Page 41 of A Portrait of Love

“Don’t worry,” he snapped, before his brother could call him out on his shameless lie. “I’m going to Lindthorpe with Raymond in the morning. That should stop me from ravishing your portrait painter if that’s what is concerning you.”

“She is an employee in my house, Simon, it is up to me to protect her. If you are looking for a suitable woman to shower with your attention you shall shortly have several appropriate candidates to choose from.”

Simon felt as if a rope were tightening around his neck; would the man never stop?

“Sod off, Wyndham. Just bloody sod off. After I’m finished at Lindthorpe I shan’t be returning to Whitcomb. It’s past time I got the hell away from this place. I can’t bear one more day of your pompous meddling without resorting to violence.” Simon flung open the door hard enough that it cracked against the wall, and then strode out into the corridor, only to slam into Raymond.

“Good God, Raymond. What the devil are you doing lurking about?” he snapped, his cousin’s wide-eyed gawking only infuriating him more. “I’ll be ready to leave at seven o’clock in the morning. You can pick me up at The George, where I shall be staying the night,” he added, loud enough for his brother to hear.

***

After Honey had changed her clothing, cooled off—both mentally and physically—and eaten a light lunch, she went to meet her second subject.

She’d just reached the landing that led to the family wing when she heard a familiar voice shouting somewhere to the left of the staircase.

“—after I’m finished at Lindthorpe I shan’t be returning to Whitcomb. It’s past time I got the hell away from this place and you. I can’t bear one more day of your pompous meddling without resorting to violence.” The sound of a door slamming followed, and then some garbled voices.

Honey turned right and scurried down the hallway that led to the duchess’s chambers—which were thankfully in the opposite direction.

She hesitated in front of the duchess’s door, giving her heart a moment to stop pounding.

Simon’s furious words and not-so-thinly veiled threat replayed inside her head.

Just what had that argument been about?

What happened to your resolution of a mere half-hour ago—in which you swore to avoid both thinking of or talking to Simon Fairchild ever again?

Honey gritted her teeth; yes, that was true. She had planned to avoid him. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t be curious. Did it?

Oh, Honey.

Honey thrust everything but her work from her mind and knocked on the door.

She was just about to knock again when the same sour crone as before opened the door.

“Oh,” the servant said, eyeballing Honey as if she’d come to beg the duchess for alms rather than paint the woman. “No more than a half-hour,” she cautioned before opening the door enough to allow her to slip sideways into the room.

Honey smiled down into her hostile face. “Of course,” her easy acceptance caused the other woman a look of surprise.

The maid led Honey through the apartments, a rather vast collection of rooms that must be some distance from the duke’s if that is where Simon’s voice had been coming from.

The duchess received Honey in her boudoir.

Cecily Fairchild was every bit as gorgeous as her name.

She looked nothing like her daughter. Indeed, it was hard to believe the tiny, delicate woman was even old enough to have an adolescent daughter. She was the opposite of Rebecca in not only coloring and beauty, but she had an aloof, almost chilly, demeanor. She also appeared every bit as fragile as the duke had intimated.

“I hope you will excuse meeting in such an intimate setting,” she said from her perch on a sumptuous chaise longue, which was upholstered in ice blue velvet that flattered her delicate, porcelain looks. She wore a frothy crème-colored peignoir and matching slippers, her cornsilk-colored hair artfully arranged as if she’d just risen from bed. Which she very well might have.

Her chambers were done in shades of crème, blue, and silver and made Honey feel as if she had stumbled onto a heavenly cloud; all the scene lacked were cherubs plucking harps.

Honey felt even taller, gawkier, and ganglier than usual, aware of every inch of her almost six feet of body.

Her grace was a tiny woman whose limpid blue eyes and smooth skin were as youthful looking as her daughter’s. The only sign that she was ill, aside from her retiring airs, were the two rather feverish spots of color on her cheeks.

“I’m sorry I could not see you when you came before. I’m afraid it was not a good time for me.”

“It wasn’t a problem, your grace. When I left, I encountered your daughter and we had our first session.”