“Five years of dedication to a piece of junk I can’t even give away,” she said with a smile. A smile content enough that he suddenly wondered if she’d ever really tried to find a buyer.

“Are you going to try selling it to me?”

“Do you want her?” Her eyes lit with humor as she nodded toward her small house on the other side of the acre. “I could use a new roof.”

This time, he was the one laughing out loud. “Maybe one day I’ll succumb to the need to take the elephant home with me, but today I’m not here for the elephant, the ram, the lion, the lizards, or the scorpions.”

“Scorpions?” She shook her head. “They’re Zanti Misfits from The Outer Limits.”

“You mean that sci-fi TV show from the nineties?”

“Not the remake,” she said with obvious disgust. “The original.”

He was hard-pressed to fight back his grin at just how much fun it was to talk with her. He couldn’t remember the last time fun had factored into his relationship with a woman. Especially a lady he was senselessly attracted to. Not only was her art magnificent, but so was she. He wanted her with a sweet kick of desire low in his gut.

“Tell me more about these Misfits.” Lord knew he’d felt like one when he was a kid, living with two alcoholics who often forgot they even had a son.

“They used to do TV marathons of The Outer Limits when I was a little kid,” she explained. “They had the worst special effects, but the stories were great. ‘The Zanti Misfits’ was my favorite episode—all about expecting the unexpected. My dad had a big barrel of nuts, bolts, and screws in his workshop, and I was so inspired by the show I swear they seemed to build themselves. They were my very first sculptures, and every once in a while, even though I already have a zillion of them, I have to make another.”

Suddenly, Sebastian realized there were Misfits creeping around everywhere. Small compared to the rest of her work, they were still fierce little creatures, their pruning-shear claws ready to snip the toes off trespassers.

“Is that how you get your ideas?” He wanted to plumb her creative depths, her mind. Hell, he wanted to delve into every single part of her. “You see something that inspires you and you just start building?”

“Sometimes,” she mused, and he appreciated that all his questions didn’t seem to bother her. “Or sometimes it’s a place, like the church in San Francisco where you saw my dragon sculpture.” The sun created a rainbow of reds in her hair. “A dragon was meant to sweep its tail over the path, barely missing Sunday parishioners. So I walked inside and asked if there was any interest in my building one for them.”

Every day Sebastian put himself out there in a seminar or book or TV presentation. Through his company, Montgomery Media International, he strove to help other people fulfill their destinies, something he found extremely gratifying. But though it seemed he didn’t have any secrets, the truth was that he’d never offered strangers a piece of his heart and soul. And he sure as hell wasn’t willing to expose what he created to anyone, deliberately keeping his drawings locked away in his den at home. He was the exact opposite of Charlie, who was so easy about his visit to her studio, so relaxed in answering his questions, so carefree about the idea of asking a church if she could build them a sculpture of a dragon.

Then again, Charlie’s talent was in performing a miraculous metamorphosis of junk heaps into amazing creatures, whereas his talent was in helping people transform themselves. He’d wisely given up his dreams of being an artist a long time ago, had accepted as a teenager that he’d never see his work hung on a gallery wall.

He ran a hand through his hair, not sure why he kept spinning back to the past today. Especially when it was the future he was far more interested in—one that had Charlie Ballard playing a starring role.

“I’m glad the church was smart enough to be interested. And I hope they paid you well for the dragon. It’s unlike any sculpture I’ve ever seen.”

“It’s Chinatown and everyone loves the dragon at Chinese New Year, so I gave it to them. The dragon couldn’t have lived anywhere else.” She gestured to her crowded garden. “Not even here.”

He supported numerous charities, but he still frowned upon hearing that she hadn’t been paid for her work. “You don’t need to give your sculptures away for free.”

She raised an eyebrow at the slight scolding in his tone and answered him back just as firmly. “I do just fine, thanks.”

He liked that she had an independent streak, her spirit matching her strong, lithe body. He liked everything about her a great deal, in fact. And yet, she really did need that new roof, one she could easily afford if any other collectors discovered her talent. And if she were willing to charge for her art’s true worth.

What, he suddenly wondered, was holding her back from being the superstar that lurked inside her? With her talent, she brought out the majesty in mere junk, like revealing the swan hiding inside the ugly duckling. She had huge vision and saw shape and form in things that no one else could even begin to imagine. So why wasn’t her metal statuary displayed all over the world, in museums and buildings and parks?

Sebastian vowed to find out. But first he needed to convince her to work with him. “I’m opening a high-rise office in San Francisco at the end of September.” He’d taken over an existing structure and was rebuilding it to suit his needs, including a production studio. It would be his new headquarters and that of the Maverick Group as well. “There’s a fountain in the lobby center.” He let silence beat for three seconds. “It needs you.” I need you. The thought hit him hard, right in the solar plexus, where no other woman had ever gotten to him. “It needs one of your sculptures.”

“You want to commission me to design something?” She still sounded as though she couldn’t quite believe what he was saying.

Had no one ever let her know just how extraordinary she was before today?

“I’m planning a grand opening for the building, attended by friends, business associates, clients, customers, art enthusiasts. The fountain and its statue—the one you’re going to create for me—will be the centerpiece of the event.” Her work would be seen by everyone who was anyone in San Francisco and beyond. But it was more than her work that he wanted people to discover and appreciate. “We won’t just unveil your art, we’ll unveil you to the world too.”

She didn’t jump at his offer. Didn’t do anything for long enough that he actually began to worry she might say no. Though he couldn’t understand why she would possibly turn down his offer.

“Well,” she finally said, “I am off school for summer break. Classes don’t start again until the fall.”

He eased closer, catching the perfume of woman and sparks. He wanted her art—and her—more than he’d ever wanted anything or anyone before in his life. “Is there anything else standing in your way?”

She paused again, her expression shifting in ways he couldn’t quite understand. There was excitement there, but also wariness and continued confusion. At last she said, “No, I guess not.”

Now that her mind was made up, she looked at him directly, her eyes glittering like emeralds. In an instant, the spark of desire lit between them again.

“What exactly did you have in mind?” she asked.

You. In my bed. For a month straight. Longer than that. For as long as I can convince you to stay.

But what he said instead was, “A stallion.”

The sweet and sultry sound of her laughter made it nearly impossible not to reach for her, to drag her into his arms and find out if her mouth tasted as sweet as it looked.

“Somehow that doesn’t surprise me.” She gave him a slow blink, then a sexy arch of her eyebrows. “Although I was thinking more in terms of a T-Rex.”