The Gallery (Contemporary Reverse Harem 4)

“He’ll also extend to you the fuck-buddy discount he gives me. Just this once, though,” he added, shaking a finger at me.

I really didn’t need to know about Blu’s fuck-buddy discounts.

Although, I wondered if he got one at Bendel’s, too.

Not two hours later, I was back at the gallery, where Blu was giving last minute instructions to the beautiful young women who’d be tending the bars. They were all wearing cute little getups of suit jackets and bow ties with nothing underneath. Not even trousers. Thigh-high stockings and stilettos finished the look with mini top hat fascinators.

Could I pull off a look like that?

Blue came rushing up to me and tore the shopping bags from my hands. “Lemme see! Lemme see!” he said, greedily.

Tissue paper and fabric began to fly as he approved my—or should I say Juan’s?—selections.

I lowered my voice. “I like what the bartenders are wearing. Maybe I could try a getup like that?”

“NO! Not only NO but HELL NO.” He looked around and then lowered his own voice. “You are not one of the hired help. Do you understand that?” he hissed.

Geez. Maybe I was a novice in this business, but he didn’t have to talk to me like I was an abject idiot.

He rustled through the three different outfits I’d chosen and settled on one.

“Oh, my freaking god,” he shrieked. “I knew Juan would hook you up,” he said, waving a red crushed velvet dress around like it was a victory flag.

“Give me that. You’ll mess it up,” I said, grabbing it from him.

“Av, tomorrow when you wake up, you will be a hundred grand richer, and that’s only the beginning. Now go put on that goddam thing before I divorce you as my best friend.”

I was no sooner in my new dress and sky-high heels when the guests started to arrive. I was already a bit nervous, but when people began pouring in the door, I thought I might lose it.

I spotted Blu from across the room. “Oh my god, we can’t have this many people here,” I whispered. “What are we going to do?”

He took a step back, his gaze running me up and down.

“Now that is more like it. You are fucking hot.”

I had to admit, I felt pretty good.

“Thank you,” I said, proudly. “Now what about all these people?” I whispered.

“Oh, you’re fine,” he said, dismissing me with a hand. “We have no more than our usual hundred-fifty or so. I think folks are coming early because they’re excited about the new place. We really played it up in the email invite.”

Well, damn. That’s why people were so eager to get here. I guessed a new venue was kind of like new meat.

Except that this was my meat.

Chapter 14

GIO

Che donna!

When Avril greeted me at the door, my Italian sensibilities were dumbstruck. I’d always appreciated a bellissima woman—as Italian men do—but I didn’t ever remember being at a loss for words when presented with one.

It was only two weeks or so previous, when we’d been at that pretentious Hamptons party, where so many people were unkindly gossiping about her. And there she was that evening in her gallery, on the other side of a humiliation that would destroy a lesser person. I could relate to what she was going through. I’d been there. It wasn’t easy.

I’d known she was an exceptional woman, but I wasn’t expecting what my eyes beheld that night. Her mass of jet-black hair was pulled into a messy ponytail, which, on anyone else, would have been overly sporty. But on her, it was the picture of elegance.

Of course it didn’t hurt that I was also able to envision taking her hair down and burying my face it in.