A Lady's Dream Come True - Grace Burrowes Page 0,60
a detail, Vera. I will never render a woman on canvas who resembles you without first gaining your agreement. Particularly if my objective is a nude, for me to abuse your trust by failing to obtain permission to create your likeness is unthinkable.”
“Thank you.” How she loved holding hands with him, loved the quiet decency he brought to every undertaking. “Oak?”
“Vera?”
“I am no longer indisposed.” This admission, which had been a topic of casual exchanges with Dirk on any number of occasions, caused Vera to blush. She hadn’t planned such an announcement, but Oak’s smile said he was glad she’d made it.
“One did not want to admit to counting the days,” he said, “or the minutes. May I come to you tonight?”
He always asked, he never presumed. “Unless you want me climbing into your bed at the midnight hour, you had better come to me.”
“I would love for you to climb into my bed at any hour.” He kissed the corner of her mouth, which of course made her want to be kissed properly, so she remedied his off-center aim, and that resulted in Oak scooping her into his lap.
“I have another confession,” she said, snuggling into his embrace.
“You cannot wait until tonight. I sympathize with your plight. Truly I do. That is why the door is locked.”
Vera was sitting in his lap, and the evidence of his sympathy was physically apparent. “I will wait until tonight, as you have waited for the past five days, but I admit that I have been glad for the pause, Oak.”
“Anticipation and all that rot?”
“Maybe, but also… you are an attentive lover when lovemaking is not on the agenda. I have enjoyed that.” Lapped it up like an alley cat coming upon a defenseless dish of cream.
“I’m a competent lady’s maid?”
He was trying to make the moment light. Vera would think later about why that should be.
“You are an attentive lover,” she said. “You act as if you enjoy my company over a meal, over cards, or when we’re like this. In the middle of the morning, trying to figure out what to do with Dirk’s paintings.”
Oak went quiet, his cheek resting against Vera’s temple. “I do enjoy your company. I hope the feeling is mutual.”
Had she said something wrong? “It is. It very much is.”
He rose with Vera in his arms—how easily he did that—and set her on her feet, though he kept his hands on her shoulders.
“Vera, you could send me to Coventry, refuse to so much as acknowledge me at the breakfast table, and I’d finish the work you’ve tasked me with and be on my way. You don’t owe me a consummation to our dalliance.”
The word dalliance rankled, even in such a gallant context. “I want a consummation, sir.”
“Good.” He kissed her cheek. “As do I. Perhaps tonight we can talk further about what to do with Dirk’s naked treasures.”
Vera disliked the sense that she was being dismissed. “I’m distracting you, aren’t I?”
He dropped his hands from her shoulders. “Distraction is a mere nuisance, an off-key piano played in the next room. Far more accurate to say that you render me witless, and in your presence, I cannot keep my hands to myself, given our plans for the evening.”
She leaned close and took a sniff of him, merely because she could. “I don’t want you to keep your hands to yourself.”
“Yes,” he said, “you do, unless a tumble on a worn and itchy hearth rug appeals to you.”
Vera’s gaze went to the carpet. “It’s not that worn.”
“Out,” Oak said, taking her by the arm and guiding her to the door. “Out, out, out, or I will accomplish nothing this whole day save daydreams of you.”
What a lovely, lovely thing to say. “Until tonight, then. And I’ve decided we will simply return Dirk’s naked ladies to storage.”
Oak looked like he wanted to argue, so Vera patted his bum and slipped out the door, closing it softly behind her. She heard male laughter, then the metallic snick of the lock.
Discipline was a fine quality—in moderation. Vera told herself that her discipline was equal to the challenge of attending to necessary tasks for the rest of the day, though they had best be simple tasks. She had never finished her note to Richard Longacre, so she turned her steps in the direction of her private parlor, intent on completing that courtesy.
The encounter with Oak had been unsettling, not only because of the paintings he’d found, but also because of the man Vera