“It’s called emotional, Elena, you should try it sometime,” I said, joking but totally serious too. “Maybe no at explosively as you did at my house the other day and maybe not so much it makes you vindictive enough to go to the press…”
She blushed furiously. “That was terrible. I still can’t believe I did that.”
“You were angry.”
“I was. And,” she hesitated, “I’ve always hated her. You know a little bit about that. I never really said anything kind about her to you. Christopher, he, well he pitted us against each other from a young age and I was never strong enough to get over.”
“Maybe it isn’t too late,” I suggested even though I knew it was.
“It is,” she confirmed softly. “She has everything I ever wanted.”
“I truly believe that you will find something that you want more,” I said, facing her fully so that had to absorb my intensity. “We were not right for each other and that’s okay. Not just for me because I have Giselle now, but for you, because now you can find someone who will truly make you happy. I never did that for you.”
She didn’t protest but I knew she wanted to. We finished out meal in more silence.
“I have these for you,” I said, after I had cleaned up. I handed her the documents that I had my lawyer draw up. “This legally gives you the apartment.”
She stared at the stack of papers in my head before taking them with a hard nod. “Thank you, I love this place.”
I never really had because I hadn’t spent much time in it. I already loved my house in the clock tower so much more; the mural on the wall of the nursery, the studio I’d had installed on the top floor in a room full of windows, the bed I shared with Giselle.
I wanted to get back there.
“I’m leaving,” I said, crouching in front of her. “I won’t be back again, but if you ever need me, I have to call me, yes?”
I meant it. Elena was the kind of woman who was really a Queen. She deserved knights and footmen and kings bowing at her feet, taking care of her every need. I think that was one of the reasons I was drawn to her in the first place.
I didn’t want to leave her alone.
“Promise me,” I said, looking into those big grey eyes, so much darker than Elle’s but still so familiar to me. “I know it seems like a poor consolation but I will always be here for you.”
She swallowed hard twice before she nodded. “You can leave now.”
“Okay,” I said, staring at her for a second more before I did just that. “I don’t blame you for the anger, for the scene at the house or the article in the newspaper. I have to live with what I did to you and it won’t ever get easier.”
“Good,” she said without fire.
“Good,” I echoed before casting one more look at the place I had called home for almost half a decade and the woman I had thought was mine.
Good, I thought as I closed the door behind me and set out with a clear mind to get home to Brooklyn as quickly as my Porsche would carry me.
When I told Giselle that night, holding her in my arms after taking her hard in our bed, about my visit to Elena, how it had felt like closure, she too had murmured good and I knew she felt clear of it as well.
Chapter Twenty One.
It was finally time.
My life had taken on the quality of an Italian soap opera since meeting Sinclair, with so many incredibly highs and lows that it felt we would never settle in to our life together. I hoped that the excitement of the gallery opening would mark the end of the many consequences we reaped from being together and herald a new, calmer beginning for us.
But calm, I was not.
“Are you serious?” I asked, my voice shrill as a teakettle whistle.
Rossi laughed kindly. “I am. The New York Times, Robin Cembalast from ARTNews, and Jerry Saltz from New York Mag have all confirmed their attendance tonight.”
“I can’t breath,” I said with the last of the air left in my lungs.
“Yes, you can,” Eddie said, rubbing soothing circles on my back. “You have to breath so that you can answer all the lovely people who are coming to see your exhibit tonight.”
I shook my head manically, my hand over my tripping heart. Stars and black spots flashed before my eyes.
“Giselle, darling, people are going to begin arriving in half an hour. You need to calm down,” Rossi scolded.
“Can’t,” I squeaked.
Everyone was going to hate my work. It was the edgiest I had ever been, the most subdued of all the paintings was the one of Mama with a deep swatch of sweaty exposed bosom in front of a stove. I was already mildly notorious for my affair with Sinclair. What was my flagrantly sexual display going to do to his reputation? I tried to inhale and choked. How had I been so selfish?
I looked around frantically, trying to find an escape from everything, when I felt two cool hands descend on my shoulders, stilling me immediately.
“Ladies,” Sinclair’s cultured, slightly accented voice crooned over my shoulder. “What seems to be the problem here?”
Both Eddie and Rossi slumped in relief at the sight of him.
“She’s having a mental breakdown,” Eddie said, candidly.
“Eddie,” Rossi rebuked, but it was okay, it was the truth.
“I think I’m dying,” I told him, leaning back into his strength so that I didn’t collapse.
“Well, we can’t have that, can we?” There was amusement in his voice but the arms that wrapped around my waist and the hand that subtly covered my slightly swollen abdomen were kind and supportive. “If you’ll excuse us for a while, I think I’ll take Giselle into the back to calm down.”
Rossi looked at him critically. “Fine, but don’t muss her up too much and she needs to be out on the floor by the time the doors open at 7pm.”
“Of course,” he said somberly, but I could sense his amusement as he gently led me into the small kitchenette off the gallery rooms.
He placed me in a chair and set about making me a cup of tea. I didn’t particularly like tea but ever since we’d found out about the pregnancy, Sinclair was a stickler for sticking to health guidelines, which, unfortunately, included banning me from coffee.
Only when the kettle was set on the stove to boil did he come and kneel between my legs, both his strong hands braced on my thighs so that his face hovered just in front of my own. I stared into his cobalt blue eyes, searching for a safe place to anchor myself amid the turmoil in my own mind. He let me stare at him for a long, silent minute while his thumbs rubbed gently across my thighs.
“You are scared,” he began, his voice as cool and refreshing as spring water. “I understand that this is a nerve wracking endeavor, your first show in New York City. I do not take that lightly, as a man who has patroned the arts in this ruthless city for years. But you must also understand that as a man who is your partner, who has grown as you’ve grown and witnessed you blossom with confidence, that I am nothing but excited for you tonight. This evening the world will be introduced to my siren, a woman of skill, sensuality and a keen observation of the dark side of the human psyche. They will find your artwork stirring and visually appealing, as those are facts, my love, and not a matter of opinion. So, whatever nerves you are feeling, feel them, but know that when this is all over and you are lying in our bed tonight, you will do so with pride and satisfaction at a job well done, d’accord?”
His powerful words lingered on the air and I greedily sucked them in through my mouth to better absorb their potency. The trust and respect of a man as powerful as Sinclair was not something that could ever be taken for granted. If he believed in me, it was impossible not to believe in myself.
“I love you so much,” I breathed, weak with relief.
He smiled as I pressed my forehead to his shoulder. “And I you, toujours.”
“Do you think she’ll come tonight?” I asked after a moment.
He didn’t ask who I spoke of. “I can’t say. She was always prideful an
d given that she is in the collection, I’d imagine she would at least come to see that you didn’t do her a disservice.”
“Do you think I did?” Worry had been eating away at the lining of my stomach since I had completed the last piece of the collection, the one of my sister wrapped in melting ice sculptures.
“Enough worry,” he said, shifting away from me to look into my face. His eyes were cold and shuttered and I knew even before he spoke that his next words would be an order. “Get over my knee.”
Instantly my core clenched. I hesitated briefly before settling over his lap, not because I didn’t want the spanking but because I had been secretly craving such a release all day. There was nothing that could eradicate my demons like the glowing space I occupied when I submitted to my Frenchman.
“I can feel your eagerness,” Sinclair murmured darkly as he caressed my bottom through the silky material of my skirt. “This is not a punishment, siren, so I do want you to enjoy it. This is about release.”
I let out a shaky sigh when he pulled up my dress and hoisted the edges of my half-bottom panties so that they slid deeply between the crease of my ass. I squirmed against the pressure it put on my already sensitive clit but he stilled me with a firm hand to my lower back.
“Still, I expect you to thank me for each one,” he said, in that unflappable voice.
I shivered in anticipation, moaning when his hand smacked against my skin.
“Thank you, sir.”
He rubbed the sting hard with his fingers. “Mmm, you are welcome, siren.”
The next hits came one after the other, alternating between one cheek and the other. Each stinging pain lulled me further into subspace. I could hear my breath panting loudly in the space, punctuated only by the harsh slap of his palm against my flesh. Somehow, I remembered to thank him each time.
Eventually, his hand moved from my lower back to the sopping wet place between my legs. His fingers slid through my folds, barely dipping inside me. I wriggled and moaned, wordlessly begging him to finish me off.
“Use your words,” he reminded sharply.
“Please, sir, may I come?”
“I don’t think so,” he said, boredom dripping from his words like my arousal was from his fingertips.
“Puh-please,” I begged as he swiftly pressed two fingers inside of me and curled them towards my front wall, pressing against the small patch of tissues that always made me detonate.
“Tell me what you are thinking about,” he demanded.
Thoughts swirled around my head before disappearing too quickly to verbalize. I groaned.
The next spank was especially brutal. I hissed through my teeth and teetered closer to orgasm.
“Not good enough. Tell me; are you worrying about the show, about what anyone may think of your art, of yourself? Or are you thinking about me; about my fingers inside your sweet, wet pussy and my hand branding your ass a nice, scarlet red?”
“Your hands, your fingers,” I panted, pressing harder into the erection I could feel poking my stomach. “Want your cock.”
He chuckled wickedly. “Good girl. I should be the only thing on your mind. I’m the master of this body, the owner of your thoughts. When I touch you like this,” his plunged another finger inside me while circling my asshole with his arousal damped thumb, “you know who you belong to.”
“You, sir,” I cried out, so close to climaxing that my vision was growing dark at the corners.
“Yes, me. Come for me now,” he ordered.
A second later, I was lost. Blackness surged towards me, hot and cold, a swirl of sensation that pummeled my body and made my skin sing from the inside out with sensitivity. Every negative sensation that had weighed down my body was obliterated by the welcome darkness and I think, for a least a moment, I blacked out.
When I came to again, Sinclair was cradling me to his chest and my clothes were righted. He smiled against my hair as he stroked it, satisfaction oozing from him even though he hadn’t been the one to orgasm. I loved that as a Dominant he got off on orchestrating my pleasure as much as I did from experiencing it.
“I’m going to keep your underwear in my pocket and you are going to walk around this gallery tonight knowing that I own you, feeling that and only that between your thighs.” He paused to let the words sink in. “Are you ready now, Elle?”
I tipped my head back and beamed up at him. “Let’s do it.”
There were dozens of people. Every time I was introduced to someone new, there was another person over my shoulder waiting for an introduction. Some of them I knew immediately, like the art critics Jerry Saltz and Holland Cotter, Jace Galantine, the famous movie star that Sebastian kept a wide berth from, and Louis Vuitton Foundation’s CEO Bernard Arnault who had first championed my work in Paris. Of my family, only Sebastian was there, having flown in from filming his new movie in Los Angeles just to be apart of opening night. He apologized on behalf of Mama who was at the restaurant managing a private party, but I knew that if she had wanted to be here, she wouldn’t have missed it for the world. It made me sad for a moment, Mama’s continued distance and Cosima’s inexplicable absence, but I had reason to be happy still. All the friends I had in the world were there to support me, including Stefan, Santiago, Kat, Odile and the Paulson family. Mr. Paulson looked mildly uncomfortable but after their experience being ground through the rumor mill, he seemed lighter somehow and was less careful about his gestures of affection and dominance over Terry. Even Brenna showed up.
“C’est un blague,” I exclaimed in French when I found her lingering by a portrait of Sinclair.
She laughed, but her expressive face didn’t light up the way it usually did. “Not a joke.”
I leapt at her, completely oblivious to the persona I had tried to cultivate through the night. She caught me, staggering backwards under my weight as I squeezed her roughly.
“Je te deteste,” I told her over and over again, as I reined kisses down on the top of her golden head.
Her shocked laughter quickly dissolved into silent tears as she brought me closer still.
“I missed you too,” Brenna whispered.
“I was always right here,” I reminded her gently.
She nodded and squeezed me once more before taking a step back. I watched her wipe the tears from under her eyes and noted that she healthier looking than the last time I had seen her, pregnant and depressed on the arm of her famous husband.
“What has happened to you?”
Her smile was shaky but bright. “Almost as much as has happened to you, it looks like. I’m sorry I didn’t responded to your emails and calls but I had to go off the grid for a while. When I logged back into reality last week I devoured all of your notes but I still feel like I’ve missed so much.”
I followed her excited gaze over my shoulder and saw Sinclair standing across the room speaking with Cage. As soon as he felt my eyes on him, he turned unerringly in our direction. My breath hitched at the quiet possession in his eyes as they dragged over me, checking in on my state of mind and my companion. Finally, his lips twitched into a slight smile and he dipped his head to acknowledge Brenna’s presence.
I bit back a smile.
“Let’s start with him,” Brenna laughed, linking my arm through hers. “And then move on to what possessed you to create this amazingly provocative art. The Giselle I knew didn’t know anything beyond the utilitarian value of rope, chains or handcuffs and now I find you exploring BDSM?”
It was my turn to giggle as we paused in front of the portrait of Madame Claire using Dominic as a foot stool, her face hazy behind a cloud of looping cigarette smoke. The oil painting was done in somber hues but for the brilliant red soles of her stiletto heels crossed over the corded muscles of his back.
Brenna licked her lips as she stared at it. “This is deeply titillating stuff, Elle.”
I grinned. “I have you to thank for all of it. If you hadn’t sent me to Mexico in your place, this would never have happened.”
I frowned though because I had never really thought it through. If Sinclair and I had met as future in-laws, would the sexual chemistry between us have remained dormant?
Awareness pulled my spine straight like a zipper, locking my posture in vertebrae by vertebrae. I shivered as Sinclair took the final step forward to stand beside me and discovered that I had the answer to my question; no matter the meet-cute, Sin and I would have eventually ended up together.
“Brenna Buchannan, I’m a fan of your work, both as an actress and Giselle’s best friend,” Sinclair was saying when I clued back in to reality.
My said best friend grinned and giggled like a little girl. “It’s always nice to meet a fan. I’m sorry it has taken us so long to be introduced.”
“She was worried,” he admitted with a scolding frown as he tucked me into his side.
Brenna blushed but I stepped in to save her from Sinclair’s scrutiny. “She wouldn’t have disappeared without reason. I understand.” I tilted my head up to stare at my handsome boyfriend. “Sometimes, we all need to disappear.”
His eyes sparkled at the reminder of our trip to Paris. I swallowed audibly when one of his large hands wrapped around the back of my neck, his fingers running lightly over the white gold and sapphire webbing of my choker. It was a subtle cue to remind me that I belonged with him.
“I’m hosting a little after party to celebrate Giselle’s success after the gallery closes. I hope you are free to join?” Sin asked.
Brenna beamed at him but I was distracted by the rest of their conversation by the sight of my sister standing frozen in the entryway.
Elena was dressed impeccably, as always, the cashmere backless black dress contrasted beautifully with her fair skin and dark red hair. A number of people had stopped staring at the art in order to evaluate her.
I swallowed thickly before excusing myself from the conversation with Brenna and Sinclair. He had no doubt noticed her too but after a quick caress, he let me move forward to handle it myself.
The Consequence Page 23