Chapter 6
The hatbox was heavier than it appeared.
It had arrived a few hours earlier, but Darcy waited until after dinner with her sisters before hastening to her chamber.
She set it upon the writing desk and eased the lid open.
She stared down at a mask of lacquered silk, red and black and bold as a harlequin’s masque, beside a dark-red wig arranged in an elegant coiffure, its pins and combs already threaded into place.
Beneath them lay a folded letter, sealed with plain wax.
Her heart gave an uneven beat. She broke the seal and smoothed the single sheet.
Dear Mrs. D. Whitley,
Darcy choked on the breath she had been holding and pressed her knuckles lightly to her lips.
One hundred pounds each. Eight paintings.
Eight hundred pounds. The figure stood in her mind with the authority of a magistrate.
When she had asked the agent in the country about a small cottage with four bed chambers, a parlor, a library, a dining room, and a well-situated kitchen, he had quoted fifty pounds for the year.
Eight hundred pounds would keep a roof over them, food on their table, and clothes on their backs for several years.
This was a fortune. It was not merely a reprieve; it would be a future earned by her own skill.
She looked again at the neat lines of the letter and read on.
If you accept this invitation, come tonight to the address enclosed by ten.
Wear the provided wig and mask, and tell the majordomo that you are Red and here to meet the Madam.
Should you agree to enter my employ, I shall arrange for a carriage to collect you and see you safely home whenever you come to paint.
There was an address on a small card tucked into the fold. “This must be a mistake,” Darcy whispered. “One hundred pounds per painting. Who would pay such a sum, and why?”
She read the letter again. “What could be so scandalous that anyone would pay such a sum?”
Darcy lowered the letter and brushed the wig with the back of her fingers.
The hair lay soft beneath its pins, a deep wine that would draw out the gold in her eyes.
The mask gleamed. She lifted it, turned it toward the window, and watched the candlelight run over its surface like water.
Red and black, bold as a dare. It would hide her brow, her nose, the slope of her cheekbones, and leave her mouth free to speak and breathe.
No one who knew Miss Darcy Whitley should recognize her beneath such a disguise.
She worried her lower lip and considered.
The letter had warned that the commission was scandalous.
Darcy was not a fool. She knew what such work might entail.
She might be asked to paint what polite ladies pretend not to see.
Yet the letter’s assurance of safety sounded like a promise meant to be kept.
Her mind began to order the problem as she would lay out a canvas.
If she accepted, she would have to go tonight.
The staff here believed her to be a widow with some connection to Lord Raine; an evening engagement would not invite much curiosity.
Even so, she could not permit his coachman to carry word of Aphrodite back to the earl.
She would have the carriage set her down in Piccadilly and hire a hackney for the final distance.
Darcy glanced at the mantel clock. Nearly nine.
She could go to Aphrodite and return before the house banked its fires.
Taking this commission would let her rent a cottage with a garden, buy coal without counting the lumps, hire a daily governess for Sarah, and keep a proper table.
She could look Lord Raine in the eye and know that whatever protection he chose to extend or withdraw, her sisters’ future would not rest upon his mercy.
Reckless, she thought. Reckless, and skirting the edge of ruin if a single step went awry. Yet ruin had a hundred shapes. Hunger was one. Begging was another. Dependence, forever, was a third. Darcy drew a steady breath.
“I will do this.” It did not seem prudent to arrive in one of her old gowns, with seams ready to give way.
The modiste who had attended them had altered several beautiful gowns for Darcy, and she had thought she might never have cause to wear such things.
Young women in her circumstances, without fortune or useful connections, seldom owned anything so lovely, nor were they invited anywhere that required it.
Yet some instinct told her that one of those lovely gowns would be suitable to wear when calling upon this Madam.
She lifted her chin, smoothed her skirts, and set about preparing herself for the night ahead.
Almost two hours later, Darcy stood before the polished black door of Aphrodite and felt her pulse in her fingertips.
Lord Raine’s carriage had set her down in Piccadilly, and the hackney she hired for the final distance now rattled away behind her.
She had not replied to the letter; she had simply prepared herself and come.
Darcy had chosen a deep-blue silk gown that flattered her figure, following the gentle curves of her body before falling in graceful folds to her ankles.
The décolletage was lower than anything she had ever dared wear before, revealing a tantalizing expanse of her breasts above the delicate edging of lace.
Once the gown settled about her figure, she had felt scandalously exposed, yet there was something undeniably elegant about the effect, something that made her feel not merely pretty, but sensual.
Upon her feet were evening slippers of matching blue silk, embroidered across the toes with silver thread.
Beneath the mask concealing the upper half of her face, Darcy had tucked every strand of her dark hair beneath a red wig, its curls arranged with artful care and allowed to tumble over her shoulders.
The transformation felt extraordinary. Dressed as a woman she scarcely knew how to be, Darcy felt a strange mingling of nervousness and exhilaration.
She lifted a gloved hand, touched the mask once for courage, and raised the knocker.
The majordomo opened at once, grave as a judge.
Darcy inclined her head. “I am Red,” she said, her voice low through the mask. “I am here to see Madam Rebecca.”
He bowed. “Follow me.”
Decadence met her at the threshold. The air was warm with sandalwood, beeswax, and something sweetly illicit.
Silk in shades of garnets and lustrous jet-black pooled in generous folds along the walls; light from a hundred candles softened the gilt and turned shadows into invitations.
A broad staircase swept upward, its banister threaded with ribboned lanterns that cast slow-moving halos upon the steps.
Women in jewel-bright satins drifted past with silver trays, offering champagne and sugared fruits that gleamed like temptations in a still life.
Music pulsed from the grand salon, coaxing the room into a languid sway.
In a curtained niche, a masked lady, half-reclined, toyed with a glass while a gentleman’s hands lingered at the ties of her bodice.
On a velvet chaise, a pair kissed with shameless pleasure, the woman’s skirts rucked high, the man’s coat fallen open as if his restraint had slipped to the floor with it.
Incense and amber curled through laughter and soft gasps, a scent that stroked the skin.
He led her along a corridor laid with thick Turkish carpet; the walls wore silk damask, the color of ripe pomegranates. Lamps in gilt brackets spread honeyed light. She passed niches where statues glowed like cream, curtains that fell in obedient folds, paintings that winked with varnish and sin.
Overhead, swaths of silk hung from the ceiling like captured night.
Nearby, a couple turned in a private waltz, their steps slow, the lady’s gown pooled at her hips as if the dance had undressed her by degrees.
Everywhere, pleasure was curated and offered, a gallery of sin arranged with a connoisseur’s care.
Laughter lifted, hushed, and rose again; a gentleman’s murmur, a woman’s answering purr, and the soft chime of crystal threaded a hundred private pleasures into one indulgent hum.
Darcy’s pulse hammered while her stomach drew tight. She had never set foot in a place like this, had scarcely believed such rooms existed; shock warred with a sharp, unwelcome curiosity that drew her a step farther in.
They climbed the broad staircase, Darcy’s hand skimming a banister polished as satin.
On the second floor, the majordomo paused at a paneled door, knocked once, and opened it upon a room dressed like a jewel box.
A voluptuous woman waited there, all curves and command, her dark blonde hair arranged to display the line of her neck and the diamonds at her ears.
Her gown, a rich claret silk, fit her as if the fabric had been taught to worship.
“Come in, Red,” she said, her voice velvet-threaded with mischief. “I am Madam Rebecca.”
Darcy stepped inside and curtsied. “Madam.”
“Brandy? Sherry?” Rebecca poured for herself without waiting, then arched a brow in silent offer.
“None, thank you.”
“As you like.” She motioned to a chair of green velvet. “Sit. I have seen your hand. It is elegant and sure. I have need of such a hand.”
“I am pleased it found favor with you.” Darcy sat, the mask warm now against her cheeks. “Your letter spoke of a gallery.”
“Yes.” Rebecca’s smile turned feline as she returned to her armchair. “I am assembling a private collection to rouse the jaded. Paintings of pleasure, but with taste.”
“Paintings of pleasure,” Darcy repeated slowly, wondering whether she had understood Madam Rebecca’s meaning at all.
“I want patrons painted in the act of tupping, masks upon their faces, naked bodies honest and beautiful. The work will hang in a room where only certain eyes may look. Think of the old masters: flesh rendered with reverence and appetite, yet given a modern daring. Have you seen the engraving after Titian, the woman punished for desire while her lovers torment her with pleasure? I want that union of severity and grace.”
Darcy’s stomach gave a quick, unhelpful turn. The room seemed to tilt by a degree. She held very still and drew air through her nose. “I… I confess I do not know what to say.”
Rebecca laughed, not unkindly. “If you are a virgin with delicate sensibilities, my dear, this is not for you.”
“I…” Oh God. How could she paint anyone naked, so intimately? “You mean for me to watch strangers… coupling, and preserve it upon canvas?” Her face burned beneath the mask. “Surely no one is expected to carry such work home to complete.”
“Of course not,” Rebecca replied smoothly. “I shall provide a private and elegant room for your exclusive use here. No one will enter without your permission. The only exception will be the servant assigned to you, and she will be entirely discreet. May I have your answer?”
“May I have a few days to consider it?”
Rebecca stood. “I am afraid my plans do not permit delay. Thank you for coming. It required courage. I shall have you escorted out.”
Oh God, I cannot lose this opportunity!
“Wait,” Darcy said with unbecoming haste, then gentled her voice. “I am only to paint. You would not expect me to participate in what I witness?”
“I would never ask a lady to take part in the debauchery and pleasures practiced beneath my roof,” Rebecca said with a smile. “You need only observe and paint what you see. Your virtue will be safe, and so will your reputation, provided your identity remains secret. You have my word.”
A tremor passed through Darcy, but she stiffened her spine. “I can do it.”
“Very well.” Rebecca resumed her seat, lifted her glass, and inclined it toward Darcy in a small toast. “You will not regret this. Let us assess you now.”
“Assess?” Darcy repeated, blinking. “What does that mean?”
“It means I must see whether you can look upon nakedness without swooning.” Rebecca emptied her drink, set down her glass, and rose in one graceful movement. “Come.”
Heart pounding, Darcy stood and followed Madam Rebecca. They went along a short passage where the carpet softened each step. Rebecca opened a door without knocking and stood aside. Darcy’s breath caught so sharply it almost hurt, and for one wild, disorienting moment, she feared she might faint.
Upon a chaise that looked as comfortable and decadent as sin lounged a gentleman, while before him, upon her knees, a nearly naked woman bent with languorous attention, her loosened hair spilling down her bare back like poured wine.
The sight was shockingly carnal.
Yet it was the man who held Darcy transfixed.
He sprawled with the careless indolence of a man utterly accustomed to pleasure, his long legs parted, one arm resting negligently along the chaise.
His evening clothes were in delicious disarray.
His waistcoat had been discarded somewhere beyond her sight, his cravat hung loose about his throat, and the first buttons of his fine linen shirt had been undone, exposing the strong column of his throat and a tantalizing glimpse of the hard, masculine breadth beneath.
He was beautiful.
Not prettily so. There was nothing soft about the severe elegance of his features, the dark sweep of his hair, or the hard, sculpted line of his jaw.
Candlelight gilded the planes of his face and caught upon the sensual curve of his mouth, lending him the appearance of some wickedly handsome man who had discovered sin and found it very much to his liking.
Even in repose there was strength in him, in the breadth of his shoulders beneath the loosened linen, in the powerful length of his body, in the effortless masculine confidence with which he occupied the chaise as though the decadent chamber and every pleasure within it existed solely for his amusement.
Darcy could not look away. She had never seen a gentleman in such a state of undress. Certainly never while a woman knelt between his spread thighs with such unmistakably intimate purpose.
Awareness washed through Darcy so swiftly it felt like heat and vertigo together. And then she understood why her heart thrummed with such wild insistence, why every inch of her skin seemed suddenly sensitized, and why drawing a single steady breath had become almost impossible.
Oh God.
The Earl of Raine.