Raphael stopped in front of the next painting.
This one was even bigger, the paint thicker and more chaotic—like someone had dumped a bucket of color into a blender and let it explode across the canvas.
He stared for a few seconds, the corner of his mouth twitching.
That's when a voice came from behind him.
"Can't make sense of it, huh?"
Female. Sharp. Dripping with sarcasm.
Raphael turned.
A woman stood three steps away—long black dress, deep-brown hair falling over her shoulders, features so perfect she looked like she'd stepped out of a Renaissance portrait.
Arms folded, one corner of her mouth lifted in a half-smirk.
Jennifer Connelly.
Raphael blinked once.
Of course he knew the face—Oscar winner, Yale and Stanford double threat, the woman who made the whole world remember Alicia's eyes in A Beautiful Mind.
But this wasn't movie Jennifer.
The woman in front of him had zero acting warmth in her gaze—just pure, condescending appraisal.
Raphael met her eyes.
"You talking to me?"
"Is there anyone else standing here?"
Jennifer took one step closer. Her stare slid from his face back to the canvas.
"Pollock isn't meant to be understood. He's meant to be felt."
Her tone was mild, but the "I'm educating you" vibe was impossible to miss.
Raphael stayed quiet.
She kept going.
"Of course, for some people, feeling might be asking too much."
She turned to him. "Especially when your face is screaming 'how much is this worth?' That expression already says everything."
Raphael laughed softly.
"So my face is the problem?"
"No. Your entire existence is the problem."
Jennifer's voice stayed calm, but every word landed like a blade. "Standing here in a custom suit, staring at a Pollock, and the only thing going through your head is money. No interest in art. No interest in culture. Nothing that can't be converted into cash."
She paused.
"Classic Hollywood nouveau riche. Good looks and nothing else."
Raphael studied her for three full seconds.
Then he smiled.
"Miss Connelly… do you actually know me?"
"No."
"Then what gives you the right to judge me?"
She held his gaze.
"That look you gave the painting. I've seen it on too many faces—people who aren't appreciating, they're calculating. How much it'll sell for. How much it'll appreciate. How much it'll make them look cultured."
She stepped closer—less than a foot away now.
"You're not the first, and you won't be the last. But yours is more obvious. Probably because—"
Her eyes raked over him. "You don't even bother pretending."
Raphael looked at her.
Thirty-one-year-old Jennifer Connelly was at the absolute peak of her beauty—flawless bone structure, those deep-brown eyes that could pull you in and never let go.
Right now those eyes held nothing but open contempt.
But hate like this doesn't come from nowhere.
Why the hell was she coming at him full force?
Raphael suddenly remembered something.
A few months earlier, right after the CK underwear campaign dropped, Philip had told him:
"Every actress in Hollywood is talking about that commercial."
The reason was obvious—same reason directors later had to use body doubles for Willem Dafoe in Antichrist. The bulge in those briefs wasn't subtle. At all.
Raphael had always known that particular "asset" was part of his edge. Hell, it had been proving itself in private since long before he got to Hollywood.
Now the pieces clicked.
He took half a step forward.
"Miss Connelly, let me ask you something."
She arched a brow.
"What?"
"Are you here for the event… or did you come specifically to start shit with me?"
Jennifer faltered for half a second.
Raphael didn't give her time to recover.
"Because if it's the first, those words were already rude enough. If it's the second—"
He let the pause hang. "Then maybe we should continue this conversation somewhere more private."
Jennifer stared at him.
Then she smiled.
This smile was completely different from the mocking one earlier.
"Somewhere more private?"
"Yeah."
She thought for a beat.
"Where do you live?"
He gave her the address.
She nodded, turned on her heel, and started walking.
After a few steps she glanced back over her shoulder.
"Wait for my call."
Then she melted into the crowd.
Raphael stood there watching her go.
Interesting woman.
The next few hours he wandered the galleries.
He looked at more Pollocks, a couple of Rothkos, a de Kooning or two.
Every single one made him think the same thing: This shit sells for tens of millions? The art world is loaded.
Emily stayed right beside him, giving little explanations. Raphael nodded, murmured "mm-hmm," and said almost nothing.
By four o'clock the event wrapped.
He went back to the apartment, took a long shower, then sat in the living room waiting for the phone to ring.
Five o'clock exactly—his cell buzzed.
Jennifer.
"Address still the same?"
"Same."
"Thirty minutes."
Click.
Exactly thirty minutes later the doorbell rang.
Raphael opened the door.
Jennifer stood there in a completely different outfit—simple white button-down, tight jeans, hair pulled back in a casual ponytail.
The haughty ice-queen from the museum was gone. Something softer, hungrier, had taken its place.
He stepped aside.
"Drink?"
"Water's fine."
He poured her a glass and sat across from her.
They looked at each other for a few seconds.
She spoke first.
"You know why I came at you like that this morning?"
Raphael shook his head—though in his mind he already knew the answer was written all over her face.
"No idea."
She laughed, low and genuine.
"Because I wanted to see how you'd react."
He raised an eyebrow.
"That's it?"
"That's it."
Jennifer leaned back into the couch, eyes locked on his.
"That CK commercial? I saw it. Couldn't avoid it—everywhere."
He stayed quiet.
She kept talking.
"And then I noticed something."
"What?"
"Half the women in Hollywood are talking about it. You can guess why."
Raphael's mouth curved into a slow, sarcastic smile.
Jennifer's own smile sharpened.
"You're not clueless about it, right?"
He sighed.
"Clueless about what?"
She stood up, walked right in front of him, and looked down.
"The ad itself wasn't that explicit… but that size of yours? Even in underwear it's impossible to hide."
Raphael gave a soft chuckle.
"So?"
"So—"
She bent at the waist until their faces were inches apart.
"Everything I said this morning wasn't real contempt. It was a test. I wanted to see what you'd do if I pissed you off."
For the first time, a genuinely wicked little smile spread across Raphael's face.
"You were fishing."
"Pretty much."
"Catch anything?"
She didn't answer with words.
She just looked at him, those deep-brown eyes dark with something raw and unmistakable.
Raphael stood up, closing the last bit of distance until they were barely ten centimeters apart.
"Miss Connelly," he said quietly, "you know… I figured today's event was just going to be another boring walk-through."
She didn't move.
"But now?" His voice dropped. "This walk-through turned out pretty damn interesting."
Jennifer smiled again—slow, warm, and completely different from the one at the museum.
The next second Raphael gave her a light push.
She let herself fall back onto the couch.
He wasn't worried about Lima or Alessandra walking in—they were both slammed with back-to-back endorsements for at least the next two weeks.
In the space of a few heartbeats her expensive casual designer outfit vanished.
She barely had time to register what was happening before she felt herself flipped face-down on the cushions. A muffled groan left her throat, and after that she didn't manage a single coherent sentence.
…
When Jennifer Connelly finally came back to herself, the sky outside was completely dark.
Her whole body felt deliciously wrecked, but one large hand was still roaming over her skin. She scraped together the last scrap of strength she had and swatted it away.
"Enough! You trying to kill me? Jesus Christ… I must be the dumbest actress in Hollywood—the first one who voluntarily signed up to be fucked to death by you!"
Raphael burst out laughing.
"Wasn't this exactly what you wanted? Now that you've got it, you're complaining?"
Jennifer let out a soft, exhausted whimper.
"Don't talk… just let me sleep… I'm actually dying here…"
A few seconds later the elegant Oscar-winning actress was snoring—soft, ladylike little snores.
Raphael shook his head, amused.
All that attitude and this is what you can handle?
The next morning sunlight poured through the floor-to-ceiling windows.
Jennifer was still out cold.
Raphael was already awake, leaning against the headboard, watching her.
Thirty-one-year-old Jennifer Connelly looked anything but elegant in sleep—hair a wild mess, tiny bit of drool at the corner of her mouth, one leg thrown possessively over his, clinging to him like an octopus.
No one would ever guess this was the same woman who had stared him down in front of a Pollock yesterday and called him a worthless Hollywood parvenu.
He gently lifted her leg off him and slid out of bed.
She mumbled something, rolled over, and kept sleeping.
Raphael headed into the bathroom, took a quick shower, and changed into fresh clothes.
When he stepped back into the bedroom, the phone on the nightstand started ringing.