Penniless And Secretly Pregnant - Jennie Lucas Page 0,30
had died of a stroke in prison!
But arguing wouldn’t help anything. Choking back a sharp retort, he tried to imagine her feelings.
He took a deep breath.
“I’m sorry,” he said slowly. “That must have been very hard.”
Looking down, she whispered, “It was.”
Leonidas glanced at the painted canvas resting in the cardboard box. It was a messy swirl of colors and shapes that seemed to have no unifying theme.
Following his glance, Daisy winced. “I know it’s not very good.”
Reaching down to the cardboard box, he picked up the painting. “I wouldn’t say that...”
“Stop. I know it’s terrible. I did it my final semester of art school. All I wanted was for it to be spectacular, amazing, so I kept redoing it, asking advice and redoing it based on everyone’s advice. I wanted it to be as good as the masters.”
“Maybe that’s the problem. It looks like a mash-up of every well-known contemporary artist. What about your own voice? What were you trying to say?”
“I don’t know,” she said in a low voice. “I don’t think I have a voice.”
“That’s not true,” he said softly, looking at her bowed head. He thought of her years of love and loyalty. “I think you do.”
Looking up, she gave an awkward laugh. “It’s okay. Really. I tried to be an artist and failed. I never sold a single painting, no matter how hard I tried. So I threw them all away, except this one. I keep thinking,” she said wistfully, brushing that canvas with her fingertips, “maybe someday, I’ll figure it out. Maybe someday, I’ll be brave enough to try again.” She gave him a small smile. “Stupid, huh?”
Before he could answer, their driver knocked on the door. He’d come upstairs to help carry the suitcases. Leonidas lifted the big cardboard box in his arms. But he noticed Daisy continued to grip the painting in her hands. She carefully tucked it on top of everything else, so it wouldn’t get crushed in the back of the Range Rover.
“Do you mind if we stop at the diner before we go back?” she said into the silence. He turned to her.
“Sure.”
Her lovely face looked a little sad. “I think I need to talk to my boss.”
They arrived at the cheerful, crowded diner, with its big windows overlooking vintage booths with Naugahyde seats. Jenkins pulled the SUV into the loading zone directly in front of the diner.
“Do you want me to come with you?” Leonidas asked.
“No,” Daisy said.
Leonidas watched as she disappeared into the busy, bright diner. He thought of the morning they’d first met. She’d taken one look at his expensive designer suit and laughed. “Nice suit. Headed to court? Unpaid parking tickets?” With a warm smile, she’d held up her coffee pot. “You poor guy. Coffee’s on me.”
They’d ended up spending the rest of the day together. If it had been one of his typical dates, he would have taken Daisy to the most exclusive restaurant in Manhattan, then perhaps out dancing at a club, then a nightcap at his mansion. But he’d known it couldn’t be a date, not when he couldn’t even tell her his real name.
So they’d simply spent the afternoon walking around her neighborhood in Brooklyn, visiting quirky little shops she liked, walking down the street lined with red brick buildings, ending with the view of the East River, and the massive bridge sticking out against the sky. Daisy greeted people by name on the street, warmly, and their eyes always lit up when they saw her.
It had been a wild ride, one that would put the roller coasters at Coney Island to shame. She’d made him come alive in a way he’d never imagined. Joy and color and light had burst into his life that day, from the moment he’d met her in this diner. It had been like a vibrant summer after a long, frozen winter.
But it could never be like that again. He would never be Leo again. Daisy would never look at him with love in her eyes again.
No. They would be partners. He wouldn’t, couldn’t, ask for more. Not when he had nothing more to give in return.
Waiting in the back seat of the Range Rover, he tried to distract himself with his phone. He had ten million messages from board members and designers and marketing heads, all of them anxious about various things; he found it difficult to care. He was relieved when he finally heard the SUV’s door open.
“Everything all right?” he asked.
“I quit.” Daisy gave