The Finished Masterpiece (Master of Trickery Book 3)

by Pepper Winters

  My lust instantly switched into resentment. “You have a lot of experience applying these?” My jealousy flared again, turning my voice sharp and sullen.

  He studied me coldly. “A little.”

  “For your canvases?”

  He nodded. “If you’re not used to them, it’s hard to apply with minimal wrinkling. I don’t want my painting ruined, so I...offer to help.”

  “Did you enjoy touching them?” Prickly self-pity raced down my spine.

  His temper billowed, etching his face. “You know, you’ve chosen a strange time to get possessive.”

  “It’s a by-product of sleeping with one’s boyfriend.”

  “Ex. Ex-boyfriend.” His nostrils flared. “I’m not yours, O.”

  My stomach twisted painfully.

  You don’t have to remind me.

  I know.

  Believe me...I know.

  I didn’t speak. Tilting my chin, I stuck out my chest. “You’re running out of time. Let’s get this over with.”

  His teeth ground together. For a second, it looked like he’d either attack me or make love to me. But then barriers shuttered his gaze, and he dropped his attention to my left breast.

  I sucked in a gasp as his cool fingers pinched my nipple. His head bent, and he placed a dry kiss right on the tip before covering the highly sensitive, tingly sensation with the pasty.

  I wasn’t expecting sweetness mixed in with the sour.

  My enviousness of other women swept back into blistering obsession. “I hate you right now. I hate that I’m tired and tetchy. I hate that I keep letting you confuse me when I should have the balls to tell you to either commit or leave me the hell alone. I hate—”

  “Finally.” He sucked in a harsh breath, squeezing my breast painfully. “Finally, you’re doing something sensible. Hate me. Fuck, out of anyone, you’re the most entitled.” His eyes glittered. “Hate me, Olin. Hate me...but don’t leave me. Not yet.”

  My limbs turned to water as he pressed my nipple, smoothing out the pasty around my areola.

  “It’s you who’ll leave,” I murmured. “Just like before.”

  He flinched.

  The mirror never warmed behind my inked back, reminding me that out of all his canvases, I wasn’t the most ideal.

  Unresolved anger made me mutter, “My scars and tattoos...will they be an issue with this commission?”

  I didn’t know why I brought up my flaws. Self-sabotage? A cry for help? A final attempt to push him away so I could be free?

  He skimmed his nose down my throat. “They’re a pain in the ass. But I can work with them.”

  Our conversation was all over the place, but I chased him regardless. “How? How will you work with them?”

  “I’ll keep that part of you facing away from the photo.”

  “You’ll hide who I am?”

  “My paint hides who you are.” Guarded eyes met mine. “I know what that tattoo represents, Olin. I’m not stupid.”

  “I never said you were.”

  “Yeah, well.” He sneered. “I get it.”

  “I don’t think you get anything.”

  His eyes heated to green fire. “Really? You think I don’t know that tattoo represents us. Our past. Our love—”

  “Love that you walked away from.”

  He planted a palm on my sternum, keeping me locked against the mirror. “You can’t do this.”

  “Can’t do what? Protect myself from you? Speak the truth?”

  “Yes...all of it.”

  “How about telling you how I feel? How about how pathetic I feel for still being in love with y—”

  “Don’t.” His hand immediately fell away as if the feeling of my heart thrumming beneath his hold terrified him. “Stop it. You don’t. I don’t have the right to—”

  “You know how much I lov—”

  “Quiet.” He slapped his palm against my lips, hushing me. “I don’t want to know.”

  The tiny changing room swirled with mistrust and intolerance, quickly slipping back into our safe place.

  Sex.

  Bodily connection rather than soul belonging.

  And instead of suffering the painful knots in my heart, I threw myself into our chemistry. Chemistry that burned so hot it charred away our past and incinerated our pain.

  This was what we had.

  We had magic.

  That part was undeniable.

  And if it was all I would earn, then I intended on taking as much as I could.

  Pulling away his hand, I said, “I want you, Gil.”

  His eyes snapped closed. “Stop. Fuck, please...don’t make—”

  “I’m wet and pissed off and seconds away from either kissing you or slapping you. You get to choose which.”

  “I choose work.” With shaking hands, he fiddled with the second pasty, tearing off the double-sided tape. “Enough.”

  “Fine.” Sticking my breasts almost in his face, I whispered, “Touch me. See what happens.”

  His entire body stiffened from my angry invitation.

  I trembled for aggressive connection. I didn’t care we were in a public place. I didn’t care I wanted to hurt him as much as help him. I didn’t really care about anything apart from deleting the jittery, slithering envy that still lived inside me.

  His fingers skimmed my bare nipple, making it diamond hard. He placed the pasty over me with a thick grunt. “I don’t know why I’m covering you up when you deserve to be naked.”

  My head fell back against the mirror as my belly clenched. I wanted to puddle to the floor by his feet. “Don’t use them then. You said you don’t like painting with them.”

  “I don’t.” His nose skimmed my collarbone, inhaling me as if he couldn’t stop himself.

  “Then why...”

  “Because I don’t want other men seeing you.” His growl hit my cleavage with heavy gusts. His teeth nipped me before he swayed back. With hungry eyes, he pinched the pasty into place, squeezing me cruelly as if to punish me for his reaction.

  For our fight.

  For everything.

  Instinct took over.

  Retaliation was my downfall.

  My hand shot forward.

  I grabbed the throbbing length in his jeans.

  He buckled against me, trapping me against the mirror. His hips rocked into my grip as his teeth caught the top of my ear and bit. Hard. “Jesus Christ.”

  My heart rate exploded, flying free from everything wrong between us.

  My other hand fumbled for his belt, furious and fast, needing him with a ferocity that scratched skin from bone.

  He bit me again, his teeth sharp before grabbing my chin and wrenching my head to the side.

  His mouth crashed on mine, and our tongues immediately met in a war of touch and heat. I moaned as he thrust against me, pushing my hands away from his cock to wedge directly between my legs. The mirror stuck to my back as we rocked and fought, dry-thrusting, fake-fucking, trembling with intoxication and insanity.

  I ruined the skin-coloured G-string. I’d never been wetter as he scooped me off my feet and drove his hips into mine with such brutality every bead of my spine cried out in pain.

  My fingers dove into his hair, tugging the messy strands all while our lips sucked and kissed, our teeth clacked, our breaths caught.

  Our desire turned us messy and manic—clawing body parts and thrusting want.

  I needed him naked.

  I needed him inside me.

  Now.

  We acted as if a war went on outside the door and this was our last chance to be together. Our last chance to be honest—to let our bodies tell the truth while our words spread only lies.

  “Fuck, O.” He drove his hardness against my clit, sending fireworks up my belly.

  Wriggling a little so I had space, I wedged my hand between us, doing my best to undo his zipper.

  He kissed me harder, and blood mixed with our flavour. Feral hunger infected both of us as our lips smashed and t
ongues duelled. I could come just from his kiss.

  I was empty.

  Empty and angry and lost.

  “I need you inside me.” Frustration bubbled and lust made me growl. “Ignore the commissions. Screw the money. Take me home, Gil. Screw me instead. God, please—”

  I expected him to attack me with rage and relief. To give into the delirious desire between us.

  Instead, my voice acted like ice water.

  He dropped me instantly.

  His lips tore from mine.

  His chest pumped as he sucked in oxygen and raked hands where my fingers had tangled his hair. “Meet me outside.” Turning around, he manhandled the impressive erection in his jeans into a less obvious angle before unlocking the door.

  I hugged myself as he stepped out. “Wha-what just happened?” Shivers caught me, partly from the air-conditioning and mostly from his snowy rejection.

  “I need this commission.” He refused to look at me, his jaw working hard. “I can’t forget it. I’ll never forget it. This commission. All the commissions are more important than anything.” He whirled on me, fury replacing any sign of weakness. “Do you understand? They come before anything. They come before you and me and everybody. Do. You. Understand?”

  “I understand.” I backed away from his rage. “You need the money.”

  “I need it more than you know.”

  “Tell me, Gil. Tell me what happens if you don’t pay—”

  A guttural, god-awful grunt fell from his lips. “I’ll pay. I’ll always pay.”

  “Pay for what?”

  His eyes snapped closed as if he couldn’t tolerate the question. Anguish replaced any sign of lust from before, dragging him into dark, woeful places he couldn’t escape.

  Dragging a hand over his face, utter exhaustion and despair caught him all over again. “You’re destroying everything. I shouldn’t be doing this—I can’t forget what’s important. I can’t let you—fuck!”

  He punched the changing room wall. “I can’t do this. You don’t get to come first. No matter what you do to me, no matter what you mean to me, you do not get to come first. Not anymore.”

  “I-I’m not asking to come—”

  “Just put on the goddamn robe, O. I’ve wasted enough time. I’ll see you outside.”

  He left with a melancholy groan that once again shattered my heart.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  ______________________________

  Olin

  -The Present-

  FOUR HOURS OF tense silence.

  Four hours of wondering what the hell went wrong.

  After he’d left me, I’d bent in half in the changing room and sucked in air. I’d begged my heart to stop jumping around like a fool and willed my body to stop crying for sex.

  I had no idea what made Gil switch so completely.

  I didn’t know why I’d become so belligerent. To be honest, I didn’t know myself anymore and I couldn’t say I liked who I’d turned into.

  I’d always been so careful of who I was and who I wanted to be. I never wanted to be the girl people pitied because of my accident. I definitely didn’t want to be the girl who got trampled on time and time again and didn’t have the backbone to stand up for herself.

  If Gil was just an arrogant bastard, I would’ve walked away by now.

  It was the fact that he wasn’t an arrogant bastard that kept me imprisoned. I couldn’t walk away because he was drowning and I was the rope keeping his head above water.

  After gathering my pieces into the best order I could, I left the changing room with a white robe wrapped tight around me. I didn’t speak when I found Gil outside with the manager of Kohls, going over the vision for his company.

  The squat manager had already arranged tape to be strung around the company’s logo and Gil’s workstation to keep pedestrians away, along with four life-sized mannequins with bald heads, pert boobs, and willowy limbs.

  Next to them, I felt dumpy and un-elegant.

  While Gil and the manager arranged the mannequins to match the huge logo letters, I hugged my robe tighter and did my best not to catch the eyes of half-interested shoppers. Each plastic figure was guided into different postures. Some with their arms up, some with legs kicked. They stayed within the lines of the large letters, adding depth to the brand.

  English sunshine kept shadows at bay, and Gil finally shook the hand of the manager and waved at me to come closer.

  “Where do you want me?” I asked quietly.

  “Sit for a while. I’ve got to paint the mannequins first.”

  I shrugged and went to rest in the car.

  From my vantage point, I’d spent two hours watching Gil turn skin-toned plastic mannequins into multihued extensions of the Kohls logo. One for each letter with their arms angled to match and their stiff, perfect bodies blending effortlessly into the building.

  When it came time for Gil to paint me, he positioned me on the O.

  Of course.

  Manhandling my arms and legs so I curved with the base of the letter of my first name, electric shocks sparked from his skin to mine. It seemed we’d forever be cursed to suffer such connection.

  Our eyes avoided each other, both trapped in apologies.

  Once Gil had me positioned, I stayed sandwiched between fake models, doing my best to be as elongated and as flawless as them.

  “Why the mannequins?” I tensed as the first tickle of Gil’s brush licked over my shoulder—the shoulder clear of scars and ink.

  “Because I don’t have enough real-life canvases.”

  “Oh.” I squeezed my eyes shut as he traded his brush for his air gun, hissing paint and coldness over my flesh, quickly staining me lime, mint, and forest green, ensuring I vanished into the Kohls logo—a complete osmosis of design.

  I opened my mouth to ask what exactly the brief had been, but Gil gave me an exhausted shake of his head. “Please don’t talk. Don’t move. Don’t do anything until I’m done. I won’t be able to work if you do.”

  I closed my mouth.

  He nodded in thanks before forgetting I was alive and focusing on his craft.

  I did my best to keep my twitches and gasps to a minimum as the air gun switched to a sponge and the sponge became a fine-tipped brush, adding depth and reality, mimicking the flaws of the logo and the scars of time.

  A crowd steadily gathered, pointing at the already camouflaged mannequins and then at me as I slowly disappeared. Gil worked fast; his technique faultless as he layered me with paint. The sun changed angles, and he added deeper shadows. The breeze picked up, and he cupped his hand around his air gun nozzle to keep the spray correct.

  I fell into the lull of his talent once again. Awed at how he shut out the world while he painted. There was no me or them or us. Just him and his creation.

  But even in his creative zone, his face held mountains of snow-capped stress.

  He wasn’t happy.

  He wasn’t pleased or proud of his work.

  Each time he ducked to paint around my throat or swallowed hard when he drew a brush under my breast, I wanted to kiss him. I wanted him to apologise as equally as I wanted to apologise. I needed to assure him that no matter what happened between us, I would never ask him to put me above his work.

  For two long hours, he wouldn’t let me catch his stare, keeping his concentration on the area of my body he was painting. When his brush trailed between my breasts and over my pasty-covered nipple, the sensation wasn’t nearly as erotic as being bare.

  My back ached from twisting. My arms went dead from being above my head. And my legs trembled from staying in position.

  Gil worked fast but not fast enough, and by the time the last detail reached my toes and the crowd clapped with how well I’d morphed into the branding of the department store, I was ready for food, space, and a shower.

  Before the paint was dry, Gil turned his attention to the other part of his brief. Halfway through his painting, the manager had arrived with a box o
f merchandise and requested Gil find homes in his design to show the range of what they stocked.

  Now, Gil selected an ebony scarf that he draped over my fingertips, a glossy blue handbag that he placed by the feet of the K mannequin, a toy train on the upturned palm of the H figurine, a silver toaster balanced on the upturned foot of the S model, and a golf club speared through the hands of the L dummy.

  All of us held something, but Gil didn’t use a fraction of the stuff provided, preferring to keep the simplicity of four fake and one alive female illusion hidden in the letters as his masterpiece.

  The scowl on his face and temper in his shoulders yelled he hated everything about this commission.

  To be honest, I didn’t like it either.

  It felt contrived and commercial. Lacking in originality and imagination.

  My stomach growled as Gil stood and rubbed his chin with green-speckled hands. His lips twitched, reminded of my appetite last night. “I’ll feed you soon.”

  The gentleness in his voice was polar opposite to the frost that had been there before.

  The stiffness and suffering that had grown while he’d painted me dissolved in an instant. “I’m so sorry, Gil.”

  He flinched. “No apology needed.” Gathering up his brushes, he added, “I’m the one who’s sorry. I’m not...I’m not usually so quick tempered. I didn’t mean to get so cross.” He smiled sadly while he touched up an area of shading on my cheek. His lips were so close to mine all while his face tightened in concentration.

  Our eyes locked.

  Our hearts pounded.

  He stepped back with a sigh.

  Throwing the used brush into his supply container, he murmured, “You just found me at the wrong time, that’s all.”

  With that cryptic comment, he hoisted the box beneath his arm and turned to place it on the trestle table.

  My eyes followed him, widening in fear at the two police officers who appeared as if from thin air.

  “Are you Gilbert Clark?” one with salt and pepper hair asked.

  Gil tensed, flinching at the police badge shoved in his face. “Depends who’s asking.”

  “I’m Officer Hoyt, and this is Officer Marlow.”