One Night of Passion (27 page)

Colin said, “Just thought I’d ask. You could say I met the
Gallia’
s captain when he commanded the
Taursus.
Most likely he volunteered to come after me just to return the favor.”

She tipped the glass to her eye and surveyed the ship. “What favor was that?”

“The last time I saw Captain Bertrand, I’d just put a broadside into the
Taursus’
s waterline and she was sinking fast.”

“You do have a way of making friends,” Georgie muttered. She glanced back at the French ship, their need for revenge blazing in every inch of sail they had unfurled to catch the
Sybaris.
“Perhaps he’s forgotten,” she offered, taking one last peek through the spyglass, hoping to catch a glance of this Captain Bertrand and take a measure of the man for herself. But the French decks were in the same flurry of activity as those behind her and it was hard to discern her captain amidst the numerous men in bright blue uniforms.

Colin snorted. “I doubt that. You never forget the bastard who shoots your ship out from beneath you.”

Despite the morning sun beating down on the deck, a cold chill ran down Georgie’s arms. “And now he has the opportunity to return the favor.”

He shook his head. “Not quite. He’ll want the
Sybaris
as a prize to replace the ship he lost. And he’ll haul me into the most wretched, dirty hole of a port he can find so I can rot out the rest of the war in some French cell. Or he’ll just save himself the trouble and hang me for piracy outright.”

“Or spying,” Georgie muttered, not realizing just how loud she had said it.

Colin smirked. “Thank you for reminding me. Perhaps you can start keeping a list for him, so as to make my trial that much quicker. Besides, I don’t know him well enough to know what he would do with your sister . . . or Chloe. And for that fact alone, I cannot risk letting him take the ship.”

Georgie noticed that he hadn’t mentioned her welfare in his list of concerns, but before she could thank him for his lack of consideration, the French fired a second round.

This time a ball hit the front of the ship, tearing through the decking and sending up a shower of debris.

“Captain Danvers!” Pymm came scurrying back up from behind a water barrel where he’d taken refuge. “They are getting closer by the minute. Will you please do something?”

“If you don’t quit complaining, I’ll send you over there to deal with them. Serve Bertrand right to have to listen to you nattering on,” Colin said, as he stomped forward, shouting orders as he went.

“I protest—” Mr. Pymm began.

“Mr. Livett!” roared Colin, stopping the other man’s complaint. “Get these people below or throw them overboard.” Mr. Livett looked ready to choose the latter, so Georgie scrambled across the deck to the companionway. Mr. Pymm darted after her, hard on her heels.

Just then another cannonball exploded, sending her sprawling forward. She landed with a hard thump, the air knocked from her lungs. For a while all she could do was lie on the deck, gasping like a freshly caught mackerel. Breathing was made all that much more difficult because something or someone had landed atop her, pinning her down. She struggled to roll over and when she glanced over her shoulder, she discovered Mr. Pymm’s unconscious form pinning her in place. A gash on his forehead bled profusely, soaking her dress so badly that it was hard to tell that she wasn’t hurt.

At least she didn’t think she was hurt, other than the burning in her lungs as she struggled to fill them again.

Colin was at her side in a heartbeat. He gently brushed aside the tangle of curls covering her face. “Are you injured?” The anger and sarcasm of his earlier expressions were gone, care lacing his words.

She tried to speak, but still couldn’t catch her breath, so she shook her head. Colin rolled the prone man free of her legs, and Georgie pulled herself up to her knees, crawling to Pymm’s side. She placed her hand on his chest, which rose and fell under her touch. Then he stirred slightly.

“He’s alive,” she managed to gasp, glancing up at Colin. “Go. Do what you must. I’ll see to him.”

Colin nodded and shouted for Rafe. “Help her get Mr. Pymm below and then stay there.”

Rafe started to protest, but his brother shot him a glance so angry and hot, not even the rebellious lad dared utter another word.

With the boy’s help, Georgie managed to get Pymm below. Kit stood in the corridor with a wailing Chloe in her arms.

“What’s happened, Georgie?” she asked.

Taking Chloe up into her arms, she settled her daughter down with a quick hug and a kiss on the forehead. “The French have attacked us. Get back in the cabin.”

Kit’s nose pinched in dismay. “But it smells awful in there. Chloe just filled her nappy. And the basket of dirty ones is nearly full.”

“I don’t care if the entire room is filled with dirty nappies, just get in there.” Then all of a sudden it hit Georgie.
Dirty nappies.

They were the solution to everything. At least for the moment. Her head turned in the direction of Colin’s cabin, and to her delight, it appeared the guard he’d posted there had decided to join the fight above.

“Just bear with it,” Georgie told Kit as she handed Chloe back to her, and began herding them all into their cabin. “Besides, Rafe is going to stay with you.”

At this, Kit brightened, just as Georgie surmised she would. Her lovesick sister happily tripped back inside, now oblivious to the cannon fire overhead or the thought that any moment might be their last.

Rafe, on the other hand, appeared less than thrilled with the prospect of spending his first battle in a room with an overflowing basket of dirty nappies, though the knowing wink Kit cast in his direction quelled most of his reluctance.

They laid Mr. Pymm out on Georgie’s bunk. “Do you think you can clean up that gash on his head?”

Kit nodded. “I’ll use my extra petticoat.”

Georgie smiled at the idea of Mr. Pymm waking up to find his head bound in ladies’ undergarments. As her sister and Rafe set to work on the unconscious man, she kissed Chloe once more and then was down the hall and into Colin’s cabin.

She only hoped this time he wouldn’t kill her for what she was about to do.

*   *    *

It had been a trap from the start. Somehow the French had been following him since he’d gone to Volturno to pick up Pymm and, he’d wager, since his meeting with Nelson in Naples. And he could only guess who was responsible for that . . .

Georgie.
His bitterness rose like gall around his heart. In his desire to see what he wanted in her, he’d endangered his mission, his crew, and the
Sybaris.

Pymm had probably been right last night. She had been on deck signaling her compatriots.

The
Gallia’
s cannons let loose another disastrous volley, bringing Colin’s attention back to the matter at hand. He knew Bertrand was only toying with him, shooting out his foremast, tearing apart his lines with round after round of shot, crippling him one bit at a time until now the
Sybaris
was nothing more than an easy prize.

The
Gallia
began to turn and Colin knew she was drawing closer to board them.

He had two choices: fight to the last man and go down with his ship, or surrender and barter to save the lives of his crew.

If he chose to give up, that would buy him enough time to get down to his cabin and destroy Pymm’s documents.

Then at least the French wouldn’t have any tangible evidence with which to damn his entire crew, other than the traitorous testimony of their beautiful and enticing agent.

And in the back of his mind, he couldn’t forget the other reasons to stand down.

Kit and Chloe.

As for Georgie, he cared less if she ended up at the bottom of the sea.

But the others, especially Chloe, were innocent of Georgie’s deceptions, of her duplicitous nature. And while he may not trust Bertand, he wouldn’t sacrifice her sister or his child just to see Georgie gain the retribution she deserved. He had to believe that if anything was true about Georgie, she’d safeguard Kit and Chloe to her last breath.

“Strike the colors, Mr. Livett,” Colin called out.

“What?” Mr. Livett asked, staring at him open-mouthed.

“You heard me. Strike the colors. Surrender the ship before we lose any more lives.”

Mr. Livett nodded and passed on his orders.

As the
Sybaris’
s flag fell, the French cheered and jeered their victory. He could hear Bertrand’s nasal shouts, giving the orders to start boarding and secure his prize.

Colin ignored their jibes. He’d never lost a ship before, and he still didn’t consider the
Sybaris
lost. He’d find a way to regain command, but for now he made a hasty course through the wreckage strewn over the deck and down the companionway to his cabin.

His mind raced with ideas as to where to hide the damning documents so they still might have a chance to reach London, but he couldn’t think of anywhere the French wouldn’t be willing to look. Since Georgie knew about the secret compartment and how to open it, there wasn’t anywhere safe for them.

His only choice was to reduce them to ashes before Bertrand arrived aboard.

His cabin was in disarray, one of the windows in the rear shattered, and his possessions scattered about. Ignoring the mess, he went straight to the panel and opened it.

But when he stuck his hand in, his fingers found nothing. Not the packet of papers, not even the silk-wrapped bundle he’d held on to for foolish, sentimental reasons that now seemed to mock his judgment even further.

For once again, she’d gotten the better of him.

Georgie.
Damn her traitorous hide.

He’d have her neck before he’d let her give Pymm’s hard-won secrets to the French.

But as he whirled around, ready to confront her, he found himself staring down the muzzle of a pistol held by a French officer. Behind him stood two more men, large brutes who looked capable of tearing a man limb from limb.

“Captain Danvers, I presume?” asked the man with the pistol. “I am Capitaine Charles-Augustin Bertrand. I believe we have met before.”

Colin nodded in greeting. “Yes, as I remember the last time I saw you, you were up to your fancy ass in seawater. Imagine my surprise when I discovered they’d given you another command to lose.”

“Ah, but I haven’t lost today.”

“Not yet, you haven’t,” Colin told him.

The Frenchman’s smile faded to something akin to outrage, until he spied the open compartment behind Colin. “What have we here?”

He came around and peered inside. “Empty. Now where could those documents you are carrying be?”

“What documents?” Colin asked. He leaned over Bertrand’s shoulder and peered into the empty compartment. “I don’t see any documents.”

Bertrand glared at him, and then nodded to his two henchmen. “It appears we have much to discuss, Captain Danvers. Is it not so?” He stepped aside to allow the deadly-looking pair to begin his unholy revenge.

Colin knew only pain. His ears rang and his head throbbed. He thought his arm might be broken, his ribs were surely cracked in several places, and still they beat him. And every so often Bertrand would ask him where the papers were and Colin would reply, “What papers?” and the beating would continue.

Then out of the blackness and roar of pain he heard her.

That sweet voice that rained down on his ears like a balm of honey and spring flowers.

“Capitaine! Oh, please have mercy,” Georgie was saying. “You cannot kill this man; it would be unfair.”

She was begging for his life? And in French, no less. Perfect French. Why that should surprise him, he couldn’t fathom.

“I would ask that you not harm him any further,” she continued to plead.

Bertrand’s tone was cultured and smooth, with a touch of arrogance. “Madame, who are you?”

Colin answered for her. “A traitorous bitch!”

For that, he received another kick in the ribs.

“Capitaine, I would prefer to speak to you alone,” she said. “Away from
that man
!”

He just bet she did. She probably had his papers sitting on a golden salver in her room just waiting to be served.

Glancing up out of his one eye that would open, he could see she wore the gown she’d had on last night, the one that had set his blood afire. Her blond hair, the silken curls he loved to touch, were dressed perfectly in long ringlets and held up in a white ribbon, and as a final adornment to her perfectly feminine costume, she held Chloe to her low-cut bosom.

She looked as innocent as the Madonna, but as far as he was concerned the resemblance ended there. Colin knew only too well that Georgie and her Gorgon curls put her more akin to Medusa.

“Madame, I would ask again, who are you?”

“I am a citizen of France, and I beg your protection from that animal, that fiend.” She drew Chloe closer to her breast, shielding the child from witnessing the sight before her. “In truth, I am Madame Saint-Antoine, the widow of General Bonaparte’s Assistant Surveyor of Antiquities in Egypt.” Georgie raised a lacy bit of cloth to dab at her eyes at the mention of this newest fictitious dead husband. “But more importantly, I have information dire to the welfare of France.”

“I should have thrown you overboard, you lying—” Colin didn’t have the opportunity to finish, for Bertrand nodded to one of his assistants and the man leveled another kick into Colin’s already throbbing ribs.

“Is that really necessary?” she asked. “I would have him live long enough so that General Bonaparte can mete out a punishment fitting his numerous crimes.” She held out a piece of paper. “I have a full accounting, to be presented as soon as possible to the nearest magistrate.”

Bertrand took the paper, glanced at it, and sighed. Even to Colin’s limited perspective, it was apparent he was growing weary of Georgie’s theatrics. “This hardly explains why the First Consul would want this man.”

“The First Consul? My Napoleon has been promoted?” Georgie smiled and then nodded. “Of course he has. He has great plans for France.”

“Yes, madame,” Bertrand replied, his boot tapping against the wood-planked floor. “But you haven’t answered my question. Why would Bonaparte want this man?”