Page 292 of Double or Nothing

Three panels fill it.

Red.

Purple.

Yellow.

Gold fractures catching beneath the studio lights.

The black line bending across all three.

Bending.

Christ, just seeing that gives me all the inspiration I need.

Lot 47.

Here it fucking comes.

My pulse becomes a drumbeat. The rush of adrenaline hitting hard and fast.

The auctioneer gives Alice’s biography. Recent sales. Private interest. Her evolving use of material and colour.

He mentions the reserve.

Three hundred thousand, and some solitary bidder has already put an advance on it.

I watch the room, not the screen.

“We’ll open at three hundred and twenty thousand pounds,” the auctioneer says.

Nothing.

One second.

Two.

The auctioneer scans the room.

Alice stops breathing.

So does Bryce.

Christopher’s mouth begins to curve. Something that looks like a fucking smile.

Not yet, fucking parasite.

I keep my paddle down.

If I enter first, this will look exactly like the personal interest William Parker expects.

Wait.

Three seconds.

Four.

A telephone assistant raises her hand.