The Auction by Tiffany Reisz

1

For the life of him, Daniel couldn’t put his finger on the reason he’d chosen this house of all places as his first stop upon returning to America.

Exhausted and bedraggled, with his eight-hundred-dollar hiking boots still crusted with dirt from Machu Picchu, he should have been anywhere but standing in front of one of Manhattan’s most luxurious townhouses. Four stories? Five? Plus, a coveted Riverside Drive address. White exterior with sleek black trim, imposing black iron fence… The townhouse was the public face of a very private world, one that Daniel used to belong to but wasn’t sure if he did anymore, wasn’t even sure if he wanted to belong anymore. Still, nice place. No, not nice. What had Eleanor called it? After a year and a half, he hoped his brain had relinquished that little memory, finally.

Swanky. She’d called Kingsley Edge’s infamous townhouse “swanky.” And he still remembered it.

Annoyed with himself—were scientists ever going to invent a cure for hopeless romanticism?—he passed through the wrought-iron gate and mounted the steps. He rang the doorbell and waited. Not surprisingly, a young woman of shocking beauty opened the door. Dark red hair, wide amber eyes, and ripe red lips…

“May I help you, monsieur?” the girl asked. Her wide eyes looked too innocent to be part of this infamous household.

The girl spoke with an accent, one he recognized all too well. French but not French. The inside of his cheek twitched.

Her eyes flashed at him. “Something funny?”

Prickly little thing. Kingsley always did like his women temperamental—it was more fun to punish them when they’d earned it.

“Nothing at all,” Daniel said. “Sorry. Just amused Monsieur ‘If You Aren’t From Paris, You Aren’t Really French’ picked a Québécoise for his doorkeeper.”

She raised her chin and glared at him. “He must have someone standing guard to keep you English Canadians out.”

Smart girl, or a good guess? Either that or his knee-jerk “sorry” must have given him away. Once a Canadian, always a Canadian. Even after twenty years living in the States.

“He won’t mind me,” Daniel said. “Is our Lord of the Underground home?”

“Might be. Might not. Depends on who you are. And from the looks of you, I would say…non, the master isn’t home.”

The looks of him? Ah, Miss Quebec might have had a point there. From South America, he’d flown straight to New York City. Yesterday he’d been in Peru. Today, Manhattan. He was wearing faded jeans to match his battered boots, a khaki long-sleeved t-shirt, and scratched wraparound Ray-Bans—the same clothes he’d had on yesterday. Add on two days of stubble, a weather-beaten tan, and sun-faded hair badly in need of a cut, and he knew he looked nothing like the usual type who knocked on this door.

“Would you mind checking? S’il vous plait?” he added, hoping the French didn’t sound too sarcastic. He was going for “just sarcastic enough.”

The girl exhaled dramatically. “If he is home, whom shall I say is calling?”

“Just tell him it’s Daniel. He knows me.”

The girl raised her eyebrow and regarded him coldly. She nodded at the front steps. “You wait here…Daniel.”

The girl closed the door in his face and Daniel almost laughed. Gone for only a day, and he already missed South America and its complete dearth of ill-tempered red-headed doorkeepers.

The door opened once more. The girl gave him a look of such disgust that he forgot for a moment she wasn’t actually French.

“You can come in,” she said as she stepped back and let him inside the house. “But wipe your boots. Or better, take them off. Then burn them.”

Daniel started to brush past her but paused mid-step. Something, some of the old mischief stopped him. And that rudeness of hers demanded a little punishment.

He faced the girl, pushed his sunglasses on top of his head, and gave her a hard blue-eyed stare, the stare his late wife had called The Ouch. Maggie knew when he looked at her like that, gave her The Ouch, she’d have trouble walking the next day…

His grumpy little doorkeeper returned The Ouch with a vicious glare of her own. But Daniel knew a sub when he saw one. In Kingsley’s household, one found only three types of people: dominants, submissives, and the rare, elusive switch. Her little pale blue sailor dress and lace-trimmed ankle socks did not scream “dominatrix” to him. Their staring contest was no contest. The Ouch won every time. After a few seconds, she lowered her eyes to the floor. He took a step forward. She took a step back. Her cheeks flushed and her lips reddened. If he wasn’t mistaken, even her breathing quickened.

“That’s better,” he said softly. “Do you have a name?”

She raised her eyes, smiled, undefeated. “Yes.”

“And it is?”

She leaned in close and whispered, “Celine Dion.”

Before he could reply, he heard another voice. He turned around.

“It cannot be…is our Daniel finally out of the lion’s den?”

The voice belonged to the tall, dark-haired, dark-eyed man descending the stairs in a suit like something off the cover of an old romance novel. The man’s riding boots were polished. Daniel had once asked if he did a lot of riding. Not horses, the man had said.

“Kingsley Edge,” Daniel said without smiling. “Were you quoting the Bible? I didn’t think you’d ever heard of it.”

Kingsley shrugged elegantly and rolled his eyes. Unlike the testy doorkeeper, he was true blue, white, and red French and had the attitude, the accent, and the libido to prove it.

“Blame the priest,” Kingsley said. “He’s still trying to save my soul. I keep telling him I don’t have one.”

Daniel’s smile faded as Kingsley met him at the bottom of the steps. “He’s not here, is he?”

Movement in the music room caught Daniel’s eye. He saw a few beautiful women lounging about two very lucky and handsome young men. But no priests in residence. Thank God. Daniel wasn’t quite ready for that conversation yet.

“Sunday afternoon,” Kingsley said and motioned Daniel to follow him back upstairs. “He’s either praying right now or reminding his little pet what his cock tastes like.”

“I don’t think she needs reminding,” added the doorkeeper.

Kingsley exhaled, turned to the girl and said something in rapid French. In equally rapid but far testier French she replied. Finally Kingsley raised his hand, snapped his fingers, and pointed at the hallway. The girl gave Kingsley a mock curtsy before spinning on her heel and storming away. Her skirt lifted with that tempestuous twirl, and Daniel caught a glimpse of white lace-trimmed panties. She should flounce away more often.

“You’re keeping a Québécoise as a pet these days?” Daniel asked.

“She’s part of my Imperial Collection. I’m creating the New French Empire…one beautiful girl at a time.” Kingsley started up the stairs and Daniel followed.

“No boys?”

“Are you enlisting?”

“You’re not my type.”

“Pfft,” he said, très français. “I’m everyone’s type.” He waved his hand.

As they walked, Kingsley whistled “La Marseillaise,” the French national anthem.The whistling always made Daniel nervous. No man alive worked so diligently to cultivate an air so casual. Daniel knew better. So when Kingsley ushered him into his private office, and Daniel found his back pressed to the door and a hand on his throat, he wasn’t particularly surprised.

He stayed calm and didn’t fight back. Coming here had been a risk, and for the life of him he still couldn’t say exactly why he’d decided to take it.

At first neither man said anything. Kingsley’s dark eyes bored into Daniel’s blue ones. Kingsley was rakishly handsome and had half the women in New York at his feet. Quite a few of the men, too. Yet underneath the playboy exterior lurked an extremely dangerous man. Dangerously intelligent. Dangerously loyal.

Dangerously loyal to the man whose lover Daniel had tried to steal last year.

Hence the chokehold.

* * *

“Whatever happened to, ‘Welcome home?’”

“This is your welcome home.” Kingsley grinned and tightened the hold, but only a little. They were friends, after all.

“I guess Eleanor told you.”

“She told me. You know the rules, mon ami. We may borrow another’s toys, pet another’s pet…but we do not steal another’s property.”

Daniel took a shallow breath. As hard as Kingsley was holding his neck, a deep breath wasn’t an option. “There’s no stealing Eleanor. I asked her to stay. There’s a difference.”

“You are alive. Obviously there’s a difference.” Kingsley released Daniel’s throat and backed away. He collapsed into a leather armchair in front of his desk. “Et vive la différence, oui?”

Daniel rubbed his throat as he sat in the chair opposite Kingsley. “Right. Yeah. Vive la différence.”

Kingsley laughed his low, sardonic laugh. The laugh died. Kingsley narrowed his eyes at him.

“Why did you come back here, Daniel? If you’re planning on trying again with her…I wouldn’t recommend it.”

Daniel stretched out his tired legs. “I’ve been asking myself that question since my plane landed. I don’t know. Tired of traveling. Not ready to go home yet. Plus…I wanted to thank you.”

“Thank me? For what?”

Leaning forward, Daniel clasped his hands between his knees. His hands…once they’d been smooth as a woman’s. He’d been an archivist in his old life and the worst thing that ever happened to his hands was the occasional paper cut. Now for a year and a half he’d been scrambling up mountains, trekking through rain forests, and digging through ancient ruins. His hands looked it.

“The funeral,” Daniel said. “I would never have been able to forgive myself if I hadn’t gone to the funeral.”

The funeral. Maggie’s funeral. His late wife. He’d only made it through that day because Kingsley had given him drugs. The good kind. He’d half-joked to Eleanor that Kingsley had slipped him a horse tranquilizer. It might have been, actually. Whatever it was, it had done the job. On a normal day, such a drug would have put him on his back for a week. That day, it had merely disconnected his mind from his body and allowed him to stay vertical for those two necessary, nightmarish hours.

“It pays to have a well-stocked medicine cabinet. And liquor cabinet. Can I get you something from either of them now?”

Daniel smiled. “No. I’m fine. Thank you. I should probably go before you-know-who shows up.”

“He won’t kill you. He’s a pacifist.”

“And a sadist.”

Kingsley smiled. “Who isn’t? Look, he won. He knows he won. He always knew he’d win, or he wouldn’t have sent her to you in the first place. I’d be more afraid of her than him, if I were you.”

“Elle’s going to beat me up, too?”

“Not your body, but your heart. Again. She does have that power over men.”

“I noticed.”

Understatement of the century. Kingsley peered at him, as if trying to see in Daniel’s eyes if he was still in love with Eleanor or if he’d come to his senses.

“I hadn’t left my house in three years,” Daniel said. “I still can’t believe that sometimes. When every day feels the same, three years can pass in a blink. I think I might have died in that house if she hadn’t dragged me out.”

Daniel had only had Eleanor for one week—a gift, of sorts. Or, to be more accurate, a loan, since he’d had to give her back. But she came and worked her magic on him and when she left, so did he. She’d joked about Tierra del Fuego. Why? Who knew, with her. She probably just liked saying the name. So after three years exiled in his own home, he went there for one reason and one reason alone—to send her a damn postcard postmarked from Tierra del Fuego to prove he was free again.

But was he truly free? He couldn’t escape thinking of her. Maybe not as free as he wanted. Not yet.

“Anyway, it was good to see you again, King. Apart from the manslaughter attempt.” Daniel started to stand but the door burst open and two laughing women nearly fell into the room.

“Tessa! Irina!” Kingsley glared at them both. “Come here. Now.”

Kingsley pointed at the floor. Both women pasted on artificial looks of contrition as they simpered across the Persian rug and sat at Kingsley’s feet.

“Ladies,” Kingsley began, “what are you two doing? Or do I not want to know? Tessa—answer me.”

He tapped the buxom olive-skinned girl on the tip of her nose. “Anya said you were in your office with the ugliest man she’d ever seen in her life. We had to see for ourselves.”

“She’s such a liar,” said the hazel-eyed brunette glancing at Daniel. “He’s more handsome than you are, King.”

Kingsley gasped and put his hand over his chest in melodramatic shock. “Blasphemy, Irina.” He pulled Irina’s earlobe. “No one is more handsome than I am.”

“You’re too pretty,” the girl continued, flashing her eyes at Daniel. He couldn’t take his eyes off the girl. Irina spoke beautifully clear English but with a tinge of a Russian accent. She, too, must have been part of Kingsley’s Imperial Collection. “He looks rough, rugged. I like his eyes.”

“Rough?” Kingsley scoffed. “I spent four years in the French Foreign Legion. I have bullet wounds. That,” Kingsley pointed at Daniel, “is a librarian.”

“Archivist,” Daniel corrected. Ex-archivist actually. He inherited a huge sum of money from his late wife and hadn’t worked in years. Now at thirty-eight he felt restless, useless. Being a man of leisure didn’t really suit him. He knew he needed something else in his life again. Just didn’t know what yet.

“Intelligent men are my favorite,” Irina said, nearly purring the words. “And in such rare supply these days.”

Kingsley exhaled dramatically and snapped his fingers. Both women stood up. The Russian Irina cast another lascivious glance at Daniel.

“I’m extremely smart,” Kingsley countered. “Except around women. Now go before I’m forced to punish both of you for eavesdropping. And tell Anya to behave herself. Grand prize or not, I’ll turn her over my knee if I have to. I’ll turn her over my knee even if I don’t have to.”

“Yes, sir,” both women responded as they shuffled toward the door, pretending to be chastened.

“Irina?” Kingsley called out. He waved her back over to him. Kingsley reached up and wrapped a hand around the back of Irina’s neck and pulled her ear to his lips. He whispered something to her and she nodded, turned her head and whispered back. Daniel sighed. The whispering was one of his least favorite of the dominant tricks. He could be telling the girl to fetch his dry-cleaning for all Daniel knew. Probably was. But by whispering it to her, he created a little secret society that only he and Irina belonged to. Doms did that all the time in Kingsley’s world. Such a mindfuck. Back in his days as a dominant, Daniel usually avoided the mindfuck. Why waste time fucking the mind when he could be fucking the body?

Irina kissed Kingsley on the cheek, glanced once more at Daniel, and left the room.

“Are you sure you won’t stay for lunch?” Kingsley asked.

“No thanks. Not hungry.” Not for food anyway. Being around all of Kingsley’s beautiful submissives had him thinking things he’d long ago tried to push out of his mind. “I should go. Haven’t been home yet. I know you’re busy.” Daniel rose from his chair.

“I’ll have Anya see you out. She’ll hate me for it.” Kingsley went to the door.

“Anya? That would be your ill-tempered doorkeeper?”

“Daughter of Quebecois separatists. She loathes Canadians. Don’t take her hatred of you personally. I’d punish her for how rude she was to you, but she’s off-limits, unfortunately.”

“Off-limits? What woman in the world is off-limits to you?”

“The auction’s in a month. She’s Le Grand Prix.”

Daniel’s eyes widened. “You’re still doing the auction? The FBI hasn’t shut it down yet?”

Kingsley waved his hand dismissively. “The FBI is always welcome at my auction. It’s for charity after all.”

Daniel snorted a laugh. Charity? Technically Kingsley did donate a large portion of the proceeds to some Catholic charity for the poor. He took his usual fifteen percent, however. Kingsley’s auction happened every August and was the talk of the town. Ostensibly, it appeared to be just another silly fundraiser for the rich and bored. Attractive people auctioned themselves off for dates with the highest bidder. But these weren’t your average attractive nobodies. They were highly trained submissives and dominants. And the “dates” weren’t dates. No dinner and a movie for the highest bidder. They won sex—hardcore kinky sex with the beautiful deviant of their dreams.

“So your doorkeeper is the Grand Prize? I pity whoever wins her,” Daniel said. “She’s beautiful, but the personality could use a little work.”

“They won’t be bidding on her personality,” Kingsley said. “They’re bidding on her virginity.”

Daniel only stared at Kingsley.

“You’d be ill-tempered too if you were still a virgin at twenty-four,” Kingsley said. “The last time we had a virgin in the auction, the highest bid went into six figures. Most we’d ever made off one person.”

Kingsley winked at him as he opened the door for Daniel. He continued, “Now are you sure I can’t get you anything? Something to eat, to drink? I feel so inhospitable threatening your life without even lunchafter.”

“I’m really fine. I think.” Daniel’s mind still boggled. Anya, the temperamental doorkeeper, not just a virgin but a prize virgin up for auction… Kingsley lived in a very different world than the rest of the unwashed masses.

“Perhaps something stronger than lunch,” Kingsley said as he veered off onto the second floor instead of heading down to the entrance. Daniel narrowed his eyes and followed. “Perhaps a little of this is what you need before you go.”

Kingsley stopped in front of a door and opened it. Looking in, Daniel saw Irina, the beautiful Russian brunette, naked on the bed, kneeling in submissive silence, her long dark hair flowing like water down her back.

All day long Daniel had been trying to put his finger on the reason why, of all places, he’d come to Kingsley’s first when coming back to America.

Now he put his finger right on it.

Kingsley said, “Welcome home.”