Sexually Frustrated and Slightly Freaked Out
Evelyn
Ilocked up the gallery and made my way home. My stiletto heels clicked on the wet sidewalk as I walked, my faux fur coat wrapped tightly around me.
What a night!
We’d had three reserves before the doors even opened, thanks to the online catalog. One private commission and six red dots, including the hotly contested The Fire Within. Chloe had handled the international side, processing a sale from a collector in Geneva.
Vincent was ecstatic.
I allowed myself a smug smile. The gallery’s future was safe for now.
I passed the Soho Grand, its silver awnings still dripping from the earlier rain, and then a closed flower shop, where white peonies wilted elegantly behind the fogged glass. Streetlights shimmered in the puddles, while steam billowed from grates as if the city itself were breathing.
This was my New York, and I loved it.
I’d been walking for almost five minutes when I heard heavy footsteps on the asphalt behind me, but when I turned around, there was no one there. Whoever it was must have turned a corner or gone into one of the apartment blocks stretching into the dark sky.
Shaking off the chill, I kept going. I didn’t normally feel unsafe in a city filled with so many people, except the rain had kept everybody indoors, and the sidewalks were mostly empty at this hour.
I probably should have taken a cab, but I’d been so on edge that I needed the walk to help me wind down before bed.
This was all his fault.
Dante Marcelli.
What had he been up to in my office? Why was he offering on a painting Mikhail had just bought for Sergei Malakov? And what was all that Ophelia crap?
I got warm just thinking about the way he’d touched my cheek like he knew me. The intimate way he’d said my name.
I tilted my face up to the night air, trying to cool my flushed cheeks, but it didn’t help. I was a jittery, hot mess, and it was all because of him.
Chloe had been duly concerned when I told her what happened. Not the touching bit, or the Ophelia references. All that I’d kept to myself.
She was convinced they had an agenda. That they’d place an offer tomorrow, or commission a painting, but I guess that remained to be seen.
I knew one thing for sure. The second I got home, I was googling Dante Marcelli.
For some reason, he’d rattled me. And that wasn’t easy to do. Both my parents had died before I was twenty, and I’d fought hard to build a career in a world of trust-fund babies and eye-watering wealth, so I’d learned to be tough.
Yet, he’d gotten under my skin and unnerved me.
There was a metallic thud behind me, like someone stepping on a loose grate. I knew the sounds of the city instinctively, having lived here my whole life.
I was almost at my apartment building. Turning, I scanned the street, but there was nobody there. The strangeness of the evening, along with the adrenaline crash that comes after a successful event, not to mention the several glasses of champagne, had all made me jumpy.
I stepped into the lobby, nodded at the nightwatchman, who half lifted a hand in response, and headed for the stairwell. Mine was a small, narrow block, and I was three floors up.
At the end of the short hallway, I stepped into the small vestibule that all the apartments in the building had, before unlocking my front door.
I’d left the hall light on, and the warm glow spilled across the hardwood floors, giving me an immediate sense of comfort.
I’d barely kicked off my heels when my phone lit up.
Chloe: You home safe?
Me: Yeah. You?
Chloe: Yeah. So I was thinking… About Dante Marcelli.
Me: What about him?
Chloe: I think he likes you.
Me: He was snooping in my office.
Chloe: That aside, I saw the way he looked at you.
Me: He looked at me like I was something stuck to the bottom of his shoe.
Chloe: More like a bowl of something he wanted to devour.
Me: Goodnight, Chloe.
An hour later, I sat curled up on the couch with my legs tucked beneath me, watching an old black-and-white movie flicker on the television screen.
Casablanca. One of my favorites.
I knew it was a little strange for someone my age to prefer classics over doomscrolling through social media, but there was something soothing about them.
Maybe because my mother had loved old movies too.
I still remembered snuggling up beside her as a child while she quoted Humphrey Bogart and cried over tragic love stories.
Back when life had felt safe. Predictable.
But tonight, my mind refused to settle.
I’d made the mistake of searching Dante Marcelli online.
The man barely existed digitally. No social media. No interviews. No candid photographs stumbling drunk out of clubs like every other disrespectable billionaire in Manhattan.
The few images I did find were stiff, polished photographs accompanying articles in Forbes or the business pages of national newspapers.
His brother Marco Marcelli appeared to have the most public profile, and from what I could gather, was the spokesperson of the business. The entire empire, once ruled by Leo Marcelli, was now run by Valentina, his daughter-in-law and Dante and Isabella’s mother.
One article called them “the last true dynasty of New York.” Another described Valentina Marcelli as “one of the city’s most formidable businesswomen.”
None of them mentioned organized crime. At least not directly. Reading between the lines, however, I caught the insinuations. There were references to dubious waste management contracts, waterfront shipping interests, and generous political donations.
A police investigation into a construction worker’s messy end had fizzled out due to lack of evidence. One “staff reporter” described the Marcellis as “a family whose influence extended far beyond legitimate enterprise.”
The fact the journalist hadn’t used their own name was telling.
A deep dive into Dante Marcelli had proven more interesting. Like Chloe had said, he’d served in the military after graduating from NYU with a Bachelor of Arts degree. Now that was interesting.
The celeb gossip website I was on mentioned US Army Rangers, saying he’d been attached to the 75th Ranger Regiment.
I didn’t know exactly who they were, but according to this obviously smitten reporter, the war hero had been deployed multiple times overseas.
Clearly she didn’t know about the rogue unit rumor.
As I read on, I became more absorbed.
Eleven years ago, while a twenty-three-year-old Dante had been stationed overseas, his father Filippo Marcelli had been shot dead during a convenience store robbery in Brooklyn. It appeared to be a random incident. Wrong place, wrong time. Except the shooter was never caught.
I frowned. Dante had lost a parent too. We had that in common.
While mine had died on vacation in Africa, his father had been murdered in cold blood. My loss had been sudden and unexpected, but his had been violent and mercenary. That had to change a person.
I thought about the intense, scowling man who’d walked into my gallery that night. Maybe I was beginning to understand him a little better.
Further reading told me that, four years ago, Dante had suddenly left the military and returned to New York.
Since then, he’d joined the family business as Head of Security.
In a pixelated photograph attached to the article, Dante stood beside Valentina in yet another expensive-looking black suit.
They appeared to be at some charity gala. He wasn’t smiling.
I shivered, pulling my robe tighter around me. Even in the black-and-white image, he still managed to radiate danger. I recognized that molten stare. The arrogant tilt of his head.
Right on cue, warmth bloomed low in my belly.
I drew in a steadying breath and resolved not to think about him anymore. I wouldn’t remember how my hand had felt encased in his, and how the heat of his touch had left me tingly and breathless.
Or how he’d run the back of his hand down my cheek, like he knew me.
I shivered.
Dante Marcelli wasn’t the first rich and powerful man I’d met. In my line of work, those were a dime a dozen.
My patrons were billionaires, celebrities, athletes, and oligarchs.
Most of them lusted after art because of what it said about them, not what it meant.
Most pieces ended up in climate-controlled vaults or penthouse basements, seen only by insurance assessors and the occasional mistress.
For them it was about possession, not beauty.
When the movie finished and Rick had watched Ilsa fly off into the night with Laszlo, I stared at the darkened TV for a long beat and wondered if I could have left the man I loved standing on the tarmac in the rain.
Except Dante wasn’t that man.
He was no one.
Yet, that night, it was his face that haunted my dreams.