Work of Art

The second show from Montage, Inc. was an even larger success than the first one had been. It was clear, not only from the excessively large crowd, but also from the bids registering, that Juliet’s team had done a tremendous job securing pieces the art world was thrilled to have a chance to acquire and had invited the right people. While Juliet had expected there to be quite the turnout, she was shocked to see that nearly every single person of the five hundred or so that had received invitations was present and accounted for. Even more had been invited to make bids over the telephone or via the new app her team had created. She could see what each piece was going for, though it took a while to update so it wasn’t exact. Currently, it looked like the piece that had been lost at the airport and then relocated would make enough profit to cover her entire expenses for the show all by itself.
It wasn’t about the money, though. Not for Juliet. No, for her, it was about building a reputation, establishing Montage as the place to go for artwork of all kinds--from a beautiful painting to an inspired sculpture, to graphic design for a movie, to the film itself, Juliet wanted to be the first person who came to mind whenever people thought about the Los Angeles art scene. And she was getting there in record time. When she looked around the crowded room, she couldn’t help but smile at her own success. This level of success wasn’t bad for a person who’d died not that long ago.
“How are you this evening, Juliet?”
Parker may have managed to sneak up on her, but she was expecting him to be there that night, and his voice was familiar to her by now. Even though she hadn’t spent much time with him in person since she’d met him that night at the club, she had spoken to him on the phone and had lunch with him once--along with a few of his friends. They had yet to go on a date. She still wasn’t quite sure whether or not that move would put Henry in a position where he’d be desperate to try to hang on to her or would if it would anger him into cutting her off completely.
“I’m good, Parker. How are you?” Her eyes flickered around the room. Henry wasn’t there yet, not that she had seen anyway. So there was no way to use this conversation as a way to gauge his reaction to the idea of her speaking to another man--a very attractive, famous man, at that.
“Great. I absolutely love what you’ve gotten together here tonight. That piece over there, the sculpture of Venus by Hozwitz? It’s divine. I think I may need that in my den.”
Juliet grinned at him. That particular piece was getting a lot of attention. But then, all of them were. “You should definitely put in an offer,” she replied, looking up at him through her eyelashes. “Did you see the Vinune?” That was the piece that had been temporarily misplaced. It was a gorgeous depiction of a woman with long dark hair covering her bare breasts as she looked hauntingly at the artist. Behind her, a storm raged out an open window. It was so realistic, whenever Juliet gazed at it, she thought she could smell the rain.
“I did. That one is going for almost as much as I paid for my house.”
Juliet snickered, thinking he was joking, but when she checked her app, she saw that it was up to eight million dollars. “That’s insane,” she muttered under her breath.
“Well, in fairness, my house is way out in the suburbs. I have an apartment closer to the stadium.”
She snickered. “No, not the price of your house, silly.” She jabbed him in the arm with her shoulder. “The painting. I wonder who the high bidder is.”
“You can’t see that on your fancy app?” He was looking over her shoulder. The question didn’t sound rude, just inquisitive.
“Unfortunately, no.” She sent a quick text to her assistant, Tucker, asking him to let her know who had the high bid. While a lot of the people in the room were billionaires and could afford that sort of price, she was shocked it had gone up nearly two million dollars since the last time she’d checked on it.
While she waited for Tucker to answer, Juliet half-listened to Parker talking about how many famous people were there and looked around the room, wondering where Henry was and who else was at the event. Parker was in the middle of telling her how he’d run into Rome Verona in the restroom when Juliet’s heart stopped beating in her chest. Her eyes bulged as she stared across the room, shock and panic taking over.
“Juliet? What is it?” Parker’s arm was around her. She couldn’t pull her eyes off of the face her eyes were locked on, not even to pretend to assure him that she was fine.
Parker moved so that he was standing directly in front of her. “Juliet?”
“Uh… I’m sorry, Parker. I thought I saw…. It doesn’t matter.” She shook her head, trying to regain her breath. “It wasn’t who I thought it was.”
“Oh, okay. You really scared me there for a minute.”
She laughed and forced a smile. “Who did you say you saw in the bathroom?”
As long as he stood exactly where he was, she couldn’t see the man that had caused her to have a mild heart attack. Maybe it was better that way. He wouldn’t be able to see her either. Because, as much as she wanted what she said to Parker to be true, it was who she thought it was. Lloyd Sinders was there, standing across the room, chatting with some other rich men his age. What was he doing there? She’d never known him to be interested in art. For a moment, she wished she would’ve went through with creating a list of people who were not allowed inside and put him on it, but that sounded ridiculous. The fact that he wasn’t invited should’ve been enough to keep him out. He must’ve come with someone--but who?
“Juliet!” Henry’s voice was loud enough to interrupt Parker mid-sentence. He rushed over, put his hand on her shoulder, and pulled her back from the quarterback. “I’m so sorry I’m late.”
“Henry--hi,” she stammered, looking apologetically at Parker. The football player didn’t seem to know what to say, so he just stopped talking, his eyebrows furrowed.
“I would’ve been here sooner, but I found a buyer for your Vinune piece, and I had to stop by and pick him up just to make sure he made it in all right since he wasn’t on your guest list. I suppose I should’ve called and had you add him. At any rate, you should come and meet him. He owns a graphic design company. It occurred to me, you should be networking with him anyway.”
“Lloyd Sinders?” Juliet asked, her lips pressed together in a thin line. “You brought a rival company’s owner to my art show?”
Parker didn’t even pretend to stifle his laugh. Henry glared at him, but Juliet ignored him. “Well, not in that capacity,” Henry began. “His wife saw the Vinune, and she wanted it desperately, so I invited him along. He’s a friend of my father’s.”
“Saw it where?” She folded her arms under her chest, her blue ball gown puckering slightly at the top, she was pressing so hard.
“On the website, of course. He called me and asked if you and I were still dating.” Again, Henry’s eyes went to Parker. Now, the athlete’s eyebrows raised.
“Dating?” Juliet repeated. “You make it sound like we’re a couple, Henry. We’re not. You didn’t have any right to ask him to come here.” While she realized she may be undoing all of the work she’d done over the last several months by yelling at him, she couldn’t control herself.
“I’m sorry,” Henry said, placing his hand on her upper arm and attempting to move her away from Parker. “Can we talk about this in private?”
“Not right now,” she said, pulling away from him. Parker took a step toward her, as if he was about to interject himself into the situation to keep her safe. Henry seemed to get the picture though. He withdrew his hand and ran it through his hair before putting his fist on his hip. “I’m busy, Henry. I have a show to run.”
Henry looked at Parker one more time, sizing him up, before he took a few steps backward and then melted away into the crowd. The second he was gone, Juliet took a deep breath.
“Are you all right?” Parker asked.
She half-nodded, half shook her head. “I’m fine. Thanks.” She lifted her phone to see what Tucker had said and wasn’t surprised at all to see that her father currently had the highest bid. “I need to go talk to my assistant,” she said. There was no way she was letting her stepmom get her hands on that painting, not if there was any way she could ethically keep it from happening.
“Do you want me to come with you--just in case that jerk comes back?” Parker asked.