Page 15 of What a Lord Wants

“You were pointing out that she’s older than you,” he translated as he slowly approached her.

Eve sniffed. That, too. “Perhaps.”

“What else was it you said about me—about growing tired of superficiality?” He stopped in front of her. “About wanting deeper satisfaction?”

Her cheeks began to heat, but she found the determination to stare straight into his dark eyes. “Don’t you?”

“In my art, yes. But you implied that we were lovers.”

The heat in her cheeks flared into a full-out blush, fanning out from the back of her neck and down between her breasts. “I only made a general observation. How was I to know that she would misinterpret it?” She swallowed down that lie. She’d certainly implied an intimacy between them that didn’t exist, but that shrewish woman deserved it for saying those awful things.

“A general observation, hmm?”

“Of course. I mean, a man like you…”

His eyes narrowed. “Like me?”

“I’ve heard of your reputation, Signore Vincenzo.” So had most of Europe. “You’re a man of great art and great passion.” Her blush deepened. “So of course you would seek out interesting women to…”

“To what?” he pressed.

She cleared her suddenly tight throat. “Share your bed.”

If her mother had lived to hear her have this conversation, Mama would have died of embarrassment. Yet Eve dared to say such indecent words right to the man’s face. That dark, handsome face with its high cheekbones, framed by unruly, thick hair that was so dark as to be almost black. Just like those eyes that seemed to notice everything. He might not have said that she was beautiful all the way down to her soul, but without a doubt those eyes could see that deeply into her.

“Doesn’t every man want that?” he murmured.

She thought of Burton Williams, who wanted her only for her father’s money. “Not every man.” The raw honesty of that was audible in her voice.

“Then they’re fools.”

She sighed out, “They certainly are.”

Smiling faintly, he shifted closer, and the trembling in her hands began again.

“You’re right about me, Eve. Iama passionate man, especially when it comes to my art.” He stood so close now that she could feel the warmth of his body and smell the scents of linseed oil, tobacco, and port that swirled around him. “And perhaps you are beautiful right down to your soul. We’ll find out how deep that beauty goes when I paint you.”

A soft thrill sped through her at that quiet promise.

“But let me be clear—allI plan on doing with you is painting.”

“Good,” she whispered. Whichwasgood. It was all she wanted, too, and far more than she should be doing anyway. So why did her heart skip with a painful thud of disappointment?

As if contradicting himself, he reached up to twirl one of her loose curls around his fingers. “I made a mistake with Constance.”

“Apparently.”

His lips twisted wryly. “She was my model, but then I took her as my lover. I won’t make that mistake again.” Self-recrimination darkened his face. “To be a great artist, a man can’t serve both his art and his mistress. If he splits his passion, both of them will suffer. I decided a long time ago to put my art before everything else in my life.”

“But she was your muse.”

“She wasnevermy muse.” He released her hair. “An artist’s muse inspires him to put his soul into his work, to reach for the sublime. To be more than himself. Constance was never that.”

She swallowed. Hard. “But she’s beautiful.”

“She is. In some ways, she’s the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.”

Her chest panged, and she turned her face away. “Oh.”