Highest Bidder

by Le Carre, Georgia

  “Yes, it does,” I agreed.

  “I always say there is nothing like the pulse heartbeat machine to boost collagen production and take years off a woman’s skin.”

  I wasn’t going to argue with her about that. I got out of the chair as another member of the staff appeared, carrying a tray with my glass of champagne on it. “This way, please, Mrs. Anderson.”

  I was lead to their waiting room. It was beautifully and extravagantly done up in cream and gold. There was a vase on the low coffee table that hadn’t been there before. It was beautiful and I immediately made note to find something similar for my boutique. I lowered myself down on one of the cream couches and leaned back.

  The woman left the flute of champagne on the low table. “Would you like to book your next appointment now?”

  I smiled. “Why not?”

  She came back with a diary. We settled on a date that was convenient to me and Irina.

  When she left, I took a sip of the cold liquid. Delicious bubbles broke on my tongue. Ah, this is the life.

  As I placed the glass back on the table, another client of the salon came into the room. I recognized her instantly.

  Diana Merrick, wife of Robert Merrick who was an ‘old friend’ of my husband. She took a double take when she saw me, then she quickly recovered, and gave me a brilliant smile.

  Of course, I smiled back, but my smile did not reach my heart. When I was down and out, she had snubbed me. Actually, turned her back on me while I was halfway through a sentence. It was not even like I asked her for a loan or help. She just didn’t want to know me because I had fallen from grace.

  “Hello, Evelyn,” she greeted brightly.

  “Hello, Diana.” My voice was equally false.

  “It’s nice to see you here … again.”

  “Yes, there was a time, only very recently, when I couldn’t afford to come here.” I pretended to laugh. “Actually, I still can’t. Thank God for my daughter. She insists on paying for me to come here once a month.”

  Diana Merrick shifted uncomfortably on her sofa. “Ah yes, Freya. She’s getting married soon, isn’t she?”

  “Yes, that’s right. They are going to have a spring wedding.”

  She cleared her throat. “Is it going to be a big wedding?”

  “Well, my daughter wanted it to be a small wedding, just the family, you know how she is, but Brent wouldn’t hear of it. He said he wanted the whole world to know who he was marrying, so my poor daughter has had to settle for an absolutely massive society wedding. Can you believe it?”

  Diana swallowed audibly. “Oh! A society wedding. How nice!”

  “Don’t tell my daughter that. She hates the idea. Thank heavens for Brent.”

  “Robert’s always had a soft spot for Brent Lucan. Says he has a good head on his shoulders. We should all have dinner one day. Maybe the three of you can come over to my place.”

  I smiled. Yeah, I bet you want to have Brent come over so your slimy husband can pitch him all night long. “Yes, Brent is rather wonderful.”

  “I suppose you must be proud of your daughter. He’s a fine catch.”

  “To be honest, I wasn’t keen at all when my daughter told me he’d asked her to marry him, but I’m starting to see how blessed I’ve been to have him come into my life. I mean, what’s not to like? He loves my daughter to bits and he can’t do enough for me.” I gave another false laugh. “He moved me out of my tiny apartment into an absolutely massive house in Mayfair. Then he goes and buys both Freya’s best friend’s houses in Knightsbridge there, so they could be close to Freya too. I know he has a reputation as a stone-cold businessman, but really he so sweet when you get to know him. I’m sure he’s going to be a wonderful father too.”

  “Yes, I heard you moved,” she said lamely.

  I could see how jealous she was.

  “Er … have the invitations for the wedding been sent out yet?”

  This was my moment, my little revenge. I looked her in the eye. “Yes, I believe so.”

  She tried not to show her disappointment. “Oh. That’s good.”

  I opened my purse, pulled out my cellphone, called my driver, and told him to bring the car around. Then I stood. “Well, I should be going. Have a nice day, Diana.”

  I sailed past reception out into the bright sunshine.

  My driver was already waiting outside. He jumped out of the car and opened the back door for me. I slid in like a Queen, and he closed the door for me with a soft click. My Bentley pulled away. As I settled into the plush leather, I smiled. The expression on Diana Merrick’s face when I told her the invitations had gone out and she hadn’t got one.

  Ha, ha!

  Life was good when your daughter was marrying a billionaire Duke.

  Life was very good.

  Brent

  THREE MONTHS LATER

  The Cathedral was so full of flowers their delicate perfume filled the air. The pews were packed with hats, dresses, and suits of the who’s who of high society. Sunlight slanted in through the stained-glass windows and gave the lofty space an otherworldly air, as if magic was going to happen.

  I shot my cuffs nervously.

  From the corner of my eye, I could see my father. His face was expressionless. At first, I did not want to invite him, but Freya said the only words that could have changed my mind.

  “I don’t think we have the right to deprive our child of his grandfather.”

  I turned around now and looked directly at him. Our eyes met and he nodded at me. He looked sad and old. His mistake was willful blindness. Like the woman who refused to see her husband’s infidelity even though she was staring at his credit card statement and seeing hotel bills from her own city. It was hard, but I was slowly learning to forgive him. I was learning to see him not as the selfish man who thought he could have his cake and eat it too, but as an old man who deeply regretted his mistakes and his arrogance. I nodded back at him. He was sorry and who was I to judge when I had made so many mistakes myself? Let me not be him in my old age.

  My eyes moved towards the front row.

  Evelyn was wearing a cream suit and sitting with her head held high. She looked happy. I had worked hard to make her happy. Yes, it’s true, I destroyed her husband, but she didn’t know what I knew about him. If she knew the truth about him, she would hate him. I would never tell her what I knew. Why ruin the illusion? Why fill her with regret and confusion? Regret was an awful thing.

  Martin, her PA was sitting next to Evelyn. I liked him and had a lot of time for him. He was loyal, and that was a rare thing in this world.

  The music changed. It was nearly time.

  I pulled my eyes towards the entrance of the church. My hands clenched helplessly. I still couldn’t quite believe I had caught something as fine and wonderful as Freya Anderson in my torn and rotting net. It was like a dream.

  When I looked back on my life before she came into it— I realized it was as if I hadn’t been truly alive. Powered by hate and consumed by thoughts of revenge, all I did was work. Day and night. I built an empire with my hate. You’d think that was a good thing. It wasn’t. In some backward societies, they tie fireworks to the tail of donkeys. Then they light them and the donkeys run to get away from the fireworks. That was me. A donkey with his tail on fire running faster than anyone else thought possible.

  Until Freya.

  She put out the fireworks.

  Sometimes, I remembered that night of the auction and felt furious with myself. I wished I had called her into my office and fucking just given her the money. Instead, I watched the poor innocent lamb take her clothes off on a stage. I allowed her to sell herself as if she was a piece of meat. I allowed those men to look at her while her legs were wide open.

  Once I apologized to her, but she refused to accept my apology. That’s the thing about Freya, she’s a warrior. She told me she wouldn’t change a single thing of our past. She said we had to go through that humiliating, horrible time to find the real peo
ple we were. That before a piece of metal can become a sword it must go through a baptism of fire. That was our baptism. We walked through fire to reach each other.

  A murmur rippled through the congregation.

  I knew I wasn’t supposed to turn around and look at her. I was supposed to wait until she got closer, but I’d always done things my own way. I turned around and watched her arrive at the entrance.

  A sigh went through my body when I saw her. All my nervousness fled.

  She was shining like an angel. God, everyone should be so lucky to see her gracing this aisle. She was so fucking beautiful.

  Through her veil, our eyes met.

  The music stopped, the whispers of the crowd faded away, and time stood still.

  I felt a sensation of déjà vu.

  I’d done this before.

  With this woman.

  In another life, another timeline, another dimension we’ve already stood this same way and looked longingly at each other. We are old lovers. That was why we could never get enough of each other. Why our lust burned like a lamp with endless fuel. We would go on forever. Even after we left these bodies. Our love was beyond time and space. Our love would never die.

  She smiled at me and I felt my eyes burn with tears of joy and pride. I had been blessed with more riches than any human had a right to, but my life was empty until she came. She was mine. Only mine. Now and forever.

  Then she began to walk down the aisle. This moment would be forever burned into my brain. Her hair was done up in glowing little curls that bounced with every step she took. When she got to the altar, her uncle lifted her veil.

  Yeah, this was my bride. It was about fucking time I put my ring on her finger and gave her my name. And later tonight … I had a surprise for her.

  I was taking her to the Blue Butterfly. She was about to taste extreme pleasure.

  Epilogue

  Freya Lucan

  I came awake so early it was still dark outside. I turned my head and looked at Brent. He was fast asleep, his breathing even and calm. He must be exhausted after last night. Maddie wouldn’t believe it if I told her, but we spent hours and hours not fucking, but making love. Don’t get me wrong, I love fucking Brent, but last night Brent took me to the Blue Butterfly.

  And the Blue Butterfly was not about fucking.

  It was about a whole other thing. Something that neither Maddie or Ella had ever experienced and I could hardly wait for them to get hitched to someone special so I could send them off to the Blue Butterfly to experience extreme pleasure. Every time I went there, I was shocked all over again at what an intricate machine the human body was and how many hidden secrets it held. We know so little about what goes on in our bodies. I admit, the first trip I took there, I was skeptical. Being naturally suspicious of anything I didn’t understand, I thought it was bullshit.

  Then an old woman with a prune face told me to touch my thumb, index and middle finger together. “Now hold your hands with your palms face down on your thighs and breathe.”

  I did as she told me to.

  “Remember how you feel,” she said. Then she had me do the exact same thing, but with my palms facing up.

  “Breathe again.”

  It was a shock to close my eyes and realize that just by turning my palms upwards it affected my body access oxygen in a subtly different way. I knew then, I had lived in my body for twenty-one years but I hardly knew it.

  Then she smeared my whole body with a thick, heavily perfumed oil and proceeded to use a razor blade to remove the layer of oil. Her skill was such that I felt the blade like a feather on my skin, sweeping, sweeping and whispering lightly. Her hands moved so quickly and she seemed to pay so little attention to what she was doing I was certain she was going to rip my skin to shreds, but I came away with not even one cut.

  The oil had a strange musky smell. Brent had already warned me that it was an aphrodisiac, but I did not expect it to so completely take over my senses. Once Maddie, Ella and me ingested magic mushrooms in a club and suddenly we were no longer in a seedy club with dirty floors. We were in a world of intense colors. The aphrodisiac was the same. It changed everything. Brent and I went for it for hours and hours and every second was intensely beautiful.

  In the pale light of the morning, I reached out and touched Brent’s face. All my life I had dreamed of a man like him, a perfect Prince, a hero. God, I loved him so much.

  He opened his eyes. “Hey Beautiful,” he mumbled sleepily.

  “Hey Handsome,” I whispered back.

  “I dreamed about you.”

  I smiled. “Oh, yeah. What was I doing?”

  His eyes were half-closed. “We were having sex.”

  I laughed. “You lack imagination, Lord Lucan. We have sex all the time. Why do you have to dream about it?”

  He stroked my hair back from my face. “We dream about the things that we cannot get out of our minds. You live inside my head, Freya. Every day, I fall deeper and deeper in love with you. I can’t imagine my life without you.”

  “Oh, Brent. You cannot know how grateful I am that Ella told me about your club, and I went there to sell myself to some fat billionaire.”

  He grinned. “Are you calling me fat, Lady Lucan?”

  “You know very well, you’re not fat. As a matter of fact, it’s me who is getting fat.”

  He frowned. “You’re not fat. You know how I feel about it. I would prefer if you put on more weight. I liked you best when you were pregnant with Lance. I loved the way your belly was so full and round with our child, and how heavy and swollen your breasts were. I used to spend hours sucking them.”

  I looked into his eyes. “Well, in that case, you’re going to like my body very soon.”

  He jerked into a sitting position, his face incredulous. “What?”

  I laughed. “Yeah.”

  “Yeah, what?”

  “Yeah, I’m pregnant.”

  “What? How long have you known?”

  “I knew last night.”

  He grabbed me and held me close to him. “Freya. I swear, there is no man that could possibly be happier than me. I love you so much.”

  “I love you too, Brent. So much.”

  “I think we should christen this piece of good news, don’t you?”

  “I think so too,” I agreed. “And I think you better hurry before Stanley wakes up.”

  “Right,” he said, and got very busy between my legs.

  The End

  Find out more about the Blue Butterfly Club here:

  Dirty Aristocrat

  Coming Soon…Saving Della-Ray

  Chapter 1

  Della-Ray

  “What?” I croaked.

  The cashier pulled my MasterCard out of her card reader, and stopped chewing gum long enough to say, “I said, your card has been declined.”

  I felt my face burn with embarrassment. I wanted to run out of there and never go back, but this was now my local. Tightening my hold on my niece’s warm sweaty hand, I swallowed the shame crawling up my throat and said, “It can’t be. I just got paid. Can you please try it again?’

  Her bored eyes were a dull amber as she held my card out to me. “There are lots of people waiting behind you, ma’am. I know a declined card when I see one.”

  I forced a smile. “Please. Sometimes it doesn’t go through on the first time, but if you try it again it does. I work in bar and it happens to my customers occasionally.”

  She looked at me blankly.

  I let go of Jess and leaned towards the cashier. “Just one more time, please. I’m pretty sure it will go through.”

  “Go on. Give her card another try. We haven’t got all day,” the woman behind me said.

  I turned to meet the queue of eyes watching me with various expression, impatience, annoyance, curiosity, and outright pity. “Sorry about this,” I said with an awkward smile to no one in particular.

  With a long-suffering sigh, the cashier slid my card back in. As I tapped i
n my pin number I could feel the sweat begin to gather under my arms. Silently, I prayed the card would go through. Otherwise Jess would be eating peanut butter sandwiches for dinner tonight.

  The cashier turned the face of her machine in my direction. “Declined,” she said loudly, as if she was pleased to have proved me wrong. “Martin!” She bellowed. “Can you come here for non-payment re-shelving.”

  “Coming,” a male voice answered from somewhere at the back of the store, but I didn’t bother to wait. I picked up my card from the cold steel counter, straightened my back and gave Jess the sweetest smile I could muster. “Let’s go, Sweetie.”

  Gage

  I looked at the blonde child’s head bobbling innocently. Then I looked again at the girl. Her face was flushed with embarrassment, but that smile she turned to give her the child. There was something majestic and noble in it. I saw that selfless smile once when I pulled a woman out of a burning car. “My baby. Is my baby safe?” she asked. When I said yes, she smiled like that just before she breathed her last. I stared at the girl in fascination. She was too thin and her clothes were clean, but well worn.

  Let it go. Let it go.

  She was not my problem. Her check would clear in a couple of days and she would come back for the groceries. Not the end of the world. Definitely I shouldn’t get involved. No way. Not with a girl like that. One look at her and I knew she would be a big complication. I didn’t need even small complications.

  “What about the groceries, Della?” the little girl asked.

  I saw her take the child’s hand with infinite tenderness and something happened inside me. I felt a tug in my chest. Like the first time I looked into the big, bottomless eyes of a child whose father I had just killed. He didn’t cry. He didn’t scream. Just stared at me as I walked away. Something inside me broke. I was never the same again.