A Scot in the Dark

Chapter 19

THE ART OF WARNICK

It wasn’t there.

Alec stood at the center of Derek Hawkins’s offices, turning in a slow circle, seething in fury and frustration.

The painting wasn’t there.

The rest of the empty studio from Covent Garden was there, lining the walls, six canvases deep, a collection of artwork that would make the docents of the British Museum squeal with excitement. It seemed that, in addition to being a superior bastard, Hawkins was, in fact, a superior talent. Which meant Lily’s portrait was as beautiful as they said.

Allegedly.

As it was not there.

What next? How would he save her?

There was no time. He had two days to find the painting. Two days before it was revealed to the world and Lily had no choice but to marry him. And it wasn’t there, goddammit.

He resisted the urge to lower the candle to the nearest canvas and set the entire theater ablaze. Hawkins would deserve it. For threatening her. For using her. For touching her.

Alec cursed, long and wicked in the darkness.

“What does that mean?” She spoke from the doorway.

He hadn’t heard the door open. He whirled to face her, the candle in his hand casting her face into flickering golden relief as she stepped inside and closed the door behind her. “You should be upstairs.”

She approached, and he moved backward, until his trousers brushed against a large still-life of pears and he had no choice but to stop. She, however, did not stop.

Why didn’t she stop?

“Upstairs,” she said. “With Stanhope.”

“Yes.”

“Instead of down here. With you.”

“Yes.” Couldn’t she see it?

“While you risk all to save me.”

Why didn’t she understand? He would give up everything he had, everything he was, if it would keep her safe. “Yes.”

A long silence stretched between them, muffled shouts from the stage beyond somehow making the room seem smaller. More intimate. Alec wanted to climb the walls to escape it. To escape her.

And somehow, she seemed perfectly calm. “It is not here, is it?”

He exhaled. “Nae.”

“I gathered as much when I heard you cursing.” How was it that she was so calm? “And so my demise approaches.” She smirked, indicating the theater beyond the door. “Like Birnam Wood.”

“What have I told you about Shakespeare?” he snapped.

She smiled. “Last I heard, you were cursing him quite thoroughly.”

“It is my right as a Scot.” He tried not to look at her. She was so close now, close enough to smell. To touch. To ache for. And they were alone.

She whispered his name like a sin. “Alec?”

He swallowed. “Yes?”

“What does the curse mean?”

He shook his head. “It does not translate.”

She waited for a long moment before he lifted his gaze to hers, her grey eyes silver in the candlelight. “And what does mo chridhe mean?”

He shook his head. “It does not translate.”

One side of her mouth rose in a little, knowing smile. “Is it better or worse than the curse?”

She was killing him. He was trying to be noble. To protect her. And—

“Why do you not want me, Alec?”

He wanted her with every ounce of his being. How did she not see that? He closed his eyes. “Lily. Now is not the time.”

“What better time than this?” she asked. “What better time than now, on the eve of my destruction?”

“We’ve tomorrow to find it—”

“We shan’t find it. That has never been our prophecy.”

“Stop referring to the damn play like it’s relevant. Everyone dies at the end.”

“Not everyone. From the ash comes a line of kings.” She paused, then said quietly, “Scottish ones.”

“Cursed ones. There are no kings in Scotland now.”

“Aren’t there?”

He ran a hand through his hair, frustration coursing through him, setting him aflame. “Get out, Lily. We’ve another day, and I shall find the damn painting if I turn London inside out. Go to Stanhope. And see if he might be your happiness.”

“He shan’t be,” she said.

“You don’t know that.”

“I do, though,” she said. “How could one man make me happy when I love another so well?”

He turned for the door. “You know not of what you speak.”

They had to leave this place, before they were caught. And he had to find air—she’d thieved it from the room with her beauty, like a fairy. And now hear him—thinking Scots madness like the damned king beyond.

He’d reached the door when she spoke, “I know you are a coward.”

He looked back at the words to find her unmoved from her place at the center of the room, surrounded by the work of the man who had ruined her, straight and strong and proud as Boadicea. And wearing his plaid like a banner.

She was perfect.

He turned away without speaking, and she threw her next spear. “I know that I tremble from wanting you.”

He bowed his head, pressing his forehead to the door.

The stage beyond went quiet, as though all of London had hushed to let her be heard. And then, quiet and longing, “I know that last night, you trembled as well.”

The words broke him. He was moving before he could think, and she was in his arms, wrapped about him, and her lips were on his, and she was sighing into his mouth like he was the greatest gift she’d ever received. He kissed her, reveling in the feel of her lips on his, of the way she softened instantly against him, as though she had been waiting for this moment—for him—for a lifetime.

Just as he had waited for her.

He lifted her, carrying her to the desk at the far end of the room, setting her down and taking her face in his hands, aligning their lips so he might taste her again and again, memorize the softness of her lips and the pretty little moans she sighed when he slid his tongue over her lips, stole into her softness, thieved from her like a beggar at a banquet.

He kissed her until they were both gasping for breath, until he lifted his lips from hers and removed his hands from her, holding them up, wide and weak between them. “I still tremble, Lily.”

Her gaze flickered to them, eyes going dark and devastating when she noted their shaking. When she reached for one, bringing it to her lips, kissing each fingertip before turning his hand palm up and pressing a warm, wet kiss to the center of his palm.

And when her tongue slipped out and swirled a circle there, branding him with her mark, he growled and took her again, licking deep and slow, until she writhed against him, sighing for more. He broke the kiss, trailing his lips over her cheek to the lobe of her ear, where he whispered, “I will ever tremble. There will never be a time when I do not ache for you. When I do not want you with every thread of my being.”

“Then have me,” she said, her breath hot at his ear. “Take me. Claim me. I am yours.” The words roared through him, nearly deafening him with desire.

But he did not deserve her.

He stepped back. Releasing her. “I am not the hero of the play, Lily. You must choose a better one. One more worthy of you. That is the point of this entire exercise.”

A beat. And then she came to her feet like an avenging queen and pushed him away from her with enough strength to set him off balance. “I choose you, you lummox.”

Good. If she was angry, she might leave him alone.

“I am not an option,” he said.

“Yesterday, you offered to marry me,” she replied.

And he would have done it. Would do it still. If only . . . “I am not enough.”

The sound she made bordered on a scream, full of frustration and anger. “You are a duke, Alec. And I am the orphaned daughter of a land steward who has been ruined in front of all London.”

“Not has been. Not yet.”

“You were not there. I assure you, it is roundly done.”

“It is not done until the painting is made real. And it shan’t be. Not if I can stop it.”

She shook her head and spread her arms wide, indicating the room. “You cannot stop it! He will win this battle. He won it the moment he marched up to me in Hyde Park and convinced me that attention was akin to love.” She gave a little, humorless laugh. “Ironically, I seem to be caught in a similar web now.”

He froze. “It is not the same.”

She cut him a look. “You are right. It is not the same. Derek never made me feel ashamed of myself.”

What in hell? “All of this—every bit of it—has been to keep you from shame. To keep you from regret.”

“How many times must I tell you that I do not regret it?”

He lost his temper. “Goddammit, Lily! Can you not simply trust that I know? That the hero you spoke of abovestairs—he is not me? You think I do not wish to marry you and protect you and love you as you deserve? You think I do not wish my past erased and this dukedom mine in truth so I might get down on my knees and beg you to be with me? So that I may make you a duchess? You think I do not wish for those children? The ones you planned to dress in pretty little embroidered clothes? The ones who would fit those silly red boots?”

Her eyes were wide, and he did not care. Still, he raged. “You think I do not wish to take you to our marriage bed and make love to you until we no longer shake? Until we no longer move, for the pleasure of it? You think I do not love you? How can you not understand it? I love you beyond reason. I think I might have loved you from the moment you closed the damn door in my face in Berkeley Square. But I am not the man you deserve.”

He stopped, breath coming fast and angry, self-loathing coursing through him, and he forced himself to look at her. Tears glistened in her eyes, and he hated himself for what he’d done. “I am not he. Not for a lifetime. Not even for the one night we had.” He thrust his hands through his hair. “We must go before we are found.”

She did not move from her place. “What did you say?”

He looked to her, “What?”

“You are not for a lifetime. You are for one night.”

The words were a wicked blow, unexpectedly cruel on her lips. Recovering from the sting, he nodded. At least she understood. Perhaps she would leave him in peace now.

He would never be at peace again.

“We must go,” he said, wanting to claw at his cravat, tight about his neck.

Lily was not through, however. “What did she do to you?”

He stilled. “Who?”

“Countess Rowley.”

Memories of the past raced through him. How did she know? It did not matter. He should have told her before then. The truth would drive her away as surely as he ever could.

And that was the goal, was it not?

No.

Yes. It was the goal.

He turned for the door. “We must go.”

“Alec.”

“Not here, Lily. Not while all of London waits beyond this room.” And he tore the door open, without hesitation.

All of London was not beyond, it turned out.

Only one of London was there.

Derek Hawkins stood on the other side, dressed in Renaissance garb, broadsword dangling from his hand. He raised the blade, setting it to Alec’s chest, just above his heart. “I do not know the law in Scotland, Duke, but in England, we are within our rights to kill intruders.”

Of course Derek was here to muck everything up.

Right now, she would give everything she had to disappear him from his place at the door, making a mountain of a molehill, threatening to kill them, if she’d heard correctly. Lord deliver her from men with a flair for the dramatic. She checked the clock on the desk.

It was half-nine and the theater was in intermission. It occurred to Lily, vaguely, that she hoped Sesily was as good at being a poor chaperone as she was at being a scandal, because Lily and Alec were going to require an excellent excuse for their absence as the entire box realized that they were missing.

Something better than Oh, they are likely breaking into Hawkins’s office, stealing Lily’s nude, and having an amorous encounter upon his desk.

In this particular case, the truth was not an appropriate excuse.

Especially now, as it seemed they would be waylaid further.

Certainly, they should not be here, in this inner sanctum. But neither should Derek be. She approached, refusing to cow to this man who had so thoroughly used her. Remarkably, because two weeks past, she would have cowed. Two weeks past, she’d been a different woman.

Two weeks past, she had not had Alec.

Alec, her massive Scot, whose broad shoulders and superior height dwarfed Derek, blocking her view as she advanced, having had enough of Derek Hawkins. “Should you not be on stage, Derek?”

That’s when she saw the sword, poised high and dangerous, the tip of it at Alec’s heart. Alec, who looked calmer than any man should be in that position.

Lily froze, terror threading through her at the image. “What do you think you do, you madman?”

Derek did not look at her. “I protect what is mine. My theater. My art. And I am willing to do anything for it.” He paused, looking down at Alec’s empty hands. “You are wise to have avoided taking anything from within.”

When Alec spoke, it was with utter, complete disdain. “You think I want your artwork? To what end? To grace my walls with your child’s play?”

The words were rife with insult, and Lily’s jaw dropped. How could he taunt a man with a broadsword pressed to his chest?

Derek sneered. “I think you want at least one piece of it, Diluted Duke.”

“There you are right. But I’ve no intention of looking at it.”

Derek laughed. “I suppose you think that having seen the real thing, you do not require it.”

While Lily gasped at the insinuation, Alec did not move, except to raise his hand and clutch the blade of the broadsword in one massive fist. Her gaze fell to his fingers, expecting them to bleed with the cut from the blade. Her stomach flipped at the idea that he hurt himself for her. “Let us go, Derek. You must return to the stage. And we’ve taken nothing.”

Derek raised a brow. “How do I know that is true?”

She cut him a look, spreading her arms wide. “You think I hide canvas beneath my skirts?”

Alec did not let Derek finish. “Let’s get to it, shall we, Hawkins? You’ve a play to return to . . . and I’ve anywhere else to be than to watch it.”

Derek scowled. “You’re no longer welcome here.”

Alec’s reply was dry as sand. “You wound me. Truly.” If there were not a sword between them, Lily might have laughed. Instead, she held her breath until Alec said, “How much?”

Derek did not move. “How much for what?”

“You’re impoverished. You’ve lost the house in Covent Garden, the studio. Your paintings line the walls here because, no doubt, you’ve nowhere else to sit them. From what I am told, the theater breaks even, but you cannot stop losing money at the tables. So I ask again—and you will not insult me by pretending not to understand—how much for the painting.”

Derek shook his head. “It is priceless.”

“I do not believe you.”

“Believe me. It is the greatest artwork since the Creation of Man.” His gaze moved to Lily. “Look at her, Warnick. You see her beauty, no doubt. Imagine what it looks like when portrayed by a genius.”

Lily could only see one side of Alec’s face—enough to see the muscle in his jaw clench and tic with anger and frustration. “Name the price.”

Derek shook his head. “There is no price. My version of Lily is not for sale.” His gaze flickered to Lily, “You see, darling? Perhaps I am the hero of the play, after all. Your duke has no trouble selling you to the highest bidder.” He paused then, like a rude child. “Oh, wait. No. He isn’t selling you. He’s giving you away. With a fortune as a bonus payment.”

Alec’s hand tightened around the sword, his knuckles going white, and Lily stepped in to ensure his fingers were not severed. She did not shift her gaze from him. “I think you ought to reconsider, Derek.”

“For you?”

“Would it make a difference if I asked?”

“No. That painting will sell all the others. That painting will make me a name for the ages.”

“And the fact that it is a painting of me? That I never intended for it to be seen?”

He gave her a long, pitiful look. “Then you should not have sat for it, darling. I shall revel in the wealth that comes from it, earned from you. As though you’d worked for it yourself, flat on your back.”

Lily gasped at the coarse words as Alec moved, fast as a cat, the broadsword turning in the air like magic, in his grasp in an instant. He took Derek by the lapels of his ancient costume and virtually carried him to the wall in the hallway beyond, setting the blade of the wicked-looking sword to his cheek. “For one so renowned on the stage, I find it difficult to believe you tempt fate so well as to exhibit such hubris while in this particular costume. You would do well to remember what happened to Macbeth.”

Derek’s gaze found Lily’s over Alec’s shoulder, and she saw it there, the expectation that she would rescue him. That she would reenact the last time they had been together as a trio. The last time Alec had threatened Derek.

She would rescue him no longer.

He must have seen it in her eyes, as he looked back to Alec and spat, “I play a brutish Scot with a whore wife. And lo, I discover a similar pair skulking about the playhouse.”

Alec pressed the sword deeper into his cheek, his words going soft and terrifying. “What did you call her?”

Derek narrowed his gaze. “You heard me. And remember, I am qualified to identify the characteristic.” He paused. “I was there before you.”

Lily paled at the words. At the scathing insult in them. Shame flooded her, and she wished to do the man serious damage for everything he’d ever done. For everything he’d ever said. And for that, spoken to Alec. Reminding him of her past. Of the things she’d done that she could not take back. “Today, like a fool, you have handed me a weapon that you toy with while prancing about your stage. A weapon I have trained with for decades.”

He pressed the blade deeper, and Derek inhaled, sharply. “What do you think your patrons would say if you were found here, in this dark hallway, gutted by Macbeth’s blade? Do you think they would believe you summoned him here, to this playhouse? What is it they call it? The Scottish Curse?” Derek’s eyes closed and Alec leaned in close. “I am your Scottish Curse, peacock. More terrifying than any ghost story you could imagine. But take heart. I’ve no intention of killing you.

“I promised you once that I would destroy you,” Alec said, his words barely there and somehow shaking the walls. “Make no mistake—I will ruin you just as you ruined her. And when you are old and withered and no one in the world can remember your name, you will quake with the memory of mine.”

Derek inhaled quickly and then released a little cry of pain, and Lily started at the sound, which was punctuated by a wild clatter of the sword as Alec flung it down the dark hallway. “Fetch, dog. ’Tis your cue.”

And Derek did, running after the sword, collecting it without looking back.

Lily watched Alec for a long moment, his breath coming in and out on waves of fury, his hands clenched and that tic in his jaw becoming more pronounced. He looked as though he were on springs—as though at any moment he might launch himself down the hall and onto the stage to finish what he had started.

She ached to go to him, and then she did, moving to his side. Taking his big, beautiful arm in hand, feeling the muscles ripple beneath her touch. “You did not have to defend me.”

Alec looked to her. “What?”

“To Derek. He is not wrong.”

“What?” His brow furrowed, and for a moment Lily wondered if it was possible that she was speaking a language other than English.

“It is my mistake, is it not? I sat for the painting. I trusted him. I . . .” She hesitated. “I thought. . . .”

He came at her, taking her shoulders in his hands. Holding her with a firmness she would later dream of. Ache for. “Hear me, Lillian Hargrove. You did nothing wrong. It was not your mistake. You loved him.”

“I did not, though. I see that now.” She gave a little huff of humorless laughter. “I suppose I should be grateful for the realization.”

“How?” he asked.

Her brow furrowed. “How?”

“How do you see it now?”

She smiled. Told the truth. “Now, I know what love is. How it feels. And what I would do for it in earnest.”

He closed his eyes at the words. Turned his head away. “We must return above. I’ve work to do. We’ve one day to find that painting.”

She released him at the words. At the hope in them. At their meaning. He still hoped to find it. To remove it from exhibition. To set her free.

It was ironic, was it not, that she had once fairly begged him for her freedom. She’d asked for money. For independence. She’d begged him to leave her and return to Scotland and let her make her own choices. Carve her own path. Face her own fortune.

And now, as he offered it to her, all she wished was to be trapped. By him.

I love you beyond reason.

“Alec.” She did not know what she would say next. How she would keep him. How she would win him.

So, she was unable to do either, as he was ignoring her, already moving, headed for the stairs, taking them two at a time, and she hurried to keep up with his long strides. She was tall, but he was Herculean, and by the time they reached the hallway that abutted the boxes, he was yards ahead of her, striding purposefully past the West box even as Sesily poked her head out to find Lily.

“You’ve something on your gown.” Her friend’s eyes went wide. “Good Lord. Is it blood?”

Lily looked down, taking in the mark at the shoulder of the beautiful blue dress, where Alec had held her firmly and told her that the past was not hers to bear.

As he bled for her.

“Is it Hawkins’s?” Sesily asked. “He’s back on the stage, but with a gash in his cheek that I’m not certain is called for in the play. Though, to be honest, I haven’t been paying much attention. I confess I like a witch now and then, but not near as much as I like the idea of Alec putting a gash in Hawkins’s cheek.”

“It is not Hawkins’s blood. It’s Alec’s.”

“Good God,” Sesily whispered.

“You shouldn’t curse so much, you know.”

Sesily cut her a look. “Are you about to tell me it is not ladylike?”

Lily shook her head. “I am not exactly a paragon of respectability.”

“Excellent. Then hang anyone who prefers I not curse. Sometimes, the words simply suit.”

Lily nodded. Then, after a long silence, she said, barely loud enough to be heard, “Shit.”

Sesily’s gaze was instantly on hers, and Lily saw the pity there. “What has happened?”

And there, in the hallway of the Hawkins Theater—the only place in London she should be stoic—Lily began to cry. She’d made a hash of it all. The painting was to be made public. And there was nothing to be done. And still, that was not her sadness. “He loves me beyond reason.”

Sesily tilted her head. “That does not sound so bad.”

“And still he refuses me. Claims he is unworthy of me for some ridiculous reason.”

“What reason?”

“I don’t know. If he would tell me, perhaps . . .” Lily dashed away a tear. “He won’t tell me.”

Sesily nodded. “Then you must force it from him.”

“Does he seem the kind of man who is easily forced?”

Sesily did not miss a beat. “He seems the kind of man who would throw himself into the Thames if you asked him to.”

The tears came again. “I asked him to want me—and he refused.”

“Because all men are addlepated imbeciles who deserve to be strung up by their thumbs in St. James Park and set upon by bees.”

Lily blinked. “That’s terribly creative.”

Sesily smirked. “I may fantasize now and then.”

They laughed together, until the curtains moved and Mrs. West poked her head out from behind the curtain. “Ah. I see Miss Hargrove has returned.” She looked up and down the hallway before exiting the box. “And your duke?”

“He is not my duke,” Lily said flatly.

“They never are, dear, until they are,” the newspaperman’s wife said dryly before adding, “I assume that you were unsuccessful in your quest?”

“For Alec?” Lily said.

One golden brow rose at the words. “I was referring to the painting.”

Lily blushed, hot and horrified. “Of course. The painting. Yes. We were unsuccessful.”

The woman hesitated, then said, “First, you may call me Georgiana. Mrs. West makes me sound the taciturn patroness of a North Country finishing school. Second, I am sorry that the duke is an idiot. But in my experience, all men are until they find reason. And the best of them do find reason.” She paused, then added, “And third, you might like to know that the painting is scheduled to be hung tomorrow afternoon, when the exhibition has closed for the night. It will remain covered until the reveal the following morning.”

Lily did not understand the point of the information, and she remained silent until the beautiful young woman smiled and said, “I have it on excellent authority that there will be a window open at the back of the hall tomorrow night. At half-past twelve.”

Lily blinked. “Are you—?”

Georgiana nodded like a queen. “If I’d had my way, that lout would have been eliminated from the exhibition the moment it became clear that he’d taken advantage of you. I don’t care how beautiful the painting is. He’s a bastard.”

Lily could not find words amid her surprise.

Sesily had no trouble finding words. “Well. Isn’t that lovely?”

“I find I do not like it when men take advantage of women,” Georgiana said, boredom in her tone. “And so, my dear, I hope very much that you will take advantage in return. Now, I think I shall return to the play, as I assume from the gash on Hawkins’s face and the blood on your gown that this might well be my last time watching this particular lout tread the boards.”

She turned back to the box. “My lady—”

Georgiana turned back.

“How are you able to ensure—”

That knowing smile returned. “My husband is not the only one with far-reaching connections.” She lowered her voice, so only Lily could hear. “Wives of remarkable men must stay together. I hope you will remember me when you are duchess.”

And then she was gone, the words hanging in the corridor like a promise.

Lily took a deep breath, unable to look away from the curtains, still swinging with the force of the woman’s entry. All those years without friends. How many times had she longed for them? And now, they came from the woodwork. Enough of them to make her feel real. Like a whole person.

Nearly whole.

She would never be whole without Alec.

He wanted to give her choices? To give her freedom?

Then she would take that freedom. And she would make her choice. It was the easiest choice she had ever made.