Page 41 of Forgery, Love, and Other Lies
“It is from your shop. I stole it. I hope you do not mind.”
She shook her head, shrugged. She cared much less about the loss of discarded material than she did about the loss of this moment between them. She would not discard it. Not even fifty years from now. It felt too real, too precious, and when she had grown old and gray, she’d take the memory of it out of her pocket and hold it up to the candlelight for inspection as he held up that wire, and with just as much reverence, too.
“It looks like it was meant to be thrown away,” she whispered.
“Do you know why I stole it?”
“Obviously not.”
“I stole it— No, never mind that description. I did notstealit. I rescued it because the thing I have been searching for as long as my father has been searching for perfection is theimperfect.”
She blinked, trying to understand, finding herself a failure. “I do not mean to offend when I say this, Lysander, but what nonsense. No one likes the imperfect.”
“I do. I love imperfections.” He pocketed the wire once more. “I have an entire collection—bits and bobs no one else wants. A broken locket, a chunk of glass, more buttons than I’ve attempted to count. I’ll show them to you if you like. Little imperfect things others toss away. But at one time that dull button used to shine and give someone pride. Perhaps the broken colored glass was an old church window filtering sunlight on bowed heads. Maybe this wire was at one point meant for a duchess’s wrist or ear.” He tweaked hers. “Even though no one remembers their worth… I do. Perhapsbecauseno one else remembers… I do.” He held his hands out to her, palm up. “See. I specialize in imperfections.”
He seemed to be telling her something greater than the meaning of his words. Rattled her it did. “If you like imperfect things,” she said, keeping her tone light, playful, “I’ve much to offer, my lord. I daresay once we investigate my offerings, you’ll find you do not like imperfection as much as you claim to.”
His knuckles brushed down the line of her neck. “What imperfections are you offering me, Fiona?”
“Oh, let us start small. What think you of these freckles across my cheeks?” She risked a glance up at him, her heart screaming at her to stop, for surely this way lay its doom.
His hand switched trajectories, a gloved thumb smoothing across her cheekbones and down the bridge of her nose. “Most women want to get rid of their freckles, I suppose.” His voice was low, deep, thoughtful.
“Yes.” Her voice was a husky whisper, though the topic of conversation hardly allowed for such a response. “I’ve… I’ve even tried a lemon concoction a time or two. To get rid of my own.”
“Don’t do that again.” Another demand, another order, and this one, too, she’d likely heed. He tilted toward her until the very tip of his nose tapped the very tip of hers, then he straightened. “Those freckles are adorable. I’d mourn if you wiped them away.”
She found some sense to construct a sensible reaction. She snorted. “And my ears…” Fumbling for something now. “I’ve known my entire life they are too big, and Jake the errand boy when I was fourteen made sure I understood that, too… Do you find those adorable?” What a cursed foolish question, as if she were fishing for compliments instead of forcing him to admit he lied. He, like everyone else, loved perfection. He dealt in it daily, buying the perfect works of art to raise men in society’s eyes.
“Go on, then,” she said, irritation creeping into her voice, “admit you like big ears.”No oneliked big ears.
He tilted his head, his gaze meandering to the side of her head and slope of her neck. He threaded his fingers through the hair at her temple and brushed it back, revealed an ear, and made the sort of sound in his throat usually only heard by hungry men staring down a large dinner. “I want to nip at the lobes.”
Her breath caught in her throat.
“Do you have any other compliments to give yourself?” he asked.
“They’re not compliments. They are flaws.”
“Not to me. To me, each flaw makes you who you are, and you, Miss Fiona Frampton, I like very much. You are intelligent, and you are creative, and you are kind and loving and a determined little minx, and you are”—he inhaled and exhaled and rested his forehead against her own—“so bloody beautiful it hurts.”
And she fell in love with him just a little bit.
Not because he called her beautiful or recited a litany of compliments that weren’t really true. She was not those things he said. She was a big-eared, freckled, unfocused criminal. But she had the feeling that if she said that to him, he would punish her, somehow, for abusing herself, as if he’d taken it upon himself to protect her. Even from herself.
No, she did not fall in love with him—just a very little bit, mind you—because he saw her differently than she saw herself. She might be falling just a slightly little bit in love with him though because he looked at a piece of discarded wire and saw something beautiful and useful. And how many others saw the world that way? He spent his time purchasing overly expensive art for other people, but in his own life, he valued those things his clients would sneer at. And if her heart had been hollowed out in this moment to make room for him, it was because ofthat.
“Fiona, what are you thinking?” His forehead still pressed against hers.
“That I’m none of those things you say I am. I am not ladylike enough to please my parents. I want to follow my father in his work, not waste my time on proper accomplishments for ladies miles above me. I cannot pretend the way they want me to, and I cannot create with paint, so I do not want to, but I have no time to work on my jewelry designs because I must always paint horrid still lifes. and I will never be as they wish me and—”
He stopped her speech with a kiss. A brief one, short and hard, that punishment she knew would come, and then he rested his forehead against hers again. “I do not want to hear you describe yourself unless it’s in glowing terms. Are we agreed?”
“Not at all. I reserve the right to describe myself however I please and however the mood strikes me. But… would you very much mind kissing me again? On that point, I think we might find some common ground.”
His hands curved round the back on her neck, hard and gentle at the same time, drawing her forward, unforgiving and possessive as his fingers speared into her coiffure, as his thumbs tipped her chin up. Such force she gasped, and he took advantage of her open mouth to plunder it.
She drowned in a maelstrom of sensation headier, more dizzying than the dance had been. Unable to separate the feel of his lips from the pinpricks of pleasure his fingers drew at her neck and from the scandalizing press of his body against her own—hard edges, lean muscle, and pulsing desire all evident despite the layers of clothing that separated them—she let herself fall into it, gave way and gave up. And let her body do as it pleased.
