(POV Grace)
Saturday morning followed the script of normalcy. I woke up early, and the aroma of coffee—made by my own hands—was the first sign of life in the house. I wasn’t working today, which meant the day belonged to my canvases. Painting is the only territory where I find real peace; it’s my portal to a time when life wasn’t a battlefield, when my only concern was brush technique and the dream of being recognized. Not that I complain about my current reality, but I miss the lightness of when the future was nothing more than a blank canvas waiting for vibrant colors.
Emily woke up soon after, drawn by the smell coming from the kitchen. I love my sister, but I won’t deny that she’s difficult. We live in the house our parents left us, and my job is what keeps everything standing. I make any sacrifice so she can have a different destiny than mine. I’m immensely proud to see her in college, studying something she enjoys. I set a clear condition for her: either she works, or she studies. Since she chose books, it falls on me to carry the weight of the expenses. It’s my sense of responsibility, forged by force when I was still very young. I know I’m sometimes too strict, but it’s my way of protecting her now that she’s an adult with her own freedom.
Emily finished eating and left, saying she was meeting her friends from the club. With the house finally immersed in silence, I headed to my refuge. Of the four bedrooms in the house, our parents’ room remains closed; the other two belong to Emily and me. The room that would have been for guests I turned into a studio after selling the old furniture. I adjusted the blank canvas, spread the paints on the palette, and began to work.
My focus was broken by the sound of the doorbell. I wasn’t expecting anyone. When I opened the door, I came face to face with a familiar face.
“Ah, Luke,” Emily’s friend. “Are you looking for Emily?”
It was the logical conclusion, but what he said next disarmed me.
“Uh, no… I wanted to see you.”
I felt genuine confusion. See me? Why? He began trying to explain himself, his face turning red and his voice heavy with shyness. For a brief moment, I found it cute. He radiated an innocence I rarely see. Memories of our last encounter resurfaced: him seeing me naked in the bathroom, that accident which, apparently, had left a mark. With that innocent appearance… had he fallen in love?
It’s been a long time since I truly interacted with a man; my last relationship ended two years ago. A playful—and I admit, slightly cruel—idea crossed my mind. It might be entertaining to tease that innocent heart a little. I mentally apologized to him, but decided to play along.
I invited him in, and he accepted. I led him to the studio, walking ahead and feeling his eyes fixed on my back. I made sure to exaggerate my steps to provoke him. Inside the room, I pointed to the bench for him to sit and bent down to pick up the paints from the floor in the most blatant way possible. From the corner of my eye, I saw his face burning red. I could almost see the scenes running through his mind.
“You said you came to see me. You saw me naked and fell in love, Luke?” I asked, sliding the brush across the canvas in a provocative tone.
I expected an awkward reaction, something typical of a dazzled boy. But he surprised me with a sharp honesty.
“No. I don’t think I fell in love at first sight,” he replied, with a frankness that caught me off guard.
“Really? Then my intuition was wrong,” the thought slipped out loud.
“Maybe yes, maybe no. I don’t know,” his voice came exposed, unfiltered. “But since that last time, you haven’t left my mind. That made me feel like a pervert.”
I liked that. I appreciate honesty. Luke, trying to escape the tension, changed the subject and asked how long I’d been painting. He complimented my talent and said I could be a professional. The comment touched an old wound, and without realizing it, I let my feelings show.
“Thank you. I wanted to be a professional once, but that’s in the past. Still, hearing someone praise my paintings… it makes me happy. Truly.”
I thought he’d stop there, but he insisted on knowing why I’d given up. His eyes searched for my story. I tried to brush it off, saying it was boring, but he was persistent, encouraging me with his gaze.
Without noticing, I was pouring out my bitter past. I told him about my parents’ death during a robbery twelve years ago, when I was sixteen and Emily was only eight. I told him how I had to give up art to work and make sure she grew up protected, relying only on the limited help of our grandparents.
“Today I paint just to try to relax,” I finished. “A boring story, right?”
“No. It was sad, actually,” he commented, thoughtfully.
To my surprise, he returned the trust. He told me about losing his mother, his father, and the loving stepmother who passed away three years ago. The atmosphere grew heavy, charged with shared losses, and we decided to change the subject. It had been a long time since I’d truly listened to someone like that. My routine is just work, painting, and rest.
But as he talked, my image of an “innocent boy” crumbled. He vented about everything: the dangerous involvement with ex-mafia members because of Vanessa, Sofia’s possessiveness, Bianca’s intrigues, the jerk who tormented Olivia, and even his concern over my sister’s play.
Luke remained there, lying on the floor of my studio as if that piece of wood were the safest place in the world to unload his secrets. He trusted me—a near stranger—and the weight of that trust brought an unexpected warmth to my chest. I listened to stories about the other women, and although he called them “friends,” my intuition screamed that there was something far more visceral there.
“I bet you’re sleeping with them,” I commented bluntly. “Only desire would make a man get into so much trouble.”
“Well… not with all of them,” he confessed, his voice echoing softly through the room.
“Wait. Are you sleeping with my sister?” I asked, turning abruptly to face him, my heart jolting with concern.
“No.”
“Do you intend to?”
“I… I don’t know. Well, with the women I’ve been involved with, I only slept with them because they wanted to do it with me first.”
I fell silent for a second, processing that. Looking closely, Luke was undeniably handsome, with strong features and eyes that carried premature maturity—but to the point of women taking the initiative? He didn’t seem like the type who hunted women; he seemed like the type who was hunted.
“Seriously?”
“Yes. You’re the only one that I—”
He froze mid-sentence, but the air in the studio was already saturated with what went unsaid. I saw in the depths of his eyes a raw desire, a spark I myself hadn’t felt in a long time. The tension was electric, but I needed space to breathe.
“It’s almost lunchtime,” I said, steering the conversation away before the silence consumed us. “Emily will probably eat out today.”
“Do you want to have lunch with me at a restaurant?”
“Well… I’d like that.”
There was no reason to refuse. I stood up feeling a lightness I hadn’t felt in years. It was as if, by listening to his problems, mine had become a little smaller.
“I’m going to take a shower. And don’t go into the bathroom this time,” I joked, recalling our previous incident to ease the mood.
While he lay back down on the floor, I walked toward the shower feeling strangely good. For the first time, someone had seen me beyond the surface of the “responsible older sister,” and for some reason, I had done the same for him.
I took a quick shower, letting the hot water relax my shoulders. As I dried off in front of the mirror, I noticed the marks of exhaustion; excessive work and constant worry had stolen some of my glow, but today my eyes shone differently. I put on clean clothes—simple but well-fitted—and went out. Luke wasn’t in the living room; he was still in the studio. When I entered, I saw him standing there, hypnotized by one of my paintings.
“Luke?” I called softly. “Do you like the painting?”
“Oh, yes.” He seemed to wake from a trance, reflecting on the canvas. “I think I had an idea,” he murmured, almost like a thought out loud. Then he focused on me. “Well, are you ready?”
“Yes. I’m just going to hang the towel to dry.”
I turned my back and went to the laundry area, hearing his footsteps behind me as he settled into the living room to wait.
“Alright, let’s go,” I announced when I returned. “I’m hungry.”
We went down the side stairs, and the buzz of tattoo machines from the studio downstairs filled the air.
“Is there somewhere you’d like to go, Grace?” Luke asked as we walked toward the street.
“I don’t usually eat out. Do you have an idea?”
“Well, there’s a restaurant that just opened near my place. I wanted to try the food there.”
I accepted the offer, but my surprise came immediately after. Luke led me to a sleek car, a machine that exuded luxury and power. I felt immediate unease. He’s a boy around Emily’s age—how could he have a car like that? He got in with disconcerting naturalness, and I followed. The interior was immaculate, smelling of new leather and expensive cologne.
As we crossed the city, he asked about my work, but my mind was focused on the change of scenery. Soon, we entered one of the most upscale neighborhoods in the city, a place of imposing buildings and businessmen’s mansions. The luxury was so palpable that I felt small, out of place.
“I live in that building,” Luke pointed to a magnificent tower as we passed. “The penthouse… maybe you’ll visit someday.”
He wasn’t showing off. There was no arrogance in his tone, just a natural statement of his reality. That sharpened my curiosity: who was this boy really, the one who poured his heart out on the floor of a modest studio, yet lived in a luxury penthouse?
He parked in front of the restaurant. The place overflowed with sophistication, and as I looked at the façade, a chill ran down my spine at the thought of the prices on the menu.
“Luke… I don’t have enough money to eat here,” I confessed honestly. The last thing I wanted was to be embarrassed when splitting the bill.
He tilted his head, looking at me with a mildly amused but kind expression.
“Hm?” He gave a half-smile. “I invited you, Grace. I’m paying. Come on, I’m hungry.”
We entered the restaurant, and the atmosphere was exactly what I feared: pure refinement. The high ceilings, soft lighting, and the discreet clinking of silverware against fine porcelain made every step I took on the plush carpet feel like that of an intruder. Luke, however, moved with impressive ease. He didn’t seem to want attention or to show off; he simply belonged there, moving with a calmness that made me even more intrigued.
We were led to a reserved table, and soon our orders were placed. While we waited for the food, the comfortable silence we’d built in my studio returned, but now it was charged with questions swirling in my mind. I looked at him, trying to reconcile the image of the boy who vented on my floor with this neighborhood and the luxury around us.
“Luke,” I began, resting my elbows on the table and looking at him with curiosity I could no longer hide. “How is it possible that you live in this neighborhood? And in that penthouse you pointed out?”
He took a sip of water, keeping his expression calm. There wasn’t a trace of arrogance in his voice or vanity in his eyes when he answered. It was disarmingly simple, as if stating an ordinary fact.
“I’m the heir to LA Models,” he said, with the same naturalness as someone stating their own name.
I was stunned for a few seconds. I knew the agency; it was one of the largest and most influential in the country, responsible for launching faces we saw everywhere. Seeing Luke there, acting so humbly and directly, made everything feel surreal. Suddenly, the puzzle pieces he’d laid out in my studio began to fit together differently. I remembered every name he’d mentioned while lying on my floor, and one of them lit up in my mind with new meaning.
“Wait,” I said, leaning forward, eyes wide. “In the studio, you mentioned a Bianca who lives with you. Is that… Bianca from those ads? The model who’s on every luxury billboard?”
Luke let out a heavy sigh, almost a lament, and gave a half-smile of someone who knows the person behind the makeup and glamour all too well.
“That’s her. And believe me, she’s a pain in the ass,” he confirmed, in the tone of someone who deals with a spoiled child every day. “Living with her requires a patience I don’t always have.”
I froze. The woman half the country saw as an untouchable icon of perfection was, to the man sitting in front of me, just a source of domestic headaches and arrogance.
Our dishes arrived, and the conversation shifted to something deeper. Luke began talking about his future perspectives for the company. He didn’t speak like a “rich kid” who’d inherited a new toy, but like someone who understood the responsibility of managing a business and the people involved. He had real plans, a vision for growth, and spoke with a maturity that made me forget, for moments, that he was in my sister’s age group.
We finished eating, and he paid the bill with the same discretion he did everything else. I watched him, still trying to process the layers of this man. The boy I thought I could “tease” with my body was, in reality, someone carrying a legacy on his shoulders, dealing with famous models, and still preferring the floor of a painting studio to vent his problems.
That “humble heir” aura was dangerously attractive. We left the restaurant, and I felt strangely good, as if I’d just read the first chapter of a book I wouldn’t be able to put down.
We got into the car, and the scent of new leather enveloped me again, but this time the atmosphere felt more intimate after all the revelations. I was still processing the fact that I was sitting next to the heir of LA Models, a man with the world at his feet who preferred the simplicity of an honest conversation.
“Is there still room for dessert?” Luke asked, a playful glint in his eyes.
“There’s always room,” I replied, smiling.
I expected him to take me to a French patisserie or somewhere with complicated names on the menu, but Luke surprised me again. We stopped at a simple, colorful neighborhood ice cream shop. He bought popsicles for both of us. There, standing on the sidewalk, licking ice cream like two ordinary young people, the social gap between my reality and his luxury penthouse seemed to vanish completely. He was just Luke.
The drive back to my house was calm. He drove smoothly, keeping a light conversation that made me forget the chaos of his life—and mine. When he parked in front of my gate, the silence inside the car became dense, charged with the electricity that had begun in my studio.
Luke cleared his throat, his hands tightening slightly on the steering wheel. He seemed to have returned to being that shy boy who rang my doorbell hours earlier.
“Grace…” he began, hesitating. “I… could you give me your number? I’d like to stay in touch.”
He looked genuinely embarrassed asking, which was almost ironic given his position. I watched him for a moment. I knew what he wanted; I remembered well the raw desire in his gaze in the studio, the lust he barely managed to hide while I was painting. But there was something more now—a connection we couldn’t ignore.
“Of course, Luke. Give me your phone.”
I typed in my number and handed it back. I was ready to get out, but the provocative woman inside me couldn’t leave without delivering checkmate. I wanted him thinking about me all night.
I leaned toward him, closing the distance between our seats. His cologne hit me instantly. I placed a lingering kiss on his cheek, feeling the warmth of his skin.
“Thank you for lunch. I really enjoyed talking to you—truly,” I whispered near his face.
Before pulling away, I slid my lips toward the curve of his ear. My voice came out low, husky, loaded with all the provocation I’d been holding back since I saw him standing at my door.
“But listen carefully… if you want to sleep with me, you’re going to have to work very hard for it from now on.”
I pulled away slowly, savoring his expression. Luke looked like he’d short-circuited—eyes fixed ahead, hands frozen, completely off balance. I got out of the car and closed the door with a sharp click, walking to my gate without looking back, but feeling the weight of his gaze following me until I disappeared inside the house—lighter and satisfied.
