Naked Canvas (An Alpha Billionaire Romance) (14 page)

“Tell me,” he said. “What do you think you learned about men that night?”

I thought about how to put it into words. Dominic picked up his stool and moved it to the other side of the bed. He arranged his paints silently, waiting for my answer.

“Well,” I said finally. “When it comes to sex, men are liars. They’ll say and do whatever it takes to get a woman into bed.”

He dipped a brush into a blob of paint on his easel. “So you judge all men by what happened to you that night?”

“I guess so,” I said. “But I don’t think I’m wrong. People are generally selfish, and men in particular are selfish about sex. It was something I suspected for a long time, and that night just confirmed it for me.”

“That’s such a cynical outlook.”

“You call it cynical. I call it realistic.”

He leaned over my left leg and continued to paint. I couldn’t see what he was painting, but each brush stroke left cool lines on my ankle. “So the way you lost your virginity changed the way you look at relationships.”

“No,” I said quickly. “Well, okay yes, a little bit. But I don’t agonize over it. I don’t let it run my life.”

“Would you say that he got you drunk and had his way with you?” Dominic asked. His tone was neutral, but I knew exactly what he was getting at by the phrasing of his question.

“You think I judged you unfairly when we hooked up?” I asked. “Because of my first time. You think I’m comparing you to him?”

“I think if you let go of your past, it would change your outlook on a lot of things.”

He said nothing after that. I assumed he wanted me to say something, but I decided to wait out the silence. This was his game, not mine. I could happily lay there quietly while he worked.

My thoughts, however, did not stay silent. He had raised a valid point. Maybe I
was
judging Dominic too harshly because of what happened that night. Equating Dominic with my first lover was an unfair comparison. Dominic was everything that other man had pretended to be.

Dominic was brilliant and profound. I had learned more about myself today than a lifetime of self-reflection could teach me. Dominic had an effortless way of getting to the truth of things. His way of viewing life and of viewing me was a revelation. I had come here to get paid, but Dominic was giving me something more valuable than money. His perspective showed me how beautiful the world could be, and he seemed intent on connecting me to my true identity.

It was something I had suspected about him when I looked at that first sketch of me. He saw me differently than I was. Like he saw me without all my baggage and all my hang-ups, and he was trying to get me to see myself that way, too.

I looked at my body in the mirror and at the shapes he had painted on me. A stormy cloud above my heart. A ship in a troubled sea. A tangle of thorny flowers imprisoning my leg. The images were beautiful and troubling. They went beyond mere decoration.

Finally, I broke the silence. “The pictures you’re painting on me. What do they mean?”

He shook his head. “I’m just free painting as you talk. Think of it like doodling. I’m letting my subconscious take me where it takes me.”

“So you’re not trying to tell me something with the images you’ve chosen?”

“Let me answer that with a question,” he said. “What is art?”

“Wow, can I pass?” I asked with a laugh.

A smile tugged at the corner of his lips. “I know it’s a big, unanswerable question, but I’m curious. What is art to you? There’s no wrong answer here.”

“I don’t know. This is probably going to sound totally stupid, but when I think of art, I think of pretty things.”

“So art is beauty?” he asked.

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“That doesn’t sound stupid at all. Every artist on the planet probably has their own personal definition of what constitutes art. And everyone who looks at a creative work has their own definition, too.”

“What’s your definition?” I asked.

“I tend to agree with you. For me, the art I make is about capturing two things. Beauty and truth. When I see something beautiful in the world, I want to capture it somehow and share that beauty with the rest of the world. And the same goes for truth. If I can’t create something beautiful, I want to portray something true. I want to find the truth of a thing and show that to the world.”

“I think you do that quite well,” I said quietly.

“Thank you,” he said.

“So how does this answer my question. Are you trying to tell me something with what you’re painting on my skin?”

“Some artists create a work of art with the intention of making their audience feel something specific. A photographer who wants to make people sympathetic to the homeless will take a photograph of a vagrant looking sad and desperate. A movie director who wants to scare his audience will have things go bump in the night. A musician who wants to make his audience sad will compose something in a somber, minor key.

“But for me, I don’t try to make my audience feel anything specific. I just put the image on the page or the paint on the canvas, and I let the viewer feel whatever they’re going to feel. There’s no single ‘correct’ reaction to my work. Whatever it makes you feel is the correct response.”

“I think that makes sense,” I said, but the doubt in my voice contradicted my words.

“Take this, for example.” He leaned back and let me see what he had been painting on my left thigh. A colorful bird with outstretched wings sat perched inside a crude and ugly cage. “What does this image make you feel?”

“It’s me,” I said.

“Is it?” he asked.

“Yes, obviously. I’m the bird, and I’m trapped inside a prison of my own design. It’s like you’ve been saying all day. I build these walls around me. I let fear control me. Or I let my past control me. It keeps me from taking risks, and it keeps me from finding true happiness. Right?”

“I told you, there is no right or wrong when it comes to what a painting makes you feel. You get what you need from a piece of art. It’s a reflection of the one viewing it, not just a reflection of the artist.”

“Whatever,” I said, grinning. “I got it right.”

He smiled. “It’s not about right or wrong. It’s about honesty. You were honest just now about how it made you feel.”

“Well, it’s sort of the direction you’ve been pushing me all day. Maybe you’re finally starting to fix me.”

“I’m not trying to fix you. There’s nothing wrong with you. I’m just trying to get to know you, and along the way, you’re starting to get to know yourself, too.”

I laughed. “There you go again. You’re like a freaking zen voodoo sex master.”

His eyes glimmered in amusement. “I should really put that on a business card.”

“You should. Well, Master Bell, do you have any more questions? My arms are getting kind of tired.”

“Fair enough. Just one more question. Tell me, which one you like better.”

I looked at him confused. He held a finger up to me, motioning for me to hold on. He smeared a big blob of green paint on the end of his paint brush and swabbed it on my arm. The paint was cold on my skin and I shivered. He painted big winding loops down the length of my arm towards my shoulder.

The motion tickled me. He was doing it on purpose. To my surprise, my entire body responded. The mood shifted in the room, and I was suddenly very aware of how naked I was.

The brush dipped into the green paint again and he trailed it down my shoulder and around the edge of my breast. He swept the brush in a coil around my breast and then onto it. He teased my flesh in a tightening spiral until the slick brush was circling my nipple. My breath caught in my throat and my back arched. The swirling brush felt glorious against my skin. I didn’t want him to ever stop. When he did, disappointment surged through me.

I looked at him, silently begging him to continue. He got a stern look on his face and grabbed a black candle from the table and circled around the bed. My muscles clenched as I prepared myself for what he was about to do.

The candle tipped and a line of blazing pain ignited on my skin from my wrist to my elbow. My eyes slammed shut. I hissed between my teeth and the sound turned to a moan as the wax cooled and the pain disappeared. My wrists strained against their bonds and my breathing turned ragged.

My eyes opened and he studied my face. There was a silent question in his eyes. I nodded. He poured a zigzagging wave of wax along the sensitive skin between my elbow and shoulder. The fire was more intense on this part of my body. The pain was greater, but so was the relief upon its departure.

My body squirmed against the bed, and I felt myself getting wet. His eyes were on mine again. They shimmered in the candlelight. I nodded again.

A flare of bright pain erupted on my breast. I cried out with a mixture of agony and ecstasy. My body felt electric. All of my senses heightened. The dazzling torment reminded me that I was alive.

I looked up at him, unsure what was going to happen next. He stared down at me with satisfaction.

“I guess I know which one you like better.”

I said nothing and let the mixture of emotions roll through me like the tides. I wanted more. I felt the sting of frustration at being denied further pleasure.

“What’s next?” I asked between heaving breaths.

“We’re almost done. Lie still.”

He lifted a thick roll of canvas from beside the bed and laid it over my ankles. “Hold very still.”

He unrolled the canvas so that it was flush against my body. It rolled up and up until it covered my shoulders and arms.

“I need to make sure everything transfers to the canvas. Do not move.”

He pressed the canvas to my skin with his hands. He started at my ankles and worked his way up. With nothing but the canvas between us, his touch was electric. I realized I had been craving that touch. I wanted to feel his skin against mine. To feel his lips and his strong arms.

His hands roved over my body. Up my hips and over my sex. As light as his touch was, a thrill shot through my throbbing core when his hands passed over it. I forced myself to remain still. I didn’t want to ruin the painting.

He pressed against my breasts. The canvas scratched maddeningly against my nipples. My body filled with yearning. Every part of me clenched with desire.

He continued up to my arms before making one final pass over my entire body. He stroked me in several big sweeping motions, lighting a fire over my entire being.

He gently pulled the canvas away, and I watched him with barely restrained desperation. He seemed not to notice. He held up the canvas so that I could look at it. The paint had transferred nicely. So had the dye in the wax. I could see the outline of my body clearly at the edge of the paint, like I was an invisible background. Both part of it and all of it. The effect was quite striking.

He moved away from me and hung the canvas over a rack to dry.

I tried to still the urgency screaming inside me as he loosened my wrist restraints. I sat up when I was free and massaged my forearms. Then he unbound my ankles before turning back to the paints beside the bed.

“That went well,” he said. “You make a great canvas and a great subject.” He ran his hand through his dark, messy hair. “You should go clean up. The paint is acrylic so it will wash off with soap and water. We’re finished for now.”

I jumped out of bed and wrapped my arms around him from behind. “We’re not finished yet,” I said, my voice thick with desire.

His body tensed up at my touch. “Angela, what are you doing?”

I pushed my breasts firmly against his back. My hands stroked his powerful chest. “I have some art of my own to make. Tell me, how does this make you feel? Be honest.”

My hand trailed down his chest to the bulge in his pants, and I caressed him. I felt him harden as blood rushed to his member.

His breath hitched in his throat. “We can’t do this.”

“Yes, we can,” I said, running my hand over his length.

“But I promised,” he said. “No sex today.”

“This isn’t sex,” I whispered. “This is art. So whatever you’re feeling is the right feeling.”

He turned in my arms so that we were face to face. I leaned my body into his so that his erection pressed against my aching sex. A small moan escaped my lips at the feeling of it. I raised myself up to kiss him.