Highlander Undone

by Connie Brockway

  Money alone was not enough to spur the interest of an artist of Mssr. Drexhall’s reputation. He’d studied for years under Worth. And while he wasn’t about to turn away a small fortune, he obviously was having trouble working up enthusiasm for the project of outfitting a woman just coming out of mourning.

  “Scintillating,” he murmured, rising from his chair and approaching. He took her hand and lifted her arm, his gaze traveling with detached consideration over her figure. He walked around her, stepped back, and cupped his elbow in one hand, drumming his fingers against his prominent chin with the other. His satin, tasseled cap slipped back on his round head, exposing a balding dome.

  “You are sure you do not mean, say, ‘attractive’? ‘Very pleasing’?”

  “Quite sure. I did not pick the word out of a dictionary. I know what I mean. I know what I want.”

  She wanted Jack Cameron. She wanted him to look at her like he had the tiny American. Intent. Rapt.

  Artistic fervor replaced the suspicion that had darkened the master’s features. “Yes,” he said as if to himself. “Yes. Scintillating I can do.”

  Addie relaxed.

  “But—” He held up a warning finger, causing her to hold her breath. “But, you must put yourself entirely in my hands. Entirely. I will brook no interference from you. None.”

  “Monsieur, I—”

  “No. I will show these foolish Americans who leapfrog over themselves to buy Worth’s facsimiles. I will show society the genius I am capable of when given a free hand. And a free hand I must have. I can promise you a gown that will burn the eyes of any man, but you must trust me implicitly. Do you agree?”

  Did she? “Yes.”

  Rather than looking pleased, a huge scowl deepened the lines on Mssr. Drexhall’s swarthy face. He flopped down in a chair, steepling his fingers in front of his lips and glowering at her fully five minutes before barking, “Louis XIV’s embroidered jacket. The drake-green silk. Now! The silver paillettes, too!”

  The attendants broke like partridges from a covey, scattering about the workroom on their various urgent missions.

  “Now, Madame, I warn you. You will suffer for my art.”

  And she did. She spent the rest of the morning being pulled, twisted, and stuck with pins. But she did so with grim resolve. Jack Cameron would see her as a woman. Not a widow, not a friend, not a sympathetic sister but a woman. A scintillating, irresistible woman.

  By the time she had finished her fitting and returned to her townhouse, her head had begun to ache, but it did not overshadow her satisfaction. Even the realization that the dratted new furnace had once again gone defective and was pumping ungodly heat into the rooms couldn’t dampen her delight. She mopped away the sweat beading on her forehead. It was swelteringly hot.

  “Greer!” she called for the housekeeper. No answer.

  What little staff she employed had apparently found “errands” to get them out of the oppressively hot townhouse. Either that or they were off looking for someone to fix it. Since the system had been installed she hadn’t seen anything of Foster’s Domestic Heating Services besides their outrageous bill.

  She cursed, barely noticing she was doing so. As the youngest child in the loose society of a house peopled by lax-mannered artists, bohemians, and rambunctious older brothers, she’d been exposed to an extensive vocabulary of epitaphs.

  She’d been doing a lot of cursing lately. Ever since Jack had disappeared from the studio with Miss Zephrina Drouhin two days ago. Since then the timorous affection she had been nursing for Jack had disappeared, shredded by the realization that she was in love with Jack Cameron.

  Not like, not fond. There was nothing tentative or sedate about the feelings Jack had roused in her slumbering heart. She loved him; his wit, his kindness, his genial nature. But it was more than companionable accord that fevered her dreams and wrecked her peace of mind.

  Their one kiss had pricked her with frustrated longing. She wondered what it would be like to have his mouth open over hers, to feel his chest naked against her, to have those strong, clever hands caress her . . . not worshipfully, not reverently, but masterfully, passionately, ardently.

  She supposed that she at least owed the American girl thanks for that. She might have gone on for months, perhaps even years, subsisting on milquetoast emotions if it had not been for Zephrina Drouhin. With her abrupt awakening from her self-imposed numbness, she had come to another certainty: if she wanted Jack Cameron, she had damn well better do something about it.

  She raked the damp, curling tendrils back from her forehead. She was accustomed to being the center of Jack’s gentle attentions. But there hadn’t been anything gentle about the expression he bent on the pretty girl.

  Her scowl deepened and she pulled out the hairpins that had vexed her all morning. Her hair tumbled free. She wanted Jack to look at her like that, not like she was some fragile, purposeless curio he was afraid to touch.

  A sudden loud bang and clatter ringing from the floorboards, followed by a sinister hiss from the radiators, interrupted her thoughts. The dratted things sounded like they were about to explode. She’d best see if Ted could wrestle the beast into behaving.

  She climbed the stairs to his studio. Inside, it was not quite as hot as below stairs. She looked up and saw that the skylights had been propped open with empty paint cans, allowing a single eddy of cool air in.

  “Ted?” she called. No answer. She looked around. There was no sign of her brother. He was probably waiting out the sauna experience in a nearby pub.

  She angled her head sideways to look at Ted’s most recently finished painting where it stood propped on an easel. Another officer in the Black Dragoons. Her gaze went stony with distaste.

  Ted was so much better than that. So much better than a mere society portraitist. He had a real gift for composition, for the juxtaposition of texture and color.

  She wandered over to the far end of the studio where Ted worked on his noncommissioned paintings. For months now he’d been working on an outsized Odalisque. Carefully, she peeled back the velvet drapery that hung over it. She stepped back and sighed with pleasure when she saw the progress he’d made.

  The harem woman reclined in the classic Odalisque position, supine on sumptuous red velvet pillows. Her ankles were crossed discreetly, the brass glint of her ankle bracelets a stunning contrast to the satiny sheen of her pampered flesh. Ted had chosen not to do his harem girl as a traditional nude, but instead had clothed her in harem garb. The effect was more erotic than mere skin would have been.

  About her torso she wore open an abbreviated red satin vest, heavy with thick gold embroidery and encrusted with thousands of winking glass pearls. Between her partially covered breasts, a shadowed valley was a mauve-stained mystery. The sheerest of gossamer silk harem pants revealed rather than concealed her long legs. A girdle of hammered gold and ruby red stones lay against the naked jut of her hipbone.

  In an outfit like that any woman would be scintillating.

  A twinkle caught her eye and she stepped behind the painting to the dais upon which the model posed. A low-slung divan stood squarely in the middle, covered with pillows and draperies. The harem costume lay in an untidy pile on top of the plush cushions.

  Curious, Addie reached out and picked it up. She smiled. Though fashioned of nothing more than paste and glass, cheap wire and stained satin, Ted had made it look opulent and expensive in the painting. Just as he’d transformed the model, whom Addie knew had a Cockney accent and a missing front tooth, into a sultry harem girl.

  She was about to leave when she caught sight of herself reflected in one of the windows. She stared at her image until a sudden, cheeky grin was reflected back at her.

  Why not? Wasn’t scintillation to be her new byword? An innocent bit of role-playing would put her in the proper frame of mind. Besides, no one was about and since Ted was gone, no one was expected. The studio’s entrance was locked. She’d seen that on her way up the stairs. And if he
r servants returned, well, they weren’t allowed to come up to the studio even when Ted was here.

  Why not, indeed?

  Her grin broadening, she kicked off her slippers. Reaching behind her, she undid the buttons on the back of her dress, dropping it to the ground. Then she untied her single petticoat and unlaced the modest corset she wore, kicking those, too, free. With a tiny thrill of delicious wickedness, she peeled off her combinations and stockings and finally stood stark naked in the studio.

  She stepped into a pool of sunlight coming from the overhead skylights. The warm air bathed her exposed skin and dazzled her eyes and she shivered in delight. She had never stood naked in sunlight. It was wanton. It was wonderful.

  For long minutes she just stood, relishing the unaccustomed sensations, gazing at her image in the window with surprised pleasure, reacquainting herself with the look of her body, the size of her breasts, the length of her legs. It had been so long since she’d taken any conscious delight in her femininity.

  Then, like a schoolgirl playing dress-up from the attic trunks, she slipped into the harem pants and linked the metal girdle low on her hip. She undid the last of the pins striving unsuccessfully to confine her hair and shook the thick waves out, luxuriating in the silky feel of it spilling over her naked shoulders, down her back and breasts. Almost regretfully she slid her arms into the short jacket. The model was much better endowed than she, and the jacket gaped loosely, barely covering her.

  She turned and regarded her image once more.

  A smoky-hued seductress stared back at her. Her long tip-tilted eyes seemed mysterious. Her cheekbones appeared exotically high and the rich red brocade of her jacket accented the deep plum color of her full lips. Her hair looked almost black in the window reflection, coiling sinuously around her neck and shoulders.

  She looked knowing and enticing and confident.

  She stretched her arms above her head, enjoying the pretense. With what she hoped was a come-hither toss of her hair, she mounted the dais, the sensation of her unbound breasts jostling as she moved an odd and unexpectedly erotic one.

  She sank to her knees on the warm, dense velvet pile of cushions and with a purr of pleasure, lay down, sliding against the soft fabric. She closed her eyes and rolled onto her back, a harem woman well versed in pleasure and pleasuring: bold, haughty, absolute in her sexual confidence.

  She arched her back, ready to receive her lover’s caress, his body’s adulation, to offer the perfection of her throat to his lips, her breasts to his mouth and—

  —heard a man’s strangled oath.

  Her eyes snapped open.

  Jack Cameron stood in the doorway balancing a heavy rolled-up carpet on his shoulders. His unbuttoned white shirt hung open and her breath caught in her throat as she saw for the first time how truly well formed he was. His chest was lean and sleekly muscled, a fine matting of reddish gold hair traversing its hard planes. His belly was flat, corrugated, and glistening with sweat.

  Beneath the strain of supporting the carpet, his arms quivered. He didn’t seem to notice. His blue eyes gleamed with indigo darkness.

  “What the hell are you doing?” The words came out in a harsh roar. He heaved the carpet from his shoulders and dropped it, then strode across the room to where she lay. He looked about wildly. Spying the velvet cloth that had draped the Odalisque, he snatched it up, hurling it at her. “Mother of mercy, cover up.”

  For an instant she recoiled from his vehemence. But only for an instant. The Odalisque she played at being recognized that Jack was much more shaken than she.

  And just as aroused.

  There was no mistaking his body’s response to her; his trousers had been fashioned too closely. He saw where her eyes traveled and growled. Grabbing her unceremoniously by the wrist, he pulled her upright as effortlessly as if she had been a doll. Where had she ever gotten the notion that Jack Cameron was frail? He was incredibly strong.

  She stumbled on a cushion and he snatched her from falling, pulling her against him. With the abrupt movement her jacket slipped from her shoulders, crushing her naked breast to his sweat-gleamed body, her nipple abraded by the fine hairs on his chest. He thrust her away as though scorched, holding her at arm’s length, his hands on her upper arms shaking.

  “What sort of madness is this?” he demanded, looming over her. His tone was fierce, angry.

  She should be frightened. Angry men always frightened her. But she wasn’t that meek creature anymore. She was the harem favorite, used to dealing with men . . . and their passions.

  She touched his chest with the very tip of her forefinger then, very slowly, very deliberately, traced the course of a single rivulet of sweat, following the hard contour of his pectoral over his flat copper-colored nipple down to where the golden hairs darkened in a thick line low on his belly. He flinched back, a sound—half oath, half moan—torn from between his gritted teeth.

  He gave her a little shake. “What are you doing? What is this?” And now bewilderment replaced anger, and something more . . . despair? She smiled, a slow liquid smile, rife with promise. He had nothing to despair of.

  “Jack,” she whispered. “Kiss me.”

  He reacted as though she’d asked him to cut out his heart. He froze, his tightening grasp on her arms the only indication he had heard her. For a long minute, he stared at her, motionless except for the rapid rise and fall of his chest.

  “Addie,” he finally said, “what has happened? What is this supposed to be?”

  She remembered his gentleness, his profound kindness, his controlled ardor.

  “This is who I was supposed to be,” she said. Jack, of all the people in the world, would understand. “I was supposed to find joy in the physical act of love. My parents did. My brothers . . . All my family have been earthy, passionate people. It was my legacy. Before Charles, before my marriage, before . . .”

  She felt her jacket slip further down and dipped her arm, allowing it to fall off completely, baring her breasts. His gaze touched them and he closed his eyes.

  The enormous effort it cost him to stand quiescent was clear. His control was compelling, but so was her need.

  “I want you to kiss me. Please. I want to feel a man’s hands on me. I want to discover if the pleasure a man’s touch once promised is ever kept.”

  He groaned and his hands clenched even more tightly about her arms. “Someday a man will keep those promises.”

  “Someday? Jack, years have gone by already. Years that should have been mine.”

  “Addie, it won’t be long.” He sounded so miserable. “You have only to crook your little finger and any man with an ounce of red blood in his veins will come running.”

  Their gazes locked. Slowly, she pushed him away, and then she lifted her hand, extended her forefinger, and crooked it.

  “Oh, God.”

  “It isn’t some ‘man’ I want. It’s you. I want your hands on me, Jack. Your mouth—”

  Whatever she was about to say was lost. He crushed her to him, his mouth open, seeking.

  She had expected lust. She had played the wanton expressly to experience carnal pleasures. This was more. So much more. There was desperation in the hungry motion of his mouth slanting across hers, desperation and a need as deep as her own.

  She had never been kissed like this. Her head swam, her whole being focusing on his body, his mouth. She was overwhelmed with sensual impressions: his scent, sweat-sweet and sharp detergent tanged; his touch, the callused pads of his fingers stroking across the full swell of her breasts, moving tantalizingly close to her nipples; his mouth, sweet heated moisture. Light-headed, she pulled back, needing to breathe.

  Immediately, he stepped away. No. She speared her hands beneath his open shirt, thrilling to the silky-hard slide of muscle bunching beneath her palms as she pulled him to her. Masculine skin, heated and smooth, like burnished metal in the sun.

  “Addie, not me. Not like this. Not now,” he begged.

  “Make love to me,
Jack. Keep the promise,” she whispered. “Only you can keep the promise.”

  In answer he winnowed his fingers through her hair, his fingertips skating with breathtaking deliberation. The tremor in his left hand translated into a breath-stealing shiver as his fingertips passed over her temples, her cheeks, until they found the point of her chin and tilted her face upward. Gently, tenderly, he coaxed her mouth open. With stunning artistry, he tongued the plush inner lining of her lower lip.

  He angled his head to deepen his kiss. Her hands crept up to his neck, and she clung to him, urging him closer. Effortlessly he scooped her up and laid her gently onto the deep, down-filled cushions, sinking down on his knees beside her. Their eyes met. He wanted her. She could see it. He swallowed painfully and would have drawn away then, but she held fast, making him brace himself above her on his forearms.

  “Addie—”

  “Shh. I’m not a virgin, Jack. I’m not holding my maidenhead like a sweetmeat to offer my groom on my wedding night.”

  “I don’t want to take advantage of—”

  “Ah,” she broke in, finally smiling. “But I do.”

  “My God, Addie. I won’t be responsible for any more hurt to you—” His tone was desperate, beleaguered, lost. He had no smile to answer hers.

  “Jack. I don’t know what you’ve gauged about my marriage.” She stopped. She didn’t want to say his name. He had no place here, with them, now, but she knew that if she didn’t clear this between them, it wouldn’t be right for Jack. “But Charles’s cruelties did not extend to the bedroom.”

  “You don’t have to tell me this, Addie.”

  “Yes. I do. We . . . did not live as man and wife except for those few days after we wed.” She felt herself blushing with embarrassment and he caressed her cheek.

  “Jack, I want this. I’m falling in—”

  He dropped his head and kissed her hard and swift, cutting off her declaration. She could feel his heart beating against her breast. She scooted deeper into the pillows, refusing to let go, pulling him with her.