Page 14 of The Duke Undone

She choked on the phrase she’d been preparing. What had he said?

Mr. Coover?

Her heart seemed to stop completely; then it sped up, not beating, but whirring, like the mechanism in a sewing machine.

“The Visitor in Painting,” she said slowly. “Mr. Coover.”

Good God.

The letter to Mrs. Forbes.

In the missive, she had created the perfect persona, one calculated to appeal to the young woman’s particular desires.

L. Coover was unknown in England. This point was, of course, a necessity, but also a boon. Mrs. Forbes didn’t want to follow the herd.

Yet L. Coover was feted in France, the darling of the Paris salons, and had lately returned to England as a Visitor. Mrs. Forbes didn’t want to appear common and needed her venturesome taste affirmed.

Lucy had felt a queer elation as she wrote. To present such a version of herself—iconoclastic, accomplished, confident—it made her shiver.

The moment Kate had introduced her to Mrs. Forbes, at the Winter Exhibition, she’d recognized the opportunity.

I adore art, but my husband knows nothing about it. Nothing. Mrs. Forbes had tossed her head as she spoke so her jeweled earrings twinkled and her throat extended. Tell me . . . do you think one of these men would agree to paint me nude?

She’d looked triumphantly at the knot of Academicians clustered beneath a massive eighteenth-century oil and then at Lucy and Kate, so transparently eager to shock them both that Lucy had felt a wave of tenderness. It was almost sweet, this round-cheeked, well-heeled young woman’s determination to prove herself naughty.

Kate had grinned her irresistible grin.

I’d paint you nude, she’d said, and Mrs. Forbes’s mouth had dropped open before she’d thrown her head back spontaneously to let out a peal of laughter.

Perhaps next year, she’d said. Truly, what I want for my own chambers is a male nude, but only if he’s a god. No suffering saints or martyrs. Pure masculine perfection. Something to restore the eyes and the ideals after watching one’s husband gnaw a drumstick. I’m like a Frenchwoman in that respect. Life is more stimulating in France, n’est-ce pas?

Kate had laughed about Mrs. Forbes all the following week.

I’ve seen her at a dozen parties. She’s always like that. I’ve met Mr. Forbes, too, and let me tell you, he is not remotely French. How could such a wild little creature end up tethered to a weak-chinned dullard?

Kate had laughed again, more bitterly, answering her own question. She’s very pretty; he’s very rich. That’s what marriage is all about, n’est-ce pas?

Lucy hadn’t written to Mrs. Forbes then. Even when she finally finished her picture, in February, she’d waited a week before she could bring herself to write.

The picture was the best—and largest—she’d ever painted. She’d used the pattern of embroidered leaves on her favorite gown to create a botanical pattern that replaced the mud of the alley. The pattern curved, so that the figure appeared to lie on a hill, with a cave behind him and the moon hanging overhead, a shade less than full.

She was waxing as she fell in love.

In myth, Endymion the shepherd king was a man of such beauty the moon herself longed to shine upon him always, to keep him for her very own. She bid Zeus, her father, put him in eternal sleep. As Lucy had studied her sketches and planned her composition, she’d realized that the story was the perfect fit. The moody, romantic symbolism represented the deeper truth.

The picture turned out bright, expressive . . . charged. Maybe even indecent. The light seemed to come from all sides, showing the precise details of the sleeper.

There was a frankness to it that frightened her. The picture, evenly lit by the moon, glorying in the male form, seemed a testament to feminine desire. She’d painted it for herself alone. But she couldn’t roll the canvas and keep it in the corner of her bedroom, not when it could be converted into the money she so desperately needed. A private sale had been the only answer. She’d started a dozen letters—Dear Mrs. Forbes—but laid down her pen without finishing.

And then the sewing machine broke. And the rent came due.

If her corpse was asking for Mr. Coover, Visitor in Painting, that meant he had talked to Mrs. Forbes. He had seen the picture. Understandably, he wanted to confront the artist. He wanted a word with Mr. Coover.

Cold sweat was breaking out across her brow.

“Mr. Coover,” Lucy said again, groping for what came next. “It is he you hope to find?”

That green gaze fixed her again, scrambling her thoughts. Her corpse gave her an ironic smile.