Merline Lovelace (11 page)

The brass and mahogany fittings of the captain’s cabin danced before Sarah’s eyes. Her lungs worked like bellows. Her chest heaved. She, the calm, sensible Miss Abernathy! The levelheaded, responsible sister that the younger ones always turned to for soothing words and sound advice! She couldn’t remember the last time she’d come anywhere near such violence of feeling, but if Straithe had stood before her at this moment she knew she’d take immense satisfaction in smacking his face yet again.

How dare he brush aside her wishes in such a cavalier manner? How dare he think that she…or Abigail, sweet, overly sensitive Abigail, of all persons!…would accede to Papa’s last, desperate wish for his daughter to wed with James Kerrick, Third Viscount Straithe?

His daughter!

Sarah strode across the cabin and flung herself into the chair bolted in front of the table. The ship’s lamp Henry Fulks had shyly lighted for her just an hour or
more ago swung on its gimbals overhead. Shadows rose and fell on the bulkhead with a rhythm that matched the ship’s own motion. She drummed her fingers distractedly on the chair arms.

The whole idea of matching an Abernathy to Straithe was absurd. Even more absurd was Straithe’s assumption that he would have his choice of sisters. When Papa whispered his infamous, irrational, illogical, and totally inappropriate proposal, he could not have had Abigail in mind.

Or did he?

Sarah’s fingers ceased their erratic beat. Her heart jumped under the embroidered vest The fury that had seared her lungs only moments before lost its steam and whistled out in a long, slow breath.

Perhaps…

Dear heaven above, perhaps Papa
had
indeed been thinking of Abigail. Gentle, so-beautiful Abigail. If anyone could turn a sinner from his degenerate ways, Abby could. If anyone could redeem Straithe in the eyes of the world…

The pain that ripped through Sarah’s stomach took her by surprise. Wrapping her arms around her waist, she held on tight and stared at the shadows dancing on the wall.

Abby could indeed redeem Straithe, she acknowledged with shattering honesty. Only Abby.

The younger Miss Abernathy’s angelic disposition and winsome smile made her welcome everywhere. Society matrons who barely tolerated Sarah’s forthright manner and passable looks positively gushed over Abby’s self-effacing charm. Men of all ranks flocked to her side. Even Lady Blair, daughter of a duke and wife of the British East India Company’s
chief factor, considered the younger Miss Abernathy’s presence essential to the success of her many social soirees.

As Lady Kerrick, Viscountess Straithe, Abigail could easily restore her husband to the company and the dignities now denied him by his scandalous past.

Oh, God!

Not even realizing that she’d taken the Lord’s name in vain, Sarah lifted a trembling hand and swiped at the tear trickling from the corner of one eye. The same honesty that led her to acknowledge that Abigail was, in fact, Jamie Kerrick’s only hope of salvation made her admit another, even less palatable truth.

Abigail could save him, but Sarah wanted him.

She hadn’t realized it until this moment. How could she? She’d never felt this sort of confused longing before. Never even come close to this wrenching, agonizing desire. Never ached for a man’s touch, as she ached for his. Never trembled at the thought of his kiss, or felt her blood sing in her veins at the memory of his body pressed against hers.

Unseeing, she stared at the swaying shadows. In the landscape of her mind she saw Jamie as she’d first encountered him in the House of the Dancing Blossoms, scowling fiercely when he found Sarah waiting for him instead of the delectable Mei-Lin. And as he’d appeared the next day at the Mission House, his jaw tight and his blue eyes filled with a determination to extract the name and whereabouts of a pilot. And then again, when he’d burst into this very cabin after the riot above decks, his whole being alive with a masculine joy of battle that absolutely confounded her.

Sarah had come alive then, too. For the first time, she’d felt a woman’s passions stir within her. She’d
been close, so very close, to giving herself to him then and there. But she’d drawn back, loath to yield the maidenhead she would no doubt take with her to the grave.

Yes, she wanted Jamie Kerrick with all the passion of her spinster’s heart. She could admit it now, in the privacy of the cabin, with none to see or hear her painful admission but herself. Yet she knew she’d not have him, as lover or as husband. She was her father’s daughter, after all. She’d spent a lifetime putting others before herself. She could do no differently now.

Sarah wanted him, but Abigail could save him.

J
amie put his brass telescope to his eye and peered at the smudge on the horizon. Instantly, Hong Kong’s high, thrusting peak leapt into view.

With a quick turn, he swept the roads between the barren island and China’s mainland. A few fishing sampans skimmed the turquoise waters, but the straits were empty of either Chinese war junks or British patrols. Jamie couldn’t have asked for a brisker breeze or a cleaner approach to Macao.

Lowering the telescope, he fired a question at the short, stocky man standing at his elbow. “Can do Macao, same same tide?”

Second Harvest squinted at the landmark mountain peak, took a few moments to calculate distance and speed, then nodded. “Can do Macao, same same tide.”

“Take us in, then.”

“Ai-yah! It is done, cap-i-tan!”

Jamie snapped the telescope shut and slipped it into its specially fitted slot in the steering house. Satisfaction whipped through him. They’d made good time, damned good time. He didn’t doubt that the
Phoenix
had outraced word of the incident at Dong-Lo. With a little luck, he could take on hurried replenishments, bundle the rest of the Abernathys and their possessions aboard, and weigh anchor again before either the Chinese port officials or the East India Company authorities got wind of the disaster.

Before he could do that, he thought with a swift grin, he had to spike whatever schemes the woman below decks had devised to thwart his plans.

With a quick order to the helmsman to hold to the course Second Harvest directed, he left the steering cabin. The hot noon sun beat down on his shoulders as he strode across the deck. Sliding down the wood handrails, he headed for the closed door at the end of the companionway. Anticipation of a lively battle thrummed like Greek fire in his veins.

He hadn’t spoken to Sarah since her stormy retreat from the mess the night before last. She’d kept to her cabin—his cabin—declining to join the men at meals. John Hardesty, hardened sea dog that he was, had slavishly catered to her every need, bringing her water to wash with, breakfast this morning, and, only an hour ago, a lunch of fried squid.

Jamie hadn’t minded giving Sarah whatever time she needed to store up ammunition for the next round in their war of wills. He enjoyed a good fight, and took particular delight in sparring with the so-prim and proper Miss Abernathy. Even more, he wanted to keep the shadows at bay and the light of battle in her brown eyes.

He didn’t doubt that she’d come up with a sack full of new arguments, or some outrageous scheme to slip away and throw herself on the mercy of that pompous windbag, Lord Blair. Having underestimated her re-sourcefulness
before, Jamie wouldn’t make the same mistake again. If he had to, he’d damned well lock her in the cabin until the
Phoenix
raised sail once again and post a guard to make sure she stayed there.

The problem was, he couldn’t decide which of the crew he could trust to keep her prisoner. Even Liam Burke had let drop that he’d come within a hair of disobeying Jamie’s orders and going in search of him at Dong-Lo, as Sarah had begged him to do. Burke, of all people! The one man Jamie trusted above all others to stand fast.

Jamie was still pondering Miss Sarah Abernathy’s effect on his crew when he raised his hand and rapped sharply on the door.

“Enter.”

The subdued response surprised him, as did the palely composed woman who stood at his entrance. Eyes narrowing, he studied Sarah closely as he walked into the cabin. She’d tamed her hair into a thick, neat braid, and borrowed another of his shirts. The embroidered vest she’d adopted as her own hung below her waist, disguising her generous curves.

Not that Jamie needed to see the swell of her hips or slope of her bosom. His palms tingled with the remembered feel of them. As much to keep from reaching for her as to brace himself for the battle ahead, he widened his stance and hooked his thumbs in his belt.

“We’ve just raised Hong Kong.”

She returned his gaze with a shuttered one of her own. “Have we?”

What the devil was she about? Did she hope to lull him with this meek demeanor? Not bloody likely. He knew her too well now.

“Aye,” he said, rocking back on his heels a bit,
“we have. We’ll drop anchor off Macao within two hours, three at most.”

For the barest instant, her lips seemed to tremble. Then she firmed them in the schoolmarmish way that had once irritated Jamie no end. Now, he considered it a personal challenge. He knew well how soft and full those lips felt under his, and how to…

“I shall need something else to wear when we go ashore,” she said quietly, cutting into his salacious thoughts. “I cannot appear in your clothing if you wish us to remain inconspicuous and…What were your words?…’slip in and out of Macao.’”

He stopped rocking and eyed her suspiciously. “I thought you didn’t wish to slip in or out, any more than you wished my escort to England.”

“I don’t, but I’ve had time to reflect on the solution you proposed to the dilemma that faces us both.”

She clasped her hands before her. In the light spilling through the high transom windows, Jamie noted white around her knuckles. She wasn’t as calm as she wanted him to think.

“If you insist on fulfilling your promise to my father…”

“I keep my word, Sarah, when I choose to give it.”

She lifted her chin. “Then I shall accompany you ashore to collect my family and such necessary items as we may carry away with us. And you, sir, shall take to wife whichever of the Abernathy sisters you choose…and can convince to wed you.”

Astounded, Jamie dropped his arms. “The hell you say!”

“Please do not use such vulgarities in my presence, sir, or around my sister and brother when they come aboard.”

Jamie wasn’t sure which threw him more. The fact that she’d fallen in with a scheme he’d proposed only to inflame her, or the fact that she stood there, stiff as a poker, and chided him for his language, as if she herself hadn’t resorted to a far more colorful choice of words just a day or so ago.

“Now as to the matter of my clothing,” she continued while he stared at her, dumbfounded. “I think it best for me to wear Chinese costume ashore, as I did when I came aboard. If you will purchase a tunic and hat from one of the boat girls when we drop anchor, I shall change quickly and accompany you to the Mission House.”

The lack of emotion in her voice finally pierced Jamie’s stupefaction. She was up to something. She had to be.

“The devil take your hat and tunic! What scheme have you hatched, Sarah?”

“None. I’m simply acceding to yours.”

“I know you too well now to believe that.” He closed the small space between them and scowled down at her. “You thought little enough of my plan a day ago. Why this change in course?”

Her eyes met his, clear and direct. “I think perhaps my father was right. You can yet be saved, Jamie Kerrick.”

“Dammit, I don’t want, saving.”

“What do you want then?”

The question hit him like a heavy, swinging boom. What did he want? A few weeks ago, he would have said that he wanted only a fair wind and a willing female in his arms when he went ashore. A few days ago, even, his sole desire was to find Sarah’s absent
parent, haul them both back to Macao, and rid himself of her pesky presence aboard his ship.

Now…

Now, he wanted more. With an urgency that tightened his groin and curled his hands into fists, he wanted to take her in his arms, to taste again her full mouth. To tumble her onto the bunk and explore the delights of her ripe body.

What he didn’t want, however, was to tie Sarah in marriage to a man with no reputation, no home other than a crumbling stone keep perched above a windswept coast, and a purse that would barely stretch to cover the losses of this voyage.

She deserved better. Much better.

“I want only to fulfill my promise to your father,” he replied at last.

“And so you shall.”

The pain that flickered briefly in her eyes threw Jamie. Dammit, this wasn’t going at all the way he’d planned. Without knowing quite how it had happened, he found himself back-paddling rapidly.

“Sarah, listen to me. I only proposed accepting your father’s outrageous offer of his daughter’s hand in marriage to shock you.”

“You succeeded well enough,” she said with a faint touch of acid.

“Aye, I know. But I have no intention of holding you…or your sister…to that pledge.”

She tilted her head, studying him through thick, dark lashes tipped with just a touch of the same burnt red as her hair. “Do you not?”

“No.”

Her chin lifted. “Then you’d best rethink your intentions,
or I shall not sail with you. Nor will Abigail or Charlie.”

Once again, she flummoxed him. Jamie gaped at her while he tried to absorb this confounded about-face. Just yesterday the woman had smacked his face and screeched that she’d be damned if she’d see either Abernathy sister wed to a scoundrel like him. Now she stood there as calm and unmoving as a ship caught in the doldrums, and informed him that she would hold him to her father’s request.

And to think he had once considered himself something of an authority on women! This one beat all.

“I said I would take you back to England, and I will. But I won’t extract marriage as the price of your passage. Nor,” he added quickly to forestall further argument, “will I compromise your reputation or that of your sister by hauling you into Portsmouth aboard the
Phoenix.
”

“What do you intend to do?” she asked with a lift of one brow. “Drop us overboard off the coast to swim ashore?”

“That’s one possibility,” he retorted. “But as tempting as it sounds, I think it best if we put into Calais first. I have a friend, an acquaintance of sorts, who married a French émigré in the early years of the war. Etienne has since reclaimed his estates in France. You and your family can rusticate with them for a week or two, and they’ll accompany you across the Channel when you’re ready. You’ll be welcomed wherever you wish to make your home if you arrive in the company of the Comtesse de Charbonneaux.”

It was Sarah’s turn for astonishment. She’d spent hours in agonizing reflection. A day and a night in most sober and prayerful thought. As painful as it was,
she’d reconciled herself to the idea of a match between Straithe and Abigail, should her younger sister wish it.

And how could Abby not? Without half trying, Jamie Kerrick could charm the laces from a lady’s boot, not to mention her stays! He had only to grin at Abby in that roguish way of his, or kiss her tenderly, or tease her with whispered promises, and she would be his.

She would be his, and Jamie would be saved.

Marriage was the only solution to the dilemma they’d landed in, and marriage to Abigail was Straithe’s only salvation. Sarah accepted that agonizing truth, and reconciled herself to a lifetime of loss.

Now, the confounded man was taking all her sober reflection and turning it on its head. Turning Sarah on her head, as well. Her mind whirling, she tried to make sense of the scheme he’d sprung on her.

“Why would this comtesse lend her cachet to the offspring of a missionary she’s never met?”

“I told you, she’s a friend.”

That hardly reassured Sarah. Straithe could claim friendship with any number of women!

“What kind of a friend?” she demanded.

“The best kind,” he replied shortly. “The kind who stands by you when you need one. Dorcas and Etienne will see us through this. You have my word on it.”

Sarah’s brows drew together. Dorcas? The name sounded a chord within her, but she couldn’t think why. While she pondered its familiarity, Straithe misconstrued the reason for her frown.

“You still can’t bring yourself to place any faith in my oath, can you?”

The terse question pushed all thought of names right out of Sarah’s mind. “No! That is, yes, but…”

He stilled her stammering protest by the simple expedient of taking her chin in his hand and tilting her face to his.

“You will, Sarah. Someday you’ll learn to trust me. I only hope that day doesn’t arrive too late.”

Made breathless as always by his mere touch, she stared up at him. “Too late for what?”

“Damned if I know,” he muttered.

Spinning on his heel, he left with a curt promise to procure Chinese clothing for her as soon as they dropped anchor in Macao Bay.

Sarah spent the next few hours in complete turmoil. With a few clipped sentences, Straithe had shattered the calm she’d worked so hard to achieve. Her thoughts whirling, she worried over how best to break the news of Papa’s death to Abigail and Charlie, mulled over Straithe’s scheme to involve an unknown comtesse in their problems, and wondered how the captain would redeem himself if not by marrying Abigail. Somehow, the question of Straithe’s future had begun to gnaw at her almost as much as that of her brothers and sister.

To her dismay, all of her worries came to a boil in the same pot within an hour of sailing into Macao Bay.

As requested, the captain procured concealing pants, tunic, and conical straw hat from the obliging boat girls. Leaving Burke with orders to replenish the ship’s stores and keep the crew from the brothels at all costs, he accompanied a well-disguised Sarah ashore. She sat beside him in the sampan, ignoring the cheerful chatter of the girl who sculled them toward the docks. Her stomach churned with the realization that she was seeing
the last of the city that had been her home for more than five years.

Macao rose in splendor before her on its many hills, set like a European jewel on the threshold of immense, unknown China. Half a mile of gently curving shore formed her outer harbor, along which ran the Praya Grande, the Grand Walk. Sarah had strolled the broad, treeless esplanade many a time with Abigail, or watched indulgently while Charlie rolled a hoop or raced and played tag with the other children.

Her throat tightening, she raised her eyes from the broad, curving bay to the mansions that fronted it. The western-style buildings rose like tiers of an elaborately decorated cake, from the sixteen-pillared portico of the governor’s mansion to the smaller but no less elaborate edifices on the hills above. Spots of green gardens showed among the residences, and here and there a church tower.