The Rebel. Adrienne Giordano

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       Chapter Three

      Morning sun shifted, the light angling sideways instead of straight into Amanda’s studio, and she stepped back from the sculpture. She’d been messing with the lips of a cell-phone manufacturer’s CEO, bending the clay, tweaking and retweaking for two hours, and she still couldn’t get the mouth right. And worse, she couldn’t figure out why. As much as it irritated her, drove her to near madness, it didn’t matter. She’d keep at it. No matter how long it took. After the botched nose on the fireman, resulting in a shake-up of her confidence, she’d get these lips perfect.

      The changing sunlight through the loft’s oversize windows didn’t help, so she adjusted the six-foot lamp behind her, directing the light in a more favorable position. Light, light and more light helped keep her focused for the sometimes tedious hours spent in front of a sculpture. Changing shadows meant time slipping from her greedy hands. She glanced at the clock. Eleven thirty. She’d been at it six hours, two of them lost on bum lips.

      “Okay, girlfriend. You need to get it together here. Forget the nose. It’s one nose. It shouldn’t be a career-ending mistake.”

      Intellectually, she knew it. Emotionally, that faulty nose might do her in.

      The studio phone rang, filling the quiet space with its annoying blinging sound. Typically, she’d ignore the phone until her exhausted and sore fingers gave out for the day. But now, with the rotten lips, it was probably a good time to take a break. Grab a quick lunch and refocus. She scooted to her desk in the corner and snatched up the handset.

      “Good morning. This is Amanda.”

      “Good morning, Amanda. My name is David Hennings. You met my mother at an event last night.”

      And, hello, sexy voice of my dreams. Wow. The low-pitched resonance of that voice poured over her. With her dating history, he was probably five inches shorter than her and a total mama’s boy. “Hello, Mr. Hennings. I did meet your mother last night. She’s a lovely dinner companion.”

      For whatever reason, he laughed at that, the sound just as yummy as his voice.

      “That she is,” he said. “She told me she mentioned I was moving into a new place.”

      Seriously, he didn’t sound short. Or like a mama’s boy. If that even made sense because how could anyone know what someone looked like by the way he spoke? She had a vision, though. A good one, an exceptional one, of a tall man, fair haired and blue-eyed like his mother. And he’d wear suits every day. Slick, Italian suits that alerted the world to his blue-blood status. Yes indeed, she had a vision.

      “She mentioned you’d be working with Lexi, who is a friend, by the way. Would you like to set up an appointment and we can discuss what you might need?”

      “Definitely. I just spoke with Lexi. I could swing by. If you’re available.”

      “Now?”

      “If that works. Otherwise, we could look at tomorrow.”

      Apparently Mrs. Hennings was in a hurry. Amanda swung back to her sculpture and the stubborn lips. A break might help. Discussing new projects always seemed to cleanse the palate, help her look at existing work with fresh perspective and excitement. But she wasn’t exactly dressed to meet a new client. Knowing she had a full day of sculpting ahead, she’d yanked her hair into a ponytail and slipped on her baggiest of baggy jeans and a “Make Love, Not War” T-shirt a friend had given her as a joke. The hair she could deal with by removing her hair band. The clothes? Not so much.

      “Mr. Hennings, that would be fine. But I have to warn you, I’m working on a sculpture today and when I sculpt I dress comfortably. I didn’t expect to have a meeting.”

      “Don’t worry about it. I’m in jeans. My mother is on a mission, Amanda, and if you know my mother at all, you know that if I tell her I didn’t meet with you because of what you were wearing, she’ll skin me.”

      “So you’re saying you’re afraid of your mother.”

      “I’m not afraid of my mother. I’m terrified of her.”

      For the first time all day, considering the lips, Amanda laughed. A good, warm one that made her toes curl. Any argument she’d had to avoid meeting with him today vanished when he’d dropped that line about his mother. Simply put, she loved a grown man who understood his mother’s power. How that grown man handled that power was a different story. Heaven knew she’d dated some weaklings, men who not only were afraid of their mothers, but also let them dictate how their lives should go. That, on a personal level, Amanda couldn’t deal with. On a professional level, she didn’t necessarily care as long as her fee got paid.

      Besides, she liked David Hennings. She liked the sound of his voice even more. Call it curiosity, a mild interest in meeting a man with a voice like velvet against skin, but she wanted to check him out.

      “Okay, СКАЧАТЬ