That was the problem. The same fires she flamed inside him might very well consume him. Because a man couldn’t lose himself in a woman like her and then expect to ever find himself again once he was out of her arms.
Biting down a curse of frustration, he shook his head. “You can’t have me.”
For a long moment, she didn’t move, only stood where she was, staring at him through the shadows and silence. Suspicion prickled at his nape that she was seeing him for the first time as he truly was—not as Vincenzo, whose wild reputation was the stuff of legend, and not as Ellsworth, whose own staid reputation stood in polar opposition. But as only a man.
And found him not at all what she’d hoped.
“You’re refusing me because I’m Evelyn Winslow, and you’re Dominick Mercer?”
Knowing how she inspired him as an artist, how she flamed his passions as a man—how she could destroy both parts of him—the brutal truth tore from him. “Yes.”
“Why? Surely you—”
“Because of that!” He jabbed a finger at the canvas and the image he’d rendered of her lying so delectably naked. “I cannot create if I’m confusing lust for inspiration. For Christ’s sake!” He sucked in a mouthful of air through gritted teeth and expelled it with a curse so ferocious that she flinched. “How do I paint innocence when I’m stealing it like a thief?”
“Not theft,” she persisted. “A gift.”
“Ruination. For both of us.” The harshness of that reverberated through the silent studio. “And I will not let you ruin me.” Not his position as a trusted peer, and certainly not his art. “No matter how enticing you are.”
“But I’m not your model anymore.”
He dragged a hand through his hair to keep from reaching for her, although he couldn’t have said at that moment whether to shake sense into her or strip her bare. “Do you think that makes a difference, just because you’ll no longer be right in front of me, posing for me? Do you think the sight of you isn’t already engraved on my mind?” The feel of her soft curves beneath his hands, her jasmine scent, the honey-sweet taste of her on his lips…Christ. “For God’s sake, Eve! Do you think I can so easily separate you from my art? If I could—if it were that simple, to control my passions—” He raked his gaze over her with a look that surely set her flesh on fire beneath the burning intensity of it. “Nothing would stop me from making love to you.”
With a soft breath, her stunned lips parted silently beneath his outburst. Both at his confession of exactly how much he desired her and her realization that he would never let himself have her.
Suddenly very tired and knowing he couldn’t make her understand the very real threat she posed, he rubbed at his forehead and the headache forming behind his brow. “Go dress.” This argument was over. “I’ll make certain you arrive home safely.”
Looking away, she gave a stiff nod.
He knew as he watched her step behind the screen to dress that she would never return to this place, never again let him paint her or sketch her. That their relationship had irrevocably changed, and already he grieved its loss.
But hadn’t he known that the moment he gazed across Lord Hawthorne’s ballroom and saw her?
The rustle of fabric only increased his frustration. If he had met her any other way except as his model, he might very well have been lulled by her enticements. He could show her how intimacies would satisfy that longing for adventure and freedom she craved. Then they could have gone their separate ways, without giving the other another thought.
But she wasn’t just a woman to be bedded and forgotten. She’d become part of his art and could never be disentangled from it now. She’d reenergized his career and inspired him to create on a level he’d never achieved before.
If he gave her his passion, what would be left for his art? A woman like Eve would demand all or nothing.
He glanced up to find her slipping out from behind the screen. The sight of her jarred him.
Gone was the plain, coarse dress she usually wore to the studio, and in its place was a muslin dress of tiny yellow flowers against a white background. Her hair—that tumbling mass of curls that so mesmerized him—was pinned in a tight knot. She looked every inch like an innocent Mayfair miss.
Dear God, how had he not noticed who she truly was before that night at the ball?
Because he hadn’t wanted to notice.
“You’re a liar, you know.”
He arched a brow in deflection. “Most peers are.”
Her expression remained somber, not finding that at all amusing. “Apparently, so are certain artists.”
That barb hit home.
Not letting the sting of it show, he leaned back against the worktable and folded his arms across his chest. The posture of a man who couldn’t care less, when beneath he was seething.
“You’re not refusing me tonight because I was your model.” The quiet calm with which she said that unnerved him. “You’re refusing because you always keep your distance.”
He gave a bitter laugh and gestured a hand at the chaise. “I couldn’t have been any closer without ruining you.”
“Not with your heart. You keep it distant.” She touched her fingers to his chest, right to his heart that leapt wildly beneath her fingertips. “Always. Because you refuse to mix your passion for your art with the passion of love—”
“Of sex,” he corrected pointedly. About this, he wanted no misunderstanding. What she wanted from him could never be love. Because loving her meant having to put her first before all things, including his art. That was a sacrifice he wasn’t willing to make.
“My point exactly. You’ll never be a truly great artist because your heart is stopping you.”
His breath caught in his throat. He was stunned at how closely she’d come to repeating Giuseppe’s words from that night all those years ago. The anger and anguish she now stirred inside him was just as fresh as then.
“What do you know about art?” he bit out. “You don’t know what it takes to create a masterpiece.”
“You’re right. I don’t.” She lifted her chin, and sorrow darkened her face. For him. “But if I know just one thing, Dominick, it’s how to live passionately.”
She dropped her hand to her side. The loss of her touch rushed over him like ice water. Then she walked away toward the door.
“No need to escort me out.” She put up a hand and stopped him as he followed her to the door, that small gesture cutting him to the quick. “The carriage is nearby. I’ll be fine without you.”
Those last words pierced him, with more meaning than she intended.
She paused to take a lingering last look at the studio. Her eyes glistened in the candlelight as she choked out, “Goodbye, Dom.”
Then she was gone.
He stared after her, gritting his teeth. How dare she accuse him of not knowing how to be an artist? His art was his life. It permeated each move he made, every breath he took. He’d given it everything he had. Sacrificed to it. Sacrificed for it. For God’s sake, he’d gone without food at times so he could buy the best pigments and brushes, lived in a cramped attic room that was stifling hot in the summers and freezing in the winters, worked so many hours at a stretch that his fingers cramped until he could no longer hold a brush—
His heart wasn’t in it? Laughable.
His art had sustained him since he was a child, through the death of his mother and then his father. He’d clung to it through his early days in Italy, when selling his paintings had been the only way to earn enough money to eat when Timothy cut off his allowance because he refused to give up his painting and return home to England. Being able to paint had been the only escape from those dark days following his brother and sister-in-law’s deaths, when he realized that the rift his art had created between him and his brother could never be healed.
It was the only thing that kept him going now, when he was expected to behave like England’s most respected peer and felt imprisoned because of it. When Consta
nce threatened to take even that life away from him.
Eve was wrong about him. Completely wrong. To declare that he’d never become a great artist—
“My paintings are just fine. Brilliant, in fact.” He pointed at the easel to convince himself. “That one is a masterpiece!”
Dear God, was it ever. Even now the sight of it captivated him. Only because of Eve and that inner light she possessed, that sense of life that simply radiated from her.
Yet the only reason Eve had modeled for it in the first place was because he’d taken Constance to his bed, mixing his heart with his art.
Except…he hadn’t.
An icy chill sank over him. His heart had never been part of his relationship with Constance. What he sought from her had been physical release only. Nothing emotional. And when Constance had become too demanding, he’d pushed her away. Just as Eve had accused him of doing to her. But what she’d wanted—
Never.
He would never split his passions. Not even for Eve.
He picked up the dropped brush and flung it once more at the wall with all his strength. The handle cracked in two and clattered to the floor.
Chapter 15
The Summer Exhibition
New Somerset House, London
Christopher Carlisle snatched two glasses of champagne from the tray of a passing attendant and handed one to Eve, who nervously smiled her gratitude. But there wasn’t enough champagne in England to get her through tonight.
And through seeing Dom again.
“What is this event called?” Robert Carlisle asked, gesturing at the busy gallery around them.
“Varnishing night,” Eve answered, drawing on what Dom had taught her over the past few months. “It officially starts the exhibition.”
Tonight was a private preview for specially invited guests, who would have the first chance to view the paintings that were part of the annual Summer Exhibition. This private reception was why Eve and her extended family were there, minus her father, who had been called away to Portsmouth on business. But even though Papa wasn’t present and the exhibition was the very last place she wanted to be, she’d had no choice but to attend. Winslow Shipping and Trade had made a large donation, and she, Mariah, and Robert had to be here to represent the company.
So they’d all come together, complete with the dowager Duchess of Trent, Hugh Whitby, and the two Carlisle cousins. None of them cared one whit about art or the Royal Academy, but a great deal about her and publicly showing their support after Burton’s cruelty. For that, she would be forever grateful.
“Tonight is the first chance for buyers to see what paintings are for sale and the last chance for the artists to touch up their works before the competition begins,” she explained. “To add last-minute bits of color or final glazes.”
From the end of the long room, two men launched into a shouting match. One of them pointed angrily at the wall and the pictures hanging there at all levels, from floor to ceiling and all the way into the corners of the large room.
She winced. “And to complain about how their paintings were hung.”
Robert grinned and took a sip of champagne, settling in to watch the fight. After all, while the Carlisles might not understand the nuances of the art world, they definitely appreciated fisticuffs.
The group around her fell into easy conversation about the unusually warm summer weather, a planned excursion up the Thames to Greenwich, the new opera opening the following week at the Theatre Royal, and would anyone be interested in attending? The dowager Duchess of Trent was eager for a group outing, the Earl of Spalding claimed a prior commitment to travel to the coast, and Christopher looked as if he wanted to be doing anything else at that moment than being sucked into Carlisle family plans as a result of proximity.
Eve stood at the edge of the group, hoping no one noticed how nervous she was.
Thankfully, the gossip and laughter caused by Burton had died away during the past fortnight, but not before she lost several friends whom she was unsure if she would ever regain. Including Penelope Daniels, who was here tonight and doing her best to capture the attention of Lord Michael Thompson, who still did not realize that she existed and most likely never would.
Then there was Dom himself. Just thinking of him made her pulse spike with nervousness.
As the man who had supplied nearly all of the paintings in the Old Master’s gallery from his personal collection, he would most certainly be here tonight, to accept thanks from the Royal Academy for allowing the works to be displayed. Ellsworth was England’s leading patron of the arts. He wouldn’t miss this.
Ironically, there wasn’t a Vincenzo among the paintings. After all, he was still a living artist and, as far as anyone else knew, happily painting and cutting a most wicked swath through Venetian gentlemen’s clubs and Venetian ladies’ bedrooms. If only they knew the truth. That the scandalous artist who had given Lord Byron a run for his money in being mad, bad, and dangerous to know was right here among them.
Heavens, what would she say to him when she saw him? Although truly, she’d already said more than enough to make him avoid her for the rest of his life.
Taking a sip of champagne, she peered over the rim of the flute for a lingering glance around the gallery. If she wasn’t so upset about Dom, she would have enjoyed the evening a great deal.
The most important people in the English art world were here. The artists lingered nearby with their brushes and supplies, waiting for the signal when they could rush forward to apply last-minute touches to their paintings, even as they hung on the walls. Tonight would be their last chance to accentuate specific details on their canvases, brightening or toning down, according to the light shining where the painting hung or to the color schemes of the paintings positioned around theirs.
Patrons strolled arrogantly through the galleries, as if they could somehow capture the virtuosity of the artists for themselves simply by purchasing paintings. They pointed at this picture and that, wanting the same ones that everyone else wanted. Popularity bred covetousness, whether the artist possessed the talent to deserve it or not.
Critics were here, too, to write articles for the newspapers and journals. They openly gave sneers to some paintings and appreciative glances to others, mostly based on the name of the artist rather than on the quality of the work. Famous artists garnered favorable reviews—they were famous, after all, so therefore their work must be good…even when it obviously wasn’t. An unknown artist had to be a genius in comparison to simply be noticed. No wonder Dom believed that art critics were as annoying as a plague of toads and just as useful.
Christopher Carlisle moved to her side and spoke quietly to keep from being overhead, “Are you all right?”
“No,” she admitted in a ragged sigh. That was one thing she’d always appreciated about Kit. As two people who’d been overshadowed by their older siblings, they related to each other in a way that others couldn’t, including being brutally honest with each other.
“You’ll be fine.” He clinked his champagne flute delicately against hers. “I have every confidence that you’ll put all those society nodcocks into their places and be charging into adventures again in no time.”
So why did he look as if that thought frightened him? Yet she smiled, grateful for his kindness. “Thank you.”
“I’d be happy to make certain Williams doesn’t do anything like that again.”
“Please no. I could never live down the humiliation of Burton knowing that his stunt affected me.” Besides, she was certain that he’d learned his lesson after Dom threatened him. Ellsworth might be the most respected peer in England, but he was also tall, broad, and muscular, with what she was certain was a solid right punch. “I just want it all to go away.”
“If you change your mind, I can arrange for a press gang to come across Williams one night on his way home from the club.”
“A press gang?” Her mouth dropped open. “In Mayfair?”
“I know peo
ple.” He was deadly serious, which made his offer even more ludicrous.
A soft bubble of laughter fell from her lips, and her hand flew to her mouth to hold it back. But that didn’t work, and the laughter rose, the first happy laughs she’d experienced since the Hawthorne ball.
“A man with a press gang at his disposal. I think society women have been looking for the wrong things in their gentlemen.” She placed her hand on his arm and leaned up on tip-toe to place a kiss to his cheek, which inexplicably seemed to terrify the daylights out of him. “If I ever need someone who—”
“Miss Winslow, good evening.”
The familiar deep voice from behind her twined heatedly down her spine—Dom.
“Your Lordship.” In her sudden fluster, she somehow managed to face him, drop into a curtsy, not spill her champagne, and remember to breathe all at the same time. No small feat! Because her heart had leapt into her throat and lodged itself there at the sight of him.
And oh, what a sight. Dressed in a black cashmere jacket over a white satin waistcoat and trousers, with his black boots shining nearly as brightly as the diamond pin in his cravat, he was every inch a marquess. Handsome and confident, surrounded by art and society…completely in his element. Even the thick waves of his hair curled perfectly against his high collar, not daring to do otherwise on this important night. The Fates—and Ellsworth—simply wouldn’t have allowed it.
She stared at him, unable to help herself. Not until that moment did she realize exactly how much she’d missed him since she’d last gone to the studio, and her chest squeezed so hard that she lost her breath. She missed not only his kisses, although those were heavenly, but simply being near him, talking quietly, laughing together, watching him paint…She had to tighten both hands around her champagne flute to keep from reaching to brush her fingers over the smooth plane of his cheek.
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