Flirting With Forever by Gwyn Cready (books for 20 year olds TXT) 📗

The duchess’s odd cockeye worked the room like a beacon on a stormy night. “But …”

Stephen reappeared from nowhere and set Nel ’s portrait on the easel with the charm of a mountebank.

Despite what was to Peter an obvious difference in their frames—the painted Nel had the slimness of an adolescent while Mrs. Post’s body suggested a more nuanced and, to Peter, far more interesting maturity—the dressing gown hid much and hair color provided the only visible distinction. Both heads could reasonably be described as red, though Mrs. Post’s was slightly lighter, with eye-catching streaks of pumpkin, amber and even a sunny marigold.

Without conscious intent, Peter’s mind began to calculate the mix of pigments such a heady confection would require. Red madder and yel ow ocher were the obvious choices, but white lead, raw umber and even verdigris would have their place. His hands began to tingle at the prospect—that is, were he to have further prospects of any sort, for if the duchess didn’t swal ow the tale, Peter would be sketching Whitehal Palace for coppers in the street.

The duchess thrust out a trembling lip. She was not so dul as to be entirely swayed by this ruse. Nonetheless she could hardly accuse Peter or the king of setting up such a verisimilitude with no more than a moment’s notice, especial y when that moment had been spent entirely under her observation.

Peter said a prayer to Saint Luke, the patron saint of painters.

The duchess’s eyes narrowed, and she threw a shoulder back in chal enge. “Vamos a ver si entiende esto, coño, ”

she said to Mrs. Post.

Peter gasped, as did the king. Peter’s Spanish was poor, to say the least, but there was no mistaking the wal op of the last word. He’d heard Carlo, a bargeman on the river, cal a sailor that once, and Carlo had taken a pole across the cheek in answer to it.

His gaze cut to Mrs. Post. How does one signal to another that the other has just been cal ed the worst name a woman could be cal ed? He cleared his throat and raised his eyes meaningful y, but he might as wel have been waving English signal flags at a Chinese prow. There was no mum show equivalent for the insult that had just been hurled, and if there were, no gentleman would employ it.

Mrs. Post chewed her lip as she attempted to decipher this sentence. Spots of red appeared on her cheeks. Her eyes darted from one face to another. She twisted the broadsheet in her hands and coughed. It was more than Peter could bear.

He held up a hand. “I am putting an end to this. I must confess—”

The rest died in his throat. Mrs. Post lunged forward and smacked the duchess across the nose with the broadsheet.

The duchess squawked in surprise, and for an instant Peter’s heart stopped. No one spoke. No one moved.

Peter could hear a dog braying in the street outside. He wondered if he’d be joining the brute there soon.

The king threw back his head and laughed.

“I must confess”—Peter stepped in front of the duchess to block what looked like the start of a second assault from Mrs. Post—“your language surprises me, Your Grace.”

The king clapped his hands, fil ed with the sort of delight he displayed at the Windsor wrestling matches. “You have been routed, my dear. You have made an attempt, and you have been routed. Make peace with the countess. I shal not have a war started over this.”

But the duchess’s fury was not so easily doused. Her face contracted, and Peter could see another outburst coming.

“Make peace, I said,” Charles repeated sharply, al humor gone.

The duchess curtsied meekly, then turned to the king.

“Please take me home,” she said with a peevish pout. “I have a headache.”

13

When the door closed, Cam col apsed on the chaise in relief. A Spanish countess?! Jeez, what next? A Sri Lankan snake charmer? Her Renée Zel weger was bad enough.

Anything