The full picture is three paintings, of three very familiar images. Images I’d know anywhere, because I created them. I take a step closer to the one on the far left, examining every inch. It’s almost an exact replica of one of my floral arrangements, the colors and shadows and details of the flowers captured as brilliantly as my camera caught them. I move along to the middle painting, another one of my arrangement photos. Jack has transformed the image I posted to Instagram, of the arrangement posed in front of the brick wall in the living room, so painstakingly perfectly someone might mistake it for a photograph. The third painting isn’t finished yet, but I can tell by the background and the rough sketch marks it’s going to be another one of my Bridge and Blooms pics, completely brought to life by this new medium.

“What the fuck?” I mutter.

“My thoughts exactly.”

I freeze, like Jack is a T. rex and he won’t be able to see me if I don’t move. “Shit.”

“What are you doing?” He stalks across the room, covering the distance from the door to the corner in just a few steps. The anger in his voice is foreign and startling.

“Look, I didn’t purposefully go snooping, but the corner of the tarp was sliding down and I saw a sliver of the painting and I’m really sorry for peeking, but holy shit, Jack. These are incredible.”

Jack pushes past me, grabbing the tarp and throwing it over the paintings. As if covering them up will make me forget them. “They weren’t meant to be seen.”

“Why not? I’ve never seen anything like them before.” It dawns on me that that’s not entirely true. “Wait. The painting in the guest room?” And the one of the brownstone, though he doesn’t know I saw it.

He nods, yanking down the corner of the tarp, making sure everything is sufficiently hidden.

“Jack, these are really remarkable. Why didn’t you tell me you were an artist?”

“I’m not.” He crosses away from me to the window, shoving his hands in his pockets.

“Clearly, you are. Why would you want to keep this talent hidden?” I take a few tentative steps toward him, but he halts me with a glare.

“It’s nothing. Forget you even saw those.” He rakes his hand through his hair.

I shut up for a minute, using the quiet to inch closer to him. When I get close enough, I reach out my hand, placing it gently on his forearm. “I’m sorry for snooping, but I’m also really not because I’m glad I saw the paintings. I wish you would’ve told me about them.”

He steps back, moving out of my reach. “Yeah, well, not everyone likes to talk about themselves twenty-four/seven.”