leaning against the brick wall. There would be twenty pictures in total. Ten had been framed and were stored at the gallery, another five were with the framers. These four, the most recent, were waiting their turn.
He heard a sharp intake of breath from close behind him. He took a step back to stand beside her and looked at the paintings, trying to look at them with fresh eyes, to see what she saw even though he knew each and every brush stroke intimately.
‘Why are all the women lying in the same position?’
Gael glanced over at the red chaise standing alone in the middle of the studio, knowing her eyes had followed his, that she too could see each of the women lying supine, their hair pulled back, clad only in jewellery, their faces challenging, confident, aware and revelling in their own sensual power.
‘Do you know Olympia?’
Her forehead creased. ‘Home of the Greek gods?’
‘No, it’s a painting by Manet.’
She shook her head. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘It was reviled at the time. The model posed naked, in the same position as each of these,’ he waved a hand at his canvases, at the acres of flesh: pink, cream, coffee, ebony. ‘What shocked nineteenth-century France wasn’t her nudity, it was her sexuality. She wasn’t some kind of goddess, she was portraying a prostitute. Nudes at that time were soft, allegorical, not real sensual beings. Olympia changed all that. I have one more painting to produce before my exhibition begins in just over a month.’ His mouth twisted at the thought. ‘But as you must have heard my model has gone AWOL and I can’t afford to lose any more time. I want you to pose for me. Will you?’
Her eyes were huge, luminous with surprise and, he noticed uncomfortably, a lurking fear. ‘Me? You want me to pose? For you? On that couch? Without my clothes? Absolutely not!’
HE WANTED HER to what? Hope stepped back and then again, eyeing Gael O’Connor nervously. But he lost interest the second she uttered her emphatic refusal, turning away from her with no attempt to persuade her. Hope could see her very presence fading from his mind as he began to scroll through his phone again, muttering names speculatively as he did so.
Maybe she should just go, try and arrange this wedding by herself. She looked around, eyes narrowing as she took on the vast if largely empty room, the huge windows, the high ceiling, the view... This much space, on the Upper East Side? Hope did some rapid calculations and came up with seven figures. At the very least. Her own studio would fit comfortably in one corner of the room and the occupant probably wouldn’t even notice she was there. Hunter had said that his stepbrother could get her into all the right places and this address, this room, Gael’s utter certainty that he commanded the world indicated that her brother-in-law-to-be hadn’t been lying.
Hope cleared her throat but her voice still squeaked with nerves. ‘Hi, I think we got off on the wrong foot. I’m Hope McKenzie and I’m here because your brother—stepbrother—is engaged to my sister.’
He didn’t look up from his phone. ‘Which one?’
‘Which what?’
‘Stepbrother. I have...’ he paused, the blue eyes screwed up in thought ‘...five. Although two of those are technically half-brothers, I suppose, and too young to be engaged anyway.’
‘Hunter. Hunter Carlyle. He met my sister, Faith, in Prague and...’
‘Hunter isn’t my stepbrother. He was,’ Gael clarified. ‘But his mother divorced my father a decade ago, which makes him nothing at all to me.’
‘But he said...’
‘He would, he clings to the idea of family. He’s like his mother that way. It’s almost sweet.’
Hope took a deep breath, feeling like Alice wrestling with Wonderland logic. ‘As I said, he’s engaged to my sister and I was wondering...’
‘I wouldn’t worry. I know he’s young. How old is your sister?’
Was she ever going to say what she had come here to say? It had been a long time since she had felt so wrong-footed at every turn—although being asked to strip by a strange man at nine a.m. would wrong-foot anyone. ‘Nineteen, but...’
He nodded. ‘Starter marriages rarely last. There will be a prenup, of course, but don’t worry, the Carlyles are very generous to their exes. Just ask my dad.’ Bitterness ran through his voice like a swirl of the darkest chocolate.
‘Starter marriages?’ This was getting worse. Was she going to be able to formulate a whole sentence any time soon?
He raised an eyebrow. ‘That’s why you’re here, isn’t it? To ask me to stop the wedding? I wouldn’t worry. Hunter’s a good kid and, like I said, the prenups are generous. Your sister will come out of this a wealthy woman.’
Hope’s lips compressed. ‘My sister is marrying Hunter because she loves him.’ She pushed the part of her brain whispering that Faith had only known Hunter for six weeks ruthlessly aside. ‘And I am sure he loves her.’ Based on a two-minute conversation through a computer screen but she wasn’t going to give Gael O’Connor the satisfaction of seeing her voice any doubts. ‘They want to get married, here in New York, two weeks on Thursday and they asked me to organise the wedding.’
Gael’s mouth pursed into a soundless whistle. ‘I wonder what Misty will say to that. She prides herself on her hostessing skills.’
‘I believe she is holding a party on Long Island shortly after. A small and intimate wedding, that’s what Faith’s asked for and that’s what I am going to give her. But it’s going to be the best small and intimate wedding any bride ever had. Hunter thought you would be able to help me but it’s very clear that you are far too busy to get involved in anything as trivial as a starter marriage. I won’t bother you any more. Good day.’
Head up, shoulders straight and she was going to walk right out of here. So she might not have Gael O’Connor’s connections; she had a good head on her shoulders and determination. That should do it.
‘Hope, wait.’ There was a teasing note in his voice that sent warning shivers through her. Hope was pretty sure that whatever he wanted she wasn’t going to like it.
‘Pose for me and I’ll help you give your sister the perfect wedding. I can, you know,’ he added as she gaped at him. ‘My little black book...’ he held up his phone ‘...is filled with everyone and anyone you need from designers to restaurateurs. You do this and your sister will have the wedding of her dreams. And that’s a promise.’ His gaze swept over her assessingly, that same lazy exploration that made her feel stripped to the skin. She shivered, her heart thumping madly as each nerve responded to his insolence.
Mad, bad, definitely dangerous to know. She was horribly out of her depth. ‘I...look, this isn’t something you can just throw at someone. It’s a big deal.’
A small smile curved his mouth. It didn’t reach his eyes; she had a sense it seldom did. ‘Hope, life modelling is a perfectly respectable thing to do. Men and women of all ages and body shapes do it day in, day out.’
She
