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Of course it’s my older brother’s name on the screen. A prickling cold swerves through my gut and I shove it away. Hit reject. Sinclair can talk to me another time.
I go into the gallery like the phone call was a rude interruption to a fully formed plan. White walls in need of repainting. A creaking blond wood floor. Art that isn’t worth the canvas displayed proudly underneath unfilled holes in the drywall. A man behind the counter is absorbed in writing something in a ledger. Probably something extremely fucking artsy, judging by the beret and the black turtleneck. He looks from the screen of his phone to the ledger and back again. Squints. I could ask about her, but I don’t want to alarm him.A woman with black hair in a gray coat. I saw her for fifteen seconds and I want her.
No, I don’t. Curiosity. That’s all this is.
I circle around to the other side of the gallery, the other wall.
The painting stops me halfway down, like the shaft of light from the alley. The sidewalk outside, the remaining blocks, and the private showing recede into the background. Details blurred. Irrelevant.
It’s a study of an ocean. A subject I’ve seen thousands of times before—millions—but this one is different. This one makes my heart beat faster. In general, paintings don’t do that. A particularly evocative piece will sometimes inspire a distant ache behind my breastbone, a signal that a piece will become or already is quite valuable. This is more. This is closer.
This is all sensation. Spray on my face. Salt on my tongue. Unsteady drifts of sand beneath my feet.
And a dark energy, coiled in the painting. Reaching out for me.
I want to reach back.
I cannot push it away.
I clear my throat until the man in his ridiculous beret approaches. “One of our best pieces.”
No shit.
“It doesn’t have a price.”
“Five hundred.” He sticks his hands in his pockets, and I don’t like how he’s looking at it with me, his shoulder a foot away from mine.
I find the initials of the artist in the lower right-hand corner.D.M.The artist should know better. Five hundred dollars is too cheap for this work. Nothing in my galleries costs less than a million, but this is special.
“We’ll arrange a private showing.”
The man’s eyes go up, wrinkling his forehead toward the beret. “Oh, I’m not sure. The artist, she—” Mistake. “We don’t normally offer private showings.”
No doubt he doesn’t. This is a low-end gallery.
“Make an exception.” I take my gloves off and fold them into the pocket of my overcoat, following the lines of the brush strokes in the painting. They descend into a roiling darkness that manages to retain its movement even without much suggestion of light. The hairs on the backs of my arms stand up. “Nora likes these kinds of places. She would do a showing here if I mentioned it to her.”
He’s breathing conspicuously, but I don’t look at him. Give the man relative privacy while he realizes who’s standing in his gallery. “Which Nora would you be—someone up-and-coming out of Manhattan, or—”
I laugh. “It’s not her real name. You must know that by now.”
He rubs a hand over his mouth. “Yeah. I do. Everyone knows that.”
Everyone knows that Nora is the pseudonym for one of the most popular street artists of the last five years. Famously secretive. Her pieces appear overnight, bursting off walls and billboards and, lately, canvas. It is nearly impossible to schedule a showing with her.
For other people. It’s not impossible for me. I’ve made investments in a few of her pieces because the value will continue to rise.
I meet the man’s eyes and find him staring. Frank. Bordering on rude.
“You know her, then.” He nods, attempting to keep it casual, but he fails. He’s too tense. Overexcited now. He keeps the heat low in this building, which is lucky for him, since he’d be sweating otherwise. A touch to his beret. “And that makes you—you’re the Collector. I’m sorry. I should have recognized you. I’m Robert. Owner of the gallery.”
“No need for an apology.” I’m not often photographed, at showings or otherwise. I’ve given my release for photographs twice in all my years acquiring art. There’s very little for him to go on. I take a business card out of my pocket and press it into his hand. “You’ll arrange the showing. And I’ll take this painting.”
This, at least, is firm ground for him. At the desk I take a sheet from a notepad and write a message. Fold it twice. “For the artist.”
“I’ll pass it on.” Robert runs my credit card at the machine in his desk, then makes a show of glancing at the business card. “I should contact you at this number?”
“Yes.”
