“Well done! Very well done!” Madame clapped lightly, interrupting Selena’s reverie.
Her body was pleasantly sore, but Selena felt refreshed in a way she hadn’t experienced since the moment the curtain had closed at the Opera House that last night she had performed with the Boston Ballet.
Madame handed Selena a bottle of water “I was there, that night at the Opera.”
“Not one of my better moments,” Selena said ruefully.
Madame gave an airy wave of her hand. “Nonsense. You are not responsible for the behavior of others.”
The water was cool against Selena’s parched throat, and Selena realized she was covered in a thin sheen of perspiration. She reached for her hoodie, slipping her arms into the sleeves. It wouldn’t do any good to get chilled and pull a muscle just when she was starting to think things were moving in the right direction.
“I will be glad to have you in my advanced class.” Madame turned off the music and picked up her bag. “There are several dancers preparing to audition for various national ballet companies, and I have one or two students brushing up on their technique before heading off to schools in other cities. You’ll be a welcome addition.”
Selena was overwhelmed with gratitude, something not usually in her emotional range. “Thank you.”
“You may begin day after tomorrow, Wednesday, at eleven o’clock.” Madame escorted Selena out the door and back into the hallway. “Make sure to stretch in the meantime. You’ll stiffen up otherwise. And I think I will start your teaching career with the young ladies you saw finishing up when you arrived. They are a lively group, but eager to please. I’ll leave you notes on their progress, and I will observe until you feel comfortable enough to go solo.”
Selena had never been to Oz, but she was starting to feel a little bit like Dorothy. Her life had changed so rapidly in the last few months she wasn’t certain she’d even recognize the woman who had stood in front of the mirror in a designer wedding dress. Maybe Jackson had actually done Selena a favor when he’d torn a hole in her pampered princess facade.
* * * *
Seraph’s text hit Demon’s phone as he was parking his car at Triptych. It was tempting to erase the message and pretend it’d been lost in cyberspace. Unfortunately his overbearing employer had opted for the messaging feature that told the sender when the missive was received.
He typed off a response, musing that this version of communication was far better than the methods available when he’d started with Seraph fifteen years ago. There was nothing like listening to her screech echo off the club walls until she found someone to run her errands.
The car beeped when he pushed the Lock button. Stashing the fob in his jeans pocket, he strode into the deep shadows near the elevator. He opted for the stairs, disliking the close feeling of being shut in a tiny box with no ready escape. The claustrophobic sensation was one thing he refused to tolerate unless no other choice presented itself.
When he emerged in the narrow stairwell a few yards from Seraph’s chambers, one of the security officers he’d assigned to her detail was waiting for him.
“I was about to call you.” Lucas stabbed his fingers through his short dark hair. “She told me to get a car ready for a trip to New York, but there’s nothing on the schedule.”
Demon considered this new information. Lucas was ex-military like the other five men he’d handpicked for this job. Handling Seraph took an iron will since she was the biggest control freak of them all. If Lucas thought there was something odd going on, there probably was.
The other man pursed his lips as if trying to decide what he could divulge. “She was pretty secretive, told me and Jace she was doing some shopping. The gist was that she’s picking up something special for you, so we shouldn’t mention anything.”
The likelihood of that was almost nil. In all the years Demon had worked for Seraphina de Medici, any gifts she’d ever given had been spontaneous and in the moment. They were never planned, not even the ones she used to garner loyalty.
“Plus, she’s not taking Jessica.” Lucas didn’t need to expand on the weirdness of Seraph going somewhere without her submissive in tow.
There was really only one way to proceed. “Give her everything she’s asked for. Don’t mention that you’ve discussed it with me. She’s obviously up to something. Until I know what, I have no choice but to play the hand I’m dealt.” Demon knew he didn’t have to tell Lucas to keep his eyes and ears open. He just hoped none of the men he’d hired would lose their lives to one of Seraph’s mad business schemes.
Both men could hear the snap of a whip through the door. Lucas grimaced. “Malachi pissed her off so badly earlier this afternoon I almost called you. She’s had Jessica in there for over two hours. About an hour ago she sent for one of the other subs from the Underground. I haven’t heard much since.”
Demon nodded to let the other man know he would handle whatever he found inside the mistress’s chambers. He inhaled deeply and sought the calm center he always carried deep within himself. He’d once heard someone mention something they called a Zen feeling. Western culture sought the sensation by redecorating their homes or landscaping a garden. They never seemed to fully grasp that it was an internal state of mind more than something experienced while inside an external structure.
He pushed open Seraph’s door without knocking and stepped lightly inside. The tapestry she’d ripped down the previous night had been rehung, and someone had cleaned up the shattered trinkets.
“Does it feel good, Jessica?” Seraph was dressed in a black latex catsuit that hugged every ample curve of her body.
“Yes, Mistress.”
It took every ounce of his self-control to stifle the urge to cringe when he realized Seraph had donned her favorite strap-on and was fucking Jessica while the sub bent over the desk. The slim little submissive had her hands clenched around the beveled edge to keep herself from being shoved over the top, and her round bottom was rosy with lashes from Seraph’s whip.
Catching movement from the corner of his eye, Demon realized there was another woman in the room. The diminutive creature was crouched in a corner beside the chaise longue. The only impression he got was of straight dark hair and a slender build. He recalled Lucas’s assertion that Seraph had called for another sub from the Underground. As far as Demon knew, the Underground didn’t keep extras hanging about to be used like rental property. Malachi wouldn’t have tolerated that sort of practice.
“It’s about time you showed up.” Seraph pulled out of Jessica’s pussy, the cock strapped to her hips jutting out at an awkward angle. “I told you to convince Malachi to sign off on the new boarding school for Alisa, not give him more room to argue. How the hell does he know he has to agree?”
Demon let his gaze wander over Jessica’s prone body. At the moment she looked lost in an erotic daze, her body quivering with the need to be fucked. That was fine. It was only when the subs began to show true fear instead of desire that Demon felt it necessary to step in.
“Intrigued, Demon?” Seraph asked silkily. “If you bend over right beside her, I’d be happy to give you some. We both know it’s been a long time.”
Something caustic smoldered beneath Demon’s carefully blank exterior. This was the woman who had reduced Malachi to ashes by systematically using a combination of sex and insults to destroy the psyche of a seventeen-year-old.
“I think that’s the most emotion I’ve ever seen on your face, you cold bastard.” Seraph’s expression turned almost thoughtful. “I’d started to wonder if my brother had turned you into a eunuch all those years ago.”
Her words unleashed a torrent of buried emotions, all of them tinged with anger. Demon had learned early that aura could be a commanding thing. Power wasn’t hypothetical. It was what made some men charismatic and others nothing more than pawns. He’d always operated beneath the radar with Seraph. There had never been any reason to garner more interest than necessary. Out of sight, out of mind.
Now he wasn’t so certain. There was a shift in the wind. Not just Malachi’s strange infatuation with a woman that fate seemed determined to insert into their lives. Seraph’s sudden bouts of secrecy, the atmosphere of unease within the club—it all gave him the feeling that they were operating in the calm before a great storm.
It all made him twitchy.
“Come on, Demon,” Seraph purred. “I’ll make it good for you.”
He lifted his chin and flung his hair away from his face. The curtain parted, and he let her see the derision in his eyes, the curl of his lip. He approached her slowly, drawing on every ounce of what made him Yaojing.
“Power isn’t something you wield, it’s something you have.” He paused several feet away, watching his words register on her face. “You have never understood that.”
“I understood it full well when I took you from my brother and went out on my own.”
“Children’s games,” he spat.
Her face paled several shades before two spots of high color began to burn on her cheeks. She clenched her nylon crop until it twanged. Everything about her expression told him she wanted him as far away from her as possible. Too bad he wasn’t done.
“I’m not going to convince Malachi of anything. He makes his own choices, especially when they concern his daughter.” Demon felt his outrage boiling into hate, a dangerous emotion.
Seraph seemed to recover her moxie. “You forget who holds all the cards around here, you ungrateful whelp.”
For fifteen years she’d held that belief, and he hadn’t bothered to correct her. The sensation of change swept him again, this time making him feel as if it loosened the chains binding him to Seraph’s service.
“One phone call from me and you’re in federal custody.” She closed the distance between them, getting right in his face. In her heels she could meet him eye to eye, but when she expected him to break and look away, he held her gaze without flinching. He was no submissive to cower and play coy. He was the Demon of Triptych, for fuck’s sake!
“Mei-ling!” Seraph barked.
Demon had almost forgotten the other woman kneeling so unobtrusively beside the longue. Now she hurried forward on bare feet. She was slim to the point of emaciation, her face painted, and her expression one of bewildered resignation.
He’d seen that expression before. Long ago in another time and place, when he’d been forced to participate in horrible crimes he would much rather forget.
“Mei-ling and I are taking a little trip to New York.” Seraph reached out and yanked the girl closer, running one palm over the tiny Chinese woman’s breast. “You stay here and get Malachi to sign on the dotted line.”
He couldn’t rip his gaze away from Mae-ling’s alabaster complexion. She reminded him so much of his sister. “And if I fail?”
“You’ll wind up like these two,” Seraph said with glee. “Now get the fuck out of here before I let Jessica use this whip to teach you some manners.”
Demon didn’t even bother with a cursory bow. He backed two steps, keeping one eye on Seraph and the other on Mei-ling. The girl’s beseeching eyes would haunt him, but he couldn’t do anything about her predicament now. Not until he knew more. Not until he had a way out for him and his family.
Chapter Eleven
“Where are you going again?”
Selena glanced into the mirror of Mattie’s dressing table, hiding a grin when she saw her friend picking at the dried paint clinging to her fingernails. Sometimes Selena wondered if her friend was ever fully focused on anything. Mattie spent half of any given conversation thinking about sketches for her next painting.
“I’m going to a club.” Selena carefully outlined her lips before applying the hot-pink lipstick that perfectly matched her dress.
Mattie perched on the edge of her bed and folded her arms. “And that’s what you’re wearing?”
Compared to the baggy, paint-stained overalls Mattie wore over her hand-stenciled camisole top, Selena’s dress looked like a little much. Or too little depending on how you viewed it.
“It’s winter and it’s snowing. Plus it’s a Monday night. Nobody goes clubbing on Monday nights. You know that, right?”
Selena scooped her curled hair into a high ponytail and anchored it with a clip that matched the chrome ring providing the most substantial portion of her outfit. She’d found the sleek, ruffled-hem dress at a shop in New York. It had a plunging neckline and an open back that made a bra completely impossible. Tiny straps secured the front of the dress to the hoop nestled between her shoulder blades. The hem hovered just below the crotch of her black satin panties.
Mattie picked up the silver heels Selena had chosen for the night. “You sure you don’t want to borrow my boots? You’re going to lose a toe in these. Either to the weather or some shit dancer.”
Lars stuck his head inside the bedroom. “Are you ready yet?”
“Hard to believe it’s taken her this long to put on so little fabric, huh?” Mattie said.
“You’re not going with us?” Lars gave Mattie one of his heart-stopping grins.
She continued to be immune to his boyish charm. “I’ll pass.”
“Come on, Mattie, it won’t be the same without you.” Lars smoothed the lapel of his jacket. He’d apparently bought a whole new wardrobe at Savile Row before coming back to the States.
“I know.” Mattie’s tone dripped syrupy sweetness. “Who will warn all the unsuspecting females about your bullshit lines?”
Unless Selena very much missed her guess, there was a touch of hurt in Lars’s gaze before he plastered his “unaffected rake” visage into place. Had she not been so busy trying to figure out her own shit, she might be tempted to push the two of them together just to see the sparks fly.
Selena stood up and plucked her heels out of Mattie’s hands. “Don’t wait up.”
“Fine, but you or Mr. Cool here need to text me and let me know you’re okay. No more nights like we had before.” Mattie looked utterly disgruntled. As a confirmed homebody, the idea of staying out all night was abhorrent to her anyway. “I was totally freaking out by the time you walked through that door at three a.m.”
“Sweet!” Lars pulled out his phone. “Mattie just gave you permission to give me her number.”
Mattie didn’t miss a beat. “It’s so much easier to block later if I know what it is.”
Selena brushed a kiss over Mattie’s cheek. Her friend had a sprinkling of purple paint across the bridge of her nose. “I promise not to let you worry.”
She and Lars tromped down the narrow staircase from the upstairs of Mattie’s ancient Cape Cod to the main level. Selena grabbed a black embroidered shawl and flung it over her shoulders. The expensive organza studded with rhinestones and trimmed in tassels was so at odds with her hot-pink minidress she half expected to be accosted by the fashion police.
“Mixing the old with the new, I see.” Lars smirked as he closed the back door behind them.
“Just get in the car.” She threw her keys at him.
He snatched them right out of the air. “I get to drive?”
“It’s next to impossible to drive a stick in these heels.”
Lars opened her door with an exaggerated bow. “I wondered why you were letting me tag along.”
He was already settled behind the wheel and spinning gravel out of Mattie’s driveway by the time Selena got her seat belt fastened. The snow had just started sticking to the pavement, the car’s headlamps illuminating the swirling wall of white that seemed to go on forever.
“Are you okay driving in this weather?” she asked.
He tilted his head to give her a dirty look. She took that to mean he was too insulted to respond. It was a valid question. Although he was a boy, Lars had been as pampered as she was. The Aasen males like Lars and her brother had been given more freedom than Selena and Desiree ever had. Not that Erik had managed to make her mother happy with it. He’d gone and married a music teacher with no family, connec
tions, or money.
At least he’s happy.
Lars’s parents had handled the overseas business transactions for Aasen International. It had kept his family abroad for most of his life. She wondered if he was happy he’d followed the family track, or if he wanted more.
“Penny for your thoughts?” He glanced over as he left the snowy side roads for the highway.
“With your trust fund? I’d think you could afford a little more than a penny.”
“A girl with your trust fund shouldn’t care if it’s a penny or a million bucks.”
She decided the only way to find out anything was to ask. “Are you pissed you had to fly back to the States just to hold the reins while my brother plays daddy?”
“You don’t sugarcoat it, do you?”
“Not when I want to know something.”
She’d known Lars a long time. Long enough to be absolutely certain he was preparing to lie to her. He seemed to be mentally sorting through possible answers while trying to find the most plausible one.
“I don’t mind helping out. I needed to come back and handle some business of my own anyway.” He gave her a careless grin. “This way your brother has to foot the bill for my travel. And I do have rather expensive taste.”
That really didn’t mesh with the boy she’d known growing up. “No, you don’t.”
“People change.” Clearly, her words had thrown him off balance.
She swapped tactics. “Are you seeing anyone?”
“Are you?”
“You just seem interested in Mattie, that’s all.” Selena fiddled with the ruffled hem of her dress.
He didn’t even bother to hide the regret on his face. “Mattie is a good girl. She’ll find a decent guy and settle down with a house full of kids who will finger paint classical works of art all over her walls.”
Boston Avant-Garde 5: Bellicoso Page 9