still hidden. Thankfully. Sir Martin had resumed speaking, but Lily did not hear the words, too focused on getting to the dais.
On getting to the painting.
She climbed the stairs, driven by something far more powerful than embarrassment.
Shame.
Shame for what she had done. For trusting him. For believing him.
For believing she’d ever be more than herself. Alone.
For believing in the promise of us.
And then she was on the stage, and he was turning toward her, the room going silent once more, in utter shock at her presence. At her intrusion. The president of the academy turned wide eyes on her.
Derek moved with perfect ease, however, waving one arm toward her. “Ah! My muse arrives.”
It was time for Lily’s eyes to go wide. He’d ruined her. As though she’d removed her clothes in front of all of London. And still, he smiled at her, as though he didn’t see it. “My lovely Lily! The conduit of my genius. Smile, darling.”
She would never have imagined that the words would have made her so very furious. She didn’t stop moving. And she did not smile. “You swore no one would see it.”
The room gasped. As though the walls themselves could draw breath.
He blinked. “I did no such thing.”
Liar.
“You said it was for you alone.”
He smiled, as though it would explain everything. “Darling. My genius is too vast for me not to share it. It is for the world. For all time.”
She looked to the crowd, to the hundreds of eyes assembled, the force of their combined gaze setting her back on her feet. Making her knees weak. Making her heart pound.
Making her furious.
She turned back to him. “You said you loved me.”
He tilted his head. “Did I?”
She was out of space. Of time. Her body no longer hers. The moment no longer hers. She shook her head. “You did. You said it. We said it. We were to be married.”
He laughed. Laughed. The sound echoed in the gasps and whispers of the crowd beyond, but Lily didn’t care. His laugh was enough to slay on its own. “Dear girl,” he mocked. “A man of my caliber does not marry a woman of yours.”
He said it in front of all London.
Before these people, whom she’d always dreamed of becoming. Before this world, in which she’d always dreamed of living. Before this man, whom she’d always dreamed of loving.
But who had never loved her.
Who, instead, had shamed her.
She turned to the curtain, her purpose singular. To destroy his masterwork the way he’d destroyed her. Without care that those assembled would see the painting.
She tore at the curtain, the thick red velour coming from its moorings with virtually no pressure—or perhaps with the strength of her fury—revealing . . .
Bare wall.
There was nothing there.
She turned back to the room, surprised laughter and scandalized gasps and whispers as loud as cannon fire rioting through her.
The painting wasn’t there.
Relief came, hot and overpowering. She whirled to face the man she’d loved. The man who had betrayed her. “Where is it?”
Teeth flashed, blinding white. “It is in a safe space,” he replied, his voice booming, placing them both on show as he turned back to the room. “Look at her, London! Witness her passion! Her emotion! Her beauty! And return here, in one month’s time, on the final day of the exhibition, to witness all that into something more beautiful. More passionate. I shall set grown men to weeping with my work. As though they have seen the face of God.”
A collective gasp of delight thundered through the room. They thought it a play. Her a performer.
They did not realize her life was ruined. Her heart crushed beneath his perfectly shined boot.
They did not realize she was cleaved in two before them.
Or perhaps they did.
And perhaps it was the realization that gave them such glee.
Chapter 2
SCOT SUMMONED SOUTH BY WILD WARD
Two weeks & four days later
Berkeley Square
A ward. Worse, an English ward.
One would think Settlesworth would have told him about that bit.
One would think that among the dozens of homes and scores of vehicles and hundreds of staff and thousands of tenants and tens of thousands of livestock, Settlesworth would have thought it valuable to mention the existence of a single young female.
A young female who, despite her utter lack of propriety on paper, would no doubt swoon when she came face-to-face with her Scottish guardian.
Englishwomen were consummate swooners.
In four and thirty years, he’d never met one who didn’t widely, loudly, and ridiculously threaten the behavior.
But Settlesworth hadn’t mentioned the