Instead he darts forward, bends, and clamps both hands on the armrests of my seat, which brings his face suddenly close to mine.
I recoil against the padded back of the chair, thrilling from top to tail. Desire tickles between my legs, and my nipples tighten immediately as my heart rate kicks up. Truthfully, I’m more scared of my own sudden arousal than of his intensity. I want him with a violent surge of hunger, with a craving more visceral than I’ve ever experienced, pulled out of me not only by his beauty but by the sheer magnetism of his personality.
“I’ll do anything.” His fingertips glide up my bare thigh, sweeping inward, just beyond the hem of my dress. “Anything you want. Make you come so hard you see stars…”
I smack his hand. “Stop it, dummy. Go sit on the sofa again.”
“I won’t.” He sinks to his knees, his expression wild and pleading. “I can give you a life beyond your dreams. My friendLloyd-Henry—the one I’m staying with—has connections here in Charleston, people who know me through him. We can get your art in front of the right eyes. Anything you want—money, introductions, nights of debauchery at the best clubs, international travel, every pleasure you could imagine—will all be yours.”
“I feel like you’re a demon offering me a bargain.”
“Except it’s not your soul we’re bargaining for. It’s mine.” He gives me a sudden, charming smile. “Maybe you’re the demon.”
It might have worked if he hadn’t used that smile. The one from the TikToks. The one he has no doubt practiced in front of the mirror for over a hundred years. The impulsive, disarming, dimpled smile, the one designed to make people feel as if he really sees them.
I believe in you, says the smile.I believe you’re a good person, and you’ll do the right thing here.
It’s a smile designed to get Dorian Gray exactly what he wants.
He must see the change on my face, the slipping of the tenuous hold he’d gained over me—the fish turning away from the hook, warned by the glint of sun on metal.
I open my mouth to refuse him again, but he cuts in. “Don’t answer yet. Give me time to prove to you how much this deal could help both of us. I’m not asking for guarantees, just for you to keep an open mind. Let me give you a glimpse into the life you could have. No strings attached. An experiment, if you will—a trial. Two weeks. At the end of it, if your answer is still no, I will accept it. And you can keep any advantages or possessions you gain along the way.”
Two weeks of living the high life, meeting prominent people in the art community? And at the end, I still get to say no if I want to?
Damn, that’s tempting. Especially since I already know I’m strong enough to resist the charms of Dorian Gray. I can do this. I can accept the desperate offer of a dying man, keep what he givesme, and still deny him…
Fuck, no, I can’t.
“If I say yes, that will make me a terrible person,” I protest. “I’ll be giving you hope when I fully intend to say no at the end. It’ll be terrible karma.”
“Worse karma if you refuse me this chance to change your mind,” he counters. “It is my life at stake, after all. I deserve the right to fight for it.”
It’s hard to argue with that. “I’ll think about it—minus the sex part, obviously,” I tell him. “That’s the most I can give you right now. This is a lot for me to take in. I never expected—”
“Of course. Think it over.” He rises from his knees and returns to the sofa, giving me a look at his perfectly rounded ass, cupped by the soft material of the boxer shorts.
No—I refuse to admire the ass of a man whose centuries-old soul lives inside a decaying painting.
I clear my throat. “In the meantime, let’s talk about that stick-wolf. Did that have something to do with you?”
“No. I’ve seen many things, some natural and some not,” he replies, seating himself on the couch. “But I can honestly say I have never seen anything quite like that.”
For some reason, I expected him to have answers. It’s disconcerting when he doesn’t. “So should we research it online or something?”
Dorian shakes his head. “Occasionally you can find accurate information about such phenomena online, but you have to dig for it. I prefer to get the answers from someone who has already done the digging and has plenty of reliable resources.”
“And who is that?”
“My roommate, confidant, best friend, and supernatural consultant, Lloyd-Henry Woodson. He is an expert in—” The chokedsound of my half-functional doorbell cuts him off. “Ah, that’ll be Vane with my clothes and the car.”
He says it cheerfully, like he’s Batman and Alfred has just arrived with his things.
But from what he’s hinted, I suspect the man lounging on my sofa is anything but a hero.
8
Baz
