Page 61 of His Mistress, His Muse, and Other Madness
“Sitting on the wall, I think.”
On either side of the bridge, low stone walls rose. She found a place not too bumpy and sat.
“Not like that,” Mr. Bradley snapped. He approached, and she held tight to her muscles to keep from inching backward. Nowhere to go but into air and water. He pushed her shoulders and knees, turning her away from the house. Then he nudged her chin up, so she stared at the sky, and moved her hands to grip the weather-worn stones on either side of her. “Don’t move.”
“Yes. I mean no. I mean… I’ll remain still.”
Bradley moved away and pulled a notebook and pencil from the pile of supplies he’d brought with him. “I’ll sketch in what time we have, then paint later.”
She remembered sitting for Simon, likely for the same painting that had brought him such a boon. It had been the first day they’d anticipated their wedding night. His gaze on her, heavy and full of desire, for several hours, had been a prelude to his hands. She’d admired those hands, lithe and agile, and though she’d known better, she’d done as he desired—disrobed, laid herself bare, assented. Because he would be her husband soon.
Such a little fool she’d been. At least she’d learned a little of the pleasures of loving that night. She’d enjoyed it, only regretted, really, that it had been with a man who had cared so little for her. She’d thought he’d loved her. Thought she’d loved him.
Littlefool. She’d loved his art and mistaken that as affection for the man. The two had ended up being quite different—one beautiful and the other not. Was she falling into the same trap with Theo? The word love had tripped her up earlier, but perhaps the word described her feelings for his art, those bold strokes on stark white paper, those exaggerated shapes and heavy lines. No. His art made her uncomfortable, sparked an odd combination of admiration and wariness. But when she thought ofTheo, she thought of him as a man, not an artist, a blunt beast with a surprisingly soft heart. She used to think she could look at Simon’s paintings for hours and see something new each minute.
She thought the same aboutTheonow.
A complication she did not need. Focus remained her word today, and her goal the man scowling as he drew her, winning him over, stopping his malicious prattle.
She cleared her throat. “Shall we have some conversation, Mr. Bradley?”
“No.”
“You do not like me.”
He snorted, his pencil never stopping its scratch across the page.
“Why? When we have never met before this week.”
His hand stilled before it began again at a more furious pace. “Simon is a good friend. You ruined him.”
“Me? Ruinhim?” She wanted to laugh, but she’d often thought the same thing, had long felt guilty over his assertion, though until Mr. Bradley, no one had flung it at her but herself.
“You seduced Simon.”
Well that snapped guilt in two. She gasped. “Mr. Bradley, I—”
“And then, when you saw a better opportunity, you seduced his patron.”
“I. Did.Not. Is that what he told you?”
“And now you’ve seduced the dead man’s son. But tell me, how are you enjoying the support of apoorman? I suppose his pockets don’t matter when he’s fucking you, but—”
“Mr. Bradley!” She shot to her feet, hands fists, nails cutting into her palms.
Not that he cared. He continued sketching as if he’d asked her about the weather instead of gravely insulting her. She shouldn’t feel insulted. Shewasfucking Theo. She winced. The word itself insulted her—too hard and too coarse for the delight she found in Theo’s arms every night, every morning. That word seemed a curse when Theo proved a… amiracle.
“You should have just married Simon,” Mr. Bradley said. “He’s poor still. No one would offer their support once Lord Waneborough removed his. All because you fucked his attention away from a man with true talent.”
Cordelia could no longer form words. The man had it all wrong, and if that was what he had been telling anyone who would listen… well, no wonder no one would speak to her.
“You do understand,” Mr. Bradley continued, “it’s not the fucking I’m opposed to. It’s that you stole a livelihood from a deserving man. A great talent. Agenius.”
She dropped back to sitting, her body heavy, and rocks crumbled from the edge of the bridge and plunked into the water below. Guilt sat heavy in her gut like one of those rocks now at the bottom of the moat. Simon had tossed her away like refuse beneath his boots, but he had been a genius, and—
The slap of boot against rock jerked her attention upward.
Mr. Bradley sauntered toward her, stopping right before her and leaning forward, forward, forward, so that she had to bend backward over the low rock wall to avoid his face just inches from hers. So close, he possessed good looks, classical, elegant lines of nose and jaw and lip, but those lips twisted into a hateful sneer.
