Time stops as my eyes widen, funnelling a stampede of emotion into me, thrusting deep into the meat of my brain. Mychest squeezes as the sight fills and fills me until it feels like I will burst open from the surfeit of sorrow and outrage, the courage beating in the heart of the painting he reveals.
The world falls away, unable to compete with the image in front of me. A masterpiece that digs into me, rushes through me, fills my arteries and pumps out to my extremities, fingers twitching, toes pulsing with electric sparks.
The thud of blood through my ears brings me back, back to this boy who stood before me in the library yesterday as I examined a book from the same artist and yet never said a fucking word.
“Your mother wasMissy Danvers?”
I venture a step forward, eyes locking to Zane’s then tearing away as my brain insists on another look at the canvas.
It’s complete bar a few finishing touches, depicting a woman after a double mastectomy. An arm crosses her midriff, focusing the viewer’s attention above to the twisted savagery of her scars, the marks caught in such detail I can feel how they’d pull with every movement, can sense the weight of carrying what’s no longer there.
I try to memorise those exquisite lines. The ones that draw my gaze exactly where the artist needed it to go. Absolute mastery of her craft in every stroke.
Then I look back at him. The same face I’ve stolen glimpses of for weeks as I tried to work out what he wants, what his game entails, the rewards and the punishments that might be in store.
His eyes show agony. His pain pulses out at me.
“This is the only place in the world you can see her art. After she died, my father brought every painting she’d ever sold, even from galleries where they were displayed for the public. He brought them and he put them here, covered with cloth or with their faces turned to the wall.”
A blank mask falls into place, his eyes cold as they study me. “Do you want to see the rest?”
He turns aside before I give the answer, the obvious answer, theonlyanswer any artist could ever give him.
“Because you can use this space to work. Spend as many hours here as you want, any time you want; it doesn’t matter. I’ll give you the door code and you can come here in the middle of the night if that’s when inspiration strikes you. The access is yours, part of what I owe, regardless of your next answer.”
My instinct is to thank him, but I pause, the earlier question still hanging.
Of course, I want to see the rest.
But there’s a condition. I hear it in his voice.
“You can use this space but if you want to see my mother’s work, there’s a cost.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
AVON
Zane meetsmy gaze and holds it, keeping me pinned to the spot. “I can’t get you out of my head. The way it felt, lodged so deep, moving inside your body while you squirmed under me, desperate and fighting to push me away.” His breath is ragged, face twisting with a dozen different emotions. “I need to have you again.”
This stoic boy is suddenly flooded with animation, like we’ve transposed bodies because my face is numb, even my lips won’t move.
“You remember the safe words I gave you?” He steps closer, fingers curving around my neck, holding me steady with their firm grip as I nod. “You will always be in control.”
In control.
A concept that’s never felt further away.
My body shakes, bones turned to jelly. I should turn, I should run because what he is suggesting is inconceivable. My head screams not to trust him, not to believe him for a second.
It’s a trick. Everything he does is a trick. One step after another leading me down a blind path and only a fool would wait around to find out what waits at the end.
His enormous palm presses into my lower back, supporting me but also forcing me towards him; the boy who hurt me worse than anyone else, ever.
He hurt me worse… but as I find my balance with his hands holding me upright, part of me is desperate to give in, to fall in with his desires, bring to life what he’s saying.
Warm breath on my cheek, breath heavy in my ear. My body thrums where he touches me, supports me. An electric pulse that feels so good my head short-circuits until I would do anything to try again.
“One painting for one orgasm, that’s the deal.”
