Midnight Mistress (13 page)

A man vaulted onto the steps. He stood away from the torches, his identity concealed by a heavy black cape and slouch hat. But Juliana would have known his voice among a thousand men.

Connor!

Juliana’s head spun. Her first thought was that Connor risked too much—his popularity with the
ton
would be ruined if one of the captains who had been with the line from the beginning recognized him as the man who’d stolen from her father. The next was a giddy, heart-stopping thrill that he’d risked so much to save her.

He strode across the steps, keeping just on the edge of the torchlight. “You call yourselves captains, yet you listen to a sharp who wouldn’t fool a child. ’Tis a wonder you all haven’t sold your ships for glass beads and trinkets!”

“Watch yourself, boyo,” Howick cautioned. “This is none of your affair.”

“Justice is
every
man’s affair. You believe the worst of this lady without a shred of real evidence. And you believe she cannot run a business simply because she is a woman.”

“Well, she
is
a woman,” one of the captains pointed out.

“That’s hardly a crime. I have it on good authority that some of your mothers were women.”

Laughter rippled through the crowd, but it quickly died as Sikes moved forward. For the briefest instant, his glance darted to the steps behind Juliana, then his gaze focused once more on Connor. “Clever words can’t change the truth, and the truth is that this lady had a lover’s rendezvous with a man at the Bell.”

“I know she met a man at the Bell, but it was not a lover’s rendezvous. I know … because I was that man.”

He pulled off his hat. Juliana gave a strangled cry. He’d publicly revealed his identity to save her.
Oh, Connor, you brave, wonderful fool
—

Her thoughts died as she realized her fears were unfounded.

“
Mon Dieu
, it is Captain Gabriel!”

“Archangel!”

The isolated shouts gathered momentum until the whole crowd cheered in one voice for their hero. Juliana stared at the scene, stunned at once by “Captain Gabriel’s” mastery in gaining the support of the entire assembly and by the fact that no one seemed to recognize him as the former Connor Reed. True, most of the captains had been hired on after he’d left for the Navy, but surely Tommy Blue would know him. But the face of the Marquis Line’s longest serving captain held the same blank astonishment as everyone else’s. Puzzled, Juliana turned toward Connor. And in that instant she saw him as the others did.

Standing above the crowd and silhouetted by the torches, his shadowed figure seemed larger than life. The flickering light turned his hair to a fiery halo, while his black cloak and the silver fog swirled around him like a sorcerer’s spell. He stood with his legs apart and his fists on his hips, radiating power and ruthless strength. Juliana stared, mesmerized along with the rest of the crowd. His cold, hooded eyes surveyed the crowd with the indifference of an all-powerful god. It was small wonder that no one recognized him. He was not the Connor she had once known.

He hardly seemed human at all.

She was so stunned that at first she didn’t realize he was speaking.

“… find out about her father. She thought I might know how his ship had fared in the Caribbean storms. I had no news to give her at the time. Though, sadly, a few hours later I learned his fate.”

It was a lie, told with impressive ease. The crowd quieted. The captains bowed their heads in respect. Connor waited a calculated heartbeat before continuing.

“This lady’s only crime was loving her father. She deserves your support, not your censure. Most of you here knew the marquis, and you knew he was a brave and fair man. If he chose his daughter to run his company, does she not deserve a chance to prove her worth? We are Englishmen, privileged to live in the greatest country in the entire world. Does not
every
person in this great empire deserve a chance to prove their worth?”

“Aye!” the crowd cried with patriotic zeal.

A few minutes ago Juliana had been on the verge of losing everything. Now, she watched Howick and the captains huddle again, but the grins they sent her way told her what their decision would be. The Marquis Line was saved. And the man she had to thank for it was heading toward the base of the steps, leaving without so much as a glance in her direction.

“Con—um, Captain!” Juliana hitched up her skirt and ran with unladylike alacrity to his side. “I just wanted—” she began breathlessly. “I mean, I do not know why you … that is, you were wonderfully gallant, and I wanted you to know how much I appreciate your regard.”

Connor lifted his gaze and gave her a burning look. “I did it for your father, not for you. Never you.” And without another word he slipped into the fog and was swallowed up by the night.

The crowd surged around Juliana. Howick doffed his hat and promised the captains’ support. An unknown woman
who was built like a barge gave her a thump on the shoulders and said, “That’s tellin’ ’em, dearie.” Tommy Blue pumped her hand. Meg’s smile blazed brighter than the torches. Sikes had slunk off into the darkness like the rat he was. Everywhere she turned Juliana met with smiles of congratulations from the gently bred and the lowborn alike. It was a victory on all fronts, but inside she felt hollow, with the same words echoing over and over inside her.
Not for you
. Never
you
.

“Lady Juliana, you comported yourself like a … well, like a Scotsman,” Mr. McGregor commented with his usual lack of aplomb. “And I thought that captain lad did a right fine job, too.” He produced a charcoal and scrap of paper out of his rumpled coat. “What was his name again?”

“Gabriel,” Juliana said dully. “And I sincerely hope I shall never see him again.”

“Oh, no, that will not do at all,” the solicitor replied as he made a notation on the paper. “I dunna know your plans, but I suggest you see him before the week is out. Tomorrow, if you can arrange it. ’Twould be best to offer him the job as soon as possible.”

“What job?”

“Why, the manager position, of course.”

Juliana stared at the Scotsman as if he’d suddenly lost his mind. “You cannot be serious. The man is a privateer. He’s the next best thing to a pirate!”

McGregor shrugged. “Pirate or no, he’s got the devil’s own gift for the art of persuasion. I dunna doubt he could easily convince the merchants to do business with the Marquis Line. And if you want my advice, I’d sign him up as quick as a tick.” He scribbled a sizable number on the paper and showed it to Juliana. “This is what you stand to lose before the week is out.”

“I am here to see Commodore Jolly.”

The undersecretary of the Vice Admiral of the Blue shuffled through his papers, searching for his calendar of appointments.
He gave a sidelong glance at the man in front of him, trying to determine if he was someone of importance. The concealing black cloak and the slouch hat that was pulled down over his brow gave little clue to his features, but the fact that his cloak was thoroughly soaked from the freezing afternoon drizzle told the clerk all that he needed to know. Any person of authority would have hired a carriage to travel to the Admiralty office in this inclement weather. The bureaucrat set aside his papers and waved the visitor aside. “Kindly take a seat. I shall attend to you as soon as I am able.”

“You shall attend to me
now
,” the man growled.

The undersecretary swallowed. He quickly opened his appointment book and thumbed to the appropriate page. “Ah yes, Mr. Smith. The commodore is expecting you. It is the second door at the top of the stairs. Please go right up.”

The man started to turn away, but hesitated. He nodded toward the row of junior officers and sailors seated on the long benches that lined the hallways beyond the undersecretary’s desk. “I suggest you attend to these good people as well. Otherwise I would be … displeased.”

The undersecretary could not see much of the man’s face, but he could see his smile. He swallowed again, then waved to the nearest man, a young third lieutenant from a fourth-rated gunboat. “Mr. Yeates, I believe you were next.”

Connor paused on the crowded stairway and watched with satisfaction as the undersecretary diligently wrote down the concerns of the junior officer. He knew the change of heart was temporary—the minute he was out of sight he had no doubt the petty bureaucrat would go back to his indifferent ways. Even after all these years and all he’d been through, Connor still couldn’t manage to rid himself of the habit of championing lost causes.

Like saving the skin of a woman who despised him
.

A cadet jostled his shoulder, jarring Connor back to the present. Damn, he was already late for his meeting with Jolly. He yanked his hat down over his brow and worked his way to
the top of the crowded stairway, thankful that the officers and clerks were far too consumed with their own concerns to notice a rain-soaked stranger in a worn cloak. Lucky thing, that, for the commodore’s short, unexpected note had urged secrecy, just as it had promised Connor that he “would learn something to his advantage.” Commodore Jolly was a highly placed official who had access to secrets of national security—secrets the French would pay dearly for. And his cryptic note proved he wasn’t quite the good-hearted buffoon that Connor had supposed him to be.

For an instant, Connor felt a stab of anger that Juliana’s guardian would sell his country for coin. God’s teeth, would he never be rid of the foolish urge to protect the girl? Well, last night was the final time he was playing white knight to her lady in distress. He’d promised Raoul. He’d promised himself. He had his own skin to think about, his own plans—and his own pleasures. Tonight he was taking Baroness Fairvilla up on her offer of a private supper and let nature take its course. Considering the lady’s shameless overtures toward him during the past month, Connor had no doubt what that course would be. By tomorrow morning he doubted he’d give a second thought to a spoiled, too-tall chit with nothing to recommend her but a pair of ocean green eyes.

Smiling at the thought of anticipated pleasures, Connor entered Commodore Jolly’s office … where his gaze collided with a pair of ocean green eyes.

Juliana rose stiffly from the leather chair in the commodore’s well-appointed oak-paneled office, trying to tamp down her panic. She’d practiced her speech so many times that she could have recited it in her sleep. Nevertheless, when Connor strode into the office wrapped in the same cloak that he’d worn last night and wearing a smile so sinful that it made her heart somersault, she forgot every one of her carefully rehearsed words. “I … that is, I’m so glad … I mean, I wanted to—”

His roar cut her short. “What the hell are you doing here?”

Her practical nature restored her wits. She stepped past him and shut the door to the office. “Heavens, keep your voice down. We do not want the whole Admiralty to know our business.”

“We don’t
have
any business. I came to meet Commodore Jolly, not you. He sent me a note.”

Juliana fingered the sable trim of her gray kerseymere walking dress. “Well, it wasn’t precisely Jolly who sent the note.”

Connor’s gaze jumped from her face to the commodore’s empty desk and unoccupied chair to the stone-cold brazier on the other side of the room. He pulled off his hat and raked a hand through his damp hair, splattering raindrops across the rug. “Does he know anything of this meeting?”

Juliana lifted her chin. “No. I knew the commodore was called away suddenly to Portsmouth, so I arranged to make use of his office. ’Tis not hard to hoodwink a clerk when I know my guardian’s hand as well as well as my own. And I am
not
alone. Meg and our abagails are waiting in a room down the hall.”

“Which makes this all entirely proper, naturally.”

Juliana stiffened at his patronizing tone. “Of course it is not entirely proper. But if I had asked you to come to the Marquis offices, you would very likely have ignored the invitation.”

“You were dead right about that, Princess. Now I’m ignoring this one.” He settled his hat back on his head and turned to leave.

“Wait! I have a proposition for you.”

Connor hesitated, but only for a moment. He glanced back at her with a wolf’s sneer. “Sorry, but it’s a bit early in my day to start compromising schoolgirls.”

“I am not … oh, you are the most
odious
of men! I meant a business proposition. I want you to work for me.”

Connor hesitated again. “You haven’t been nipping from the commodore’s brandy flask, have you?”

“Of course not. I want you to work for me—as manager for the Marquis Line.”

Connor started to say something, but Juliana overrode him, speaking at breakneck speed. “The position would not interfere with your own … um, enterprises. You could continue to sail under your own command, wherever and whenever you please. But I need a figurehead for my company—someone the merchants and captains can put their faith in until they learn to put their faith in me. After your assistance last night, my solicitor, Mr. McGregor, determined that you are the man for the job.”