"For the love of, God." Ada slapped on the lounge lights as Hunter shouldered his way in through her studio door. "What, pray tell, is so important that it couldn't wait until after—" Seeing coffee and baked goodies, her eyes danced. "Gimme." Snatching the tray from him, she popped off the lid, and went teary eyed at the scent of sugar and spices. "Whip cream? You angel."

You could count on Hunter, she thought. In the light and breezy to the thick and seedy, he was as reliable as sunrise, and at the moment just as happily received.

He gave her a moment to inhale caffeine and sugar, unwinding his scarf from around his neck as he took the time to browse her wall of fame, as he saw it. Which had grown exponentially since he'd last been here, with added magazine covers, editorial fashion spreads and runway captures, but one made him stop, look a little closer.

And smile.

Lynn was a vision haloed in light, surrounded by circling children as if she were their sun. The joy of it, the moment and her, swept in a whirl of black and white, capturing the essence of true and profound joy so tangible it made his already tender heart ache.

Ada gave him a minute, lingering over her goodies while he fell into a love-struck stupor she found so damn cute, and couldn't help but smile. Did he know he was so utterly obvious, she wondered? At least to anyone with eyes who looked long enough to see that Hunter Mercer was madly, uncontrollably in love with her best friend.

Glancing absently at her watch, gauging she'd given him more than enough time to dream and drool, Ada cleared her throat. With surprising reflexes, Hunter pulled himself out of his reverie and cast his attention from the photograph, as if it held no more interest than a street-side poster for tampons.

"So," Ada smiled, licking whip cream from her finger. "You were all top secret on the phone when you called last night. Spill."

"Sure, but why don't we take this to your office?" he suggested, removing the portable USB key he'd brought with him. "And I can show you?"

Curiosity thoroughly stoked, Ada led the way through the main photography room, down the hall and around to her private office where she spent the majority of her time, holed up behind computer and desk, working on and tweaking hundreds of thousands of photographs she captured each month.

Turning on the lights, she set her laptop to start and gestured to the only other seat she had to offer—a narrow chair buried under three banker boxes. Smiling, and not needing much more of a prompt, Hunter made himself useful and carted the boxes over to the side wall and stacked them at the foot of a small mountain of similar boxes before sitting down.

Ada held out a hand, accepted the USB key she slipped into her laptop. "What am I looking for?"

"Start with the first file," Hunter suggested, taking a sip of his espresso as Ada found her reading glasses and slipped them on, all business, as she booted the key and found the file. He knew the moment the image popped by the look that flashed across her face and the wistful, emotional smile he'd hoped to see.

"Holy..." she breathed, sighed, then shook her head as affectionate tears swam—though they wouldn't fall. He knew Ada West would chop off a hand before she gave in to fussy, female waterworks. "This is incredible."

He'd captured her in acrylics, Maureen Mercer in all her glory. A moment of laughter and joy, with such tenderness in the strokes of the brush that blended paint with memory, from the day of his parents twenty-seventh wedding anniversary.

"It's arriving by courier tomorrow afternoon. I want it framed in time for the party this weekend."

"It's beautiful," she sighed, no longer feeling moody about being dragged out of bed around the unthinkable hour of seven am. "She'll love it. And I know just the frame we should use. Gilded mahogany. It'll contrast the light tones here, and here." She turned the laptop to face him, sweeping her finger across the screen as she pulled up the online sample of the wood and matting. "We could go for a brushed gold matting, pale—nothing too ostentatious. The wood has a good weight to it and will suit your mom's existing décor, I think."

Hunter nodded, seeing it all come together in his mind. "I like it. Yes, let's go with that."

"Should we discuss pricing?"

Hunter waved the question aside. "I won't pinch pennies when it comes to mom. And I know you'll be fair," he added with a wink. "Move on to the next file. There's a grouping, also to be framed, but I want to see what you think, first."

She did as he asked. Now these were all arresting black and white sketches done in charcoal. Landscapes and city scenes. Old Rome and the hills of Tuscany, the roughened streets in Berlin with a homeless man, barefoot and stretched out on the slab of cold alley floor. Again, contrasts—but this time not with texture, but time.

Old and new. The modern and the forgotten.

She'd seen these pieces, Ada mused, flipping from one to the next, in the Forbes article a few months back. And she thought now what she had thought then, that Hunter was a talent to be reckoned with and was bound to take the world by storm.

"Fantastic," she said after ten minutes of careful study. "There's a lot, here, though. You want them all framed?"

"Not everything, no," Hunter corrected. "I'm thinking a grouping of a dozen should do. Carefully selected with a few of my sculptures and other works."

"For...?"

His smile spread as he leaned back in his seat, circled his thumbs. "I've got a gig coming up in early spring with the Art Gallery of Ontario."

Ada's eyes threatened to pop from her head. "Get the fuck out."

"And I want you to photograph the event."

Her palms began to itch with the glorious thought of fresh, exciting work and opportunity. "Me?"

"You." Hunter affirmed. "Added to that, I want your input on the selection of pictures I am to feature there. We'll start with a few shots, in the studio here, that we can post to the AGO website for their marketing and press. A little behind the scenes segment with me, cataloging a few of my more popular pieces that have already received considerable review. I've agreed to put a few of them up for auction, and to commission three new ones to be revealed the day of the exhibit opening."

"Hunter, I could kiss you." Ada beamed, biting into a soft, chewy gingerbread cookie. "Money is a better bribe to get me out of bed over coffee and treats, but I appreciate you coming prepared, nonetheless."

"So I guess you're happy to take it on."

"Anyone else who dares to want in will have to fight me, tooth and nail," Ada warned with a challenging gleam in her eyes. already her mind was frantically spinning around all the intricate details. This was going to be the highlight of her spring, and would see her launched into a very successful summer and fall.

Oh the contacts she was going to make. The people with whom she would rub elbows. Gigs like this always drew out the money crowd, and those were the sort she knew how best to pitch a sell.

"Just for all of this," Ada straightened, copying what needed to be copied from the drive before she handed it over to Hunter, "I'll give you ten percent off the framing for the birthday present."

"Ever the miserly scrooge," Hunter teased. "I think I deserve more like the industry wholesale of forty."

Ada snorted. "Not happening. Now get. Go." She waved an impatient hand. "I've got work to do. See that your publicist gets the necessary paperwork to me by Wednesday. I'll also draft and prepare a contract for you to review and sign around that time."

"Sounds good." Rising to his feet, Hunter pushed the chair in, drummed his fingers against the backing. "I caught Lynn on the way over. She seemed a little...tense. Everything okay with her?"

"Hm? Lynn?" It took her a moment to focus, for the knowing 'ah' to sound in her mind, but she wisely smothered the smug grin that wanted to tease its way along her lips. "Oh, out for her morning run, was she? Yeah, she's good. Little sister Joy has made an impromptu crash on her couch, but other than that," Ada shrugged.

"So, she's...good?" Hunter picked absently at a ball of fluff on the cuff of his jacket. "Happy?"

"I see time abroad hasn't changed much, has it." Ada smirked at him from behind her screen. "Still got the hots for my BFF."

"Don't know what you're talking about."

"Pfffft," Ada snorted. "Sure. Okay. Let's play dumb. But if you by chance happen to be angling for an opportunity, now is an excellent time to make a move. Reel her in."

Hunter swirled his cooling coffee, sipped thoughtfully. "Lynn's a person, not a fish."

"And single. Going on over a year since there was anything serious."

"So I've heard." From his mother, he thought, who casually dropped a few details his last night, and had kept his mind spinning almost until sunup this morning.

"Hasn't even so much as sniffed a guy since that disastrous blind date three months ago," she continued, examining her nails.

"What's your point?"

With a roll of brown eyes, Ada pushed to her feet and squared off with him from the other side of her desk. "Enough with the playing coy. How long are you going to wait before you do something?"

"Not that it's any of your business." Because he knew it would irritate her a bit, he reached up and ruffled a hand through her vibrant, red hair and smiled at the snarled oath. "But, for the record, I do have a plan of action. One that requires careful strategy. Time. Preparation."

"Pussy." Ada punched his shoulder for messing up her do. "But if it's a question of time and preparation," she added, her mind, switching gears from work to play. "We're planning a little night out next week to celebrate a couple of accounts I landed. Dancing. Drinking. Should be fun. Why don't you come? We'll make it a duo of things to celebrate, an excuses to get drunk and reckless." She wiggled her brow in a way that made him think of Grant.

It couldn't hurt, he thought, after a moment of careful reflection. If he wanted any hope in hell of getting a moment to test the waters, he needed the appropriate place and setting... A night out created a rare opportunity to spend time with her outside of the usual family environment.

"Could work." Hunter mused, sipping thoughtfully.

Satisfied, Ada beamed a smug little grin, flicking her eyes back to the screen though she was keeping her senses sharply honed on him. "Lynn is certainly looking forward to it. I know she'd love for you to come. Just keep that in mind. Oh, out," remembering herself, and the time, she waved again.

"Your time is up."

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