The Royal Academy’s exhibition hall, housed in Somerset House, was thronged.
Those of the upper classes who hadn’t traveled to a country pile for Christmas were out in droves in the city, seeking their own entertainment. And a new artist, one who was rumored to have garnered the attention of royalty at home and abroad, was always a draw.
Flynn had no idea where those rumors had come from, nor did he care. He skirted the crowd, his hat pulled low over his brow, his eyes fixed on the far wall where a massive knot of people milled, gesturing and chattering. He ignored the noise, slipped through the crush, and came to an abrupt stop, robbed quite suddenly of breath.
His Madonna had been hung in the center of the hall above a raised dais used only for the most illustrious of exhibitors. High above him, winter light streamed in from the windows and fell across the painting, illuminating the Madonna’s gentle expression with an unearthly brilliance. It was dramatic, it was celebrated, and it was everything his mother had always wanted for him. The gift he had always wanted for her to reward her unflagging love and belief, even if she never had the chance to see it.
Charlotte had done this, he knew. He didn’t know how or when, though those details could be guessed at. What wasn’t fathomable was why. Why had she done this for him after everything? After he had walked away from her?
Because she loved you, the voice in his head hissed. And you didn’t believe her. Didn’t believe in her.
Didn’t allow her to make a mistake.
He raised his hands to his face and pressed his fingers into his eyes hard enough that spots danced. He cursed and let his hands fall, spinning quickly enough to startle a flock of well-dressed matrons who were pressing toward the dais. He ignored the infuriated gasps as he shoved his way back through the crowd. He would fix this. He would find her and—
“Mr. Rutledge.”
The man was standing just inside the hall, as though he had been waiting for Flynn. He could have been a Tudor prince, given his expensively tailored clothing, his aquiline features, and the confident ease in which he moved, an ebony walking stick held loosely in his hand.
“I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage,” Flynn replied.
“Hmmm.” The man made no effort to introduce himself but merely gazed in the direction of the portrait on the far side of the room, impossible to see now behind the crush. “I must say, your work did not disappoint. Haunting. Compelling. You have bent the light to your will with a mastery very few possess.”
“Thank you.” Flynn frowned. “But if you’ll excuse me, I—”
“Leaving in such a hurry?” The man tapped his fingers on the head of his walking stick. “I would have thought you’d wish to linger. Bask in your newfound success, as it were. Even without the rumors of royal patronage, you’ll have lords and ladies falling all over themselves for a piece of you. It was, after all, the purpose of this exercise, was it not?”
“No. It wasn’t the purpose at all.”
“Ah.” Pale blue eyes probed his. “I wondered.”
Flynn bit back a retort. This man didn’t know him, and Flynn certainly wasn’t about to explain himself to him, whoever he was. Nor was he going to waste any more time. He needed to find—
“Charlie Beaumont.”
For an agonizing moment, Flynn thought his heart might have stopped in his chest. “I beg your pardon?”
“Mr. Charlie Beaumont. I understand that he was your partner for the St. Michael’s commission.”
Flynn felt a peculiar feeling winding through him. “Yes. How did you know that?”
“You might find it of interest then to know that I have since hired him,” he replied, ignoring Flynn’s question.
“For what? Where?” Flynn was trying to keep his expression neutral, but even he could hear the rough desperation in his voice. “Where is s—he?”
“Ah. I wondered at that too,” the Tudor prince murmured, almost too quietly for Flynn to hear. “He was here, as a matter of fact. You just missed him,” he said more clearly. “If you hurry, you might catch—”
Flynn didn’t hear the rest. He was already running.
* * *
The carriage was as fine as any Charlotte had ever seen in her life.
But given King’s blatant predisposition for fine things, she shouldn’t have found this surprising. Sleek and well sprung, and painted a glossy ebony with scarlet trim, it was only missing a coat of arms. Not something that a boy from Aysgarth, dressed in a loose pair of trousers and a baggy coat with a canvas bag slung over his back, should ever have at his disposal.
Charlotte handed her bag to the goliath of a driver, dressed just as sleekly in ebony livery, and tried to offer him a word of thanks. It came out as a strained whisper because the emotion that was threatening to suffocate her was making it equally difficult to speak.
She had stayed in that hall only long enough to see that the Madonna had been hung as she had wished. Long enough to hear the rumors swirling through the expensively dressed crowds speculating about the man behind the painting and arguing over who might have discovered him. Long enough to know that, if nothing else, Flynn would know that she had loved him.
And then she had escaped to the carriage that waited for her, because the tide and the ship that would take her from England waited for no one. She climbed into the plush, darkened interior and reached for the door, only to have it yanked open, away from her grasp. A body hurtled through the opening into the carriage, and the door snapped shut. Charlotte swallowed a shout of startled alarm.
“Don’t go.” Flynn was crouched in front of her, his hands braced on either side of her legs, breathing hard.
Charlotte closed her eyes, willing her breathing to steady and wondering if she might be imagining this. She opened her eyes and discovered he was still there, illuminated by the daylight filtering in along the edges of the closed curtains. A familiar brew of terror and ecstasy bubbled up to fill her chest. “What are you doing here?”
“Trying not to make another mistake,” he said hoarsely.
“Another mistake?”
“My first mistake was letting you go once. I’m not going to repeat it.” His eyes were the color of pewter in the dim light, filled with anguish.
Charlotte looked down at her hands, her heart hammering against her ribs so hard that she feared they would crack. “In all fairness, I made the first mistake.”
His fingers caught her chin, forcing her eyes back up to his. “And it was yours to make and mine to forgive. And I didn’t. And for that, I ask your forgiveness.”
“This is a very circular conversation,” she sniffed, a sound that was half laugh, half sob escaping. “All these mistakes and forgiveness.”
“Yes. Because we’re going to make more mistakes,” he said. “And we’re going to forgive them. Because that is what people who love each other do.”
Charlotte caught her breath, her throat tightening even further.
“I love you. All of you. Charlotte, Charlie, Lady Charlotte. Whatever you wish to call yourself, it matters not to me.”
“Yours,” she whispered. “I want to call myself yours.”
He kissed her then, a hard, possessive kiss that stole whatever was left of her composure. Her hands slipped around his neck, and she held on tightly, not ever wanting to let go.
He pulled her closer against him. “I can’t ever repay what you did for me in that gallery,” he said against her neck.
“I didn’t just do it for you,” Charlotte replied. “I did it for me. I did it for a woman I never got to meet, but who loved unconditionally.”
“Charlotte.” He pressed his forehead to hers.
“I have a commission waiting,” she whispered. “I have to leave England.”
“I know. I heard that Charlie Beaumont had been hired.”
“Come with me—”
“Yes.”
“You don’t even know where I’m going,” she sniffed with a smile.
He pulled back from her and wiped a tear from her cheek that she hadn’t realized had fallen. “It doesn’t matter.”
Charlotte caught his fingers with her own. “I love you, Flynn.”
“And I you. Don’t ever forget that.” He smiled softly at her. “Tell me where we’re going, Lady Charlie.”
She kissed him, love for this man suffusing every corner of her being. She raised her head and saw that love reflected in his own eyes with the promise of forever. “How do you feel about Italy?”