Pretty, Dark and Dirty

“And I’ve told you that I don’t have any. None that I can give you. So, where does that leave you now?”

“On a bus back to New Hampshire, I guess.”

“Sure, you could go home, work a boring summer job at The Burger Barn, keep pressing your mom for answers she’ll never give you. Or, you could stay here. Spend the summer getting to know the city, let me introduce you to other artists and dealers. My studio is yours, if you want to use it. So is my guest room. It’s got a beautiful view of the park.”

“You think you can bribe me with fancy paints and a nice view?”

“They are very fancy paints, and it’s a damn fine view.”

His playful smile almost made me lose my cool, but I held firm. I wasn’t going to give in just because he was offering me the world—though his world was the one where I longed to live.

“I don’t expect you to forgive me today,” he said. “I have no right to ask you for anything, but I can make you a promise. I’ll never leave you again, Jett. Not unless you want me to.”

“Why would I want you to?” The words slipped out before I could stop them, and I realized I’d just betrayed my position. I was angry and frustrated, but I wanted to stay with him, and he knew it.

He shrugged. I almost missed the wounded glint in his eye.

“You might prefer the memory of the father I was to the man in front of you.”

I didn’t know what to say to that, so I said nothing. Clearly, I hadn’t really known him back then either.

Still, whatever we were to each other, then versus now, I had a choice to make. I could hold tight to my anger and buy myself a bus ticket home, closing the door on this new, mysterious Mason and his former role in my life forever. Or, I could accept his apology, allow him to make room for me in the world he’d built around himself, and spend the summer making up for lost time.

Unlike my mother, I’d never been very good at holding grudges.

“I don’t know if I can get used to calling you Mason.”

“So call me Dad—” His hazel eyes darkened as his mouth curved into another pulse-fluttering smile. “—or Daddy.”

Chapter Three

As it turned out, this new, mysterious Mason owned two adjacent lofts on the top floor of a historic building in Manhattan.

We stepped out of the elevator into a white-walled corridor with two sets of double doors. He opened one set of doors and motioned for me to enter.

“My studio is across the hall,” he said. “I do have some work to do in there later today. Think you can keep yourself busy for a few hours?”

I twirled in a circle, face turned up toward the exposed beams and copper piping. The living room was massive.

“I’m sure I’ll manage.” I squinted against the natural light streaming through the floor-to-ceiling windows. “So, this is how the other half lives.”

“This is how you live for the next few months.” He took my bag and slung it over his shoulder. “Come see your room.”

I followed him upstairs to the loft and down the hall to a good-sized bedroom with brick walls and more natural light. He’d been right about the very nice view.

“Bathroom’s down the hall,” he said. “My room’s just past that. Towels are in the closet at the end of the hall. Help yourself to anything in the fridge.”

He set my bag on the bed and then showed me how to operate the electronic curtains in case I didn’t want to wake up with the dawn. I sat on the bed and scanned the room, taking in the potted ferns on the windowsill, the linens in turquoise and violet. He’d remembered the color palette in my bedroom at the old house. The thought made me smile.

I stood as he turned to go.

“Dad?”

He paused in the doorway.

“Thank you for lunch,” I said.

“You’re welcome, sweetheart.”