The Pleasure Seekers

by Melanie George

“I want to apologize to you.” Shadows hugged the sleek curves and hollows of his face, the fading light creating dancing patterns on the ground between them. “It isn’t my strongest suit,” he admitted with an uneasy smile. “I haven’t had a great deal of practice. I know I bungled things yesterday. It’s just that when I saw you and the Frog—”

  “His name’s François.”

  His disgruntled look almost made Bliss smile. He stuffed his hands into his pockets. “I got a little crazy. I’m sorry.” He looked at her through those indecently long lashes, his eyes penitent as he softly added, “For everything.”

  In that moment, it might have been easy for her to forgive him. Part of her wanted to believe that what had begun as a means of striking out at her father had turned into something else along the way.

  It truly frightened her, how much she wanted him. Nothing in her life had prepared her for Caine, and nothing had ever made her so afraid.

  She turned from him, the words to send him away not coming as they should. A moment ticked by, then he came up behind her, his body a solid wall of heat against her back. She could feel his chest rising and falling, his scent, so masculine and evocative, enveloping her.

  “Tell me why you were crying when I arrived,” he murmured in a tone that was hard to resist.

  Bliss shook her head, pain resurfacing at the reminder.

  “Whose graves are these?”

  She closed her eyes briefly and tried to breathe past the tight knot in her chest. “My grandparents.”

  “You miss them.”

  “Very much,” she said, despair creeping into her voice. “I only got to see them a few times the year before they…” She bit her lip to keep it from trembling. “The year before they died,” she finished.

  Caine’s fingers lightly traced her temple. “But you still have fond memories of them, don’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Tell me what you remember most.”

  Bliss hesitated, glancing down at her hands. “My grandmother liked to sing,” she heard herself say. “She had a wonderful voice, a pure soprano. She was always smiling. Always happy.”

  An image of her grandparents unfolded in her mind’s eye and brought with it a tide of emotions. How she wanted them back. She would do things differently this time. Not make so many mistakes.

  “My grandfather had a way of captivating people with his stories. He would recount the legends and struggles of the First Republic with such passion and fire. He gave me an appreciation for the plight of the underdog.”

  “They sound like wonderful people.”

  “They were. They cared deeply about many issues and hated injustice of any sort. It was through their eyes that I started seeing the world differently, though I expressed my feelings through my art.”

  “I saw some of your work last night. You’re very talented.” He paused for a moment. “May I?” He gestured to her sketchpad that sat on the marble bench.

  Bliss hesitated. Rarely had she shared her personal work with anyone. “Yes,” she finally murmured.

  He stepped away and took hold of the book, her private diary of the life that existed outside the sanctuary of the cemetery walls. Opening the first page, he studied the drawing, and then looked at her, an expression in his eyes Bliss had never seen before. Sorrow and compassion.

  “Her name was Fantine,” she said to his unspoken question. “She was a shoe-stitcher. I came across her begging for credit at the butcher’s shop. The owner turned her away.”

  “What happened to her face?”

  “Her husband beat her,” Bliss replied, her voice flat with the sickening taste of the words. “He would spend what little money they had drinking at the tavern, and then stumble in the door expecting his supper to be on the table. When it wasn’t, he blamed her, as though she had any control over his squandering. It didn’t seem to matter to him that his children had little or nothing to eat.”

  Caine cursed beneath his breath. “The son of a bitch should be hung from his testicles,” he said fiercely. Bliss only wished the solution could have been that simple. “So where is this woman now?” he asked.

  Bliss closed her eyes. “She’s dead. She had to find a way to feed her family, and began selling her body down along the Faubourgs. One of the men got too rough and strangled her.”

  “Jesus.”

  “Her children are at a workhouse now.” She opened her eyes and met Caine’s concerned regard. “Do you know anything about the workhouses?”

  “Not enough.”

  “They’re horrible. Most people would rather eke out whatever existence they can find on the streets, than submit to the near starvation and indignities such places foster.” Bliss would never forget the overwhelming sense of sorrow that had pervaded the dank walls and dirty faces when she had gone with the vicar to visit the children. “They’re like prisons, with the workers allowed few visitors and often subjected to strict discipline, many of them separated from their families.”

  “Can’t the government do anything about it?”

  “The government sanctions it. And even if there are complaints, they turn a deaf ear.’’ Bliss flipped to the next page in her sketchbook, showing him a picture of a little girl, her once cherubic face frozen in a mask of pain. “She has phossy jaw. It’s a form of necrosis caused by the phosphorous the match-tippers handle. They allow children as young as seven and eight years old to work alongside adults, twelve to fourteen hours a day for ludicrous wages, shut up in unhealthy workrooms, beyond the reach of either air or light or sunshine.”

  Caine rubbed a hand over his eyes, as though the sight was too much even for him. The remaining sketches were all similar, faces of hungry women and children, many of them working by the light of a single candle, their hands raw and chapped.

  “Isn’t there anything anyone can do about this?”

  “Care,” Bliss replied. “Our society punishes the poor, as if poverty is the result of laziness alone, not of misfortune caused by hard times or other circumstances beyond the person’s control.”

  “It’s clear you care a great deal about their plight.”

  “I paint them, but what have I really done for them?”

  “You’ve also spoken up on their behalf.”

  “But my voice is not enough. I’m a woman; I can’t change the laws. And I don’t possess the same strength my grandparents had. If they believed in something, they fought for it staunchly.”

  “You’re a lot like them.”

  She shook her head and glanced up at the night sky, stars beginning to shine through the velvet canopy. “I try to be as steadfast as they were in their beliefs, but I’m on the outside looking in, capturing emotions and feelings on canvas, but never expressing them from the heart.”

  Caine’s finger whispered down her neck, his nearness almost an embrace. “I’ve never known a woman who is more passionate about something she believes in. You took me on, didn’t you? If you can do that, you can do anything. You should show your art. Let the world see this cruelty for itself.”

  Bliss lowered her gaze and wrapped her arms around her waist. “I don’t know.”

  Caine held his hand out to her, palm up, a tender offering of support. The unexpectedness of it nearly made her cry. She put her hand in his. The pads of his fingers slipped along hers, sending a frisson of awareness through her before his hand closed over hers, brown and firm and strong, his warmth taking away the coldness that seemed to go bone deep.

  “What does that inscription say?” he quietly asked, gesturing to the epitaph on her grandmother’s headstone.

  Bliss gazed at the words that had been etched in the marble. ILS FURENT ÉMERVEILLÉS DU BEAU VOYAGE QUI LES MENA JUSQU’AU BOUT DE LA VIE. “They marveled at the beauty of the voyage that brought them to the end of life,” she softly recited.

  “It’s a wonderful sentiment.”

  “Yes. They loved each other quite a bit.” Her voice shook and Caine gave her fingers a reassuring squeeze, res
ting his cheek against her hair. “They died within a week of each other. My grandfather was already ill, but I believe my grandmother’s unexpected death made him give up the battle and let go. He had lost the most important reason he had to stay alive.”

  “It must have been devastating for you to lose two people you loved so suddenly.”

  “It was.”

  “How did your grandmother die?”

  “She was killed.”

  “I’m sorry,” he murmured, pressing a light kiss to her temple.

  The tears Bliss had been trying to hold back began to trickle down her cheeks. “It was so peaceful that day,” she said. “But looking back, I realize that it was more of an unsettling silence.”

  “Can you tell me what happened?”

  She hesitated, but the memories poured out of her. “The tension that had been building between the government and the people had escalated. The district around the Rue Montmartre and the Rue du Temple stirred with growing anger. Dozens of barricades suddenly sprang up; some occupied by more than a hundred guardsmen with rifles. I could see the soldiers from the window of my grandparents’ home.” She shivered in remembrance.

  Caine’s arm came around her waist, holding her close. “You must have been terrified.”

  “I don’t think I understood what was happening. I remember feeling strangely detached, as though I was watching the scene from outside myself. My mother forbade me to come along when she and my grandmother went out into the street, but I followed them anyway, keeping far enough back so that they wouldn’t see me.

  “A woman stood on the summit of the hill. She was reading a proclamation written by Victor Hugo. Several hundred people gathered to listen. Nearly a thousand of the king’s men stood guard.”

  “What happened then?” Caine gently coaxed.

  “I heard the cathedral bells of Notre Dame chime the hour. It was three o’clock. A moment later, someone shouted, “Long live the Republic!” and then a shot rang out, no one knew from where. While the crowd stampeded, the soldiers fired on them.

  “The entire incident lasted no more than five minutes, but in the end, a dozen people lay dead in the streets. I can still see the unblinking stare of an elderly man stretched out against the curb, still holding his umbrella, and a young boy whose body had been riddled with gunshot…and my grandmother.”

  Her tears began to fall in earnest. “It didn’t seem possible. I thought that it was a nightmare and I would wake up any minute. I stood there, unable to move, my mother kneeling by her side, a terrible keening sound coming from her. I was frozen to the spot, staring down into my grandmother’s eyes as the light faded from them. I remember thinking that she would get up and the nightmare would be over. There was only a small bloodstain on her chest, surely not enough to fell a woman who had survived so much.

  “She reached for my hand then, but I couldn’t take it. I knew she was saying goodbye and I didn’t want her to go.” A sob broke from her lips. “It was my last chance and I…I let it slip away.”

  Caine turned her around and enfolded her tightly in his arms, letting her cry. His fingers twined in her loose hair, holding her there, his other hand gently caressing the nape of her neck.

  They stayed that way for long minutes. When her tears began to subside, he moved to the marble bench and sat down, pulling her onto his lap.

  “Feeling better?” he murmured.

  She nodded, dabbing at her eyes with the handkerchief he had slipped into her hand.

  “You were only a child,” he told her in a comforting tone. “You can’t blame yourself for being afraid of something you didn’t understand.”

  “I should have begged them not to go.”

  “How were you going to stop them?”

  “I don’t know,” she said with a half sob. “But I should have tried. I should have told my mother to stay home when my father forbade her to come here. He knew it was too dangerous. Perhaps if I had pleaded with her she would have stayed, and then she and my grandmother would never have gone out into that street, and my mother and father would still love each other.”

  Caine cradled her head against his chest, his hands stroking rhythmically through her hair. When her last sniffle dwindled away, he cupped her chin and tilted her face up to his, kissing her lightly on the lips.

  Love blossomed in Bliss’s heart, fragile and frightening. Somewhere along the way, she had fallen for the disreputable Earl of Hartland. Who would have believed it? England’s staunchest defender of women had fallen for England’s staunchest defiler of women.

  “If you could paint anywhere in the world,” Caine said softly, twilight aglow around them, “where would it be?”

  Bliss’s gaze drifted to the beautiful winged angel perched atop the tomb behind them, the seraphim’s stone eyes seeming to light on her in soft inquiry. “I don’t know,” she replied. “I suppose here. All aspiring artists seem to find their way to Paris eventually.”

  “You suppose? Or you’re sure?” His eyes, as he stared down at her, were as dark and deep as the sky overhead. “Where else would you like to go?”

  The answer came to her in an instant. “Back home. To Exmoor.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I was happy there.”

  “And you’re not happy now?”

  “Happy enough,” she murmured, touching a finger to his neckcloth, so perfectly tied, so neatly presented, as though he had eradicated the beast he had been in Devon, who took what he wanted and the devil with the consequences. And yet beneath that veneer of decadent glory, Bliss suspected both men existed, and the possibility made her weak.

  “What do you miss the most?” he asked.

  “A real family,” she answered from her heart. “It seems a lifetime ago that I was part of one.” Hearing her foolish yearning, she glanced away from him. “This must sound silly to you. I’m a grown woman now, not a child.”

  “Family is family, no matter what your age.” He stroked the line of her jaw, coaxing her to look at him. “It was only my father and I for as long as I can remember.” He glanced briefly toward the twinkling lights of the boulevard, where the dance halls were just opening their doors. “I never really knew my mother. She died when I was four.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  There was certain despair in his eyes when his gaze returned to hers. “Nothing to be sorry about. You can’t miss what you never had.”

  “I think you can.”

  The expression on his face became intent. “Tell me what you see when you look at me.”

  It was the easiest question he had ever asked her. “I see a man who has been devastated,” she said in a soft voice. “Who’s haunted. Pained. Who makes me weak, but also makes me strong. Who’s compassionate when no one’s looking. Cruel when he’s hurting. Gentle when he wants to be tough.”

  He stared at her for a long moment, as if she had succeeded in rendering him speechless. Then he touched his finger to the corner of her mouth. “You accused me once of never asking for something I wanted.”

  Bliss’s pulse quickened, her voice breathless as she said, “And what is it that you want?”

  “A kiss to begin with,” he murmured, his hand sliding under her hair to take hold of her nape and lifting her mouth up to his. “Then I want your heart.”

  Nineteen

  It is not enough to conquer;

  One must know how to seduce.

  Voltaire

  Caine’s mouth covered her soft gasp of surprise, his words making hope flare in her heart as she wrapped her arms around his neck. One large hand gripped her waist, gently kneading the flesh beneath her dress, making a bonfire begin to burn brightly inside her.

  He kissed her cheeks, her jaw, her throat; her body arched up against his mouth as he pressed his lips to the flesh above her bodice. He skimmed his hand along her side and up to her breast, outlining the full swell, then boldly cupping her. Bliss whimpered into his mouth at the first touch of his fingers across her nipples.
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  “God,” he groaned. “You’re so damn sweet and responsive.” He nuzzled her throat, his warm lips a heady caress. Bliss whispered his name, encouraging him. He pressed his cheek against hers, his voice hoarse with restraint. “I have to stop, or else I’m going to take you right here, love.”

  It took Bliss a moment to realize that they were outside, where anyone might see them.

  She nearly leapt off Caine’s lap. His low chuckle teased her as she scrambled upright, glancing around to see if anyone was nearby. Luckily, the growing lateness of the hour had left the cemetery virtually empty.

  She glanced over at Caine and noted the amused glimmer in his eyes, along with simmering passion. “You’re wicked,” she chided, a reluctant smile tugging at her lips at his lecherous expression, the scar on his cheek barely noticeable in the darkness.

  Her gaze moved over the thin line. She hesitated, then reached out to touch it. He didn’t stop her. The skin was silky beneath her fingertips, a marked contrast to the rough texture of his jaw.

  “I wrote to my father,” she said, feeling the tension that moved through Caine’s body at her admission. “He told me that he never knew you came to see him. That if he had, he would have spoken to you.” She ran her finger down the length of the scar, and felt a slight shudder wrack his frame. Then she leaned over and pressed a kiss to it.

  “Bliss,” he groaned, the word a plea.

  “He’s sorry for what happened to you, Caine…just as he’s terribly sorry about what happened to your father. He never wished the earl harm.” She paused, hoping he would say something, but he remained still and silent. “He told me to tell you that should you wish to take up your position in the House of Lords, you would have his support.”

  He looked at her for a long moment and Bliss braced herself, thinking he would explode, but instead he just nodded. He had listened, and he had heard her. She could ask for no more.

  She shivered as a gust of cool air rippled across her skin, reminding her she had not brought her shawl. Caine shrugged out of his coat and put it around her shoulders. The warmth from his body infused the lining, the scent of sandalwood and smoke comforting as he helped her to her feet.