Sixteen #3
The fabric was as thin as gossamer, and the front of the undergown lacked any means of closure. There were no hooks, no ribbons, no fasteners, only a narrow V that yawned almost to the waist, like a floor-length dress shirt with all the buttons removed.
Nonetheless, Cam found herself longing to put it on, to feel the cool weave glide across her skin, and hear the glissando of muslin under silk.
She heard a knock at the stairs and then Peter’s deep “Aye?”
Stephen announced himself, and Peter beckoned him to the landing.
“I am to see you about the matter of an envelope?” Stephen said, perplexed. “Apparently I have forgotten where we put it.”
Cam grinned.
He added, “It pertains to Miss—”
“I know to whom it pertains,” Peter said gruffly. “Take twenty crowns out of petty cash, place them in a pouch, and see that they are delivered.”
Stephen, who clearly didn’t need a brick heaved at him to take a hint, said, “To the person in question?”
“Aye.”
“Five sittings and twenty guineas?”
The look Peter gave him must have ended the discussion for Cam heard only the quietly muttered “We’ll all be in a sponging house by Whitsuntide” as Stephen returned to the floor below.
She turned her mind to the matter of changing.
The fireplace rose to the ceiling in the center of the space, and since it stood between her and Peter, it screened her both from the stairs and from the side of the room in which he stood.
The fire was open on both sides, but the opening rose to no more than knee height.
Nonetheless, it was mildly unnerving to imagine herself naked, as she’d certainly be, if only for a moment, standing in the middle of Peter’s studio.
Peter appeared to have no sense of the upheaval, for he remained busy with the adjustment of the chaise. She took a deep breath, snuggled as close to the hearth as the heat of the fire would allow, and let the robin’s-egg blue gown drop.
* * *
Peter had heard her gasp as she opened the wardrobe. It pleased him immensely that she was so delighted. The gowns were made for him by a seamstress in Lincoln’s Inn Fields. He’d rarely had a sitter who did not marvel over the workmanship.
He wondered if she’d choose the lily-embroidered one as he’d recommended.
For a moment he was taken back to that house, his father’s house in Soest, with the heraldic lily over the door.
It was the name Peter had chosen when he cast his lot with the English.
How he had missed his parents when he’d come here.
It seemed his whole life, except for one short period, had been about missing one person or another.
Another knock sounded. “Sir?”
Dammit. “What is it, Tom?”
“The palette, sir. As you requested. May I come up?”
“Leave it on the landing. I’ll fetch it in a moment.”
Peter could see the pale blue of her gown through the lens of fire. Then he saw it fall. Her calves were slender, and each movement stirred a part of him that he had thought was unstirrable.
You old fool. He’d painted many women, possessed even more.
The notion of the calf of a woman he hardly knew sparking his desire was beyond imagining.
Her shadow stretched across the wall like some Stygian shade.
He could see the easy fall of her breasts as she lifted the gown over her head.
He would have given many ducats to see the muslin slide down those shoulders.
He could imagine the rosy nipples catching the thin fabric and the inviting triangle of curls below.
He put a hand on the railing and caught his breath. Idiot. She was a customer, and what’s more, she was newly engaged. Nonetheless, he hurried down to the palette, scooped it up, and returned, two steps at a time, in order to not miss her as she emerged from the shadows.
She came out like a new queen—regal, uncertain, rising to the weight of the occasion.
The color of the gown made her hair sparkle and flash as if she wore a crown of candles, and his heart soared to see the glimpses of lilies.
They crept around her neck and followed that long, glorious line southward into the valley between her breasts.
He wondered if her skin gave off the same lily-of-the-valley scent as her hair had when he’d been sketching her.
He loved the look of women in dishabille, as they called it, and he certainly loved the look of this woman in it. It was fresh, natural, and bewitchingly erotic without a whisper of impropriety.
“Are you ready?” he said.
Her fingers worked the edge of a sleeve nervously. “I feel like a bride on her wedding night.”
“Oh dear. Whatever minor confidence I’d had in approaching this painting has now officially taken its leave.”
They both laughed.
* * *
Despite an education that included seven long years under the fastidious eye of the monks at Saint-étienne, Stephen felt his mouth, still in possession of that last morsel of ham and bread, fall open.
Peter’s cousin, who had long since pushed his plate away and awaited a piece of the cook’s fine gooseberry pie, cocked his head. “Was that laughter?”
Stephen swallowed and let out a satisfied smile. “We must let the cook know to keep the kitchen fire lit. I do believe it’s going to be a long evening.”