Quiet as the Grave. Kathleen O'Brien

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СКАЧАТЬ space in the house.

      Still, paint was paint, and it had a way of insinuating itself into some pretty strange places.

      “Thanks,” she said, smiling politely at Ben, though her voice was tight. He needed to back up. He was seriously violating her personal space. And that smile was gross. The man was fifty, for God’s sake. His kid was staring right at him.

      She lifted her camera up between them and moved to the far side of a gold chair, the kind of fragile, frilly thing Mrs. Kuspit apparently loved. The huge room was full of them.

      “I’ll just get two or three more shots, and then I think I’m done here.”

      “Great.” Ben looked over at Kenny, who stood next to the living room mantel, where trophies were arrayed like a metallic rainbow, catching light from the overhead chandelier and tossing it onto the flocked ivory wallpaper in little oblongs of silver and gold. They didn’t match the frilly gold chairs, but apparently Mrs. Kuspit didn’t make all the decorating decisions.

      “Hey, I’ve got an idea,” Ben said, snapping his fingers. “Kenny, pick up the football. Make like you’re getting ready to toss a long one.”

      Kenny grimaced, but he bent down and retrieved the football at his feet. He lifted his arm awkwardly, glancing sideways at his father. “Like this?”

      Ben made a disgusted sound. “Damn it, Kenny, why are you flashing us your armpit?” He strode over to the boy and began twisting his skinny elbow into a better position. “If you think I’m paying four-and-a-half thousand dollars to have you look like a geek, you’ve got another think coming.”

      The boy flushed, but he didn’t protest. He just stared at the floor while his father adjusted him like a mannequin. Suzie lowered her camera and tried not to hate the man. Throwing a football in the formal living room? Come on. His ego had to have some limits, didn’t it?

      She didn’t say anything, though. She’d had weirder requests, like the woman who wanted her parakeet’s picture painted as if he lived inside a genie’s bottle. She’d like to meet the psychiatrist who could figure that one out.

      She had taken that commission, too. She needed every job she could get. If the Kuspits liked her painting—and she could already tell she’d have to add about ten pounds of muscle to the little boy in order to please Daddy—they would hang her picture where their rich friends could see it.

      Their rich friends would then decide that their own little darlings deserved to be displayed in a big, beautiful rococo gold frame, too.

      And voilà! Suzie could pay the mortgage on her town house, and everyone was happy.

      Except Kenny.

      Poor kid.

      Ben was big and beefy, a good-looking former athlete. Kenny was scrawny and appeared to have about as much athletic ability as a scarecrow. Most of the trophies on the mantel were inscribed with phrases like Most Improved or Best Sportsmanship.

      “Okay, that’s good, hold that. Don’t move.” Ben gestured impatiently toward Suzie. “Get one of him like that.”

      Suzie lifted the camera, although the image she saw in the viewfinder was hardly inspiring. Kenny looked like he was being tortured.

      He must hate football, but Ben obviously didn’t care. The three older Kuspit offspring were girls. Suzie would bet that, the minute Ben saw the little manly splotch on the ultrasound, he had scrawled “live vicariously through my son, the awesome high school quarterback” into his engagement calendar. He wasn’t going to let the dream die easily.

      If he only knew what a mistake he was making. Look at Mike Frome, the most “awesome” jock in Suzie’s high school. At seventeen he’d landed Justine Millner, the prettiest girl in Firefly Glen. By eighteen, he’d been forced to marry Justine—because she’d had his kid—though he no longer even liked her. By twenty-five they were divorced.

      Not that Suzie was keeping tabs on his life or anything. She knew all that only because, right after the divorce, Justine had hired Suzie to paint her son Gavin’s portrait.

      It had probably merely been Justine’s way of spending Mike’s money as fast as she could, but Suzie didn’t care. She would have taken a commission from the devil himself to jump-start her career. And Gavin had actually been a pretty neat kid in spite of having been scooped out of a scummy gene pool.

      “Suzie?”

      She focused again, and saw both Ben and Kenny in her viewfinder. Ben was frowning. “Suzie? Is everything okay?”

      Darn. It had been a long time since she’d let thoughts of Mike Frome distract her.

      She pressed the camera’s button automatically, forgetting that she’d now have both father and son in the picture. No big deal. She often picked up all kinds of extraneous people and things. She could drop them out with her photo program.

      “Yeah, fine. I think that’ll do it.” She smiled at Kenny. “You did great.”

      Kenny looked skeptical, but he smiled back and shrugged. He turned to his father. “Okay if I go? I’ve got homework.”

      Ben patted him on the shoulder. “You bet. Gotta get those grades up.”

      God, could the jerk put any more pressure on this kid? Suzie began packing away her camera and supplies, reminding herself to schedule the sittings when Ben Kuspit was at work. He did go to work, didn’t he? Surely plaguing the hell out of your family wasn’t a full-time job.

      “Ready?” Suddenly Ben Kuspit’s voice was very close behind her.

      Oh, rats. She’d forgotten that she’d agreed to let him drive her home. Her twelve-year-old Honda, which she’d named Flattery because it wouldn’t get you anywhere, had hunkered down in her driveway and refused once again to start. She’d taken a cab over here, but Ben had insisted on driving her home.

      Suddenly she didn’t like that idea at all.

      “You know,” she said, turning, her camera still in her hand, “I think I should get a cab back. This took longer than I’d expected, and I know you have things to do.”

      “No, no,” he said with a smile. That smile. He caught his full lower lip between his teeth in a way that would have looked stupid even on a man half his age. “There’s nothing I’d rather do than take you home. Honestly.”

      Oh, yeah? Well, honestly, the idea of getting in a car with you makes my skin crawl.

      Somehow she kept the smile on her face, though she was getting downright sick of this guy.

      She thought of the Sailor Sam’s Fish and Chips uniform she’d hung above her easel as a reminder of what life used to be like. A reminder that she was always just a couple of blown commissions away from having to wear that blue sailor jacket, tight red short-shorts, kneesocks and jaunty red-ribboned cap.

      She took a deep breath. “No, it’s okay. I’d really rather take a cab.”

      “Don’t be silly.” He reached into his pocket and jingled his keys suggestively. “I insist.”

      “Mr. СКАЧАТЬ