Page 20 of Art of Sin

9conceit

A temptation arises: it is the wind. It disturbs you: it is the surging of the seas.

Saint Augustine

At home Sunday evening,I catch up on work and phone calls, distractedly shoveling take-out sushi in my mouth. News has gotten around that I’m representing Gideon Masters. Everyone’s barking up my tree for a comment, from clients who are worried their business or products will suffer, to contacts and friends in the industry looking for an inside scoop.

At least the only fire I have to put out is for a trendy electrolyte-water company who Trent informs me got backlash on social media this weekend for being overpriced. We hash out a plan, and an hour later he reports that VitaH20 will be on the weekly top-ten list for a huge lifestyle blog. Minutes later, Maggie emails me the copy for the article. The two of them are my dream team, and I tell them as much.

I’m in the middle of an email updating the client when my phone buzzes. Pausing, I check the screen.

GIDEON: Image Attached

I open the message and almost spit out my mouthful of spicy tuna roll. The photograph isn’t one of Finn’s but from a phone I hadn’t noticed Gideon using. In it, I’m in the last pose, bowed like a dancer with my arms gracefully extended overhead. My eyes are wide and startled, my cheeks scarlet with embarrassment, my lips parted on a gasp.

Finn is just barely in the frame, his profile stark and focused. Though I can’t see his expression, I remember well the look he gave me. My breasts tingle and tighten with the memory.

Drawing a shuddering breath, I consider how to respond. Before I can, he texts again.

GIDEON: This moment was the first time you showed me the real woman.

I shiver, his words too close to my last thoughts in his presence—that I’d finally glimpsed the man behind the mask. That man was dark, lonely, and full of regret. Before sanity gets the better of me, I type out a reply.

DEIRDRE: And what did you see?

His answer comes swiftly.

GIDEON: A masterpiece.

I read the message too many times, my breath short, then toss my phone to the other end of the couch. Scrubbing my face with my hands, I try to erase his visage from my mind. It’s no use. He’s burned onto the backs of my eyelids, a light so brilliant I won’t see the darkness at its core until it’s too late.

Gideon is a trap in the shape of a man, custom made for the woman I keep smothered beneath my career, my designer clothing, my shoe collection and labeled handbags—a dirty, hungry girl who craved security above all, but who only felt normal with instability because that was most familiar.

Gideon simmers with that instability. I want badly to be consumed by it. To throw myself into the surging seas. But the woman swimming in the deep is a monster, and I’m not her anymore. I won’t be any man’s puppet. Not ever again.

My phone buzzes. I snatch it up and read the message.

GIDEON: I only regret not being the one to put that look on your face.

“Fucker,” I hiss.

DEIRDRE: Stop this.

GIDEON: Stop what? Being honest?

DEIRDRE: This is ridiculous. What do you want from me?

GIDEON: I’m not sure yet.

DEIRDRE: Are you a sadist? You like fucking with people until they go crazy?

GIDEON: Does it make me a sadist to want to strip people of their layers until what’s left is the perfect, naked self? I don’t think so… Or are you just afraid of what I’ll find inside you?

DEIRDRE: Did you intend for that to sound creepy as fuck? Because it did. I’m turning off my phone now.

GIDEON: Oh, Snowflake, I’m so glad we met. You make me laugh like I haven’t in years.

DEIRDRE: Good night, Gideon.

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