Three women with nothing in common but a taste for the good life and a shared history of betrayal are about to find out just how far they’ll go to make a name for themselves in the glamorous world of fine art—a place where the stakes are high but the rewards can be . . .
PRICELESS
Young, ambitious Lizzy Duffy is determined to become a successful auctioneer—even if it means sleeping her way to the top. But when she suspects that her boss is using her, Lizzy wastes no time in plotting the ultimate revenge. Fine art expert Carrie Klein has come a long way in her career. Now she’s ready to take the London art scene by storm and show her rival she’s not the naïve woman he once took advantage of. And in a drafty farmhouse, impoverished artist Serena MacDonald struggles to support her young daughter by forging Old Master paintings . . . one of which ends up at auction. When her secret is discovered, Serena’s fate may depend on her ability to fabricate one last masterpiece.
From the glittering lights of New York City to the major auction houses of London, internationally bestselling author Olivia Darling delivers an unforgettable novel of ambition and greed, desire and deceit, that’s as alluring and luxurious as a rare work of art.
Release date:
October 26, 2010
Publisher:
Dell
Print pages:
416
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It was the moment he sucked whipped cream from her fingers that Lizzy Duffy realized her relationship with her boss had changed irrevocably. Subsequently, losing her virginity to him was either the best or the worst career move she could possibly have made. As she lay on her back in Nat Wilde’s bed, worrying at a cuticle and examining a cobweb in the corner of his bedroom ceiling, Lizzy decided that it was probably her worst move. And staying the night had compounded it. She remembered something she’d read in some magazine: don’t act clingy after the first time you have sex. It was clingy, wasn’t it, staying the night in the hope of a reassuring cuddle? Nat had fallen asleep right after he’d come. Lizzy knew she should have gotten straight up and caught a taxi home right then to prove she wasn’t bothered. Beside her, Nat slumbered on, seemingly unmoved by the same dilemma.
What on earth had possessed her? Fact was, Lizzy knew exactly what had possessed her. Nat Wilde had possessed her the moment she’d first laid eyes on him at her interview for a position in the Old Masters and Nineteenth-Century department at Ludbrook’s, the auction house on New Bond Street. Fresh from her master’s degree in art history at the Courtauld, Lizzy had prepared a pretty speech about her passion for nineteenth-century British watercolorists. But she hadn’t had an opportunity to deliver it. Nat Wilde had been running late. He’d breezed into the Ludbrook’s office fifteen minutes after the interview had been due to start. He’d been slightly inebriated, having lunched with his best friend, Harry Brown, head of Ludbrook’s’ department of fine wines, at their gentleman’s club on St. James’s. Nat had picked Lizzy’s CV up from the desk and had seemed unable to focus on it. Then he’d looked at her, focused very well on the hem of her skirt, and said, “You’ve got the right degree, you’re passably pretty, and you wear short skirts. You’re hired.”
The right thing at that moment would have been for Lizzy to take offense, but before she could open her mouth to protest at such a superficial and sexist dismissal of her proper talents, Nat Wilde had smiled at her. And it had been the kind of smile that had made her feel he had been joking about her being “passably pretty.” That was an understatement, of course. He found her far more attractive than that. Lizzy couldn’t help but smile back. She’d been smitten.
“Your first assignment,” Nat had said. “Tell me about this little painting right here.”
Her heart still fluttering like a hummingbird with the hiccups, Lizzy had followed Nat across the room. Balanced on a shelf had been a small watercolor of a farmer bringing cows in from the field at the end of the day.
“Artist?”
“Easy.” Lizzy had trotted out the name.
“Real?”
Lizzy had peered closely. “I think so. The only way to know is to see the signature. But he wouldn’t have signed a piece this small on the front. You’d need to turn it over and—”
“Already done that,” Nat had said. “Put a reserve on it of ten to twelve grand. What do you think?”
“I think that’s just about right,” Lizzy had said. “How about you?”
“I think you and I are going to work together very well.”
And they did.
Never before had Lizzy found getting up for work to be such a pleasure. She was thrilled to be working with the art that she loved, surrounded by fellow enthusiasts. She had long been determined to have a great career in an auction house, but now she had an added incentive to sparkle. Each morning she veritably sprang out of bed at the sound of her alarm. She spent at least an hour getting ready, blow-drying her fine blond hair into something resembling a do. And oh how her efforts were rewarded. Nat Wilde could make her day with a wink, and the winks were plentiful. They’d flirted like crazy for the past six months. And now here she was. In his bed.
That afternoon’s sale at Ludbrook’s had been a barnstormer. Lot after lot had busted through the ceiling prices Nat had predicted. And finally, Nat had achieved a price of seven figures for an early nineteenth-century oil. It went to a Russian collector. All the good papers would cover the news.
After such a successful day, Nat announced that the entire team deserved a treat. He utilized his direct line to the maître d’ at the Ivy and booked a table for eight o’clock.
“Sit here,” said Nat to Lizzy, patting the seat beside him. “You’re my right-hand girl, and I want you at my right hand.”
Lizzy settled into the seat, catching the envious glances from the other girls in her department—Olivia and Sarah Jane—as they found themselves at the other end of the table, between the two bespectacled boys, Marcus and James.
“Champagne!” Nat announced. He ordered a bottle of Champagne Arsenault’s Clos Des Larmes, which Lizzy understood was the good stuff. It certainly went down easily. They polished off six bottles among them, the restaurant’s entire stock.
“It’s on old John Ludbrook’s account,” Nat reminded them. “And you deserve it!”
He toasted the team, as one and individually.
“Olivia,” he said, “you are the goddess of typing. Sarah Jane, without you, my mailing list would be nothing.”
Lizzy felt herself color crimson when Nat praised her pretty blue eyes. “Which are so good at spotting a masterpiece!”
Dessert arrived. Lizzy chose sticky toffee pudding with cream, getting some on her finger as she pulled the dish toward her. Quick as a flash Nat grabbed her hand and stuck her finger into his mouth.
“Don’t want to waste any,” he said.
Lizzy almost crawled under the table for shame. She was hugely relieved no one else seemed to have noticed.
“How are you getting home?” Nat asked as they were collecting their coats.
“I’ll get a cab,” she said.
“Where to? Hammersmith, isn’t it? My place is on the way there. We’ll share a ride.”
They started kissing as the cab sailed past the roundabout at Hyde Park Corner. By the time they got to Nat’s flat in South Kensington, Lizzy knew she wouldn’t be taking the taxi on.
“Do you have any cash?” Nat asked. “I left my last tenner as a tip.” Lizzy duly dug out her last twenty and handed it to the driver.
“Thank you. You’re a dear. I’ll pay you back tomorrow.”
Nat took her by the hand and led her into the shared lobby of the mansion block in which he lived. They continued to kiss in the mirrored lift. Nat’s tongue flickered inside her mouth like an eel in a bucket. Lizzy smiled at her reflection over Nat’s shoulder as he nibbled at her neck. She sighed with delight as Nat slipped his hand up her cashmere sweater and started to fumble with the clasp at the back of her bra.
Once inside the flat they went straight to the bedroom. Lizzy’s nerves were as taut as violin strings as her clothes fell to the floor. Would Nat still want her when he saw her naked body? Nat’s growl told her that he did.
“Oh. Yes,” Lizzy sighed as he cupped his hands around her bare breasts and fiddled with her nipples. As he sucked each one of them in turn, he somehow managed to slide her little white cotton panties down as far as her knees. While Nat turned his attention to Lizzy’s buttocks, the panties dropped to her ankles and Lizzy kicked them off. Now she was completely in the raw but Nat was still fully clothed. He soon remedied that.
While Lizzy arranged herself on the sheets in what she hoped was an alluring manner, Nat divested himself of his tie, his shirt, his trousers, and underpants as though the clothes were on fire. There was a brief and awful moment when Lizzy thought Nat might actually be intending to ravage her with his socks still on, but he remembered just in time and pulled them off as well. They went flying across the room. One ended up dangling from the standard lamp.
Nat dived onto the bed, narrowly avoiding head-butting Lizzy in the nose as he did so. Lizzy hadn’t really thought about what would happen next. More kissing, she hoped. She wanted to be covered in kisses from head to toe. Top to bottom. Indeed, it seemed that Nat was already very fond of her bottom. It wasn’t long before he flipped her over onto her tummy and was bestowing naughty little love bites to her shapely pink buttocks. So far, so silly. Lizzy giggled as Nat jiggled the spare flesh on her bum. But then things turned rather more serious. He stuck his hand between her legs. She felt his fingers groping for a way inside. And then, suddenly, he lay fully on top of her, squashing her face into the mattress. She felt his erection, which she hadn’t really seen yet or gotten to know, pressing hard against the place where his fingers had been moments before.
“Nat, I . . .”
She meant to tell him, but before she knew it, the inevitable was already happening. Lizzy drew breath sharply at the first thrust. Fortunately, there were only five more of those before Nat came with a terrifying bellow that made Lizzy respond with a cry of her own.
“Good for you?” he asked as he pulled out.
Good? Well, it hadn’t hurt as much as she’d expected. And there was no blood. If she were honest, most of Lizzy’s enjoyment of the moment had been stymied at the thought that she might leave a dirty red stain on Nat’s pure white sheets. But she didn’t. She checked. There was no evidence whatsoever that anything monumental had taken place.
Fact was, Nat hadn’t even known she was a virgin. Lizzy thought he might have guessed, but, if he had, he didn’t say anything. He just rolled off her and fell asleep. His face as he lay dreaming was youthful and perfectly untroubled. Unlike Lizzy’s.
She lay awake all night, staring at the bare walls of Nat’s bedroom (utterly typical for the home of a fortysomething divorced guy), replaying the event over and over, wondering and worrying if she had done what was expected. And then, of course, there was the question of contraception. They hadn’t used any. Would her local pharmacist stock the morning-after pill? What were the rules about taking it? How had she gotten to twenty-six without actually knowing this stuff? How had she gotten to twenty-six without losing her virginity anyway? She shook her head in disbelief as the disapproving face of her only serious boyfriend came to mind. He had been president of the Christian Union at university and had flat-out refused to have sex outside marriage. They had broken up when Lizzie was twenty-five. There had been opportunities since, but by then Lizzie had decided that getting to your midtwenties without having done it was just plain weird, and she didn’t want to have to explain so she avoided the issue. And after all that, she lost it to her boss. In just eleven minutes from taxi to finish. Was that it?
Finally, at seven in the morning, Lizzy decided it was time to go.
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