“Some people think so.”
“But you don’t.”
Sweat trickled down Beth’s back, despite the clouds cutting the sun’s heat. The trouble with Ian Mackenzie’s questions was that he asked the unanswerable. And yet she should know how to answer—everyone should. But they couldn’t, because everyone simply knew. Everyone except Ian. “Desire is part of it,” she said slowly. “The love for another’s body. But also love for their heart and their mind, and for all the silly things they do, no matter how absurd. Your world brightens when they walk into a room, dims when they leave it again. You want to be with the beloved so you can see him and touch him and hear his voice, but you want his happiness as well. It’s selfish, but not entirely so.” “I can feel desire and wanting. I find you beautiful, and I want you.”
She warmed. “I must say, you are quite good for my pride. But when you don’t desire a woman, you feel nothing for her?”
“Nothing at all.”
Beth heaved a sigh. “And that, Ian Mackenzie, is why I said you’ll break my heart.”
His gaze strayed out the window to cloud-strewn Paris. “Wanting is not enough? Desire so strong you’ll do anything to fulfill it?”
“It’s lovely in the moment, but in the long view, 1 think, no.”
“In the asylum, I learned to take the short view.” She imagined a younger Ian, lanky and not yet grown into his man’s body, bewildered and alone. The bewildered boy reminded her of the girl who found herself abandoned at fifteen with predators roaming, waiting for her to become their victim. Even now, with a respectable name and a fortune, Beth never felt entirely safe.
“I admit that I, too, have learned to take the short view,” she said.
“You feel the wanting.” Ian took her fingers between his, pressing their palms together. “You felt it at the duchesse’s.” Her face heated. “Of course I felt it. You had me in that sitting room with my skirts up to my ears. How could I not?” “Do you want to feel it again?”
Excitement whispered through her. “If I were a lady, I’d protest that of course I don’t want to feel like that ever again. But I do, actually. Very much.”
“Good, because I want to see your body.” Beth swallowed. “You’ve already seen a good portion of it.”
He sent her a dark smile. “And it was fine. I wish to see the rest. Right now.”
Beth darted a glance to the door. “Mac might return any minute.”
“He’ll stay away until we leave.”
“How do you know that?”
“I know Mac.”
“The window . . .”
“Too high for anyone to see in.”
Beth had to admit that he’d answered her most basic objections. She knew she should have other objections, but she couldn’t remember them right now.
“And if I decide I’d rather run away?”
“Then we’ll wait.”
Beth hesitated, her legs feeling like water, but at the same time, she knew nothing would induce her to leave this room short of a fire. A very large fire.
“I’ll need help with the buttons,” she said.
Beth’s clothes came off layer by layer, like a complicated wrapping peeling back to reveal simple beauty. One by one, her garments fell across the studio’s sofa in a multicolored layer: rich blue bodice and overskirt, a brighter blue underskirt, the fabric light for summer. Two silk petticoats, both white, then her corset cover, until at last Ian unlaced the linen corset himself.
Ian’s arousal throbbed, and he knew he wouldn’t be happy until he saw her bared in her entirety. He untied her lacy pantalets, then unbuttoned the chemise. The silk garments floated gracefully to the floor, and Beth stepped out of them, nude for him. She reached for him, but Ian stepped away, and Beth stopped, confused.
Her hair was mussed from undressing, little ringlets falling from the mass of curls on top of her head. Her arms were soft and round, her thighs also, her waist nipped in by years of wearing a corset.
From her waist her hips softly flared to smooth and firm bu**ocks. He’d seen her vee of dark hair when he lifted her skirts in the little gilded room, but it was even more beautiful now touched by daylight.
Under his close scrutiny, she blushed and folded her arms over her br**sts.
Ian leaned against the back of a chair and basked in her beauty. “You don’t need to hide from me.” Beth hesitated, then gave a little laugh and spun around, arms outstretched. She was so beautiful, with her curls every which way, her mouth laughing, her blue eyes flashing in the fading sunlight. The clouds thickened and rain began to fall, but that didn’t dampen the glow inside the room. Beth laughed again. “How strange is life?” she asked. “One moment you are a dowdy companion without a shilling, the next you are a wealthy bohemian in Paris. One moment a drudge, the next you are buying gifts for your paramour.”
Her words slid over him like water. He’d remember each one in its precise order later, but he would never understand them any better than he did now.
Beth caught up the drape Cybele had dropped and spun it around herself. The gauzy folds caught her hips and br**sts, not hiding her in the slightest. She spun around and around, laughing.
Ian grasped the drape when she whirled by, and used it to haul her against him. She stumbled into his arms, still laughing. His first kiss parted her lips, stopping the laughter as she melted to him.