14
I woke from a faint dream. White light trickled through a slit between the curtains, cutting the room in half. Julian’s room.
A jolt rang through me as my mind swam to the surface, realizing Julian’s arm slung over my hip, his feet between mine. I wriggled, and his breath shifted irregularly as he came to. He unraveled himself from me, disturbing the slick of sweat pooled between our skins, then jerked suddenly. I rolled onto my back to see what was the matter, and he pinned me down by my shoulders. Not playfully.
His face was clouded, eye blank and unseeing. Glistening chest pumped fiercely as an old bellows. I remained still, remembering my training. Never wake a sleeping soldier.
“Julian?” The eyelash fluttered. Nostrils flared as heavy breaths forced their way out. “It’s all right . . .”
My voice shook him. Julian blinked and blinked, the gloss of sleep fading as he woke fully. He noticed his own hands gripping me, and withdrew to a seat.
“Forgive me—” His voice was thick from sleep. “I’d forgot you were there.”
“I’m flattered.”
Julian could not be amused. He rubbed his face, patiently awaiting his breaths to even. When I sat up, he recoiled, as if afraid we might touch. “Did I hurt you?”
“No.”
He relaxed against the headboard. “You frightened me.”
“I know.” I gave him a smile. “I’m all right, see? In you come.” I slid under the quilt, and after another pause of contemplation, he lay so we were face-to-face.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“Don’t be.”
His lashes floated downward, then up. “Did you sleep well?”
“Oh, yes.” Truthfully, I’d tossed all evening. Though it was the fault of my anxieties, not Julian’s bed. “You’re a satisfactory bed partner. No snoring or kicking to report.”
Julian painted his fingers down my arm. He looked different in the morning, movements slow and imprecise, tongue thick and lazy. I wondered how I appeared to him with hair pressed to one side of my face. Regardless, he stretched his neck to kiss me. There was a floral bitterness to his mouth that was not at all unpleasant.
He rested his hand heavily on my cheek. I touched his chest, flushed and heated from sleep, feeling down the line dividing his torso. Muscles tensed under my fingers.
“You look like a laborer,” I said. “Solid, I mean. Were you—are you an athlete?”
Julian propped his head in his hand. I longed to sketch the bicep’s coils and ridges. “I do calisthenics of a morning . . . part of a routine of things Gwen has me do each day. Is it ghastly?”
“Just the opposite. You resemble Michelangelo’s David.” Julian considered himself pensively. I chuckled. “What else is in your routine?”
He lay back, strong hands pulling me over him. I was thrilled. This was Lord Wakeford freed from decorum. Not so terribly shy after all. With my head on his shoulder, I was frightfully snug.
“I wake at half past eight,” he said. “I make up the bed, drill, wash. Then dress and eat breakfast and read the newspapers—”
“That’s how you found me?”
“That’s how I found you.” He smiled. “A doctor first recommended exercise for easing nerves. Swimming once helped to clear my mind.”
“You had nerves before the war?”
A sore nod. “My father would say”—he scrunched his face mockingly— “ ‘Be a man, Julian; nerves are a woman’s debility.’ He wasn’t keen to leave his legacy to a lamb.”
I brushed my hand through Julian’s hair, thinking its length made him look vulnerable in a way I was rather fond of. “It’s a dreadful shame that masculinity must mean hardness.”
Julian studied my lips before kissing them delicately. Leaving his mouth resting on mine, he turned so our hips were flush. I was still dressed, but his hand found my hem, slipping under, slipping up—
Three knocks at the door.
Julian’s head fell against mine. As one, we breathed plaints of frustration. I tried to sit up but he held me there. “Let it be. He’ll go.”
Heart racing and lips itching painfully, I wanted badly to concur. Perhaps our night together, tame as it was, had helped him pluck up the courage for more. But I hadn’t forgot the lines read each morning at breakfast. I couldn’t worry Roland by keeping Julian from his.
“Answer. I’ve already upset your routine enough as it is.” This time he let me sit up. “May I wash up in your bathroom?”
Julian rose with a grunt. “Second door.”
While he went to the sitting room, I tiptoed through the door to a dressing room. The walls were lined with cedar wardrobes and drawers, which I peeked inside to find shoes and hats and suits of every cut and color, hung pressed and ready to be worn. Even Julian’s officer uniform was kept here, beside his evening clothes—immaculate white tie, and tails. What a shame that I’d never see him wear them.
Another door led to the bathroom. It was unlike any I’d seen, like a parlor in its own right, with a bathtub and lavatory. I padded across cold marble on bare feet, then onto a plush oval rug to the basin. There was no mirror, of course, and as I ran water over my hands, I marveled at the immensity of the rectangular outline where one had been.
I splashed my face, rinsed my mouth, and smoothed my hair. In search of a towel, I found a rack stand with one draped over its arm. Dry now. To the left of it, a chest of drawers was crowned with fine pots of lotion, brilliantine, cologne, and other things that smelled undoubtedly male. I read the labels of a few medicine bottles—cough suppressant, aspirin. Veronal. He must have been given it for nerves. He’d have to be careful there.
Back in the bedroom, Julian was just coming in carrying a silver tray. He set it on the bed and looked up at me, now wearing his mask, hair still wild from the night. “Help yourself.”
I’d every intention of popping out to dress for the day, but was entirely too fond of how he looked topless in his trousers. So I climbed on the bed and sat cross-legged before the spread. Huxley brought a full breakfast—poached egg, sausage and bacon, oatcakes, rack of toast, and a bowl of fresh fruit. The coffee smelled strong, and I poured it to hand to Julian.
He accepted, and perched himself on the edge of the bed to remove his mask.
I brushed raspberry jam on a corner of toast and ate quietly while Julian lit a cigarette. I watched him lustfully as he blew smoke that curled in the ever-brightening light from the window, swirling like paint in a cup of water.
“You said you used to swim,” I said. “Do you miss it?”
He nodded.
“Never thought to have another go? Likely day for it.”
Julian answered in a tumble of smoke: “It isn’t for me any longer.”
I finished my toast and thought on this, wondering how else I might approach his leaving. Roland and Gwen remained in the back of my mind. Now I knew the truth about the debts, I saw the urgency of the matter. And so far, I had only given Julian more reason to stay in this room.
The notion gave me an ill feeling. I’d allowed my affections to overtake my sense. I had to decide what I wanted, and soon, before the flame grew to a fire I could not so easily put out.
After changing clothes, I tossed my own bedclothes to appear slept in. A shame, really—the maid might have had a break. She also would have had rumors of how the artist hadn’t slept in her room last night, and I wasn’t interested in being thought of as that sort of woman.
Though I was. My God! I entirely was.
I hurried to make it to breakfast by my usual time. The others were having a rabid conversation over The Tatler, about upcoming nuptials between Edwina Ashley and Lord Mountbatten, the society wedding of the year, to which the Napiers were not invited because (as Celia put it plainly) a positive word had not been uttered about their family in years.
I pretended interest, anxiously awaiting the post. I was hoping for something from my parents. Perhaps if Mother had written back, it meant she was willing to negotiate, and the uncertainty of my future would stop keeping me awake.
“You bloody nobles are so tiresome,” Freddie said, cigarette bouncing on his lips. He pinched it between two fingers and tapped the ash onto the open journal. “I can tell you—and Bertie will agree—that there is far more to life than blood and connections.”
I was handed the attention of the table. “I really wouldn’t know . . .”
Freddie went on gladly. “Well, I know for certain that in an hour’s time, I can find you a far more glamorous party in London, with not a single highborn person in attendance. And nobody would care what your name is. They’d simply say . . .” He pointed his cigarette at Roland. “ ‘Here, you are called beauty.’ ” Then at Celia. “ ‘You are called brightness.’ ” Then at me. “ ‘You are called bravery.’ ”
“And what will they call you, Freddie?” Celia asked.
He grinned, teeth gleaming. “Blandishment.”
It was then that Huxley appeared with his salver. I held my breath. “His lordship has taken his breakfast, sir.”
Roland nodded. “Very good.”
The butler retreated, showing no obvious signs he’d been aware of my presence in Julian’s bed. But his salver held something for me after all. As he handed me the letter, I heard my heart in my ears. It was not Mother’s, nor Father’s hand. Though the writing was familiar enough. It was from my neighbor, Mrs. Lemm.
Dear Bertie,
I hope this letter finds you well, and enjoying your holiday in Wiltshire. How splendid it was to call on your mother and learn that you are off painting for the Earl of Wakeford! All of us here in Brickyard Lane are so proud of you, and look forward to hearing about your stay at . . .
I folded and stuffed the letter back in the envelope. Not entirely worth the read, at least at the moment. I tried to hide my despair, beginning to take down food without tasting. I would have to speak to Julian about payment, to ensure that his debts would not affect this job. My heart aside, I needed to leave here with something to show for my time. With no home to return to, I was betting it all on receiving that check.
Freddie leaned forward for another piece of toast and tapped it on his plate. “How is our fair Wakeford, old boy? Well fed, it would seem.”
Roland looked at me. Freddie noticed, and then I had the two of them gaping in my direction. When I didn’t speak, Celia offered, “Julian is endlessly the same.”
Freddie bit his toast and chewed while watching Celia opposite him. “I’ve never seen such a pretty face turn so swiftly sour.”
Celia scoffed and poked her egg until the yolk bled out across her plate. But Freddie wasn’t finished. “If he came through that door today, he’d not be the same, would he? Then would you have something kind to say of him?”
Roland’s chair creaked under him. “Steady on, Fred.”
“Don’t look so dismal, my love; your face will wrinkle.”
I should have thought the conversation grave if Celia hadn’t plucked a grape from her plate and sent it across the table into Freddie’s lap.
His face remained neutral. “That is not very ladylike.”
She was giggling, and even Roland allowed a smile.
Freddie rolled his wrist, flourishing smoke. “I sometimes think I’m the only one of us with any manners.”
Roland glanced down at his post, tossing a few things aside before declaring, “Gwen’s throwing a birthday party for her nephew at the house, and she’s invited us all. Must be desperate not to be left alone with Richard’s sisters.”
“See that, Cece?” Freddie said. “You shall dance after all.”
For that, he was pelted with another grape.
Unable to shake my dampened spirit, I finished my tea and made my excuses.
My studio was in a beautiful state of artful disarray. I had not begun to clear up after I’d finished the last painting, and everywhere at my feet were the remnants of its color palette, still sticking to brushes and swiped across any surface with the space. I figured cleaning brushes would do to busy my hands for a while.
I needed to sort my thoughts. About Julian. About home. About my career. And how, if at all, they might someday fit in the same sentence.
I set Mrs. Lemm’s letter on the windowsill to read later, and sat on a stool beside it, dunking each brush into a glass jar of turpentine. There was something cathartic about watching the color melt away and sink, joining what was congealed into a mud-grey putty at the bottom. Colors I had painstakingly mixed to perfectly match my intentions disintegrated into swill.
We were like butchers, we artists—or bakers, or servants—with all the mess done behind closed doors so that only the finished product could be appreciated. Would that the Napiers could glance at one of dozens of paintings around their great house and remember how it had started, as a spark and a shade of pigment, as a blank canvas and the ache in the artist’s hand . . .
Julian could.
Why was I so anxious? My confidence was once the single thing about myself I could love unconditionally. I had been so confident when I’d left home, that I would impress Lord Wakeford, that my art would be seen by his peers, that more commissions would come flooding in and there would be no time to miss home. This was all before I knew there would be no recommendation, and possibly no payment. This was all before I’d come to adore them as people, come to know Lord Wakeford beyond that first, keen handshake.
He was lovely, I could not deny that to myself. But I had not come for romance. I had come to prove myself first and foremost as an artist. Where did a man fit in that life? To marry would mean abandoning everything—the chance to live on my own and travel and shake the restraints of my privileged upbringing. And though I called him Julian, he was still the Earl of Wakeford, which meant that whatever blossomed between us would be cut short come August.
One night. It was only one night, and one night it would remain. I could not lose sight of what I most wanted in the world for the warmth of a man’s body beside me.
That night I put on my nightgown and sat on the bed, but I knew I would not rest. I was beginning to miss my parents, my old bed, and the certainty of home. The easy monotony of what I’d left behind. I had not had the foresight to imagine how stressful it would be to lose the comfort of sameness.
In the end, even sitting still was too difficult. So I took my candle down the stairs, leaving it just inside the door before stepping onto the terrace.
I was not alone. In the light of the moon, Freddie’s cigarette glowed bright red against the night. I approached slowly, slippers dragging against the flags. He wore only a pair of drawers and a dressing gown, sat astride the balustrade, one leg dangling over the rosebush below.
“Come; join me,” he said, with a wave.
I did, wrapping my dressing gown more tightly around myself. Freddie pinched tobacco from a box in front of him, and carefully sprinkled it onto a paper with narrow fingers.
“Can you forgive my dishevelment?” he asked, wiggling bare toes.
“Only if you forgive mine. Could you not sleep?”
“Roland falls asleep so easily—like a puppy in a basket. I’m not so lucky.”
I shivered as a breeze blew back my hair, wondering perhaps wickedly if Roland and Freddie made love in their own way, a tangle of hard, masculine limbs and large hands brushing stubbled cheeks. Afterward, did they hold one another so tenderly? Did they whisper in the dark?
“Did you fight in the war, Freddie?”
His face fell to the stony, distant expression of men who came home. He tossed his spent cigarette into the roses. “How dare I refuse the call?”
“You seem . . .” How to word it? “You seem to have come through it well.”
“I’ve spent my life pretending to be someone I’m not. There is nothing a little flourish can’t hide.”
Bringing the cigarette paper to his lips, he licked the edge, then rolled it between his thumb and forefinger. He held it up between us and I accepted willingly. After a fight with the breeze, it was lit. The sweet taste of good tobacco put me at ease.
“You’re all right, then?” I asked.
“Apart from a small memento”—his scarred leg came up in display—“I’m fantastic. Young, beautiful, in love. What more could I hope for?”
I smiled, jealous of his confidence. “What will you do now Roland’s through in Oxford?”
“Eat together. Drink together. Sleep together. Get old and fat together.” Freddie patted his stomach, slim as can be, and we both laughed. “Mercifully, there’s nobody to press Roland into the military or the cloth. So we’ll live here, I assume.” His eyes went up, flaring in what light came from the sleeping house. “Paradise, is it not? I would love Roland if he was a prince or a pauper, but Castle Braemore is my favorite place in the world. I’m ever so glad it’s his.”
I was grateful for the darkness concealing my expression. I knew what he did not—that this was the last summer he would spend here. I blew smoke and watched the night carry my ash away. “I suppose Roland wishes he’d been born first.”
“Oh no. War scared the life from him. Roland was certain he’d have to replace his brother. That’s the last thing he’s ever wanted.”
“You were quick to defend Julian this morning.”
“Julian gave me shelter when my life at home became unbearable. He stopped Roland’s mother sending him away. He’s the reason we have a place to be together at all.”
I’d known as much, truly, but Freddie’s words rang through me. “What do you make of Celia’s anger?”
Freddie sighed, and drew one leg up on the balustrade and held it to his chest, resting his chin on his knee. “Roland will give you a thousand excuses: she’s young, she’s naive. He’s not spoken the truth to me.”
That came as a shock. “Really?”
“There’s something there they’d rather keep hidden. I’d wager they have good reason.”
I almost disagreed, though it was certainly true. Roland and Freddie’s secret was well worth keeping. It assured their safety. Their future together.
“I’ll take your word,” I said.
We were quiet while I finished my cigarette. Then Freddie asked, “What is it that keeps you up this night, Bertie Preston?”
I stared into his unguarded eyes. He trusted me with his secrets, even now admitting to me his love for Roland. He’d been honest so I would feel safe to speak plainly.
“I came here thinking that my career had begun,” I said. “That a commission from the Earl of Wakeford meant I’d be painting for British nobility until I had fame and more money than I would know what to do with. But I didn’t know this place would be empty. I didn’t know the Napiers were so ruined . . .” A tremble of nerves. It was odd to be saying all this aloud. “If I spread word that I’ve been here, I’m guilty by association, but if I don’t, I’m no one.”
Freddie scratched the back of his neck, brow pinched. He wasn’t at all fond of aristocracy, despite his devotion to Roland. Perhaps I’d salted the wound. Though when he looked at me again, he was almost smiling. “Why do you care so much about painting for nobility?”
I brushed fallen ashes to the ground. “I suppose after Julian’s letter, I assumed I could. That I deserved to . . .” Admitting this made me feel childish.
“There are artists,” Freddie began, “plenty of which are friends of mine, who make a living from their work without ever having shaken the hand of a lord. You need not aim so high, my darling. You need not waste your time making a name amongst people who think themselves better than you. They will only hurt you, because they fear what they don’t understand. They fear things you know are lovely.”
I had to look away from him to quell a rise of emotion.
“There are others out there . . . people who favor feeling over propriety. Those are your people, Bertie. Not the ones you’ll find on the pages of Burke’s. And as for the Napiers . . . you will never meet a family with more love in their hearts. If you turn your back on them for a check, you’re just as cruel as those who would shame them.”
I swept away a tear, but Freddie must have seen it, for he took my hand. “You have the talent to paint for the king, I’ve no doubt. But I imagine if His Majesty never pays a call, you’ll keep on doing it, won’t you? Because you’re a painter. Art is your flame.”
I thought of who I was in the weeks before Julian’s letter, in the months and years before, mixing and painting in my bedroom, finding inspiration in every wander down the road, in each person who sat opposite me in the train. She would be disappointed to see me now.
Freddie was right. I’d developed a mad craving for recognition that now seemed so juvenile. How humiliating it was to have it reflected at me so plainly! I’d forgot what made my art important.
Julian had been moved by a colorless photograph of my painting. He’d seen more in it than even I knew was there. He’d risked the assurance of his seclusion to invite me to Castle Braemore. That was powerful. More powerful than fame and fortune.
Still, that ever-present knot tightened around my stomach. This would all come to an end once summer was over. “Are you ever frightened of the future, Freddie?”
“Fear is a notion, Bertie. The action that follows is far more important.”
I left him there on the terrace to smoke another cigarette, and went upstairs on weary legs. I turned and kept on until I was standing before the door to Julian’s apartments. As I’d hoped, there was yellow light beneath. I raised my fist and, as firmly as I dared, gave a knock.
I couldn’t think what caused him to open with such little pause. But within seconds he was standing before me, bare chested, hair dripping from a bath.
“I can’t sleep,” I whispered.
Julian took my hand and shut the door behind us.
We were nearly undressed when we fell into his bed. The linens were already in disarray, as though welcoming us back to where we belonged. Julian did not slow this time—not for a breath. We kissed as two people who were ravenous for something buried deeply within each other, a drop of sweet, cold water for parched tongues. He tasted so good that I wanted to take a bite, to savor, to let him melt in my mouth.
I knelt with one knee on either side of his hips and slipped out of my dressing gown. He rubbed the tops of my legs and watched as I tugged my nightdress up, up and over. His hands trailed slowly up my waist, gliding over my ribs. I rose and his lips brushed over my nipple. I arched my back, weaving my hands in his hair, holding him to me.
More, more, ever more—to break apart would surely stop our hearts.
I tugged his hair gently to incline his head, to kiss his mouth. His heart pounded against my chest, his breaths and mine the same sweet, hot cloud.
His defenses fell before my eyes. He pulled my hands down to his chest and I kissed him. We moved, floating on the wave of our breaths. I whispered his name. He kissed me back.
There was still hesitation, but it was smaller, a twinge in his brow, a lasting question in his eye. I put his hand between my legs so he could feel I wanted him, that I wanted this, that with him I felt safer than I had with any other man. It was in that moment of sheer vulnerability that he hardened and the last ounce of resistance melted away. I smiled into his mouth.
We both shook when we finally came together. We held on to the freezing bow of a ship that threatened to capsize. We locked arms around each other, clung to life. Breathing our last breaths. Gasping for time. Then the water rushed in, the ship went over, the ocean meeting us as we fell. He pulled me deeper and I drowned.
When I bit his shoulder, it was slippery with salt water.
“What was that for?” he asked with a breathless laugh.
“I’d like to eat you up.”
We slipped under the quilt, slick skin sticking to clean sheets. I touched the rounded part of my inner thigh where the tepid evidence of Julian remained.
He lay beside me like a man on his deathbed, dosed with morphia. Not a line on his face. Not a muscle tensed. Not a visible thought.
I wished desperately for a pencil and paper.
His head tilted towards me as I wrapped one of his curls around my finger. I imagined sketching his features onto the blank right side of his face with sharp graphite, crosshatching for dimension on cheekbone, feathery lines to perfect the creases of his eye, shading over the bow of his lip, which I’d smooth out with the pad of my thumb.
I mimicked the action, and Julian reached behind me, making chills as he traced the bottom of my spine to the top, counting the vertebrae. His head inched forward, as though he meant to kiss me, but didn’t make the full journey.
“Are you warm enough?” he asked.
I nodded. Julian closed his eye, and I swept my lips over the thick hairs of his brow. As his breaths slowed I whispered, “Very warm indeed.”