Defiant: 5 (Noble Passions) (4 page)

With something resembling a screech, Prudence Billingsly
shot to her feet and, after pushing the cabin boy out of her way and muttering
something about her smelling salts, she quit the room in a flurry of muslin.

Billingsly glanced around the table and grimaced. “Well,” he
huffed. “I’d better go with her.” But still, he sat. For longer than was
precisely necessary.

“I should be going too,” Wrotham said, setting his serviette
on the table and bowing to them all. “Thank you very much for dinner.”

Silence descended as the door shut behind the lot of them.
And then MacDougal barked a laugh and clapped Ned on the shoulder. “Thank you,
my boy. Thank you.”

Ned hid his grin. “What did I do?”

“You performed a miracle. No doubt I won’t have to suffer
through one more meal with that woman. And her drudge of a husband.” He
chortled to himself.

“Would you like us to leave?” Ned asked. Manners demanded he
do so.

“Oh God, no. You two are my kind of men. We can talk and
drink all night without worry of offending a tender spirit.” He grinned. “I
refer, of course, to Wrotham. Prim bugger, ain’t he?”

Ned shrugged. It was hard to tell since he hadn’t said much.

But apparently MacDougal didn’t require an answer of any
kind. He lifted his cup. “Andrew. Boy! Come give us a refill,” he called to his
cabin boy.

“Yes sir.”

The voice was low and gruff but it sent a shiver through Ned’s
bowels…because he recognized it. His head whipped up and he looked at the cabin
boy. Really looked.

On the face of it, he was a slender lad with raggedly
chopped blond hair, baggy clothes and a scruffy face beneath a pulled-down cap.
But if one knew what one was looking for, one would see it.

The bluer than blue eyes, thick dark lashes, high
cheekbones.

But it was the dent in her chin that gave Sophia away.

Ned stared at her as horror curled through his gut. Horror
that she was here, posing as a cabin boy, for sure. Horror at what Ewan would
say when she turned up missing, or what he would do when she turned up missing
with
him
.

However, the true horror making him want to lose the meal he’d
just eaten was the unspeakable tragedy, the appalling fact that Sophia St.
Andrews had chopped off all her hair.

“What the hell are you doing here?” He tried to quell the
panic in his voice as he shot to his feet. He failed.

She did not answer. Merely fixed those limpid eyes on him
and batted her lashes. Batted. Her. Lashes.

His horror was replaced by raging fury. And fear. A hard,
cold fear he hadn’t felt since Edward took them in off the streets. Did she not
know how dangerous it was for a girl, a girl as beautiful as she, on a ship
filled with bawdy men? Did she not realize the peril she was in?

And not just from the randy tars on this ship.

She was in danger from him. His palm itched to give her a
walloping she would never forget. He longed to bend her over his knee.

MacDougal glanced from one to the other. “Do you know him?”
he asked.

“Indeed I do.” Ned shot a frown at Percy. “Could you give us
a moment of privacy, please?” MacDougal had to be told about this dangerous
cargo he carried, had to be convinced to turn this ship around at once, but Ned
did not care to share the truth of Sophia’s identity with all and sundry.

Percy, the ass that he was, grinned and leaned back in his
chair, crossing his arms. “No,” he said. “I think not.”

Ned was possessed of the urge to kick the legs out from
under him. For one thing, how rude. And for another, he did not like the way
Percy’s assessing gaze was raking his…raking Sophia.

MacDougal tossed back his drink and gestured for another.
Ned frowned. The man had had too much already in Ned’s estimation. He was the
captain of the ship, for pity sake. They were heading into a squall. He should
be stone-cold sober. Aside from which, the thought of Sophia in the presence of
a drunk MacDougal turned his blood to ice.

“Well, I fail to see the problem,” he said with a casual
grin.

Ned’s fingers curled as he resisted the urge to pound it off
his face. “You fail to see the problem?”

“Yes,” the captain said as Sophia refilled his glass. “The
boy came with a letter of introduction from the McCloud himself.”

Ned narrowed his eyes at Sophia. “Oh really?”

She nodded.

It didn’t help.

“I’ll wager it was forged.”

Her shoulder lifted in an unrepentant apology.

“Forged?” MacDougal wiped his face with a broad palm. “Why
do you say that?”

Ned collapsed in his chair. His knees would no longer hold
him. He did not cease glaring at Sophia, which, unaccountably, seemed to amuse
her. “Because your boy is not a boy.”

“What?”

“Your boy is a girl.”

MacDougal paled. His gaze shot to Sophia. “No.”

“It gets worse.”

“Worse?”

“She is the McCloud’s sister.”

MacDougal’s throat worked. His lips flapped. And then,
finally, “Fuck me. Oh. Fuck me.”

Percy chortled. “Famous!”

Ned glowered at him. And then at her. “What were you
thinking, Sophia?”

She tipped up her chin. “What do you think I was thinking?”

“Stop playing games.”

Her grin evaporated. She leaned on the table and glared at
him. “Oh, this is no game, Ned. He was going to force me to marry Dittenham.”

“He wouldn’t have.”

“Bah. You hardly know him. When he gets that look in his
eye… I would have been Lady Dittenham in a fortnight. And smelling of fish.”

“Dittenham does rather smell of fish,” Percy said somberly.

Sophia nodded her thanks to Percy and then had the gall to
smile at him. It sent shivers up Ned’s spine. He growled at Percy and then
whipped back to her. He waggled his finger, though it reminded him of Edward.
Reminded him he’d sworn never to waggle like that. “Your brother must be beside
himself.”

“I left a note.”

“A note?” His voice warbled in the soprano of an exotic
bird. “What did it say?”

She tapped her lips, making him antsy. The sight of her
finger, her lips—

“What did it say?”

“Don’t bark, Ned. There’s no need to be rude.”

“What. Did. The. Note. Say?” he ground out between his
teeth.

“It said something along the lines of…
I don’t care to
smell of fish
. Although who would, really?”

“Did you tell him where you were going?”

“Heavens, no!” She sputtered a laugh. “He would have
followed.”

“Damn straight he would have followed.” And dragged her
back—

His thoughts stalled as he realized, all of a sudden, the
import of what had happened. She was here. With him. Alone.

Well, not precisely alone, but neither Ewan nor Edward were
here.

And he hadn’t lost her forever. Not yet.

An inappropriate excitement fluttered in his breast.

No. No. No.

He wasn’t good enough for her, he reminded himself.

That
was the issue. Not propinquity.

That and the fact she was not safe.

“We shall turn back at once,” MacDougal said. He had gone a
trifle pale.

Sophia blew out a sigh. “Don’t be ridiculous. We’re halfway
to Italy.”

MacDougal glared at her. “How do you know where we are?”

She gestured to the charts on the desk. “I can read.”

“Really?” Percy perked up. “You can read charts?”

“Naturally.”

Again she smiled at him and he smiled back and, without
thought, Ned did kick the legs out from beneath his chair. He fell back with a
thud. Sophia shot Ned a reproving look and tsked.

“We’re going back.” MacDougal scraped at his beard with his
nails as though he might want to rip it off. “But in the meantime…” His gaze
rounded the table and landed on Ned. “Where shall she sleep?”

“Sleep? Where has she been sleeping?”

MacDougal went a little green and waved to a hammock
swinging in the corner.

Ned’s belly dropped. His vision blurred. His fists clenched
tighter. He glared at MacDougal. “
With you?
” he spat.

“I dinna know!” Like a trapped rat, he cast about for some
escape. “She’s nae sleeping here now.”

“She can sleep with me,” Percy offered.

Ned had no idea how his hands came to be around Percy’s
throat. His friend’s croaked “only kidding” brought Ned ’round before he choked
the life from him, but barely.

“Don’t even joke about it,” Ned snarled.

“All right. All right. Let me go.”

Ned did. Percy collapsed onto the floor.

“She will have to sleep with you,” MacDougal said.

Ned whirled around, trepidation flaring. “What?”

“It only makes sense. You’re her relation.”

Horror. Utter horror.

“We’re only related by marriage,” he growled and then winced
as Sophia flinched at his tone.

“I can sleep with the men,” she said. “There’s plenty of
room down below.”

“No.” Three male voices croaked in tandem.

“She will sleep with you, Wyeth,” MacDougal said. “And that’s
final.” When Ned shot him a panicked look, he shrugged. “It’s only for three
nights.” But it was a thin consolation.

Ned walked Sophia back to his room, annoyed that he was
shaking. He wasn’t sure what upset him more. The stark reality of what she’d
done, the fear churning in his gut or his lust. How he was going to sleep for
the next three nights with her so close was a mystery.

Well, no. It wasn’t.

He wouldn’t sleep.

Not a wink.

He opened the door and pushed her in. She stopped in her tracks.
Her nose wrinkled. “What is that smell?”

He pushed her deeper into the room. “Never mind.” The last
thing he wanted to admit right now was his humiliation in the face of the
churning sea.

Though it seemed he didn’t need to admit it. Sophia was a clever
girl. She worked it out for herself. “Have you been ill? Is that why I haven’t
seen you on the decks?”

He stared at her. “You’ve been on the decks?”

“Of course I have.” She tossed her head in that way she had.
The way that would send her curls bobbing. If she had some. Another wave of
remorse for those silver locks swept through him. Ewan was going to kill her
for that alone.

On the positive side, the prince would probably no longer
want her. She looked enough like a boy to pass as one. If he hadn’t known her,
he might have been fooled.

“It was wonderful,” she said with an impish grin. “I climbed
the mainsa’l.”

His heart stuttered. The thought of Sophia high on the mast,
clinging to a thin rope, horrified him. “You climbed the mainsa’l?”

“That’s what they call it, you know. The mainsa’l. I could
see forever. The wind whipping past. It was glorious.”

“Don’t ever do that again.”

“Ned, you better sit down. You don’t look well.”

“Sophia—”

She put out a lip. “You’re starting to sound just like Ewan.”

Hell and damnation. He was beginning to understand Ewan,
that raging look of dread in his eyes, his incessant warbling.

He grabbed an extra blanket from the bed and threw himself
into the chair. “You take the bed. I’ll sleep here.”

Her eyes widened. “You can’t sleep on that chair. You’ll
fall over.”

“I’ll survive.” He dragged his trunk over and propped his
feet on it and then tried to make himself comfortable. He covered himself with
the blanket. Would that he could hide. “When you’re ready, blow out the lamp.”

It swung above the bed on a hook, casting eerie shadows. She
frowned at him but did so, and with that puff the shadows were gobbled up by
pitch black.

Ned shivered as he listened to her nestling into the bed.
The sound of the sheets and covers raked on his nerves. She would be warm and
soft to sleep next to. He scuttled the thought as his cock rose.

Damn it all to hell anyway. What had he ever done to deserve
this? Bad enough they had to sleep in the same cramped room but to have to
listen to her—rustling about and
breathing
—wanting her as he did. It was
torture to be sure.

He reminded himself this was the best solution. Now that
MacDougal knew she was a woman, there was no way he could allow her to stay in
his room. And Percy—well, that did not bear thinking about. They could have
asked Billingsly to move out, he supposed, and let Sophia sleep with Prudence,
but that thought made his gut clench as well.

This was the best option by far. For everyone. Everyone but
him.

At least he could keep an eye on her.

Or so he thought until he sputtered awake hours later to
find her gone.

* * * * *

Sophia stood on the bow of the boat in the dark as the wind
and rain lashed her face. She loved it. Loved it. Not only was the storm
elemental and fierce, it hid her tears.

Surely she hadn’t expected Ned to greet her with open arms.
Not when she had barged in on his adventure as she had. But she certainly hadn’t
expected him to be so horrid. His expression had devastated her.

Foolish girl
, it said.

But then her heart agreed.

She was foolish.

Foolish to ever think that he—

“You’re soaked.”

She whirled around though she knew what she’d see. More
glowering.

She was right.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“I’m reveling.” She thrust out her chin in case he didn’t
believe her.

He gaped at her. “Reveling?”

“Yes.” She didn’t mean to shout but his wintry demeanor
annoyed her tremendously. She threw out her arms. “Look at this!”

“It’s a storm.”

“It’s beautiful. The waves are wild, untamed—”

“You could be swept overboard.”

“The wind is howling and the rain is savage. It’s glorious.”

“It’s freezing. Come inside.”

“It’s not freezing. It’s summer.”

“
I’m
cold.”

“Then
you
go inside.”

“Sophia Fiona—”

“Don’t call me that.”

“It’s your name.”

“You sound like Ewan.”

“I’m starting to think Ewan is a saint.”

She glared at him. “What a beastly thing to say.” She hated
that her chin wobbled a little. Hated that he winced.

“I’m sorry, Sophia. This has been trying for me.” He sluiced
the water from his face. “Won’t you please come inside?”

“All right. Fine.”

“You will?”

“You did say please.”

He blew out a breath and offered her his arm.

She frowned at it. “I’m a cabin boy, remember? You don’t
offer a cabin boy your arm.” When he didn’t lower it, she smacked it. “Someone
will see.”

That caught his attention and he slowly lowered his arm. “Right,
then. Come inside.” He followed her back to the cabin, his stride decidedly
unsteady. If anyone was tipping overboard, it was most likely
him
.

When she once again stood in his chambers, she realized the
folly of her actions. She hadn’t brought a change of clothes and she was
drenched. So was he. Without a word, he relit the lamp and then opened his
trunk and pulled out several shirts, two of which he tossed to her. “Change.”

That was it. One word. Just “change” and then he presented
her with his back. She huffed a breath but did as he asked because she was
really rather cold. The feel of the cloth falling over her chilled flesh warmed
her. Because it was his shirt. It had touched his skin. She wasn’t sure why the
thought sent heat scudding through her belly.

“Use the other shirt to dry your hair,” he suggested as he
began toweling off as well.

She huffed a laugh. “All of your clothes will be wet.”

“They’ll dry. Are you clothed?”

“Yes.”

He turned. And froze. His gaze locked onto her bare legs. “I-I
thought you said you were clothed.” A squawk.

“I am.” But the intensity of his stare made her
self-conscious so she slipped into the bed.

“Close your eyes,” he said as he unbuttoned the damp linen
clinging to his chest.

“Why?”

“I need to change as well. I’m f-freezing.”

“All right.” She did. But she peeped.

He ripped off his wet shirt and her breath caught at the
sight of his broad back. Muscles rippled as he moved and she swallowed. He was
beautiful. He tugged the fresh shirt over his head and she nearly whimpered as
that magnificent vision disappeared. But then he unfastened his trousers.