Dreaming (6 page)

Finally she must have sensed his look, because she raised her head, then promptly averted her eyes again as if she knew her face showed her thoughts, and those thoughts were too wounded to show the world. When she spoke, it was so quietly he had to move closer to hear her.

“Did you stay away because of me?”

“You?” he said, then repeated, “You?” And because he couldn’t help himself, he began to laugh.

Her mouth fell open, then she frowned when he laughed harder. Her expression said she didn’t know whether to be offended or to laugh with him. After a moment her chin went up and she just sat a little straighter, watching him through eyes that were both puzzled and hurt.

He stopped laughing so hard. “Considering our past, I suppose I’d have good reason to stay away.”

She nodded seriously while plucking at her skirts.

“But I don’t think I can lay the blame at your door, hellion.”

Her head shot up and she stared at him as if he had given her an unexpected gift. She smiled so brightly his breath caught for an instant, and he stood there feeling as if he’d swallowed a torch.

“Why did you stay away?”

Why? According to his friends, he been doing little else but drinking and gambling, drinking and dueling, and drinking and trying to bed every willing woman in
England
. Hell bent on destroying himself. He wondered how she’d react if he told her the bald truth. That her hero hadn’t the courage to come home. “I’d have come back if I could,” he finally said with a shrug of indifference.

He could see by her expression that he’d not satisfied her question.

“You don’t want to tell me where you’ve been, do you?”

“No, I don’t.”

“Then the Reverend Mrs.
Poppit
was right.”

“Just what did the Reverend Mrs.
Poppit
say?”

“Quite a bit, actually. You are her favorite topic during tea at the weekly meeting of the Ladies League for Moral Stewardship. She said you’d come to no good drinking and gambling and carousing about with rakes and such.” She gave him a direct look.

“Of course you know she claims to be an authority on rakehells, one of which she claims you are. And no one dares question her.” She paused for a thoughtful second, tapping a finger against her lower lip while she chewed on it. “I must say, however, that I’ve often wondered at the propriety of the wife of a reverend being so knowledgeable about sin. But I don’t think anyone has the starch to question her authority.”

She gave him a soft look of blind faith. “You needn’t worry, though. I have never believed that of you.”

He waited, then asked, “What would you say if I told you she was right?”

She searched his face, looking for God only knew what. Then her expression became mulish and she shook her head. “I don’t believe you are wicked.”

He laughed. “Well, I suppose to Mrs.
Poppit
and that Ladies League, I am the very epitome of wickedness.”

Her eyes widened just enough to make the devil in him reach out and slowly run a finger along her
jawline
.

“I’ve tasted my share of sin.”

Her lips parted and her breath caught.

Through a lazy gaze he stared at her mouth for the longest time, feeling the inexplicable urge to run his thumb across her full lips, especially the full lower one that she so often chewed, perhaps even dip a finger into the damp pink of her open mouth.

In a natural response, he slid his hand behind her neck and stroked her ear with his thumb. Once. Twice. “And you should remember that, hellion.” Three times. “I am wicked.” He paused for effect. “Very . . . very wicked.”

She stared up at him, her mouth still open, her eyes uncertain. Slowly, he pulled his hand away, then chucked her under the chin. “Now be a good girl and go sit down by that beast you call a pet while I try to find some way for us to escape.”

She blinked once and he laughed again. She flushed bright red at his laughter and looked away, her eyes disillusioned.

He found suddenly that he felt more cruel than cocky, rather like he’d just drowned some kittens. So foreign a feeling it was that he paused for a moment, then instinctively looked back at her. She had retreated and was sitting by the beast, her face pensive.

Perhaps he had succeeded in frightening her off. That was his intention. However, he felt no sense of relief.

After a small lapse of silence she shifted, and again he heard the rustle of her skirts. He ignored it and began pounding on an inside wall, looking for a door. He could feel her stare for long minutes, accompanied by a silence that should have worried him.

“I think that is some of your appeal.”

“What?”

“Your wickedness.” She sighed.

He froze.

“I had thought this adventure might be even more romantic than a dream.”

He turned. “You think this is romantic?”

She nodded. “When you were unconscious, I wondered if perhaps this might be the most romantic thing that ever to happen to me.” There was a frankness in her face. “You and I—us, together—being kidnapped by smugglers.”

“This isn’t a silly romantic novel.” With that he turned back around and away from that face, choosing to continue down the wall, randomly tapping on the boards. “And the fact that you find smuggling romantic does not surprise me. However, I think it would be better if you viewed the situation more realistically. We are locked in the hold of a smugglers’ ship.” Having no luck with this wall either, he turned and scanned the hold.

“They were quite nice when they locked us in here,” she said in a chipper tone.

He straightened to his full height. “How fortunate for us. Nice smugglers. Do you suppose they’ll throw a little soirée for us when we get wherever the hell it is we’re going? And if they were so bloody nice, then why did they lock us in here?”

She gave him a curious look and casually scratched the hellhound’s ear. “Of course they would lock us in here. I mean to say, they were smuggling . . . and smuggling is illegal . . . and we saw them smuggling, illegally. It seems quite natural that they would lock us up.”

“You don’t seem very concerned.”

“I was more concerned about you. You were unconscious quite a long while. Although I suppose I should admit that I was frightfully upset for a few moments. It would take nerves of steel not to concern oneself when one was in the midst of being nabbed. But then I remembered.”

“Remembered what?”

“I’m with you, and you’ll protect me.”

She was making him out to be some hero. He found humor in the irony of that, he who had wanted so badly to be a soldier and been denied the chance, first by his father and then by fate. He hadn’t thought his first taste of battle would be with a love-swooned hellion hunting for a hero.

“Truth be told, if I was concerned about anything, it was whether or not you had been seriously injured. I’m perfectly fine. However, I must say the smugglers looked rather shocked when I ran toward you instead of down the beach and away from them. You were my only thought—so much so, I ran past the two men they’d sent to chase me. They were quite confused. Ran into each other before they came after me. I quite believe they expected me to become hysterical.”

“Most ladies would be hysterical. But if there’s one thing I should be aware of, it’s the fact that you are not ‘most ladies.’”

Her bright look died suddenly. She wore the expression of someone who had failed miserably. “I’ve never acted as I should.” She sighed, staring at her lap where she had just clasped her hands. “It’s been the bane of my existence.” She glanced up. “However, I’m certain I would have been hysterical had something happened to you. I need only to think of you lying there on that beach, ever so still, while I wondered and worried if my papa’s jest had come true.”

“What jest is that?”

“He told me that if I didn’t leave you be, half a lifetime was all you would get.”

He gave a bark of mocking laughter.

“Papa laughed too,” she said quietly. “He doesn’t take me seriously. I think perhaps you don’t either. But that won’t change how I feel.”

Her faith in him was so strong he tensed, as if deep down inside he was rebelling against the responsibility of caring for another, as if he didn’t deserve such blind faith and wouldn’t accept it from her. Everything about her screamed vulnerability, a vulnerability that was somehow linked to him.

She looked back up at him, her eyes wide with honesty and little hope. “Would it help if I acted concerned now? If it would help I could, you know.”

She might as well have just said I’ll do anything for you. Be anything for you.

“I’ll decline your offer of feigned hysteria,” he said more sharply than he intended. He found himself staring at her bowed head. “Hysterical females have no appeal,” he added gruffly. “Just be yourself.”

She looked startled, then turned to stare at the locked door. After a few minutes she asked, “What do you suppose will happen to us?”

“I have no idea.”

“I’m certain they won’t harm us.”

He snorted with disbelief. “Blind faith needs some element of logic, hellion.”

“While we were in the boat, rowing out to this ship, they let me hold your head in my lap.” There was an illogically hopeful tone to her voice.

“Enlighten me. Please.” He crossed his arms. “What does that have to do with anything?”

“Well, it makes perfect sense to me.”

No wonder I’m confused.

“They wouldn’t have let me hold your head if they had meant to harm us. They wouldn’t have given a fig about your head. If you really think about it, doesn’t that make sense?”

“I’m beginning to wonder if anything will ever make sense again,” he muttered, turning to look at the crates behind him. They were long and coffin-sized, he thought, giving fate credit for a sublime sense of humor.

Besides bodies, crates that size could contain almost anything. Curious, he tried to pry the top of one open with his hands, but it was nailed shut, so he stepped around and searched for some identifiable markings.

“Perhaps it was the fall on your head.”

“What?” he asked offhandedly, rubbing at some kind of lettering on the crate.

“Why, surely you’ve heard of the expression ‘knocked senseless?’ It seems to me that term wouldn’t exist if it didn’t happen, so perhaps that’s why nothing makes sense to you.”

“My sense is just fine.”

“Oh.” There was a small snatch of silence. “That’s good, isn’t it?”

“Hmmm.” Barely listening to her chatter, he examined the crate closely, then squinted to try to read the writing on it.

“Are you aware that a moment ago you claimed nothing made sense?”

He straightened. “What I said was . . . ” He looked at her and words left him. She stared at him as if awaiting the most important answer of her life. Her expressions always seemed to ask him for things he could never give.

Her face was somehow different than he remembered. Not as young or as full, yet still innocently inquisitive. He ran his hand through his hair in frustration and stood there, silent. Time seemed to tick by in
aeons
, then he finally admitted, “I seem to have forgotten what I said.”

“I remember!”

He held up his hand. “Whatever I said doesn’t matter, because there is still no logical reason for them to lock us in here.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Then let me explain it to you. There are plenty of locals involved in an innocent degree of smuggling. For some families, handling contraband is the only way they can survive.”

“I know that. I was raised in
Devon
too. That’s why I wasn’t concerned.”

“You didn’t let me finish.”

“Go ahead. Finish.” She gave a wave of her hand, yet he had the distinct feeling that her mind was already set.

“They don’t, however, kidnap peers and innocent women and lock them in a ship’s hold.” He leaned against the crate, crossing one boot over the other while he awaited her next argument.