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“Fifteen million!” boomed a familiar voice from the back of the room.
It took me a second to realize who it was, because he was no longer wearing his uniform. My driver, Dante, stood there, in a dark suit that looked freshly pressed, a white shirt neatly tucked into the slacks, and his cap, sunglasses and ill-fitting jacket gone. He looked alarmingly sexy, a hand slung in a pocket.
“Are you a registered bidder?”
He pointed to the late arrival, the nervous blonde at the phone table.
“That is my company’s representative, Isabella, from the Central Bank of Argentina. She can vouch for my funds. You can hang up now, Isabella. I am so sorry I’m late.”
Dante—or whatever his real name was—raised the temperature of the theater from simmer to boil. The auctioneer, now flustered, turned to find the bespectacled woman’s head resting in a hand, defeated.
“So then … it is fifteen million … going once … going twice … and sold to the gentleman in the dark suit. Carolina Mendoza’s Red Rage goes for fifteen million. A record, ladies and gentlemen. A smashing record!”
Applause broke out in the theater, but my hands held firm to my armrests as I watched Dante stride over to the losing bidder to shake her hand. The crowd continued to clap as Dante posed for pictures in front of the painting. The auctioneer, after a quiet word with Isabella, motioned me down the stairs to the telephone table, now cleared of everything except an elaborate certificate carefully centered on a leather blotter.
“Isabella tells me the fifteen million dollars has already been cleared. Unless you have any objections to an unregistered bidder purchasing the painting, you may sign the transfer of ownership,” said the auctioneer, handing me a fancy pen with a feather tail, and adding, “It is an enormous amount of money. Impressive.”
He also seemed unnerved by this handsome man who had infiltrated these somber, private proceedings in such a strangely dramatic way. But what do you say when someone drops fifteen million dollars, tripling what was projected? You say thank you, and you sign on the dotted line, which is what I did, with an appropriate flourish. I couldn’t wait to tell Matilda about the windfall.
I handed the auctioneer the papers.
Dante, or whoever he was, came over to the table and completed the transfer with his own undecipherable signature. Then he met my still-confused gaze.
“Nice to formally meet you, Miss Mason. I can assure you that Ms. Mendoza’s painting will be going to a very good home. I am a big fan of all her endeavors. So you can imagine how sad I was to be left off the list of bidders, and how grateful I am that you did not hold that against me.”
“Who are you?” I asked, cautiously weaving my hand through the crook of an arm he offered. “And what was all that limo subterfuge? The not speaking En
glish? Showing up unregistered? Was that really necessary? Surely you could have—”
“Dauphine, my dear, I will explain everything in good time. But we must leave now, before curiosity overtakes the room, swallowing us both. People will begin to ask questions. About me, about you and about the … group you represent.”
“What do you know about that?”
“I know enough to ask you … if you’ll accept the Step.”
Of course! So he is one of them. He’s one of us!
As a crowd gathered to photograph Red Rage before it was packed and shipped, he ushered me up the steps to the theater’s exit. Now it was all making sense, though my heart continued pounding.
The foyer was empty, save for a half-dozen bored drivers checking their watches. Dante pulled me sharply in the opposite direction, through high glass doors covered in lace curtains. Suddenly, we were alone in a beautiful narrow hall painted ivory, lined with columns and wainscoting in the same golden hue as my bracelet. He let go of my arm, his whole body now facing me.
“So?”
“So …” I said, inching backwards until I collapsed onto an overstuffed settee beneath a bust of some famous composer. “Did you really just spend fifteen million dollars on a painting?”
“I did.”
“Why?”
“To impress you. Did it work?”
I shifted over so he could sit beside me.
“Possibly.”
Clearly, this was a man for whom everything came easy. But I wasn’t quite sure I wanted to be one of those things. He leaned in, his face inches from mine. His nostrils flared like an animal’s picking up the scent of fear … and liking it.
“I’ll ask you once again: do you accept the Step?”
