Color Me Pretty: A Father's Best Friend Romance

“What do you think the police will say if they knew how much time she spends in the south side? It seems convenient she’s been seen there at night. What else would somebody her age, with her reputation, be doing there? All it takes is one little call, West. One.”

My fists clenched. I knew everything he spouted was bullshit, like usual. The warehouse was the one place I wished Della would have stopped going to a long time ago, but the least I asked of her was to take Dallas when she decided to ignore my concern. Dallas may have liked her, but he would have told me if there was something more going on than I was aware of.

She was always by herself there. She painted. She sometimes even fucking danced—I’d seen it, watched it on more than one occasion before she even started practicing again with the Anderson girl. Della wasn’t there because she was into the things her father had gotten pulled into.

That warehouse was where she felt closest to her parents. It was the only reason I didn’t try arguing with her about going, even if it pissed me off. She wouldn’t have listened to me if I forbid her. We both knew I didn’t have that kind of power over her. I didn’t want to.

“You have no proof. And even if you did, which is not fucking likely—” I stepped even closer until he could feel the anger ripple off me like radiation I hoped he burned from. “—it won’t matter anyway. You tried destroying the Saint James name so no one would believe a word they said. That’s exactly what’s going to happen to you.”

The laugh that came from him was dry and weak. False bravado like he thought he could fool me into thinking he wasn’t scared. I knew better. Richard Pratt was shitting his pants because those files would put him away for a long time. Money transfers. Phone records. Witness accounts. Audio. Video. Everything he thought he could fight by blackmail was going to take him down.

When Dallas and McAllister had brought Pratt’s businesses to my attention, I’d asked the question that the Saint James trial hadn’t answered. It was the same one that I knew Della had wondered but refused to verbalize. “What did Pratt have on Anthony to get him to do his bidding?” After both men looked into it, they realized…nothing. Pratt had nothing on Anthony, but the man I’d once called my closest friend hadn’t known that. He was willing to do anything for his family, even if it made him into the person he never wanted to be.

All for Elizabeth and Della.

“You’ve made too many enemies,” I stated, my own lips quivering from the smile I’d plastered onto my face. I didn’t want him seeing what I knew he’d done to Anthony, and to Della by default, make him think it changed me. He wanted it to. The Dick wanted me to be angry and lash out, but I wouldn’t give him that satisfaction, even if I did want to make him bleed.

“Your girl is going down,” he growled.

I didn’t believe him though.

Because my girl was the strongest person I knew.

Chapter Eighteen

Della

The hand reaching out to me was one I hadn’t seen in years, which was why I launched myself directly toward the open arms of the softest person I knew. Right before I made contact with my mother’s warmth, she said, “I told you to be better, sweet Della” and before I could tell her I was trying, she disappeared.

Bolting up in bed, I listened to the loud drumming of my heart as I took slow, deep breaths. I hadn’t realized I was crying until I swiped my face, feeling the damp cheeks that the backs of my hands were greeted with.

Curling the comforter closer around my body, I glanced at the time on my phone screen and blew out a breath. I hadn’t been asleep for more than three hours, but sleep would definitely be evading me now.

One glass of water later, I was standing at the doorway of my spare bedroom staring at the line of painted canvases that were resting against the back wall. Each one held different positions of the same ballerina slowly standing from the original bent over position I’d painted her in. I knew the easel held the final piece of the collection, a collection I named “Color Me Pretty”, except the dancer was standing tall and facing forward and her features…I hadn’t drawn them yet.

I walked over to examine how far I’d come the night before, when I’d decided to work on it to help me wind down after my last final, realizing shortly after I’d sat down to paint that I wasn’t in the right mindset to finish the series. I was tired, spent, and focused only on what my final grades would be. If it weren’t for Ribbons’ class, I wouldn’t have even stressed about it. But I’d barely passed the midterm exam and failed a few smaller quizzes that had come after. The paper we had to submit in person felt like a final send off between us, but I wasn’t sure if the weeks of effort and research I’d put in was even worth it for somebody like her.

Potential, I’d scoffed to myself. Hadn’t she told me she thought I had it once? That was worse than hearing half the things the tabloids said about me. They talked about my body and attitude, not my inability to learn or be successful as if I were hopeless altogether.

At two in the morning, I’d found myself walking into my bedroom and digging through my closet for something that I hadn’t held in my hands in a long time. Making my way back into the spare room, gripping the purple compact mirror that my mother always kept in her purse, I opened it and exhaled softly.

The girl staring back was tired, bags under her eyes, chapped lips, and flushed cheekbones. Looking from the glass to the paint I’d saved on my palette, I dipped my brush into the cream color I mixed and studied the mirror again.

It was four a.m. before I’d bit into my bottom lip and shadowed the sharp jawline and cheekbones heightened by weeks of hunger and physical activity before stepping back. I’d somehow gotten paint on my sleep shirt but didn’t care as I took in the final product in front of me.

She was…beautiful. Swallowing past the lump in my throat, I grabbed my phone and lifted it to the painting before snapping a photo and texting the only person I wanted to see it.

He responded instantly.

Theo: Almost as stunning as the real thing.

I blushed and reread the text again before replying. What are you doing up?

Theo: Running

I double checked the time and shook my head, knowing he got up to work out early but still judging him for it. How many times had he told me he wished I would have waited and gotten more sleep? It seemed pointless to bring up how he rarely did the same.

Theo: What are you doing up?