never saw one squirt her hand lotion.”
She dropped her gaze and muttered, “Only for contests.”
“You win first prize.”
Sam wasn’t going to ask what the prize was. “I’m sorry. Would you like a tissue?” She pretended that capping the tube took all ten fingers and the attention of both eyes. She still felt his scrutiny. “No, thanks,” he said in a tone that indicated tissues were for cowards. He probably used leftover pieces of sandpaper.
“Jake, I like that dog of yours,” Mrs. Path Walker announced, eyeing the hound shrewdly. “He is an art form.” She turned to the photographer. “Let’s take a couple of pictures with the girl’s hands on the dog’s head.”
“Hmmm, whimsical contrast,” the photographer agreed. “Beauty and the beast.”
Jake looked at Sam. His eyes were deadly serious, but the corner of his mouth lifted in a slight smile. “You’re not a beast.”
Sam’s tart reply was stifled by the photographer’s bustling approach. “Let’s get started then. You need to powder your hands. They’re shiny. Sit in the chair in front of the backdrop.”
Her lap filled with tissues, the jar of powdered foundation, and a cosmetic brush, Samantha sat down and tucked her loafered feet under the chair’s rungs, then began dusting her hands with makeup. Her hands were cold and shaky; she kept her head down and tried to ignore the fact that Jake had walked over next to her and was giving silent directions to his bloodhound. From the corner of one eye she watched the movements of four rust-red canine legs and two denimed human legs that ended in large, scuffed hiking boots. She smelled a pleasant scent. Either Jake or his dog bathed with mint soap. Probably the dog.
“This is Bo,” he told her. “If you squirt lotion at him, he’ll eat it.”
She feathered the brush over her left palm. It skittered like the tail of a nervous hen. “As long as he doesn’t try to eat my hands.”
“No, the last time he ate anything that clean, it made him sick.”
Bo buddied up to her chair. A tail as strong as the rudder on a battleship whacked the back of it, sending small earthquakes through her spine. “He likes you,” his owner said. She couldn’t be sure, since she wouldn’t look up, but from the droll lilt in his voice she suspected he was enjoying the way her brush bounced each time Bo’s tail hit the chair.
“I love animals,” Samantha answered, hoping to placate him and get through this unnerving event peacefully. “We had a cat once, but it left. I suspect it didn’t like vegetarian cat food.”
As if pleased to know he was an admired member of the animal kingdom, Bo laid his large head in Sam’s lap. She looked down into dark eyes sheltered by saddlebag brows. Jowls as soft as lambskin drooped onto her bare knees. He was irresistible. She dabbed the brush on his wet nose. He sneezed. Tissues and powder exploded in a small cloud.
Sam leaned back, fanning the mist of powder. “He’s got a sensitive nose,” Jake said. “Sorry.” Before she could protest, Jake retrieved her scattered tissues from the grass and began wiping his dog’s head, which still remained on her lap. She was inches from Jake’s face, close enough to study the sweep of his long black eyelashes and the kind of beard shadow that said he had the hormonal wherewithal to grow a pelt as thick as a bear’s on his jaw. And she was close enough to see the lines of serious concentration around his eyes and mouth.
Jake wondered if she knew he felt awkward. True, he’d given Bo a subtle command to put his head in her lap, but the sneeze had been Bo’s ad-lib. Having her distracted by Bo had seemed wiser than letting her squeeze the sense out of his brain with her steam-heated scrutiny.
He supposed some men would say her hands were the only thing about her that was beautiful. He noticed them finally, posed like stalled wings in the air over Bo’s dusty head, sleek and perfect, with perfect oval nails painted orange—no, peach would be the name people who cared about niceties would give them.
The rest of her fell into the category of being simply, wonderfully Samantha—not fat, not thin, not flamboyant, not dull—unbreakable, perfect Samantha, with a slightly crooked little nose, a small, full mouth, and blue eyes that could make his heart stop.
He finished scrubbing Bo’s head and, not quite knowing how to be formal about it, stuffed the used tissues in his shirt pocket. Then, still bent beside her at eye level, the only gentlemanly thing to do was look her in the face again.
He met her eyes, those startling, sad-funny blue eyes that he’d felt watching him the whole time, and received a new onslaught of her direct, arousing appraisal. “Should I dust you off with your brush?” he asked.
“No. And don’t wipe my face either.”
A patina of powder had settled on a chin that was a bit too strong. She had fine, straight, shoulder-length hair the color of gold, slicked back prettily under a thin white headband. If she wore any makeup, he couldn’t tell. Other than the powder Bo had blown on her.
“Good Lord have mercy, let’s get the girl cleaned up and get on with this,” the photographer said over their shoulders. Jake straightened and motioned to Bo, who drew his head back and leaned against the chair.
“Let me dust you,” the photographer said, and began flailing at Sam with a paper towel.
Jake stepped back, frowning, and watched the photographer fasten a heavy bracelet on one of her wrists and place a ring on her hand. She wiped remnants of powder from her face with one of her infamous tissues and occasionally glanced Jake’s way with a perturbed look.
The photographer fussed around her and Bo. “Now, put your hands on top of this … this thing’s head. Yes, like that.”
“Jake, could you tell your dog to sit up, as if he has a spine?” Mrs. Path Walker asked, huddling over them.
The photographer snorted. “He must move away from the chair. The shot will include only his head and the girl’s hands. He’s positively welded to her side. We can’t do it that way.”
“He’s not a thing, he’s Bo,” Sam interjected, giving everyone a mild scowl.
Jake added grimly, nodding toward Sam. “And she’s not ‘the girl.’ Call her by her name.”
Sam gave Jake a quick look. Bo looked up at him with an expression she suspected had been in her eyes when she gazed at Jake—adoring.
Under the pressure of her hands, Bo’s eyebrows sank into more creases than an accordion. She looked down at him and bit her lower lip, then smiled.
Jake felt the quick surge of arousal, a disastrous appreciation for her appreciating a ridiculous dog, an appreciation for everything about her, and the pain of a hope so deep, it made his chest hurt. He had important things to say to her, and wanted to get this public distraction over with as quickly as he could.
“Bo, move,” he ordered, effectively destroying their camaraderie. She mumbled something about bad tempers and took her hands into her lap. He went over and dropped to his haunches in front of her and the dog, then moved Bo a piece at a time until the whole was separated from her chair by more than a foot of space. “There,” Jake said brusquely, and nodded at her.
Her mouth had a breathtaking talent for holding his attention. With a downward tilt of the corners she reproached Jake. “I thought you were a dog trainer, not a dog mover.”
He touched the tip of his finger to Bo’s nose. Immediately a tongue as long as the interstate between Raleigh and Atlanta appeared. Bo turned his head and wrapped his tongue around Sam’s wrist, silver bracelet included. He simply sat still, looking up at her, his tongue in place. The photographer shrieked. She stared at her wrist calmly. “Now I know how a chicken liver wrapped in bacon must feel.”
Jake sighed. Her good humor was more than he deserved. “Bo, suck it in.”
The tongue was reeled in, and order restored.
Jake moved a few feet away. The photo shoot began in earnest. Bo sat patiently with Sam’s hands cupping his face in various poses, each time modeling a different set of Marie Path Walker’s jewelry.
The photographer cooed and praised, a happy man for once. The dog made such a cute prop, he kept saying. When he finished with Bo he began tapping his forehead and telling Marie he wanted something with, well, something that had less fur and more sex appeal. “If we could find a man with the right hands, we could do something with a male-female theme,” he told them.
“Him,” Samantha said suddenly, and pointed at Jake. She was trying desperately to hide how she really felt. “He has only a bit less fur and slightly more sex appeal. But great hands.”
Jake stared at her with the look he used to stop police detectives who asked too many questions about his tracking techniques. She shook her head. “I want your hands,” she said, and he picked up immediately on the hoarse, wishful undertone. “What would I have to do?” he demanded, realizing it meant a chance to touch her.
The photographer interjected. “Oh, we’ll set up a pedestal and arrange your hands with the—with Sam’s. Entwined fingers. Very male-female. The yin and yang thing, you see. Hmmm, eastern philosophy. Let me see if I can explain it for you—”
“I know my yin from my yang,” Jake told him. “And the only question I have is, do I have to wear makeup?”
“Yes, yes,” Samantha answered. “Come here and sit down, and I’ll fix your hands for you. It won’t be painful, and it won’t give you any urge to buy pastel boxer shorts.”
Jake thought for a moment. “I don’t want my name printed in the credits.”
“Fine,” Mrs. Path Walker said, waving her arms in exasperation.
Samantha stood and hurried to the chair she’d been sitting in before. Self-rebuke mingled with sad awareness. She wanted to touch Jake, wanted to feel his hands in hers for a few minutes. She dropped into the chair and fumbled with a small cloth bag.