“It is called ‘Ode to a Lovely Lady.’”
The familiar sweet notes rose against the night and she closed her eyes. The beautiful melody captured her and transported her back to the
Marie
and to Dominic and the island. Even though she’d been in captivity only a few short days, those wonderful times seemed to have been very long ago.
When the music faded away and the applause began, Clare felt a sadness wash over her, but there was happiness, too, in knowing he’d played the composition just for her. She guessed it was Tait’s and Dominic’s way of letting her know they cared. She’d needed buoying after such an emotional evening and being treated to “Ode to Clare” had helped immensely.
The applause finally ended and was followed by Teddy’s farewell to her guests, “Thank you all for coming.
Vive la France!
”
The phrase was echoed again and again by the shouting crowd, and then everyone headed to their carriages and drivers for the journey home.
On the short ride back to the house, Violet said to Clare, “By the way, we’re going to Charleston in the morning and taking the early ferry, so I’ll need you to pack tonight and provide me with enough clothes for a few days. We’ll return Monday, at the latest Tuesday.”
“I wanted to see my children on Sunday, Violet. I haven’t seem them since we sailed to England back in March.”
“Maybe next week. Dot will be traveling with us. I wish to do some shopping and visit the slave market for an estimate on how much she may be worth. If the price is fair we’ll leave her with the owners.”
Clare felt sorry for Dot, but focused on pressing her own case. “I would prefer to remain here and see my children, Violet.”
“I heard you the first time, Clare, but did you hear me?”
When Clare didn’t respond, Violet asked again, “Did you?”
Clare responded tightly, “Yes.”
“I thought you had.”
While Teddy stood on the porch saying good night to the last of her guests, Dominic waited for her to step back inside so that he could thank her for the invitation and then make his own departure.
The news that Clare might be carrying his child filled his heart, and Violet’s stated plan to put his progeny on the block made him want to strangle her on the spot, but he put her out of his mind and mused on Clare. Had they really created a child? Would he be holding a tiny baby girl or boy in his arms sometime in the near future? The prospect was thrilling and humbling. That neither of his parents was alive to help welcome their grandchild to the world sobered him a bit. Were they here, he knew they’d be pleased not only with the child but with the mother. He’d asked Tait to play Clare’s signature tune as a token of his love and to let her know that she was supported and surrounded by those who loved her as well.
Teddy walked through the doors on the heels of that thought, and for a moment she simply studied him with an enigmatic smile. “Thank you for your attendance this evening, Captain.”
“It’s been my pleasure.”
“Do things usually turn out the way you plan them?”
“Most times.”
“They don’t for me.”
Since he had no way of knowing where this might be headed, he went ahead and took the bait. “What do you mean?”
“I think very highly of Clare. I made my niece and nephew an offer for her last fall.”
“Which they refused, I assume, since she is still with them.”
“Yes, but rumor has it that Victor is going under. He’ll need to start selling things, and frankly she’s the most valuable thing they own.”
“Why reveal this to me?”
“In case you decide to take an interest in the child she may be bearing, you’ll need to know her fate.”
“My lack of feelings for Clare notwithstanding, no child of mine will be placed on the auction block.”
“Victor might accept an offer from you.”
Admittedly, it was an avenue Dominic had toyed with. “Then maybe I will take up the subject with him.”
She nodded. “Good night, Captain.”
He bowed and made move to leave, but before he could step out, she added, “And Captain, may the love that binds you and Clare be strong forever.”
He stiffened and turned, but she was climbing the stairs and did not look back.
C
Because of all the stops along the way to pick up other passengers, the ferry ride up the coast to Charleston got them to the city’s docks a bit past midday. The weather was overcast and a bit windy, but only a hurricane would stop Violet from shopping, so they stepped off the ferry and waited for their luggage to be unloaded. Once that was done, Clare walked over to the cabs lined up for hire and made the arrangements to be driven into the city proper.
Violet had the cabdriver stop first at the boardinghouse she always stayed in when in the city, and after securing a room for herself and a place for Clare and Dot in the servant quarters out back, had him drive on to the small, exclusive dressmaker’s shop she loved to frequent. Clare was still angry over not being able to see her children, but had no recourse but to go along.
Inside, the shop owner greeted Violet a bit coolly. “Miss Sullivan. How are you?”
“I’m well, Miss Dexter, and you?” Without bothering to wait for a reply, Violet passed the woman by and went over to view the ready-made gowns on the dress forms. “This is very lovely,” she said, gently flaring the skirt of a brown sateen gown. “How long would it take for this to be fitted and sewn?”
“Less than a week for my clients with accounts that are not in arrears.”
Violet turned.
Miss Dexter said plainly, “You have yet to send payment on the gowns you received last fall, Miss Sullivan, or the one delivered this past February. You assured me at the time that the matter would be resolved. Am I to assume that you are here to take care of the outstanding debt?”
Miss Dexter was known not only for her dressmaking but for being genteel and polite, so for her to publicly shame Violet this way in front of the other patrons milling about the shop spoke to how seriously she was taking the matter of Violet’s unpaid bill.
Clare could tell by the tight set of Violet’s jaw and her red face that she had not been prepared to have her dirty laundry aired for all to hear. Violet considered herself to be a wealthy pillar of society even if, in reality, that was no longer the case.
She trilled, “My brother must have forgotten. I will give him a piece of my mind on your behalf, I assure you, and you will receive the overdue funds by month’s end. Now, as for this gown—”
But Miss Dexter cut her off. “I won’t be offering you any further service until your bill is paid, Miss Sullivan. I run a business, not an almshouse.”
Violet turned scarlet this time, and huffed with offense. “Well, I’ll be sure to patronize someone else in the future. Come, Clare. Come, Dot,” she snapped icily.
Clare and Dot followed her to the door, and as they exited and stepped out onto the street were nearly bowled over by a fair-skinned man and woman passing by. As both parties recovered, Clare froze upon recognizing them. The woman’s eyes widened as she recognized Clare also.
A cold smile came across Sylvie’s face. “Well, if it isn’t our dear Clare. Is this your mistress?”
Violet scanned Sylvie up and down. “I am Violet Sullivan. And you are?”
“A former acquaintance of Clare and her lover LeVeq. Did he finally tire of you, little Clare?”
Violet turned to Clare, “LeVeq? Who is LeVeq!”
Clare’s heart was racing. She saw a light of interest flare in the eyes of the man with Sylvie. She recognized him, too. It was Dominic and Gaspar’s nemesis, Paul Vanweldt.
Sylvie answered helpfully, “Why, he’s the privateer who stole her from her mistress, if the rumors are true.”
“She was stolen from me, but by a man named deMille. He’s in Savannah now.”
Sylvie threw back her head and laughed. “It’s an alias he’s used in the past. You say he’s in Savannah now?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know why?”
“He returned Clare and is there selling smuggled goods. He said he’d tired of her.”
Sylvie shook her head. “I doubt that to be truth, Miss Sullivan. He was very much smitten with your slave, and she with him. He wouldn’t have returned her to you willingly. If he is still in Savannah he is there for a reason that is undoubtedly tied to her.”
Violet turned to Clare. “Is this true? You are lovers!”
Clare didn’t respond.
She grabbed Clare’s arm, nails digging into the skin, “Answer me!” She slapped her. “Answer me, whore!”
Clare’s hand flew to her burning cheek.
“Why is he still here!” Violet demanded.
Violet appeared to have an epiphany and stared at Clare with wide eyes. “It’s those cubs of yours, isn’t it. You came back for them! That’s why he hasn’t sailed! After all my family has done for you!”
She hauled off to slap her again, and Clare blocked the blow and pushed her back. Violet fell. “You struck me? I will sell you, right this minute, you lying whore!”
People were stopping to watch the spectacle along the traffic-heavy thoroughfare.
Vanweldt helped Violet to her feet and said kindly, “Mistress, if you mean what you say, I may be able to assist you. I am a trafficker. I hate LeVeq as much as I am sure you do now. I can arrange for the sale of this traitorous slave to a party in Martinique who would be overjoyed to gain custody of someone LeVeq cares for. In fact, I can pay you good coin for her now, and be reimbursed upon delivery.”
Clare’s whole world began to shake. “No!” she cried out in angry disbelief. “Violet!”
“Silence! How much!”
He whispered a sum into Violet’s ear and she responded with wide eyes. “So much?”
“No, Violet! Don’t do this!”
Vanweldt took a small bag from his pocket and gave it to Violet, and then clamped an iron hold on Clare’s wrist while Sylvie looked on, pleased.
“Let me go!”
Clare wanted to fall to her knees and beg but knew it wouldn’t change things.
The amused Sylvie told Clare, “Who knew that when Paul and I met in Jamaica and found we had a mutual dislike for your lover, that we’d both be able to extract our revenge on him through you? Now we can all sit back and laugh at the idea of him searching frantically for you, but not knowing where to look. I’ll bet his bastard heart will break.”
“Speaking of bastards, she may be breeding,” Violet informed them while she placed the bag of gold in her small knit handbag.
As he scanned what he could see of Clare’s still flat belly within her cloak, Vanweldt’s eyes took on an evil glow. “Even better.”
No one noticed Dot edging towards the road that ran by the front of the shop. Suddenly she bolted into the thick midday traffic, dodging wagons and carriages.
“Get back here!” Violet screamed and took off after her, but she was so angry and focused she didn’t look first, and ran directly into the path of a fast-moving wagon being pulled by four thundering horses. The impact threw her up in the air and then under their powerful hooves. By the time the surprised driver pulled back on the reins it was too late. Passersby hurried to the scene. Sylvie reached her first. The numb Clare watched Sylvie kneel over Violet’s broken corpse, ostensibly to check for vital signs, but in reality she was placing her handbag atop Violet’s. She deftly picked up both, keeping Violet’s smaller one hidden beneath her own. A man claiming to be a doctor came running up, and Sylvie quickly but smoothly backed free of the people now circling the kneeling doctor and the dead Violet.
When Sylvie was again by Vanweldt’s side he said to her quietly, “You are a woman after my own heart.”
“No sense in letting all that gold go to waste. What about the girl?”
“Forget her. By the time she makes her way back to Savannah, if that is indeed where she’s heading, we’ll be halfway to Martinique.” With his hand still clamped on Clare’s arm, he forced her to accompany them away from the scene.
They put her in a carriage driven by the giant dark-skinned mute Clare had last seen with Vanweldt on the deck of the
Amsterdam.
“Dominic will find me and he’ll kill you. Save your lives and let me go.”
“Be quiet,” Vanweldt ordered shortly.
“He wanted to kill you the afternoon he sank the
Amsterdam.”
He turned to her sharply.
“Yes,” she assured him. “I was there on the
Marie
that day. You and what was left of your crew were lucky he let you escape with your lives. I doubt he’ll be so generous again.”
“Quiet!” Sylvie snapped.
“And you, poor, poor Sylvie. Maybe he’ll maroon you. Leave you all alone on a deserted island with only a pistol for comfort. You were his mistress. You know how deadly Dominic can be, especially if it involves someone he cares for, but he doesn’t care for you anymore, does he?”
Clare was struck again, and blood oozed from her split lip, but she wasn’t deterred. “When Dominic finds me, you’ll both beg to be sent to hell.”
The giant drove them through the city to the docks, where she was taken aboard a small ship. While Vanweldt and his crew members got them under way, Clare was below decks being bound hand and foot by the mute. Sylvie was holding a pistol on her, and once Clare was tied, Sylvie told the mute, “Force open her mouth.”
Clare tried to keep her lips and teeth locked but the powerful hand grabbed her by the jaw and the great pressure made her mouth open in response.
Sylvie smiled. “I doubt you can make trouble trussed up as you are, but just in case. This is something Vanweldt uses on difficult slaves.” She poured the foul-tasting draught past her lips, and the struggling Clare had to swallow or choke.
Moments later the cabin began to spin, or was it her head, Clare couldn’t tell, but before she could make sense of it, the world went dark.
A few hours past dark, Gaspar boarded the moored sloop followed by a young girl. The worried look he wore when he entered the cabin immediately grabbed Dominic’s attention. “What’s happened?”
“I’m not certain, but she is anxious to speak with you.”
“Your name, my dear?”
“Dot. Please, sir, you have to help her!”
“Who?”
“Miss Clare. Miss Violet sold her. I tried to get here as fast as I could, but—”
“Sold her! When?” He looked to Gaspar. “Gather the others.”
Dominic gestured her to a seat in his cabin. She had tears in her eyes.
“Now, start again and from the beginning.”
Dot told him the story beginning with the early morning ferry ride to Charleston and ending with Clare’s sale and Violet being struck by the horses. “I don’t know how badly she was hurt. I ran. Once I got back to the dock, I convinced a fishing boat going to Savannah that I’d gotten separated from my master and needed to get home, and they brought me, so then I came here.”
“You did well, Dot.” And she had. “You said the woman at the shop called the man with her Paul? Can you describe him?”
She did. “He claimed to be a trafficker. The woman with him, she never said her name but she said she knew you and Miss Clare, and that she and the man Paul had met in Jamaica.”
“Sylvie and Vanweldt,” Dominic spat. It had to have been they.
By then, the others had entered and Dominic hastily filled them in. Their faces were torn between concern and fury.
“Did he say where he might be taking her?” he asked.
“Martinique. He said he knew someone who’d enjoy owning someone that you cared for.”
“Eduard,” Gaspar bit out. “I’ll bet my share it’s him.”
Dominic’s tightened jaw throbbed with emotion.
Esteban said, “I’ll ready the sloop.”
“Good.”
He hastened back up to the deck.
Dominic focused again on Dot. “We will find Miss Clare, but I don’t wish to leave you here in Savannah unprotected. Do you wish to sail with us?”
“Will I be free?”
“Yes.”
“Then yes. I’ll sail.”
“Richmond, you, Tait, and Sam stay here. Hide her well. Everyone else with me.”
“Where are we going?” Gaspar asked.
“To get the children. Then home for the
Marie.”
“You should have killed Vanweldt when you had the chance.”
“I’ve no time for hindsight, brother, but you are correct.”
They hurried to the livery for horses.
Calhoun said, “You seem to be in an all-fired hurry, deMille.”
“We are, but we’ll be returning shortly.”
Once the horses were saddled, Dominic, Esteban, James, and Washington Julian tore out for the Hampton home.
Dominic was sick inside. The woman he loved was in the hands of Vanweldt. He knew the Dutchman would take a perverse joy in inflicting whatever harm or terror he could as a means to strike back at him, and putting Clare in the clutches of his snake of a brother would be the ultimate revenge for both men, and for Sylvie. However, Dominic hoped they knew they would be paying for this perfidy with their lives because ultimately and eventually they would.
Arriving at the Hampton home they saw no lights inside. Either no one was home or they were sleeping. Dominic thought the latter. The house was located on the edge of the property; the fields and, he assumed, the slave quarters were situated in the back.
“Do we have a plan?” Gaspar asked.
“No,” Dominic said, getting off his horse. “We go in, put a pistol to their heads, and demand the children. We’ve no time for politeness.”
Gaspar grinned. “Aye, sir.”
A sharp rap on the door brought a sleepy, middle-aged slave to the threshold. He raised the candle boat in his hand in an effort to see the visitors. A pistol pointed at his face appeared out of the dark. His eyes widened and his hand holding the candle began to shake.
“Get your master. Now. Do not tell him we are armed or it will cost you and him your lives.”