Surrender of a Siren (21 page)

“At least I only teased the boy. I’m not the one poised to break his heart.”

She blinked. “It’s only infatuation. He’s not really in love with me.”

He pounded the table. “Of course the boy’s in love with you! They all are. You talk to them, you
listen
to their stories—even Wiggins’s prattling, God only knows why. You draw them little sketches, you make them paintings for Christmas. You remind them of everything they’ve left behind, everything they pray they’ll one day hold again. And you do it all looking like some sort of Botticelli goddess, surely the most beautiful thing they’ve ever laid eyes on. Damn it, how’s a man to
keep
from falling in love with you?”

Silence.

She stared at him.

She blinked.

Her lips parted, and she drew a quick breath.

Say something
, Gray silently pleaded.
Anything
. But she only stared at him. What the hell had he just said? Was it truly that bad? He frowned, reliving the past minute in his mind.

Oh, God. Gray rubbed his face with one hand, then gave a sharp tug on his hair. It was that bad.
Damn it to hell
. If Joss were here, he’d have a good laugh at his expense.

“Have you …”

“Have I what?” Gray prompted, promptly kicking himself for doing so. God only knew what she’d ask now. Or what damn fool thing he’d say in response.

“Have you ever seen a Botticelli? Painting, I mean. A real one, in person?”

The breath he’d been holding whooshed out of him. “Yes.”

“Oh.” She bit her lip. “What was it like?”

“I …” His hand gestured uselessly. “I haven’t words to describe it.”

“Try.”

Her eyes were too clear, too piercing. He swallowed and shifted his gaze to a damp lock of hair curling at her temple. “Perfect. Luminous. So beautiful, your chest aches. And so smooth, like glass. Your fingers itch to touch it.”

“But you can’t.”

“No,” he said quietly, his gaze sliding back to meet hers. “It isn’t allowed.”

“And you care what others will allow?” She took a step toward him, her fingers trailing along the grooved tabletop. “What if you were alone, and there was no one to see? Would you touch it then?”

Gray shook his head and dropped his gaze to his hands. “It’s not …” He paused, picking over his words like fruits in an island market. Testing and discarding twice as many as he chose. “There’s a varnish, you see. Some sort of gloss. If I touched it with these rough hands, I’d mar it somehow. Make it a bit less beautiful. Couldn’t live with myself then.”

“So—” She leaned one hip against the table’s edge, making her whole body one sinuous, sweeping curve. Gray sucked in a lungful of heat. “It isn’t the rules that prevent you.”

“Not really. No.”

Silence again. Vast and echoing, like the long, marble-tiled galleries of the Uffizi.

And then, at last: “It’s still your fault.”

“What is?”

“Everything. Davy. Of course he wants to prove himself now. How did you expect him to react, asking him all of those questions? Grilling him in front of all the crew, in front of me?” She wilted into the chair. “You should have known better. You should have
done
better.”

There she went again, appealing to his hypothetical sense of honor. Pulling at her neckline as she did it, sending jolts of desire straight to his groin. Confirming he’d no true honor at all.

“I mean, how would you feel, your whole life exposed like that in front of all those men?”

“The men respect me because they know I’ve been through it, too. Just like all of them received the same treatment once. No secrets between sailors, Miss Turner. Unlike some”—he threw her a glance—“I’ve nothing to hide.”

“Is that so?” Her gaze sharpened.

Gray nodded.

“Well, then. What is your name?”

He crossed his arms over his chest. So this was her game, was it? Very well. If she wished to question him, he would answer. She was free to learn every vile, brutish thing about him. That would teach her to appeal to some imaginary sense of decency. “Benedict Adolphus Percival Grayson. The same as my father’s.”

“I thought you said there was only one woman permitted to address you by your Christian name.”

“And it’s still the truth. Don’t get excited, sweetheart. I’ve not given you leave to use it. You may, however, call me Gray.”
Please
, he added silently.

She shook her head. “What is your age, Mr. Grayson?”

“I am two-and-thirty this coming year. Miss Turner.”

“From whence do you hail?”

Gray eased back in his chair. “I was born and raised on Tortola, as you know. The Grayson family tree is rooted in Wiltshire. My grandfather was a gentleman of some standing, and my father was his typically wayward second son. For his sins, which were legion, my father was exiled to Clarendon—that was the name of our plantation—to mend his dissolute ways.”

“And did he?”

“What do you think?” He reclined in his seat, propping one boot on the table between them.

A smile tugged at her lips. “How many siblings have you, Mr. Grayson?”

“In truth, I could not say. My father’s acknowledged children number three. I have one brother, whom you have met, and one sister, whom you have not. We are all of different mothers. So to answer your earlier question, it would seem the West Indies proved an ineffective remedy for dissolution.” He watched her for signs of shock or displeasure. Her brow, however, remained as placid as this godforsaken sea.

“I know your father is …”

“Dead.”

She cleared her throat. “Yes, dead. Is your mother still living?”

“No. She died when I was an infant. I’ve no memory of her at all.”

A single crease scored her forehead. “I’m sorry.”

“Are you?”

The words simply rolled off his tongue, uttered with no particular inflection or intent. But Miss Turner snapped to attention. Gray fought the urge to fidget under her scrutiny.

“Yes,” she said, a note of defiance in her voice. “I am sorry. It’s a tragic thing, to have no memory of your mother.”

Gray shrugged. “Better than having some memory of her, and feeling the pain of the loss.”

“Do you truly believe it’s better?”

He frowned and tugged at his ear.

“I didn’t think so.”

Gray put a hand on the armrest and shifted his weight. Perhaps allowing this interrogation hadn’t been such a brilliant idea after all. Miss Turner was supposed to be the one growing uncomfortable, not him.

“Brown or white?” She propped her chin in one hand and stared at him.

“Excuse me?”

“Bread, Mr. Grayson. Given a choice, do you take brown bread or white?”

He chuckled. “Brown, if there’s butter. If not, white.”

“Ale or grog?”

“Ale. Chased with brandy.”
Not a bad idea
, he thought, reaching into his coat for his flask. He unscrewed the cap and lifted it to his lips.

“Have you ever stolen anything, Mr. Grayson?”

He froze, looking at her over the flask. With deliberate slowness, he tipped it back until the fiery liquor spread down his throat. Then he wiped his mouth, recapped the flask, and replaced it carefully in his breast pocket. “Of course.”

She tilted her head and raised one eyebrow, inviting him to elaborate.

“Where shall I begin? With the typical childhood petty thievery? Pineapples, chickens, my father’s stickpin … I could go on for several minutes there. Shall I detail for you all the dozens of ships I’ve boarded, the boatloads of precious cargo I’ve seized? Privateering is sanctioned thievery, perhaps, but theft nonetheless.” He drummed one finger lightly on the tabletop. “I’ve made stealing a way of life, Miss Turner. I could go on about it for hours. How much elaboration do you care to hear?”

She paused a moment, considering. “You’re not ashamed to own to it, then. Your thievery.”

“In most cases, no. I’m not.”

“Then in some cases, you are? What is it you’re ashamed of stealing, Mr. Grayson?”

Gray wrestled with her clear, unwavering gaze. Dare he make the confession? It would serve his purpose well, expose him for the blackguard he was. The girl ought to know just what sort of man she regarded. Then maybe she’d cease looking at him with those trusting eyes, expecting things of him she had no right to expect. Expecting things he had no way or means of giving.

Dropping his gaze to the floor, he rubbed a thumb across his lower lip. “I stole my brother’s inheritance.” His own voice sounded strange, oddly hollow. His whole body felt oddly hollow. “Twice.”

“Well,” she said. He glanced up to find that her expression held not disdain or shock, as he might have expected. As such an admission deserved. Rather, she looked intrigued.

“The pineapples and chickens, the dozens of ships …” She traced a groove in the tabletop with her finger. “All these I can easily imagine. But stealing an inheritance … twice? However did you manage that?”

“It’s a long story.”

“I’ve no pressing engagements.”

“I was in England, on break from Oxford, summering in Wiltshire at my grandfather’s estate. We received word that my father had died. My grandfather took the news hard. I think the old man always held out hope that his prodigal son would one day make good, return to the fold. When that hope was extinguished …” Gray cleared his throat. “He suffered an apoplexy within the week and never recovered.”

She made a small, crooning noise in the back of her throat. “You lost your father and your grandfather in the space of one week?”

“No. My father had already been dead for two months.”

“Yes, but still. You’d only just learned of it.” She hugged herself.

Gray frowned as she stroked her shoulder, inflaming his own long-buried hurt even as she soothed herself. Damn it, she was supposed to be reviling him, not pitying him. And certainly not sympathizing with him. “Do you want me to finish the story or not?”

“I’m sorry. Go on.”

He spoke briskly now, as if conducting a business transaction. “My grandfather left Clarendon to my father. In the event my father was no longer living, the lands were to be divided between my father’s male children.”

“You and Captain Grayson.”

“Yes.” He leaned forward over the table. “But you see, sweetheart, they didn’t know about Joss. I gather my father neglected to mention his half-African by-blow in his annual estate report. The solicitors had no idea.”

“But if he’s illegitimate … Would he have stood to inherit at all?”

He turned his hand palm side up and studied the blunt, clipped edges of his fingernails. “Perhaps not. No way to tell without explaining matters to the executors.”

“And you didn’t.” Her eyes turned from curious to piercing. “You accepted the lands, and then you sold them. Without asking your brother.”

Gray nodded.

“Did you divide the proceeds with him, after the fact?”

“No. I bought this ship and had it fitted for privateering. It was all in my name, but I promised him we would split the proceeds after the war.”

“And did you?”

Gray shook his head. “No. I gave him what share he earned as first mate, and not a penny more. I took the rest, bought a house in London, and started Grayson Shipping.”

“Grayson Shipping,” she repeated. “Not Grayson Brothers Shipping.”

“Grayson Shipping. The ships, the investment, the risks, the profit—it’s all mine. I am my brother’s employer, not his partner.”

“My goodness.” She sat back in her chair, still regarding him intently. “Yes, I think you are rightly ashamed.” And there it was. The prim face of censure he’d been seeking. A strange sense of satisfaction descended on him. Divine justice, perhaps. Other men, better men, confessed their sins to priests and saints, but Gray had chosen for his confessor this governess. The most beautiful woman he’d ever set eyes on, in all his years of chasing pleasure from one horizon to the next. The only woman to stir this desperate yearning in his breast. And this was his penance—to watch her shrink back into her chair, to see those clear eyes glaze with mistrust as she at last recognized him for the devil he was.

Yes, this was his due. And she wasn’t finished yet, his petite, austere inquisitor. No, there was so much sin yet to be revealed.

“Go on, then,” he prompted.

She gave him a quizzical look.

“Conclude the interrogation, sweetheart. You’ve more questions to ask.”

She stared hard into a corner of the cabin. “Are you married, Mr. Grayson?”

“No. I’m not the marrying sort.”

“Have you had many sw—” She paused. “Many sweethearts, then?”

“Yes. Many.”

She winced, almost imperceptibly, but he felt it like a flick of the lash. Still, she turned to meet his eyes again. Brave girl.

Ask it
, he urged silently.
Make the confession complete
.

“And how many lovers, Mr. Grayson?”