Gen was right in the middle of primping for her date—fluffing up her hair, choosing an outfit, picking out the right shade of lipstick to complement her skin tone—when Kendrick called her, panic forcing an edge into his voice.
“It’s all wrong!” Kendrick wailed into the phone, obviously already well into a bottle of whatever it was he was drinking these days. “I can’t do it. Not out here, in the middle of nowhere. It was a mistake to come here. I’m going home.”
“Wait. What?” Gen said in disbelief. “You can’t do what?”
“I can’t paint!”
“Of course you can,” Gen insisted. Her pulse started to pound. “I’ve done everything you’ve asked. I got you the yogurt you wanted. I got you the sheets. I even got you a damned skylight!”
“It’s not that,” Kendrick moaned. “It’s not … Yes. You’ve done everything I’ve asked. But it’s not working! Everything I do is shit! I can’t fucking paint!”
Gen held the phone to her ear and pressed a hand to her forehead to make sure her brain wasn’t going to come flying out. She’d busted her butt for this asshole, and this was what she got?
“Gordon,” she said in a tone that was deliberate, calm, and serious as hell. “You signed a contract. I promised you living quarters and a stipend, and you promised to produce art work. I’ve held up my end of the deal. I’ve more than held up my end. You are not going to … to have some kind of tantrum so you can renege on your contractual obligation.”
“Do you think I want to paint insipid crap? Do you think I want to lose every last ounce of my creative inspiration? Do you think this is all about you and your damned contract?”
She heard some ragged breathing and realized with horror that he’d started to cry.
“Gordon …”
“I want to go home,” he wailed like a kid at an ill-fated slumber party.
Gen looked at the clock on her bedside table. Ryan was scheduled to pick her up in less than twenty minutes.
“Gordon, just don’t do anything, okay? Just relax tonight, get some rest. And stop drinking. I’ll come over tomorrow and we’ll talk this out.”
“I want you to come get me,” he said. “I need …” She heard some rustling sounds.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m packing.”
“What?!”
“I need you to come get me and take me to the airport.”
Gen took some deep breaths and closed her eyes. “We can’t do anything tonight,” she tried again. “There won’t be any flights out this late.” She had no idea if that was true. “I can come over tomorrow, and we’ll talk.”
“Fine. I’ll get a cab.” She heard more rustling, and she imagined him cramming heaps of clothing and other detritus into his suitcase.
“No. Wait. Just … just sit tight,” Gen said, cursing under her breath. “I’ll be right there.”
She hung up the phone and looked at herself in the mirror, in her date outfit and her nice hair. All of that hotness, just so she could talk Gordon Kendrick off the ledge.
Shit.
She picked up the phone again and called Ryan. She hoped he’d pick up, and that he wasn’t already on his way here.
“Gen,” he said, and he sounded so pleased to hear from her that she felt awful about canceling their date. She felt awful about it anyway, because it meant she definitely wouldn’t be getting laid.
“Something happened,” she said, and filled him in on the details.
“I’ll meet you at the guest cottage,” he told her.
“You will?”
“Sure. Somebody’s gotta make sure he doesn’t leave before you get here, right? I’m already here.” The way he said it made it seem like simply the logical thing.
“Thank you,” she told him. “Really, thank you. I’ll be right there.”
She hurried out to the ranch still in midprep for her date; she was wearing eyeliner but had not yet applied mascara, and she was carrying the big, clunky purse she used for work rather than the sleek little bag she’d planned to bring to dinner. And she hadn’t yet put on the accessories she’d chosen. Her necklace and earrings still sat on her dresser, waiting for her.
None of that mattered, though, if Kendrick was going to flee the ranch. The money she’d spent, the time she’d put into the artist-in-residence program—all of it would be gone, wasted, if he got into a cab or a rental car and scurried back to Chicago before the residency was over. She’d have to sue him for breach of contract, and the very thought of that caused a knot of stress to form in her chest. She might spend thousands on a lawyer and never get back her investment.
When she pulled her car up to the guest cottage, Kendrick was hauling a suitcase out onto the front porch, and Ryan was talking to him, trying to calm him down.
“Let’s just go back inside and talk about this,” Ryan was saying as Gen got out of her car. “The cab’s not even here yet. We’ve got time to just settle down, think this through.”
Oh, shit. If Kendrick had called a cab, this might not be simply a show of drama, a display of fragile artistic temperament. He might really intend to get the hell out of here. Gen went into damage control mode. She took a moment to calm herself before she got out of the car and walked purposefully toward the cottage.
“Gordon,” she said in the most soothing tone she could muster. “What’s going on here?”
Kendrick looked disheveled, his clothes askew and his hair sticking up in all directions, his man bun flopping pathetically. Gen could smell the alcohol from here. “I told you on the phone,” he said. “I’m leaving. I can’t work here. I feel trapped. There’s no air! I can’t breathe!”
Kendrick turned away from her to go back into the cottage and retrieve more of his belongings, and Gen looked at Ryan and rolled her eyes extravagantly to indicate the depth, the sheer size, of Kendrick’s absurdity.
Wordlessly, she pointed to Kendrick’s suitcase, which was sitting on the porch, and then made a sweeping motion with her hands to indicate that he should put the case back inside the cottage. Ryan grabbed the handle of the big Samsonite and hauled it back in the door, Gen following close behind.
Inside the little guest house, Kendrick had an armload of his things and was carrying them toward the door. Apparently, he planned to take his shampoo, razor, spare shoes, and umbrella back to Chicago without the benefit of a bag to contain them.
“Gordon, please. Let’s just sit down on the sofa and talk,” Gen said in a soothing voice she imagined police used to calm hostage-takers.
“There’s nothing to talk about,” Kendrick said. “It’s over. I can’t paint. My career is finished. I’m going home.” A stick of deodorant fell from his arms and clattered onto the floor, and he made no move to retrieve it.