Malcolm had picked a good day for a tryst. Sunday was the gallery’s shortest day—open only from one to five. After she closed The Red, Mona went shopping. She didn’t need much—a velvet choker, a flower for her hair, clean white sheets for the bed, all easy to find. At her apartment she showered and shaved and waxed until she was as smooth as a marble statue. Malcolm hadn’t told her to remove her hair, but Olympia had no visible body hair in Manet’s painting. Mona should have asked him what he preferred. She knew he would have told her had she asked. A shameless man, he’d made her feel rather shameless. In fact, the whole conversation with Malcolm had been rather dignified. She hadn’t felt embarrassed or ashamed. It felt like a business transaction, which she had appreciated.

After all, she was a businesswoman.

She was glad Malcolm had given her instructions for what to wear and how to wait for him. It made it easier. No second-guessing. Before dressing to leave her apartment, she stood in front of her full-length mirror and examined her naked body. She wasn’t thin exactly, certainly not skinny. She had breasts larger than her frame but no man had ever complained about that. Her legs were her best feature, if she did say so herself. The face? A straight nose, full lips, high cheekbones, high forehead, which is why she wore blunt bangs. The verdict? She’d make a passable Olympia and a very fine whore indeed. She was getting used to that word. In fact, she was starting to like it. It gave her a thrill to think of herself that way. A goldmine, that’s what Malcolm had called her body. A goldmine. Who wouldn’t go digging if one were sitting on a goldmine? Only a fool.

She could only hope she wasn’t fooling herself.

Mona dressed in a long breezy skirt, sandals, a white bra, white panties, and white cotton top. Her usual casual summer uniform. The streets were humid when she walked to the gallery four blocks away and by the time she unlocked the door, she was sweating. It was a relief to step into the air-conditioning. In her office, she caught Tou-Tou sleeping in the leather club chair Malcolm had sat in.

"You know better than that,” she said to Tou-Tou, as she scooped him up and set him on the floor. "Company only. You have your own bed.”

He looked at her, affronted, as if to say "How dare you judge me? I know what you’re doing here…”

Or perhaps she was merely being paranoid. Tou-Tou followed at her heels as she went into the back storage room. She switched on the floor lamp, as the room was windowless but for the single skylight above the bed. This had always been her favorite part of the gallery. It was full of odd and gorgeous clutter. Here were the strange paintings her mother had loved but could never unload. Erotic paintings mostly. A woman in a red dress with one strap dangling off her shoulder, a bare breast exposed. A naked couple fornicating on a boat while the ship sank and sailors drowned. A lady in Victorian garb whipping the corpulent ass of a naked man with a branch of holly. All good company for such a liaison as Mona’s tonight.

She wondered if the paintings would give Malcolm any ideas.

In addition to the paintings, antique furniture was scattered here and there—a red velvet fainting couch, a cheval mirror with an ornately carved frame hidden under a white sheet, a Rococo-style chair with carved wood arms and red and gold striped fabric. They were for parties, special events. When she was a little girl, Mona would come here after school and nap on the fainting couch, dance in front of the mirror, sit in the Rococo chair and read her little school books, while her mother in the other room hobnobbed with artists, art critics, art lovers, and anyone else who wanted to come in from the rain.

And, of course, there was the brass bed. It had been her bed as a girl growing up in her mother’s apartment. She’d lost her virginity in that bed and taken Ryan’s in it as well. Her memories of that bed, in that bed, were potent ones. After tonight it would hold even more memories.

She prayed they would be good ones.

Funny, the last night she’d slept in this bed was the night her mother died, the night her mother had made her promise to keep the gallery, no matter what. And now she’d keep her promise in that bed. She only hoped her mother would understand. Mona looked over her shoulder at the portrait of a handsome, randy old duke naked from the waist down with his penis poking inside the squirming girl on his lap.

Oh yes, her mother would very likely understand.

And approve.

Mona had stripped the bed of sheets and blankets when it was brought to the storage room. They’d been old flannel sheets, pilling and faded. If she were going to whore herself, she would do it on high thread count Egyptian cotton. In Manet’s Olympia painting, the sheets on the bed were white, as was the coverlet. She’d found an old white quilt in her mother’s things and put that on the bed. When she finished, the bed looked lush and inviting. The temptation to lay in the bed was strong, lay in it and touch herself. Should she prime her body a little bit before Malcolm arrived? Would he want her to be wet when she greeted him?

Well, it’s not likely he’d be displeased if she was.

She stripped naked and put her clothes on the seat of the wooden chair she’d placed at the end of the bed. Olympia wore a flower in her hair, so Mona tucked one into her side bun. She tied the red velvet choker around her neck. Finally, she adjusted the lamp so that a gentle golden halo of light surrounded the bed and left the rest of the room in shadows. Then she lay down to wait.

Though the sheets screamed luxury, decadence, and comfort, she could not relax. It was eleven now. Malcolm would likely arrive at midnight as he had the past two times he’d visited the gallery. She felt so awkward lying there naked. This wasn’t her. Not at all. No matter what Malcolm said, this wasn’t her. But for the sake of the gallery she would try anyway. She imagined herself lying stiff and unmoving underneath Malcolm as his cock jabbed at her tight, dry vagina. That wouldn’t do. It would be agony. He’d tear her and she’d bleed all over the white sheets. She wished she’d thought to bring wine and drink a glass or two. Instead she’d only brought a few bottles of water, a bowl of cut strawberries, and apples.

Closing her eyes, Mona breathed deeply into her body, pulling the breaths into her lungs and belly. She imagined the real Olympia. She must have existed, or a girl much like her. The painting had shocked viewers for the forthright way Olympia held up her head. Shameless, she was. Unapologetic. Why should she apologize? It was the men who paid her for sex. She was merely doing what she’d been told to do all her life: submit her body and will to men. How dare those men judge her? They’d created her. A woman can’t sell her body without clients to buy it. Olympia would laugh all the way to the bank and then likely spread her legs for the bank president in exchange for free checking.

What a girl.

Mona smiled. She wished she’d had Olympia’s courage. She wouldn’t be shaking on the bed while waiting for her next customer. No, she would bathe herself—a whore’s bath, washing the leavings of her previous client out of her. She’d repair her coiffure. It must be just right. She’d dab perfume between her thighs, behind her ears, between her breasts. She’d drink white wine to wash the taste of the last man from her mouth. She would recline on her bed and massage her breasts to bring her nipples to hardness so that when her next client came into the room, he would think she was aroused at the very sight of him.

She heard the door opening.

Mona lifted her head. Malcolm stood in the doorway in his three-piece suit.

"Ahh…” he breathed. "My Olympia.”

Mona didn’t know what to say, so she said nothing. Malcolm didn’t seem to mind her silence. He came to the bed and sat beside her. She sat propped up on her pillow and frozen on the sheets, shivering.

"You look so lovely,” he said softly, his gaze grazing her naked body from face to feet and up again. "I’ll enjoy you tonight.”

"I’m nervous,” she said.

"Of course you are. I wouldn’t want or expect anything else.”

"You want me to be nervous?”

"Very much. It will make the triumph all the sweeter. I love the challenge of overcoming reluctance.” He bent and kissed her chest over her racing heart. Then he stood and walked to the end of the bed where he proceeded to undress. First the suit jacket came off, then the vest. He unfastened his buttons with agile fingers. He didn’t make a production of undressing, and yet she couldn’t take her eyes off him as he peeled out of his shirt to reveal strong sculpted biceps, a flat hard stomach, and a broad chest. The shoes were next and then the trousers. Her eyes widened at the first glimpse of his cock, already erect and glistening at the tip. She watched it as he walked back to her, taking in its impressive size and even more impressive girth. She would need to be very wet to enjoy that inside of her.

"You’re pleased with me?” he asked and she sensed the question wasn’t a question at all. A statement of fact. He knew she was. He simply wanted her to admit it.

"I am. Although…”

"I’ll take care of everything,” he said. "I haven’t lost a woman to it yet.”

She laughed and it helped ease her fears. He sat on the bed again at her side. He touched the side of her face, caressed her cheekbone, pushed her bangs to the side and kissed her forehead.

"I’m so pleased you’ve agreed to this,” he said. "Very pleased. It’s been a long time.”

"For me too.”

"Then we’ll both enjoy this.”

"Although it’s for you, isn’t it?” she asked.

"What do you mean?”

"I mean, you’re paying for me. You can do what you want. It doesn’t matter if I enjoy it or not.”

"I do hope you’ll enjoy it,” he said. "But it’s not a requirement. In general, however, your pleasure gives me pleasure. Not everything I do will be physically pleasurable for you, however. For me, yes, but not for you. That was the nature of our agreement, yes?”

"Yes,” she said, nodding.

"There’s still time to change your mind. I don’t force women. It would be beneath even such a man as myself.”

She shook her head. "I want to do it.”

"Even if you don’t enjoy the sex—and you will—you’ll certainly enjoy the money.”

"I plan to,” she said. Not the money itself, but the freedom money would buy her.

He smiled his devil’s grin, but didn’t look as devilish as the first night. He was only a man after all. A handsome man, naked, and lovely to behold.

"Good. Very good. Now spread your legs for me. Very wide.”

She pulled her knees up, sliding her feet along the sheets and then letting her legs fall open. Malcolm looked at her without touching, merely examining the goods he’d bought.

"You didn’t have to remove your hair,” he said. "Prostitutes shaved in the old days to remove lice. Luckily you don’t seem to have that problem.”

"I thought perhaps she was so young she didn’t have pubic hair yet. Perhaps that was why the painting was so scandalous.”

"The art world didn’t care about young women selling their bodies. They only cared if someone dared to break their rules of composition, of acceptable subject matter. You could show a naked woman hiding her face or lying supine and limp as a wet rag. God forbid he paint a girl who dared them to look her in the eyes.”

"They were fools,” she said.

"They were scared,” he countered. "A woman with power. A woman who owned her body and wasn’t afraid to sell it. That painting is art because it terrified its first viewers. Art should be dangerous, you know. It should say something to society that society doesn’t want to hear. Do you know what the opposite of art is? Propaganda. There’s too much of that in the world. Not enough art. And certainly not enough of this...”

Malcolm dipped his head and pressed a kiss on her pubis over her clitoris. He exhaled warm air over her sensitive bare flesh and she shivered. He lifted his head but only to open her labia with his fingers. He wasn’t gentle when he touched her, but not rough either. Perfunctory. Businesslike.

"Perfect,” he said when he had her spread out for him. "A work of art.” He dipped his head again and licked the hole he’d uncovered, even pushing his tongue against and into it. It wasn’t exactly pleasurable but she found no reason to object. It felt so odd to be used in this manner. No dinner first. No tender kisses. No foreplay other than a discussion of art history, which, for a woman like her, was arousing in its own way.

His tongue sought and found her clitoris as he stretched out on the bed to give his full attention to arousing her. Her clitoris started to awaken as he lapped at it with long slow motions of his tongue. He circled it, sucked it lightly, and circled it again. The first quiet gasp of pleasure escaped Mona’s lips. Malcolm said nothing about it but she sensed it pleased him. He’d paused when she’d done it and then licked her again in the same way that had pulled the sigh from her lips. With his fingertips he spread her open again and licked her inner labia, her folds, and the entrance of her body again. She wanted to touch his hair or his shoulders but wasn’t sure if that was allowed. She gripped the sheets in her fingers instead.

"Delicious,” Malcolm murmured and she felt the word as hot puffs of air against her clitoris. His tongue swirled around it again, making it swell, making it ache. She felt it throbbing against his lips. Then he touched it with his fingertips, putting pressure on it right where she needed it. His touch wasn’t rough, but insistent, and the throbbing grew harder. It throbbed like a pulse point, pumping blood through her hips.

Again he turned his tongue on her, those long deep strokes right across and around the core of her pleasure. All sensation was concentrated in that tiny throbbing little organ. Every nerve was alive there, every muscle poised for release. She was so wet now—dripping—he could have put his cock into her with one brutal thrust and she could have and would have taken it all. He didn’t penetrate her then, although in the haze of her arousal she could have sworn she’d begged him to.

She’d go mad if he didn’t let her come. She was already wild with the need for it, squirming under his mouth, pumping her hips, grasping at the sheets to give her leverage. She pushed against his mouth, needing more and more and more. The muscles inside of her clenched and released, clenched again tighter. Her vaginal walls were slick and ready. She was ready. She had never been more ready.

When she could bear no more, and a scream rested on the tip of her tongue, Malcolm abruptly rose up and mounted her. With his hands on her hips, he impaled her with a deep hard stroke. She came with a cry, arching and writhing, as he thrust wildly into her. In the midst of her orgasm he came into her, ejaculating deep into her. She felt it pouring out of her even as his hips kept pumping, dragging her climax and his out as long as he could. It felt endless. The contractions were so sharp they almost hurt. She felt one muscle in particular, a tight little muscle near her cervix, fluttering wildly as Malcolm filled her with his thick semen.

She was getting paid for this.

Finally, it was over. Malcolm put his hands on either side of her body and dropped his head while her vagina gave its little final gasps. She lifted her head and looked between her legs, at the large organ splitting her open. She waited for him to pull out of her. He didn’t.

Slowly he began to thrust again. She couldn’t quite believe it. She kept watching as he withdrew from her pussy and slid inside again. It seemed impossible she could take so much but she saw it with her own eyes—thick inch after thick inch disappearing inside her and reappearing slicked with her wetness and his. Surely he couldn’t mean to fuck her again so soon. She wasn’t ready, but that didn’t matter to him, did it? This was the arrangement.

Mona looked up at his face while he fucked her. His eyes were closed and he seemed to be utterly lost in the pleasure of his thrusting. His lips were slightly parted and she wanted to touch them, but didn’t. He was using her, using her body, using her hole. She didn’t move with him, merely lay underneath and watched his thigh muscles flex and release with his thrusts. It didn’t hurt. She was dripping wet and her body offered no resistance at all. He’d tunneled into her, opened her up, and made himself at home inside her. It felt vaguely pornographic, lying there on the bed, watching him fuck her. It could have been any woman on his cock but it so happened to be her. The pumping of his hips was mesmerizing. How long could he go on? She looked forward to finding out. His breathing was heavy, not labored, but his entire body had gone tense again. He had the sheets in a death grip. The veins in his hands she found so attractive didn’t end at his wrists but snaked up his arms all the way to the biceps.

"Who are you…” she breathed.

Malcolm’s eyes fluttered open and he looked down at her.

"You’ll find out,” he said.

"When? Where?”

"Eventually. In this bed. Any other questions?”

"May I touch you?”

"You may. Always, unless told otherwise.”

She raised her hands to his shoulders. They were iron under her palms. Such a hard man—hard body, hard cock, hard to read, hard to believe he was real even as he pounded into her very convincing proof of his existence.

"Open wider,” he said and she spread her legs even more for him. She’d never spread this wide before because no lover had ever told her to. Inside she felt her muscles shifting, moving, finding new ways to accommodate the large organ penetrating her. He reached between their joined bodies and wetted his fingertips with their fluids. He massaged the wetness into her clitoris and it swelled instantly at his touch. It would burst if he didn’t stop. She would burst. Her pussy split open wide, the thrumming and throbbing, it was all happening again. A low moan built in the back of her throat. Malcolm rammed her with quick, deep thrusts. She had to hold the headboard to steady herself. The orgasm hit her with blinding force. It was obliterating. Her shoulders rose off the bed while her sex spasmed all around the organ inside her, trying to grip it and hold it in place because at that moment her body wanted him in it more than it had ever wanted anything before in her life. She wanted it, needed it, and if he ever took it out of her she would wither up and die.

Mona collapsed back onto the bed again, sweating and panting. Very slowly, very carefully, Malcolm eased out of her. She winced as he pulled out, tender as she was from his merciless thrusts. She’d never been fucked quite that hard. Then again, no man had ever paid for the privilege of fucking her quite that hard so she couldn’t blame him for wanting to get his money’s worth.

Malcolm lay on his side next to her, propped up on his elbow.

"See?” he said. "You make a marvelous whore.”

"You say that like it’s a compliment.” She talked in a rasping whisper. He’d stolen her breath away.

"It is. It most certainly is a compliment.”

"You didn’t come again?”

His erection pressed against her bare thigh, brutally hard still.

"I wanted to linger in your cunt awhile. I found it quite welcoming.”

"Make yourself at home,” she sighed.

"I intend to.”

She smiled wanly. She could fall asleep right now and not wake up for ten straight hours. That’s how much the sex had taken out of her. Her legs were still open wide because she hadn’t the energy to close them. Semen dripped out of her onto the sheets. It itched and tickled all at the same time. She felt debauched but not debased. She wasn’t sure what the difference was, but there was one, she knew it.

"Lovely, lovely hole,” he said as he put his hand between her legs and stroked her wet inner lips before slipping two fingers inside of her. He poked and prodded around, seeking soft spots and tender spots, sensitive spots that exulted in being touched. "Quite tight. Very hot inside, very wet. Strong muscles. I thought you wouldn’t let me out of there for a moment.”

"I didn’t want to. Right before I came I felt like I’d die if you ever took your cock out of me.”

"You’re not the first girl who’s told me that. I know how to choose my women well.” He smiled. She was starting to like the smile very much. "I likely won’t allow you to climax unless I’m inside you. I prefer it that way.”

Had he been a boyfriend she might have raised an objection. She loved coming from oral alone and often had. Malcolm had taken her to the very edge of orgasm with his tongue but then he’d penetrated her at the last moment.

"If you prefer it that way…” Her voice trailed off.

"Your pleasure is for my pleasure,” he reminded her. "When you come on my cock, I feel it. That’s all there is to it.”

She smiled. "I won’t complain.”

"No, I don’t think you will. You’re too good of a whore for that.”

"You do like your whores, don’t you?” she asked.

"I have trouble respecting a woman who gives away for free what she could sell for good money. Whores are the only women who know their own worth. I mean that.”

"What about male prostitutes?”

"Their clients are generally men as well. I don’t fault anyone who takes a man to the bank before going to bed with him. I wouldn’t let a strange man put his finger in my mouth and whores take far more into their bodies every single night. It’s skilled, brave work. Bless those lasses, they’ve saved my life and damned my soul. What more could I ask for?”

"You’re a strange man.”

"And you…you are a beautiful whore.” He bent his head and kissed her lips. He’d already fucked her twice—his semen was inside her, and his fingertip pressed gently against her cervix—and yet this was their very first kiss. It wasn’t a gentle kiss, not tender, but sensual and warm. He tasted like an old Irish whisky, which she liked, and he knew how to use his tongue, which she loved. He kissed her from her lips to her neck. She murmured a pleased sigh when he took her breast in his hand and squeezed it lightly, then slightly harder.

"I was wondering when you were going to do that,” she said.

"I haven’t fucked in quite a while. Getting in your cunt was my top priority. But these lovely nipples are a close second. Very close.”

He slid on top of her, straddling her at the waist. He pressed her wrists into the bed on either side of her head and held her down. First he licked her right nipple, then licked it again. He licked it like he’d licked her clitoris, long slow passes of his tongue. Her nipple hardened and as soon as it did he sucked it into his mouth. Mona turned her head and watched him suckling at her breast. He was intent on the task, his eyes closed, as he drew the nipple and aureole all the way into his mouth. It wasn’t a comfortable sensation, this intense pulling. He sucked hard and for a long time. She had to remember he was doing this for himself. He’d paid for the privilege of doing what he wanted to her body. And something told her this was merely the tip of the iceberg.

Despite the discomfort, she found herself growing aroused again. Perhaps there was a part of her that responded to being used by a man for his pleasure. She certainly couldn’t stop watching him sucking her nipple. He was latched on tight and he didn’t seem ready to stop any time soon. Blood rushed to her breast. Inside his hot mouth he swirled his tongue around the peak. Her nipple felt hard as a diamond to her. He let it go but only to pinch it between thumb and forefinger, pinch it and pull it and tug it. He released one of her wrists to slap her breast. He struck it with his open hand, not terribly hard, but hard enough to sting, then slapped again a little harder. Another slap followed by a squeeze, more tugging and pulling of her nipple, a pinch, a pull, a tug, and another long, long suckling. She panted, moaned, her head swimming from the riot of sensation. Her breast felt swollen and heavy and so terribly tender.

Without warning he turned his attention to her left breast. He slapped it too, grabbed it and groped it roughly. She cried out when he pinched the nipple painfully hard but right afterward, he put his mouth on it and the sudden shift in sensation had her crying out in pleasure. He sucked the nipple deep into his mouth, sucked and kept sucking until she groaned loudly in the back of her throat. He released it, sat up and back onto her hips and slapped both her breasts with his hands, slapped and grabbed them, slapped and massaged them. Quick pain followed quickly by slow pleasure. She didn’t know what to feel. She accustomed herself to one and then had to immediately get used to another. Was this what her previous lovers had wanted to do to her breasts? Handle them roughly, squeeze and slap them, suck and pull them? Were they all too polite, too well-trained? Is this the way men behaved behind the curtain of civility? Is this what all her lovers would have done had they bought her body with money instead of with charm and the empty promises of love someday, perhaps, maybe?

She rather thought she preferred it on this side of the curtain.

Her nipples were almost purple from how hard he’d suckled them. And her breasts were bright red and burning from the slaps of his hands. He held both breasts in his large hands, held them hard, hard enough to see all those veins she so enjoyed looking at. Pinned beneath him by his weight, she could barely move her hips, but she tried. She wanted him to feel her body begging for his cock.

"Not yet, darling,” he said. "Not quite yet. I’m having far too much fun to stop now.”

He rolled her breasts, molded them against his palms, lifted them and held them. There was nothing of the savage about him, but nothing of the gentleman either. He was simply a man behaving like a man.

She liked this man.

Abruptly he stopped and slid off her stomach.

"Come,” he ordered, taking her by the arm and pulling her to her feet off the bed.

She felt like a mannequin as he moved her this way and that, turning her back to his chest, bending her over the bed, placing her hands just so on the covers, and then sticking his prick into her from behind without a word of warning. He held her hips while he pumped it into her, controlling the depth and the speed entirely. He gave. She took. This would be her role for the next year when they met. She was to take it, whatever it was. Sometimes she would enjoy what he gave her. Sometimes she would not. He had told her that already…but now she believed him. His penis was long and large and every few thrusts the tip would hit her cervix, something she found uncomfortable to say the least. But Malcolm was enjoying himself, fucking her like this. His every breath and grunt and groan told her he was. So she stayed loose-limbed in his grasp, her tender breasts swaying with his every rough deep thrust, and waited it out.

At last he came, shooting her full of his hot thick fluid. It slicked her thighs and the male scent of it permeated the room. The scent of sex. The scent of a man with his whore.

The scent of money.

Malcolm pulled out of her and patted her on the ass.

"Good lass,” he said. "Well done.”

"Thank you.” She slowly stood up straight and took a deep breath.

"Take a moment,” he said as he laid on the bed again. "You’ve earned a little rest.”

She was desperately thirsty from panting so hard.

"Water?” she asked.

"Please.”

She pulled the little basket she’d packed out from under the bed. From it she took out two green glass bottles of sparkling water.

"Dangerous,” he said.

"What is?”

"Glass bottles.”

"Why so?”

He smiled.

"You wouldn’t,” she said.

He cocked his head to the side, raised his eyebrow.

"All right,” she said as she unscrewed the cap of the bottle. "You would.”

"It isn’t that I would. It is that I will. You do realize this is merely foreplay, don’t you? We haven’t even started yet. I like to play games. I like to play roles. I might even bring an audience one night or two. I might even bring friends…”

If this was nothing but foreplay, nothing but the opening act, what would the main attraction be like?

"You didn’t bring the riding crop,” she said.

"Not tonight. Would you like me to bring it for our next assignation?”

"I have a choice?” She handed him a bottle of water.

"You have a choice of when, not if. There is no if. I will beat you with a riding crop at some point in the next twelve months.”

"Might as well,” she said. She wasn’t looking forward to being beaten with a crop, but it seemed it would be best to get it over with. Maybe she would like it. Only one way to find out.

"We’ll see,” he said. "Drink your water.”

She drank her water deep and he sipped at his. His stamina was remarkable. He had the sexual energy of a teenage boy and the lasting power of a man. A potent combination.

"Is this something you do often?” she asked. She sat on the bed, cross-legged like a child in school.

"Fuck?”

"No. Find women in need and turn them into whores?”

"You aren’t my first. You will be my last, however.” He gave her his half-drunk water bottle and she set it on the floor beside the bed. Then he laid back on the pillows, stretched out. His penis lay limp and draped on his thigh, a sleeping giant.

"Why is that?”

"I made a promise I fully intend to keep. With your assistance, of course.”

"That’s a very cryptic thing to say.”

"I’m afraid I can’t explain any better than that. I think you’ll understand eventually.”

"If I’m your last, I hope I’m also your best.” She took a final drink of her water, finishing the bottle.

"I have no doubt you’ll give me my money’s worth,” he said with a grin. Then he raised his hand and crooked his finger at her, beckoning her to him. She started to put her empty bottle on the floor and he shook his head. "Bring it here.”

She froze, but only for a moment. He must have his money’s worth.

"Lay on your back,” he said. "Open up.”

She did as he told her, opening her legs for him.

"Pleasure yourself with your fingers,” he said. "Use both hands.”

Her vulva still dripped with his semen and her labia were swollen and sensitive to the touch. With two fingers on each hand she caressed her folds as he watched, parting them, spreading them wide.

"Touch your clit,” he said. "Pull back the hood.”

She took a ragged breath. His eyes gleamed rapaciously as he watched her pull back the flesh to reveal the tiny knot of tissue underneath.

"Hold there,” he said softly. "Don’t move a single muscle.”

He bent and with the tip of his tongue touched her exposed clitoris. A light touch, but it felt like a bolt of lightning shot through her from that point of contact to the base of her neck and the heels of her feet.

"Rub yourself the way you do when you’re alone,” he instructed. "Like you’re trying to make yourself come, but don’t.”

She nodded and shifted her two fingers into a small V-shape, the pad of each finger on either side of her clitoris. Slowly, she made a circular motion, then an oval, pulling the hood lightly with each apex and nadir. As she did so, Malcolm picked up the water bottle and examined it. It wasn’t a large bottle—only about six inches tall with a narrow neck and a round bulb of a base, a typical glass water bottle. There was no paper label on it, only paint. She’d taken off the screw cap. It was just glass, she told herself. Thick smooth glass and he was sliding it, mouth first, into the hole. She moaned as the cool glass pressed against her hot inner flesh. Smooth, so very smooth, but hard as well, unbearably hard. Thick at the base, too thick to take all the way in. And yet as she rubbed herself harder and faster, she wanted it in. Could she take it? Malcolm seemed in no hurry to force the matter. He pushed it in and then allowed her body to push it back out again. He pushed it in. Her body pushed it out. His dark eyes were trained on the sight; he looked only at her pussy and the bottle.

"I once poured wine, bottle and all, into a pretty whore’s cunt and drank it out of her,” he said in a low and faraway voice. "Evangeline. A freckled ginger. She was the bastard daughter of a duke.”

"Did she like it?”

"She liked me. There wasn’t anything she wouldn’t let me do to her. One evening, I played cards with her father and beat him. I rolled up the money I won from him, slipped it in a bottle, and put the bottle in his daughter’s cunt that very night. When I told her where I’d gotten the money, she laughed so hard the bottle shot out of her and shattered on the floor. Coins went everywhere. I nearly pissed myself. What a sight.”

"You’ve had adventures, haven’t you?”

"Haven’t you?”

"Not until you,” she said. "And probably not after you either.”

"Oh, you’ll have an adventure after I’m gone. I’ll see to it.”

"I bet you will,” she said. Malcolm only smiled and forced the bottle in a little deeper. Her muscles stretched and opened to receive it. The longer she touched herself the more she wanted it. She felt a deep muscle contraction and it was so delicious she almost orgasmed right there.

"Be good,” he said.

"Trying.”

"This is a show,” he said. "And you’re putting it on for me. Entertain me, not yourself. Entertain me.”

His tone was commanding and she responded well to that tone. She put her heels on the bed, flexed her hips, lifting them as she pulled in her stomach muscles to turn her body concave so that he could see her pussy better. With both hands she pulled her labia apart as he pushed the bottle in so deep her vagina nearly engulfed it. It slid out of her, but Malcolm eased it back in as she once more pulled the labia apart. She could take it. She could. She knew she could if she could only open up a tiny bit more. Her body was so tense it almost hurt to shift her thighs a few inches wider. But she did and as Malcolm pressed the bottle in, the heel of his palm against the base, she inhaled and drew it into her all the way, entirely.

"Hold it in,” Malcolm said. His hand covered her entire pubis, blocking the bottle’s exit. She clutched at the sheets, her body taut, tense, and ready to snap. But she held it, she held her breath and held the bottle in her. Malcolm tapped the base of the bottle and she felt vibrations all through her hips. She groaned, moaned like the whore he’d made her. More taps, more vibrations. He put two fingers on the base of the glass and moved it side to side, up and down, around in a circle. The pleasure was maddening. She’d never taken so much. She had never been opened up and filled like this. Not even his huge organ had split her so wide as this. She came up on her elbows, unable to believe it was happening, but when looked between her thighs, there it all was—the bottle buried in her, Malcolm’s hand holding it in, her clitoris swollen more than it had ever been before. She pushed air through her lips like a woman giving birth.

"What do you want?” Malcolm asked. "Do you want it in or out?”

"I don’t know,” she breathed.

"I like it in. Very nice,” he said. "But you must be about to die, aren’t you? Wouldn’t you love to come?”

"I need to.”

"You don’t need to. You want to. And I want to keeping fucking you with the bottle. Push it out.”

"This is…perverse,” she said between breaths.

"Don’t complain,” he said. "I could have used a wine bottle.”

She tightened her inner muscles and forced it out of her. She watched it emerge from her wet sex and into Malcolm’s hand. But as soon as it was out to the mouth of the bottle, Malcolm eased it back into her, all the way in again. He slid his arm under her shoulders and she lay back across it. The position forced her back to bend and thrust her breasts into the air. Malcolm licked and sucked at her nipple as he toyed with the bottle inside her. Mona begged him to let her orgasm, implored him, offered up her body to him, which was meaningless since he’d already bought it from her.

"Soon…” was all he said. Soon. He rasped it into her ear. Her body shook and shivered, shook and tensed. She had to come, had to, absolutely must…

He was fully erect again, his cock pressed against her thigh. She reached down and grasped it in her hand, held it simply to hold it, this instrument of her pleasure and her torment. Malcolm shuddered and chuckled, no doubt amused by her desperation. The begging went on. Soon the only word she knew was "please.” She said it over and over. Finally, he gave in.

"Push it out,” he said and she rolled up again to force the bottle out of her. Malcolm mounted her quickly, penetrating her with a stroke. With her breasts in his hands, he rode her into the bed. The thrusts were rough and rapid and bruising. He squeezed her breasts with brutal strength, and she didn’t care, not at all. She cared only about the huge hard shaft slamming into her over and over. She arched into the orgasm, crying out louder than she ever had, her vagina closing in quick contractions all around the brutal organ inside her. Her entire body flinched with the muscle spasms. God, what was he doing to her? How could she ever return to a normal life after this?

She collapsed back onto the pillows and Malcolm pulled out of her. She rolled onto her side and he lay beside her, his chest to her back.

"I have to sleep,” she said as he kissed the side of her neck under her ear. "I can’t go on anymore. I have to sleep…just for a minute. I think you killed me…”

She was out of her mind with exhaustion. Malcolm laughed that gentle mocking laugh again. He pulled the red rose from behind her ear, unpinned her hair and let it lay free on the pillow. He teased her nose with the petals and kissed the back of her neck.

"Sleep then,” he said. "I don’t mind. Sleep and I’ll take you while you’re sleeping.”

"You wouldn’t…”

"Don’t you know better than that by now, darling?”

Mona did know better than that by now. Smiling, she nodded, shifted forward onto her stomach, her knee up to leave her sex open to him. As she drifted off to sleep, she felt him enter her again. Surely she couldn’t sleep with his cock inside her. But the thrusts were long and slow and for once, quite gentle. They were steady and rhythmic and it was as if he was rocking her to sleep. And she fell asleep with him inside her, his warm breath on her naked shoulder, her name on his lips as he kissed her earlobe.

When she woke, sunlight streamed through the skylight over the bed and Malcolm was gone. Slowly she rolled up and pressed a hand to her forehead. The last thing she remembered was Malcolm taking the red rose from her hair and the velvet choker off her neck and penetrating her gently from behind.

If asked, she doubted she’d swear on a Bible that she trusted Malcolm, but this morning she awoke unharmed, not raped, nor mutilated or murdered. He’d fucked her, yes, consensually. How many times? She wasn’t sure if she should count her orgasms or his. And she couldn’t count his because he’d fucked her while she’d slept. Had he done it only the one time? Or several times throughout the night? The thought of him gently rutting on her unconscious body aroused her, though she wished it didn’t. She had to admit to herself she enjoyed being thoroughly used. It was new information about herself. It didn’t trouble her to make this realization. It only troubled her that it didn’t trouble her.

Mona laughed.

She laughed because Tou-Tou slept curled in a ball at the end of the bed and she wondered if Malcolm had picked the little cat up and put him there in the night. For in Manet’s Olympia, a black cat stands guard at the end of his mistress’s bed. The black cat symbolized prostitution. Mona had to wonder if the term "pussy” came into fashion before or after Olympia.

Tired as she was, Mona would have liked to stay in the bed all day. Unfortunately, the gallery doorbell buzzed. There was work to be done. Always more work.

"Just a moment.” Her voice was hoarse as she called out, but the buzzing stopped.

Her body ached in places she’d never ached before and her nipples were ringed with pale blue bruises from his mouth and hands. As quickly as she could, she pulled on her skirt and bra and shirt. Had it all been real? She looked at the bed, the sheets wildly askew and dotted with dried fluid stains. Oh, yes, it had been real. Every sore muscle in her body, especially the ones inside her, told her it was. She went to the side door in the office, the delivery door, unlocked and pushed it open.

"Yes? Can I help you?”

A woman stood across the threshold, dark skin with a white scarf in her hair. She was beautiful as a Raphael, and in her arms she cradled a bouquet overflowing with white roses and baby’s breath.

"Delivery for Mona St. James. Is that you, miss?” the woman said in an island accent Mona couldn’t place. Something lovely and Caribbean anyway. Had Malcolm found the prettiest woman in the whole city to bring her flowers? She wouldn’t put it past him.

"It’s me. Thank you,” Mona said, taking the flowers from the woman’s arms. She should have seen this coming. In Manet’s Olympia, a woman stands by the courtesan’s bed presenting her with white flowers. "Is there a card?”

"Not a card, miss,” the woman said. "But he told me to give you this.”

She handed Mona a clear glass bottle sealed with a cork.

Mona laughed to herself. Terrible man.

"If you’ll wait here, I’ll find some cash.”

"He tipped me well enough for ten men,” the woman said. "Enjoy your flowers. He said you’d more than earned them.”

The woman gave her a knowing smile and stepped away. Mona set the flowers on the desk. They smelled of summer, which it was today—June 21st, the summer solstice. A new summer full of promise. She pulled the cork from the bottle. There seemed to be a note inside. It took a little doing to ease the rolled parchment from the bottle’s mouth, but at last she worked it out.

Mona unrolled the paper and her eyes widened. She dropped down into her desk chair, heedless of the discomfort.

The paper wasn’t a note at all but a drawing. Not a drawing but a sketch—a sketch she recognized instantly. She knew those curves, those watery lines. A sketch of a dancer. Not any sort of dancer. A ballet dancer.

There was only one word on the entire page and one word was all she needed to know Malcolm had made good on his first payment for her services.

Degas.