"Can't wait to see the Upsall," Jeremy said tonelessly.
"This way." She spun around and walked back into the room behind the counter.
Jeremy followed. Nick came to stand in the opening. He did not enter the room. Carson hovered at his side.
"What's an Upsall?" Carson asked.
Octavia unwrapped the painting with a small flourish. "This," she said, "is an Upsall. I think."
Carson studied the swirling storm of color on the canvas. "Cool. Looks like the painter dropped a big bucket of paint and it splashed all over the place."
Nick's mouth twitched. "Couldn't have said it better, myself."
Jeremy said nothing, intent on the canvas. After a few moments of frowning scrutiny, he crouched in front of the painting and examined the brushstrokes in the corner of the canvas.
"Well?" Octavia asked. "What do you think?"
"It's certainly his style. Upsall had a way of putting paint on canvas that was very distinctive."
"Yes. That's how he obtained such incredible depth of color. It could be a copy, of course, but it looks like there's several decades worth of dirt and grime on it."
"Which means that if it was a copy, it was made years ago."
"Upsall's work didn't become popular until recently," Octavia said. "There wouldn't have been any incentive for someone to take the time and trouble to forge one of his paintings several decades back."
"Could be the work of an admirer or a student," Jeremy said, sounding doubtful. "What are the odds that an original Upsall has been sitting in old man Thurgarton's house all these years?"
"I'm no expert," Nick said from the doorway. "But following your logic, Seaton, what are the chances that Thurgarton would have had an excellent copy of the work of an obscure artist?"
Jeremy did not look at him. "Like you said, you're no expert."
"But Nick does have a point," Octavia said firmly. "It would be just as difficult to explain a fine copy as it would an original. All things considered, I'm strongly inclined to stick with my first instincts. I think this is a genuine Upsall. I'm planning to get a second opinion next week, though, just to be sure."
Jeremy straightened and shoved his hands into the pockets of his trousers. He continued to regard the painting for another long moment. Then he nodded once, abruptly.
"I think you're right," he said. "It's an Upsall. Which means that Arizona Snow, Virgil Nash, and the Heralds are all about to get a very nice windfall."
"Looks like it." Octavia rewrapped the painting.
"Who'd have believed it?" Jeremy shook his head. "A genuine Upsall hidden away in Eclipse Bay."
Nick smiled with icy amusement. "Who says Eclipse Bay isn't the center of the art world?"
Chapter 8
Another summer storm was headed toward Eclipse Bay. Not a yippy little terrier of a storm like the one that had scampered through town last night and left everything damp. This one promised to be a real monster. It prowled and paced, sucking up energy from the sea while it waited for the cover of darkness.
Octavia stopped at the far end of the short stretch of beach and stood looking out over the quietly seething water. The tide was out. The brooding sensation was back.
A couple of days ago she had convinced herself that leaving Eclipse Bay at the end of the season was the right thing to do. Now she was not so certain. The strange feeling that she could not depart until she had accomplished whatever it was that she had come here to do had descended on her again.
Was her imagination going into high gear? Or was she already coming up with excuses to delay the day she walked away from Eclipse Bay and Nick and Carson Harte?
A shiver went through her. This was not good. This was risky rationalization and she did not do risky stuff. According to Claudia, the tendency to play it safe and not take chances was a major failing. She could still hear her aunt's words ringing in her head.
You know what I want you to do after I'm gone? I want you to go out and raise a little hell. Live it up. Take some chances. Life is too damned short as it is. You want to get to my age and have nothing interesting to look back on?
Okay, so she'd taken a mini-chance last night and what did she have to show for it? She'd cooked dinner for Nick Harte. Big deal. She'd kicked him out of the cottage before she'd even discovered whether or not he was sufficiently interested in having mad, passionate sex with her to bother to give her The Talk.
Playing it safe.
She had set out to walk off the restlessness after getting home from the gallery, but the exercise wasn't working as therapy. It was tempting to blame her mood on the advancing storm, but she knew there were other factors at work. One of them was the memory of the tension she had witnessed between Nick and Jeremy earlier that day.
Why was she allowing the thinly veiled hostility that had shimmered between those two get to her? It wasn't her problem if they had issues. She had her own issues. She had a business to sell. That sort of enterprise required planning and care. And then there was the move away from Eclipse Bay to engineer. For starters, she had to make arrangements to ship all of the stuff she had brought here. What on earth had made her bring so many of her personal treasures to the cottage? She should have left them at her apartment in Portland.
But the apartment in the city had always had a temporary feel. She had not been tempted to try to settle in there. It was her cottage here in Eclipse Bay that she had tried to turn into a home.
Lots of issues.'
Nick Harte.
Yes, indeed. Nick Harte was a big issue.
What was it about him that drew her? He was not her type. She had more in common with Jeremy Seaton, when you got right down to it.
This was getting her nowhere. Brooding was a waste of time and energy and it never, in her experience, resulted in good outcomes. The negative feelings simply fed on themselves and got heavier and more bleak.
It was time to get a grip. Take charge. Act responsibly.
She turned and started determinedly back along the beach.
She had almost reached the bottom of the cliff path when the overwhelming, primordial knowledge that she was not alone jangled her senses.
She looked up quickly and caught her breath when she saw Nick standing at the top of the bluff. The ominous early twilight generated by the oncoming storm etched him in mystery. His dark hair was ruffled by the growling wind. His black windbreaker was open, revealing the black pullover and jeans he wore underneath. Top bad there wasn't a photographer around, she thought. This shot would have been perfect for the back cover photo on one of his books.