Stroke of Genius

by Marlowe Mia

  “Don’t you remember what I told you about letting a gentleman lead, Grace?” He leaned down toward her and she caught a distinct whiff of whisky on his breath. Her father imbibed often enough for her recognize it.

  “You’ve been drinking,” she accused as she pulled the curtain closed behind them.

  “Only for medicinal purposes, love. The leg’s already had quite a work-out this evening.”

  “Oh, are you in pain? What a pity. Let me even things out a bit for you.” She stomped as hard as she could on his left foot.

  “Ow!” Crispin sank onto the cushions. “What was that for?”

  “Why did you discuss what happened between us with his lordship?” She fired back at him, refusing to feel the least contrite when he hooked his left ankle over his right knee to massage the injured foot. “Crispin, how could you?”

  “I didn’t.”

  “‘Grace wouldn’t wed one man and bed another,’” she parroted his words back to him. “Sound familiar?”

  “I didn’t . . . He already knew . . . and anyway he started it,” Crispin said.

  Grace made a low growl of disgust in the back of her throat.

  “Besides, we were talking about something else entirely,” Crispin said.

  “Seems pretty straightforward to me.”

  “What I meant when I said it was that you were the sort to remain faithful to the man you marry. Not that you’d already bedded me and therefore wouldn’t wed him.”

  “But he felt honor-bound to test that assumption by asking me this night.”

  “Did you accept?” He stopped rubbing his foot and went perfectly still.

  She shook her head.

  He drew a deep breath. “It’s gratifying to be right all the time.”

  “You insufferable—”

  “Yes, I know, I really am, but being insufferable is part of my charm.”

  She bit her tongue to keep from giving him anything else to twist to his advantage.

  “I didn’t mean to hurt you. When I told Dorset you were the faithful sort, I was just thinking . . . if you married the marquess, I’d have no chance of being with you ever again. And I didn’t think I could bear it.”

  His brows drew together and he raked a hand over his head. Then he stood and looked down at her.

  “That’s why, against my better judgment,” he said, “I want you to marry me.”

  Just like that. With no preamble. No protestations of love.

  “Why should I marry you?”

  “Because of this.” He gathered her into his arms and kissed her.

  At first, she stiffened. Then when he didn’t press her, she relaxed. His mouth covered hers so sweetly. The tip of his tongue brushed along the seam of her lips. It was the same as their very first kiss.

  The same gentle pressure. The same deep yearning.

  And she scrunched the fabric of her gown between her fingers just as she had before.

  But this time she parted her lips and their kiss deepened. He pulled her tight against him, all hard and ready. Her body responded with a low ache she hadn’t realized was waiting to be released.

  “Oh, Grace,” he said when he broke away from their kiss. “I want you so.”

  Then quietly, desperately, the world went away.

  There was only heat and need and feral instinct. All Grace knew was the joy of his hands on her as he cupped her buttocks. Her breasts strained against the silk bodice, aching for his touch. Her finger splayed against his chest, feeling the hard maleness of him beneath the elegant shirtfront and waistcoat.

  Then she found the buttons at his waist and reached into his trousers to stroke his cock. He made a low groan, trying to be quiet, but not quite succeeding.

  He kissed her hard, pressing her back against the smooth column flanking the half-circle of windows. Before Grace knew what was happening, he’d raised the hem of her gown and lifted her, poised for his erection to enter her through the conveniently open-crotched pantalets.

  She hooked one leg over his hip. She was so achingly ready, he slid into her with a single slow thrust. They moved together, their gazes locked.

  Crispin bit his lower lip as he came. Grace pulled his head down so she could take that lower lip between hers and suck it as his seed pumped into her. Her own release followed swiftly, throbbing around him. When the last pulse died, her body went limp, but he held her up while she caught her breath.

  “So, that’s how a man violates a woman without removing any of her clothing,” she whispered between gasps.

  She felt his belly jiggle and knew he was suppressing a chuckle.

  “Oh, Grace, you are a wonder,” he said as he withdrew and smoothed down the front of her gown before doing up the front of his trousers. “Back to my proposal. May I take that delightful interlude as a yes?”

  Grace started to nod, but then she cocked her head. “The music has stopped.”

  Crispin put an ear to the curtains. The crowd noise had dimmed, too.

  Grace put a hand to her lips. She might have lost control a time or two and cried out. In the haze of the lust, it was hard to remember what she’d done.

  Crispin parted the curtain and peered through the slit.

  “Tell me the entire assembly isn’t staring at this alcove,” Grace whispered frantically.

  “No, one of the guests seems to have muzzled the musicians and is calling for his lordship to come forward.”

  “Which guest?”

  “Lady Sheppleton.”

  “Then we’d better go join the others. If their attention is diverted, so much the better.” She pushed through the curtains ahead of him and padded across the great ballroom to where the guests were crowding around, craning their necks to get a better view.

  It occurred to her that she still hadn’t officially accepted Crispin’s proposal, but he’d made her wait for him earlier. It would serve him right to have to stew for a bit.

  “And so without further ado,” Lady Sheppleton was saying when Grace drew near enough to hear her, “I present your lordship with a delightfully life-like composition.”

  She pulled the sheeting off the canvas to reveal her gift.

  Several of the crowd gasped aloud. A low rumble of frantic voices echoed around the large space.

  Grace couldn’t see the image from where she stood, so she pushed around a few of the other guests. To her surprise, they parted for her once they recognized her and gave her a wide berth.

  Someone was sobbing softly. It sounded disconcertingly like her mother.

  Then finally, Grace got a clear look at the artwork and stumbled back a pace. It was a detailed drawing of her, even down to the little brown mole near her elbow. And naked as the day she arrived in the world.

  “Of course the work isn’t signed, which may lessen its value. Cheap is cheap, they do say.” Lady Sheppleton shot a glare at Grace. “But I have it on good authority that this is a Crispin Hawke original. Oh, silly me! We have the artist right here. Isn’t that right, Mr. Hawke? This is your work, is it not?”

  Grace turned around to face him. Crispin didn’t deny he’d drawn it. He didn’t say a word.

  She’d never sat for a nude portrait, but no one would doubt the woman in the work was her. Surely he must have realized how damning this would be. How could he do this to her?

  No man who loved a woman would do it. He was toying with her. It was just another of his games.

  “I’m done playing,” she said to no one in particular and ran from the ballroom as fast as her beaded slippers could take her.

  Chapter 38

  Pygmalion appealed to Aphrodite, but no help came from that quarter. Though the goddess smiled on happy lovers, she would not force them to be so. His only hope was in Galatea.

  He would try one last time to win her, even if it meant losing himself.

  Grace faced her mother’s tearful recriminations stoically, but when her father came into her bedchamber, she turned into a quivering puddle of regret. He made matters
worse by hugging her and urging her not to cry.

  When she finally pulled back and saw her tear-stained face reflected in his eyes, she wanted to disappear into the floor, to curl into the thick feather bed and never emerge again. She settled for slumping down on the foot of the bed and letting the tears flow unimpeded.

  “Now, now,” her father said. “Things aren’t so bad as all that.”

  “What do you mean, Homer? How could things possibly be worse?” Her mother lifted her head from her hanky long enough to give a soft wail.

  “Min, we were young once, remember. It’s not the end of the world,” Homer said.

  Grace’s mother shot him a horrified look and Grace wondered if there had been much more to the night of the secret sleigh ride than her mother had told her.

  “Lord Dorset sends his apologies and wanted you to know that he’s asked Lady Sheppleton to leave immediately.”

  “How can she travel at night?”

  “She won’t have far to go. She confessed that Cousin Jasper is neck deep in this little scandal. If you’d accepted his proposal, the blackguard was planning to use that portrait to extort a larger dowry.” Father’s face was flushed and he looked as if he’d like to wring Lord Washburn’s neck. Then he sat down beside Grace on the foot of her bed and took her hand.

  “I just had a long talk with Mr. Hawke,” her father said. “And he’s willing to do the honorable thing.”

  “Isn’t that big of him?” She rose and began to pace. Slow rage replaced shame. Crispin didn’t love her. When he proposed earlier that evening, it was merely because he enjoyed ‘swiving’ her. Even Cousin Jasper’s smarmy, self-serving proposal had been more flattering. Now that they’d been caught, Crispin was paying for his sins by shackling himself to her. She decided she’d be no man’s penance. “Tell him I refuse.”

  “What?” her mother said.

  “It would be foolish to let one moment of weakness lead to a life of misery.” Grace felt as if scales had fallen from her eyes. Crispin was arrogant and selfish and had played one game or another with her from the moment she met him. She believed a time or two during their long night of loving that she’d seen behind his carefully constructed façade, but now she realized he’d fooled her yet again. She didn’t know who he was. “Crispin Hawke is not the sort of man one marries.”

  “I think you’ve misjudged him, daughter. He’s waiting outside the door. Talk to him.”

  If she saw him, she might weaken.

  “No.” She sat down hard on one of the chintz chairs because her legs had turned rubbery. “I’m sorry for the pain I’ve caused you. If you intend to turn me out, I wouldn’t blame you.”

  Her father waved that notion away.

  “Then, please let’s go home,” Grace said, suddenly desperate to see autumn in New England and the early morning mist rising from the Charles.

  Her father bent and pressed a kiss to her forehead. “I just don’t want you to do anything hasty.”

  Grace smiled wryly. “I fear I’ve already done that.”

  He patted her cheek. “Come, Min. Let’s give her some time to herself.”

  Even though she left under protest, Grace’s mother let herself be shepherded out the door. For a few moments, Grace heard the rumble of masculine voices as her father and Crispin spoke in hushed tones. She couldn’t make out any of the words and didn’t want to try.

  She sat in perfect stillness for a good quarter hour, trying to decide what to do with herself. She’d never marry now. It wouldn’t be fair. Not because she was ‘soiled’ but because she didn’t think she’d ever be able to erase Crispin from her heart.

  If she didn’t marry, what did a spinster heiress do?

  Her gaze fell on the long-neglected sheaf of papers on the secretary. She hadn’t added to her mythology manuscript in weeks.

  She could write. Without bothering to call Claudette to help her out of her ball gown, she settled into the straight-backed chair and sharpened her quill. If she got ink on the fine silk, it was a small matter. Why would she ever need a ball gown again?

  She knew how her Pygmalion should end now. And it wasn’t at all in line with Rev. Waterbury’s notions. Her fingers flew across the page, words pouring out of her like water from a well-primed pump.

  She only stopped once, when the clang of a hammer and splintering stone echoed up the valley and in her open window. Crispin was working again. Did she hear despair in those strikes?

  No, it’s just my imagination. A writer’s curse, she decided. But as the relentless blows continued, a teardrop marred the page she was working on all the same.

  * * *

  Boston, Massachusetts

  Two months later

  Grace hurried along the Beacon Hill Street with her cousin Mary, anxious to share their news with her parents. Thanks to the lure of a real English lady (the sister of a baron, no less!), Boston’s matrons had turned out en masse. Grace had secured enough support at the Athenaeum Society Tea to begin assembling a public library collection.

  Grace hadn’t written again after that night at Lord Dorset’s estate. It was as if she’d left her whole heart on the page and had nothing more to say. Having purged her soul in the Pygmalion story, she decided to leave the manuscript there at Clairmont when the Makepeaces headed for home, with Cousin Mary in tow, early the next morning. It was enough to have gotten it out, written it all down.

  And leaving it behind felt right. Like closing the door on her ill-advised English adventure.

  If only her heart possessed such a handy slab of oak.

  She blustered through the door of the Makepeace brownstone with a smattering of autumn leaves swirling at her feet. “Mother, who do you think was at the meeting today? You’ll never guess and you’ll be so surprised!”

  “We have a surprise here too, dear,” Minerva said. “Come, girls and quickly.”

  Grace removed her bonnet and tried to smooth her hair as she and Mary followed her mother up the mahogany stairs to the second floor parlor.

  “Well, if you aren’t going to guess, I’ll just have to tell you,” Grace said. “Mrs. Cabot was there and she didn’t speak to more than three people. Do you suppose making herself so scarce is why we’re all agog when she does show—Crispin, what are you doing here?”

  He rose as she entered, his hat in his hand. “I’m delivering a couple packages.”

  “Look, dear,” her mother trilled. “Mr. Hawke finished your piece.”

  The sculpture of her hands was already displayed prominently on the Chippendale table before the violet-tinged window that looked out over Boston Commons. In smooth glowing stone, the piece spoke of charm and elegance, qualities Grace never claimed. Along with an undertone of sensuality that was definitely Crispin’s doing.

  “It’s very fine,” she said woodenly, wondering if everyone could hear her heart slamming against her ribs. “You said ‘packages.’”

  “So I did.” Crispin handed her a parcel wrapped in brown paper and tied with twine. She sank onto one of the chairs across from the settee and tugged at the bow.

  Crispin waited till all the ladies found a seat before he took his again. “Lord Dorset found your manuscript after you left Clairmont and gave it to me. The writing’s good, Grace. And your Pygmalion is an ass. An ass I recognized. So I took it with me back to London and submitted it to Brownley & Cobb. They’d like to publish it, so they made this mock up for me to entice you with.”

  Publishing her stories had been a girlish dream, but now Grace didn’t know what to say.

  Crispin turned to her mother. “Mrs. Makepeace, I know I don’t deserve your trust, but might I have the favor of a moment alone with Grace? There are some things I wish to explain.”

  Her mother looked askance at her. Grace nodded.

  “Very well, Mr. Hawke,” Minerva said, “but this time, I don’t think your man Wyckeham should remain. I suspect our Claudette is hoping to see him. Come, Mary.”

  “Thank you, mum,” Mr. Wyckeha
m said and hurried to the door, barely able to restrain himself till they all filed out ahead of him.

  The room went still enough for Grace to hear the click of the mantle clock and the whoosh of her own blood in her ears.

  Crispin was so handsome, it hurt to look at him, so she focused on the grain of the Spanish leather binding the book in her lap.

  “I’m not sure where to begin,” he finally said.

  “That must be discomfiting for a genius.” She’d thought all the anger, all the longing was gone, but it boiled up a fresh. “Perhaps you should start with why you humiliated me with that drawing.”

  “When I drew it, I didn’t know it was you,” he said.

  Her head snapped up at that.

  “Before we met, I saw you, Grace.”

  “And you decided to undress me for your own amusement after seeing me on the street?”

  “No, I saw you in my dreams,” he said. “Your face, your form, you. And it was not amusing. You gave me no peace. Night after night, you plagued my dreams. So, I thought if I could draw you, I’d be able to erase you from my mind and get a decent night’s sleep again.” A wry smile lifted his lips. “And then I met you in the waking world and decided there was no escape.”

  She stood. “Let me trouble you no further, then. I gave you an escape already.”

  “No, wait. Hear me out.”

  He rose and took her hand. She didn’t have the strength to pull it away.

  “I grew up knowing I was nothing,” he said, his gray eyes darkening as he looked down at her. “Then, I found my art and suddenly I was important. But it was only because of what I could do, not for who I was. Inside, I’m still nothing.”

  “That’s not—”

  “Let me get through this, please. I didn’t want to love you, Grace. It meant letting you close enough to see all that nothing. And when you did, I couldn’t blame you for running away.”