Cecelia wasn’t at all certain what was going on, but something was. Lady Ramsdale came to collect her, and they climbed into the carriage. “Where are we going?” Cecelia asked as she settled back against the squabs.
“We’re going shopping,” Lady Ramsdale chirped. She looked at Claire and Sophia and raised her brow. “You’re going to see Marcus.”
“What? I don’t know what you mean.”
Claire pushed back the curtain that covered the window, and there stood a painting. It was a beautiful painting of a small meadow. A tree stood in the corner, and a small stream meandered across the field. A blanket lay nestled in the tall grass with a basket of food beside it. “Marcus is waiting for you in there,” she said.
“He is? How did you?” Cecelia sputtered.
“Dear God,” Lady Ramsdale said, throwing her head back. “If I have to wait a fortnight for you and Marcus to spend time together, it’s going to be like talking to a bear. A big one. One that will bite my head off at every turn.”
“H
e’s not that bad,” Cecelia groused. He kind of was. Or she could imagine he would be. And she was dying to see him alone. She’d missed him so.
“Why are you really doing this?” she asked.
Lady Ramsdale wiped beneath her eyes. “I remember what it’s like to be young and in love. Embrace it, Cecelia.”
Sophia and Claire looked on sympathetically. Then Claire gave her a nudge. “He’s waiting for you.”
“We can’t give you very long,” Lady Ramsdale warned. “So spend your time wisely. We’ll collect you in four hours. Then I have to deliver you back to your father.” She looked out, her eyes dreamy. “You can take a long walk by the stream. You can sit beneath the shade of that tree. You can talk for four whole hours.” She grinned.
“Or you can just make love for four hours,” Sophia said, her voice bland. “Though it’s rather wretched sounding, and it makes me want to cast up my accounts. So, if that’s what you’re doing, I don’t want to know about it when you come back.”
“As if they would do anything else,” Claire said, sarcasm heavy in her voice.
“This is a bit awkward,” Cecelia said, hanging her head.
“He loves you. You love him. Enjoy your time together. Because you’re not likely to get any more.”
Claire held out her hand, and Cecelia dropped to her knees, ready to crawl into the painting.
Twenty
Marcus jerked his watch fob from his pocket and looked down at it. It had been three quarters of an hour since he’d entered the painting. With his blasted luck, he would be stuck there for the rest of his life. It would probably serve him right. But when his mother had presented him with the opportunity to spend some time with Cecelia after having been away from her for a whole month, he’d jumped at the chance.
Her father had probably figured out their plot and foiled it. But then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw Cecelia climb into the painting. Claire poked her head in long enough to wave at him and yell, “Four hours, Marcus! And please don’t be naked when I come back!”
Marcus reached down and helped Cecelia to her feet. “What is this place?” she asked.
He shrugged. “It’s one of Claire’s paintings. It’s not a real place. You can tell by the walls.”
“There are walls?” she asked, walking toward the edge. She sank her hand into where the painting ended, and her hand disappeared through the fog. “The walls are fictitious.”
“All of this is,” he said.
“That’s some talent Claire has. How did she end up with it anyway?” Cecelia asked.
Marcus looked at her and bit his lower lip. “That’s an amusing story.”
He took her hand in his and walked with her to the blanket beneath the willow tree. The sky was blue and the clouds puffy and billowy, and the stream lent a low rushing noise to the background. “Tell it to me,” she said as she sat down.
He sat beside her and straightened one leg before him, while keeping the other one up. He drew her to lean against his leg so that she reclined in front of him, and he tangled his fingers with hers. “It all started with Sophia.”
“Sophia can walk into paintings too?” Cecelia asked.
“No, Sophia is entranced by music. It’s how she met the Duke of Robinsworth. She was at a house party his mother threw when she heard music in the night. She was entranced by it, and it drew her to his chambers. They spent a lot of time together over the piano, and she couldn’t resist his songs.”