Freedom. And that . . .that, she did long for, had always longed for.
But it was a foolish thing to long for, wasn’t it? Very few ladies enjoyed the sort of freedom she envisioned. Why, she may as well yearn for a casket of gold coins, or a castle nestled amongst the clouds, a winged horse, or some other mythical entity.
Wishes that would never be realized.
Meanwhile, the servants were stirring.
She took up the pillow again. There was no second earring caught in the tassels, but when it came to rubies nearly as big as one’s thumb it was best to be sure, so she dropped down onto her knees again and peered under the chaise.
Yes, there it was, the second earring, the ruby glimmering faintly. She was obliged to lay flat on her stomach to get it, but at last she managed to grasp the little pearl dangling from the end and slide the earring out from under the chaise.
She rose to her feet, brushed the dust from her cloak, and went to stuff both earrings into her pocket, but one of her thumbs grazed the ruby, and it moved.
Oh, no. Had she loosened one of the stones when she slid it out from under the chaise? She perched on the edge of the opposite chair and prodded carefully at the ruby, testing the setting. That was strange. The ruby itself wasn’t loose, but the setting shifted when she pressed down on it.
She leaned closer to get a better look.
How curious. There was a tiny hinge, just at the edge of the setting. She’d never seen anything like it before. Why would there be . . . wait.
These were no ordinary earrings. They werelockets, with the rubies set into the lids.
She touched her thumb to the hinge, the locket sprang open, and inside . . .
There was a tiny painting. She brought it closer to her face, squinting down at it. It was difficult to make it out in the dim light, but it seemed to be a portrait of a gentleman, and it looked as if he was—
“Dear God!” She dropped the earring into her lap as if it had bitten her. “God in heaven, is that . . .” She peeked at it again, then jerked back with a gasp, slapping a hand over her eyes. “Itis!”
The portrait was tiny, but the brushwork was so skilled, so exquisitely done, one could see at a glance what it depicted, and what it depicted was, well, not the sort of portrait one expected to find inside an otherwise innocent-looking locket.
Despite having grown up with no mother, she knew a bit more about the sexual act than most inexperienced young ladies did. Her father had insisted upon it, and had taken it upon himself to explain the mechanics of it, but he hadn’t embellished upon the facts, and he certainly hadn’t gone into the more, er, exotic aspects of the thing.
What was happening in the painting certainly qualified as exotic.
That was shocking enough, but that wasn’t what held her attention.
It was the gentleman.
He was tall and broad shouldered, his bare legs thick with muscle, with a smattering of crisp dark hair that matched the wild mass of tousled curls atop his head.
A familiar wicked grin curved his full lips.
She stared at him, her heart pounding. Unless she was mistaken, he looked very much like . . .
She leapt up from the chaise, rushed over to the duke’s desk and lit the lamp with shaking fingers, then held the earring up to the flickering light.
Shewasn’tmistaken.
The man in the portrait looked very much like the Duke of Montford.
* * *
Prue tried to fall back to sleep once she returned to her bedchamber, but as it turned out, a naked duke under her pillow was quite enough to ruin her sleep for the rest of the morning.
A portrait of a naked duke, that is.
She’d slipped the earrings under her pillow for safekeeping, but she spent a restless morning nonetheless, plagued with fitful dreams of a tall, dark-eyed demon with a maddeningly smug grin sneaking his hand underneath her pillow, his soft laugh stirring the loose hair near her ear.
That had been enough to startle her awake and send her scrabbling frantically under her pillow to make certain the earrings were still there. There’d been no drifting off to sleep again after that, and she’d lain awake for the rest of the morning, her arms at her sides, staring up at the blue-striped canopy above and thinking of... nothing.
