by Erica Ridley
She slid her palms from his cheeks to his hair, burying her fingers in the soft curl at his nape. Her mouth opened to his onslaught, devouring his kisses as much as he was devouring hers.
A part of her had wanted to kiss him from the moment she’d seen the curve of his lips and the emotion in his eyes. Perhaps what she’d truly been searching for hadn’t been an excuse to kiss him, but rather a reason for him to kiss her. Either way, it was perfect. Better than perfect. A real kiss, a real man, someone who valued her as more than a possession, someone with whom her body twined because she had done the choosing. And, oh, how divinely their bodies twined...
Without lifting his mouth from hers, he gripped her hips. The taper fell from her fingers. The flame sizzled and winked out before the candle hit the ground. Although darkness engulfed them, she did not panic. His hands were rough, yet somehow gentle—everything she wanted and was frightened to want, all tangled into one. His grip was firm enough to feel, to know, to claim. And yet he wasn’t hurting her, hadn’t forced her, hadn’t done anything but open his heart. She had pulled him close to tell him with her tongue and the press of her body the things that her mind could not make words for. She was safe in his arms, and her only thoughts were of his kisses.
His splayed fingers caressed her spine, her waist, her hips. She reveled in the sensation of being held, of being treasured. Of feeling safe. She abandoned her grip on his hair in order to lock her arms behind his neck, to raise herself on her toes and lean into him so that he was supporting her with his strong body, while she supported him with the emotion in her heart.
He had one hand in her hair, the other at the small of her back. Her arms hugged him tightly, her breasts rubbing against his chest, her pelvis doing much the same against his thighs. Her limbs trembled from pure sensation. She hadn’t known it could be this way. Doubted it even could be this way with anyone except this man, whose big heart had touched her soul. She had to know if there were room in his heart to feel even a fraction of that connection with her, too. If her heart could touch his, and return the favor. The caress of his tongue against hers made her tingle in all the other places she yearned to feel his touch. What would intimacy be like when fueled by shared passion? His kisses were hot and wet and dangerous. And with every kiss, she wanted more.
Panting, he tore his lips from hers, and God help her, she felt the loss in every pore of her body.
“I... We can’t,” he said hoarsely, then claimed her mouth in another long kiss before breaking free once again. “I want to, but we can’t.”
He untwined her arms from about his neck and placed them at her sides. Although it was now pitch black in the passageway, she felt as though he could somehow still see her, that the darkness helped him see straight through her clothes to her core. Her flesh heated at the thought.
Still holding her hands, he pressed a kiss to her forehead.
Violet’s ardor cooled at the gentle touch. A kiss to the forehead was not passion. A kiss to the forehead was good-bye. Her shoulders sagged, her entire body feeling as if it might crumble into a thousand pieces and settle like dust among the shadows.
His warm breath tickling her hair, he whispered, “Thank you.”
She couldn’t even speak. And then he was gone.
Chapter 12
Even a sleepless night fraught with shamefully lurid dreams of compromising positions could not keep Violet from stumbling out of bed to greet the new morning. She hadn’t forgotten the gifts of the previous day. So many paints and canvases awaited that the sheer number and variety of cloths and colors was positively dizzying. She had never been visited by Father Christmas, so she couldn’t say with certainty, but she imagined children lucky enough to receive presents must feel precisely this drunk with giddy anticipation at the prospect of opening every single box.
Art brought her joy. The anticipation of art brought her joy. And with any luck, perhaps she could share a bit of that joy with the solemn Waldegraves.
Violet smiled to herself as she shoved pins into her hair. Dawn was far too early to countenance marmalade or soft-boiled eggs, but it was perfect for art. The moment she was remotely presentable, she was out the door and down the hall. Even the shadows her meager flame cast upon the catacomb walls could do nothing to dispel her spirits. Not when there were canvases waiting!
Within minutes, she was cross-legged on the floor, surrounded by a sea of colorful potential. Soon, her chignon had fallen, her borrowed dress was three shades lighter with dust, but she was happy, truly happy, for the first time she could recall since the death of Old Man Livingstone.
Wryly, she glanced over her shoulder at the soaring wall of boarded-over stained glass. If ever there was a domicile in need of some beauty, it was Waldegrave Abbey. And if ever there were a lonely child desperately in need of an escape, it was Miss Lillian.
Now that her materials were organized, the only question was what to paint first. Violet peered into the largest box of canvases. Mr. Waldegrave had surely lost his mind. With or without frames, there were enough blank canvases to paper the entire sanctuary! What on earth was he—
Her spine snapped straight. It was all she could do not to laugh aloud at the thought. Why not paper the sanctuary? Perhaps there weren’t truly enough canvases to rise all the way to the topmost rafters, but at the very least she could certainly manage eye-level. Miss Lillian might not be able to step outside, but there was no reason at all why Violet could not bring the outside in.
It would take weeks, of course, and every speck of every paint in every box—but, oh, would it be worth it!
Unable to conceal her grin, she rose to her feet. Right now she had a little girl to teach, but tonight she would paint. Tonight, and every night hence. She shook the dust from her skirts and surveyed the room one last time.
Oh, certainly it couldn’t hurt to augment today’s lesson with a bit of art. Surely that would be far more interesting than the endless screech of chalk upon the blackboard. Without wasting precious time on putting together a frame, she rolled the smallest of the unstretched canvases, selected a brush and a small tray of watercolors, and sailed out the door to collect her charge.
Two hours later, she was kneeling in the schoolroom beside a little girl so overcome with excitement that her shaking fingers flung more paint droplets upon herself and the floor than the canvas before her. The promise of watercolors had ensured Lillian acted the model student throughout maths and history, and now that she finally held a dripping paintbrush in her hand, Lillian was in danger of exploding with happiness on the spot.
Slowly, painstakingly, she drew the bristles up, over, down, until the final swish of a berry-pink “n” glistened wetly at the edge of the canvas.
“There. ‘Lillian.’” She lifted her gaze to Violet, her lower lip clenched nervously betwixt her teeth.
“Just so,” Violet agreed with an encouraging smile. “How does it feel to have created something so beautiful?”
A mischievous smile flashed across Lillian’s face. “It makes me want to take the brushes back to my bedchamber and paint every single day.”
“I knew we were two of a kind,” Violet said with a laugh. “I was your age when I nicked my first stick of chalk, and after that there was no going back.”
Lillian’s eyes widened. “You stole chalk? How?”
“I pretended to let a boy kiss me,” Violet said with a conspiratorial grin. “Distract ’em, and you can nick anything.”
Lillian giggled. “I don’t have to kiss boys. Papa can buy anything I want.”
Violet’s cheeks heated. “True enough. And if it’s paint you desire, you won’t have to work hard to convince your father. Once he sees how talented you are, he won’t deny you a thing.” She nodded toward the canvas. “I particularly like the colors you’ve chosen. I see you’ve got pink in there twice. Is pink your favorite color?”
Lillian’s eyes widened, then lowered. “I should not have done the same color twice. I mucked it up, didn’t I
? I ought to have chosen red or brown or black or—or anything else. I will next time. I promise. Oh, can we do it again? Sometime, I mean. Please? I’ll use any color you wish. It doesn’t have to be pink. I—”
“Lillian.” Violet grabbed her beneath the shoulders and forced the child to meet her eyes. “The only rule in art is that there aren’t any rules in art.”
Lillian frowned at her. “That doesn’t make any sense.”
“Art doesn’t have to make sense. You can paint in every color of the rainbow if you so choose, or you can paint in just pink for the rest of your life.”
Lillian blinked damp lashes. “What does a rainbow look like? Is it truly beautiful?”
“Rainbows... ” Violet took a deep breath. She needed to calm the child, not add to her pain. “Honey, what I’m trying to say is that no matter what color you pick, it’s fine. It’s better than fine—it’s you. Which makes it perfect.”
Lillian shook her head. “It’s not perfect. Nothing about me is perfect. If it’s me, then it’s ugly and awful and stupid and should be hidden away forever and ever.” She tried to twist free from Violet’s grasp and, when she could not, lashed out at the table leg with her foot. The corner of the canvas slid over the table’s edge, distorting the final stroke of the “n” into watery pink rivulets. “I wanted it to be better than me.” Lillian’s voice broke. “I wanted it to be pretty.”
“It is pretty. You’re pretty.” Violet tried to envelop her in a hug, but Lillian held herself stiff and unyielding. After a moment, Violet changed her mind and gently let go. “Here. Watch this.”
She rescued the half-fallen canvas and repositioned it in the center of the table. She slid the tip of the brush through a spot of pink in the tray, and began to paint along the border of the canvas. Broad strokes. Delicate strokes. And every one of them in varying shades of pink.
At first Lillian held back, staring suspiciously at the canvas through narrowed eyes. Once she saw the images take shape, however, she stood so close that Violet could barely reach around her to keep painting.
“They’re flowers,” Lillian breathed. “Pink ones. Pretty pink ones. They’re not red, like the ones Papa brings. They’re not like Papa’s flowers at all. They’re—they’re—”
“They’re lilies,” Violet supplied, without pausing the steady strokes of her brush. “This beautiful pink flower is called ‘lily.’ Like you.”
Her breath caught. “They’re real?”
“Absolutely real. Some lilies are pink, and all of them are pretty. But none is as beautiful as you.”
Lillian stared, her eyes wide with wonder.
Violet pretended not to notice, focusing instead on completing the flowery border surrounding Lillian’s name.
“Lilies,” she repeated softly, her eyes transfixed on the canvas. “Like me.”
At last, the final petal was sketched. Violet laid down the brush. “Now what do you think, Miss Lily? Do you like them?”
Lillian choked out a hiccupy laugh and threw her arms around Violet’s waist. “I adore them,” she said into the folds of Violet’s dress. “Thank you.”
“I adore you,” Violet replied quietly, unsurprised to realize it was true. She placed a soft kiss atop Lillian’s dark head. “And you’re welcome. If you concentrate very hard on your sums this week, perhaps I shall even teach you to paint lilies yourself.”
Lillian jerked her tear-stained face away from Violet’s skirt enough to stare up at her in disbelief. “Are you bribing me?”
“Absolutely,” Violet answered with a cheerful grin. “Is it working?”
Lillian giggled and gave her another squeeze. “Absolutely.”
At that moment, a knock sounded upon the schoolroom door.
“Papa.” Lillian ran color-stained fingers over her hair and attempted to straighten her paint-splattered dress. “Do you think he’ll like the painting?”
“I’m certain of it,” Violet reassured her, praying Mr. Waldegrave would not inadvertently crush Lillian’s obvious wish to please. “Come in!”
The door swung open and Mr. Waldegrave strode through, the trio of fresh-cut roses in his hand undoubtedly meant for his daughter’s chamber. “Ladies, I—”
He stopped short at the expression on his daughter’s face. He glanced questioningly at Violet, then followed her pointed gaze to the canvas upon the table. When he turned to smile at Lillian, the pleasure in his eyes was unfeigned. “What a lovely painting, daughter. Did you do this?”
Lillian nodded double-time, then blushed and glanced up at Violet. “That is to say, I painted my name—I picked the colors and everything, and I even picked pink two times, because there’s no rules in art. And then Miss Smythe helped with the other flowers. You will never guess what they’re called!”
His eyes crinkled in amusement, but he paused to consider the canvas as if lost in deep thought. “If I’m not mistaken,” he said after a long moment, “I would have to say they look just like lilies.”
“They are lilies!” Lillian crowed, then turned round eyes up at Violet. “They are real!”
“Of course they’re real, Miss Lily,” Violet answered briskly, busying herself with the cleaning of brushes to distract herself from the strange joy-sorrow tangling in her stomach. “I believe they may even be my favorite flower.”
“They’re my favorite color and my favorite flower! May I keep it? Please? Oh, Papa, may I have it in my room?”
Mr. Waldegrave’s eyes widened. Whether he was more shocked at being personally addressed or at hearing the word “please” fall unbidden from his daughter’s lips, Violet could not say.
“I suppose we ought to let it dry first,” he said with a smile, “and then I don’t see why not. You did a wonderful job, Lillian, and the painting will look splendid in your bedchamber.”
Lillian stared at her father as if he’d offered her a kingdom. “Y-you think it’s... wonderful?”
He stared back at her in surprise. “I can see that it’s wonderful. If you didn’t want it for your bedchamber, I was set to beg it from you for my own.”
“You were?” Lillian blinked at the painting, then raised shocked brows at Violet. When Violet simply raised her own eyebrows in response, Lillian squared her shoulders and returned her gaze to her father. “All right, then.”
His forehead creased. “All right what?”
“All right, you can have it.” Lillian gave her father a censorious stare. “But not until it dries. And I get to visit it anytime I want.”
Mr. Waldegrave lowered his eyes, as if he believed he could somehow hide the vulnerability therein. But the only person blind to the all-encompassing love he had for his daughter was his daughter herself. And he was just as blind to hers. If Violet had managed to lift their suffering for just a moment, for just long enough for them to truly see each other, if only for a second—then the wet scrap of canvas lying between them was the greatest bit of art she’d ever created in her life.
“Deal,” he said at last. “I will cherish it always. Thank you, daughter.”
Lillian shot Violet a smug look and stage-whispered, “Papa never thanks me.”
Violet returned an arch look of her own. “Have you ever tried to deserve his thanks?”
Lillian frowned. “What do you mean?”
Violet lifted a shoulder. “People get to hear ‘thank you’ when they do something nice. Perhaps hearing ‘thank you’ more often is within your control after all. What about your father? Do you say ‘thank you’ to him when he is nice to you?”
Lillian’s lips puckered. She seemed to realize there was not much to be said. Not when all three of them knew very well that she’d spent years doing her best to appear ungrateful. For the first time, however, she seemed to consider how her father might have felt. Cheeks tinged with pink, she gestured awkwardly at his side and mumbled, “You bring flowers.”
“So I do,” he agreed slowly, staring at the roses in his hand as if he’d forgotten their existence. Perhaps he had.
“Although it seems I have been bringing the wrong kind all along.” He shook his head as if to clear it from unwanted thoughts, and then offered his daughter a hopeful smile. “Starting tomorrow, I will grow lilies instead.”
Lillian angled her head as if thinking the proposition over carefully before coming to a decision. “Lilies are my favorite,” she said slowly, “but... I like yours, too.”
This time, it was Mr. Waldegrave’s turn to be nonplussed. He gazed at his daughter as if her words held the power to turn dirt into gold.
“You do?” His voice was so soft as to be almost shy. “These are roses. Lilies are your favorite, but roses... Roses were your mother’s favorite.”
Lillian sucked in a breath as if the flowers before her had been imbued with magical powers. “They were?”
He nodded as if he could no longer trust himself to speak.
Lillian looked at the profusion of painted lilies surrounding her name, then back to the three roses dangling from her father’s hand. The blooms were full, the petals perfect. Bright red and fragrant. She stepped forward to take them from him. “They’re my favorite, too. I have two favorites. Lilies and roses both.” She cut a sudden worried glance toward Violet. “I can have two favorites?”
“You can have as many favorites as you wish,” Violet assured her. She’d been trying so hard to melt into the background that it was startling to be suddenly included, as if her opinions were as important as those of father and daughter. “Favorites are like art—there’s no rules at all.”
Lillian nodded gravely. She brought the roses to her nose, her eyes closing as she inhaled deeply. When she opened them again, she had eyes only for her father. “Thank you, Papa. Your flowers are beautiful.”
He flinched, as if her words cut just as much as they healed. Or as if right up until she spoke, he had still expected his gift to be thrown back into his face. He hesitated, then reached one thorn-scarred hand out to his daughter. “Would you like to help me arrange them in the vase?”