Page 31 of A Stroke of Luck
“Nonetheless, I will not tolerate such overt rudeness.”
Once again, her expression betrayed a hint of surprise, as well as some other emotion he could not quite define. “I owe you thanks for coming to Nonny’s defense. That was … quite decent of you.”
“Does that come as such a shock?” He had meant it to come out lightly, but the words hung a bit heavy in the air.
The young lady turned to look out the window. The morning sun, though muted by a mist rising up from the gardens, threw in harsh relief the shadows smudged under her eyes and the lines etched around the corners of her mouth. Prestwick found himself wanting to reach out and smooth a bit of the worry from her drawn cheeks, yet he stilled the twitch of his fingers with the reminder that she would likely not welcome the gesture.
For some reason, that bothered him more than he cared to admit. He did not like to think she saw him as being cut from the same cloth as his relatives.
“All of this comes as a bit of a shock, Your Grace,” she replied wearily, the wave of her hand encompassing the furnishings of the room and the manicured grounds beyond the mullioned panes of glass. “Your cousin’s taunts have some truth to them. We stand out like sore thumbs in your world, and the intricacies of Polite Society are quite foreign to us.”
Hearing the note of uncertainty in her voice, Prestwick sought to buck up her spirits. “Come now, you have weathered far more daunting situations in your travels. I daresay you will have no trouble learning how to go about. To begin with, I was going to suggest a trip into town this afternoon, so that I can arrange for the three of you to acquire a new wardrobe?—”
Her spine immediately went rigid. “I don’t want your money, sir. I am quite capable of taking care of my family without having to stoop to accepting the charity—or pity—of strangers.”
“Hell’s teeth, Miss Greeley! Stop cutting up stiff on me.” His earlier sympathy dissolved in a snort of frustration. “I thought you smarter than to let foolish pride override cold reason. If it makes the offer any less repugnant, it is notmymoney I am offering. The funds will come out of Uncle Aubrey’s estate—which, by your own claim, already belongs to Nonny. How can you have any objection to that?”
“V-very well. I suppose, since you put it that way, there is no reason to refuse,” she said slowly.
“Good,” he answered with equal chilliness. “I shall have the carriage brought around after nuncheon.”
Zara grimacedas the door fell shut with a suspiciously loud thud. Sliding down into one of the wing chairs by the hearth, she propped her chin in her hand and sighed. With her savage temperament and tongue, she was clearly unsuited to life among the civilized ton. Only look at how she seemed to bring out the worst in a highly proper gentleman like the duke.
Not that it mattered, she assured herself. She really had no desire to flit about in the drawing rooms and ballrooms of London, allowed no more meaningful expression than rendering boring little flower arrangements in watercolor, or tittering over the latest bits of vicious gossip.
Her gaze drifted to the Gainsborough portrait of the late Lord Kenworth and she suddenly found her fingers itching for brush and palette. Or at least pastel and pencil. It had been an age since she had been able to devote any time to her work, and she had missed it dearly. Her art gave her an outlet for her emotions, and a place of refuge where she might shed, if only for a few hours, the mundane problems that weighed upon her. More than that, it let her imagination soar.
Her sketchbook and materials were safety tucked away in the bottom of her bag. If she skipped the noontime meal, she would have time enough to find a quiet spot in the gardens and fill a few pages.
The grounds offered a number of interesting views, especially one stone bench tucked away behind a tall holly hedge that afforded a vantage point over a sloping meadow of wildflowers and distant pond. She even thought that she spotted the ruins of a tumbledown marble folly hidden among a copse of elm and yew on the far side of the water, but decided that any exploration farther afield would have to wait for when she had more time.
Untying the canvas roll of her supplies, she chose a thin stick of graphite and began to draw.
It took several discarded starts to loosen her stroke and regain the fluidity of her touch, but once she had been at it for a bit, Zara felt her fingers begin to fly. Pausing only occasionally to accentuate a line or shadow with a dab of charcoal, she sketched out a number of scenes—a row of espaliered pear trees, a corner view of the manor house, a detail of climbing wisteria vines.
Then, turning to a fresh page, she contemplated the blank expanse of white for some moments before starting in on a new subject. Her hand began to move quickly, the strokes taking on a life of their own. First, a series of bold lines drew in the basic composition, then a subtle shadowing of delicate crosshatching filled in tone and detail. After darkening one accent and elongating a curve, she sat back to survey the work with a critical squint.
The eyes were not quite right, she decided, but she had caught the arrogant tilt to the tip of his nose and the way the softly waving tumble of hair curled around his ears. The mouth was also expressive of the gentleman’s more pensive mood, though perhaps she had exaggerated the brooding sensuality of its curves. Her finger traced over the sinuous fullness, a quirk of exasperation suddenly thinning her own lips to a quizzical line.
What perverse muse had inspired her to draw a likeness of the Duke of Prestwick?
As her gaze moved downward, Zara drew in a deep breath. And what had possessed her to render the starchy English peer in a pose of languid relaxation, naked to the waist! She had, of course, lived in Italy for some years, which allowed for freedoms of the sort that were quite foreign to a sheltered English schoolroom miss. As an artist, she had license to look at things forbidden to any proper female. She knew quite well what a man’s naked torso looked like—the hard, wide planes of the chest, the flat nipples, the sculpted muscles taut across the rib cage, narrowing to lean hips and a flat belly, with its tantalizing trail of wisping hair leading lower.
Oh yes, she knew what lay between a man’s contoured thighs. She had seen rampant maleness in the flesh, not merely in sculpted stylization on a Greek statue. Not, thought Zara with a dry swallow, that she had ever taken advantage of the relaxed strictures or morality of the Continent to experience more than a look. Still, she couldn’t help but be aware of the Duke of Prestwick as a raw, masculine presence.
She blinked, bringing her palms up to cool the flush on her cheeks. Surely she was not physically attracted to the pompous peer! Surely the strange heat now coursing through her veins had to do with anger over his high-handed manner, not lust over his well-formed limbs.
As a shadow fell across the page, Zara realized that the hour had grown later than she had realized. Tucking up her skirts, she rose and reluctantly gathered up her things. All in all, she was not displeased with how her first efforts had turned out. Her skills were a trifle stiff from disuse, but it had felt wonderful to begin exercising her creativity again. Indeed, she would have preferred to remain working for the rest of the afternoon. However, the shopping expedition really could not be avoided, she decided. Though she cared not a whit for the sad state ofher own wardrobe, she did not wish to see her brothers further humiliated.
A graveled path to her left led through a trellised rose garden and down to the french doors of the stone terrace. Choosing it as the most direct route back to her room, Zara moved off with a heavy step, the low crunching of the stone echoing her own inner mutterings over having to go through with the odious obligation. As she passed by an open casement of high, mullioned windows, a loud remonstrance recalled her from such silent musings.
“Take your grubby fingers off that, brat!”
It was the voice of Harold, his harsh tone sounding an angry note.
“I—I was just?—”
“Sticking it inside your filthy jacket?” finished the gentleman with a rough sneer. “No doubt you hoped you might pawn it for a pretty sum.”
