He ignored her. A new strategy, Anne was fairly certain, he’d adopted, designed to torment and lure at the same time. He would discover she was made of sterner stuff. He had, however, gone to the trouble of having some sort of sheeting suspended so a portion of the quarterdeck was in shade. She and Martha could sit there without having to worry about winds whipping away her parasol. In addition, Martha discovered two wide-brimmed gentlemen’s hats tied to the outside knob on their door that morning. Squinting against the sunlight reflecting off the water, they wore them now as additional protection against the harsher elements. In the distance she could see dolphins frolicking. She found herself wishing she could be so carefree.
She also felt a tad guilty that she was doing little more than enjoying the day while around her the men worked. Some scrubbed the decks, others wove rope, a few scampered up the sail rigging. She suspected if she and Martha weren’t out on the deck that a good many of them would be running about without shirts. As it was a good many buttons were left undone. From what she could see of their skin, the men were dark from the sun beating down on them. Leathery, tough skinned. But not the captain. His flesh was more bronzed than anything. Perfectly shaded.
“How old do you suppose he is?” she asked.
Martha startled and Anne realized she’d been absorbed in watching Mr. Peterson going about his labors. “Who?”
“The captain.”
“Oh, I don’t know. Late thirties, early forties, I suppose.”
“So old? No, I think he’s much younger.”
“He has his own ship.”
“Still, I can’t quite picture him not being captain of a ship. I think he would pull at the traces if someone else were holding the reins. I think gaining his own ship would have been a priority for him when he was very young.”
“You seem quite infatuated with him.”
“You must admit he’s a fascinating specimen. He’s nothing at all like the gentlemen I’ve met in ballrooms.” Nothing like Walter, or his brother. Or her brothers for that matter.
“He could bring you a great deal trouble, m’lady.”
Oh, she didn’t half know that. But only if I let him. “Please give me some credit, Martha. I’m not completely without experience when it comes to gentlemen.”
“But they were gentlemen. He’s more scoundrel.”
He was temptation. Anne couldn’t help but think that if the devil wanted to lure women into sacrificing their souls for pleasure, he’d have used the captain as his lure.
“The lords will be glad to have you back in Society,” Martha said.
“Oh, yes, I suppose.” She came with a nice dowry, something the captain certainly didn’t need. “I don’t think ladies should come with a dowry,” she mused. “Makes it difficult to know if the gentleman is choosing the lady or security.”
“Any gentleman would choose you.”
She smiled at her maid’s devotion. “Perhaps.” She pointed toward the horizon. “What do you suppose is going on out there?”
Martha glanced toward the black clouds that seemed to be touching the water. “Oh, I don’t like the look of that.”
“Mr. Peterson!” Anne called. When he glanced over, she said, “What do you make of that darkness in the distance?”
“Storm coming in.”
“Don’t you think someone should make the captain aware of it?”
“He’s aware, m’lady. He’s busy now trying to determine how best to avoid it.”
“Ah, well, then,” she said half to herself, half to Martha, “we’ve nothing to worry about.”
A couple of hours after sunset, the storm caught up with them—or they caught up with it. Anne wasn’t quite certain of the particulars except for the fact that she was exceedingly disappointed in the captain’s navigating skills. When the ship had begun tossing her and Martha about the cabin as though they were ragdolls, they both ran up to the deck and watched in horror as water lashed over the sides.
The captain grabbed her arm in a bruising hold and jerked her about. The fury reflected in his eyes rivaled the storm’s. “Get below and stay there!”
“What about you?”
“Now!”
And he shoved her. Shoved her! Then the bulk that was Peterson was doing the same with Martha and blocking the doorway. “Into your cabin immediately!”
Now she and Martha were curled on the bed, taking turns hanging over a bucket, even though neither had anything left to bring up. She tried to console herself that the ship had no doubt been through many storms, that the captain no doubt knew what he was doing. But the fierceness with which the boat lurched was terrifying. Her stomach sank and rose with the swells of the sea. She wanted to die, wished she was dead.
The ship groaned and creaked. How could it withstand the bombardment? What if it didn’t?
She thought she heard a knock. Was it the ship splitting apart? Then it came again and the door opened. The captain stood there with strands of his drenched hair having worked free of his leather thong. He removed his greatcoat and tossed it to the floor where it landed with a wet slap.
“Are we going to sink?” she asked.
“No, we’re through the worst of it.”
“It doesn’t feel like it.” She wanted to tell him that if anything it felt worse, but at that moment her stomach pitched and she grabbed the bucket. Oh, it hurt, it hurt to heave and have nothing come up.
Suddenly he was crouched beside her, rubbing her back. “Easy now,” he cooed, before yelling, “Peterson!”
The large man stepped through the doorway. “Aye, Cap’n?”
“Take the maid to your quarters.”
“Aye, Cap’n.”
He leaned over the bed and lifted a feebly protesting Martha as though she were a feather pillow. “Easy, woman. No one’s going to hurt you.”
To Anne’s surprise, Martha sagged against him and began crying.
“I know, I know, girl. It’s frightening, but it’s all over now. You’ll feel right as rain soon enough.”
She was also surprised by the soothing tone of his voice, and she wondered if he’d been watching Martha that afternoon as much as Martha had been watching him. The painful cramps stopped, and she rolled back. “He won’t . . . hurt her, will he?”
“No, but with the bed bolted down and one side up against the wall, it’s too difficult to try to take care of you both here. He’s big, but he’ll be as gentle as a lamb.”
“And you?”
“Gentle has never been my style. I can’t believe you’re still in your blasted corset.”
“I thought we might have to abandon ship.”
“Which is exactly why you should have taken it off.”
“I didn’t want to wash up onshore improperly attired.”
“Sweetheart, we’re so far from any reachable land that you would have been drowned. You wouldn’t have cared.”
She didn’t like his scolding her and was going to explain that Martha had loosened it some, but she was distracted by his fingers rapidly unbuttoning her bodice. She slapped at his hands with what little strength she could muster. “Don’t.”
He’d already completed the task and was working on her corset. She was wearing a chemise beneath it, but still she tried to roll away from him, only he held her in place.
“Don’t be so modest,” he growled. “I’m not looking.”
She relaxed. “Truly?”
“Of course I’m looking. I’m a man, aren’t I?”
She laughed, then groaned as her stomach protested the movement. “You’re so refreshingly honest. I think I may have done some damage here.”
“It’s always harder on your body when your stomach is trying to empty itself and there’s nothing to bring up.”
“Hardly polite conversation.”
“But the truth. You’ll be sore for a couple of days.”
If she survived. At that moment she couldn’t quite believe that was a possibility. Her corset loosened, he removed it with an efficiency that she would have protested if it didn’t feel so lovely not to be confined. He dragged the gown and petticoats down her legs and whipped a blanket over her before she could complain about the precarious immodesty of her position. Through half-lowered lids she watched him making his way around the room, but couldn’t quite find the strength to ask him what he was doing. The ship was still bucking. How did he maintain his balance so easily?
She imagined him moving about a dance floor with the same grace. He would be poetry in motion, and the woman held within his arms would be swept away. How could she not? He returned to the bed, sat on its edge.
“Face the wall,” he ordered.
“Why?”
He held up a brush. “So I can do something with your hair before it becomes a tangled rat’s nest.”
“I can sit up.” She was halfway to her goal when the room swirled around her and her stomach roiled. She fell back and rolled to her side, wishing the world would stop spinning.
“Ah, Princess, I bruised you when you came up on deck.”
She felt his callused fingers skimming over her upper arm so lightly, as though he was afraid of hurting her again.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have treated you so roughly. Forgive me.” He brushed his lips over her discoloring flesh, and in spite of her misery, she felt pleasurable tingles all the way down to her toes.
And disappointment. A kiss. The time of his choosing. She opened her mouth—
“That does not qualify as a kiss,” he said in a low purr.
She released a small laugh. “I could argue that, but I won’t.”
She felt a tug here, a gentle pull there as he began removing the few pins that remained in her hair. It tumbled down and he gathered it up. She thought she heard him mumble, “Glorious.” But how could anyone consider anything about her glorious at that moment? She was a miserable, tired, aching wretch.
Then the brush was gliding through her hair and nothing had ever felt so marvelous.
“You’ve done this before,” she murmured.
“Never, actually.” He slid a hand between her head and the pillow, carefully lifted, dragging the brush through the strands, pulling them taut, before lowering her.
“You’re very good.”
“I’m a quick study.”
She was being lured into sensations she wasn’t quite comfortable feeling. They seemed naughty. She should send him away now. Instead, she didn’t want him to ever stop his tender ministrations. She had never expected such care from him. She thought he would be like a tempest: powerful, uncontrollable.
Nothing about this man ever seemed to be as she anticipated.
“Peterson said you were going to go around the storm,” she chided, not quite pleased with herself for making the words seem accusatory.
“We didn’t have enough room to maneuver. We could have possibly outsailed it but I thought it better to continue forward, skirt it as much as possible. It didn’t look too threatening.”
“But it was.”
“Not really.”
She glanced back. “You’ve been in worse?”
He grinned. “Much worse. Cape Horn is notoriously treacherous. At least in these waters, we don’t have to deal with icebergs.”
“Does nothing frighten you?”
He grew somber, his gaze gliding over her before he began once again to concentrate on her hair. Knowing that he wasn’t going to give her an answer, she turned her attention back to the wall, studying the knotholes in the wood, relishing the feel of his hands gathering up the silken strands, taming them with the brush. She supposed she should be scandalized to be wearing the barest of undergarments beneath the blanket while a man sat on the bed stroking her hair. If she didn’t feel so awful she would demand he leave. But she did feel awful, except for where he touched her. Why should she not take comfort in that?
He parted her hair and began to plait it.
“You’re really quite nice, aren’t you?” she asked of the wall.
“Because I won’t take advantage of a woman who might heave her stomach contents over me? You don’t have very high standards, Princess.”
Oh, dear God, but she wanted to laugh hard, but she knew her sides and belly would protest, so she settled for a wide smile that he probably couldn’t see. When he was finished with his task, he draped her braid over her shoulder and she fingered the strip of leather that had been holding his hair in place.
With his large warm hand, he began stroking her back.
“I’m feeling somewhat better,” she said. “You don’t have to stay.”
“I’ll stay until you drift off.”
It felt so lovely. She couldn’t remember the last time someone had given her so much attention. That it was him could not have surprised her more. He was a man of varying facets, complex and interesting.
Her eyes grew heavy. She didn’t want to go to sleep, didn’t want to give up the press of his fingers along her spine, the circling of his palm over her shoulders. But the lethargy weighted her down and drew her into oblivion.
“Does nothing frighten you?” she’d asked.
She frightened him, terrified him in fact. When he’d seen her first come to the deck during the storm, terror had ripped through him. She could have tumbled, been hit by a broken mast, washed overboard. Anything could have happened and it had rocked him to his core to consider her gone . . .
Before he acquired his payment. That was what was so troubling about the whole blasted situation. The woman seemed to have no care regarding debts owed. He’d follow her into hell to claim what was due him.
Unfortunately, he suspected she was headed for heaven, which was barred to him.
Rubbing her neck, Tristan listened to her soft breathing. Her arm was bared, and his gut again clenched at the sight of the mottled flesh where he’d grabbed her. She’d have a nasty bruise by tomorrow. If he could only touch it and draw it upon himself, he’d gladly do so. He doubted she’d ever been so brutally handled.
He was truly the barbarian that the Londoners considered him.
He was also—in spite of wearing a coat out into the storm—damp and chilled. If she’d not been drowning in her own misery she might have noticed and insisted he change into dry clothes. Not that he would have with her awake. But with her asleep . . .
He eased his hands away from her. She didn’t stir. As gingerly as possible he rose from the bed and crept to a chair where he removed his boots. Then he grabbed a linen towel and rubbed it briskly over his wet hair, before finger combing the strands back. He was exhausted. Every muscle ached from fighting the storm.
What he truly wanted was to lie in his own bed, curl his arm around her, and sleep the sleep of the dead. But he supposed for tonight it was either the floor here or a hammock in the area where his men slept.
Wearily, he forced himself to his feet and wandered over to the chest where he kept his extra clothes. He dragged his shirt over his head and tossed it aside, before lifting the heavy lid.
“Oh, dear God, whatever did they do to your back?”
He froze, fighting against the need to hide the unsightly latticework of scars that marred his back. He forced a casualness into his voice that he was far from feeling as he grabbed a shirt. “I thought you were asleep.”
“No, only drifting about. Those are lash marks, aren’t they?”
He slammed down the lid and shoved his arms into his shirt, before jerking it down over his head and shoulders, welcoming the knowledge that with the material in place, the ugliness was once again hidden. “They’re nothing.”
“They must have hurt terribly.”
“For a short time, yes,” he gritted out.
“But the pain long remembered, I should think.”
Shoring himself up to ignore the pity in her eyes, he gazed over at her. She was sitting up, clutching the blanket high at her throat with both hands, as though that could protect her from him. Her eyes were wide damp saucers. Damnation but he never flaunted his scars and he hated that she’d seen them. “I believe that’s the point, Princess.”