An Experienced Mistress (22 page)

More than ever, he was sorry he hadn’t been that lover for her.

The two ladies behind him drew up to the canvas. “I’m surprised they hung this in public view, too,” one murmured to the other.

Even if the resemblance of the figure in the painting to Will wasn’t obvious, if he kept standing right under the picture, sooner or later someone might notice the similarity. He moved away and feigned interest in a bronze displayed in the middle of the room.

He couldn’t see where Genevieve had gotten to now. He turned to make his way to the back of the gallery, where he’d spotted her last.

“Well, well, Visser, so this is it, eh?” a jolly voice said.

An older gentleman stood at the side of Genevieve’s cousin. Visser appeared slightly more respectable than when Will has last seen him. He wore the same, too-long greatcoat, splotched with nameless stains. But his black, curly hair looked less greasy, and his boots fairly new rather than caked with mud.

“That’s it,” Visser proclaimed, pointing at the
Adonis
painting. “My masterpiece. I call it
The Heroic Hunter
.”

Will sucked in his breath, stunned.

So Genevieve had taken up her old arrangement with her cousin? Letting him take the credit for her paintings, and splitting the money with him?

He could hardly believe it. Even if Cage didn’t cheat her and lie to her, as he’d done before, the deal was patently unfair. No one could see that better than she.

And after the man threatened to steal her paintings, why would she even speak to him again, let alone allow him to profit from her work once more?

Genevieve herself stormed his way.

Face red, eyes sharp, she looked infuriated. He supposed that in the time since he’d seen her last, she’d thought of more than a few choice words to say on the topic of his unchivalrous behavior.

He’d been prepared for this. He braced himself for the inevitable dressing-down.

She charged right past him.

As she headed straight for her cousin, he realized she hadn’t even seen him in the crowd.

“Cage Visser,” she said in a voice loud enough to be heard by half the gallery. “How dare you even show your face in public?”

Visser’s eyes widened in shock.

“Here now, ma’am, what’s all this?” the older gentleman with him asked.

Genevieve didn’t seem to hear the fool. Her lush mouth parted, her breast heaving with indignation.

Dear God. Had she ever looked so lovely?

But yes. She always had. She was a goddess.

“How dare you?” she continued to Visser. “I can’t believe you actually stole my painting!”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Cage turned to his companion, a sneer on his face. “My cousin. She’s not quite right in the head, I’m afraid.”

Will’s right hand contracted into a fist at the insult. Genevieve’s pointed to the Adonis picture on the wall and addressed the older man with Visser.

“That is my painting!
Mine
! Do you understand me?” Beautiful as she was, Will feared that she did, actually, look a little insane. “He stole it from me!”

A small crowd gathered around them to see what the commotion was. “Pathetic,” someone muttered.

Coventry and Jack rushed up to Will’s side. “What’s this all about?” Coventry said under his breath.

“It’s true,” said a clear female voice. Genevieve’s dark-haired friend stepped forward from the crowd. “It’s her picture.”

Another man, tall and bespectacled, hurried up to them. “My dear woman, you are sadly mistaken,” he informed Genevieve. “I am the gallery owner, and I certainly know whose painting it is. That’s his signature, right at the bottom.”

Genevieve reached over with one finger to touch the initials, barely visible in the dark foliage at the corner of the painting. The signature had been altered: Genevieve’s initials were gone. She turned pale.

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to leave,” the gallery owner said. “You’ve created a disturbance.”

Will couldn’t let this go on.

He stepped forward. “She’s telling the truth. It’s her picture. This man’s a damned liar.”

A woman in the crowd gasped at his profanity.

Genevieve whipped around to stare at him, her eyes wide. “Will,” she whispered.

“I don’t know who you are, but surely you’re not acquainted with this woman?” the man with Visser said. He looked from Will’s polished appearance to Genevieve’s bohemian garb. “How do
you
know she painted it?”

Out of the corner of his eye, Will saw that Coventry and Jack moved forward to hear what he was going to say. Everyone stared at him now.

“Simple,” Will said. “I posed for it.”

The throng around him burst into gasps and whispers.

“That’s right, I’ve seen that before,” Jack exclaimed. He pointed at Genevieve. “You brought it over to my mother’s house, didn’t you?”

Genevieve peered up at him. Then she nodded. “Yes. I did.”

Jack let out a loud laugh, waggling his finger at the painting. “I told you he looked familiar.”

“I can’t believe I didn’t see it before,” Coventry muttered.

Cage’s confident sneer vanished. His eyes shifted back and forth rapidly. “Now wait a minute. A passing resemblance doesn’t mean anything.”

“But it’s more than a passing resemblance, isn’t it?” Will deliberately drew closer to the painting. The fascinated crowd looked from the canvas, to him, and back again.

Good God. A whole group of strangers, all seeing what he looked like with his clothes off. Or what he looked like in a fur loincloth, which was almost worse. He saw the fellow from the Club, and even more horrible, a couple who were friends with his parents.

It was a nightmare—almost like the one in which one arrives at the ball having somehow forgotten to put on one’s pants.

But dignity be damned. Genevieve needed his help.

“Look at the way she painted the hand on the staff,” he pointed out. “It’s curled around so you can only see the tops of the fingers.”

He held up his wounded left hand, causing a fresh wave of murmurs from the strangers in the crowd. Then he mimicked the pose in the painting, curling the hand around an imaginary staff so that his maimed fingers didn’t show. “You see?”

Astonished faces stared at him. Will flashed a smile at Genevieve, who stood there aghast. “I like how you did that,” he said to her.

He pointed to another part of the painting. “And she’s put my initials in it. Here’s the W, for William…” He traced the outline of the mountains in the background. “And here’s the C, for Creighton.” He pointed out the pattern of rocks on the ground near the bottom of the picture.

Excellent. When this whole scandal was written up in the Society pages, they’d be sure to get his name right.

The bespectacled gallery owner shook his head. “I admit the resemblance is extraordinary. But I think you’re just being chivalrous. You are obviously a gentleman of quality. Are we to believe that you, sir, posed for her wearing nothing but a bit of fur?”

The two ladies who’d admired the picture tittered. They cast sideways glances at Will, though not precisely at his face. Let them look.

“On the contrary,” he answered the gallery owner. “I was wearing nothing at all.”

Now cries of outrage along with the gasps came from the crowd. “But this is obscene!” someone said.

“All right, she did paint it,” Cage said loudly, a gleam of inspiration in his eye. “But I was only trying to protect her. I knew if she exhibited it, no one would want a picture from her again!”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Genevieve demanded.

The gallery owner turned to her with a grave look on his face.

“I am afraid, ma’am, that this picture goes far beyond anything we would consider proper.”

“It was proper enough a minute ago!” she retorted.

“We exhibit morally uplifting art here, not licentious paintings. I’m surprised you weren’t ashamed to call this painting your own.” He shook his head disapprovingly. “A woman painting a nude man? It’s indecent.”

Horrified, Will saw the crowd turning on Genevieve. “It’s wicked, is what it is,” someone said. “I’ve never heard of such a thing. Scandalous,” someone else declared.

Damn. This was worse than before. He’d tried to protect her honor; instead, it seemed, he publicly tore it to shreds. People glared at her as though the whore of Babylon had walked into their midst.

“I’m not the only woman here who’s seen a nude man,” she snapped.

“If you’re speaking of the situation of married women, I assure you it’s not at all the same,” the gallery owner said.

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that,” Will objected.

He suddenly saw how to save the situation. How, in fact, to save everything.

Or how to make a complete and utter idiot of himself.

What the hell. He’d done that already.

“Actually, it is quite a bit the same,” he said.

Cage Visser’s friend snorted. “How so?”

“Because I’m going to marry her.”

There was a moment of absolute silence.

“Now, Will, let’s not get carried away,” Jack said, putting a hand on his arm. “Heat of the moment, and all...” Will shrugged him off.

The gallery owner looked curiously at Genevieve. “Is this true?”

Chapter Eighteen

Genevieve shook her head. “No. It’s not true.” He just wanted to get her out of a terrible situation.

And she appreciated it. But the evening’s ordeals, the crowd of people looking at her as though they might haul her out and stone her if they could find big enough rocks, and the irony of him bluffing about intending to marry her, made her feel small and miserable.

She would run away, and have a good cry. And then...what? That Mrs. Boldridge wasn’t going to want a painting from her, once her son told her how she’d disgraced herself.

Will stepped closer to her, took her hand. Ridiculously, she jumped at his touch.

His dark eyes held her in their gaze, earnest, solicitous. “Gen. Please,” he said in a low voice obviously meant only for her ears.

Genevieve sagged. “Why are you doing this? After the way you acted before?”

He nodded, steadily, as though he expected that. “I was a fool. I was on edge because I had been deceived. I thought you didn’t return my feelings...when in fact I’d never declared them.”

“Exactly! You were a fool.”

“Well, I have just said so.”

“How am I supposed to know how you feel, if you don’t tell me?”

“I am telling you now.” He took a deep breath as if to steady himself. “Right. Let me try this properly.”

And then, to her shock, with a whole gallery full of people staring, he got down on one knee in front of her.

This couldn’t be.

He still held her hand. Oh, God, was he playacting? If he was, she would kill him.

No. He looked up at her, unguarded, vulnerable. The steady, committed ardor in his face awed her.

“I love you. More than I have ever loved anyone.” He smiled slightly at his own words. “More, I think, than anyone has ever loved anyone. If I can make you as happy...or even half as happy as you make me, you’ll be a very happy woman. And God knows I’ll try, Gen. My whole life I’ll try.”

He spoke that intimately, yet in a voice strong enough that anyone who cared to could hear. He was so beautiful, like some chivalrous knight from a tale, pledging his heart and soul.

She stared as he reached into his waistcoat and drew out a ring. The gold glinted in the gaslights of the hall. Now she knew he wasn’t joking.

“Miss Genevieve Bell, will you do me the very great honor of becoming my wife?”

Genevieve started crying. She thought she might fall, so she lowered down to kneel with him, grasping his arm for support.

He petted her hair away from her face, wiped away a tear with his thumb. His hands cradled either side of her face, and he leaned forward to kiss her, a sweet, devoted kiss that healed her to the depths of her soul.

“So...yes?” he drew back and whispered.

She let out a half-laugh, half-sob. “Of course, yes.”

“Ah, thank God.” He kissed her again. “Gen, I’ve missed you so much. I love you...”

“I love you. You have no idea how much.”

She became aware again of everyone staring down at them. “We should get up,” she said with a shaky laugh, wiping at her wet face with her sleeve. “We are making fools of ourselves.”

“I don’t care,” he murmured, his mouth twisting in a sublime smile.

“That was beautiful.” A nearby lady sighed. “Just beautiful.”

“Well, I don’t know,” her companion said. “They still ought to have waited until they were married.”

But for the most part, the air of judgment was gone. Witnessing Will’s proposal had completely transformed the mood in the gallery. As Will helped Genevieve to her feet again, a smattering of applause sounded from somewhere in the back of the crowd.

“I seem to have misjudged the situation somewhat,” the gallery owner said, fiddling with his glasses. “While the picture is perhaps not entirely proper, it is, nonetheless...”

Will glared at him.

“Yes. Well,” the man said, and with a little bob of his head he retreated.

Then somebody was squeezing the life out of Genevieve. “Oh, my goodness! I’m so happy for you!” Ruth gushed into her ear.

“I cannot believe it,” Genevieve told her. “Did that just truly happen?”

She was aware of Will’s friends gathering around him, offering congratulations as well. “Ah, Will, you don’t understand this mistress thing at all,” Mrs. Boldridge’s son teased him. She turned around.

“Well done, brother,” a tall man said. He gave Will a quick one-armed hug.

Will reached out to her and drew his arm around her waist, pulling her closer in a comfortable, possessive gesture. “You had better come meet these fellows. Or I guess you’ve already had the misfortune of meeting Jack.”

“Yes, she did,” Jack said. “And yet she is still marrying you. I can’t quite make it out.” He winked at her as he shook her hand. “Do let me know if you ever change your mind...”

Genevieve laughed.

“Exactly how many times do you want that nose broken in your lifetime?” Will said.

The other one offered his hand. When Genevieve extended her own, he bent over it with a courtly kiss. “Coventry Moore, your humble servant.”

“It is a pleasure to meet you. I don’t know if Will told you my name? I’m Genevieve Bell.”

“I know who you are. I admire your work.”

“Indeed?”

Coventry nodded. He offered her a handkerchief, which she realized she needed. “I have a feeling Will’s a very lucky man.”

“Thank you,” Genevieve said, grateful and a little nonplussed. Will’s friends, at least, seemed to accept her. The warmth of their welcome was yet another unexpected joy.

“Where is
he
going?” Jack cried out.

Genevieve had forgotten about Cage. Everyone, it seemed, had forgotten about Cage. But now he skulked his way toward the door.

At Jack’s cry, he’d sped up his pace, but Coventry ran after him with the speed and force of a steam engine, Jack close at his heels.

Visser tripped on the edge of his too-long coat and stumbled, almost falling. Coventry tackled and grabbed onto him, and in the next moment Coventry’s fist connected with the man’s jaw. A shockingly loud crack, and Cage went limp.

His mouth in a grimace, Coventry let Cage’s body slump to the floor. “Send for the constable,” he ordered the gallery owner.

“Damn you, Coventry,” Jack complained. “
I
wanted to hit him.”

Coventry shrugged. “You can if you want.”

“Well, it’s no fun now.”

“Good Lord.” Genevieve inhaled, suddenly dizzy. She grabbed onto Will’s arm.

“Are you all right?”

“Yes. I’m more than all right.” She laughed at him. How could he ask such a thing, after how happy he’d made her? “I’m just...a little overwhelmed.”

“Of course you are. Come on, let’s take you home with me.” His arm encircled her shoulder, protective and comforting. He looked up at Ruth. “Do you need a carriage back home?”

She grinned. “Don’t worry about me, sir. I’ll just walk. It’s not far.”

“No calling me ‘sir.’ It’s Will, all right?”

“All right, then.” She grinned even wider.

“My coachman can take her.” Jack walked over to them again. “I’ll ride home with Coventry.” Ruth nodded in agreement.

“Let’s go,” Will said to Genevieve. “It’s about time we had some privacy.”

Genevieve’s heart swelled with joy and wonder.

****

“Will, can you be certain that this is what you want?” she asked him, once they were in the carriage.

“Please don’t ask me that again. Otherwise I will feel insulted.” His lips brushed her temple. “Do I seem unsure?”

“No, but—”

“I am certain. More certain than I’ve ever been of anything.”

“I believe you.” She clasped his arm. “Although you seem too good to be true.” He began to shake off the compliment, but she continued. “You say you were a fool before...won’t everyone think you’re being a fool now? Your friends are very kind, but what about your family?”

“It will take my siblings about two minutes to decide they adore you. For my mother, just a little longer...Truly, the only one who may be very unpleasant is my father.”

“Oh, dear.” That wasn’t going to be fun. “I’m a little frightened of him already.”

“Come now.” Will pulled her closer. “You are not going to let a grumpy old baronet scare you off, are you?”

“No,” she said decisively. “There isn’t anything that could scare me away from you.”

“That is more like it.”

“My father won’t approve of you, either, you know,” Genevieve told him.

“No?”

He looked so surprised that it made her laugh. “He dislikes the aristocracy. I think he will find it very strange that I am a baronet-ess, or whatever I shall be.”

Will didn’t smile. “But he will come around?”

“I’m just teasing. I think he’ll be thrilled. Shocked...but thrilled. And he’ll like you. How could he not?”

“I’m looking forward to meeting him.”

“We will be married.” Genevieve sighed, settling back in the carriage seat. “I can hardly believe it.”

“Where do you want to have the wedding?”

“Is there going to be much of one?” Genevieve hadn’t thought this far ahead yet. The idea of an actual wedding was a whole new marvel.

“What a question! Don’t you want a proper wedding?”

“Yes, but with your father...”

“No matter what, we’re having a wedding. Who knows? He might even attend.”

“Perhaps you’d rather just do things quietly.”

“Too late for that. We’ll have hundreds of guests and rivers of champagne.”

Well. She had to admit that sounded marvelous. “Oh, good gracious. I’m going to have a
wedding
.”

Will laughed. “I think most women would have realized that a little sooner. Now where should we have it?”

“I have always especially loved country weddings.”

“A country wedding, then. And you’re going to wear a lavish dress.” He pulled her closer to him again. “You’ve always looked wonderful in white.”

She frowned. “I don’t think I’m allowed to wear white.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. White is your color, isn’t it? And everyone will be in raptures over how beautiful you are, and then we’ll go to...I don’t know. To Paris and Rome, perhaps, so you can look at famous art?”

“Oh, good Lord.” She put her hands to her head. “Stop it. I can’t take it.”

“That wouldn’t be good?”

“That would be wonderful!”

The carriage pulled up to the townhouse. Will hopped down, then lent her a hand to climb down, dismissing the coachman for the night.

In the candlelight of his bedroom, she unbuttoned his coat, feeling extremely wifely as she did so, and feeling charmed by the sensation. Once he’d gotten his coat off, he wrapped his arms around her and kissed her, long and deep.

“I love you,” he said when their lips parted.

“I love you, too.” She beamed up at him. “How many times are you going to tell me that tonight?”

“I don’t know. Are you tired of hearing it already?”

“No. Never.” She ran her hands up his sides, feeling the warmth and strength of his body through the thin linen shirt, the rhythm of a brave heart that beat only for her.

God, how she loved this man. Her fingers, so deft with a brush, were equally nimble at her present task of unbuttoning his shirt. Soon his boots and trousers, her shoes and bride-white frock were discarded beside the bed where they lay down together in a pool of moonlight in one another’s arms. Every motion of their bodies was graceful: every arch of the back, each wondering sigh. They moved together as one, exalted by their passion for one another, instinctive masters of the art of love.