Page 21 of What a Lord Wants

He was certainly in a bad mood. Perhaps now wasn’t the time to inform him that, technically, he wasn’t paying her at all. “My apologies.”

“I don’t want your apologies.” He roughly shoved away a box of pencils. “I want you to do your job.”

Averybad mood. Not helped, certainly, by the gloomy day outside that cast a blue-gray light across the city and made the work he’d planned for today more difficult. If not impossible.

“I’m behind in creating this painting.” An urgency she’d never heard before regarding the project underscored his voice. “It needs to be finished by August, and I can’t do that if you’re not here.”

From the table where he was working with pigments, Jacopo cast an embarrassed glance her way. Then he looked back at Domenico and said quietly, “Vorresti che me ne andassi?”

“Yes. Leave us alone for the rest of the afternoon.”

“Sì, maestro.” He put away the pigment, then raked a curious gaze over her, lingering at her bosom. “Le sue tette sono troppo piccole per—”

“Careful. She speaks Italian.” He tossed a paint knife onto the table and turned to face her, hands on hips. Suspicion darkened his face. “And how exactlydoyou know Italian, anyway?”

This wasn’t like him to be so confrontational. So distrustful. “The sailors at the docks.” Something had happened…But if she asked what, would he send her home for prying? “Many of the men there come from Italy.” Not a lie. She’d picked up Italian from them over the years by visiting the wharves with her father, although most of what she knew wasn’t fit for polite society. Speaking of which…She leveled a hard gaze at Jacopo. “E i miei seni sono perfettamente bene.”

He stared at her wide-eyed, his cheeks flushing.Good. Maybe next time he’d think twice before commenting on the size of her breasts.

Domenico clenched his jaw in irritation, then jerked his head toward the door and ordered Jacopo, “Go.”

With a sudden tension flaring inside the studio, the apprentice was more than happy to leave.

From the dark look that Domenico gave her, perhaps she should have gone with him. Then nearly did anyway when Domenico pushed himself away from the table and stalked toward her.

“If anyone asks about me,” he informed her quietly, “you’re to tell them that Jacopo is Vincenzo. That he’s the artist who works in this studio.” His dark eyes were piercing. “Understand?”

She didn’t understand a thing. “Why would I—”

“Understand?” he repeated, brooking no argument.

Not at all. Yet she nodded.

He raked paint-stained fingers through his hair as he turned away. “Then today we’ll—”

“But if he’s Vincenzo, then who are you?”

He froze at her question. Only for a heartbeat, but she noticed.

“A tortured soul in hell,” he muttered. Before she could press further, he gestured toward the screen in the corner. “Undress. We’re starting the sketch for the underpainting.”

“Even though it’s raining?”

“The lack of light won’t matter. We’re not working with colors today.”

Nodding, she hurried behind the screen, grateful to have a moment’s privacy to collect herself.

What on earth was wrong with him? He was entitled to have bad days, granted. But this was completely unlike him.

Taking a deep breath, she reached up to unbutton her dress. A plain, simple frock that she’d bought from a rag man’s market stall. After all, she was supposed to have been an actress with limited funds, one who could never have afforded the muslin day dresses she normally wore or the maid whose help she needed to put them on and off. Just like the costumes he insisted she wear when she—

She froze, her fingers stilling at her bodice.

There was no costume behind the screen.

“Maestro?” she called out. Like Jacopo, she’d taken to calling him that. It didn’t come naturally, but calling him Vincenzo didn’t seem to fit either. As for Domenico…well, Constance had called him that, with a familiarity that would never belong to her.

“Yes?”