Seduction - His Every Kiss Part 27

"What?"

"He showed me a Christie's pamphlet-you know the kind I mean, that have engravings, sketches, and descriptions of the items to be auctioned. He had it with him in Devonshire, and when he was introduced to you, he knew at once who you were."

"That was why you made me leave," Grace said with a sudden glimmer of understanding. "You saw engravings of me without... without my clothes, and you set me aside. Without even an explanation!" A flash of pain crossed his face, but her own pain was too great to care. "d.a.m.n you, you set me aside for these stupid paintings?"

Horrified at all the hurt in her own voice, she fought hard to regain her control, but it was futile. She was splintering apart. "Because my own husband painted me nude?" A bubble of hysteria rose in her throat. "I didn't think Dylan Moore was such a prude."

"I didn't give a d.a.m.n about that!" he shouted, stepping toward her. "I hated the idea of other men looking at you, ogling you in some collection or museum, I grant you that. But that was not the main reason! It was your face! It cut me to the heart, your face."

"What? I don't understand."

"Look at yourself, look at your face." Dylan jabbed a finger in the direction of the canvases on the table. "You loved him."

"Of course I did." She could only stare at Dylan, bewildered. "I told you that."

"Cheval was a great painter, wasn't he? Oh, yes, a very great painter. He painted what he saw- that love in your face, so much love, all the love in your heart, all the love in the world, for him."

"So?"

His face was ravaged, full of pain, like a wounded animal. "You have never, ever looked at me that way."

He loved her. She knew it in an instant, not from what he said but from the shattered way he looked at her. All her defenses came tumbling down as she stared at the proud, wounded man in front of her. She had never seen anything like this pain in a man's countenance before.

"Oh, Dylan," she said, lifting her hands in a helpless gesture. "I was a girl. I was a child. I scarcely knew what love was. When Etienne painted that, I was seventeen years old, and my infatuation for him was mixed up with admiration and physical desires. I loved my husband, yes, but it was such an insubstantial love, it didn't last more than three years. He was my lover, and I had never been in love before. It was all so new, so romantic, and so very exciting..." Her voice trailed off as she looked into Dylan's pain-filled face.

"I had only known Etienne a week when we eloped," she reminded him. "He may not have married me until two years after we met, but he did love me in his way, as much as he was able. He was a man of such violent moods, living with him was h.e.l.l. He thought I was his inspiration." Dylan let out his breath sharply and turned away.

"As his moods got darker," Grace went on, "he became more and more unstable. When he couldn't paint, he blamed me. Then he turned to other women. Somehow, it all went wrong, and the love all died. I could not bear the blame he heaped on me, the affairs he flaunted in my face, and I left him. Oh, Dylan," she cried to his back, "I loved him, but I was not the woman I am now. Can you not understand that?"

Something, a sound broke from him, and he turned around. "I hate him, Grace. I hate him because he hurt you, he took your beautiful, generous, loving heart and he broke it, he forced you away. I did the same. I hate him because I hate myself. I did not appreciate what I had until it was lost to me."

"Dylan-"

"Wait!" he interrupted. "h.e.l.l, I almost forgot."

He strode out of the parlor, and when he came back, he had a bunch of roses in his hand, all mixed colors, tied with a ribbon. He thrust them into her hand. "I know roses are your favorite, and I tried to buy you a beautiful posy of them, but there's no florist in the village. I stole them out of some poor woman's garden on the way here."

Grace took them, and inside, she began to shake. "Why are you giving me flowers like a suitor at my door?"

"It was Isabel's idea. You see, she said I had to come and get you back. She had it all planned out, that you were going to be her new mother. Part of that real family business she wants. And she told me to come and get you, to give you flowers and apologize. She says that works on you when she misbehaves, and I thought it was worth a try. Grace, I'm sorry."

"You hurt me."

"Yes. I know." He did not even try to make an excuse. His mouth tightened, but he did not look away. "I saw you crying in the dirt. I know saying one is sorry is the most trite, stupid, inadequate phrase in the English language. But I don't know what else to say. I know how terribly I hurt you; and I'm so G.o.dd.a.m.ned sorry."

She took a deep breath, inhaling the sweet scent of roses. In the rush of his words, she'd caught something about being Isabel's new mother, but she wasn't sure if he was proposing or not. There had just been too many unexpected things today, she couldn't seem to think straight.

"I never knew I could be a jealous man," he said, "but when Ian came, and he was looking at you, it started gnawing at me. You remember how we quarreled?"

"Yes, I remember."

"Then I saw the engravings of those paintings and that look on your face, and I can't explain what happened inside of me. I just... I just erupted. I was so afraid, Grace, so afraid, knowing you didn't love me. Not when you could look at the man you loved like that and hadn't ever looked that way at me."

He gave a harsh, humorless sound. "Not that I deserve it. I have hurt so many women in my life, and I never thought about any of them, not one. Most of them I can't even remember. I never thought about them or how they felt. Only how I felt. Now, I know what I did to them-I broke their hearts, and I know how it feels because mine is in pieces without you. I love you. I love you more than my life. I love you more than my music."

"Dylan-"

"Grace, don't say anything," he interrupted, a desperation in his voice she had never heard before. "I know you probably just want me gone, but I have to tell you about me. You were right. I didn't know what love was. I thought I knew, but even with Michaela, I didn't. I proposed to her, but I still didn't give my heart, not really.

Music took it all."

"Dylan, I understand that. You don't have to explain that to me."

"I have never given my heart away," he went on as if she hadn't spoken. "Never. Because I always knew that when I did, I would give it all, and there would be nothing for the music." His words were coming so fast now she could barely follow what he said. "Do you see? Without music, I would be nothing. For five years, without music, I was nothing."

"That's not true."

"It was true. Then you came back into my life again." He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a sheaf of papers. "Here's the symphony. I wrote it about us, I named it for you."

"I know," she whispered. "I-"

"I want you to have it," he said. "Without you, I could never publish it. Without you, I don't give a d.a.m.n about the music anymore. I know just saying these things doesn't mean anything. But I love you. And I want to get married. To you, I mean. Us, you and me. Post banns and do everything right. I wouldn't spirit you off to France and not marry you for two years like some Frenchman."

"I see."

"Well?" he prompted her to get it over, say it. "Grace, will you marry me?"

There was a long silence. He looked at her and waited, but when she still didn't speak, he lifted his hands to touch her. Then he changed his mind and let them fall back to his sides. "Say something, for G.o.d's sake," he ordered in a fierce, agonized whisper. "Aren't you going to say anything?"

She gave a shaky laugh. "Are you going to let me say anything?"

"Grace, if you're going to shred me to ribbons, do it. G.o.d knows, I deserve it."

"I'm not going to shred you to ribbons." She looked at the symphony in her hands, then at the painting on the table. She thought of what he had done for her family, and how he'd come to her this way to list all his faults for her like a litany with which to lash himself. "What am I supposed to do with a symphony?" she asked him.

"Burn it. I don't care."

"You and Isabel. With both of you, there always has to be drama in everything. Can you not just fall in love and propose like a normal person? Do you have to write a symphony about it all? I'm just a girl from Cornwall, for heaven's sake. You know, it is a very good thing for the two of you that I happen to be a sensible person. Or you would both be lost."

"What?" He looked at her, and there was no sound in his mind but the thud of his pounding heart. "What are you saying?"

"I'm saying yes. I love you."

"You do?"

She nodded, and he hauled her into his arms. He held her so tightly that he knew he must be smothering her. "Grace, Grace, don't ever leave me again. Ever."

"You are the most unaccountable man! You told me to leave, remember?"

"I never said I wasn't a fool." He kissed her lips, her cheek, her ear. "Grace?"

"Hmm?"

"Remember when I said I didn't do all those tilings to get you to come back to me?"

"Yes."

"I was lying."

She smiled and wrapped her arms around his waist. "I know."

Startled, he pulled back and looked at her. "You do?"

"Yes. You smile a certain way when you lie."

"I do not. I have never lied to you before."

"Isabel does, and she smiles just the same way you did when you said you weren't trying to sweeten me up and get me back. Like daughter, like father. That's how I knew."

"I was right about you all along. Army general. With you in charge of me, I shall never be able to get away with anything."

Grace laughed at that and brushed back a long, black lock of his hair. "As if I could ever be in charge of England's most notorious rakeh.e.l.l. You're the one in charge, because with every smile of yours I see, with every kiss you give me, you make me love you more."

He pulled her even closer. His hands slid along her hips, stopped, and he became serious again. He hoped she was right about that smile thing, because he wasn't smiling now. This was important. "From now on, every smile and every kiss and every symphony is for you. Only you. For the rest of my life. I swear it."

He resumed kissing her ear and began to pull at her skirt, but instead of giving in, she put her hands on his wrists. "Wait," she said with a little frown, trying to sound severe. "What about all the sonatas, the concertos, and the operas? What woman gets those?"

Dylan pulled his hands free of her grasp, gave up on the skirts, and tried an alternate route. He reached for the top b.u.t.ton of her dress. "Isabel, of course. Oh, and I have to save some of my kisses for her, too."

"Well," she murmured, giving in at last, "you did write me a symphony."

"Yes, I did." He pulled the neckline of her dress back and kissed her soft, white skin. Then he lifted his head, looking at her in wonder, fully appreciating for the first time just what a miracle that was. "d.a.m.n. I really did. And you told me muses don't exist." His lips grazed her mouth. "They do. I'm going to marry mine and spend the rest of my life hearing music because of her."

end.