Chapter 8 #3
Sarah had straightened as if the words had set a brace across her narrow shoulders.
Sebastian returned to the desk, but the correspondence waiting there did not hold him.
Ledgers from Derbyshire, a draft from a committee chair for Monday’s debate on canal tariffs, a copy of the minutes from the Lords on the Corn Laws, all of it necessary work.
He sat and took up the steward’s report, then set it down again.
Sebastian raked a hand through his hair. “Why the devil should their unhappiness trouble me so?”
He had thought at first to be ruthless. He had very nearly been so. It would have been simple to lodge them in a house for a week and then send them beyond the reach of his concern. The cleanest solution was often the coldest.
A knock broke through the quiet. His butler entered, presented two letters upon a tray, and bowed himself out. Sebastian glanced at the seals. One bore the mark of his man of affairs, Mr. Williams. He tore that one open first.
Your Lordship,
Mr. Peabody has abandoned both his chambers and his residence. Discreet inquiries reveal that he closed his practice and departed for the Continent last night. It is further reported that he abandoned his wife and three children and departed in the company of an actress from Drury Lane.
Your faithful servant,
Williams.
“That damn wretch,” Sebastian murmured, voice low and lethal.
The man’s flight was as good as a confession.
Some provision must have existed, and Peabody had either diverted it or concealed its loss.
The crooked blackguard had never imagined Sebastian would one day demand an accounting.
He would uncover every provision his father had left them, restore every farthing they were owed, and then set them safely upon their own path.
That, at least, he was willing to do. His jaw flexed as he forced a steady exhale and reached for the second letter.
The seal belonged to Madam Rebecca. He broke it and quickly scanned the contents.
Raine,
I have invited Red to Aphrodite this evening to begin her first commissioned piece.
Lord Dunmore has agreed to pose with Lady Lavinia, his current flame of the month.
He is preening already, convinced he will be immortalized as Adonis.
I trust Red’s steadiness far more than I trust Dunmore’s manners.
The man is a libertine in every sense, and Red’s lush figure will test his restraint, while his arrogance will persuade him that she could not possibly be immune to his charms. I promised Red safety while she worked.
She seemed comfortable with you by the end of her assessment, and I hope you will accompany her as her protector while she paints him.
Rebecca.
Sebastian reread that last line, something taut and electric coiling inside him. The raw hunger he had felt for the woman behind the mask reawakened with such force that he had to brace one hand upon the desk.
Bloody hell.
These last few days, he had done his damnedest to banish the woman known only as Red from his thoughts.
He had told himself that the novelty of the situation and the absurdity of being painted while sprawled with his cock throbbing in his hand explained his attraction to her quick wit and lush figure.
He had assured himself he would forget both the woman and the encounter by morning.
He had been wrong.
Sebastian’s mind offered up the memory with obscene clarity: the lush curve of her mouth visible beneath the mask, the faint catch of her breath when she first saw him bared, the tremor she fought so fiercely to hide.
She had painted him with such reverent intensity that he had felt flayed open, seen in a way no lover had ever managed.
Her steady, capable, elegant hands had moved with devotion over the canvas while he gripped his aching cock with the hunger of a starved man.
The memory made a muscle jump in his throat.
Far worse was the way she had invaded his sleep.
Twice now he had dreamed of her, the mask discarded, her features always just beyond clear sight, the dark red hair unbound and spilling down her back as she sank to her knees before him.
The dreams were so vivid that he woke hard and hungry, cursing himself.
Sebastian dragged a hand through his hair.
He should refuse Rebecca’s request. He had no business thinking of Red, not with such heat, not with such fractured hunger that scraped along his nerves and made a mockery of his restraint.
Yet the moment he imagined another man, Dunmore of all insolent bastards, pressing too close to her, whispering filth into that delicate ear, trying to coax another blush from her or seduce her into removing her clothes, a dark, vicious curl of something possessive tightened in Sebastian’s gut.
The possessiveness was ridiculous, yet his answer formed instantly and without a whisper of doubt.
He would go, and perhaps, in the quiet between strokes of her brush and the shadows cast by candlelight, he might finally discern what it was about the woman behind the mask that pulled at him with such maddening appeal.