Laird of Ballanclaire (23 page)

She knew Kam was going to achieve it, too. She held him to her as closely as she could so when it came, she could feed the strength and power of it right back to him, quivering the entire time, while the long cry he gave filled her ears, the room, her heart.

Awareness came back slowly. Her breathing calmed to a manageable level while the moisture on her half-clothed body cooled. She had to force her neck to lift her head so she could look over at where his head rested beside hers. She was replete. Satiated. Liquid. Weak.

“Oh, Kameron,” she murmured. “We shouldn’t have done this.”

He chuckled, and then he was chortling. Constant had to tighten her knees around his hips, keeping his movement to a minimum. She watched as he moved his arms into the position to push up. She was amazed to see him tremble when he tried. All he managed to do was roll his head toward her, before he fell back down.

“Oh, you are so wrong, my love. We most certainly should have. We probably should have warned everyone first, though.”

Constant snorted. Then she was laughing with him. Then she sobered. “They’re going to know what we did, Kam.”

“They damn well better. If na’, I’ll tell them.”

“I—you wouldn’t!”

“Rest assured I will. You’re mine, Constant Ballan. You’re my lady, my wife. Mine.”

“But . . . this is a platonic voyage.”

“And I still doona’ ken when I agreed to that. And if I did, I’m reneging. I’ll na’ continue with self-denial. You’re moving to my cabin. The moment I have enough strength to lift from you and get there myself.”

Constant snickered.

“Oh, darling, do you ken what we have together?” he asked.

“I am not stupid.”

He opened his eyes and smiled at her. It was one of the most moving, gentle expressions she’d ever seen.

“You’re na’ remotely stupid, my love, just inexperienced in what I’m referring to. Forgive me for saying it in such a fashion. I only meant that what we have is a gift. The greatest gift. I should know. I’m na’ exactly virginal.”

“I heard all about your exploits at Madame Hutchinson’s boardinghouse.”

“That was a partial rendering, love. But hear me out afore getting testy. Women have always chased me. All kinds of women. All types. Using all the excuses. They gave me keys. Invitations. Room directions. I would go to house parties and collect so many keys I dinna’ recollect which one belonged to which lady. I made a game of it. Whichever door opened first, that was my lover for the night. All night. Every night.”

Constant told her body to stiffen, but only her legs twitched. Nothing worked the way she wanted it to. She settled for turning her head away and speaking as coldly as she could. “I don’t care to hear more, Kameron.”

He reached for her chin and turned her back to him. She didn’t open her eyes, even when he blew the sigh across her nose.

“Forgive me, love. I was na’ trying to offend or insult, I was doing a bit of explanation. I should mince words, but I canna’. I swear to you, I have never felt as I do with you. I would have wed you without a noose about my neck, darling. I would do it again tomorrow. Today. I swear it.”

“Oh, Kameron.” She sniffed.

“Doona’ take that tone. Please? I am trying to speak a declaration here.”

Constant opened her eyes and had to narrow them slightly at the luminous, golden-brown gaze of both of his.

“Where did your patch go?” she asked.

Kameron lifted onto his forearms, his muscled stomach resting against her. She lost air with the weight of him. She was moving to push him off when he rolled, pulling her atop him.

“My guess? ’Tis gone to the same place as your wardrobe,” he finally answered.

“But I’m still clothed.”

Constant tipped her head to look down and then looked back, her eyes wide. Her skirt was bunched about her belly, and the edge of one stocking dangled from her toes. She wore nothing else.

“You were saying?” he asked, with a slight smile hovering on those full lips.

“Where did my clothing go?”

“The same place as my patch. My shirt. My kilt. They’re another casualty of our passion. It hardly matters. I’ll find it all later. And if na’, I’ll see to replacements. I have more.”

“Well, I don’t. I have three dresses to my name.”

“Na’ to worry. I’ll order more. My duchess has to make her bow before royalty. She has to have hundreds of dresses.”

“Your—your . . . ?” Her voice stopped.

“One day, you’ll be my duchess. Strawberry leaves and all. I hope you’re na’ too annoyed.”

“Strawberries? Why?”

“It’s a coronet. Duchesses are distinguished by the golden filigree they wear to state occasions. It’s shaped to look a bit like strawberry leaves. The Duchess of Ballanclair owns four sets.”

“Oh, Kam.” She buried her head into his neck.

“What is it, love?”

Constant shook her head, trying to hold back the tears. She was never going to be his duchess. She couldn’t do that to him, or to his heritage, or to her own children.

“Constant, what we have is the most heaven you can find on earth. I guarantee it. Do you know something else?”

“What?”

Kameron opened his mouth to say something, but the heavy knocking on her door forestalled him.

“Lord Ballanclaire! Your presence is required in the captain’s quarters.”

It was Barrister Blair. He didn’t sound amused. Kam looked at the ceiling and blew the sigh. “I think we’ve been found out,” he said.

The heavy knocking came again. “Lord Ballanclaire!”

“Stop pounding. I can hear you.”

Kameron’s voice sounded strange coming through his chest. Constant set her ear atop him and listened. Thrilled. Committed it to memory.

“I have to go now, love. But I’ll be back. You’ve my word. The next knock at your door will be me. Be ready.”

“Immediately, my lord!”

“Damn it all. I should have been born a commoner, the lucky devils,” Kam remarked as he rolled from beneath her.

It wasn’t Kameron knocking at her chamber door. Constant hadn’t really expected it, despite his assurance. She knew the truth. They weren’t sailing toward anything certain. There was only a vague hope of a future at the end of it. Love didn’t matter in the world Kameron had been born into. He couldn’t change it. Nobody could.

Constant grimaced in the mirror, taking another deep breath before answering the knock. She didn’t know what to feel. She should be feeling everything from anger to embarrassment to resignation. She was doing her best to stifle any emotion. Despite everything, they had broken the rules. She knew they were going to be punished for it. She hoped Kam wasn’t fighting it unduly. She didn’t want him hurt. She never wanted him hurt. She would rather take all the pain on herself. She should have been stronger. She should have resisted him.

Constant blew the sigh over her lips. She couldn’t resist him. Kameron was more than handsome. He was honorable, loving, generous; claiming her and their babies regardless of the consequences. He was every inch a desirable husband. He was also masculine and virile. He made her feel very much a woman. Resist him?

Impossible.

The knock came again. She told herself she was ready, but her hand was shaking when she reached for the door bolt. She put her hands together and blew on them to warm them, trying to mitigate some of her fear. She reached to pat the newly braided modesty of her hair, once again hidden beneath a cap.

She opened the door. Barrister Blair stood there, with more guards than she could count lining the hall. Constant looked down, supremely embarrassed.

“Mistress Ridgely?”

“Sir,” she said to the floor.

“I have come to escort you to the sister ship,
The Destiny
. You are being moved. I would suggest no untoward reaction over it.”

“I understand,” she mumbled.

“This is for the duration of the voyage. You will be allowed to see your children on a contingency basis.”

The floor blurred. “Contingent on what?” she asked.

“On your cooperation. If you would follow me?”

Constant squared her shoulders and lifted her chin. They were segregating her and withholding her babies. She should’ve expected it. She followed Blair to the railing and sat calmly in the large, woven basket that lowered her into a waiting skiff. She didn’t look at anyone as she took a seat on one of the benches. The barrister was accompanying her, along with a retinue of guards. No one said a word.

Four rowers moved the skiff along swiftly, and Constant watched her own hands sway on her lap as they neared the ship that was her new home. Almost as an afterthought, she looked up at the wooden hull.
The Destiny
was smaller than the ship they’d left, but not by much. There were cannon holes along the sides, something she hadn’t seen on the flagship.

Constant glanced back once at the ship that held her heart and her babies. When she turned back, she caught Blair’s gaze on her. She couldn’t prevent the longing that had been on her face. She knew he’d seen it. She looked back at her entwined hands.

She probably should feel grateful to him. It was going to be akin to cutting her own heart from her bosom to leap into the water when the time came. This enforced separation might actually help her resolve. She set her jaw and looked back up, doing her best to give Barrister Blair an expression devoid of any emotion whatsoever.

Constant rode in the basket from the skiff onto a deck that looked almost exactly like the one she’d just left. She ignored all the looks coming her way. There seemed to be men everywhere. They didn’t appear to know the significance of her arrival, or that she was, in essence, Lord Ballanclaire’s mistress. She intercepted more than a few of them looking in her direction before she settled on watching the polished deck beneath her.

“Come along, mistress. Your berth has been prepared.”

Constant kept her vision squarely on the back of Blair’s heel, doing her best to ignore the reaction taking place all about her. It felt as though every sailor stopped what he was doing to stare.

Maybe they did know her place. That was disconcerting.

She’d been given the forward cabin, reserved for the highest class of passenger. Constant stood in the doorway and waited for her heart to calm. The white spread on her new bedstead was of quilted satin. The porthole was overly large, allowing sunlight to stream in. There was a large rug between her and the bed, a mirrored stand with ewer, a large armoire, and what she could only assume was a maid. She almost turned back around.

“There has been some mistake,” she said when all Barrister Blair did was stand there.

“Yes, there has. Unfortunately, it was His Lordship making it. This suite is yours for the duration of the voyage. Your luggage will follow shortly. I hope you’ll be comfortable. This is Lucilla. She’s to see to your needs.”

The maid, a small woman with a well-lined face and a round shape, bobbed into a curtsy before her. Constant’s eyes went from the woman to Blair and back.

“My needs?” she asked.

“You’re to start with the basics. Lucilla has instructions to see to your skin. That is our number one priority. I doona’ ken what you’ve been doing to it, but nae lady of the realm has skin resembling a tortoiseshell.”

Constant’s eyebrows lifted.

He smiled. It didn’t reach his eyes.

“We are going to turn you into a lady. Barrister MacVale and I are agreed on this. We canna’ take you in front of His Grace unless you possess the rudimentary skills. Well, we can, but it will na’ assist our cause.”

Constant looked down again. What could she say?

“Lucilla? This is the lady we spoke of earlier.”

Barrister Blair spoke in Spanish. That was surprising, not only for his ability but the ease with which he spoke.

The maid nodded. Constant watched.

“I wish her bathed, dressed, and ready to be presented at eight.”

Barrister Blair turned back to Constant. He had another disdainful smile on his fat face. Once again, it didn’t reach his eyes. Constant waited.

“I have given instructions to your maid. She’s Spanish, but speaks rudimentary English if you need to communicate with her.”

“
Gracias
,” Constant answered in the same language, and then continued. “But it shouldn’t be a problem for us,
señor.
”

“You speak Spanish?”

Constant regarded him for a few moments. It was rather entertaining to discomfit him. She smiled in the same emotionless fashion he used. “Yes. I do. I read. I write. I speak fair Spanish. And I’m versed in French,” she replied.

“French?” He choked on the word.

“
Oui
,” she answered.

“I had no idea.” His eyes were round.

“Somehow that doesn’t surprise me, sir. You had me dismissed on sight as a backward woman, with no learning and no culture and little in morals. You are wrong.”

“But this is excellent!” He clapped his hands. “It makes my job so much easier. I canna’ wait to apprise Clayton. He was halfway leery of my plan, because of the language barrier.”

“Your . . . plan?”

“We will speak of it when the time is right. For the moment, you need to concentrate on one thing. One.”

“I already know what you require of me,” Constant replied quietly.

“We need you to become a lady. Better yet, if you could become a peeress without equal, a virtual queen. That is what we need from you. Can you do that?”

Constant’s mouth was open. She had to command it to close. “I don’t understand,” she whispered.

“All in good time, my dear. All in good time.” The change in him was remarkable. “You doona’ ken the Ballanclaires. The duke is arrogant, conceited, pompous, and presumptuous. His wife is worse. They will na’ accept anything less for their daughter-in-law. Trust me.”

“They won’t accept me, then,” Constant replied in the silence that followed Barrister Blair’s description.

“We must make certain they’ve nae choice. Enough said. Lucilla!” He turned to the maid who jumped at the sound of her name. Constant guessed it was an exaggeration that the woman spoke rudimentary English, for Lucilla looked as surprised and confused as Constant felt. “You are to prepare this lady to be presented. I will call for her at eight—”

“Presented?” Constant interrupted. “Before I agree, I would like to know for what, please?”

“Oh, that. It’s the term for preparing oneself for the dinner occasion. Everything a lady does is in the form of a presentation. From the moment of awakening, to the time you reach your bed again. It will encompass all your time. You’ll see.”

 

 

She did see. One week became two, then three. Constant lived in long gloves that reached her shoulders, to hold the creams against her skin. She wasn’t allowed outside except with a parasol, since the dusting of freckles across the bridge of her nose branded her a commoner the moment anyone saw them. She lived with a thin board strapped to her spine in order to correct her posture, and during the day she wore a corset about her midriff to create the proper shape of a woman. She suspected it was more to make her breathless and thus unable to speak above a whisper, which the two barristers had to lean closer to hear.

Through it all she was denied contact with her children. Constant only brought it up once. Both men had exchanged glances and promised she would see them once she mastered the art of dining. Art of dining? It was more a theatrical play. Constant had never seen such an array of silver or a stacking of plates such as she faced each and every meal. Then she was instructed on the proper etiquette. Never touch anything until the hostess has been served and has picked up her own silverware. Never speak loudly, or across the table. Converse softly with the diner either to your left or your right. Never take more than three bites of any course. That was a ridiculous requirement, but with her board firmly in place and her stomach sealed into a corset, she couldn’t hold more than three bites anyway.

She had it mastered by the end of her first week, and then the requirement was changed. She could see her children when she accomplished a courtly presentation, with a curtsy and then a slight nod. Constant knew the game, then. She wasn’t going to be allowed any contact with her children, Kameron, or her past.

Unless the Ballanclaires decreed it so.

So the first week limped into the second, and then the third, and before Constant knew it, she had only two weeks left. She hung on to the rail, holding her cloak tight against the chill, while her gaze roved the bobbing and weaving decks of Kameron’s ship. She didn’t see him. She never did. That didn’t stop her looking and searching. She sighed, nodded to Lucilla, and walked across the sway of
The Destiny
’s deck until she faced the opposite side to look for the phantom ship that both barristers had told her she was imagining.

Constant squinted at the encroaching dark gray clouds, catching sight of what could be a ship, or a bird, and she hugged her cloak closer, sealing out the wind. She was only allowed outside twice, for a total of exactly twenty minutes, every day. Blair and MacVale told her that any longer and she’d destroy what Lucilla had accomplished with her skin.

It was such a waste of time. She was beginning to wonder if the plan was to change her into a creature of pomp and leisure and then settle her among the Spaniards, or even the French. Constant wrinkled her brow, although she’d been nagged at not to. Every afternoon was devoted to Spanish and then French, until she could speak both fairly fluently, with an aristocratic tone that was accompanied by an upward tilt of her nose. And all of it came with a breathless quality that both men approved of, but was really owing to the corset.

A mast silhouetted itself on the horizon, a bolt of lightning revealing the perfection of shape. Constant watched until it faded. She knew there was a ship out there! It had been paralleling their course for weeks. Both her mentors told her she was imagining things. The last time she mentioned it, they hadn’t let her out of the cabin for a full day. A full day when she couldn’t even look for Kameron. She wasn’t risking that again.

“Come,
señorita
. It is time to return inside.” Lucilla spoke at her side. “You heard the sailor’s warning.”

Constant turned her head. “
Uno momento?
”

“
Sí
, although I’ll regret it with this wind and the coming rain. You heard them.”

“I know.” Constant turned from the railing. “We’re expecting a storm. A big one. They’ve been waiting for it. They’ve been planning for it. They’ve been expecting it. I just don’t know why.”

“It was a red sky this morning. You heard.”

“
Sí
,” Constant replied, although that wasn’t what she’d meant. Lucilla hadn’t any aptitude for intrigue. Otherwise she’d have noticed the barristers checking conditions throughout the day. Constant had overheard Barrister MacVale at luncheon, speaking in whispers about wind direction and speed, and when she’d been at her porthole earlier, she’d seen Blair lowering a pole into the water over and over again, measuring wave heights.

All of which was as mystifying as their denial of the other ship.

“Now,
señorita
?”

Constant turned back, balancing herself with both hands on the railing to get back to her cabin. She would welcome the four walls about her for the rest of the day, she guessed, although it was beginning to resemble a cell the longer she stayed in it. It was luxurious, but a prison nonetheless.

Lucilla needed help to latch the lamp onto the ceiling beam. Constant forced herself not to interfere as one of the men Lucilla had called for help assisted. It was getting difficult to keep her balance and she finally sat on the bed for stability. The man gave her a sidelong glance before leaving, and Constant reddened. Over the weeks it had happened again and again. She guessed the cause. They knew who she was, and why she was here.