"Tina Wainscott - Dreams of You [rtf]" - читать интересную книгу автора (Wainscott Tina)

Last time it had been sunny and cheerful, but today the late afternoon clouds cast a gloomy air over the beach. And last time there had been more people there. The crowd that gathered between her and the lifeguard station had put her on alert. She'd been too busy watching the restless waves to look ahead, and the crowd hadn't been there when she'd arrived four hours before.
At first Nikki thought it might be an accident, with onlookers circling others who were moving around with some kind of purpose. She had pulled her faded coat closer, hoping to become invisible. Most people didn't pay much attention to her anyway.
When she got closer, it became apparent that it wasn't an accident at all, but a photography shoot. Even though the winter winds whipped, the pictures were obviously being taken for a summer advertisement; the models were wearing gold Lycra bikini tops and jean shorts. They wore alluring smiles, but Nikki could well imagine the goose-bumps the camera wouldn't pick up.
She had intended to keep walking by, but instead became one of the curious spectators. Glamour was something she hadn't been around in two years, and the women with makeup and windswept hair sparked a twinge of envy. Not that she'd ever been glamorous, but putting on makeup and dressing up now seemed as far-fetched as catching a ride on a spaceship to some distant planet.
Then a male voice, clear and deep, made a tomboyish girl leap from her spot behind the camera. "Get that seaweed out of here, Tracy. That stuff stinks."
Tracy collected the piles of seaweed as if it were discarded underwear, with the very tips of her fingers and a grimace. Nikki remembered Devlin, her brother, flinging the smelly tangles on her as a child, just to see her scream and cry. Then she got smart and learned that seaweed wasn't so bad. Well, so long as nothing was living in it. Or dead in it. When she didn't scream, he stopped throwing it on her. One of the models picked up a tangled mass and made a face, which the photographer caught on film.
Nikki could see only the photographer's back as his velvety voice coaxed the models into changing for the next set. He was tall, with wide shoulders, and he wore a leather cap over his dark hair. His baggy leather jacket enhanced the tightness of his jeans. He was wearing what looked like expensive leather shoes without socks, and on the beach yet!
"Come on, ladies. This is the last change, and we're done. Give me another smile. Ah, that's better."
A lanky blond put her hand on her almost nonexistent hip. "Easy for you to say, honey. You're wearing a jacket."
Without a word, he slipped out of his jacket to expose his black sweatshirt, and lifted his hands as if to say, 'See, I can handle it too.' The blond smiled theatrically and whirled around to join her two companions in the tiny cabana erected for the shoot. The photographer shook his head and continued adjusting his camera. It looked like a Hasselblad, similar to her own only newer. Her hand went to the square lump beneath her coat. She couldn't bear to watch any more and had slid from the group unnoticed.
Nikki shook herself out of her reverie. Would she ever feel pretty again? She pulled her coat tighter, taking a last deep breath of salty air before heading back. She needed a friend, and in her life, there were precious few of them.
Ceil was probably at the grocery store scarring free samples or at the Lord's Shelter. That left Ulyssis.
Ulyssis grinned as Nikki stepped inside the art gallery. Beyond his smile, though, she could sense something amiss. Three silver-haired ladies were admiring a flowery painting of a little girl by a pond. Nikki wandered toward the back corner, aware of how out of place she looked in the gallery. You'll never fit in, Nikki, she could hear her mother's voice saying. Why couldn't she hear the nice things her mother had said, instead of being haunted by her condescending words? When the ladies left, she turned to Ulyssis.
"Did they even look at my pictures?" she asked, staring up at her collection-or where her collection had been. "Wait a minute. Did you move them?" Her heart felt a stabbing pain. "Or don't you want to carry them anymore?" More than pain, she felt panic. Those pictures were her only income, and even that was sparse sometimes.
Ulyssis walked over and stood next to her, wringing his hands nervously. He was going to tell her that he didn't have room for her shots anymore. They were too depressing, too real. Nikki swallowed hard, gathering her courage to face his words.
Finally he touched her arm with his incredibly smooth hand. "Of course I want to show them, Nicolina. Your pictures may not appeal to every buyer, but they catch the attention and curiosity of everyone who sees them."
She forced a smile, then gave a puzzling look at the blank space covered with ten hooks. "What happened to them?"
"I sold them."
Her eyes widened. "All of them? At one time, to one buyer?''
"Yes," he said, still strangely solemn.
She grasped his hands and jumped up and down a little. "That's wonderful!"
"It's the man who bought them that has me a little worried."
He held out the business card, an opaque plastic material with a modern typeface. A. Wilde, Visions, Inc. She fingered the raised blue ink, giving him a shrug.
"What has you worried?" she asked.
"Have you ever heard of him?"
"No. He's from New York. I've only met a few photographers, and they were local."
"He came in asking about a woman he'd met four years ago. She'd brought him in this gallery, he said. He showed me a sketch he'd made of her. Nicolina, it was you."
That familiar ache began forming in the pit of her stomach. Fear, the feeling of being prey. Her voice cracked as it left trembling lips. "Me? It couldn't have been. I wasn't seeing anyone four years ago, especially not someone from New York. He must have met someone who looked like me. It was only a sketch, Ulyssis."
"That's what I thought too. And as he was about to leave, he stopped and looked right at your collection. He stood there for a long time just looking at them, and when he turned around, it was as if he'd seen a ghost. Then he asked me if I knew the photographer. I told him those had been there for years, and I hadn't heard from Nicolina in a long time. He bought one, the old black man with the stroller. Then he came back a few minutes later and bought the rest. He left me his card and said that if you were to come in by chance, that he could make you successful."
The business card dropped from her fingers, and Ulyssis picked it up. Nikki realized that her mouth was hanging open, and she quickly closed it. "But there couldn't be a connection. He doesn't know me, and even if he was hired to find me, how could he think I took those shots? Ulyssis,
I never told anyone but you that I took pictures of the homeless. God, Mother would have had me quietly institutionalized if she knew I went to that side of town." Nikki swallowed the lump that had formed in her throat. "There's no way he could connect me to those pictures. You're the only one who calls me Nicolina." She didn't want to believe that someone was after her again, not after all this time. For two years, after the investigation and trial, she had lived on the streets. Her sentence was two more years, and ironically, it was the only place she felt safe.
When Ulyssis handed Nikki her part of the sale, his thin hand held hers. He looked relieved. "You're right, of course. I'm just being paranoid. I'm sorry to worry you. After all, he didn't seem to connect your pictures with the girl in the sketch, who probably just looked a little like you. And if he were hired to find you, he would have pictures of you, not just a sketch. Besides, I called the number. It seems to be legitimate. The answering service said that Visions, Inc. has been around for five years. Don't give it another thought. You know I worry too much about you. But be careful, maybe a little more than usual, okay?"
She thought of her recent forays to the beach, but didn't mention them. "I will, I promise."
"Good." He looked at the card. "If he is legit, maybe you should keep his card. In two years, when you're free to return to society, you might want to call him up."
She took the card. "Maybe. It can't hurt, anyway."
"Your latest batch is probably dry by now. Choose the next ten you want displayed, and I'll frame them for you."
"Thanks," she said, meaning it in many ways. She headed to the darkroom Ulyssis had set up for her two years ago when she realized she had to trust someone from the other world. He had proven to be a trustworthy friend, and without him, she would be picking through dumpsters and living on samples like Seamus and Ceil. As she pulled her prints down from the clips, she wondered about the mysterious man who had bought her pictures. She couldn't think of anything that would give her away. The man didn't have a photograph of her, nor did he use her name. If he were hired, surely he would have given Ulyssis that information.
Nikki walked into the back room to her drying cabinet, fashioned from a hanging wardrobe closet. She tried not to think of Devlin, but sometimes she remembered him at the oddest moments. Like now, as she pulled the photographs down from her clothespins, she remembered finding Devlin in her makeshift darkroom at the mansion, looking at the drying prints.
"What are you doing here?" she'd asked, annoyed that he'd trespassed in her private sanctuary. Even Blossom didn't venture into that wing. Nikki was just glad that particular batch wasn't of the homeless area.
He looked a little startled, but recovered quickly. With his dark brown hair and beady eyes of the same color, he looked nothing like her, but just like their mother. Nikki had her father's light coloring.
"I just wanted to see what you were up to, what you do when you hide out over here."
"I don't hide out." Why did she always sound so defensive? She smiled to diffuse the words. "I just need peace and quiet when I work."
Devlin wandered over to a table where she laid out her photographs to choose which ones she'd try to consign at Ulyssis's gallery, another secret. She wished he'd leave so she wouldn't feel scrutinized.
"You're actually pretty good, kid."
She stood there, waiting for the punch line. It didn't come.
"Y- you think so?"
"Well, I'm no expert, but they're good as far as I can tell. You should try to sell them."
She had been selling them, but she'd never shared her small triumphs with her family. Devlin wasn't putting her on. It was the first time she could ever remember him complimenting her.
"Maybe I'll do that. Thank you."
He started to leave, but turned and leaned against the doorway. "You really love doing that, don't you?" he asked, nodding toward the table.