Free Darkmoon (The Witches of Cleopatra Hill Book 3) by Christine Pope

window, with the winter light streaming in and wakening reddish tones in my dark hair. The largest one, still on the easel, a stylized portrait of me with my hands outstretched, my face raised to the sky. It was a pose I’d used often during our seasonal observances back in Jerome, but of course Connor couldn’t have possibly seen me doing such a thing.
    In all of them he’d painted me as looking far more beautiful than I thought I was in real life. But then I realized he’d been painting me as he saw me, and not as the world did.
    It was overwhelming. I had no idea what to say. I only stood there, staring, for the longest moment. Finally I managed, “And here I thought you only did landscapes.”
    Then we did burst out laughing, more to break the tension than anything else. Connor sobered abruptly, however, and said, “I couldn’t get you out of my mind. Every time I closed my eyes, you were there. Every time I turned around, I thought I could hear the sound of your voice. It was as if you’d become a ghost, too, and were haunting me. But if I could paint you, think of your face that way, it helped. A little.”
    “They’re — ” I broke off, not sure of how to put it. If I said they were beautiful, was I praising his art, or my own features? It just felt…strange. “They’re incredible.”
    “So you’re not freaking out?”
    Was I? No, not really. Everyone handles pain in their own way, and if painting me over and over again helped Connor come out on the other side of his grief, who was I to say that was wrong? “No, Connor, I’m not freaking out. I won’t say it’s not overwhelming, but it’s not freak-out worthy.” I smiled up at him. “I mean, I’ve got people coming next week to knock out the walls in my kitchen. I needed something to focus on, and I figured remodeling the kitchen was as good a distraction as any.”
    He tilted his head to one side, seeming to consider me. “We really are a pair, aren’t we?”
    “Yes, we are,” I told him. “Now buy me some lunch before I pass out. As I told Marie, I’m eating for two.”
    “Angela McAllister, I would love to buy you lunch.”
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    W e ended up at the Lumberyard Brewery, partly because it was walkable, and partly because by then I really was starving, craving something heftier than tapas or a sandwich.
    “You sure you’re okay with eating at a brewery?” Connor asked after the waitress had handed us our menus and left to fetch us some water. “I mean — ”
    “It’s okay,” I cut in. “I was never much of a lunch drinker anyway. As for the rest….” I shrugged. Thank the Goddess that I really hadn’t drunk excessively after I got back to Jerome, except for that first night. Part of me had wanted to, had wanted to down bottle after bottle in an attempt to erase Connor from my mind. That wouldn’t have solved anything, though, and I’d told myself I wasn’t going to let him affect me that way. Even so, I’d had more than I should. I could only hope a glass here and there hadn’t hurt the baby, but there wasn’t much I could do about it now. “I’m not such a lush that I can’t give it up for a while. What worries me is that I think I heard somewhere that you’re not supposed to eat chocolate when you’re pregnant. Now, that would be a hardship.”
    Connor grinned and shook his head. The waitress came by then with our waters and asked if we wanted anything else, but we both demurred. I had a feeling Connor could have used a beer at that point, even though it seemed he was planning to abstain right along with me. We both ordered burgers, and I asked for a side of mac and cheese in addition to my cheeseburger. After the waitress left, he remarked,
    “You weren’t kidding about eating for two.”
    “Nope,” I replied, swirling the straw around in my glass, watching as the lemon slice bobbed up and down between a couple of ice cubes.
    “Have you seen a doctor?”
    I looked up from my water to see Connor gazing at me