Authors: Miranda Jarrett
Tags: #Fiction, #Romance, #Historical, #General
Double blast Lily for doing that to her own sister!
"Of course I wish you to be happy, my dear captain," said Lily, unperturbed and unrepentant. "That is the point of this whole exercise between us, isn't it? Though I'll vow you're doing a remarkably fine job at present of making my sister quite, quite gladful. La, who would have guessed she'd blossom so!"
Nick lifted his head from Rose to glower at Lily, counting on that fearsome, unspoken warning that had sent so many sailors scurrying and quivering to obey to do the same with her.
Of course, Lily being Lily, it made no impression at all.
"It's not this foolish trick to blackmail me, if that's what you're thinking," she said mildly. "I told you before that the only thing you can do to make me leave is to improve yourself, and Lord knows you've still a way to go. And I told you, too, that I've no control over Rose's life in the slightest. As her sister I'm not overpleased with her losing her maidenhead to you in a brothel bedchamber, but I can't stop her. At least I suppose it's better you than Lord Eliot, though she'll be in for pots and pots of trouble if he ever finds out."
Nick shut his eyes and tried to concentrate on Rose, not Lily. If he tried hard enough to ignore her, he reasoned as he ground his teeth, perhaps she'd give up and go away.
But Lily only clucked her tongue. "You can be as rude as you please, my dear Nick, but you won't shed me until I've said my piece. I don't care how you do this to my sister. It's the
why
that worries me, because you don't know why yourself. Randy and virile you doubtless are—most wondrously virile! —but lust alone isn't making you do this. And until you can sort out your reasons, you truly must not be on this bed with my sister wriggling beneath you."
In another room, a woman screamed, then another, and the frightened, urgent voices of men urging calm. "For God's sake, it's a fire!" shouted someone at last, his voice cracking with fear. "Fire, here!"
Lily beamed proudly. "Why, I do believe someone's been careless with a candle," she said. "Fancy being so distracted as not to notice when the bedclothes are on fire! I hope your friend Cassie pays her jolly hussies what they're worth."
Nick groaned. He could smell the smoke himself now, and the confusion of screams, running footsteps and conflicting, shouted orders was growing louder by the minute.
"I shouldn't tarry if I were you," advised Lily, already fading away herself. "As warm as you've made things here for yourselves, I'll wager they'll get too hot even for you if you remain much longer."
"What's wrong?" asked Rose as she reached up to lightly stroke his cheek, sensing rather than understanding the change in Nick. "Something's happening, isn't it?"
All too aware of what he was giving up, Nick turned his mouth to kiss her fingers, then swore and rolled to one side, reaching for his breeches. "I'm sorry, sweetheart, but we're going to have to leave."
"I'd rather not," she said wistfully as she watched him dress, curling herself tight to hold on to the fading warmth his body had brought to hers. Instinctively she knew she'd come close, so close, to understanding one of her life's greatest mysteries, and her body quivered and ached with unfulfillment. "That is, I wish to stay if you do, too."
"There's no wishing about it, Rose." Lily had been right, the devil take her cursed wings. They didn't have much time left to escape, for now he could hear the muffled crackle of flames. "Dress yourself, lass, quickly now. This whole bloody place's on fire."
"On
fire?"
How could she have been so besotted that she hadn't noticed the terrified wails and the smoke that was beginning to drift into the room under the door? With a frightened yelp she grabbed for her clothes, struggling into them as quickly as she could. Shrugging on her coat, she ran to the door.
"Nay, Rose, leave it!" shouted Nick as he tore down the last of the bed's hangings. "There's too much smoke to try the stairs. We'll do better over the rail. Come now, hurry!"
The smoke stung her eyes and burned at her lungs. Coughing, she turned in time to see Nick tying one edge of the bed curtains to one of the white-painted columns of the piazza. He tested the knot with a quick jerk, tossed the bundled fabric over the railing, and held his hand out to her.
Coughing and wheezing, she peered over the edge. They were at least twenty feet above the gravel garden walk, and the knotted bed curtains swaying gently from the railing seemed to her even less substantial than the rope ladder on board the
Angel Lily
. She didn't want to do this, and she wasn't sure she could. But now she realized that the dull roar she'd been hearing was the fire itself, and the sharp, brittle pops were the sound of the house's windows exploding with the heat. Shoving her hair back from her face, she bravely swung one leg over the rail.
But then Nick's hands were around her waist, pulling her back and into his arms. "Put your hands around my shoulders," he ordered. "Hang on tight, sweetheart."
Without pausing to think she did as she was told, clinging to him with her legs around his waist as well for good measure. She gasped when he took them over the rail, swinging out easily to brace his feet against the white pillar as he held the knotted red curtain, and then she made the mistake of looking down at the ground spinning dizzily so far beneath them.
"For God's sake, Rose," rasped Nick, "don't throttle me!"
"But I don't
—
"
"Don't argue!" he ordered, his voice strained. "I've run through rigging my whole blessed life, but I've got to have some air to do it!"
"Aye, aye," she said miserably as she tried to shift her grasp to please him. She squeezed her eyes shut and buried her face against Nick's hair for good measure, still hanging on to him for dear life—a life that seemed to become more and more dear by the moment. At last, she heard the gravel crunch beneath his feet.
"Oh, Nick," she began as she slid down his body to stand on her own shaky legs. "How can I—"
"Damnation, Rose, not yet," he ordered, and seizing her hand he guided her through the garden to the gate in the wall and to the safety of the street.
Once outside, he stopped, taking both her hands as he anxiously searched her face. "You're not hurt, are you?" he demanded hoarsely. "Not too much smoke?"
She shook her head. Bits of cinder and ash drifted in the air like gray-and-black snow, and all around them people were shouting and running with more buckets to fight the fire, but to her there was no one else than this tall, soot-covered man gently rubbing his thumbs into the underside of her wrists.
"Oh, Nick, you know I'm fine," she said. She coughed again and lifted her shoulder to wipe her face with her sleeve. "Look at me. How could I be better, considering?"
He frowned. " 'Tis my fault. I should never have taken you there in the first place."
"True enough. You shouldn't have." She smiled shyly. "But I'm vastly glad you did."
"Vastly?"
"
Vastly
vastly." Her smile wavered a fraction. She wasn't quite as fine as she might wish—she'd been too frightened for that—but she wasn't about to tell him that. "You took very good care of me, you know, saving me like that. You're the one who did all the work."
"Not quite all, Rosie." He grinned wickedly, his teeth white in his black-streaked face, his eyes brilliantly green. "I promise you'll have the rest soon enough."
Before she could answer he swept her into his arms and kissed her hard, lifting her feet from the ground as he took away what little breath she had left. He laughed when he set her back down and the best she could do was to grin stupidly in return.
She tried to remember back to that morning, when all she thought lay before her was another endless day in the little cabin with only herself for company. Instead she'd been saved from toppling overboard, attacked by street thieves, brought close to losing her virginity in a brothel and carried down the wall of a burning building. Yet to Nick it seemed to be normal enough, nothing to remark, and as he took her hand to lead her to the street in front of the burning house, she wondered if every day for him was as exciting as this. Her heart still pounding, she tightened her fingers around his and prayed she'd have the chance to find out.
Cassie was standing beneath a palmetto tree, forlornly clutching a dark green dressing gown about her shoulders as she watched the fire with her girls weeping and sobbing in a circle around her. Standing with his arm around Cassie was a stout man who'd lost his wig, shoes and neck cloth, a gentleman whom Nick recognized as a Carolina delegate to the Continental Congress. Not that Nick would be so tactless as to greet the man, but it pleased him that Cassie's friends stayed by her no matter the circumstances. Needless to say, he intended to do the same, especially since he was, through Lily, responsible for the fire in the first place.
"Nick, my love," she said sadly as he bent to kiss her cheek. "It was that addlepate Adele, of course, the foolish little drab. How could she not notice when her own bed's in flames?"
Grimly Nick thought of Lily's interference, and sympathized with poor Adele. "If I come across a certain London-bound vessel tomorrow, I'll see that you get a share of the profits to help rebuild."
"You're a gallant, generous rogue, Nick Sparhawk, and I thank you for it." Cassie's gaze wandered back to the house, where the line of men handing buckets of water from the pump in the street to the fire had finally managed to douse the last of the flames. "We all thought 'twas much worse, but they say now 'twas really only the one room damaged. Strange to have a fire come up so sudden like, then burn out with so little damage. Not that I'm complaining, mind you. At least no one was hurt."
Nick shook his head sympathetically. Where Lily was concerned nothing was strange. He'd wager that just as the fire had begun when he'd refused to listen to Lily, the flames had begun to die down the moment he and Rose were once again safely dressed, and he resolved to send Cassie a handsome gift to help pay the carpenters, whether he captured the Tory planter's ship or not.
"And I'm sorry your own evening had to end so soon." Cassie leaned around Nick to find Rose and winked broadly. "But you tell that pretty cabin boy of yours that when she tires of the sea, there'll be a place waiting for her here if she wishes it. She's got the spirit I like in my girls, and she must be fair enough beneath the grime, else you wouldn't bother with her."
Nick laughed, as much at the shocked look on Rose's face as at Cassie's offer to reform his unkempt cabin boy into a high-priced tart.
"Oh, I don't think she's ready to give up sailing just yet," he said, still chuckling. "You have my word of honor that I'll see to that."
And Lily, and all her hows and whys, could just go to the devil where she belonged.
"S
o you really will try to capture the ship that Madam Morton told you of?" asked Rose excitedly as she stood beside Nick on the quarterdeck of the
Angel Lily
. Once they'd left Cassie's house and returned to the wharf, Nick had ordered the boat to return to the ship immediately, preferring to leave behind the handful of crewmen who'd dawdled too long in the taverns than waste even a minute of time. He'd begun calling orders before he'd even clambered on board, and to Rose's amazement the men had jumped to obey with the same eagerness to be under way and gone.
He swept back his untied hair with one hand—his hat, just like Rose's cap, had been casualties of their swift escape from the fire—and grinned down at her. Somehow he'd shed his coat and acquired the sword she'd tried herself and a pair of flintlock pistols were thrust into his belt. In the moonlight he looked like every idea of what a pirate should be: his billowing shirt still open at the throat with the sleeves shoved up over his forearms, his patterned waistcoat unbuttoned and tossed by the wind, his expression rakishly confident, his broad-shouldered body radiating energy and, decided Rose, dangerous excitement that she wanted very much to share.
"Of course I'm going after them," he said, clearly amused that she'd even ask such a question. "That is, you know, the whole reason I'm here. 'To attack, subdue and take all vessels belonging to the inhabitants of Great Britain.' That's what Congress tells me, anyway. Besides, I wouldn't wish to let Cassie down, would I?"
A tiny flicker of jealousy rippled through Rose. Given Cassie's occupation, her "old friendship" with Nick doubtless had gone further than was usual for most friends, and Rose, her imagination now considerably more informed, tried not to picture the details. She'd no real right to be jealous, anyway. After all, Cassie might have told him about the merchant ship from the Santee River, but
she
was the one he'd taken with him to capture it.
But she did wish he'd kiss her again. Now, here before all his crew bustling about to guide the
Angel Lily
through the entrance of the bay to the deep water. She wouldn't mind at all.
Oh, he'd been charming enough since they'd returned to the ship, but then he did that as easily as he breathed. What she'd hoped for was something a bit, well, a bit more, considering all that they'd said and done in that red-draped room. Surely it had meant something to him, hadn't it? She smiled to herself as she remembered how tenderly he'd held her, the magic she'd found in his kiss, the way he called her Rosie. Inexperienced she might be, but she didn't think of herself as being foolish or overtrusting. She'd never been changeable and impulsive like Lily, falling in love with a different man every day of the week. At least, she thought wistfully, she hadn't until she'd met Nick.
"If what Cassie said proves true," he was saying, as much to himself, thinking out loud, as to her, "then we'll most likely fall in with this brash-mouthed Tory by dawn. Not my favorite time for a fight, on account of the sun, but if we can catch him on his lee, then 'twill save us all the fuss and wear of a long chase."
He sighed, gazing up at how the topsails caught the wind, then looked back to her with a careless shrug of his broad shoulders. "Here I am prattling on about chases and fighting, without a thought for you. You're Tory yourself, or at least English, and likely you've no wish to hear me say such—"
But suddenly he broke off, and as he reached out to brush his fingers against her cheek, his whole face seemed to light from within, and Rose felt her heart race in anticipation.
"Cassie said you had spirit, sweetheart, and you do, more than most women can
muster in a whole life of trying." His hand slipped from her cheek to her
shoulder and he drew her to him, close enough for her to hear the conspirator's
confidence that now colored his words. "Before we start out after this Tory
planter's ship, I'll make you the same offer I make all the Englishmen before I take them as prisoners. Join up with me, and I'll grant you shares same as everyone else. I won't ask you to fight, of course, but if you wish to stay here by me, then it seems only fair to offer you a part of the prize money."
She stared at him, not sure she'd really heard him aright. "You wish me to swear loyalty to your country when you attack a ship from mine, and in return you're offering me prize money?" she asked incredulously. "Change sides just like that? Captain Sparhawk, you've worried before that you've lost your wits, and now I truly know you have."
"Nay, not over this," he scoffed. "This planter's really more one of my countrymen than yours, anyway. You don't have to look when they strike the king's flag if you don't want to."
"Then why should I agree at all?" she demanded indignantly. "Isn't it bad enough that you've taken my father's ship to use against the English without making me party to it, too? What sane reason could you possibly offer?"
His grin widened wickedly as his hand strayed beneath her jacket and around her waist. "Because, sweetheart, I thought you'd want to," he said, his voice low and seductive but teasing, too. "Lord knows you're brave enough. Stay beside me and prove it to yourself. You'll never have a better chance to see that you're not your papa's little gingamabob of a girl wrapped up in cotton wool."
She hesitated, strangely tempted by his argument. She'd told him before how he made her feel unlike herself, but she hadn't confessed how much she enjoyed being this other Rose, the one who left off her stays to wear boy's breeches and practically threw herself on her back before a man she scarcely knew. Silently this other Rose pleaded with her conscience. How much could this last adventure cost her? As Nick had said, this wasn't really an English ship they'd be chasing, and besides, neither her father nor Lord Eliot need ever know. She glanced down at the battered sword at his side, remembering the weight of it in her hand, and how much easier it was to imagine herself as a wild pirate queen than Lady Eliot Graham.
"Say aye, Rosie," urged Nick, his breath warm on her ear. "Say it for yourself, and for me as well."
He didn't know why it seemed to matter so much that she agree, but it did. Any lass that had come this far with him would find a chase like this one after a Carolina merchantman dull work indeed, but the truth was that he didn't want her away from his side. He wanted her here to smile at him and laugh with him and say all the outrageous things to him that no one else would ever dare. With her he felt younger and happier than he had in years. And here on deck, she couldn't expect him to play draughts. His dear, conniving White Rose. Perhaps he'd give her the fancy draughts set anyway. He couldn't help smiling at her again as she stood nestled beneath his arm, frowning her indecision as she looked up at him from beneath her lashes.
No one would mistake her for a lady now, and especially not for the prim little wren who'd landed squawking on his deck that first day. How she'd blossomed, his pretty little Rosie. He slid his hand back and forth along the flaring curve from her waist to her hips, remembering again how she'd looked sprawled across the scarlet bed wearing nothing except her mother's jewelry, and feeling, too, just how quickly his body responded to the memory. How the devil he could have thought her plain was beyond him. After this chase, after this capture, he'd show her exactly how desirable he found her now, and this time not even Lily would stop him.
"I won't let you go until you agree, Rosie," he said, considering what she'd do if he kissed her here on the deck before all the men. "If this planter's as rich as Cassie promised, then even your mean old papa wouldn't fault you for claiming your share. All I ask is that you don't tell that grand lordling of yours. I'd hate to see him hang you for a traitor."
At that her eyes flashed with defiance, not so much luminous silver by this moonlight as pure English steel.
"I'm not his wife yet," she said, lifting her chin stubbornly, "and until I am, I've no obligation to tell him anything. I'll come with you, Nick, and I promise—I
swear
—that Lord Eliot won't hang a single one of us."
"Oh, he'd have to catch us first, lass," said Nick, delighted by her rebellion, "and I've no mind to let him do that. Over here, Gideon, and learn the news."
"What now, Nick?" asked Gideon dryly as he joined them.
Earlier Rose had noticed how the lieutenant had been one of the few men of the crew who'd been able to look at her in breeches without open amazement. She'd overheard from someone on board that the captain and his lieutenant had been friends since boyhood, which most likely explained Gideon's world-weary air. All those years in Nick's company would leave few surprises. Now Gideon stood with his hands behind his back, his neat and orderly dress, even in the middle of the night, the complete opposite of Nick's.
"So what is it this time, Nick?" he asked blandly. "Don't tell me you two are ready to cry the banns?"
"Nay, nay, better than that," declared Nick. "Miss Everard's agreed to join our company, at least for this day."
Gideon sighed patiently. "You can't read in a lady. It isn't done, and it's probably against your commission, too."
"Since when has that bothered us?" Nick swept his hand through the air as if to wave away all objections. "I'm captain, and I say we'll take her. The only question is how to rate her."
Gideon sighed again, and let his gaze wander slowly over Rose, slowly enough that she self-consciously tugged the front of her coat closed over her breasts. She hadn't really intended to agree, but now that Nick had taken her part against Gideon's misgivings, she found she wanted nothing more.
"Since she's wearing Johnny Hinson's clothing," said Gideon at last, "I'd rank her a boy, same as Johnny. Half a share."
"You can't call me a boy," protested Rose, drawing herself up as tall as she could. "I'm far too old. I'll be twenty-one next May."
Nick raised his brows in feigned wonder. "Twenty-one? Goodness, Miss Everard, I'd no notion you were so advanced an ancient. We'll have to put you down on the books as a gentleman volunteer. That way you'll earn a full share."
"As it should be," she said, "considering whose father built this ship and whose sister it's named for. A whole share seems entirely proper."
She smiled up at Nick, and as he winked his hand slid lower beneath her coat, no longer quite on her hip. But she didn't stop him or move away, though at least she did feel her cheeks grow warm as she tried not to gasp with pleasure. Oh, bad, wicked Rosie was here, all right, she thought, and having such a grand time that Miss Rose Everard's meek little warnings could scarcely be heard at all.
"Aye, aye, Captain Sparhawk, we'll add another gentleman volunteer to the books." Dutifully Gideon touched the brim of his hat before leaving them, but the glint in his eyes was more from bemusement than respect. "And my compliments on your splendid recovery, Captain. Better these 'gentleman volunteers' than angels any day."
"What did he mean by angels, Nick?" asked Rose curiously as the lieutenant made his way forward. "Has he seen Lily, too?"
"Nay, I told you, she only shows herself to me," said Nick as lightly as he could, "and she hasn't even done that lately. Maybe she's gone to her peace at last."
But the mention of Lily doused Nick's playfulness, and he disentangled himself from Rose to take up his spyglass again. He didn't want to lie to Rose, but he didn't want to discuss her meddling, ethereal sister with her, either, especially not after what had happened earlier at Cassie Morton's house.
Instead he handed the heavy glass to Rose. "Take your last look at Charles Town, sweetheart. With any luck we won't be back again for a good long spell."
With any luck, he thought grimly, she wouldn't be back at all. By now her father's agents on St. Lucia would have received the letter Gideon had sent on his behalf, and were likely arranging her ransom in plenty of time for her wedding. Another fortnight, maybe three weeks, and he'd have to give her up.
And then, God help him, he'd be alone again.
Unaware of his thoughts, Rose took the glass from him and tried to focus on the city fading on the horizon. But in the dark all she could make out in the distance were a few church spires, and with a sigh she lowered the glass. Inexplicably his mood had changed, his face set and his eyes shuttered against her. The coming chase and fight for the other ship, she thought; for all his foolish teasing about her becoming a volunteer, any battle when lives would be at risk would concern a captain.
"Charles Town seemed a pretty city, from what I saw of it," she said, striving for empty talk to fill the silence. "I'd never dreamed that the American colonies—I mean the American states—had anything half so fine."
"What, you thought we still lived in Indian huts made of bark and twigs?" His smile was empty, his thoughts patently turned inward. "Charles Town is fine enough in its way, but it can't begin to compare with Newport. When I was a boy, we already had a colony house and a market house, both handsome buildings made of brick, and enough wharves and warehouses and shipyards to make Charles Town here look like a muddy puddle. In Newport there was at least a score of churches and meetinghouses, with all faiths—Friends, Congregationalists, Baptists, Anglicans and Jews—content to live side by side without squabbling. There were shops as well stocked as those in London, and gentlemen's houses by the dozen. My own father built one house in town, on the point near the water, and kept a second as a country seat, high on a hill near Middletown, both grander than any other in the colonies."
"In the states," said Rose with a smile, unable to resist correcting him as he'd so often done her. "You said colonies, and you meant states."
"Oh, aye, I suppose I did." But he didn't smile in return as he absently fingered the hilt of the sword at his waist. "Of course by now Rhode Island's as much a state as any of the others."
What the hell had made him babble on so about his home to her
? Nay, it wasn't even his home, only the town where he'd been born and grown as a boy. He'd been eager enough to leave Newport behind, hadn't he? Even now he didn't think of himself as having a home at all, at least not the way other men did, a home port with a house and bed ashore that were his alone. But that was the price of the freedom he'd earned for himself, the hard-won cost of independence that had let him become his own man on his own terms, and had taken him to lands most people never dreamed existed. And from his fifteenth birthday, he'd never doubted that he'd done the right thing.