Painting Naked (Macmillan New Writing) Read Online Free PDF

changed a bit, and he’s still got that incredibly sexy laugh.”
    My breath comes out in a rush.
    “What did you say?” Sophie asks.
    “Nothing.” I clear my throat.
    She laughs. “You always did unravel over Colin.”
    “Did you tell him about me?”
    “I said you’d been married and divorced, had two sons, your own business, and lived on the beach in an American state I can’t pronounce.”
    My life, summed up in one sentence. “Where does he live? What does he do for a living?”
    “They run some sort of guest house, or a bed and breakfast, in one of those terminally cute Cotswold villages.”
    “ They? ”
    “Colin and—” Sophie pauses. “Oh, Jill. You know how bad I am with names.”
    I swallow hard. “His wife?”
    “I’ve no idea,” Sophie says. “Probably. He just called her Shirley, or maybe it was Sheila.”
    “What’s she like?”
    Another pause. “He was alone. Apparently one of them has to stay at the B and B, especially at weekends.”
    I want to ask more, but what’s the point? Colin’s in England—another lifetime away. “How’s Hugh?” I say. A far safer question. “And where is he?” Sophie’s brother is rarely in one place very long.
    “Hugh’s in Saudi, selling software to sheiks.”
    “What about Keith?” Unlike Colin, he’s kept in touch with Sophie and Hugh.
    “I forgot to tell you. He and Penny just had another baby.”
    “Christ!”
    Sophie laughs. “He’s making up for lost time.”
    “No kidding.” Ten years ago, when he was forty-three, Keith married a woman half his age, and they’re now on their fourth child. “Sophie, come and see me before the summer ends.”
    “Can’t,” she says. “The puppies are too young to shove in a kennel, and besides, I’m booked solid with work till the end of August.”
    “September, then?”
    “Jill, it’s your turn to come here.”
    “I know, but—”
    Thwoooop!
    My sink lets loose with a gigantic fart.
    “Holy shit!” Sophie says. “What was that?”
    Reaching for the sink, I plunge my hand through the scum and pull out a can of Fancy Feast. “Let me call you back, okay?”
    The pond water gurgles and drains away and I wonder how much money Zachary’s gourmet dinner just saved me.
    Enough to fix the leak in my bedroom ceiling?
    A down payment on my next car?
    A ticket to London?

Chapter 5
     
     
    Sands Point
    June 2010
     
     
    My business line wakes me at eight fifteen Friday morning. I bury my head in a pillow and groan because I stayed up half the night designing logos for The Contented Figleaf, a trendy new bistro on Bay Street. I was beyond tired, yet unable to sleep. Multiple deadlines for Elaine Burke had kept me working flat out all week. Finally, my restlessness turned to rebellion and I took it out on that innocent little restaurant by sketching a row of naked garden gnomes in pointy red hats leering over their shoulders and holding up fig leaves. Snow White meets The Full Monty . I doubt they’ll go for it. Greedily, I snatch another thirty minutes in the sack.
    Half an hour later I stagger into my office. The message light’s blinking. I hit play .
    “Jillian?” There’s a pause. “Surely you’re in the office by now.”
    Elaine. Not a good start to anyone’s day, especially mine. I pad into the kitchen to make tea, and while waiting for the kettle to boil, I grab the wall phone and punch in her number. May as well get it over with.
    She answers on the first ring. “Where were you?”
    I stifle a yawn. “Good morning, Elaine.”
    “I’m in a hurry,” says my most important client, before launching into a list of changes for a sales brochure I just finished. “Are you getting all this?”
    “Yes.” I head for my office but the phone cord pulls me up short. Can’t find paper or pencil, so I scribble on a grocery bag with a laundry marker.
    “You didn’t do as I asked,” Elaine says, contradicting the instructions she gave me on Tuesday. “That shot of the dining room