Secrets in the Stone Part 24

"Thank you," Adrian said softly, quite liking the idea of being Rooke's lady friend. And she intended to make it very plain to Rooke and Pops that Melinda Singer was not.

v Rooke unlocked the door to her shop and pushed it open for Adrian. "So, just have a look around while I take some photographs."

Adrian took a deep breath and crossed the threshold. "Thanks. I will."

a 219 a She purposely didn't rush to look at the sculptures that sat on the floor and shelves, but took her time absorbing the spirit of Rooke's s.p.a.ce. This was Rooke's most private place, where she revealed her heart. Adrian guessed from the tight set of Rooke's shoulders as she turned away, ostensibly to take pictures, that she was nervous. Knowing that Rooke felt anxious, probably exposed, made her want to go to her immediately and put her arms around her. But she didn't. Rooke had given her a gift, and she wanted to honor it.

The room was much bigger than she expected, extending back from the front portion of the garage for a good sixty feet. A series of big bay doors ran down one side, probably used at one time to admit large machinery. A forklift was tucked into a corner at the far end of the room and she could easily envision Rooke maneuvering the machine into the room with huge blocks of stone balanced on its extended metal arms. Closer, she identified tanks with dangling black hoses-air compressors. She'd read that most stone carvers used power tools now, but she remembered Dominic saying that Rooke didn't.

"What do you do with the power drill?" Adrian asked.

"I use it to cut up the big stones before I carve them," Rooke said over her shoulder.

Adrian approached the closest sculpture, a nude figure of a woman standing, her arms entwined and curved above her head as if she had just risen from bed to stretch after a long sleep. As she studied the nearly four-foot-tall figure, she became aware that the woman had not just risen from sleep, but was luxuriating in the aftermath of spent pa.s.sion. Her back was subtly arched, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s high, her nipples tight, her slightly rounded stomach almost undulating with the last s.h.i.+vers of pleasure.

"She's beautiful," Adrian breathed, extending her hand toward the figure. She caught herself and stopped.

"You can touch her," Rooke murmured.

Tentatively, Adrian stroked the outside of the woman's arm, over her shoulder and along her flank. She caught her breath and stared at Rooke. "She's warm."

Rooke's eyes lit up. "You feel it?"

"Oh yes." Adrian nodded vigorously. "Why is that?"

"Because she lives for you the way she does for me."

Adrian caught her lip between her teeth to keep it from quivering.

a 220 a Through eyes slightly blurred with unshed tears, she scanned the other figures, all women-all radiant, vibrant, heartbreakingly beautiful women. "They're wonderful."

"Thank you."

"No, I mean, they're wonderful. " Adrian hesitated, but could not keep the truth from Rooke. Rooke deserved only truths. "Melinda was right to search for you, and she's right about your work. You are remarkable. Your sculptures are amazing. I'm glad Melinda is arranging a showing."

"I'm glad you like them." Rooke clasped Adrian's hand. "That's enough for me."

"Okay," Adrian said a little shakily as Rooke's touch sent spirals of electricity shooting up her arm and into her chest, "I accept the compliment. Thank you. That means a great deal to me."

Still holding Rooke's hand, Adrian turned partially away so she wouldn't throw her arms around Rooke. If she did, she wasn't sure she would stop until she touched her, everywhere. The combination of being alone with Rooke here, in this place, surrounded by such incredible beauty and pa.s.sion, made her desperate to be close to her. No, more than close to her. She wanted to drown in her. "What about this big one, covered up in the middle of the room? What's under the tarp?"

"Ah, she's not done yet."

"She? Always she?"

"Always."

Adrian dragged Rooke a little closer to the hidden piece and rested her hand carefully on the tarp. Rooke watched her with such intensity she lost her grip and tumbled into those s.h.i.+mmering dark irises, slipping into the s.h.i.+fting landscape of black and gold and shades of brown. When they'd made love, she hadn't felt the earth move because her body and mind had already taken flight, but she saw it move now in Rooke's eyes. Her blood quickened and her heart stirred and she knew.

"You're waiting for her, aren't you?"

Rooke nodded.

"How long?" Adrian whispered.

"Since always. Until forever."

"Rooke...I..." Adrian swallowed hard, overwhelmed by such powerful, fragile pa.s.sion. So much had happened recently she didn't understand, so many frightening, unsettling dreams and desires, but of a 221 a one thing she was certain. She would never do anything to hurt Rooke, including making promises she might not be able to keep.

"There's a long time in between always and forever." Rooke smiled gently, no trace of disappointment in her face. "Plenty of time."

"Thank you." Adrian brushed away the tear that had somehow found its way to freedom and gestured to the sculptures surrounding them. "For all of this."

Rooke pulled her into her arms, and Adrian went willingly. She needed Rooke's touch. Rooke's breath was warm as her mouth brushed over Adrian's ear. "Don't thank me. You make me happy."

Adrian trembled in her embrace, determined not to think of cold, barren hearths and crumbling stone ruins, of great warriors broken by betrayal and infidelity. "I'm glad. You make me happy too."

"Then let's go to New York."

a 222 a

ChapTER TwEnTy-SiX.

Rooke dropped her duffel bag in the kitchen and held the back door open for Pops. "I could have driven to pick Adrian up."

"You could have," Pops said as he walked with her to the truck.

"But you've been doing enough driving lately. No use pus.h.i.+ng your luck."

"Probably," Rooke agreed, climbing in the pa.s.senger side.

Pops pulled out onto the road to Adrian's. "I've got suitcases you could have used."

"The duffel is fine."

"You have enough money?"

"Plenty."

"You have that ATM card I gave you?"

"Yes, and I remember the PIN. If I need extra money, which I won't, I'll ask Adrian to get some out for me." Rooke grimaced, feeling a little bit like a twelve-year-old going away to camp for the first time.

She wasn't worried, but she owed it to Pops to make sure he wasn't either. "I've also got the medical and emergency contact cards in my wallet. Nothing is going to happen to me."

"I know that." Pops pulled the visor down against the slanting afternoon sun. "Ask Adrian to take some pictures at the gallery. I don't imagine you'll remember."

"The show isn't for another few weeks," Rooke said. "Maybe you could come down with me then. It's not that far and-"

Pops put his hand on her knee and squeezed gently, then returned it to the wheel. "I guess I'll have to buy a new suit."

Rooke laughed. "Why? I'm not going to."

a 223 a "I wouldn't be surprised if one of those ladies doesn't convince you otherwise."

"One of those...oh, Melinda and Adrian." Rooke sighed. "Yeah, Melinda will probably have something to say about that."

Pops shot her a quick look. "She looks like a woman who gets what she wants."

"Uh-huh."

"You two, ah-"

"No," Rooke said as Pops turned into Adrian's driveway.

"Not that my opinion matters, and whatever you decide is fine with me," Pops shut off the engine and sat with his hands on the wheel at ten and two, "but I noticed Adrian has a way of looking at you like she sees you, all the way through."

"I know," Rooke said. "Feels that way too."

Pops nodded. "That's good, then."

"Yeah, it is. I better see if she needs a hand with her luggage."

Rooke opened the door and jumped out, then leaned on the open door until her grandfather turned to look at her. "Thanks, Pops. I couldn't ask for a better family."

"Same here," Pops said gruffly. "Now go help the lady."

v "Really, Grandmother, there's no need for you to call out the cavalry," Adrian said, trying valiantly to harness her irritation. With the phone tucked between her ear and shoulder, she crossed off items on her list as she took one more walk around the house. "Everything here is under control, and I'm sure both my father and my brother have better things to do than drive up here to check on the things I've already taken care of. Besides, I probably won't even be gone a week."

"I don't understand why you have to go back to the city so soon.

What can be so important, it can't wait?"

"I told you a few minutes ago. Rooke Tyler is going to be staying with me for a few days while she prepares for an upcoming show."

Adrian sat down on the bottom step of the wide, curving staircase that led to the second floor and closed her eyes. Whenever she mentioned Rooke, her grandmother seemed to develop a case of selective deafness, a 224 a and she was tired of it. "Rooke is very important to me. Why is that so difficult for you to accept?"

"Don't you think you've asked your family to accept quite enough," Elizabeth Winchester said, her tone rife with disapproval.

"Really? And what would those things be? My desire to choose my own career? My refusal to let the men in the family plan my life?

Or maybe the fact that I'm a lesbian-"

"There's no need to be disrespectful," Elizabeth snapped.

Adrian sighed, still amazed that her family could press her b.u.t.tons so easily. "How could you condone Ida Hanc.o.c.k disowning her own daughter and then refusing to acknowledge her granddaughter? She's your best friend-why didn't you try to change her mind?"

"She had good reasons for her decisions."

"What reasons could there possibly be? You have no idea what an amazing woman Rooke-"

"Really, Adrian, you're starting to sound quite taken with her.

I realize that you've always wanted to be different, so of course you would be enamored of someone who's different-"

"Different?" Adrian laughed harshly and dropped her head on her bent knees. "Oh, Rooke is different, all right. She has no agendas.

She's completely honest. She's amazingly sensitive and more talented than anyone I've ever met. She's..." Adrian stopped short of saying, she's everything I've ever wanted in a woman. There were some things her grandmother would never understand and there was no reason to punish herself by trying to make her. "Let's not argue."

"We wouldn't have to argue if you would simply stop your stubborn insistence on casting aside every standard your family values.

You are well past the age for adolescent rebellion."

Adrian shot to her feet. "I'm not rebelling, Grandmother. I'm choosing my own life."

"And I suppose you would choose someone completely unsuitable for you in every way, just to make your point?"

"No," Adrian said. "Not to make a point. To have an honest life."

Elizabeth Winchester snorted. "Oh my dear, such idealism. No wonder your parents despair of you ever coming to your senses."

"I have to go now, Grandmother. Rooke is here. I'll speak to you later in the week."

a 225 a "Don't make a decision you'll regret," Elizabeth said.

"Believe me," Adrian said as she softly disconnected, "I'm trying hard not to."

Adrian put the phone back in the kitchen and pulled on her field jacket just as a knock sounded at the front door. She grabbed her briefcase and hurried into the foyer. The anger and sadness her grandmother's words had prompted melted away in antic.i.p.ation of seeing Rooke. She pulled open the door and Rooke was there, her eyes alight with the same expectation that trembled in Adrian's chest. Adrian dropped her bags and threw her arms around Rooke's neck, kissing her with abandon. Sometime in the middle of the kiss, Rooke must have wrapped both arms around Adrian's waist because when Adrian, breathless and exhilarated, tore her mouth away from Rooke's, her feet were no longer touching the porch.

Laughing, Adrian said, "Put me down."

In answer, Rooke kissed her and spun her in a circle, then gently released her. "Hi. I missed you."

Adrian's giddy excitement instantly coalesced into arousal. She gripped the front of Rooke's leather jacket in her fists and tugged her toward the still-open front door. "You have no idea."

"Adrian," Rooke said, her voice low and husky. "Melinda's car will be at Stillwater in fifteen minutes."

"They'll wait." Adrian unzipped Rooke's jacket and curled her fingers inside the waistband of Rooke's jeans. "I missed you too."

"Pops is in the truck."