Chapter 31
Jake rocked forward onto the balls of his feet before settling back on his heels, his feet as restless and tetchy as the rest of him. Sweat-slicked palms clutched the package he’d brought for Olivia. He refused to think of the package as a present.
Payne had nearly gone apoplectic when he left the manse carrying the package with the intention of delivering it himself. Viscounts didn’t deliver packages. They had them sent by post or delivered by footmen.
His intention had been to hand the package over to Olivia’s butler, pivot, and leave. It had been a good plan. Except he hadn’t followed the plan. Instead, he’d stepped inside the foyer and said, “Will you inform Lady Olivia that Lord St. Alban is here to see her?”
Those had been his exact unplanned words. Now he stood tarrying in her foyer while the household staff searched the house for her. It appeared they’d misplaced their mistress.
He was, in fact, under no obligation to stand here and wait for her. He should place the package on the receiving table and leave, saving them both the embarrassment of his presence. It was what she wanted. She’d made that much clear.
He didn’t need to see her unknot the twine and pull the parchment paper apart. He didn’t need to see her face light up from what lay inside.
Rationally accepting what he didn’t need to see, he set the package down. “Right.”
Behind him, he heard a muted click and the soft creak of a hinge. His head whipped around, and his body followed a beat behind. The front door stood wide, the silhouette of Olivia framed within its opening. She resembled an angel, light and lithe, illusory.
Except, when details began coming into focus, his first impression was replaced with a different reality of her. Hair set at an odd angle . . . Dress fabric strangely heavy and frumpled . . . She was . . . Disheveled.
He took a step forward, alarm guiding him. Olivia wasn’t merely disheveled. She was nothing less than a complete mess. Hair stringing down her face, half up-half down. Feet bare on cold marble tiles, rainwater pooling beneath her. Dress ripped to shreds and translucent with wet and clinging to her body in ways that cleared all decent thought from the mind of any sousing male who happened upon her, who happened to be him at present.
She closed the door and rested her forehead against oak. Her body language spoke of defeat. Another wave of concern crested inside him.
He cleared his throat, and her body went stiff, but she remained with her back to him. “Olivia”—It was all he could do to stop himself from launching across the foyer and gathering her in his arms—“are you well?”
She twirled around at the sound of his voice and froze in place. Startled azure eyes met his, and an involuntary, “Oh!” passed through her parted lips. Her entire person was so pale from head to toe that she nearly blended with the stark white walls behind her.
They stood like this, eyes locked, hearts racing, for the blink of an eye, for the longest moment in history to Jake’s mind.
“Have you been in an accident? Or”—His hands clenched into hard fists, ready to do battle with the world—“attacked?”
Her eyebrows drew together in bewilderment. “Of course not. But Jake,” she continued, “I have given some thought to the stars.”
He took a concerned step forward. “Would you like to take a seat? To rest yourself a moment?”
“Why? I’m perfectly well. I mean, look at me, I’m a perfect mess, but well.” She splayed her arms wide and looked slightly maniacal to his eye.
“Mayhap you’ve taken a fever?”
She shook her head, sending droplets of rain flying. “Not in the least. Getting back to the stars, you said they were orderly.”
“And you said they were chaotic,” he countered. “Shall I find you a towel, at least?”
“I don’t need a towel, Jake. I need to tell you something.”
She inhaled deeply, and he made sure his gaze didn’t stray toward her chest, for he was fairly certain he’d detected the dusky outline of a nipple through sopping wet muslin.
“Could the truth be located somewhere in the middle?” she asked, the question breathless and rushed. “Within the stars lies a capacity for order and chaos. They quietly watch us from above until, one day, they decide to shoot across the sky in a searing blaze of light until they have nothing left.”
“Perhaps,” he drew out slowly.
“Perhaps,” she drew out equally slowly, “people are like stars in that way. Perhaps within us lie those same ingredients for order and chaos. Except, what if that searing blaze of light isn’t chaos? What if there’s an ordered catalyst that triggers a star to take to flight across the sky?”
“I’m fairly certain Mina could give you scientific answers to your questions.”
“I’m not talking about science. Can’t you see?”
“I’m not sure I can,” he admitted.
Her head canted to the side, and her brow crinkled. “What are you doing in my home?”
Was that wonder in her voice? Likely a figment of his imagination, conjured up by his own desires.
“I thought you weren’t in,” she continued.
“I’m not,” he said. “I’m out. I’m here.” What precisely were they talking about? He gestured toward the receiving table at his side. “I’ve brought a package”—Not a present—“for you . . . your house.”
“Oh?” She stepped toward the package, toward him by default. “What is it?”
As she neared him, his body anticipated a passing contact. He could move aside, out of her way, allow her a straighter line to her goal. But a self-defeating part of him wanted her to have to curve around him so he could breathe her in. Her shoulder passed scarcely an inch wide of him, and he inhaled.
There it was: her scent of lavender and sandalwood, yes, but also Olivia, womanly, enigmatic, a scent he could almost taste on his tongue. Except he also detected the distinct reek of London street. Again, the alarm sounded in his head, and it was all he could do to keep his hands at his sides and not reach for her. “Olivia, what has happened to you?”
“I was, um, out for a stroll and was caught in the rain,” she mumbled and avoided his gaze.
She was lying. It had been raining for a solid week, no end in sight. Ladies didn’t stroll in such weather, even ladies as unconventional as Olivia. He’d never seen the cool and collected Lady Olivia Montfort as uncollected as she appeared right now.
“Are you unwell?” he asked again.
Singularly focused on the package, she waved away his concern with a flick of her delicate wrist. She picked up the package and turned it over in her hands a few times. Light, reverent fingertips feathered across its plain surface as if she was savoring and prolonging the moment. His heart lifted on a doomed note of hope.
Her tongue began worrying the tip of her one crooked tooth, and lust, base and unworthy, shot through him. He was ever fluctuating between lust and love with this woman. Both must cease. He couldn’t have the one without the other. Not with Olivia. It didn’t work that way with her.
Her eyes caught his and brightened. “It feels almost insubstantial, it’s so light.”
“A mere trinket. It might fit somewhere in the house,” he said on a nervous rush, his words the green jumble of a young man. Her fever of restless energy had infected him, too.
“Oh?” Her fingers set about working the twine loose.
He needed to be gone from this place before she opened the package. “I shall be on my way. Good day.”
He offered a shallow bow in her direction and stepped toward the door, determined to leave this place, and Olivia, in the past. She didn’t want him in her present.
“Jake,” he heard behind him, “stay.”
He stopped, for her words, for the fervent hitch on which they hung suspended between them. But that didn’t mean he had to watch her like some lovesick wretch. His gaze fixed on the iron detailing of a rather ordinary wall sconce.
Behind him sounded a gasp, followed by another faint, “Oh!”
His body tensed. This was the moment. Like Lot’s damned wife, he couldn’t resist a single, last glance. If it turned him into a pillar of salt, so be it. He must see her face.
It was exactly as he’d envisioned: rapt and ravenous in its exploration of the small painting. Her head popped up and luminous eyes met his. “It’s exquisite.”
Those words and the joyous expression blossoming across her face drew him back into the room, back into her sphere. His resolve to leave her, broken. His mouth began moving, words spilling out of their own accord. “It isn’t the original. That wasn’t for sale.” According to the Dutch government, this Vanmour didn’t have a price, and he hadn’t enough time to find out if that was true.
A canny, speculative gleam entered her eye. “You didn’t just happen across a reproduction of Whirling Dervishes in Mevlevihane Pera.”
“Kai knew of an artist who could reproduce it. I thought perhaps you might hang it—”
~ ~ ~
Olivia held up one silencing hand, even as the other clutched the painting tight to her chest, to her heart. It was the least insubstantial gift she’d ever received. She pointed to a specific patch of wall, the same patch she’d mentioned weeks ago. “Right there.”
Of a sudden, she felt overwhelmed by the gesture and a little shy of this man. This painting represented everything she admired about him.
No. Nothing as cold and distant as admiration. This painting was a pure expression of love, daring and true, lacking expectation. She as good as held his heart in her hands. After having his heart crushed underfoot at the Duke’s ball, he’d taken a risk by bringing this painting to her. Now, it was her turn to take a risk.
She set the painting on the receiving table and stepped toward him, her slow and careful pace belying the urgency of her emotions. As she made her advance, he watched her from beneath a speculative brow. He thought she’d gone mad.
Perhaps she had. Mad for him.
She stopped, her body a foot removed from his, reached out, and took his gorgeous, capable hands into her cold and wet ones. His hands were warm and dry and safe. A shiver purled down her spine, one vertebra at a time. “About those stars,” she began.
“Olivia, perhaps you fell and hit your head. Oft times, one doesn’t remember such an occurrence. One of my crew once cracked his skull—”
She touched a fingertip to his lips, at once quieting him. “Shh, hear me out. You didn’t ask me to marry you because I might carry your babe. Or because you need a stepmother for Mina. You didn’t ask me to marry you because you might love me.” She deliberately inhaled and deliberately exhaled, once, twice. “What if the catalyst for our stars is love? It takes us out of our orderly, mundane existences and makes it possible for us to truly live.” At once shy and bold, she continued, “Without you, I am an orderly star lacking the ability to come to life. You are the flame who sets me alight.”
Oh, the way his serious eyes took her in. How could she ever have thought she couldn’t trust herself in love when a man like Jake wanted her?
She dropped to her knees before him, his hands clasped within hers. His intensity only strengthened her resolve to pursue this path. To have him as hers. “I thought love needed to be perfect to be real, but I see now that is a fragile sort of love. It can’t last.” She shifted back and settled her bum onto her feet, her knees no longer able to support her, trembling as they were. “I don’t want perfection. I want you.”
His lips quirked to the side. “Flattering.”
“True love is hardy and messy. I want to spend the rest of my life making a perfect, little mess with you. Would you consider making an exception to every rule that states what a wife should be and take me as yours?”
He sank to his knees so they faced each other on an equal plane, his serious gaze giving nothing away. A tremor of misgiving streaked through her, and a possibility stole in. What if he no longer wanted her? What if she’d read this situation wrongly?
“What of your freedom, Olivia? Your freedom to be an unwed lady of means. Your freedom to pursue the life you choose. You defied Society to achieve it.” He hesitated, weighing his next words. “I can’t have you resenting me for taking something so precious from you.”
The fear grew claws and sank into her. She could lose him. She must find the right words. “You told me that no wife of yours would ever be subject to an unequal marriage.” She took his face in her hands. “I believe you. I trust you. I love you. Freedom doesn’t have to be a lonely endeavor. When shared with the right person, with you, how much more liberating. Let us be free together.”
He reached up, calloused fingers gently stroked the side of her face, and the fear released from her body. Her eyes drifted shut, and she surrendered to the moment. The granular rumble of his voice sounded at her ear. “Yes, Olivia. You have undone me.” His lips touched her neck, and she thought she might melt through the floor.
When his mouth, at last, found hers, she fell headlong into his kiss, and her heart expanded until she felt it must burst with joy. Her arms wrapped about his waist, bringing his body into hers, surely soaking his clothes through to his skin. She hadn’t realized how cold she was until now, his warmth seeping into her body at the cellular level. The chemistry between them was undeniable. It always had been. The love they now openly shared heightened it.
An impatience to discover what new heights of passion they could reach seized her, and her greedy hands found the knot of his cravat and tugged. He tore his mouth from hers, a flare of desire darkening his eyes to near black. “The servants,” he intoned on a low murmur.
Reality hit her, and her fingers froze. She’d been about to make love to Jake in the foyer of her new house in the broad daylight. What new heights, indeed.
He stood, lifting her with him. “How about we make an exception to another rule?” he whispered, his words a hot, velvet temptation that snaked across her body, raising goose bumps, tightening nipples, caressing her clear through to her very center.
“And what rule would that be?” she asked, the question a breathless expulsion of words.
“I seem to remember one about not anticipating the wedding night . . .”
A sly smile curved her lips. “I cannot think of an exception I would rather make.”