As He Bids (2 page)

But the fact of the matter is that everything about the man turns me upside down. From the moment he steps in the room, I'm in a state that is nothing less than total arousal.

Yesterday, when we were working on a draft agreement, he stood so close to me that I could feel his body heat. I thought I was going to melt, and when he put his hand on my shoulder to lean over to look at the image of a painting on my screen, I thought the shape of his fingers was going to be seared into my skin.

Thinking about it brings this idiotic smile to my face, and for an instant, I forget that I'm late.

I didn't hear the alarm, and I missed my train. The next one was running behind schedule, and of course I forgot my phone as I rushed out. It's charging by the fridge, and I didn't stop by the kitchen. The few phone booths left are out of order, so I can't even call to warn that I'm running late, and I'm too shy to bum a call from one of my fellow passengers since it's not a life-or-death emergency.

Tab stops me as I rush through the reception area of Goldsmith and Evans. "Hannah, he's gone already," she says.

No! I'm crestfallen. Today was a big day; Bruce was meeting a very famous collector who needs assistance deciding what to sell since he wants to "refresh his inventory" and take a gamble on new artists.

I just missed a chance in a million to have a look at one of the most amazing private art collections in the city. Though it's annoying, it's not what upsets me most. I know my being late will disappoint Bruce, and the last thing I want to disappoint him. I so crave his approval; it's ridiculous.

His smiles and frowns govern my mood. I'm on a hell of a roller coaster ride. In less than thirty seconds, I can fall from elation to despair and climb back up to euphoria.

"Before he ran out, he told me he's left a list of things for you to do while he's away," Tab tells me.

"Thank you, Tabitha." Waiting for the elevator, I watch her as I catch my breath.

Her head is tilted to the side as if she's hesitating to say something, and then she calls out, "Let me get you a cup of coffee. Whatever he's left you to do can wait another two minutes now."

I follow her into the large kitchen that's right behind her booth. It's a restaurant-size kitchen with all the equipment to cater the large parties the auction house throws on the opening nights of the major exhibitions.

She leaves the door open so she can keep an eye on the lobby while she pours me a cup of coffee. "How was your first week?" she asks with what looks like genuine interest.

"Exhausting," I say. "I didn't see the days fly by. The man is incredible. I don't think he ever sleeps. And you were right--he's very pleasant to work with. Demanding but courteous and fair."

"Would you consider staying on after the internship?" she asks, looking past me as she speaks to make sure no one is waiting for her in the lobby.

Her question takes me by surprise because I had never thought of that possibility. To avoid answering her right away, I sip the coffee--and it's amazing!

"Oh, my God, did you make this? It's incredible. It's like I died and went to coffee heaven."

"It's the basic fuel Steven Goldsmith runs on," she tells me, "and he's not the kind to have me make one pot for the boss and one pot for the staff, so I get to drink this every day. Cool, right?"

She doesn't repeat her question, but now that she's planted the seed, I'm certain my imagination is going to run with it.

Tab opens a closet, takes out two little pouches of butter cookies, and gives them to me. "I'm assuming you didn't get breakfast," she says. "That should tide you over till lunch."

Seeming to notice the way I look at the cookies, she puts a hand on my shoulder and demonstrates she can read my mind properly. "You're voluptuous. This is the way you were built to be. Don't fight it. The best men like women with real shapes." She winks and adds, "I know Bruce does!"

Before I have a chance to ask her how she happens to know that, she rushes out to her desk as people walk in. I drop the cookies in my purse, refill my cup with the heavenly coffee, and get to my office, which is actually Bruce's office.

There's a list of things to do on my desk, nothing complicated: I need to follow up on shipments of sold goods, schedule a few appointments, and do some research on a sculpture in terra-cotta that came in the mail this morning.

I stare at the picture. It's the bust of a black woman, and it's very intriguing because it conjures up something in my memory. But I just can't remember what. The visible part of her costume is obviously eighteenth century, and her headdress makes me think of the traditional ones the women still wear in the French Antilles. I prop her on the corner of my desk by the telephone and get about my business, throwing glances at her every time I answer the phone.

The morning is short, and I make up for my late arrival by skipping lunch. I dunk each of the butter cookies in what's left of my coffee, and by the time six comes around, I'm a bundle of nerves. But I'm all done.

I pick up the picture and look at the woman again.

"Where do I know you from? Who do you remind me of?" I ask her. And somehow, she answers me. I get a light bulb moment.

A few years ago, there was an exhibition that gathered sculptures of "exotic" subjects. That was the term the curator had come up with to convey to the public that the portraits were not Caucasians.

I close my eyes and visualize one aisle of the exhibition, where I know I will find my answer. In my mind's eyes, two lovely polished plaster busts by Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux are side by side. They were called
Le Chinois
and
Captive
. This is not it. I keep the film of my memory running in my head. Next to them was a fancy affair in bronze and marble by Charles Cordier, called
La Juive d'Alger
, and then--yes, that's it--I see this young black man's
Portrait de Paul
in terra-cotta by Jean-Baptiste Pigalle. That's who she reminds me of. It's a Pigalle sculpture!

My internal projection shuts down abruptly as Bruce enters the room.

"This is not going to work," he thunders. "I can't have you late in the morning and then falling asleep at your desk."

"I wasn't sleeping," I protest.

"Maybe, but you were late this morning," he says. "And Tab tells me you didn't stop for lunch."

"Right, I was making up for coming in late," I explain.

"Don't give me any excuses. This is not acceptable. Really not working out as I expected. I need to find an alternative solution." His nostrils flare, and his pupils are dilated.

God help me, I think he's so sexy when he looks that mad. I have this insane urge to throw myself at his feet and ask for forgiveness. I don't want him to be mad at me, I just want to make him happy, as happy to be with me as I am with to be close to him.

"You obviously can't put up with my schedule. Pack your stuff and go home," he says, his voice dropping to the tone that hits me hard every time.

I can't believe it. I'm being fired. I bite my lower lip and look at my desk. I've only been here five days, not long enough to bring anything to mark my territory. I just need to pick up my handbag, and there will be no trace left of my passage through his office.

I get up and walk around my desk. Before I reach the door, I remember why I had my eyes closed when he entered his office. I turn back, take the picture of the young woman, and stand in front of Bruce's desk. He continues looking at the screen of his computer, totally ignoring me.

I count to ten very slowly in my head, but he still does not look up to me. I guess he's dead set on ignoring me. That's it. As far as he's concerned, I'm history already.

Trying not to think about how much his attitude hurts, I drop the picture on his desk and say, "I haven't had time to finish the research, but I'm pretty sure it's a Pigalle."

Without waiting for an answer, which would probably never come anyway, I turn around and storm away.

So much for my fabulous internship with Goldsmith and Evans. I won't even get to participate in the last auction of the season next week. I've been studying the catalog, and it's going to be a fabulous sale. It'll probably set new sales records for the auction house.

Without me.
 

CHAPTER THREE

I hold it together all the way back home. The train ride takes forever, but I'm in no hurry. It's not as if I have somewhere special to be for the next two months. No one's expecting me. My parents are away in Europe for the summer. I have their house all to myself.

Back home, I hang out in the kitchen, in front of the television with a pint of ice cream. I eat the entire thing straight from the box. There's no beating chocolate ice cream as comfort food.

I try to fool myself that it's just my hurting pride, but I know it's more than that. I'm nursing a broken... something. I was in total lust with the man. Before I even met him for real on Monday, I was in absolute awe of him. He's a legend in the art world, and I'm not easily impressed because I was raised by two legends.

My mother studied in Paris at l'Ecole Boulle, and for as long as I can remember, she's been traveling throughout the world to restore museum-quality pieces. Thirty years ago, she met my father in the Louvre, where he was doing research for his PhD on Old Masters before becoming one of the most acclaimed art dealers in the world. So, yeah, it takes a lot to impress me.

I hate that Bruce fired me just because I was late one morning. He had me going home after ten every single night of the week. Of course, the corporate car did drive me, but still, my head hardly had time to hit the pillow before it was time to get up again and get ready to return to work. In one week, he sucked all the energy out of me.

And yet, despite the lack of sleep, it was one of the most exciting weeks of my life. Working with him was nothing less than amazing. Of course there were moments he would just ignore me, but it was not on purpose. He would just get lost in his thoughts, then totally out of the blue, he would turn to me and ask for my input as if my opinion truly mattered to him. It could be about a work of art, the meaning of a person's answer, or the way my food tasted. But whatever the subject, when his focus was on me, I felt as if I were the most important person in his life. I will miss that feeling. It was magical.

I drag myself to bed. I toss and turn then wake up an hour later, panting and covered with sweat. I curse myself for falling so hard. This overwhelming feeling of loss is out of proportion for someone I've truly known only for a week. Sleep overtakes me again when my body decides to catch up on all the missed hours.

When I finally get out of bed, I spend what's left of Saturday taking care of everything I didn't have a minute to do since last Monday. I change my sheets, do the laundry, empty the fridge of the perishables before they start to take on a life of their own, clean the messy glass shelves, and take out the trash.

Concentrating on the mundane is good. But I have trouble coming up with things I could do to keep me occupied for the next few days while I figure out what to do with the rest of my summer. I have no doubt that at least ten job offers would materialize magically in an instant if I called my parents for help. Should I call? Up until now, I've always tried to succeed on my own merits. I don't want to sell out now.

Who am I kidding? I sold out the second I was born into this family. My own merits are not really my own anyway. I am who I am today because my parents gave me the best education money could buy. The incredible amount of extracurricular knowledge I have accumulated and that I can conjure up effortlessly is not really my own, either. I owe it to them for taking me to every noteworthy museum throughout the world during my summer vacations.

So my success is theirs more than it is mine. That may be one of the reasons I am so fascinated by Bruce. He doesn't owe anything to anyone. His parents were more of an encumbrance than an asset. He and I may have been born in the same town, but we're from such different families that we could just as well be from two different planets.

While I breezed through high school and college without ever wondering about the cost of anything nor questioning the luxurious nature of my single room in the dorm, he probably had to work several jobs. I'm sure he must have made do without sleep for extended periods of time. This is why I can't really blame him for having no patience with me. Why would he want to spend his precious time training a spoiled brat who's had everything served to her on a silver platter and still manages to arrive late on her fifth day of work? Looking at myself from his point of view, I would probably have fired my sorry ass, as well.

I spend Sunday hanging out with spoiled brats like me at the country club. When the night comes around, reality hits again. I need to pull myself back together and stop this pity party.

Tomorrow, after another good night of sleep, I will think more clearly and just turn this miserable page.

CHAPTER FOUR

It's almost ten when I wake up on Monday. Feeling like myself again, I march into the kitchen to make myself breakfast. As soon as I reach the kitchen, all my cooking ambitions desert me. I take the lazy way out: a bowl of cereal. Watching the tiny marshmallows bleed their colors into the milk, I play around with the spoon to change the hues. When I put the milk back in the fridge, I realize I haven't looked at my phone. It's been charging since I plugged it in on Thursday night.

There are a few texts from friends and no fewer than twenty missed calls. I scroll through the list, which starts on Friday morning. There are several calls from Bruce's extension at Goldsmith and Evans. He must have tried to find me before he left that day. I scroll all the way down, and the last two calls are from Tab's line. One call was made around nine thirty this morning, and the last one, fifteen minutes ago.

I guess she's wondering why I'm a no-show. Bruce probably didn't have an opportunity to tell her he let me go. I press redial. Tab was cool with me, so the least I can do is call to say good-bye to her.

"Goldsmith and Evans Auctioneers. How can I help you today?"