The Auction (The Original Sinners Pulp Library) Read online

  At that Daniel could only laugh miserably as he gazed up at the ceiling.

  “So Plan B?” Eleanor asked.

  Plan B. Daniel had hoped it wouldn’t come to this. He’d fucked things up badly enough with Anya that he feared any sort of subterfuge on his part would only make it worse. But it wasn’t about having her anymore or taking her virginity—not that it had ever been about that. He had to keep her safe. Even if she ended up hating him and never speaking to him again…it didn’t matter. It wasn’t about him and his happiness. Only Anya.

  He turned his head and looked at Eleanor lying next to him on the floor. She was such a beautiful woman with her black hair and green-black eyes, her full breasts and fuller lips, her intelligence, her wicked wit, and her untamable heart. And for the first time in a year and a half, he didn’t even remotely want her.

  She raised her eyebrow at him and waited.

  “You aren’t in the auction, are you?”

  Eleanor stared at him. “God, you’re an idiot.”

  10

  At seven that night, Daniel did something he hadn’t done in years—he stood in front of a mirror wearing a suit and tying a tie. He’d foregone ties ever since Maggie’s funeral as he couldn’t put one on without remembering that day. But tonight’s auction called for formal attire. So on went an old suit of his Maggie had bought for him. It was Armani, a very nice suit, but it didn’t fit him quite right anymore. The trousers were too baggy, the jacket too tight on his shoulders. Kingsley would throw a fit but Daniel didn’t care.

  He’d just finished tying his tie when he heard a knock on the door. Daniel wondered who it could be at this hour. Eleanor had agreed to his plan—after calling him an idiot a few more times—but said she would have to meet him at Kingsley’s where the auction would be held. He hoped Anya might have had a sudden change of heart but he knew better than to dream that big.

  Opening the door he saw a small elderly man standing out in the hallway with a black garment bag.

  “Signore Vitale?”

  “Signore Caldwell. Your suit is ready.”

  “My suit? Right, of course.” Daniel had almost forgotten he’d been fitted for a new wardrobe. He simply assumed Anya would have put anything of his at the very bottom of her to do list. Or burnt it.

  Daniel took the garment bag from Signore Vitale. “Thank you for bringing it to me. I didn’t realize you delivered.”

  “I usually don’t. I leave that to my assistant.” Signore Vitale smiled sadly at him. “She politely declined.”

  Daniel’s heart sank. “I’m not surprised.”

  Signore Vitale nodded at the garment bag. “Go. Try it on.”

  “Of course. Please come in.”

  Daniel left Signore Vitale in his living room while he went back to his bedroom and stripped out of his clothes. He unzipped the garment bag and found an exquisite three-piece suit inside—black with silver pinstripes. Although distinctly modern it had a retro 1940s cut to it. All he needed was a fedora to look like he’d just stepped out of a Humphrey Bogart movie.

  Once dressed, Daniel stared at his reflection in the mirror. He’d never really seen what women found so compelling about him—not terribly tall and certainly not pretty. But tonight in this suit he looked…

  “Damn,” was all Daniel could say.

  He went into the living room and found Signore Vitale waiting by the windows.

  “Perfect fit,” Daniel said. More than perfect, the suit fit like his own skin.

  “My assistant, she does amazing work. Far better than mine even when I was a young man. I’ve never seen her work so hard on one piece before. Even last night she stayed late at the shop picking out the perfect buttons.”

  Daniel’s stomach clenched at the thought of Anya working late sewing his suit by hand. “Anya did all the work?”

  “Every single stitch. Seemed to be a labor of love for her. Such a talent. I’ll miss her.”

  “Miss her?”

  Signore Vitale nodded. “She put in her notice. She’s moving back to Quebec to be with her family again.”

  Be with her family again? Or to run away from him and how much he had hurt her? If Anya went back to Quebec, he knew she would never leave again. She’d become a mother to her siblings and give up her whole life taking care of them. Daniel couldn’t let that happen.

  “When’s her last day?”

  “It was yesterday. She’s going back tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow?” Auction tonight, leaving tomorrow… “That’s not going to happen. I’ll keep her here if I have to tie her down.”

  “Something tells me she might enjoy that.”

  Daniel smiled. “Send me the bill. I have to go.”

  “No bill. Anya paid for it.”

  Guilt speared his heart like a knife. Damn stubborn girl. If she kept this up, he’d be forced to ask her to marry him.

  “Send the bill anyway. Thank you for bringing this to me. Now you’ll have to excuse me. I’m going to go buy your assistant.”

  Signore Vitale shook his head. “I hope you are as rich as Croesus then. That girl is priceless.”

  “Worth every penny.”

  Daniel took a cab to Kingsley’s. Limousines and Rolls Royces, Caddies and black Lincolns came and went, dropping off their well-heeled passengers. Daniel pushed past an actress he vaguely recognized and into the house just as Eleanor skipped down the main stairway toward him. He couldn’t help but smile at her. At formal events in Kingsley’s world, all the submissives were expected to wear white. Eleanor had on a white Regency style gown with a bow in the front that fell all the way to the hem. Her long black hair was pinned up in curls and ringlets. And around her neck she wore her white collar that looked merely like a choker. She looked as if she’d stepped out of the pages of a Jane Austen novel.

  “Daniel, you look so fucking hot, I’d suck you off right now if we weren’t in public.”

  “And Jane Austen spins in her grave. You look lovely.”

  “Thank you. So the plan…”

  “Is idiotic, as you said. But it’s the only one I have. Can I trust you to go through with it?”

  Eleanor batted her dark eyelashes at him. “You know I’ll do anything to get in trouble with Blondie.”

  “Is he here?” Daniel asked.

  “Of course he is. Maybe we should get him to bid for you instead of me. It’s all kinksters here tonight. Nobody would ever bid against him.”

  “I can believe that. No offense but I trust you more than I trust him.”

  “That’s very sweet, Daniel, but I just stole your wallet.”

  Eleanor held up his wallet.

  Daniel rolled his eyes and took it back from her. “Come on,” he said.

  The two of them mounted the stairs and headed up to the top floor. Kingsley had a glass-enclosed rooftop garden and as usual the auction would take place there, illuminated both by candlelight and city-light.

  The auction had just begun by the time they arrived. Eleanor waited at his side under an orange tree. On the opposite side of the garden, Eleanor’s owner stood next to Kingsley and watched them both intently.

  “Are you really going to get into trouble for helping me?” Daniel whispered to Eleanor.

  “Well, you’re not his favorite person, but I think I’ll come out of it with my head still attached to my body.”

  “You sure you want to go through with it?”

  “Daniel.” She looked up at him and grinned. “Do you even have to ask?”

  He smiled back. “I’m glad you dumped me. You terrify me.”

  “You say the sweetest things.”

  Boisterous applause and wolf-whistling erupted as Kingsley came to stand on the small stage at the center of the crowd. Daniel barely heard a word of Kingsley’s welcome speech and his thank you’s to everyone for helping support his King’s Trust charity with their bids tonight.

  “I love you, Kingsley,” a woman shouted out in the middle of his speech.

  “Your
taste is impeccable,” he replied without missing a beat. “See me after the auction.”

  The first submissive took the stage and the auctioneer, a handsome older gentleman with silver hair, began the bidding.

  “Oh, hello there,” Eleanor purred.

  “Are you lusting after the auctioneer?” Daniel whispered.

  “No, him.” She nodded toward the person on the stage—a tall young man who looked about twenty. He had tan skin that made his blue eyes look even brighter. His shaggy dark brown hair fell across his forehead and he nervously swiped it to the side.

  “Buy him for me,” Eleanor begged, turning her pouting face up to him.

  Daniel glanced down at the auction program—Antonio, age twenty. Beside his name was a tiny, lower-case S.

  “He’s a submissive, Elle. Not your type.”

  Eleanor’s eyes narrowed at the young man and for a moment she looked genuinely dangerous, almost predatory. “Oh. Right. Not my type.”

  She didn’t sound the least bit disappointed.

  The submissive sold to a man in the audience for an impressive ninety thousand dollars. Daniel could only imagine what the young man would have to submit to that night to justify that ninety grand.

  The auction continued and the next three submissives sold between a hundred and a hundred and fifty thousand dollars.

  “Wow. Big spenders tonight,” Eleanor said. “This is more than they made last year in the entire auction. Hope you’re ready to pay up.”

  “I’m ready,” Daniel said.

  “You do realize this might not work, right?” Eleanor asked, looking at him with genuine concern in her green-black eyes. “Anya might still hate you.”

  He nodded. “I’m not buying her to win her forgiveness. I just want her to be safe.”

  Eleanor rose up on her tip-toes and kissed him on the cheek. “She’s an idiot, too, if she doesn’t love you back.”

  “You didn’t love me back.”

  “I’m an idiot. Now shush. It’s starting.”

  Kingsley came back to the stage and introduced their last prize before the intermission. Daniel’s hands went numb and his heart fluttered painfully as Anya stepped onto the stage and clung to Kingsley’s hand.

  “My God…” Daniel breathed. He’d never seen a more beautiful woman in his life. Anya wore a simple gown of pure white. Two small braids formed a crown around her head like a halo while the rest of her long red-black hair fell in waves down her back. On her face she wore a tight smile and a look of sadness tinged with fear in her eyes.

  Kingsley kissed the back of her hand, whispered something in her ear, and left the stage.

  Daniel’s heart pounded ferociously in his chest. The auctioneer took the stage again and began the bidding.

  “Let’s begin the bidding at fifty thousand dollars.”

  “What do you want me to bid?” Eleanor asked in a whisper.

  “What was the winning bid last time for the grand prize?”

  “A lot.”

  One man in the crowd bid the fifty. Another man bid sixty-nine thousand, which led to a round of laughter from the crowd. Daniel memorized that bidder’s face so he could find it and break it later. Meanwhile Anya waited on the stage, doing her best impression of a statue.

  Yet another man bid ninety-thousand.

  Then a gasp rippled through the crowd.

  Someone had just bid two-hundred thousand dollars. But not just any someone.

  “Holy fuck…” Eleanor breathed. “Blondie just on bid on Anya.”

  She clasped her hand over her mouth in obvious shock.

  Daniel stared across the crowd and found Eleanor’s owner smiling dangerously at him. No, not smiling. Smirking. And Daniel saw a message in that smirk, a message that read, You had mine. Now I’ll have yours.

  Kingsley stood next to him, holding a checkbook in his hand.

  “Son of a bitch,” Daniel said. “What the hell is Søren doing, bidding on Anya?”

  “Punishing you for trying to steal me? Mindfuck? Decided to dump me and this is how he’s telling me? All of the above?”

  “Any other bids?” The auctioneer gazed around the crowd.

  “I can’t let you bid for me,” Daniel said. “Not against your owner.”

  “He’s making me pick again,” she said. “You or him.”

  “Fuck,” Daniel breathed.

  “Do you love her?” Eleanor asked.

  “I want to. But I—”

  “It’s okay,” she said with a smile. “You can pick her over me. I promise.”

  Daniel wrenched his eyes from Eleanor’s handsome smirking owner and looked at Anya. He’d warned her a sadist might bid on her and clearly, from the look of abject terror on her face, she knew exactly who that sadist was. The sadist.

  “How much do you want me to bid?” Eleanor asked.

  “If there are no further bids,” the auctioneer said.

  “Hurry, Daniel.”

  “He’ll be furious at you.”

  “He’s cute when he’s mad. Winning bid last time was two-hundred and fifty-six thousand,” she reminded him. She didn’t need to remind him. He knew the exact amount. “So…?”

  “Bid this,” Daniel said and handed her a cashier’s check.

  It was the same amount Le Grand Prix had gone for last year, multiplied by ten.

  Eleanor raised her hand and in a clear strong voice called out, “Two million five hundred and sixty thousand dollars.”

  The entire assembly gasped again.

  “Did I do that right?” Eleanor whispered. “I hope I did that right. I’m shit at math.”

  “Madam?” the auctioneer said as he turned to her. “Are you quite sure?”

  Eleanor nodded. “Oh, hell yes,” she said toward Anya. “I’d hit that.”

  From across the room Eleanor’s owner’s smirk turned into a furious steely-eyed glare.

  “He’s going to kill you, isn’t he?” Daniel asked.

  “Probably. Ask me if I care.”

  From the stage the auctioneer announced, “Going once…going twice…sold to the young woman in the white dress who would hit that.”

  Eleanor ran to the stage, took Anya by the hand, and dragged her toward Daniel.

  “Don’t worry,” Eleanor was saying to Anya as she brought the girl to him. “I won’t make you put out. Unless you just really want to. Here’s the money man. I bought you but he’s my backer. See?”

  “Pen?” Daniel handed Eleanor an ink pen.

  “Give me a second…I want to enjoy this.” Eleanor held onto the check, gazing at it adoringly for a moment and kissing it with a dramatic flourish. Then, with a sigh, she said, “Okay. I’m at peace.”

  She signed the check over to Anya. “Was nice while it lasted. Talk to Daniel. I need to go get flogged right now.”

  With a wink, Eleanor ran off to her owner. They disappeared into Kingsley’s house and were gone.

  Anya turned to him, and Daniel raised his hand.

  “Let me speak. Please,” he said and Anya closed her mouth. “I’m an idiot. I said exactly the opposite of what I meant to say that night. All I meant was…I want you in my life. I want to take care of you. And all your brothers and sisters. I’ll take care of them like they were my own family. Even Leonard. I’m sorry for ruining things. Truly sorry.”

  Anya smiled a little but he didn’t let her speak.

  “Eleanor bought you, not me. You don’t owe me—or anyone—anything. I’m asking nothing of you but forgiveness. Anyway, you look beautiful tonight. You always look beautiful. And…no, that’s everything. I’m done making an ass of myself now.”

  He stood there in silence and waited. Anya looked everywhere but up at him.

  Finally she opened her mouth.

  “I forgive you,” she said before turning on her heel and walking away into Kingsley’s house and out of his life.

  11

  He closed his eyes and leaned back against the trunk of the orange tree. All of his hopes for
Anya…all of his dreams for them…he let them go. Because they were so low on his priority list compared to her safety that he couldn’t even begin to be sad yet. He knew he would be, tomorrow perhaps, and then every day of his life after. But she wouldn’t be giving her body to a stranger tonight, so he considered his idiotic plan a rousing success.

  The crowd stood up and mingled amongst each other. Waiters came bearing wine and champagne. Kingsley strolled over to him and looked him up and down.

  “Your suit,” Kingsley said.

  “Yes?”

  “It’s an improvement.”

  Daniel laughed coldly. “Anya made it. Even paid for it herself.”

  “Her way of serving you your own testicles on a platter.”

  “Feels like it. I won her, Kingsley. And I lost her. Then I won her again. And I lost her again. I just keep losing. Know any florists still open? I’ll bring her lilies. Two million five hundred and sixty thousand dollars’ worth of lilies. Think that would work?”

  “Poor Daniel.” Kingsley clicked his tongue like an obnoxious French hen. “I spent a weekend in Monte Carlo not that long ago. I saw a man who kept losing and losing and losing…but finally he stopped losing. Do you know why he finally stopped losing?”

  Daniel shook his head.

  Kingsley smiled. “He stopped the playing the game.”

  “Whose side are you on?”

  “Mine, always.”

  Kingsley patted his cheek condescendingly and strolled off.

  “It’s Mass-ah-CHEW-setts,” Daniel called after him.

  “Don’t forget, you’re up next on the block,” Kingsley called back, while Daniel mentally served Kingsley his own testicles on a platter. He hated to admit the Frenchman might have a point. He hated to admit it…so he wouldn’t admit it. Not out loud, anyway.

  Intermission ended and the auctioneer took the stage again. The crowd seemed even more excited about the second half of the auction than the first half. Daniel supposed seeing the Underground’s most infamous dominants on display like submissives usually were provided a bit of amusement along with the shock value. Kingsley’s paid doms cultivated an air of mystery and danger about them. Kingsley’s does were not summoned, not for any amount of money. They saw clients at their leisure only. One simply signed up on the waiting list and waited to be summoned. And paid through the nose for the privilege.