JoAnn Wendt (25 page)

Though the rest of the rooms lay drab—crying for similar refurbishing—he could pronounce his Williamsburg house worthy of a king’s visit. Worthy even, he thought acidly, of a Wetherby visit.

The thought gave him an unpleasant jolt.

A sharp and very real pain in the neck.

Rubbing his neck, he glanced guiltily at Annette as she lay sleeping. He’d not told her yet. He’d told no one about Eunice Wetherby. He’d been back a week, but somehow the moment never seemed appropriate to tell her. Cowardly, but there it was. She’d greeted him so happily. She’d pranced like a child, showing him all she’d done with his house. And, as always, the first touch of her hand on his had set off the old familiar vibrations. Within thirty minutes of seeing each other, they’d catapulted into bed. She’d been wantonly loving. An angel of passion compared with the diffident, prissy fiancée he’d left behind. She’d banished all memory of Eunice. Almost, she’d banished the memory of sweet Flavia.

He turned his head as she gave a little gasp in her sleep, then trembled. Once. Twice. He shifted up on his elbow, watching her. A dream. Perhaps not a pleasant one.

“Annette,” he said softly. “Annette?”

It took her a few moments to waken. She glanced about, confused. Then her eyes found his face and she smiled sleepily.

“Where? Oh—did I spend the night at your house?”

“You did.”

“Did we—”

“Twice.”

She laughed contentedly, her sleepiness mellowing her sultry giggle, taking it to lower and even more appealing levels. She stretched like a cat, then sighed. With one finger she idly traced the grizzle that was sprouting on his jaw.

“And did you like it, Captain McNeil?”

“No, Lady Annette.”

She giggled at the absurdity of his answer, but responded to it with sleepy soberness.

“Then I shall have to try harder.”

He grinned.

“By all means.”

With a happy sigh she slipped her hands around his neck and drew him close to her warm breasts.

“Now?” she suggested.

He shook his head.

“Militia Day.”

“Pooh. Miss it.”

“Can’t.”

“No.”

She gave him a little push of frustration. “Damnation, McNeil!” He laughed at her unbaroness-like outburst and rolled out of bed. Hitting the floor, he grabbed a robe and built a fire. When the kindling was crackling, he went to the cherry-wood wardrobe, flung open the doors and rummaged for underbreeches. He pulled them on. Deerskin breeches followed. He rummaged deep in the recesses of the wardrobe, emerging with nothing but a tart, “Annette, where the devil is my buckskin shirt?”

“How should I know?” she tossed across the room.

“The devil you don’t. You’ve refurbished everything else. Likely you’ve sent it to the cabinetmaker. To have the fringe done in brass.”

She giggled appreciatively.

“An excellent idea, McNeil. Marry me, and like a good wife I shall set about obliterating your wardrobe immediately.”

His breath caught unpleasantly.
He slammed the wardrobe door shut. There it was again. It would have to be dealt with. Sooner or later the news of Eunice would reach her ears. Should she hear it from some malicious gossip? Or from him?

Damnation! Steeling himself to tell her, he drew a heavy breath. The day suddenly smelled sour. Shirt forgotten, he went to the bed and sat down heavily. The bed bounced and Annette giggled.

“Naughty, naughty.” She wagged a finger in his face. “Militia Day, Captain McNeil.”

He caught her annoying finger. “Annette,” he began carefully, “what would you say if I told you I were bethrothed?”

Her gay laughter pealed.

“I would say nothing.”

“Nothing?” He was seized by astonishment. The astonishment burst into bubbles of relief. So she wouldn’t care! They could go on as usual.

“I would say nothing,” she repeated, lunging up and grabbing him by the ears. “I would simply
shoot
you.”

He pushed her away, more annoyed than startled. Then, as he sensed the justice of her position, he broke into laughter, wondering if being shot by the baroness might not be preferable to a lifetime of climbing into bed with Eunice Wetherby.

“Bray like a jackass, will you?” she snapped.

He ducked her slap. She cursed and lunged again.
He caught her, flinging her deep into the goosedown quilt, imprisoning her. He kissed away her shrieks, kissed her until her furious struggles turned to gasps of desire. When she lay quiet beneath him, he spoke.

“Annette. Annette, I must tell you—”

His attempt was sabotaged. The heavy carved door flew open, banging hard into the robin’s egg blue paint. Loud boots clumped in. Harrington’s booming voice greeted him, and the opportunity was lost. Garth swore under his breath.

“Mornin’ Cap’n! 'Tis Militia Day! About them twelve-pounders, Cap’n. Be we firing the twelve-pounders today? If so, Jenkins and me’ll be needing a voucher to draw powder from the magazine.” He paused, casually doffing his cap at Annette. “Mornin’ ma’am,” he said politely, as though finding a woman in his captain’s bed was nothing out of the ordinary.

Annette steamed. She grabbed the coverlet.

“Really, McNeil. You should train your servants. They shouldn’t be allowed to come crashing in.”

Garth said, “Of course they should be allowed. Many’s the ship that has come to calamity because a tar had to observe the protocol of knocking on his captain’s door.” He grinned at Harrington. “Besides, Harrington is
not
a servant.”

“‘Deed not, ma’am. Ye might say, ma’am, I be the Cap’n’s nurseymaid.”

Annette was not amused. She wrenched the coverlet to her chin.

“Get out, lout!”

“Yes, ma’am.” Harrington edged for the door. Garth stopped him with a gesture. Ignoring Annette and lunging off the bed. Garth renewed his search for the buckskin shirt, banging drawers, riffling through suits of clothes in the wardrobe.

“We’ll give the men practice. Bring the eight-pounders. You’ll find the powder voucher on the desk in the library. And, Harrington—”

He paused, finding the soft buckskin shirt hidden on a peg in the rear of the wardrobe. He pulled it out and yanked it on.

“It wouldn’t hurt to ‘nurseymaid’ Raven today. Keep an eye on him. Raven cost me fifty pounds last Muster Day. He got drunk at Raleigh’s Tavern and bet half the town he could shoot the yellow tailfeather off Governor Dinwiddie’s prize fighting cock.” Garth grinned sourly. “Blew the damned bird to Kingdom Come.”

Harrington chuckled, then threw a scared look at Annette.

“Ay, Raven’s a true McNeil. Even if the lad
can’t
walk a gangplank without puking.”

A sputter of vexation came from the bed.

“McNeil! Get him out of here!”

Garth ignored her, driving his stockinged feet into brown leather boots. He swung toward Harrington.

“Is Trent up?”

“Up, fit as a fiddle and perky as a jaybird. Trent be in the kitchen, talkin’ up a storm to anybody what’ll listen. He be taking his breakfast mush with cook. Cook says she’ll bring him round to watch the Muster.”

McNeil’s face softened.

“Tell cook not to take the child too near the artillery. The boom of the cannon might scare him. And tell her to bring along a lunch. Trent can eat with me on the Palace Green.”

Harrington touched his cap in the affirmative, grinned at Annette, launched himself off the sea chest and clumped out.

As the door banged shut, Annette made a small, exasperated sound. Petulantly she said, “Damn you, McNeil. I think you care more for that Amsterdam orphan than you do for me.”

Her dark eyes flashing, she waited for his denial, but he refused to give it. Coolly, he ignored her reference to the child. He went to the washstand, sloshed water from pitcher to bowl and doused his head. The less said about the boy, the better.

But a chill fingered its way up the back of his neck as he finished his slapdash grooming. If Annette noticed his partiality to the child, others would notice too. And question it. Suppose the duke of Tewksbury got wind of it and put two and two together?

He knew he should put the child in the charge of a nursemaid and ignore him. But it went against the grain. This was his son. His
son.
Whenever he swung the laughing child up into his arms and gazed into those intense eyes, he saw sweet Flavia. And he saw himself. The boy was all he had left of her — all that remained of their love.

With a vexed sigh, the baroness swung her legs out of bed, rose, went to the wardrobe and fished out a wrapper she kept there. Shrugging into peach silk and Flemish lace, she leaned against the door, blocking his way as he sought to go. Her eyes flashed angrily.

“You haven’t an iota of sentiment in you, McNeil. Yet you take pity on an orphan and bring him into your home. You treat him like a
son.
Why? Why do you do this?”

He scented danger. Danger for Trent. His eyes narrowed. With rough disregard, he pushed her away from the door.

“Why?” she persisted. “Why should you suddenly collect orphans?”

He eyed her with coldness.

“A habit I have. Baroness. A habit of collecting other men’s castoffs.”

His implication was ruthlessly clear. Hurt rose in her eyes. A dot of color began to burn in each cheek. Her nostrils flared defensively. She seemed to hover between lashing out and weeping. Indecisive, she drew a long quivering breath.

“In your absence. Garth,” she said, her voice unsteady, “I’ve received offers of marriage. Lord Dunwood of Baltimore. Peter Hayes, the plantation owner. Mr. Fisk, the Boston shipbuilder. But I hoped . . . ”

“Hoped I would help you choose?”

It was deliberately wounding. And meant to be. Anything to divert her thoughts from the child.

He was satisfied to see the hurt in her eyes change to wild anger. Her small fists clenched.

“You—you—damned fornicating sea rover. So I am good enough to be your mistress, but
not
good enough to be your wife!”

 “Precisely.”

With a shriek she hurled herself at him, her pummeling fists ineffective in the heat of her passion.

“Oh, go to your Militia Day,” she cried as he captured her wrists. “Go and be damned. I
shall
wed Lord Dunwood. And I warn you, McNeil—I warn you, I shall be
exceedingly
happy.”

She’d hurled her final utterance as though it were the direst of threats. He couldn’t help but laugh.

“Exceedingly?”

She twisted free of his grip, backed away and bared her teeth like a she-wolf.

“Yes!” she hissed. “Exceedingly! And you needn’t make fun of Lord Dunwood. He may be bald and a bit stout, but he is younger than
you
and very, very virile.”

“Exceedingly
virile?” he taunted unkindly.

With a curse, she whirled from him, flew across the room and flung herself onto the bed. She pounded the quaking mattress in frustration. “Oh, go to your Militia Day. I hope you shoot yourself in the balls!”

He started to go out, chuckling, then changed his mind. Annette was only his mistress, not his first mistress and surely not his last. But in her odd, promiscuous way, she’d been damned loyal. He owed it to her to behave decently.

Closing the door, he turned and walked back to the bed. He sat. She wouldn’t look at him. Belowstairs, servants clumped about, doing chores, talking. Someone was whistling. The faint smell of frying ham wafted up from the distant kitchen, melding—humorously, he thought—with the exotic scent of Annette’s perfume.

At last she rolled over. She looked at him. For a woman of forty-five, she had a young-seeming face. Just now her expression was such a childish mix of both pique and the eagerness to forgive that he laughed and kissed her.

She warmed to him at once. She drew him into her arms, her lips parting eagerly. The familiar urge, the animal instinct, stirred hot and delicious in his groin. He kissed her again, hungrily.

“You’ll be later to Muster,” she whispered happily.

“Exceedingly
late,” he agreed.

* * * *

It was ten o’clock before he swung out of his house on York Street, struck north on Waller Street and headed for Nicholson Street. He was on foot. To take a horse on Militia Day would be foolhardy. Already, the dusty streets were choked and congested. Farm wives hauled their wares to market in handcarts. Street jugglers performed wherever a willing audience of two or three gathered. Children erupted everywhere, like an outbreak of measles.

He passed Campbell’s Tavern, skirting a group of children who’d gathered in the manure-pocked street, organizing games. They laughed excitedly, huddling like quivering puppies in a tight group.

“Run, sheep, run!” their leader shouted from the center.

The group broke like a starburst, McNeil dodged flying arms and legs.

To compound the chaos, British regulars drilled on Militia Day, too. The redcoats did this—not in a spirit of cooperation—but in rivalry. The spit-and-polish redcoat and the casual Virginia-born Englishman harbored an instinctive and competitive dislike for one another. While the redcoat prized soldierly obedience and could be marched off a cliff without batting an eye or missing a step in cadence, the independent Virginian chafed at such folderol. Eager to show his individuality, the Virginian marched to his own drumbeat. Often, he made his drill performance deliberately sloppy as a statement of independence.

The American-born Englishman could be led, Garth admitted. But he could
not
be driven.

Each militia elected its own officers and gave only nominal heed to the redcoat officer assigned by the royal governor to the unit. Friction was the natural result; skirmishes were inevitable. Once the ale began to flow, not even the governor’s stern warning of punishment could keep the Virginian and the redcoat from going at one another. McNeil counted himself lucky if at day’s end the men under his command tallied in with only a few black eyes and a broken nose or two.

But the tone of
this
Militia Day should be different, more cooperative, he told himself. The problem with New France was escalating. The French were infringing upon Virginia’s frontier. A year ago, the French had seized a half-built English fort on the forks of the Ohio River. As a waterman, McNeil knew the gravity of this encroachment. Control the forks of the Ohio, and you controlled access to the great Mississippi River. Control the Mississippi, and you controlled a whole continent!