How would she get there? Amanda thought for a moment, and then the solution appeared. Zeke was leaving tomorrow—today—for England. If he would take her with him and deposit her at Lands End …
But first she had to get away from Matt. Her head was tucked cozily beneath his chin so that she couldn’t see his face, but his deep, even breathing indicated he was still asleep. Even as she listened, a shallow snore confirmed her supposition. All she had to do was get out of the bed without waking him, dress, fling some clothes into a bag, and leave. But she had to hurry. If she knew aught about ships Zeke’s would sail at dawn.
It was a beautiful day, bright and sunny, the antithesis of Amanda’s mood. The
Eloise
had been at sea for ten days; Amanda stood at the rail, staring glumly at the sparkling blue waves as they rolled and curled as far as the eye could see. She had achieved her goal: she had left Matt and was returning now to the convent. But she was miserable. And beginning to wonder if leaving Matt hadn’t been a dreadful mistake.
Zeke had tried to talk her out of it. He had almost refused to take her with him, but at the end desperation had sent two big tears coursing down her cheeks, and, like his brother, Zeke was not proof against feminine tears. So he had allowed her on board, and the
Eloise
had sailed with the dawn. Since then, Zeke had grown progressively gloomier. He seemed to feel, like Amanda, that he had made a dreadful mistake.
To make matters worse, Amanda had been suffering from seasickness for almost the last week. Which was ridiculous, as the sea was as smooth as glass. But she was nauseated much of the time, unable to eat the shipboard fare. Zeke, becoming aware of her distress, had special dishes made up for her to tempt her appetite, but they suffered the same dismal fate as everything else she ate. Amanda supposed that her stomach must be reacting to her inner distress. It seemed that her whole body was rebelling against leaving Matt.
“
Amanda.
” Zeke was coming down the stairs from the quarterdeck. Amanda turned to smile at him, unaware that she was so pale that she looked almost ghostly, and that her eyes were made even larger by the dark smudges beneath them. In the simple lavender-striped muslin day dress she wore, she looked almost fragile, her waist made tiny by the lavender sash, the dropped neckline revealing the delicate bones in her shoulders.
“You look ghastly,” he said bluntly, crossing to stand beside her and looking down at her with concern. Amanda made a face at him.
“Thank you. You do know how to charm a lady.”
He responded with a wry smile, reminding her so much of Matt that she felt a pang. She averted her eyes from his narrow face to stare again at the sea.
“Benson, the cook, tells me that you didn’t eat anything again this morning.”
“What is the use? You know as well as I that whatever I eat will come right back up again. Besides, I wasn’t hungry.”
“If you don’t eat, you’ll make yourself ill.”
“I’m ill now.” That indisputable truth silenced him momentarily. Amanda knew he was genuinely concerned about her, and she appreciated it, but she was so miserable that she didn’t want to talk about it. The state of her stomach was an annoyance, but it was not the worst of her distress. Her damaged heart was that.
“Amanda.” Zeke’s normally confident voice was oddly hesitant. It arrested Amanda’s attention, and she turned to look at him, her brows lifted questioningly. She had not bothered to dress her hair that morning, had only run a brush through the thick waves and secured them back from her face with a lavender ribbon. The simple style made her look even younger than she was, and Zeke’s frown deepened.
“Yes?” she said when it appeared that he wasn’t going to say anything more. His eyes slid from her face to the sea, and he looked distinctly uncomfortable. Amanda’s puzzlement grew.
“Amanda, forgive me for asking this, but … how long has it been since you’ve had your monthly time?” His face was scarlet as he put the question, and his eyes remained firmly fixed on the sea. Amanda blushed, too. A gentleman did not ask such a thing. Indeed, Amanda, like most of her sex, liked to think that men had almost no knowledge of a woman’s bodily functions.
“I don’t think that is your concern,” she began stiffly. He turned to look at her, his expression intent, although the embarrassed color remained in his face.
“Do think about it, Amanda,” he said softly, looking grave. It had been a while, she remembered. Not since before Matt had had her dragooned aboard the
Clorimunda
…
“Oh, no,” she whispered, appalled.
“My God,” Zeke groaned, the color fading from his face. Apparently her horror-stricken voice was all the answer he needed. “I knew I should never have brought you with me. Matt will have my head on a platter when he finds out about this. You’re carrying his child, and I’m taking you halfway around the world.”
“It’s nothing to do with him.” Amanda raised her chin defiantly. Now was not the time to dwell on what she had discovered, to think what she would do now that she knew she was expecting a child. Under the circumstances, she could not even be sure that the convent would take her in. An unmarried girl who was with child—it was the ultimate in disgrace.
“You don’t know much about it if you think that.” Zeke’s voice was dry. Amanda glared at him, blushed, and turned to stare back out to sea. “Well, there’s no help for it. You won’t be disembarking, my girl. You’re coming back to New Orleans with me.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Oh, yes, you are. Like it or not, you’re carrying my brother’s child. That makes you my responsibility until you are safely back with Matt.”
“I don’t
want
to go back to Matt.”
“But, you
will.
” They glared at each other. Then Zeke’s eyes gentled. “He’ll marry you, Amanda, you’ll see. Matt wouldn’t be Matt if he didn’t do the honorable thing.”
That flicked Amanda on a raw spot. She didn’t
want
him to do the honorable thing. She wanted him to
love
her, damn it.
“I don’t want him to do the honorable thing! He’s already offered to, and I refused him.”
“He asked you to marry him?” If possible, Zeke sounded more appalled than she had when the significance of her missed courses had become clear to her. “You didn’t tell me that.”
“You didn’t ask me.”
Zeke looked harassed. “Knowing Matt, it never occurred to me that he’d propose marriage to you—not without a compelling reason. He thinks marriage is a trap for fools—he’s told me so times out of mind.”
“Then I’m more glad than ever that I refused him,” Amanda answered harshly.
Zeke groaned, rolling his eyes upward in a silent plea for strength before looking at Amanda again.
“I knew I should have steered clear of this. Damn it, Matt will have my hide, and I won’t blame him. Why the hell didn’t you tell me he wanted to marry you? I’d never have let you come aboard if I’d known. Instead you cried to get your own way.” He sounded thoroughly disgusted.
“It worked, didn’t it?” Amanda glared at him. His attitude infuriated her. Because she was carrying Matt’s child, Zeke was ready to hand her over to Matt, lock, stock, and barrel. But she wasn’t having any of that, thank you very much. Matt might be hard to defy, but she wasn’t about to knuckle under to Zeke.
“God, I see now what my brother was up against. I’m surprised he hasn’t strangled you. I’m tempted to myself.”
“Just you try, Zeke Grayson.” Amanda tilted her chin at him belligerently.
Zeke stared down at her small, slender frame and had to laugh. “Matt told me you were a termagant, but I didn’t believe him. Seems I’ve wronged him all around.”
“I won’t go back to him, Zeke.” Amanda’s anger had faded, and she spoke with quiet determination. Zeke’s eyes turned serious, too, as they met hers.
“I thought you loved him.” He spoke so quietly that Amanda wasn’t prepared for the way the words stabbed at her heart. She turned away to look out to sea, not wanting him to see her face.
“Amanda?”
Amanda swallowed, then made an impatient gesture. “That’s the problem—I do.”
“God preserve me from women,” Zeke muttered, putting his hands on her shoulders and turning her to face him. “Now, let me understand this: you love him, he wants to marry you, and that’s the problem?”
Amanda met his steady gaze, and despite everything she could do, her lower lip quivered. “He doesn’t love me,” she explained softly.
Zeke’s hands tightened on her shoulders, comforting her without words. “Are you sure?”
Amanda nodded miserably. Zeke started to say something, only to be interrupted by a cry from overhead.
“
Sail ho.
”
Immediately Zeke looked around, his expression changing dramatically.
“Where away?” he called back to the sailor high aloft in the crow’s nest.
“Astern,” came the answer, and unaccountably Zeke began to grin.
“Come,” he said to Amanda, wrapping an arm around her waist and pulling her with him toward the quarterdeck. Once they were standing on the raised platform, Zeke let go of Amanda and seized a spyglass. Striding to the rail, he peered in the direction of the stern.
“Christ, it’s too far away to be sure,” he said disgustedly, lowering the glass.
“Be sure of what?” Amanda asked, mystified. Zeke waved an impatient hand at her.
“I’ll tell you when I’m sure, which won’t be for a couple of hours.”
And despite her teasing, that was all he would say. It was rather more than a couple of hours before the ship came close enough so that Amanda could get an inkling of what he was talking about. She stayed on the quarterdeck for most of that time, scowling off and on at Zeke, who seemed oddly lighthearted. The ship behind them was at first no more than a tiny dot on the horizon, but gradually it grew until Amanda could see that it was much like the
Eloise
and the
Clorimunda,
a three-masted, high-prowed ship, elegant and graceful. Zeke seemed in no hurry to pull away from it, so Amanda deduced that he must know it for a friend. But he refused to answer any of her questions; instead he grinned maddeningly.
The sun was just beginning to sink below the horizon, bathing the sky and the sea and both ships with an orange glow, when the other ship pulled alongside. Watching, Amanda saw a sailor in the other ship’s crow’s nest wave two flags at them in a complicated pattern.
“Captain, he wants to come aboard,” the sailor in the
Eloise
’s crow’s nest called down to Zeke.
“He does, does he?” Zeke grinned. “Let’s make him work for it. Tell him no, Darcy.”
“Aye, sir.” But the man sounded dubious. Amanda turned to Zeke, still puzzled. Then came an earsplitting boom, and she turned back just in time to watch a round black missile arch over the
Eloise
’s prow. On the deck of the other ship, smoke billowed from the mouth of a small cannon.
“Zeke, they’re
shooting
at us,” Amanda exclaimed in horror.
Zeke grinned. “A warning shot over the bow only,” he explained, his voice soothing. Then he grinned again. “He must be angry as hell.”
“Who?” Amanda was still mystified. Zeke, shouting an order to heave to, didn’t answer. She turned to look at the approaching ship again.
Rosimond
was the name on the prow. Thinking further about Zeke’s odd reaction, she began now to have the faintest niggle of an alarming suspicion …
Zeke had left her side to see to the lowering of sails and anchor. Amanda turned back to watch as a small boat was lowered from the
Rosimond
’s deck. Three men climbed down a ladder from the deck to drop into the boat. Two began to row toward the
Eloise
while the other stood in the prow with one foot propped on the forward seat and his arms crossed over his chest. Even at that distance he looked furious—and familiar.
“Zeke, it’s
Matt.
” Zeke had come to stand beside her again. He was grinning, and at the horror in her voice his grin widened.
“It is,” he said, sounding amused. “Come, let’s meet him. Amanda, stay close to me, and allow me to do the talking. Agreed?”
Amanda looked at him. In that instant all her suspicions crystallized into certainty. “You knew he was coming, didn’t you?” she said accusingly.
“Shall we say I hoped.” Zeke slid his arm around her waist and propelled her with him toward the sailors who were lowering a ladder over the side.
Matt was the first one up the ladder. As he pulled himself up and over the side, Amanda stared at his face. It was black with temper. Instinctively she shrank against Zeke, who still had his arm fixed comfortingly around her waist. Matt looked up, saw them, and strode toward them.
“You son of a bitch,” he roared at Zeke when he was still some paces away. “What the hell do you mean, sending me a message that you’ve run off with Amanda?”
“It took you a long while to respond,” Zeke replied mildly. The grin still played around the corners of his mouth. Matt glared at him, stalking across the deck until the two men stood eyeball to eyeball. Matt was some two inches taller than Zeke, and much broader and more muscular. Clad in a billowing white shirt and snug black breeches and boots, with his silvery eyes blazing murder and his mouth set in a hard, forbidding line, Matt looked capable of any violence. Standing slightly behind Zeke, ignored by Matt except for a single, searing glance, Amanda shivered. She was glad that all that fire and brimstone was not directed at herself.
“The only damned ship in port was being keelhauled,” Matt growled. “Or I would have been here much sooner, I assure you. Damn it, Zeke, I should thrash you for all the trouble you’ve put me to.”
“You didn’t have to come,” Zeke pointed out.
Matt snarled at him. “You knew damned well I would. Amanda is mine, and I don’t share. Not even with you, brother.”
One of Zeke’s sandy eyebrows lifted in a quizzical gesture so reminiscent of Matt’s that Amanda was struck again by the elusive resemblance. “Perhaps you should ask Amanda how she feels about that.”