Charlotte stood and stared at the exquisite painting of the Madonna.
She’d slipped silently into the church to look at the painting, and it still sent chills down her spine, much the same way it had the first time she had seen it. It was of a quality that museums across the Continent sought for their walls, the sort of work that art teachers referenced to their young pupils. Here, in the soft light of her candle, Mary’s expression took on a haunting, ethereal quality, and Charlotte almost expected her to raise those soulful eyes and gaze at Charlotte.
And what would she see?
A woman balancing on the fine edge of ecstasy and terror.
Which was, of course, the aftermath of discovering exactly what it felt like to be kissed by Flynn Rutledge. Ecstasy because she had never, in all her life, been kissed the way Flynn Rutledge had kissed her. He had kissed her with a need and a passion that made her want to believe in happily ever afters of the heart. He had kissed her with the conviction of a man who had finally found what he’d been searching for.
And that ecstasy was coupled with a dread-filled terror that he would reconsider and declare that kiss a monumental mistake. And then in the next breath, a hope-fueled terror that he wouldn’t. Both of which catapulted her into unknown territory where expectations, professional and personal, were murky at best.
This new Charlotte, the one who took what she wanted, hadn’t stopped to think things through. Hadn’t stopped to think that she would fall as far as she had. Far enough to know that she couldn’t lose him, no matter what the cost. There was still a small voice demanding that she tell him who she really was, but everything else in her rebelled at that notion. She didn’t ever want to be Lady Charlotte again. That passive, unhappy, lonely creature had vanished forever in a pretty blue Haverhall sitting room, leaving behind only Charlie, a woman who fought for who and what she believed in.
A woman who had fallen in love.
Charlotte closed her eyes. Ecstasy and terror. Terror and ecstasy.
Rutledge had left with Lisbon after he’d viewed the panels, offering no explanation but both men instructing Charlotte to rest on their way out, and Flynn refusing to meet her eye. Charlotte had paced restlessly for a handful of minutes before she found her boots and coat and fled the confines of the studio. She’d wound up here, alone in the front of the empty church, as if she might find answers in the silence of the space. But the cavernous darkness only pressed in on her tiny cocoon of candlelight, leaving her trapped with her thoughts.
“You’re supposed to be resting.” His voice came out of the shadows and made her jump.
Awareness crackled through her like a tempest.
“Corpses have rested less than I,” Charlotte mumbled, trying to conceal the tremble in her voice. “I was cut, not run through and disemboweled.” She glanced over at Flynn as he came to stand directly beside her, his shoulder brushing hers. He wasn’t wearing a coat, and in the meager candlelight, it was difficult to see his features.
“Mmmm.” He didn’t argue further.
A silence descended between them, not uncomfortable but heavy with things unsaid.
“Who was the woman in this painting?” Charlotte asked, knowing she was being craven by not addressing what needed to be aired but unable to do it quite yet.
Flynn shifted, and she could feel him looking at her. Eventually he turned, granting her a small reprieve. “My mother,” he replied.
Charlotte studied the woman who was gazing down at her son with such adoration. Who had clearly been adored in return. And even though she had started this conversation as a diversion, she needed to know more. “Tell me about her.”
“I’ve already told you enough,” he said, his words sharp in the darkness.
“No, you told me what she did,” Charlotte said quietly. “You never told me who she was.”
She heard Flynn release his breath on a sigh. “She was my most ardent supporter. The one person in the world who believed that I was destined for greatness.”
Charlotte remained quiet.
“Her…clientele was generally comprised of rich gentlemen. Some more gentle than others who found a penny’s worth of amusement in the sketches and drawings of her young son. By the time I was ten, I was selling small pencil-and-chalk pastel portraits on the docks, mostly to seamen anxious for a memento of their wives and lovers. By the time I was fourteen, I had secured a handful of commissions from wealthy industrialists. It was enough to help keep us from starving when my mother fell ill.”
“I’m sorry,” Charlotte said helplessly.
“I’m not. Necessity is a powerful motivator. I may have mentioned that before.”
Without considering what she was doing, she found his hand in the darkness and threaded her fingers through his.
“My mother insisted that one day my paintings would hang in the Royal Academy. That one day, the titled men who had laughed and paid mere pennies for my work out of pity would look up at those walls and know that they could never afford another. That her son would become greater than they because of talent and not an accident of birth. That was her dream for me.”
“She was right. Your work belongs there,” Charlotte said with utter conviction. “Your paintings—this painting—deserve to be there.”
“Perhaps. But I think that, with talent, there is always a component of fortune that is required for true success. An alignment of the stars, if you will—the outcome of which neither you nor I can control.”
Charlotte pondered that silently, wondering at the way her own path had altered the moment she had discovered a painting of a young girl hidden in the attics of Jasper House.
He was still staring at the Madonna. “Before she died, I promised her that I would make it happen—an exhibit at the Royal Academy. And in failing to accomplish that, I feel like I’ve let her down.”
“You haven’t let her down. She would still be so proud of what you’ve done. Proud of you and the man you’ve become.”
“That’s kind of you to say.”
“That’s not kind. It’s the truth, Flynn.”
Flynn let go of her hand, and Charlotte felt the loss of his touch like a blow. “I’ve come to accept that some things are simply out of reach. No matter how much you want them, you can’t wish them into being. Shouldn’t, perhaps, wish them into being.”
There was something in his tone that suddenly made her doubt that he was speaking of art or family anymore. The razor edge of terror and ecstasy that she still balanced on cut hard toward the former.
“What else do you want, Flynn?” she whispered, asking the question that she should have asked at the very beginning.
He reached for the candle and turned away from the painting. “It’s cold. We should get back,” was all he said.
* * *
She left the church and made her way silently through the darkness, Flynn at her side, his head down against the chill. He ushered her wordlessly into the studio, setting the candle on the mantel and bending to add more coal to the glowing embers.
He held his hands out to the warmth, and Charlotte found herself riveted by the sight of his long fingers silhouetted against the glow. Beautiful, long capable fingers that had just held hers. Fingers she had already felt on her skin. Fingers that she desperately longed to feel on her body again. Everywhere.
“Flynn.” She spoke his name into the silence, and it hovered somewhere on the verge of a question, addressing everything that had not been said since the moment he had kissed her. Addressing everything that still needed to be said.
“It’s late. You must be exhausted. Perhaps you should rest,” he said stiffly, straightening though he continued to gaze down at the fire.
“Rest,” she repeated.
“Yes.” He sounded strained and Charlotte recognized the choice he was offering her.
The gallant bastard.
“Is that what you want, Flynn? Me to retreat into my room and close that door on you? On us?”
He put a hand out on the mantel, as if anchoring himself to something. “Charlotte.”
“Tell me what you want from me.” She would give him no quarter. “Tell me what you wanted when you had your hands on my skin and your mouth on mine.”
He looked up at her then, his eyes glittering in the low light. “Too much.”
Charlotte fought for a breath. “Then take it. Because you were right. We are not done.”
He closed the distance between them, his steps predatory. He caught her chin in his fingers and tipped her head up, his eyes fierce and feverish and wildly possessive. A new wave of arousal ripped through her and settled low and hard in her belly. All of that hunger was for her and only her. It made her feel powerful and reckless all at once.
“I need you to be very sure about this,” he rasped. “Because if I start, I don’t think I’ll be able to stop. I don’t think you understand just how badly I want you.”
She could feel the anticipation wavering in the space between them, thick and electric. “Don’t tell me,” she whispered. “Show me.”
“Charlotte.” Her name sounded strangled, and it was all he said before his mouth came down on hers. He slid a hand to the back of her head, his fingers tangled in her hair. He didn’t touch her anywhere else, just made love to her mouth with his, and it was indecent and incredible and intoxicating.
His tongue delved deep, the velvety richness of it teasing and tasting, desperate at first and then becoming more deliberate. She had her eyes closed, her entire body vibrating with need as his lips moved from her mouth to her neck, sucking and licking his way down the column of her skin. Her head tipped back, and she shivered.
His lips left her then, and she opened her eyes to find him watching her. “Why did you stop?” she whispered.
His fingers slid from her hair. “I haven’t stopped,” he said roughly. “I’m just getting started.”
He began working on the buttons of her coat, his fingers deft and sure. Careful of her shoulder, he peeled the coat from her body, letting it drop to the floor. Gently, he tugged her toward the hearth, stopping her in front of the heat. He went to work on the laces at her throat, pulling the linen over her head. His hands came back to span her ribs, and she leaned into his touch impatiently.
He bent, his lips against her throat again, his hands working on the bindings at her breasts. And then they, too, fell away, and now his palms were cupping their slight curves, his thumbs circling her hard nipples, pleasure streaking through her like lightning. Her hands came up to his shoulders, needing to hold on to something.
She looked down breathlessly as his head dropped lower still and he took the nipples he had just been caressing into his mouth, his tongue swirling around each peak. She didn’t recognize the sound that escaped from her, but she recognized the pulsing dampness that instantly throbbed at her core. And perhaps he recognized it too, because his fingers were on the fall of her trousers, and they were sliding down her thighs, Flynn lifting his head just long enough to yank her boots and her trousers from her legs.
He was kneeling before her now, his hands wrapping around the back of her legs and then over her buttocks, and his tongue was tracing a trail of fire over her navel and to the top of her curls. She watched as his hands came around her hips, brushing her mound and sliding along the inside of her thighs, urging her legs farther apart. He slid a finger through her folds, and Charlotte gasped, her own fingers clutching his shoulders as everything clenched deep inside.
“Perfect,” she thought she heard him murmur, but the uncontrollable pounding of the blood in her ears was making it difficult to hear.
He was stroking her now, insistent circles over the pulsing spot that was twisting her insides tighter and tighter. The heat at her back from the hearth was nothing compared to the heat that was building inside of her. And then his fingers slipped away, but before she could protest, his mouth was there, right where she needed it, sucking and licking and making her vision dim along the edges.
“What are you doing?” she gasped.
“Tasting you,” he growled without stopping. “All of you.”
Charlotte hadn’t thought herself a virgin, but under Flynn’s hands, she was. She had never been seduced like this. Had never known that such excruciating pleasure was even possible. She should be mortified, she knew, at the way her legs shook where they were spread, at the way her hips tilted helplessly with want, and at the way her hands left his shoulders and gripped his hair, holding him exactly where she needed.
“Flynn.” It came out somewhere between a plea and a groan.
He sucked hard once and then again, his tongue flicking with unerring precision, and Charlotte felt her world explode in a haze of white light. Pleasure radiated through her in merciless waves, and she whimpered, her entire body shuddering. Flynn didn’t relent, his hands unyielding at her back, and still the spasms kept coming, leaving her panting and shaking and sobbing.
It could have been hours or minutes before she managed to come back to herself, and she folded gracelessly to her knees, her legs unable to hold her any longer. She extracted her fingers from his hair, wrapping them around his neck, her forehead resting on his shoulder. Belatedly she realized that he was breathing as hard as she, every muscle in his body rigid beneath the clothes he still wore.
She wondered if she ought to be embarrassed about this as well, the fact that she knelt in front of this man, stark naked and boneless, while he was yet fully dressed. When she could collect her wits, she would give it more thought. But not right now.
“That was perfect,” she whispered.
Flynn made a harsh sound and nodded.
She lifted her head and gazed at him. In the light from the hearth, she could see his eyes squeezed shut, a grimace across his face. “Flynn?” she whispered.
“I just need a second,” he said hoarsely. “Watching you…that was like nothing…just let me…” He shifted on his knees and groaned softly.
Charlotte glanced down to the fall of his trousers, where she could clearly see the bulge of his straining erection. She slipped a hand from around his neck and stroked him through the rough fabric. Flynn jerked and hissed.
“Charlotte.” She recognized his plea because it was the same as the one that had fallen from her own lips. Exhilaration and hunger flooded through her, knowing that it was she who had brought him to this brink.
Carefully, she took her hand away, her fingers going to the laces of his own shirt. When she took him over that edge, she wanted to see him the way he had seen her. Beneath her touch, she could feel him trembling, his muscles flexing. His eyes were on hers now, darkened silver full of need and want. She slipped his shirt over his head, letting it fall to the rug, sliding her palms over the expanse of his chest. The scattering of hair over the lean ridges of muscle tickled the pads of her fingers, and Charlotte pushed him back gently so that he was sitting before her. She went to work next on his trousers, loosening the fall and sliding them down his legs the way he had done with hers, casting them and his boots aside.
And caught her breath at all the masculine glory that was laid out before her. He was leaning back on his hands, his broad shoulders gilded in the glow, faint ridges of muscle descending from his chest across his abdomen. The hair she had felt across his chest descended too, creating an ever-narrowing trail to where his erection jutted between long, lean thighs. He was watching her. Watching and waiting.
She hesitated, wanting to do this right. Not sure where she should start. Suddenly uncertain that she would be able to give him the kind of pleasure he had wrung from her.
“Come here, Charlotte,” he said.
She crept toward him on her hands and knees, and she saw something shift in his expression. He shoved himself off his hands, reaching for her, and hauled her into his lap unceremoniously. She could feel the unyielding muscle of his thighs beneath her where she straddled him and could feel the hard weight of his erection where it lay trapped between them.
“I want to make this perfect for you too,” she whispered.
“This is perfect,” he said. “You are perfect.”
“Tell me what you want.”
“I want you to touch me.”
Charlotte shifted, sliding back a fraction, and wrapped her hand around his erection. Flynn closed his eyes, and his head fell forward, his hands coming to rest on her thighs. Charlotte slid her fingers up the rigid length, watching his expression, gauging his reaction. Her thumb caressed the head, and she heard him grunt, his hips flexing beneath her, pushing himself harder into her hand. She leaned forward and caught his mouth with hers as she stroked down, catching his moan against her lips.
His eyes opened. “I can’t wait,” he gasped against her lips. “I thought—”
She kissed him hard, an open-mouthed, hungry kiss that he returned with a fierce desperation. She raised herself on her knees, positioning the head of his cock at her entrance, feeling a new pressure coil through her body as he pressed into her with a muffled moan. His hands moved from her thighs to cage her hips, hard and urgent, guiding her all the way down until he was seated deep within her, filling and stretching her completely. She twined her arms around his neck and rolled her hips slightly, sparks of pleasure instantly igniting.
Flynn made a feral sound and thrust up against her, and the sparks ignited into a wildfire. Charlotte closed her eyes, letting him control the pace, surrendering to the timeless rhythm, feeling her body once again reaching inside itself as Flynn rocked into her. Against her ear, she could hear him breathing, harsh, rapid breaths that spoke only of his need. The tips of her breasts rubbed against his chest as he moved, adding to the maelstrom of arousal that was now burning out of control.
Her orgasm, when it came, was just as devastating as the first. It tore his name from her lips as she ground helplessly against him, the rhythm broken. He thrust up hard once again before his hands tightened like a vise on her hips, and he lifted her forward, slipping from her heat and finding his own release between them with a guttural shout.
Their breathing slowed eventually, the sheen of perspiration Charlotte could feel trapped on their skin cooling them even in front of the hearth. She rested her head in the crook of his neck, her fingers tracing the smooth line of his collarbone. She didn’t ever want to move. Didn’t ever want to leave this man.
“Come with me.” His voice rumbled against her ear.
She lifted her head. “I beg your pardon?”
“Come with me to Italy.”
“Just like that?”
“Just like that.” His hands slid up her back.
Charlotte shivered. “What are we doing, Flynn?”
“I don’t know. All I know is that the stars brought me to you. And the thought of letting you go is unbearable.”
“Flynn—”
“Promise me you’ll think about it.”
Charlotte couldn’t imagine a time when she wouldn’t be thinking about it. But there was a debt to be paid, the one that had brought her here.
Be careful what you promise, my lady. Circumstances can change and make promises difficult to keep. It was what King had said to her. She hadn’t understood then. She understood now.
“I promise,” she whispered.