One corner was beginning to slip, and Matthew saw the elaborate gilt frame peeking out from beneath the sheet. The candles from above flickered, making the gold sparkle in the light, like diamonds in a necklace.
“Gentlemen,” the loud voice of the auctioneer boomed. The cacophony of voices and laughter immediately died to an eerie quiet.
“Damn me, Wallingford, you’ve dangled this pretty little piece before us long enough. Give us a glimpse, man,” Lord Ponsomby said irritably as he tossed more brandy down his fat throat.
“Yes, you’ve had your fun, now give us a peek,” cried someone near the back of the room.
“Gentlemen,” the auctioneer yelled, hitting his gavel against the wooden podium. “All in due time, gents. Now, we will start the bidding for this exceptional piece at five hundred pounds.”
“Let’s see it first,” shouted Frederick Banks, an investment banker. Matthew found himself smiling. Old money never cared what they bought, but new money, they wanted to hold on to it, watching it grow, making certain they got good return for their investment. Old Banks was new money, trying to take a pence and press it into two.
Matthew was reasonably certain that Banks would find his portrait an infinitely prudent investment, if indeed, the old roué’s reputation was to be believed.
“Gentlemen, ladies…I give you the Dance of the Seven Veils.”
With a whoosh, the sheet was pulled away from the portrait by the club’s butler. A collective murmur of appreciation rippled out from the center of the crowd to the fringes of the room. There was a hushed awe, a sort of reverence in their silence that made Matthew turn his head and gaze at the portrait.
It was as stunning as it was erotic. Beautiful, tasteful, yet tit-illatingly explicit.
He heard a series of appreciative murmurs. Simply stunning. Sensually beautiful, as well as Erotically elegant. All words that made him immensely proud.
When he had the idea for the auction, he had known the piece would need to cause a stir. Something that would make the wealthy part with their money, preferably lots of their money.
It had started out as a piece of lewd portraiture, but had morphed and changed into something tasteful, but decadent. Any man who adored the female form would shed his own blood to own this painting.
Standing back, Matthew tried to dissect his work. To pick it apart and focus on the imperfections, yet he could not find anything to criticize. It was perfect, even down to the way the women’s bare breasts were being displayed and how some of their ankles and wrists were bound with their veils.
Each woman, white, black, Asian, Arabic, East Indian, was depicted in elegant repose with brilliant colored silk veils that set off the hue of her glowing skin. All were naked and spread for the admiration of the male voyeurs before them. Some were sprawled out on a crimson velvet chaise. Others were kneeling. Two women were bound together by a blood-red veil tied around their bosoms, their mouths locked in a passionate kiss. Two other women explored each other’s bodies, while one looked on, touching herself, her face awash in pleasure.
In all, the seven women were stunningly beautiful, well endowed, and most of all, supremely comfortable posing for him. It was not conceit, but the truth, as well as the mark of a good artist. The easy confidence shone in their faces, in the way their eyes seemed to sparkle and the way their lips curved in secret, provocative smiles and pouts.
“A thousand pounds,” someone cried.
“Two thousand,” Banks, the frugal investor, rebutted.
The numbers continued to be shouted out, climbing at a most pleasing rate. With this amount of blunt, he could purchase the building he wanted, an old little shop in Bloomsbury with a lovely bow window. It needed work, and while he was a shameless rogue, he was not above working up a sweat. He wanted this gallery. It had been the only thing he’d wanted in the past sixteen years.
“Six thousand pounds,” the auctioneer cried. “Going once…going twice. Sold to Mr. Banks.”
With a satisfied smile, Matthew watched Frederick Banks jostle through the crowd, toward him.
“Damn me, what a pretty picture,” Banks said excitedly as he pumped Matthew’s hand with his damp one. “I’ll deposit a draft in your account in the morning.”
With a nod, Matthew glanced once more at his painting. “I will have one of my footmen deliver it to you. Perhaps the bank would be the best place?”
Banks’s eyes widened. “Yes, yes.” He laughed. “My wife would have a fit of the vapors, although it might teach her a trick or two, wouldn’t it?”
From what he had heard, Mrs. Banks was well versed in a number of delightful little tricks.
“Thank you, Mr. Banks,” Matthew muttered, wanting to depart from the burgeoning crowd that seemed to swell before him. “I think I shall take my leave.”
He never was one for being smothered by bodies. And he had no interest in carrying on idle conversation.
“You look like you could use a drink. A celebratory drink.”
He knew that voice. His rod hardened in his trousers as he took the glass filled with the mysterious green liquid and stared down into a lovely face that looked up at him with hunger. “Ah, the green fairy. How did you know?”
“A woman never tells her secrets,” the woman said with a coy smile as she passed it to him. “Absinthe, it does do wonders for the mind, doesn’t it?”
“Mmm,” he murmured, drinking it down. Nothing made him forget who and what he was like absinthe.
“What a wickedly debauched painting,” she said. Her eyes flickered over the portrait with appreciation. “I would wager that those women actually liked posing for you.”
“Perhaps,” he murmured, looking her over. He had seen her a few times before, but had never approached her. Tonight she was wearing a red dress, with a low square-cut bodice. He liked what he saw falling out of the cheap gown.
“I would like posing for you,” she whispered. “Are you up for it tonight?”
Christ, he was already hard and straining. The effects of the absinthe and the euphoria of getting six thousand for his painting only made the ache more unbearable. “The question is, my dear, are you up for it?”
Her lashes fluttered, concealing eyes nearly as cynical as his. “That, my lord, depends on what you want.”
“You. Tied up.”
Taking the now-empty glass from him, she set it down on the arm of a chair. “That will cost extra, of course.”
He smiled, one he knew could only be described as world weary. “It always does.”
“I have a room upstairs. With a delightfully large bed.”
“What of a wall?” he inquired as he trailed behind her, assessing her hips, which swayed erotically beneath the tawdry red satin. “It’s my usual preference.”
The woman gazed back at him as she headed for the stairs. “For another ten pounds.”
He nodded in agreement. What was ten pounds when faced with fucking in bed? It was an investment in pleasure and what little of his sanity still remained.
“You’re an odd duck,” she said to him, her painted eyes softening in the glow of the wall sconce. “Broken, I think.”
“Broken?” He laughed. “Madam, I am completely and unequivocally damaged beyond repair. Don’t bother to try to fix me. I’m utterly ruined and fit only for the rubbish bin. Now, where the blazes are you taking me?” he asked as the absinthe began to find its way to his brain, making his thoughts fuzzy. Maybe a bed would be all right tonight. He was drunk enough, he supposed.
“Just a little farther up,” she whispered.