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The floor beneath her feet had been painted a pristine white too, the light pouring in from the windows giving the space an almost other-worldly dimension.
A dimension where everything was set in its place. Almost chastely so.
Everything except the raised platform at the end of the space and the single black armchair that served as an observation point for the platform. On the floor next to the chair, a half-empty bottle of dark rum stood next to a crystal tumbler containing dregs of amber liquid.
As if that weren’t awe-inspiring enough, her gaze rose higher, her eyes widening as she walked further forward to better see the untouched slab of solid black granite suspended from the ceiling.
Against the white walls and floor, the platform and the piece that would form a stunning sculpture one day was wildly hypnotic, commanding and receiving attention. Suki stopped behind the chair, unable to take her eyes off it.
The mental vision of Ramon watching that piece of stone, sketching, viscerally connecting with his subject...his muse...breathing life into the piece was so visually mesmerising, she didn’t hear him speak above the growing buzzing in her blood.
‘Suki?’
She snatched a quick, restorative breath and faced him. ‘Yes?’
‘Are you okay?’
She nodded quickly, dragging her gaze from the spectacle before her. ‘I’m fine. Umm...why is everything covered?’ she asked, hoping to cover her flustered senses.
‘I don’t like distractions when I work.’
Distractions or reminders?
Unbidden, the memory of how Ramon and Svetlana had met rose to her mind. According to Luis, he’d seen her on a catwalk in Milan and had been so struck with her, he’d asked to paint her. Within days they were lovers. Before their first month was over, he’d asked her to marry him.
Emotion she recognised as naked jealousy spiked through her blood. ‘Do you have other studios?’ she blurted before she could stop herself.
The unexpected question drew a frown. ‘No, this is my only one. Why?’
So he’d brought Svetlana here. Painted and sculpted her here. Suki shook her head, swallowing down the sick feeling that surged high. ‘I’m just...curious.’
He continued to stare at her for probing seconds. Unable to stand it, she turned around, walked closer to the steps leading up to the platform. This time the noise in her ears was the creaky churning of her heart. And again she didn’t hear him when he addressed her.
‘I’m sorry, what did you say?’
He prowled to the edge of the platform, stared down at her with narrowed eyes. ‘I said, take off your dress.’
Her heart skidded, then jumped into her throat as heat engulfed her. ‘I...what?
‘The dress, Suki. Take it off. Then lie down on there.’ He indicated behind her with his chin.
Turning, she saw that the slab had somehow been lowered to hip level. From where she stood it looked like a narrow bed. A bed from which would be hewn a magnificent piece of art from Ramon’s hands. The same hands that had thrilled her so thoroughly when they’d made love.
Sizzling heat flowed over her body, singeing the apex of her thighs and tightening her nipples in remembered torment. Crossing her arms in fr
ont of her to hide her body’s weakness, she slipped off her thongs and climbed up the three shallow steps of the platform. Behind her, Ramon tracked her movements, towering over her as she slowly reached out to touch the stone.
There was no give in the chains holding it in place.
‘Don’t be concerned—it will hold your weight.’
She wanted to say that wasn’t her concern. She wanted to say she didn’t want to lie down because she was afraid of what she would reveal from being this close to something so powerful. Of what he’d see when she was exposed to him.
And she would be. Ramon had been right when he recounted Luis’s imitation of her the one time they visited Piedra Galleries in London. Every single one of Ramon’s pieces of work had held her in thrall. Touching his pieces had been like touching the man himself.
And that was even before she’d shared his bed, taken him into her body. Been impregnated with his child. Now the sensation was ten times more potent. Because all those feelings were beginning to take a certain shape, make a terrifying kind of sense.
Sensing her prevarication, he stepped closer.
