Tides of Love (Seaswept Seduction Series) (13 page)

Lifting her thumb to her mouth, she nibbled the nail, directing her attention to the pad of paper sitting by his feet.

He nudged it beneath the desk with the toe of his boot. "Not the first time you've come between Annie and her husband, either, is it?"

She nibbled harder, wondering how to avoid this line of questioning. A sensible, rational explanation might do. She tilted her head. Maybe she could say—

"Quit trying to concoct a suitable reply."

Flustered, Elle promptly forgot her objective. "Twice. It's happened twice that I know of. Sean twisted her arm behind her back the first time, which left some nasty bruises on her wrist. The second"—she lowered her hand, felt a frown tug—"he split her lip, knocked a tooth out and loosened another. I begged her to go home, to her family. I offered to pay for the ticket to Atlanta. Or to let her stay with my friend Savannah, in New York, if she'd rather not go home. But Annie had just figured out she was pregnant... and he frightened her so." Sean Duggan had made threats she wasn't about to repeat to anyone—especially a man who had turned out to have a surprisingly ready temper.

When he continued to stare, she snapped, "To state this plainly, because I can see you're waiting for me to dig a ditch and crawl in,
everything
I've done for Annie has been against her husband's wishes. Including teaching her to read and write."

Noah bumped his spectacles up, drawing his knuckles across his eyes. Laughing, he said, "Just like you to make an enemy of every bully you encounter. Congratulations. That makes two this week."

"You think I'm still that silly little girl, don't you? Getting into one predicament after another. How incredibly insulting."

"You slip into trouble as easily as a warm bath, Elle. Be insulted if you like, but yes, that's what I think."

"For your information, Professor, not every problem has a solution. Sometimes people go by gut instinct, sheer, candid
emotion.
Fight fires when they catch a whiff of smoke, not wait until they trip over the burning building. Maybe my actions are a tad precipitate." She bent down, jerked the towel from the floor, and snapped the cloth into sloppy folds. "But at least I know how liberating it is to act without planning every move."

He lowered his hand, the spectacles resting on his brow stark against his sun-kissed skin. His left lid sagged slightly, giving him a reckless, rakish, thoroughly undeserved air. "How liberating"—his gaze traveled the length of her and back—"does it feel, sweet?"

"Don't call me that," she said and swallowed hard.
Trapped.
She felt trapped, her ankles chained to the floor. When he stared at her, grave and probing, she forgot her avowals of indifference.

Damn and blast!
She didn't love him, this tall, well-formed man gripping the chair with bulging knuckles, his square jaw tense with frustration. If she loved anyone, it was the boy who had wiped tears from her face and blood from her knees.

She certainly didn't love this enigmatic, unreachable man.

Sometimes, she didn't even
like
him.

She lifted her chin, prepared to tell him, but her lips parted and no sound passed. His expression had gone hot. She couldn't think of another way to describe it. Eyes dark as a stormy sky, nostrils flaring as they caught a scent. Her scent? His hands uncurled, and he lifted his body enough to bring their faces in line.

Her fingertips tingled, her arms inching toward him.

Noah met her halfway, his breath hitting her cheek. She made a low sound in her throat, and he stilled. Cursing once, he shoved from the chair. It rocked from side to side and finally flipped with a crash. Before she could recover, he was standing by the door, holding a coat in his hand.

"Put this on," he growled.

"But—"

"You can't go running around in"—he tossed the coat over her shoulders—"your underwear."

"I'll be back—"

"I'm going with you."

"Annie—"

"She's safe here. Safer than you are at Widow Wynne's." He grabbed a rumpled fishing hat from the hall tree and stuffed it on her head. "This door will be cinched as tight as any on Pilot Isle. I should know, I installed the lock."

She tipped the hat, glaring at him from beneath the stained brim. He glared right back. Gritting her teeth, she said, "Now look here—"

"I have the only key, Elle. I'll be watching the coach house. That bastard won't get past me. And he won't get in here, I promise you."

"But—"

"If you say no again, I'll sit on your front step and wait for him. Do you want that?"

"No, of course n—"

"Keep the hat pulled over your face." He placed his hand in the middle of her back and gave a firm shove. "All I need is for someone to observe you leaving here in the dead of night."

She stumbled onto the landing, "All... all
you
need? Do you think it would do wonders for me, Professor?"

He swung her to face him. "Thought we had a promise," he said, his fingers cupping her jaw. "No more. I don't want you to call me that." She watched his lips settle against his teeth, and she opened her mouth to reply.

And inhaled his breath.

A teasing scent. Peppermint.

His half smile settled into a flat line. "You don't have to agree, sweet. Just move it." He jerked the coat lapels close to her chin, took her hand, dragged her down the stairs, and across the dew-slick grass.

She stammered, French tangling with English and gibberish coming out. Noah ignored the chatter, flinging her hand from his as soon as Widow Wynne's door closed behind them. Resigned to his interference, she fought a fierce surge of anger and prayed she would get through the night without killing him.

* * *

Look what my damned illogical protectiveness has gotten me into this time,
Noah thought, flicking the maroon-velvet drapery aside and glancing into a sober night.

Restless, he prowled the length of Widow Wynne's gaslit drawing room, wishing his thoughts were as surefooted as his stride. What had happened in the coach house? Definitely wasn't a belated sense of duty that had made his body heat like a skillet over a flame. He'd simply been watching the wheels in Elle's mind spin, cataloging the emotions crossing her face because he could, and then something, a tender, warm expression had sent a jolt of raw need right to his heart. Making matters worse, he'd inhaled her scent, and
goddammit,
leaned in to kiss her.

The longing to touch her had all but brought him to his knees.

He fingered a frayed hole in the sleeve of his shirt, distancing his mind from his body. The wind shrieked outside, rattling the windowpanes and shooting a draft of moist air across his face. He brushed his fingers past his cuffs, checking the buttons. These were work clothes, not ones he generally wore in the company of women. Then again, Elle had not even thought to throw a coat on over her
nightdress.
His coat—the one neither of them had the nerve to discuss—would have done well enough.

Now, blessit, she had both of his coats.

Suddenly, a vision of Annie spreading her hands over her swollen belly flashed in his mind. The smell of blood lingered in his nostrils. Returning to the window, he searched the dark street again, almost hoping for a sign of Sean Duggan. If that bastard
ever
got his hands on Elle, Noah would kill him. And Annie, dear God, what would happen to her if they didn't get her away from Pilot Isle? Somehow, they must. Noah had seen what years of abuse did to a woman, eroding her confidence and her dignity, leaving a vacant, pitiable shell. Caroline Bartram had denied her husband's mistreatment for years because she had felt indebted to him. Her previous occupation had not garnered many proposals, and the first one she received, she accepted. She had denied Noah's offer of assistance, until she finally understood that her husband would destroy her if she did not leave him.

Annie's situation seemed chillingly similar.

The door clicked shut, and he glanced back, releasing a relieved breath. Elle had changed into decent clothing, thank God, although the blouse looked fit for the rag box, too wash-worn to do more than cling to her lush bosom. The skirt was much the same, hanging in temptingly gentle folds from her hips. Why the hell couldn't she wear all those layers that normally kept a man from seeing a woman's true shape?

"Any sign of Sean?" she asked, her voice surprisingly controlled. He had to hand it to her—the woman was made of stern stuff.

"No." On his second pass around the parlor, he paused by the mantel, a dab of color catching his eye. "What is this?" He plucked a faded yellow ribbon from a brass hook.

"Oh, that." Elle cleared her throat and from the teasing scent invading his senses, took a step closer. "A suffrage bazaar ribbon. Widow Wynne let me put some of my things in this parlor when I moved from my father's house. He offered to keep them there but... I didn't trust him with, well, not with that."

"World's Congress of 1893, Department of Women's Progress. New York City." Noah turned the ribbon over and back. "Where did you get this?"

"At a rally."

"You've been to New York?"

Stepping forward, she took the ribbon from his hand. "I was a student delegate, not a full member."

He considered, trying to firm his slack jaw muscles. "Student?"

"Yes." Crisp as a fresh bill, no hint of inflection.

"You went to university, Elle?"

Bringing her mouth close to the mantel, she pursed her lips, and blew dust from a ceramic clown figurine. "For one year." Their arms brushed; the hem of her dress flapped against his ankles. She drew a breath, and he wasn't sure if he heard it or felt it. Or both. "There was trouble at the rally"—she gestured to the ribbon—"the university called my father and... that was that."

"Trouble?"

She slipped her watch from her pocket and checked the time. "I got arrested."

"
Arrested?"

She snapped the cover and returned the watch to her pocket. "For two hours. The police herded us into the rear compartment of three wagons, not much more than grocer's carts. They only quarantined us to clear the streets they said, quite apologetically. The jail cells were clean. Not bad if you ignored the things etched on the walls." She frowned, remembering something unpleasant. "And the catcalls."

"A jail? With bars?"

"Yes, a
jail
cell. With bars. I wasn't scared. I knew from the astounded look on the lieutenant's face that he had no idea what to do. I feared my father's reaction much more than I feared a stranger's. Silver badge or no." She turned toward the window, thrusting the velvet curtain back as he had. Then she laughed, the sound both anguished and amused. "Actually, I found the experience rather exciting. A once-in-a-lifetime event."

"You call being arrested an
event
?"

She rubbed a scratch on the glass and shrugged. "I can't explain it, but I felt an incredible sense of freedom. Watching the crowd of women marching along Fifth Avenue, I realized life offered more if I only had the courage to grasp it. For the first time
,
Noah, I altered my destiny. My life finally took a turn I had chosen. A turn that did not require my father's sanction. Or society's." She rubbed harder at the scratch, weighing what she would reveal to him, he could tell. "Though the situation did not end well."

"Your father forced you to leave the university?"

"Oh, heavens, yes. He telegraphed the dean after the rally, threatened them with endangering my safety. They were glad to see me go, and I can understand. Many universities hesitate to start women's programs because of the additional responsibility." Elle cut her eyes his way, the pain in them making him wonder if she had talked about this with anyone else.

"He never wanted me to attend. He forbid me, in fact, vowing to withhold funds. I wrote to every eastern school accepting women and requested information. I had mail sent to a postal box in Morehead City. After a few months, he thought the matter, a whim, was forgotten. He didn't know I had money stashed in a spectacle case in my closet. Money
Grandmere
Dupre sent the year before she died. And what little I'd managed to save taking in darning and delivering groceries for the mercantile, anything I could do without my father's knowledge." She began a gradual circle of the parlor, her memories setting her in motion. "In June of 1892, I got a letter from Byrn Mawr that I had received a stipend for the fall term in exchange for working in the library four afternoons a week. I sent a reply of acceptance in July, took the train north in August. I stayed with Savannah, my roommate's family, until the term began in September. I returned to Pilot Isle a year later, without my degree."

My degree.
Noah swiped his hair from his brow and felt a pinch of realization. Her voracious appetite for knowledge suddenly made sense. "Elle—"

"Oh, I know what you're thinking." She bounced up on her toes to adjust the gas fixture on the wall. The flame heightened behind etched glass, sparking an orange blaze in her curls. "I would have graduated if I had not gone to the rally, and you may be right. I've turned that over in my mind a thousand times, until I can't stand to think of it anymore. But, I would have missed my one, true moment of completeness, standing in a crowd of strangers, all of us experiencing our own sense of purpose. Also, I can't help but long for her, the girl who believed." She tilted her head to the side and a smile much older than her years graced her lips. "She was braver than people who fear the future because of uncertainty."

Using the edge of her sleeve, she swabbed the fixture's brass arm, injecting a cool tone into her voice. "I lost that naiveté, that self-assurance, when I came back. I still have no fear of the future, I simply loathe the certainty."

Noah propped his elbow on the mantel, a deck plank salvaged from one of Pilot Isle's many shipwrecks. As Elle paced the length of the Aubusson carpet, he realized:
I
do not know this woman.
This engaging, puzzling, and entirely too attractive woman he denied desiring even as desire pulsed in steady jolts. He watched her frown and glide her worn slipper across the floor. The impulse to ask what made her brow crease was so powerful he gave in to it. "What are you thinking?"