Page 25 of Her Rogue to Ruin
But Portia was suddenly all business. An artist seeking the perfect composition.
“I can light a few candles, and we’ll get some nice shadows.”
“Yes,” he murmured as she tentatively touched his shoulder, pushing with the lightest touch so that he almost faced the easel.
Her fingers were blessedly cool and made him realize how heated his body was from only minutes spent in her company.
“We could have your face in profile.” She ghosted her fingers along his jaw and he nearly groaned. “Or if you wish to protect your identity, we could have you turn your face away entirely.”
She held his jaw between her thumb and forefinger and gently nudged him to look away from her.
“Oh yes,” she mumbled, and he felt her fingers as light as a bird’s wing flutter across his back. “This is a nice view.”
Phin couldn’t resist a chuckle. “You mean the view is better when you can’t see my face?”
She released his jaw, and he turned back to find her smiling.
“That’s not what I meant. If you’ve passed a looking glass in your life, you must know you have a very handsome face.” She let out a long breath. “As I’m sure you’ve been told a time or two. But your back…”
“What about my back, Portia?”
“It’s beautiful.” She pressed her lips together, cast her gaze down, and then faced him squarely. “Artistically speaking.”
“Thank you.” Phin felt his own cheeks begin to warm and laughed. No woman had drawn a blush from him in…well, possibly ever. The warmth spread to his chest and he felt some knot he’d not even known was inside him unfurl. “That’s the nicest compliment I’ve ever received.”
She lifted a smock from the table near her easel and lifted its straps over her shoulders. When she reached back and fumbled with the ties, Phin stood and reached out to help her.
His fingers brushed hers, and she lowered her arms, letting him tie her into the garment.
“What pose do you prefer?” With her head turned, he imagined how easy it would be to lean down and touch his mouth to hers.
“I bow to your artistic judgement,” he told her in a voice far too husky for such a practical conversation.
She turned to face him, and for a moment he got lost tracing the sapphire streaks in her violet eyes.
“Do you trust Mrs. Grove?”
Phin frowned at the question. “I barely know her.”
Portia narrowed her gaze and her brows puckered in confusion. “But I thought you cared for her. That you’re enamored with her.”
“No.”
When her eyes widened, he recognized how much he sounded like a cad. Hell, perhaps he was a cad.
“Then why gift something so intimate?”
Phin turned away from her, gripping the back of his neck, wishing they could go back to a moment ago when her fingers swept across his skin as she’d arranged him on the damned velvet-dressed stool.
He walked over and sat on it again. “Shouldn’t we get started?”
“You don’t answer my questions.” Portia lifted her hands to her hips, a stance he’d seen a hundred times in his mother, his sisters, when they were frustrated with him. “You won’t tell me why you were angry that day in the study, and you won’t tell me why you wish to impress a woman you don’t care for.”
“I’ll answer,” he finally told her, “if you’ll start painting.”
“Then I want to start with your face.” She dipped her gaze. “So you can keep your trousers on.”
“What about my back?”
