Once Tempted (19 page)

Olivia found herself smiling back, despite her resolve not to trust him. “Yes, thank you. I’d appreciate that.” She crossed the room and took the chair he had offered before.

“Now that’s all settled, perhaps you can tell me how you got mixed up with my rapscallion brother and the rather infamous Mr. Pymm.”

She shifted slightly. “I’d prefer not to discuss it, if you don’t mind.”

“I see,” he said, retaking his seat in front of his log book.

“What I’d like is to be returned to London,” she told him. Why she’d asked for that she didn’t know. London didn’t seem any safer than being marooned in the middle of the Atlantic with a shipful of strangers.

Captain Danvers was shaking his head. “I regret I’m unable to put you ashore.”

“What if I told you I was possibly wanted for murder in London? That the authorities would reward you handsomely for returning me?” She hoped he might be a greedy sort, tempted by gold. If she could convince him to turn his ship around, she’d make her escape the moment they docked.

But the captain appeared to be neither concerned nor alarmed that he was carrying a wanted passenger. He merely laughed. “So is half my crew, Miss—?”

Olivia didn’t know if she should be relieved or unnerved to be traveling in such nefarious, albeit fellow company. “Mrs. Keates,” she said, using her former
nom de guerre.

“Mrs. Keates, then. My apologies, but I didn’t learn of your presence until we were well out in the Channel, and I can’t possibly take you back now. I have . . . 
business matters
that cannot be delayed.”

Business matters.
By the way he said it, it hardly sounded like he engaged in the tea trade or woolen shipping. So she’d been right on one count. Secrets were a Danvers family trait. “Where are we bound?”

“Lisbon.”

Olivia let out a long, slow breath. Lisbon. And one step closer to
El Rescate del Rey.
Goose bumps fluttered over her arms.

Still, it was a long way to Portugal, and in between here, wherever here was, and that fabled land, she was alone on what was most likely a pirate ship, with a crew wanted for a menagerie of heinous crimes, and all because of one man . . .

“Damn him,” she muttered between gritted teeth. Damn that Robert Danvers for dragging her into this mess.

“I assume you are referring to my brother,” Colin commented, leaning back in his chair. “He does have that effect on people.”

“This is all his doing. I’ll see him in hell for this.”

“Actually, you may have your wish sooner than you think. He’s in the first mate’s cabin gone with fever. I doubt he’ll live through the night.”

If anything, Olivia discovered, Robert Danvers was a hard man to kill.

“This fever has to break,” she muttered to herself, as she reached for the linen cloth soaking in the basin of water and mopped his sweaty brow for probably the thousandth time.

Robert twisted and turned in the narrow berth, and Olivia struggled to hold him still. She’d restitched his wound twice—for he’d pulled the threads loose in his imaginary battles against the foes he fought in his fever-soaked brain.

“Lando! Lando!” he called out. “Don’t go there. Don’t trust anyone.”

“There, there,” she whispered, trying to soothe the worries from his brow with the cool cloth. “All is well, you must rest.”

He caught her hand, the desperate strength in his fingers belying the fact that he had been ill all these days. “Warn him. Tell him what she’ll do to him,” he begged her.

“Yes, I’ll tell him. But first you must rest or you’ll be of no use to him.”

He did not let go but pinned her with a wild gaze, his eyes focused for a moment on hers and his piercing stare cutting through her. “You’re lying. You aren’t going to warn him.”

She’d been through this with him countless times already, so she knew what he wanted to hear. “I have already warned him. He’s safe. He’s on his way home.”

Her words, once again, eased the demons raging within him. He slumped back into the berth, his eyes closed and his restless movements ceased.

At least, for the time being.

In his latest struggles, his blanket had fallen away, and she went to cover him before he got chilled. Even as she started to pull the frayed woolen length over him, she paused for a moment, magnetized by the sight of his body.

The scars and imperfections she’d become intimate with over the last few days of caring for him, she now looked upon as old friends and landmarks. And yet it was the maleness of him, the unrelenting strength that even in illness he would not give up, that took her breath away.

The corded muscles in his shoulders. The lithe, lean shape of his torso. The small patch of dark, curly hair forming a triangle on the upper part of his chest. Unbidden, her hand went there. She ran her fingers through the curls, the warmth of his body coursing into hers, the cadence of his heart beating a refrain into her own.

Something had changed her heart as she’d cared for him—softened her toward him. He wasn’t the arrogant beast who’d kidnapped her, the man who’d so rakishly kissed her in the park.

But a man in need of her touch. Of her faith. Of her hope.

His fierce devotion to this Lando made her almost jealous. He fought and fought with every ounce of his meager store of strength for this unknown man or woman, not unlike how she imagined her Hobbe might.

With unswerving dedication.

Could a man out only for the promised wealth of a lost treasure also hold such unselfish loyalties?

She thought not. And so she found herself looking at him differently, and late one night, in a blinding moment of realization as he’d clung to her hand and begged her to warn Lando of some impending danger, she’d wished Robert held the selfsame feelings for her.

Her passion for Hobbe found a new life in the dying embers of this man. And if anything, she wanted more than ever for him to live, if only to prove her right. If only to discover that her heart wasn’t betraying her this time.

“You’ve spent another night with him, haven’t you?” Colin called out from the door.

Olivia snatched her hand back and hastily covered her patient. Smoothing her damp palms over her skirt, she turned to face Robert’s brother. “His fever needed tending.”

“So I see,” he said, stepping into the small chamber and taking a look at his brother. His sharp gaze turned and studied her. “I don’t need any more patients on this ship. Aquiles and my brother are bad enough. You need rest.” The underlying order in his voice brooked no disobedience.

But it had been this way each morning for the last three days. And she ignored him just as stubbornly today. “He needs me more. He wouldn’t be in these circumstances if it hadn’t been for . . .”

If he hadn’t stepped in front of Chambley’s pistol and saved her life. Now she owed him a life in return.

“I’ll have Gavin bring you up some food and a hot pot of tea,” Colin offered, his mouth set in a line of frustration. He turned to leave, but then stopped and turned back to her. “Olivia, I’ve seen men linger like this too many times not to know the outcome. You’ve done a lot to keep him from dying, but if his fever doesn’t break soon, I fear for his mind. He may never recover.”

Olivia smiled weakly at him and nodded. “He’s had a busy night, what with evading the French, begging me to hide his maps and asking for someone named Lando. Do you know who he is talking about? This Lando?”

She swore Colin’s eyes flickered with some bit of recognition, but the man, as cagey as his brother, refused to offer her any help in piecing together Robert Danvers’s identity—or his past.

“No, ’tis just the fever speaking. Men say all kinds of odd things when their blood is infected.”

Olivia didn’t believe him but hadn’t the strength to argue the point. Still, she couldn’t help asking, “Captain Danvers, who is your brother?”

The man smiled, an odd, wry twist to his lips. “That is a good question and one better left for him to answer.”

“And if he dies?” she managed to ask, glancing at Robert’s flushed features and fever ravaged body.

“Then I suppose neither of us will ever know the answer.” With that he turned and left.

A few moments later she heard a shuffling in the gangway, and assumed it was Gavin with her tray. “You can just set it on the trunk there,” she said, without looking up from her work. When the boy didn’t say anything, she turned and discovered someone entirely different in the doorway, the last person she’d ever expected to see here, so far away from England and her former life.

Jemmy Reyburn.

Chapter 8

“O
livia!” Jemmy said. “There you are! I’ve had a devil of a time slipping up here to find you.”

She managed to find the words to get past her shock. “Jemmy?”

He ducked into the room, glancing back to make sure he hadn’t been seen. When he straightened and looked at her, his face split in a wide smile, a grin surrounded by four days of youthful and uneven beard. His clothes, once the pride of Bond Street, were a filthy, disheveled mess, and he stank as if he’d been bathing in bilge water.

“Hail, Queen Mab,” he said, using his pet name from childhood for her.

“What are you doing here?” She hustled past him and closed the door.

“Rescuing you, if you must know.”

“Rescuing me? How did you ever get here? Where have you been?” She plucked at his coat. “Don’t answer that last question. I’d rather not know.”

“As for how I got here, it is a rather adventurous tale. Mother and I decided it wasn’t proper for you to go to the Foreign Office without someone to lend you support, so I volunteered to go, but when I got there, no one knew anything about Chambley bringing you in. Not even the fellow’s secretary. Impertinent fellow, that one.”

“Yes, yes,” Olivia said, “but how did you end up here, on the
Sybaris
?”

“After I left the Foreign Office, I headed straight to Chambley’s. Never liked the fellow. Heavy-handed and all.” He shot a glance over her shoulder at Robert. “Going to live, do you think? The crew has quite a pool on the matter. Most think he’ll heave up anchor before the day is out.” He paused for a moment. “I believe that means they don’t think he has much of a chance.”

“He’ll live,” she said, more to convince herself. “He and I have some unfinished matters.”

“Then if I get the chance, I’ll put my money on you. Mayhap I’ll win enough to pay my passage.”

“Speaking of passage, how did you end up on this ship?” she asked, determined to see Jemmy to the end of his story.

“Oh, yes, my arrival here, I was getting to that,” he said. “After I got to Chambley’s, there you were with Bradstone barreling out of the place, with the entire house in uproar. I had a devil of a time following you. That fellow of Bradstone’s is quite the deft whip.” He stopped and scratched at his sleeve. “I don’t even want to know what is crawling inside this coat.”

Neither did Olivia.

“Well,” Jemmy said, continuing his long-winded tale. “I got lost in the Dials looking for you until I offered a rather cheeky lad most of my pocketbook to help me locate you. When I did, that bastard Bradstone had you bundled up and into another carriage before I could stop him.” Jemmy shot an aggrieved glance over at her patient. “Hope he lives. I’ve got a bit of a score to settle with him on your account. Demmed if he is a marquis, he can’t treat you like this.”

“Jemmy, before you go issuing any challenges, you should know that man isn’t the Marquis of Bradstone.”

“Isn’t Bradstone? How can you be sure?” Jemmy shook his head, unconvinced by her assurance. “His own mother took him in.”

Just then Robert shifted in his berth, the blanket covering him falling free, exposing his bare buttocks and legs.

Olivia blushed and pulled the woolen length to cover him. “Rest assured, I would know the difference.”

“Suppose you would,” he muttered, blushing as well. Finally he hastened to finish his story. “I followed you all the way to the docks and watched them cart you aboard. I knew I needed to get you off before they sailed, but I had a devil of a time getting on without being seen, and when I finally did, they were just about to set sail. The problem was I couldn’t find you, and the next thing I knew, we were off and away down the Thames.”

“And you’ve been aboard ever since,” Olivia said, finishing his story.

“Sadly, yes. I tried at night to find you, and I’ve spent the rest of the time dodging the crew and trying to find a safe place to hide out.” Jemmy drew in a long breath and then sighed. “I suppose if he isn’t Bradstone, you really didn’t need rescuing.”

“Oh, Jemmy, you are the dearest boy, but look what you’ve done! Your mother is going to be beside herself wondering where you’ve gotten to.”

He nodded, hanging his head in false contriteness, as he had when he was twelve and she’d catch him stealing tarts in the pantry. Then, just as suddenly, he brightened. “Is it true we are bound for Lisbon?”

“Aye,” she nodded.

His face glowed in excitement. “Wellington! This will be my chance!”

“Not if I have anything to say in the matter,” she told him. “You’ll be on the first ship homebound and back to your mother. She’ll never forgive me for dragging you into this. That is, if you aren’t pitched overboard first.”

“You think they would?” he asked. “They are a rather bloodthirsty looking lot, aren’t they?”

“I think you may have something there. The captain claims to be a simple merchantman, but I have my doubts.”

“A simple merchantman?” Jemmy laughed. “Not likely! Not unless arms and munitions are considered regular cargo. If what I’ve seen is any evidence, there’s enough powder and shot down in the hold to sink half the fleet.”

Before Olivia could reply, the door bumped into Jemmy’s back.

“Pardon, miss,” came Gavin’s voice through the closed door. He pushed it open and barged in. “Brought your tray along, like the Cap’n ordered.” The boy’s eyes widened at the sight of Jemmy.

“Gavin, this is my friend, Mr. James Reyburn,” Olivia said, pulling the boy into the already crowded cabin. “I was wondering if you would risk a bit of trouble for my sake.”