Rarities Unlimited 03 - Die in Plain Sight

the middle of the night.
    “Um, everything is fine here,” she said.
    “Tell it to Susa,” he retorted.
    A gust of wind tugged at the denim jacket Ian was wearing and flattened his jeans against his legs. It wasn’t raining, but it was damn chilly.
    “Is there a rule against you coming inside?” Lacey asked.
    “It’s either that or freeze my butt off.”
    “Gosh, it’s so nice to be wanted for my own sweet self.”
    Before he could answer, she slammed and locked the window. Then she padded barefoot down the stairs and through the gloomy shop with its brooding noir posters, and unlocked the front door.
    “Don’t forget to lock it behind you,” she said, turning her back on thevery man she’d wanted to see a short time ago. But that was then and this was now, when he looked mad enough at having to be with her to take a bite out of a rabid dog. “There’s coffee and champagne and beer in the kitchen. Crackers and cheese if you’re hungry.”
    Ian watched Lacey go back up the stairs like a paint-splattered wraith and wondered what she had on under the huge flannel shirt—if anything at all. The thought had an immediate effect on his crotch, which made his temper take another steep downward dive. Susa and her damn hunches and her cast-iron will.
    The smile lurking around Susa’s mouth hadn’t made the orders she gave any easier to take. Neither did the dark, sultry voice of Etta James drifting down the stairs, caressing the words of “Hold Me.” Why the hell couldn’t Lacey have liked retro rap or the new groups that wouldn’t know a tune if it bit them on their tattooed balls?
    With a sound of disgust, Ian started shoving locks into place. He wasn’t hungry, didn’t drink on duty, and was too wide awake to need coffee. Turning on his penlight, he stalked down the dim aisles of Lost Treasures Found, looking at the shapes of pre-Columbian gods on modern pottery, the practiced ennui of noir posters, and the equally practiced elegance of Art Nouveau knockoffs from the Roaring Twenties. He paused at an Art Deco lamp whose clean lines somehow reminded him of the open country east of the Sierra Nevadas, where sun and wind reigned supreme.
    He flicked the penlight at his watch. Seven whole minutes had gone by. Whoopee. Only three hundred and sixty-seven more to go. By morning he should have the frigging inventory memorized.
    “You don’t have to prowl around there in the dark,” Lacey said from the upstairs room. “I’m painting, not sleeping. Lights won’t bother me.”
    He didn’t have to ask if she would mind company. If she was painting, he could stand close enough to taste her and she wouldn’t even know he was there. But instead of reassuring him, that irritated him. All in all, he was in one pisser of a mood.
    He took the stairs three at a time.
    Lacey heard the footsteps swiftly approaching and gripped the easel so hard she almost left dents. With exquisite care she finished opening the telescoping legs so that she could paint standing up. Normally she sat while painting, but not tonight. She was much too edgy.
    And having Ian arrive like a thunderstorm looking for a place to break wasn’t helping her nerves one bit.
    “I thought all artists worked only in full daylight from north-facing windows.”
    “In a perfect world, yes. I don’t live on that planet. Full-spectrum lighting works in a pinch,” Lacey said, waving her hand at a bank of special lights overhead.
    With that, she selected a fresh canvas from her file of prepared surfaces and placed the thirty-six-by-thirty-inch rectangle on the easel.
    “Is that stuff really canvas?” he asked.
    “The best is made of linen. Very expensive.”
    He looked at the canvas, frowning. “So that’s linen?”
    “No. Can’t afford it, so I’ve adapted my technique to make the most of cotton.”
    “Virtue out of necessity?”
    “Yeah. Like peanut butter. You’ve got enough peanuts to cover the planet, so what do you do? You mash them so they store better.”
    Trying not to smile, he bent over her shoulder and peered at the pale rectangle waiting to be filled with color. “Looks like it’s already got a layer of paint.”
    Lacey told herself that she couldn’t really sense the heat of Ian’s body reaching out to her. “Some of my canvases are commercially prepared, so that I don’t have to fill and sand and paint on the ground layer myself. But this is one of a batch that I prepared weeks ago.”
    When he didn’t say anything,