She did. There was a lovely man, Val the silver fox. He looked like an architect or an artist, but he did not desire to be one. No, Val Gold was the rare bird, an intelligence agent, a lover of art and literature who used them to hone his observational skills and to relax his trained body. A man who, unlike so many modern men cluttering up the atmosphere, was an avid consumer of the arts. One who did not ever think that because he loved reading he was, perforce, a secret writer, or that because he loved to go to galleries and museums he was, perforce, a secret painter. This made him first-rate at intelligence.
Vivienne took up a half-lotus position. She trained her eye across the pool. The sky was blue, but it felt red. The crystal clarity of light in the American Western winter? Well, it
