Chapter Six

Ryan spent several minutes poking his head into one studio after another, looking for Vicki, before a woman with blue and green hair finally took pity on him. "Who are you looking for?"

"Vicki Bennett."

"Lucky bitch. Talented as all hell and now you." She pointed down the long hallway. "She's on the first floor at the back of the building."

He thanked her and his heartbeat immediately kicked up at the thought of seeing Vicki again as he made his way toward her workroom, even though he'd just had breakfast with her. Her door was open a few inches and he put his hand on the knob to walk through it, but when he caught sight of her, he stopped dead in his tracks.

If seeing Vicki last night in her bra and panties had rocked his world, getting to watch her with clay beneath her hands, her legs open around her worktable, her feet bare, her eyes closed as she worked...was so far past world-rocking he didn't think they'd invented a term for it yet.

Some of the best nights of his life had been shared with Vicki in her parents' garage. She'd gotten used to him hanging with her while she worked. Some nights, when she was really intensely working on something, he'd work on his aim with a bag of baseballs. And on the nights where she'd get frustrated and throw the clay against the wall, he'd take her stained hands in his and convince her it was time for a wetlands walk. They'd both wash their hands clean in the water and he'd want to kiss her so bad.

He could get sex other places. Plenty of it, if he wanted. But he couldn't get what they had with anyone else.

Vicki was his friend, a real friend who didn't care if he was a great baseball player. She didn't expect him to be the easygoing, athletic Sullivan brother. She didn't need him to be the guy who was supposed to have the world at his feet.

Vicki never put any pressure on him to be anything at all. Just himself.

He had always thought she was beautiful, but she was never more beautiful than when she was deeply, passionately creating.

Sun was streaming in through the windows along the back of her room, illuminating her beautiful skin, her long eyelashes fluttering over her cheekbones. She was biting her lower lip as she worked and then licking at the spot where her teeth had pressed a small mark. Now that he'd finally gotten a tiny taste of her, Ryan wanted so much more. He wanted to run his lips down past the pulse that beat on the side of her neck to the curve of her shoulder so that he could breathe in the clean, sweet scent of her skin.

She was small, but her fingers were long and strong as she worked the clay. But it wasn't just her hands that were moving. Every part of her was at least a little bit in motion, all the way down to her toes. She'd painted her nails with rainbow stripes and it occurred to him that Vicki was just as beautiful and mysterious as a rainbow.

One he'd been chasing for years without ever coming close to reaching the pot of gold at the end.

Telling himself that if she didn't come to a good stopping point soon, he'd head out to the stadium, Ryan leaned against the open door and dragged his gaze from her to take a look at what she was working on. Even though he owned several of her major pieces, seeing so many of her sculptures in one place at one time proved yet again just how staggering her skill was.

She'd been a talented teenager, but she'd turned talented into brilliant.

Vicki was just pulling out her earbuds, her eyes still closed as she lifted her arms above her head to stretch, when she opened them and saw him standing in the doorway. A surprised little squeak came from her lips and she almost toppled off her seat.

"Ryan? How long have you been here?"

He finally walked inside her workroom. "Long enough to be reminded all over again how talented you are."

She flushed and reached to push a stray strand of hair back behind her ear, streaking her cheek with clay. "Did you need something?"

"Just to see your studio and to apologize for leaving you to finish breakfast alone." He moved closer to the sculpture she'd been working on. "Is this the one you were telling me about last night? Overflow?"

"No, it's something new I was trying, but the inspiration came in such a rush this morning that I haven't even had a chance to look at it yet - "

Her words fell away as she turned to face the sculpture. She shook her head as if she couldn't believe what she was seeing.

She moved closer to it, her hand outstretched, then stopped as if she was afraid of getting too close.

Even though it was still rough around the edges, he could easily make out the shape of two hands entwined. It looked like surf breaking over them, with water moving over, under, and beneath the hands without breaking their hold on each other.

Ryan immediately flashed back to the previous night out on the beach, when he'd reached for her hand and she'd let him hold on to her for a little while.

"It's amazing, Vicki."

"It's just rough, raw clay," she said, but then she was sitting back down on her seat as if her legs had been on the verge of giving out. "Ryan?" She lifted her eyes to his and he couldn't tell if she was sad or happy. "I - "

He had to move closer to her, then, to put his hands on her shoulders to try to soothe her if that was what she needed.

He could feel the ragged breaths shaking her before she said, "I've been searching for this for so long." Without letting go of her shoulders, he shifted so he could see her face better and was rewarded with a gorgeous smile. "It isn't perfect. I'll have to take the time to sketch it, to make a much cleaner maquette to see where it isn't working and where it is. But for the first time since I got here - longer than that, actually, so much longer - I think I might actually have a chance at creating something good."

"Not just good, Vicki. Something amazing."

She jumped up out of her seat as quickly as she'd dropped into it and threw her arms around his neck. He pressed a kiss to the top of her head and enjoyed the sweetness of her curves pressed against him.

Her face was radiant as she tilted it up to look at him. "I'm glad you came by to share this moment with me."

How he managed to fight the urge to kiss her, he'd never know. "Me too." He looked around at the other pieces in the room. "Looks like you've been busy this week."

She barely glanced at anything. "Dozens of false starts is all they are. They can all go in the trash now."

"You'd better be kidding." He ran his hand down her back to take her hand, then pulled her over to a shelf with blue sculptures of waves that were so fine and translucent they almost looked like glass. "These are amazing. How can you even make the clay do that?"

"You know how. You saw me throw plenty of clay against the garage walls that year trying to get it to do what I wanted it to do. I don't throw nearly as much at walls anymore, thankfully."

"Remember that night you tried to teach me to make a bowl?"

Vicki's laughter was the best sound in the world. "I'm afraid that even five-year-olds put your pottery-making skills to shame."

He'd been a horny fifteen-year-old boy so distracted by her nearness, her scent, her hands over his as she tried to guide him with the clay that, for the first time in his life, he'd been all thumbs. Plus, he hadn't liked not being good at something right off the bat. It had been easier to give up early than to consider the possibility of failing later.

"I need to take a little break to clear my head and hands before I get working again." She lifted his hand, then picked up the other one and studied them. Her eyes were sparkling as she said, "What do you say we give these legendary hands of yours another try?"

He had to work like hell to keep her from seeing just how much the idea of her trying anything at all with his "legendary hands" got him going. "I'm all yours."

At his response, her eyes met his again and he thought he heard her suck in a quick breath before she shook her head. "Go sit. I just need to dig out my wheel and some fresh clay. Put this on." She handed him a thick plastic apron. "We're going to get you all messy."

Holy hell, the way she said messy in that sassy way had him just about bursting behind his zipper. What he wouldn't give to get messy with her.

Glad for the thick brown plastic to cover up his hard-on, he sat back and enjoyed watching Vicki gather everything and set it up in front of him. She'd always licked at the corner where her upper and lower lips came together when she was concentrating, and watching her little pink tongue wet her gorgeous mouth every few seconds had him losing control of himself for a split second and groaning out loud.

"Is everything okay?"

Just taking in her beautifully flushed skin, her big green eyes, the hair falling out of her ponytail and brushing over her shoulders, had him this close to saying, "No," grabbing her by her ponytail and dragging her mouth to his.

Instead, he forced "Never better" from his lips.

"Okay, we're ready." She pulled over another stool beside him and sat close enough that her thigh pressed against his.

"Aren't you going to get dirty?"

She held out her arms. "Haven't you noticed? I already am."

He finally saw that she had clay splattered all over her, most of it on her perfect breasts. The air coming in through the window was cool enough to have them pebbling slightly beneath her bra.

Which one had she put on today? Was it the black one with the small blue bow in the center or the -

His hard-on spiked again beneath his jeans as he quickly fell deeper down the slippery slope that was Vicki.

How could he have thought playing around with her like this was a good idea? But it was too late to get out of it now, even if he could have dragged himself away from her.

"Okay, first we need to center the clay. This is really important, so you're on balance and not fighting with it the whole time. Are you comfortable?"

No. He'd need a freezing cold shower - or a few hours in bed with her - before he could even come close to getting comfortable.

When he nodded, she said, "Press your forearms against your thighs like this," and unintentionally gave him a killer view down her tank top.

Pink lace. That was the bra she'd put on this morning. Worse still, it was cut low enough for her full br**sts to almost spill out the top.

Just barely, he managed to do as she asked, repeating, "Forearms to thighs," like an idiot.

She handed him a wet gray blob. "Okay, now center the clay on the wheel with a nice firm toss, so it sticks."

His aim was dead-on and she hummed her approval. "Perfect. Now start it spinning slowly with your foot and - "

The second the wheel began to spin, the gray lump splooged against the rim of the wheel. He could see how hard Vicki was trying not to laugh.

"Go ahead," he told her, "let it out."

Her laughter immediately bubbled over. "I just had a major flashback to our old garage days. But don't worry, I'm not as easily daunted anymore. I think I just need you to get a feel for the way it is when it's working. Then you'll be able to do it on your own."

His heart almost stopped in his chest when she moved behind him and put her arms around his. "Shoot, I can't reach the clay like this." She moved beside him again, frowning. "Probably the only thing that will work is if I face you on the other side or - " She stopped, shook her head.

"Or what?"

"I could try sitting between your legs." She gave him a crooked grin. "You know, in the classic Ghost position, but without the sex afterward."

He worked to keep his grin easy, his joke light. "And here I was sure that was your plan all along."

Her own grin faltered for a minute, her cheeks flushing before she shook her head and laughed. "You don't know how many Ghost jokes I've heard over the years. I can't believe I just made one." She was all business again as she moved her stool in front of his and pushed the wheel out slightly to make room for their arms and legs. "Okay, let's make magic happen, shall we?"

Heck yeah, he was ready for magic. But since he wasn't ever going to get to the ultimate magic with her, he tried to be happy with what he did have.

With her small but strong hands over his, they threw the clay in the center and began to form it into a cone shape.

"That's it," she encouraged. "Can you feel how right that is?"

Sweet Lord, all he could think was that she could have been talking to him in bed while he was tasting her. He grunted a yes and let her keep manipulating his hands with hers.

She sped the wheel up with her foot, then wet both their hands one after the other so their fingers slipped and slid against each other until it was hard to tell where one started and the other ended. Just like in the sculpture she'd been working on that morning.

Keeping their left hands on the outside of the wheel, she had them press down with their right hands from the top of the clay. A few seconds later, she maneuvered their hands again so that they were pressing on either side of it to force it upward.

"We're ready to make the opening now. We're going to have to work together to keep our hands really still so that the hole doesn't get all wobbly."

Her voice sounded breathy and he could feel her heart pounding through her back against his chest where he was pressed against her.

"Start with your thumb," she said right before she moved his right thumb into the top center of the mound, then held it steady with their left hands, "and then when you feel like we're deep enough, you'll use both hands to widen the opening, like this."

Ryan couldn't make sense of a word she said after deep enough, not with all the blood rushing from his brain and pounding south. Fortunately, Vicki was moving his hands for him on the clay and all he had to do was let himself be led by her.

"How does that all feel so far?"

"Great."

She slowed down the wheel and backed off the pressure of their hands on the clay as she looked over her shoulder at him. "Do you want to try pulling up the sides?"

Thinking that he would barely have to move his head forward at all to kiss her, he blurted, "God, yes, I want to try it."

Her eyes widened. "If I'd known you would be this enthusiastic about it, I wouldn't have let you quit so soon when we were kids."

It took him several beats to figure out what she was talking about. Finally, it hit him what he'd said...and what an idiot he must sound like. In any case, it was for the best that they hadn't done this as teenagers, because there was no way he would have had a prayer of controlling himself back then. Even as an adult, there wasn't much slack left on his self-control.

Before he could figure out how to backpedal from his earlier statement, she turned back to the wheel and said, "Oops, it's going to squash in on itself if we don't get moving. The quick and dirty is that you're going to reach in with your left hand and pull the walls up. On three. One. Two. Three."

He tried to let his hands go loose in hers again, but with the words - and visual of - quick and dirty playing over and over in his head, he couldn't manage it. In under five seconds, the clay beneath their hands went from a well-formed almost-bowl to a haphazard blob.

She exclaimed in dismay at the exact moment he cursed.

And then they both started laughing, her back shaking against his chest.

"I was so sure you were going to get it this time."

"I guess this proves I'm not that good with my hands after all," he joked.

She laughed again at his wildly inaccurate statement and he was finally letting himself enjoy the feel of her h*ps against his thighs, her ponytail tickling his neck, when a figure appeared in the doorway.

Ryan felt Vicki's entire body tense...and his own hands fisted in the clay until it seeped out grey and viscous between his fingers.

"James." Her voice shook slightly on the man's name, but was perfectly steady again a moment later. "I didn't expect you to come by until later this afternoon with the rest of the board."

"Hello, Victoria. Ryan."

Vicki pushed the potting wheel away and stood up.

Ryan moved with her and nodded his greeting. "Hi." He made sure the two letters came out as menacing as possible and were easily translated to read: Hurt her and I'll find a way to hurt you back.

James focused his attention on Vicki. "Has your solo work turned into a group project?"

He was smiling, but Ryan didn't buy it. He was about to advance on the man, but Vicki put her hand on his arm before he could get his fist any closer to the creep's face.

"Ryan and I were just taking a little break together." Despite how flustered he could tell she was, she sounded remarkably calm. "Is there anything you needed before this afternoon, James?"

"I wanted you to be the first to hear the good news about Anthony."

Hearing her ex-husband's name from the douchebag's self-satisfied mouth had Ryan seeing red.

Blood red.