Page 73 of His Mistress, His Muse, and Other Madness
Was she overreacting? Possibly. Her emotions were high, but… the sketch had been so nasty, the opposite of the one he’d given her when he’d proposed marriage. That one had been light and humorous and filled with delight. With love. The one he’d drawn of Pentshire and Miss Mires burned with judgment and hate.
How many men like him, satirists, would love to draw something about the late Marquess of Waneborough’s mistress? Or daughter. Or who knew what. All of it one and the same at the end of the day; it washer. If she looked for satirical drawings of herself, would she find them? Caricatures less friendly to her than Theo’s, exaggerating her body through a cynic’s eye and commenting on her soul?
There were two versions of Theo—the gargoyle without a heart and the man she’d discovered beneath, a funny ray of sunshine who seemed to adore her. God, her heart hurt. He wanted to help her fund her school. He wanted to provide a life for her, for them. And she wanted to accept those offers. But at what cost? She had no right to judge how others loved, and neither did he. What if Pentshire’s love was innocent?
Innocent.
Like her? Did she trust too easily, look for the best in people when they did not deserve it? Refuse to see their faults? No fault there! How else would she have seen the true, the good Theo beneath his spiny armor?
Her brain hurt. Her gut a bit, too. She did not want to argue with him. They’d come here for this precise reason, to lie, to snoop, toexpose. Not her. She’d come to court, to offer opportunities for others to do good in the world. And to save herself. The dilemma stemmed not from her reasons or his reason, but because they’d become athem. A fortnight ago, she’d not cared overly much how he wasted his time. And his actions would not have hurt her school. Well, except for the fact, he’d been trying to kick her out of it.
If she’d never fallen into his bed then fallen in love, she would not now be so… broken.
She rolled onto her belly and hid her face in her hands, found her cheeks wet. Blast it all. Tears? On top of everything else?
A knock on the door before it creaked open.
“Cordelia?” Theo’s voice, and then his body’s weight pressing down the edge of the bed. “I want you to be able to sleep. Please let me stay here with you. Just so you can sleep. I… I won’t touch you.”
She didn’t say yes. But she did not say no, either. And in that silence, he lay himself down beside her, but as far away as he could manage. And in that positioning, she inched herself as far from him as she could until she teetered on the edge. A mere misplaced breath could send her falling.
“I’m here.” His voice hoarse. “You’re not alone, yes?”
She could not rightly answer that.
“I’m here.”
The last words she heard before she fell asleep.
* * *
Cordelia woke when the sun in the window glowed pale pink on the horizon. Theo was curved around her, his chest hot against her back, his face buried in her shoulder. Now his arms were loose though heavy about her waist, but when she’d crept to him in the middle of the night, no longer able to resist his outstretched arm, his reassurance of “I’m here” still ringing in her heart, his hold had been tight as a vise.
She loved him. The first thought that entered her head upon waking, and the utter truth. But he would not listen to her. And she could not let him hurt others. Other truths that came in rapid succession. Hurting them would hurt him, too. He fought for justice, and he slipped past that into some gray territory he did not know how to manage because… of her. He considered hurting them to provide for her.
She would not let him.
Yet she’d been unable to resist him last night, unable to hold steady and keep to her side of the bed. If she gave into him every time he showed his heart, the man would get away with murder. She must resist him. But his body against her felt like perfection, and his breath steady on the skin of her neck washed away her loneliness so entirely, she’d do anything—
No.
She’d long run from the discomfort of independence, fearing loneliness, fearing her own inability to care for herself. She was a pampered earl’s daughter after all.
But now she must care for and protect someone else.
She rolled out of Theo’s embrace, holding her breath. Then, on quiet feet, she slipped from bed and dressed. It took only a few moments and a few held breaths to sneak into his room, to gather his drawings and slip them into her valise, to write a note with his pen and ink and press a kiss to it. Stockinged feet were more silent on stairs than her half boots, so she waited until she spun down that spiral staircase one last time before she sat on the last step and put her boots on.
“Good morning, Lady Cordelia. Up mighty early. Going somewhere?”
She jumped, covered her mouth with both hands to muffle her yelp. “Lord Pentshire. My, you terrified me.”
He bowed. “Apologies, my lady.” His gaze flicked to the valise then back to her, accompanied by a single raised brow.
“Ah, yes.” She stood, smoothed her skirts. “I am in need of conveyance back to London. Or perhaps to the nearest village so I may take the mail coach.”
He shook his head. “No mail coach. You can have a carriage. But, ah, where is Lord Theodore?”
“I must return without him. A family emergency. The, ah, letter he received yesterday.”
