Chapter 1: The Forged Invitation
The scent of linseed oil and desperation hung thick in the air of the Brooklyn walk-up. April Albert wiped a sweaty forehead with the back of her hand, leaving a smudge of cobalt blue on her skin. The last brushstroke on the canvas was a slash of defiant, stormy grey, a perfect mirror of the tempest in her heart.
It was a good piece. Maybe one of her best. But it wouldn't pay the rent sitting in her studio.
The knock at the door was no gentle tap, but the hard, final rap of authority. Her stomach plummeted. Through the peephole, she saw the weary, impatient face of her landlord, Mr. Henderson.
"Miss Albert. I know you're in there."
She opened the door a crack, the chain lock still engaged. "Mr. Henderson. I'm working. The light's perfect."
His eyes, tired and resigned, slid past her to the canvases crowding the small space. "I'm not here about the light, April. I'm here about the money." A white envelope slid through the gap, fluttering to the floor at her feet. "That's it. The final notice. Forty-eight hours, or I change the locks. I've got my own bills to pay."
The door clicked shut, his footsteps retreating down the hall. April leaned her forehead against the cool wood, the fight draining out of her. She saw her mother's face, pale against a hospital pillow, heard the beep of machines that had cost a fortune. She had sold everything of value then. Now, all she had left was her talent and a stubborn will that sometimes get her in trouble.
Her gaze fell on the small trash can by her easel. There, atop coffee grounds and crumpled sketches, was a thick, cream-colored cardstock. The Veritas Gallery invitation. She had taken it from a studio she had cleaned recently. It was stacked neatly on a desk and she had quickly taken one and hid it, only to discover it was signed for a specific guest. It was useless. She had thrown it away days ago, a painful reminder of a world that had no place for her.
Now, it looked like a lifeline.
She picked it up and smoothed the expensive paper on her cluttered kitchen table, pushing aside a mug of cold coffee. Her hands, usually so steady with a brush, trembled slightly.
This is insanity, a voice in her head whispered. You'll get caught.
What choice do you have? another, sharper voice countered. Live on the street? Let everything your mother worked for end up in a dumpster?
She selected a fine-line artist's pen, its tip a precise, needle-thin point. She took a deep, steadying breath, the kind she took before committing to a difficult line in a portrait. With painstaking care, she began to work, her brow furrowed in concentration. She didn't add a name. That was too bold, too traceable. Instead, in a flawless mimicry of the invitation's elegant font, she added a simple, devastating alteration next to the pre-printed name of a prominent collector: "+1 Guest of Damien Alistair."
The name felt foreign on the paper. Damien Alistair. The billionaire. The phantom. A man whose name was synonymous with power and ruthless acquisition. She was using a giant for a shield, and the absurdity of it almost made her laugh. Almost.
Her plan was twofold: the forged invitation was her key, but the large portfolio bag leaning against the wall was her weapon. Inside, carefully wrapped, was the storm-grey canvas, "Uncivilized." She would get in, find a moment to place her piece among the others, and pray it caused the kind of scandal that led to a paycheck.
The Veritas Gallery glowed like a diamond under the Manhattan night sky. April felt a thousand years old and painfully young as she stepped out of the stuffy subway air into this world of chilled champagne and soft laughter. The portfolio bag felt impossibly heavy and obvious on her shoulder.
Her simple vintage black shift felt cheap and thin. She tugged at the hem, painfully aware of the way the fabric clung to her curves, so different from the willowy silhouettes around her.
Just get in. Place the painting. Get out, she repeated the mantra in her head, a prayer to the god of desperate artists.
She presented the invitation to a stone-faced man in a black suit at the door. His eyes scanned the card, then her, then lingered on the large portfolio. The moment stretched, thin and tight as a wire. She forced a smile, hoping it looked more like bored entitlement than sheer terror.
He gave a curt nod and stepped aside.
Relief was a cool wave, so potent it made her dizzy. She stepped into the lion's den.
Moving like a ghost, she found a sliver of empty wall in a less-trafficked corridor leading to the restrooms. In one smooth, nerve-wracked motion, she slid the canvas from her bag and quickly attached it to the dainty frame. smoothening it evenly, she leaned it against the pristine white wall. It looked like it belonged, a jolt of raw energy amidst the calculated calm. Her heart hammered against her ribs. Part one was done.
From his position on the elevated balcony, Damien Alistair watched the human tapestry below. It was the same scene every time: the same people, the same conversations, the same desperate quest for his attention or his money. He found it all profoundly tedious.
His head of security, Marcus, stood a respectful distance away, a silent, watchful shadow.
"A successful evening, Mr. Alistair," a gallery trustee simpered at his elbow.
"It's a room full of people," Damien replied, his voice flat. The man retreated, chastened.
It was then that his gaze fell on a disruption in the pattern. A woman, standing before a brutalist painting, her head tilted. She wasn't admiring it; she was analyzing it. A small frown creased her brow. She had a mass of chestnut curls trying to escape a clumsy up-do, and a figure that spoke of softness and curves in a room of sharp angles and dieted frailty and rail like women.
But it was her eyes he noticed, even from this distance. A startling, vivid violet, full of an intelligence and fire that was entirely out of place.
"Who is she?" he asked, his voice low.
Marcus followed his gaze. "Unknown, sir. She arrived alone. With something like an easel. It may be a painting."
Damien's interest, a dormant thing, flickered to life. He watched as she moved through the crowd, a sparrow among peacocks, completely unaware of the hawk that had just fixed its gaze upon her. His eyes then drifted to the corridor where she had just been, landing on the new, unfamiliar painting. A small, dark smile touched his lips. He understood the entire gambit in an instant.
April had cornered a woman who looked important, her words tumbling out in a rushed, too earnest pitch about the piece she had just placed. "...the emotional texture is really the selling point, you see? The way the light breaks through the storm clouds..."
The woman's eyes glazed over, already looking for an escape.
"That's a bold critique of an artist who took home the Veritas prize last year," a voice said from behind her. I noticed another piece, a more interesting one, I must admit".
The voice was cold, smooth, and laced with an amusement that wasn't kind. It was a voice that was expected to be listened to. A voice that owned the very air it traveled through.
April turned, and her world narrowed.
He was taller than she had imagined, and more solid. His shoulders were broad beneath a suit that was clearly, devastatingly, not off-the-rack. His hair was the color of a raven's wing, styled with an artful carelessness that cost a fortune. But it was his eyes that held her frozen, a pale piercing blue, the color of glacier ice, and just as cold.
They saw everything. Her trembling hands. The soul-deep panic she was fighting to control. It is Him.
Her mouth went dry. All her sharp retorts, her clever defenses, evaporated.
He didn't smile. His gaze dropped to the empty portfolio bag at her feet, then back to her horrified face. He knew. He knew it all.
"Perhaps from an unknown artist," He stated searching her face. I don't recall," he said, his voice dropping to an intimate, terrifying murmur meant only for her, "issuing a plus one. Or curating your exhibition….Miss?
April". She managed to say, clearing her throat nervously..
"April... I guess you already know who I am. Call me by my first name. It would be a delight to hear it from the lips of such a beautiful temptress". A light blush coloured her cheeks at his suggestive tone. He didn't wait for a reply. He glanced at the large, quiet man who had appeared beside him as if from smoke.
"Escort my... guest to the car," he instructed, his icy eyes never leaving hers. "We will be leaving."
Before she could form a word of protest, a firm hand was on her elbow, steering her away from the glittering crowd, through a service entrance, and out into the biting night air towards a waiting black sedan.
The finality in his tone was absolute. The gilded world of the gallery disappeared, and as the car door closed with a soft, expensive thud, April wondered what fresh hell she had just walked into.