Fire in the Blood

'What?'

'I'm not here to ask you for money!'

'But Larry said..

'Yes, Larry wants you to lend the company money, but I don't. Are you going to pour me that coffee or not?' He forked some soft creamy egg into his mouth while she watched him in disbelief.

'You don't?' she slowly repeated.

He sighed and picked up the coffee-pot, poured them both a cup of the fragrant, dark liquid.

'You don't want me to give you back the divorce settlement money?' Nadine had to clarify the position; she simply couldn't believe what he was saying.

Sean nodded and ate some more egg and mushroom, bit into crisp toast, then took a sip of coffee.

'Sean!' she angrily said. 'I asked you..

'I heard,' he said, looking up then, his face cool. 'I just told you. I do not want your money. OK?'

She stared into those dangerous blue eyes. 'Then why are you here?'

He smiled crookedly. 'Something you said to Larry made me come.'

She was thrown into a panic, hunting through her memory and getting very confused. 'What? What did I say to Larry?'

'You said that you weren't involved with Jamie Colbert before the divorce, that we split up because of Fenella.'

She stiffened. 'Well, it's true, isn't it?'

'No, it isn't,' Sean said. 'I never so much as looked at Fenella while I was married to you. We were in trouble before I even met Fenella, and the cause of our rows was Colbert. So that's why I'm here—to ask you if you were lying to Larry, or if I was wrong all those years, and you weren't having an affair with Jamie Colbert while we were married.'

CHAPTER FOUR

'I 'M NOT getting into another of those endless fights,' Nadine said huskily. 'I still have nightmares about them. You wouldn't believe me then, and I don't expect you to believe me now. It doesn't matter anyway, we're not married anymore, we're divorced—so what's the point of talking about it? Look, I'm going to my art class. Don't be here when I get back, Sean, or I'll pack and leave myself.'

She got up and collected the large blue beach- bag in which she was going to carry all her art things around. Sean still sat on the balcony, drinking his coffee and watching her, his brooding blue eyes narrowed. It wasn't easy to ignore his stare, but she managed it out of sheer practice. Nadine was used to men staring at her, their eyes exploring her from head to foot, from her smooth-skinned face with its wide, passionate mouth, and the coils of rich chestnut hair framing it, down over her high, round breasts and slim waist to her rounded, feminine hips and long, slim, tapering legs. She had had to learn not to blush or get angry; her profession demanded it. She still didn't like it. And when it was Sean doing the watching it was ten times harder for her to stay cool.

She left without saying a word and hurried off to meet the other art students in the lobby of the hotel. Luc then led them through the gardens to his studio, which adjoined the hotel on the left side.

Luc's studio was a spacious room with full-length windows flooding it with light. There were wonderful views on three sides: the gardens, the beach, the blue Caribbean. The fourth wall was stacked with canvases leaning against each other; above them other paintings hung, crammed close together, all Luc's work. Nadine saw water-colours, oils, sketches in charcoal, crayon, pencil: most of them landscapes, a few portraits.

The students were all allotted an

easel; Luc told them they were going to do some preparatory sketches of whichever view they were facing, so that he could assess the standard of their work. Some were total beginners, others had been painting for years. His approach to each would necessarily be quite different.

Nadine was so distracted this morning, half her mind still involved in argument with Sean, that she had a problem trying to decide what to draw, and she knew she wasn't doing anything inspired, blocking in the beach, palm trees, bougainvillaea, the brilliant blue sea and sky. It all looked over- coloured suddenly: a picture for a chocolate-box lid. She scowled at it; how did you sketch a view that was all colour? She heard Luc's voice talking to a dark girl in a scarlet sundress who was standing at the next easel.

'Had you thought of putting in a human figure there to give it a focus? You know, when people look at a picture they automatically look first at any human beings in it. It's instinctive...' His voice dropped to a murmur, and Nadine couldn't hear the rest of the sentence.

She looked at her own sketch. There were no human beings in her picture, either. She looked up at the actual view and saw children running under the palm trees, throwing a ball to each other. She began to put them into the picture: nothing elaborate, just blurs in the shadow of the palms.

Luc came up behind her a few moments later; she waited rather nervously for his comment.

'Not bad,' he said, to her surprise. 'You have an eye for perspective. But a little more boldness wouldn't hurt. Be more assertive with form; make it a positive statement, not a nervous little wiggle.' He had a piece of charcoal in his hand and bent forward. 'Like this...' He made a slashing stroke and a palm tree appeared. 'And here, maybe...' Another stroke and there was a man walking on the beach. 'Do you see what I mean?'

'Yes,' she said, envying him that sureness and speed. She was always hesitant to put a line on the paper.

'Take risks, Nadine,' he said, as if he had read her thoughts. 'Start again, and this time don't be scared, be bolder.' He smiled at her encouragingly, then went on to the next student.