The Masterpiecers (Masterful #1) Read online

  Ivy told me J.J. became famous after he spray-painted the corridor of his dorm in college. At first, he was fined, but then the principal decided it made the drab cement more attractive, so he dropped his complaint and commissioned him to repaint the rest of the hallways. After he graduated, other colleges called on him to enliven their bland atmospheres.

  “How many schools have you spray-painted to this day?” Dominic asks.

  “Three. I’m working on number four.”

  The screens around them are displaying his work. It’s actually pretty neat, with all the colors and the oddball characters.

  “Promise not to paint over any walls in this place or we’ll get into serious trouble.”

  J.J. smiles. “Promise, dude.”

  “Shall we shake on it?” Dominic suggests, jutting out his hand.

  Chuckling, J.J. shakes it.

  “Josephine, do we have insurance?” Dominic asks, twisting around, still holding J.J.’s palm.

  She smiles complacently.

  “Phew.” He lets go of J.J. and makes a big show of swiping his brow. “Best of luck to you, my friend.”

  “Thanks, man.” J.J. is very West Coast, totally chill and totally tanned.

  “And now…a woman who needs no introduction.”

  I think I’m about to see my sister, and my body goes as rigid as the rusty bars of my cell. Don’t bring it up, Dominic. Don’t bring me up!

  Chapter Six

  Ivy

  “Miss America 2000!”

  People clap. The woman closest to me smiles and gives the cupped-hand pageant wave. Seriously, who invented such a pathetic gesture?

  “Maria Axela,” Dominic says, proffering his arm.

  She latches on to it and rises, her black lace dress swinging around her knees. Even though she’s in her mid-thirties, Maria exudes a voluptuous childishness with her perky breasts, flat waist, and pouty red lips.

  “So tell us, Maria, what made a former beauty queen enter an art competition?”

  “What made me enter?” she repeats in a thick Hispanic accent. “It’s quite simple really. I’m not just nice to look at”—she winks—“I’m skilled.”

  “Jeb? Can you—”

  Before Dominic even finishes his sentence, the screens light up with Maria’s work. Sixteen paintings of pageant winners. I stare along with everyone else, thinking that whoever told her she was skilled should be shot. The oil paintings are poor renditions of chirpy girls in sequins. I scan the room. Everyone seems captivated—everyone except for Brook. He’s staring at me. When our eyes meet, he jerks his gaze back to the screen, a little color staining his jaw.

  “I don’t know what’s more beautiful…the women who pose, or your execution of them,” Dominic says. He tucks a few more words into her ear, which make her glossy lips pull up. “A big round of applause for the Masterpiecers’ first beauty queen contestant.”

  Maria sits back down, while I sit up straighter.

  “And last but not least, please welcome a young and extraordinarily talented girl, Miss Ivy Redd.”

  I grin as I stand. Dominic’s already at my side. He smells like a bottle of cologne, and something stronger—stale and vinegary. Day-old Merlot?

  “This girl has created something truly original. Quilts! And I’m not talking old-timey ones, but fresh, modern works inspired by cityscapes, nature, basically everything she observes around her. Jeb?”

  I watch the projected images of my work, a sense of pride stirring deep within me. Blown up and bright, my pieces look magical.

  “So tell us what or who inspired you?”

  “My mother,” I say into the mic Dominic is holding up to my mouth. “She made quilts. Incredibly colorful landscapes with silk and tassels and chiffon.”

  “Like yours?”

  “In a way. Although, I favor abstract over figurative.”

  “Do you stitch them by hand?”

  “Of course. I have to feel the fabric, the thread, the needle. I need complete control over the process.”

  I’m eager for him to ask to buy one. I think he just might, when a waiter scuttles onto the stage, rudely interrupting us. He’s carrying a silver platter covered in shot glasses. The liquid inside is amber with smoke curling out of it.

  “Is that what I think it is?” Dominic asks the waiter, forgetting all about me.

  “Daisy Dukes, sir,” the man says, extending the platter.

  Dominic grabs a glass and holds it up. “Daisy, to you, my dear.” He’s about to drink it, but stops. “Isn’t there a saying that people who drink alone are drunks?” His smile widens and he gestures for the waiter to distribute the glasses.

  He starts with me. I’m about to grab a random one when he points to a small glass that isn’t fuming. Frustrated, I take it.

  “Everyone has a shot glass?” Dominic asks. “Bottoms up!” Just as I tip my glass toward my lips, Dominic hollers, “Wait! Ivy, no!”

  I jolt and spill some juice. It trickles down my forearm and soaks into the immaculate satin.

  “Hers is simply du jus, Dominic,” Josephine says with a strong French accent. “It’s not even the same color as this”—she sniffs it and her nose wrinkles—“concoction.”

  He claps his hand over his chest emphatically. “And here I thought I was going to get into trouble with the authorities.” His comment receives laughs.

  I stare at the expanding wet spot on my thigh. Why did Dominic single me out? Chase and Lincoln are underage too.

  “Now I really need this.” He bares his rows of pearly whites like a shark. “Ready?”

  There’s a hum of assent. Elbows lift, necks snap backward.

  Josephine puckers her painted lips. “That’s dégoûtant.”

  Dominic smiles and shakes his head. “Don’t mind her, Daisy. She thinks everything’s awful if it’s not French.”

  “You’re such a baladin, Dominic,” Josephine says.

  “That means catch in French,” he ping-pongs back.

  “Non.” The corners of her mouth lift briefly. “It means comedian.”

  “And this, ladies and gentlemen, is why I’ve never gotten romantically entangled with this beautiful woman. We don’t speak the same language.” Dominic flings his shot glass to the waiter who just catches it. “Now, where were we?”

  “The last contestant!” people answer back jovially.

  “Oh, yes. The last contestant. Ivy, anything you’d like to add at this time? Perhaps you’d like to send out a greeting to a family member?”

  “No.” I hope Aster won’t get offended, but I don’t feel like bringing her up.

  He tips his head to the side. “Well then, best of luck to you, Mademoiselle Redd!”

  Luck is overrated. Relying on it would be like trying to climb a fir tree by holding on to its pinecones. Dumb.

  “May the best one win!” Dominic exclaims.

  The orchestra on the side of the room breaks into the Masterpiecers’ anthem, a melody about beauty and emotion and vision—or so Dominic explained the first time the show aired two summers back. It’s pretty, but a little too mournful.

  “Thank you all for coming,” Dominic announces once the music dims. “Now enjoy your dinner and don’t get to bed too late. Tomorrow’s event will begin at 10 a.m. sharp in the main hall. Contestants, it’s picture time!”

  As we file off the stage underneath expanding applause, my stomach grumbles, the packet of nuts from the plane long gone. I smell fresh baked, buttery rolls and something rich and spicy. I fill my lungs with the aroma to ward off the hunger.

  I meet some curious gazes as I walk out. I smile to appear forthcoming. Cara’s there when I walk out, standing next to seven other people with head mics and informal apparel—the other assistants, I suppose. They all come to join us.

  “How’s that stain?” she asks.

  I’d nearly forgotten about that stain. The fabric is darker. “Should I change before the group shot?”

  “No. They’ll probably have yo
u stand in the back.”

  I clench my jaw. “They could have me sit down. It’s barely noticeable if the fabric is bunched up.”

  “I don’t choose, but it’s a possibility,” Cara says as we walk back through the Egyptian artifact-filled rooms toward the grand hall with the domed skylights.

  It’s full of people—security guards lining the walls, the camera crew, a guy with a shaved head prepping a large camera on a tripod, and faceless others milling about, adjusting furniture, strobes, reflectors, and the angle of an enormous painting they must be using as a backdrop. I feel like I’m on a movie set. It reminds me of my childhood fantasy of becoming an actress, which I grew out of during adolescence when I discovered my talent with needles and thread.

  Cara leans in as we arrive on the set, so close that her blonde bob grazes my chin. “The photographer’s really famous.”

  I stop myself from scratching the spot her hair brushed to avoid blemishing my skin with red claw marks.

  “Works for all the fashion magazines,” she continues.

  It still tickles, but I keep my nails at bay and focus on the photographer. He does look familiar with his smooth head and handlebar moustache.

  “Patrick Veingarten,” she says.

  He’s not just famous; he’s a legend.

  “Dominic, my friend, it’s been ages,” Patrick says. They smack kisses on each other’s cheeks. “Ravishing, as always, my dear Josephine,” he says, lifting one of her white hands to his lips. “And if it isn’t the Masterpiecers’ most beloved graduate,” he tells Brook, clapping his back.

  “You mean the one who stuck around.” Brook smiles and his dimples appear.

  Patrick chuckles.

  “So what are you thinking?” Dominic asks Patrick, gesturing to eight ornate golden frames.

  “You’ll see,” Patrick begins. His gaze scans all of our faces before perching on mine. He strides toward me and takes my elbow. “Let’s start with you.”

  He has swirls of light green and brown in his eyes, like slow-churned, mint chocolate chip ice cream.

  “I hope my camera will do you justice,” he adds with a wink.

  “Where would you like me?”

  “Somewhere more private,” he whispers inside my ear.

  I replace the snort frothing up with a subtle titter, which I hope will win me a spot in the foreground of the picture.

  “Why don’t you sit here?” he says.

  Ka-ching. I lower myself into a rose-colored velvet chair that’s angled sideways, cross my legs, and straighten my back.

  “Too stiff. Too stiff,” he says. “Let yourself go a little, Ivy. Think languid, just pleased, but still ravenous. I’m sure you know how to do that.”

  I hear someone grunt, which makes everything tighten up inside of me, from my ligaments to my veins. I look for the source and find Lincoln scrutinizing me, arms crossed in front of her chest. She’s just jealous I was chosen first. I breathe in deeply and do as I’m told.

  “Now tilt your head to the side.”

  I let my eyes go unfocused to blur the ogling faces around me, then slowly, I unfold and refold my legs, lay my forearms on the stuffed armrests, and loll my head against the soft velvet imagining it’s one of my mother’s quilts.

  “Get the oval frame in front of her,” Patrick yells to one of his assistants. It’s so large it encases all of me. He steps back to observe the effect. After a long minute, he breathes, “Perfect…a true work of art.” He admires me for so long that my confidence skyrockets. Coupled with my roiling hunger, I feel like I’m floating, hovering over the rest of the contestants on a cloud as gilded as the frame outlining me.

  “Next,” he yells.

  I skid off my cloud, and land with a thump in the deafening room.

  Leisurely, Patrick positions the others, bestowing upon them the same admiration he afforded me. Stupid me for feeling singled out. Patrick’s appreciative of his work, not of his subjects. He scatters the judges among the framed contestants and instructs them to act as though they were appraising our value. Brook, who’s supposed to be assessing my worth, is looking everywhere but at me. I’m pretty sure I make him uncomfortable.

  While the strobe lighting blinks on and off, making a popping sound each time, the assistants orbit around us, slanting reflectors and readjusting the frames.

  Patrick steps out from behind his camera. “Perfect. No one touch anything! Brook, I’m sure your shoes are valuable, but eyes on Ivy please. Everyone else, stay in position.”

  With one click, we are immortalized.

  Chapter Seven

  Aster

  I return to my cell with my head so full of my sister that I don’t mind she didn’t send me a verbal shout-out. We’re twins—we have other ways of communicating. When she smiled, I knew it was for me.

  I also don’t mind all the attention I’m getting tonight. Let them stare at the new girl. Let them get an eyeful. Soon, I’ll be gone. Ivy will take me to New York with her. I’ll be able to quit my job at the pizzeria and focus on what I love best: graphic design.

  A bell rings through the sterile hallway signaling that the cells are about to be bolted for the night. I hurry into my room just as the automated gates begin grinding against their built-in rails to lock us up like lab rats. The shrill sound reminds me of the garbage truck that used to beep every morning at five sharp while it backed into our street. Never thought I’d be nostalgic for the sound of a garbage truck.

  I brush my teeth and splash cool water over my face from the sink in the room I thankfully don’t need to share with anyone. As soon as my head hits the pillow, I fall asleep, but wake long before dawn. I fish out the book that I keep underneath my pillow to make it more substantial. I don’t have a flashlight, so I angle the cream pages toward my barred window through which trickles the faint glow of the perimeter lighting.

  I borrowed the book from the prison library. It’s the story of a Southern white woman’s love affair with one of her father’s slaves. Sometimes, I wonder if my ancestors were slaves too. I’ll never know. My mother had no stories about my father. I remember asking her how long they’d known each other before she had us. Her answer was always a huff and a flick of her wrist. Then again, my mother was no storyteller. There were no bedtime fables when we were children and no dinnertime tales. Rare were the times when we all sat around a table for a meal anyway.

  I realize I’ve read the same paragraph three times, so I put the book away and fall back asleep. It’s the shrill ringing and metal grating that rouses me. I rub the sleep out of my eyes, but it feels counterproductive, like I’m pressing fistfuls of sand into them.

  I use the toilet quickly, feeling exposed now that the lights are on and the other inmates have started filing out of their cells. I stretch the T-shirt I’ve slept in over my knees to hide more skin. Before even washing my hands, I race to the bed and yank on my jumpsuit.

  Breakfast is the usual: bland oatmeal. It goes down okay and doesn’t come up, unlike some of the other stuff they serve. I take my food back to a deserted table and wolf it down because I want to go to the dayroom to see my sister. Unfortunately, Gill spots me and strides over. She sets her tray down right in front of mine.

  “In a hurry, A?” she asks.

  “A?”

  “It’s better than Ass.”

  I narrow my eyes. “My name’s Aster. Not Ass. Not A.”

  “O-kay,” she says, scrunching up her lips. “Don’t get your jumpsuit in a twist. I was just trying to be friendly.”

  “I don’t need a friend.” When she smirks, I add, “I’ll be out of here by next week. No point in making friends.”

  “Breaking out so soon?”

  “No. I’ll be released so soon,” I say.

  “Yeah. Keep thinking that if it helps you sleep at night.”

  “It was an accident. I’m not some criminal.”

  “I’m pretty sure killing a man makes you a criminal.”

  I glare at her. “Just shut u
p.”

  “Or what? You’ll kill me too? Aster, if they thought you were the victim, you wouldn’t be locked up with the likes of me. Wanna know what I did?” She’s smiling. It’s grotesque. Her teeth are crooked—all of them.

  “I don’t care what you did.”

  She sets her pointy elbows on the table and knots her finger together. “You’re not even a little curious?”

  I shake my head and gulp down the remaining cooked cereal even though it has the texture of wet cement. And then I’m on my feet, tray in hand, about to make a run for the door when one of the guards marches my way. He has rolls of fat bulging over his waistband.

  “Inmate Redd.”

  The cafeteria goes quiet—too quiet. Sure enough, everyone’s gaping.

  “I’m here to escort you to your appointment with the psychiatrist,” he says.

  “Now?” I exclaim.

  The guard lets out a thick laugh. “No, tomorrow.”

  There’s snickering.

  “Yes now. Let’s go!”

  “But—”

  He hunches over and leans in so close that his nose is nearly against mine. “Do you want to end up in the tank instead of in your cozy little cell? Because I can make that happen.”

  I swallow hard. “No, sir.”

  His breath smells like stale cigarettes. It makes my eyes water. After a few painfully putrid seconds, he pulls away and starts for the door. Gill smirks. I would give her the finger if I weren’t afraid of how she would retaliate—because isn’t that what people do to each other on all those prison shows?

  I peek at the clock on the wall right before going through the metal detector that checks for stolen cutlery. Eight thirty. I have another hour before the show starts, although I’ll miss the preparation.

  “Is this a routine appointment?” I dare ask the guard.

  He turns to look at me, lips hoisted up on one side like skewed blinds. “Yeah. Your mani-pedi’s right after.”

  Seven days. I focus on that. In one week—if the district attorney hasn’t already set a court date and a bail amount—Ivy will come home and find a way to set me free. She promised and she always holds her promises.