Even after two years of freedom, Catherine’s stomach tightened painfully as her eye traced the lines of her late husband’s face. “That’s George.” She’d shown him with his gaze fixed on the heavens, his hair wildly curling, his skin shaded with tan and the ruddy hues brought out by harsh sea winds.
The date carefully placed in the lower right corner mocked her: she’d worked this portrait when her love was still shiny new, like a pewter mug that hadn’t yet been dropped into the sea to rust and ruin. “We were newly married, and it was my first time traveling aboard ship—everything was so exciting. Navigators and astronomers were taking readings at all hours, the botanists were preparing to collect samples once we landed, the naturalists were studying weather patterns and bird flights and the sea creatures we managed to sight along the way. And of course the sailors who kept the ship on course and the sails stretched out to the heavens were always working and watching the skies. But there wasn’t anything I could do to help—rather, there wasn’t anything George wanted me helping with, so I decided I could make a record of sorts.” She turned over the next page, with a throb of mingled affection and grief. An old man with a twinkling eye and a boisterous set of whiskers. “This is Captain Lateshaw.”
She turned page after embroidered page, showing Lucy the full set—all the scholars and sailors‚ so many of whom had been lost to illness and accident—as well as the landscapes she’d added later, once they’d reached the islands.
And then, of course, she came to the princess’s portrait, bare of breast with a defiant regal glint in her eyes. She’d been a chieftain’s daughter on an island whose map name had been changed several times since the first European arrivals landed there.
Catherine shook her head, a pang of shame flaring hot within her. “Nearly the whole island’s population has been lost since then to disease. One of the sailors told me on our second voyage out. This portrait, clumsy and obscure and half a world away, may be all that remains of her.”
“I don’t know why you insist on calling your work clumsy. Your stitches look almost like brushstrokes; I doubt my brother or any of his friends could have done so much with even the most delicate brushes and perfectly blended tints...” Lucy glanced up at Catherine’s troubled face and hastily reached out to turn the next page. “Oh,” she said, startled. “Who isthat?”
A black-haired, fox-faced woman in burgundy stared back out, her chin tilted haughtily and her hazel eyes knowing and warm. Her lips were a sensual symphony, the dimple beside her slight smile perfectly placed.
Catherine’s mouth went dry. Lucy couldn’t know how often she’d turned to this portrait in the privacy of her own room—or how it stirred her every time. “That is Contezza Maddalena Bricci,” she said, blushing to hear how raspy her own voice had turned. “We met her on our voyage back from Egypt after our second expedition. She was a painter, and taught me many things about color and shading. You’ll notice the embroidery gets markedly better after this point in the sampler.”
“She’s lovely,” Lucy marveled.
“This portrait may be an improvement, but it still fails to do her justice,” Catherine hastened to point out. “You ought to have heard her laugh...” She looked up to find Lucy’s gaze on her, eyes narrowed in consideration. “What?” she asked.
Lucy’s long mouth curved up knowingly. “I assumed I was the first woman you ever kissed,” she drawled. “Was I?”
Catherine went full scarlet. “You were,” she said tartly, “but I confess: you weren’t the first Iwantedto kiss.”
“So you are drawn to dark-haired, troublesome women,” Lucy said, leaning closer.
“God help me, it seems I am.” There was only one way to end such a conversation—Catherine happily pulled Lucy forward until she could reach her lips.
The afternoon’s tender delicacy was gone, replaced by a kiss that tasted lush as wine and scorched like fire. Catherine drank pleasure from Lucy’s ready mouth, the girl’s encouraging gasps firing her newly bold impulses. She hadn’t been dizzy from the wine at dinner, but she was giddy now, the room spinning around her and the only solid thing the skin and heat and feel of the woman in her arms.
The kiss went on and on, but when Catherine’s curious fingers slipped along the line of Lucy’s bodice, the girl broke away with a gasp.
Catherine dropped her hand at once, panicked and aroused in equal measure. “Too fast?” She’d done it now: she’d lost control, tried to take too much, too soon...
Lucy laughed and reached out to pull her back. Catherine stiffened automatically, shame at her unruly desire turning her yearning into ash.
Lucy’s keen eyes watched her closely. “It wasn’t too fast for me—but perhaps it was too fast for you?”
Catherine fought to loosen the tangled knots of her feelings, then huffed in frustration. “I don’t know.”
Lucy took Catherine’s hands, gently rubbing them between her own. “Then we stop.”
Catherine blinked. Her senses were still a riot, her breath still coming fast and hot in her throat. “As easy as that?” She didn’t know if she was protesting or demanding proof Lucy meant what she said.
“Of course,” Lucy replied breezily, as though she hadn’t just said one of the most puzzling things Catherine had ever heard. “The whole point is to feel excited about one another, isn’t it? If you’re more anxious than excited, then we wait. Simple.”
Catherine narrowed her eyes. “Don’t you want to do more than kiss me?”
Lucy laughed again, and the sultry echo of it slid like warmed honey down Catherine’s spine. “Oh, if you wanted me to write out my full list of wants, it would be Christmas before I was through.” She slipped a thumb over the inside of Catherine’s wrist; the countess’s pulse leaped to meet her fingers. “But all those ideas depend on you wanting those things done to you. Or wanting to do things to me. Because it’s not about you doing, or me doing—it’s what we do together.” Her eyes turned faraway, fixed on some memory. “The very first girl who took me to bed taught me that. She was kind, and patient—and very, very creative, once I was ready.” She chuckled, seeing the blush bloom on Catherine’s cheeks. “But for the first six months, all we did was kiss.”
Catherine’s cheeks warmed further, and her eyes slipped down to Lucy’s mouth. “I’m not sure I want to wait so long as that.”
Lucy’s gaze sharpened, and her lips parted as she sucked in a breath, but she only said, “As long as you need. Now, since you have dismissed your maid, let me help you undress.”
It was not how Catherine had imagined being disrobed by Lucy. She had had vague notions of hasty, desperate gripping and pulling and a general carelessness about buttons and laces and seams. George had been that way—until he stopped seeking her bed at all—and so had Darby; Catherine had assumed that’s just how people behaved in the throes of lust. Didn’t passion overwhelm people beyond the bounds of good sense, caution, or control?
But Lucy’s hands were careful and soft as they unlaced the back of Catherine’s gown, loosened her stays, and pulled all the pins from her tousled hair. It was closer to how Narayan would have undressed her—though Narayan would never have dropped a kiss on the back of Catherine’s neck, or combed fingers through Catherine’s tumbling hair in that luxurious way. It was—it was like every touch of Lucy’s hand was a silken thread, painting a sunrise one skein of warm light at a time. At the end, Lucy wrapped Catherine’s favorite velvet bed jacket around her shoulders and kissed her once more, sweetly. Catherine couldn’t help melting a little. “Good night,” she whispered.
Lucy chuckled. “Good night, my lady.”
