Happily Ever After (8 page)

She was going to get satisfaction from him if it
was the last thing she did. Harlan was a rotten louse, and she wasn’t going to
rest until she gave him a piece of her mind—not until she had the
pleasure of seeing him wretched at the thought of losing her father’s money.

She had completely misjudged him. She had thought
him an honorable man.

Suddenly feeling the urge to draw, Sophie
retrieved her pencil and pad from her baggage. She couldn’t go anywhere without
it. Somehow, it was as essential to her as breathing. She sat back on the cot
and began to draw.

She’d hoped Harlan would love her—as her
grandfather had loved her grandmother. Her own parents were merely tolerant of
each other, partners certainly, but confidants ... or lovers... she didn’t
think so. They traveled together often, but rarely told the same tales on their
return, and Sophie had long ago surmised that the only time they spent together
on those extended trips was the time spent en route.

She sighed at the thought, but hardly blamed her
father. Her mother had always been a trifle overbearing. As their only child,
Sophie had been expected to behave as an adult from the instant she had been
able to walk and talk. Her mother had allowed nothing less.

Her father was a dear soul, but he hadn’t been
happy as long as Sophie could remember. He seemed to spend his entire life
trying to live up to her mother’s expectations. Sophie wanted to believe he
would applaud her this moment, wanted to believe he would revel in her courage.
She wanted to believe he would understand, he above all others, but she knew he
couldn’t allow it. Never once had he taken a stand against her mother, and
Sophie thought it rather sad that, for love, he had lost his own spirit. And
yet some little part of her could feel him just now ... some slightly
rebellious piece of his soul. In her mind’s eye, she could see his secret smile
and single nod of approval.

Taking a rest from her sketching, she glanced at
Harlan’s picture, allowing herself a moment’s sorrow. She wouldn’t mind so much
being alone. There would be no one to tell her what to do, but to tell the
truth, she was lonely already. She might deny it, but she couldn’t lie to
herself. With a sad smile she recalled the days so long ago when, as a child,
she’d snuck away to play with the boys. Her mother had been furious but those
had been the only times that Sophia had felt a sense of communion with other
human beings. She often wished she’d had siblings ... if for nothing else than
simply to share confidences with.

She missed that desperately.

Yet how could someone miss something so fiercely
when she’d never had it to begin with?

Deep inside, she was lonely, empty, and more so
now with Harlan’s betrayal. He had offered her so much hope, and she had clung
to it. She had built all her dreams around him. And now they were all gone.

But she was stronger and wiser.

She went back to her drawing, working absently.

It had been all she could do not to be physically
ill when she’d claimed to miss Harlan so fiercely. The louse. She hadn’t
planned to explain anything at all to Jack MacAuley, because she really didn’t
feel it necessary to air her dirty laundry. It was none of anyone’s concern why
she wished to see her fiancé—ex-fiancé.

She stopped to cast a malevolent glance at the
portrait by her bedside. It wasn’t as though she were begging passage anyway.
She had paid handsomely for the privilege of traveling aboard this wretched
vessel, and doubted any man in her shoes would feel obligated to disclose his
personal affairs. She simply hadn’t known what else to say to convince Jack
MacAuley to let her aboard, and didn’t particularly like that she had been
browbeaten into revealing all that she had. She knew Jack was not Harlan’s
closest friend, but men tended to band together, and she doubted Mr. MacAuley
would be party to some woman’s attempt at reprisal.

Maybe she had even said it a little out of embarrassment.
It wounded her pride not a little that Harlan could use her so meanly, and it
made her feel a bitter shrew to admit to wanting revenge.

And maybe she
was
a bitter shrew, but as soon as she recovered some measure of her pride, she
could let it go, and live unencumbered by this terrible feeling ... this sense
that she had been trampled on—and more, that she had allowed it.

This was so unlike her, this ever-simmering sense
of rancor. The sooner she rid herself of it, the better.

“If you would have left at least one more of those
monster pieces of baggage behind, you might have some room to sleep in.”

Sophie started at the unexpected intrusion.

She turned to find Jack MacAuley peering in on
her, his head in the door. Her heart fluttered a little at the sight of him,
but she ignored the sensation, refusing to explore the reason for its
manifestation.

She blinked down at the sketch she’d been working
on. Jack’s face peered up at her, his eyes staring at her intensely, and she
started, clasping it to her breast in shock. Her heartbeat quickened. She
hadn’t even realized!

“Would you mind terribly knocking next time?” she
snapped at him.

He smiled mockingly. “I did knock.” He knocked
again on the doorframe so as to prove it. Cad! Glancing at the picture of Harlan,
he said, “You were so lovelorn staring at that picture you just didn’t hear
me.”

Lovelorn?

Sophie cringed that he would think so, though she
didn’t deny it. She clutched Jack’s caricature possessively, lest he see it. The
blood seemed to rush into her brain, and her head suddenly hurt. “A fiancée is
supposed to be lovelorned in the absence of her loved one,” she told him,
trying to sound aloof, though she felt anything but.

“Is that so?”

Sophie thought so, but it occurred to her only
after saying so that she had never really languished over Harlan. She
considered that fact. “Yes,” she replied, but continued to puzzle over the
realization. She had been engaged to Harlan for three years and had never felt
as though she’d missed him terribly—anxious, perhaps to begin a new life
with him, but miss him? Never.

Perhaps because she’d spent so little time with
him before he’d left?

She resisted the urge to turn his picture over.
The sight of him only seemed to elicit her anger.

“I wouldn’t know,” Jack said a little acerbically.

Neither would she, if the truth be known, but she
wasn’t about to admit it.

“Anyway, if you can bring yourself to stop pining
long enough... I have a favor to ask of you.”

The man had no respect at all, and it was probably
her imagination but the portrait of his face pressed against her breast seemed
to warm her even through her dress.

She wondered irately if he had ever been taught
his manners. It certainly didn’t appear so.

“I am not pining!”

“I beg to differ.”

He cast another glance at Harlan’s picture and
lifted a brow when his gaze returned to Sophie. “What else would you call
sitting, gazing at a picture of your lover with that wistful look on your
face?”

Sophie sat straighter, irritation crawling the length
of her spine.

Certainly
not pining!

“Not that it’s any of your concern,” Sophie
corrected him, “but he is my fiancé,
not
my lover!” She cast him a malevolent glance.

And if her look had been wistful at all then it
surely had little to do with any desire to see Harlan Horatio Penn III. There
was only one thing Sophie wanted from her fiancé, and that was satisfaction.

Jack merely grinned at her.

Why did that simple statement please him?

“Why are you doing that?”

“What?”

“Smiling!”

Jack lifted a brow. “Am I smiling?” He took
another look at the little portrait, and concluded that the man had a weak chin
to match his weak character.

“Yes, and please stop! It makes me uncomfortable!”

She did seem a bit fidgety so he frowned at her.
“This better?” He made an exaggerated face, wanting a smile, just a tiny one
out of her. Uncertain why it mattered, he nevertheless wanted to know what she
looked like when she dared to crack a smile.

She rolled her eyes but couldn’t quite hide the
faint smile that came to her lips. Her face didn’t crack, he noticed.

“You are absolutely despicable, Mr. MacAuley!”

He ducked his head back out the door and said to
anyone and no one at all, “I think she likes me!”

He heard her laugh, though her expression was sober
when he ducked his head back in the door.

“If it makes you feel better to think so,” she
conceded, and he watched her mood sink as she glanced at the portrait of Penn.

Funny, it had the same effect on him ... but it
was a strange reaction to have to the man you intended to marry.

He watched her more closely, trying to decipher
her mood. Was she truly missing Penn? Or was there another reason for that
forlorn expression?

He shouldn’t give a damn, but he’d found his mood
soured by the sight of her brooding over her bumbling boyfriend, and quickly
restored by her admission that they were not yet lovers.

“Women are not all so base,” she reproached him,
seeming to read his thoughts.

He couldn’t keep himself from wondering if her
lips were as soft as they appeared.

“They are if their man is worth a damn,” he said,
and dared to wink.

She leapt to her feet, smashing her head against
the low ceiling. “Ouch!” A rosy hue crept up her cheeks as she rubbed her head,
and she clutched the sketching pad almost jealously to her breast. He noticed
it for the first time. “Mr. MacAuley!” she protested. “I hardly think this
conversation is appropriate!”

“Watch the ceiling,” he warned belatedly.

She glared at him and tried to stand defiantly,
but couldn’t quite manage the effect in this miniature room. He wasn’t certain
precisely why he seemed to need to bait her, but he liked that she didn’t stand
down.

He gestured at her pad. “What is that?”

She crossed both arms over the item in question.
“What is what?”

“That, in your hand.”

She shook her head. “Nothing.”

“I see... and what is it you were doing with that
nothing?”

He didn’t know why, but she suddenly looked
guilty, and his curiosity needled him harder. “Nothing,” she answered again,
her tone slightly raised.

“I see,” he said, and refused to beg. “Speaking of
what’s appropriate,” he told her, changing the topic, “I hardly think your beau
is going to appreciate the fact that you are alone on this ship...” With me, he
almost added. “... in the company of so many men. Have you thought of that?”

Her chin jutted toward him, though her glance was
suddenly wary. “Are you telling me your men cannot be trusted?”

“We aren’t barbarians if that is what you’re
asking, Mizz Vanderwahl... though your kind often likes to think so.”

“My kind?” She drew back at that, taking offense,
and probably rightly so. Jack knew he was being unfair, but years of fighting
the system had left him slightly rankled and ill-tempered—something he
usually managed to overcome, but not when faced with Sophia Vanderwahl, the
fiancé of his nemesis.

“About that favor?” he prompted, changing the
subject.

She narrowed her eyes at him. “You have a lot of
nerve, insulting me and then asking for favors. The answer is no, whatever it
is! Now if you don’t mind leaving me to the comforts of my state room,” she
said haughtily, and turned, dismissing him to rummage through an open bag.

Jack allowed himself a moment’s appreciation of
her pert little backside, then, knowing they had reached a standoff, he
conceded. “Suit yourself, princess.”

She whirled to face him, standing abruptly once
again, smashing her head. “Don’t call me that!” This time she didn’t yelp, only
rubbed her head, but her eyes flared with anger.

The devil on his shoulder jabbed him. “If the shoe
fits…

She rubbed her head harder, looking beautifully
indignant. “You know, I really don’t think I like you, Mr. MacAuley! Not at
all!”

“Don’t worry,” he assured her, “It’s mutual.”

But he
wanted her.

He didn’t have to like the woman to feel desire for
her. The proof was in his trousers, firmer now after their encounter.

He left her, closing her door behind him, and
couldn’t help but smile at her fit of temper that followed. He heard her
through the door though she tried to muffle her scream. More than he should, he
enjoyed pricking her anger. She was far too easy a target, and he concluded
that there was more to Mizz Vanderwahl’s trip to the Yucatan than she was
willing to let on.

The question was
what
.

Whatever it was, Jack was certain of one thing...
Penn was at the heart of it, and it wasn’t that Sophia Vanderwahl missed him.
He didn’t take her for the type to chase a man about even with a ring on her
finger, and she’d already admitted they were not lovers.

No, there was more to the story, and Jack intended
to find out exactly what it was.

He determined to keep a close eye on Miss Sophia
Vanderwahl, and if Penn had put her up to spying for his own gain, Jack was
going to make him regret ever having tangled with him.

As would his golden-eyed fiancée as well.

In the meantime, since Sophie had refused his
favor even before hearing it, he was going to have to find someone else to cook
for them since they seemed to have accidentally left Shorty behind.

How long did it take a man to say goodbye to his
gal, anyway?

It was just as well that she hadn’t heard him
out... He tried to, but couldn’t quite picture Sophia Vanderwahl with an apron
on and standing behind a lit stove. He could see her better sitting on a throne
with a yapping mutt in her lap.