The Red (The Godwicks, #1)

by Tiffany Reisz

Art for art’s sake was a lovely idea in theory. But art alone couldn’t pay the bills.

He didn’t seem dangerous. No, he seemed terribly dangerous. But he didn’t seem violent. There was a difference.

“What is it you want from me?” “May I be blunt with you?” he asked. “I’d prefer it.” “I very much wish to fuck you.”

“You know I’m not a prostitute, yes?” she asked. “Not yet. But I think you’ll make a fine whore.”

“You smile like the devil,” Mona said. “The devil doesn’t smile,” he said. “The devil smirks.”

She’d just agreed to become a prostitute to save her gallery. Something told Mona that somewhere out there, her mother was proud of her.

Art should be dangerous, you know. It should say something to society that society doesn’t want to hear. Do you know what the opposite of art is? Propaganda. There’s too much of that in the world. Not enough art.

Such a hard man—hard body, hard cock, hard to read, hard to believe he was real even as he pounded into her very convincing proof of his existence.

“This is…perverse,” she said between breaths. “Don’t complain,” he said. “I could have used a wine bottle.”

“I’m not the devil, my darling,” he said, sinking his teeth into the side of her neck again like some kind of rutting beast. “The devil wants your soul. I only want your body.”

They were finches. They were foxes. They were fools. And she was one of them. A nymph in a moon-white gown. A creature of myth and mist. A girl kissed by goddesses and mated by satyrs.

“Here?” He kissed her chest over her heart. “Do you ache for me here?” “Malcolm…you told me not to love you. Don’t make me love you.”

“The things you do to me…I’d never dare dream them, much less do them. And yet, when I’m with you, there is no game I wouldn’t play, nothing of my body would I keep from you. You leave me and I go mad with waiting. You leave me and you are my every waking thought and my every sleeping dream. And if I knew when you were returning to me, I would count the minutes until I saw you again.”

“No, that’s a lie.” “What’s the truth, Mona?” His voice was so soft and tender it hurt her. “I would count the seconds.”

Reason called to her, telling her to run from the pain. She ignored its voice. It sounded too much like her own. She’d far rather listen to Malcolm’s.

for a split second she wondered…what if Malcolm was the devil? With a riding crop in her cunt, she could almost believe it. So what if he was? She wanted him all the same.

Heaven and hell were in this room and they had one foot in each.

What magic was it, what sorcery that could turn an act of violence and pain into an act of adoration and affection? It was alchemy, the art of turning base things into gold.

She could either see Malcolm or she could see reason, and Malcolm was a finer sight than anything as dull as reason.

Pomegranate, the only fruit that grew in Hades.

The aching between her legs was a permanent fixture now. She would have to get used to it.

“I hope you find a fine sweet young virgin someday to marry,” she said. “And I hope she opens her cunt for your brother and your father and your best friend the minute your back is turned.”

She’d had the strongest orgasm of her life while chained to a boulder with a half-man, half-beast inside her. There was no going back after that. She could only go forward.

She never wanted to taste freedom again. She only wanted to taste him.

“Make me come again and I’ll sleep.” “You’re terribly greedy.” “For you,” she said. “Only greedy for you.”