Page 22 of Dare to be Wicked

Cassius dressed hurriedly and made his way back to the summerhouse. Lottie was there as she’d promised, waiting for him. She was inspecting the canvases stacked up against the walls of the building. He waited, his heart thudding nervously, wondering what she would make of his work. Though she must have been aware of his presence, she did not hurry, lingering on a painting of women working in a field.

“These are marvellous, Cass. You truly are an artist.”

He let out a breath, only in the moment realising how important her opinion had been.

“There is something exciting happening in France, in art,” he said, suddenly bursting with the desire to tell her, to explain. “It is a rejection of all the old men of the art world and the lies they tell by idealising and perfecting that which was never ideal nor perfect. It is a desire to paint the truth, Lottie, to paint life as it is, even if it is not always pretty, not always as we might wish to believe it.”

Lottie looked again at the painting of the women and he saw what she saw: dirty hands and soiled clothes, backbreaking work under an unforgiving sun that baked the earth dry, the women sweaty and worn out. He felt anxiety lance through him, a fear that she might not see the beauty in such a rural scene. It was far from glamorous, after all. Eliza understood his desire to see the world as it was. It was one of the reasons he had believed they were so well suited, for she had never shied away from the realities in life like some of her station. Eliza wanted to make the world a better place for those who had nothing, and Cassius wanted those who had everything to confront the truth.

“It is honest,” Lottie said at last. “An honest representation of what you saw. It is not an imagined depiction of an historical event, in no way contrived. You are making no comment on what it means, nor guiding the viewer to think as you do. It simply is.”

His breath caught, an exclamation of delighted surprise in his throat that she had understood, accepted so easily what men were arguing about in heated exchanges all over Europe.

“I can feel the heat of the sun,” she said, staring at his painting as though he had opened a window between worlds. “I can smell the parched earth and imagine how hot and tired they are, how their backs must ache. It is a marvel, Cassius… and this one of the lavender fields! Oh, I wish I had seen them with you for they look to be glorious. Was the perfume lovely?”

“It was,” he said, too stunned to say more. He could only watch her with his heart swelling in his chest, touched more than he could say by her enthusiasm, her excitement at what he had achieved, her delight in everything she saw. She flicked through canvas after canvas, exclaiming over each one and Cassius was so enraptured by her he did not think to stop her before she reached those hidden at the back.

“Oh,” she said, staring down at a nude painting of a woman reclining on a day bed.

She looked up, meeting his eyes.

“She’s very beautiful.”

He wanted to tell her the truth, that there was no one on earth he found as beautiful as she was, but he was not free to do so yet. Damnation, why had he left this ridiculous situation and not dealt with it at once?

“Was she your lover?”

Cassius hesitated, a beat too long by all accounts.

She smiled and turned back to the painting. “I shall take that as a yes. Well, she looks to have been well pleased by the experience, the lucky girl.”

“Lottie!” he said, his voice rough, stunned by the words that had reached inside him and lit a fuse that threatened to burn too hot and fierce. “Lottie, I….”

He didn’t know what it was he wanted to say, but he stepped closer, so close the scent of her reached him. It was faint and feminine, that hint of jasmine and something fresh and tantalising that made his chest tight with longing.

Lottie looked up at him and he was caught, held fast in eyes of such blue he was transported back to the Mediterranean.

“Lottie,” he said again, dazed now, drunk on her proximity, foolish with desire.

“Cassius.” She breathed as much as said his name and he moved a fraction closer, drawn as if tugged by some invisible string but she looked away, breaking the spell.

“You must paint me,” she said, her voice a little too loud, the colour in her cheeks telling him she was as aware of the tension simmering between them as he was. “Exactly as I am. Warts and all,” she added, glancing back at him with a twinkle in her eyes.

“No one will believe I paint the truth if I come close to capturing you. They shall think me a romantic, for nothing could ever be so lovely.”

She opened her mouth, her blush rising, and he was torn between wanting to kiss her and the desire to capture that exact shade of rose pink.

“There is no need to flatter me,” she said, but the words were breathless. “You must paint me as I am, as you see me. Will you?”

Sunlight slanted through the window, gilding the elegant curve of her neck, highlighting the straight little nose and burnishing her hair so it shone like old gold.

“Yes,” he said, helpless to do otherwise.

“Cassius!”

They leapt apart, and though they had only been talking, their reaction proclaimed them guilty of some heinous crime. Cassius turned around to see Ashton glaring at him.

“Damn you, Cassius. Everyone is waiting for you two and you’re damned lucky I thought to come and find you both. What would your mama say if she found you alone down here, Lottie, or your sister?”