The Red(52)

"You won't put on your clothes?"

"The gallery is closed," she said. "Why should I?"




 

 

He followed her to the office. She could see him out of the corner of her eyes trying not to look at her nakedness.

She switched on her desk lamp and placed the sketch before him on the desk. Sebastian studied it a long time without touching it. She saw his pupils dilate and she knew the sketch excited him in a way that fucking her hadn't nor ever could. He was the sort of man who wanted a woman to be a girl and if she was too carnal, too sexual, a woman who challenged his primacy, his lust would turn quickly to hate. And to think she'd once judged Malcolm for preferring whores over other women. Now she understood why he did. She'd rather spread her legs for the Minotaur again than this sanctimonious man-child.

"It's a fake," Sebastian said, standing up straight and crossing his arms over his chest, defiant.

"You're certain?"

"I am. Dead certain."

"I see." She picked up the sketch and made as if to tear it into two pieces. Sebastian lunged and snatched it out of her hand.

"I thought so," she said, then laughed at him.

He slapped her.

She stared at him in shock. It had barely hurt, barely stung. He seemed as surprised by the slap as she. Mona laughed again.

He reached for her and pushed her down onto the desk on her back. Mona spread her legs for him as he unzipped his trousers. He leaned over her and entered her. She came almost immediately. Her breasts bounced as he rammed her repeatedly, spearing her with his cock right into her core. This was hate, not lust, but it felt all the same to her. He fucked her to punish her, to shame her for being too much for him. He fucked her to punish her for having desires he could never satisfy, needs he could never meet, a hole he could never fill no matter how many times or how hard or how deeply he penetrated it. He gripped the back of her knees and spread her legs further, holding her splayed open on the desk before him. It seemed the entire office shook with the force of their fucking. A book fell off the shelves and landed on the floor. The desk drawers rattled. Even Sebastian lost control enough to grunt with each stabbing thrust into her. She grasped his shoulders to steady herself she came again. Her pussy clamped down on his shaft, tight as a hand, and his body bent like a bow when he felt it. He cried out and orgasmed with her.

When it passed, she released his shoulders and lay passively on the desk. He remained inside her, his head down as if weeping or praying or hiding his shame.

"Again?" she asked, lifting her hips to taunt him.

"You disgust me." He wrenched himself out of her and straightened his clothes with his back to her. She wasn't hurt by his words, only disappointed in him. He had desire but no passion. They would never suit and she'd been a fool to think they would. 

"I wonder if I'll have a bruise on my cheek tomorrow," she said.

She sat up on the desk and crossed her legs to keep the semen from spilling onto the papers underneath her. Probably too late for that.

He turned around. "I shouldn't have struck you. I'm sorry."

"I hope you find a fine sweet young virgin someday to marry," she said. "And I hope she opens her cunt for your brother and your father and your best friend the minute your back is turned."

She thought he would hit her again, but he didn't. He only picked up his coat and threw it over his arm.

"The sketch is real," he said. "You have my word on that."

"Here, you can have it." She held it out to him. His eyes widened.

"You don't mean it," he said.

"I do."

"It's worth thousands. It's Degas."

"He's your favorite, not mine. Take it."

Slowly he raised his hand and took the sketch from her.

"There," she said. "Now we're exactly the same. You fucked me. I paid you. This is how it works."

His eyes were nearly red with fury. She smiled.

"You are a whore," he said.

"Not today. Today I'm buying. So what does that make you?"

He left her then without another word.

He took the sketch with him.

Mona came off the desk. She didn't want to put her clothes on, didn't want to rejoin the real world. She had tried and failed. The world held nothing for her anymore. She wanted only Malcolm, but she had sent him away, ended their arrangement and she had no idea how to contact him again, how to beg him to come back.

Exhausted, spent, and sorrowful, she walked around to the book on the floor that had fallen while Sebastian had fucked her the final time. Without closing the book, she picked it up and studied the page it had opened to when it fell. The image on the page was of a painting called Der Blutende. "The Bleeding Man." The date was 1911 and the artist was Viennese painter Max Oppenheimer, a Jewish artist Hitler had labeled a "degenerate," according to the caption. The painting was of a young man with dark hair. He had some sort of gauzy white garment falling down his thighs, partly revealing his flaccid penis. The man's body was curved to the side as if he were in agony. His eyes glowed with pain and he held his hands to the center of his chest where blood was spattered and spurting. Did the blood come from his hands? Or from a wound on his chest? Apparently no one knew for sure. But Mona knew from one glance that the beautiful young man was bleeding from his heart, and he had to use his own hands to hold the heart and the blood inside himself.