Captain Rose’s Redemption
Captain Rose’s Redemption
Georgie Lee
From gentleman to rogueWho had her former fiancé become?Captured by pirates off the Virginia coast, Lady Cassandra Shepherd is shocked to see in the blue eyes of Captain Rose the young man she loved and lost. What has caused him to exchange his honour for a chance at revenge? But now he needs her help. Dare Cas believe the captain can reclaim his life as an upstanding gentleman and with it, her hand in marriage?
From gentleman to rogue
Who had her former fiancé become?
Captured by pirates off the Virginia coast, Lady Cassandra Shepherd is shocked to see in the blue eyes of Captain Rose the young man she loved and lost. What has caused him to exchange his honor for a chance at revenge? But he needs her help. Dare Cas believe the captain can reclaim his life as an upstanding gentleman and with it, her hand in marriage?
“An exciting spy novel with a Gothic twist.”
—RT Book Reviews on Courting Danger with Mr. Dyer
“The Governess Tales series starter is charming.”
—RT Book Reviews on The Cinderella Governess
A lifelong history buff, GEORGIE LEE hasn’t given up hope that she will one day inherit a title and a manor house. Until then she fulfils her dreams of lords, ladies and a Season in London through her stories. When not writing she can be found reading non-fiction history or watching any film with a costume and an accent. Please visit georgie-lee.com to learn more about Georgie and her books.
Also by Georgie Lee (#uced9615f-2791-52fb-84aa-4909a95516a0)
Engagement of Convenience
The Courtesan’s Book of Secrets
The Captain’s Frozen Dream
It Happened One Christmas
The Cinderella Governess
The Business of Marriage miniseries
A Debt Paid in Marriage
A Too Convenient Marriage
The Secret Marriage Pact
Scandal and Disgrace miniseries
Rescued from Ruin
Miss Marianne’s Disgrace
Courting Danger with Mr Dyer
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk).
Captain Rose’s Redemption
Georgie Lee
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ISBN: 978-1-474-07375-2
CAPTAIN ROSE’S REDEMPTION
© 2018 Georgie Reinstein
Published in Great Britain 2018
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.
® and ™ are trademarks owned and used by the trademark owner and/or its licensee. Trademarks marked with ® are registered with the United Kingdom Patent Office and/or the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market and in other countries.
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To the little one who was with me through much of this story.
Contents
Cover (#u2f070558-e1cf-5db7-97bd-303bcb45b629)
Back Cover Text (#u5466e81b-960f-5bb1-857f-25d6381684f9)
About the Author (#u83387796-b276-5a2c-8c78-8be02f4b95d6)
Booklist (#u1788af69-4de9-57e8-a553-c7d7a4a83fff)
Title Page (#ua1c8d548-ed25-5f51-8587-0195f6b92e73)
Copyright (#ue0a24b7b-a01e-55b9-9cac-49e7269ef6a9)
Dedication (#ub328646d-4d32-50d6-acdb-31750e4ccee6)
Chapter One (#uc9493a6a-5554-5dba-b72f-81da86e4bd6f)
Chapter Two (#ue0d7c639-4099-50de-9569-49100fe6f8c6)
Chapter Three (#u10768856-9cb4-5599-8e72-e951f41ea2b8)
Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#uced9615f-2791-52fb-84aa-4909a95516a0)
Off the coast of Virginia—1721
‘Open the door or we’ll break it down.’
Lady Cassandra Shepherd flexed her fingers over the butts of her father’s matched duelling pistols and remained silent. Dread and the humid air of the mid-Atlantic nearly smothered her and made the mother-of-pearl handles stick to her skin.
‘What’ll we do, my lady? What’ll they do to us if they get in here?’ asked Jane, the young nurse, her weak whisper nearly lost beneath the pounding boots, screaming and gunfire overwhelming the small cabin from the pirates pouring on to the Winter Gale.
Cassandra could answer the question, but didn’t. ‘Don’t worry, Jane, all will be well. I promise.’
Cassandra smiled at Dinah, her two-year-old daughter, who clung to the nurse’s skirts, her eyes wide with concern. Innocence made her braver than Jane, but not immune to the panic of the adults. Dr Abney stood beside Cassandra, clutching his old sea service pistol. All four of them watched the door from behind the trunks where they’d barricaded themselves inside the Captain’s cabin at the outset of the attack.
No further demands were made. Beyond the door, the air cracked with blunderbuss fire and the continued commands and hollering of the pirates on deck, their voices much closer and more commanding of the crew than before. The pirates on the other side of the door didn’t repeat their demand.
‘Perhaps they’ve gone away,’ Jane choked out.
‘They won’t be put off so easily.’ Dr Abney exchanged an uneasy look with Cassandra and cocked his pistol. His ball wasn’t for the pirates, but for her. Hers were for Jane and Dinah, to spare them from slavery or a worse fate at the hands of these brigands if Cassandra couldn’t think of a way to save them all. The reality of it almost shattered her nerves and she prayed, if the time came, she’d have the courage to do the unthinkable.
No, it won’t come to that. She gripped the weapons tight and focused on the door. There was still a chance they might survive, no matter how slim, and she would seize it. She must.
Everyone jumped when a blow rattled the flimsy door along with the narrow and spindly desk and the low trunk they’d shoved against it. The hit shook the iron hinges loose in the jamb and the wood bowed under the pressure. It was clear the rusted hinges wouldn’t hold against another assault and the desk and trunk would only delay and not stop the intruders.
A final strike wrenched the hinges free and sent the door crashing down to crush the desk and seesaw across the top of the trunk. Filthy men squinting to see in the dim light stumbled into the cabin, tripping over the broken wood.
Cassandra raised the pistols, demanding her hands remain steady. She didn’t have enough lead shot to send these dogs to hell, but she wouldn’t give up, not before she tried to save herself and her daughter.
‘How dare you enter here,’ she scolded loudly.
The pirates jerked to a halt and their grimy jaws fell open at the sight of her.
‘Pardon us, lady, we weren’t meaning to intrude,’ a slim man with weasel-like eyes over a pointed nose replied, his hands slipping one over the other in their eagerness to be on her. ‘If you’ll be puttin’ down the pistols, we’ll be gettin’ to business.’
‘Mr Barlow, ’tis Captain’s orders no woman is to be forced and no passengers molested,’ a man in a red Monmouth cap, his grey hair sticking out from beneath it, warned, more interested in the contents of the damaged desk than Cassandra. He searched through the papers that had been scattered about when the door had broken it, probably searching for any gold or jewellery the Captain kept there.
‘I don’t give a fig for Captain’s orders,’ the weasel spat. He turned back to Cassandra and licked his lips. ‘I’ll be tastin’ a little of the finery he keeps for himself.’
Mr Barlow took a menacing step forward, and Cassandra cocked the pistols. ‘Come closer and you’ll regret it.’
‘Don’t go givin’ orders, missy. There are twelve of us and only two shot.’ His lascivious smile revealed a mouth of yellow and missing teeth.
A shudder slid down Cassandra’s spine, but she kept her stance strong. ‘Then you’ll be the first to die.’
The weasel exchanged an uneasy glance with the other men who took a step back, willing to let the weasel take the first ball before they attacked.
‘Thar be no need for anyone to die.’ Mr Barlow held out his hands in a forced friendly way, but Cassandra didn’t relax.
‘Then fetch your Captain. I’ll discuss the terms of my surrender with him.’
‘No need to fetch him. He’s here.’ The deep voice rolled through the room from the doorway, the Virginia accent drawing out the vowels sounding familiar, like a hummed song she couldn’t remember the words to.
Mr Rush jerked to his feet, still clutching a handful of papers, while the other pirates hustled to shove aside the broken desk and door and make way for their Captain.
The sheer mass of the man blocked the light from outside when he crossed the threshold, his presence shrinking the already tight quarters. He stood above six feet tall with shoulders like a thick yoke draped in a white shirt open at the neck. Perspiration soaked the linen, making it cling to the dark tan of his chest and each ripple of his taut stomach. Dark breeches tucked into high boots covered the solid muscles of his legs. A Spanish sword swung from a belt at his hip and a leather sash slung across his torso held two pistols fine enough to make Lord Chatham, her great-uncle, jealous. The butts of the pistols clanked together when he jerked to a halt at the sight of her. From behind the thin black half-mask that swept the bridge of his nose, leaving his cheeks and mouth free, his rich blue eyes with a hint of yellow near the irises widened, his shock striking Cassandra harder than the cannonball that had shattered the Winter Gale’s mainmast.
He didn’t expect to find a lady on board, she thought. And yet there was more to his shock than her sex, station or even her weapons, especially when he glanced to the side, avoiding her eyes the way Giles, her late husband, used to do whenever Cassandra had confronted him about his mistress.
Something in the slight tilt of the pirate Captain’s head while he studied the rough floorboards shifted an old memory deep inside Cassandra, of Virginia pine trees and warm fields, and sitting on the porch at Belle View reading Greek myths aloud with her former fiancé in the days before he’d gone to sea and then died. Anger rushed in with the memory and, when the Captain met her gaze again, she stepped back, stunned to find the same indignation blazing in his deep blue eyes.
He’s angry at me for resisting. She ran one finger down the curve of the trigger, afraid her act of defiance might have placed her, Dinah and the others in more peril. She tensed, waiting for him to yell or lunge at her the way Giles had whenever she’d defied him. Instead, the Captain swept into a deep bow, his posture concealing the confusion in his eyes. ‘Captain Rose, at your service, Miss—?’
Captain Rose straightened, his brow above the mask rising a touch while he waited for her answer. However, his lips moved slightly as if he already knew it and was about to say her name.
Impossible. He didn’t know who she was and she shouldn’t enlighten him. It risked him taking her hostage, though he’d get nothing for her. Lord and Lady Chatham would probably answer a ransom letter with a request for the rogue to dispatch her. It would spare them and London society further embarrassment. Her solid aim slackened at the memory of their betrayal, but she made her arms rigid again, keeping the pistol fixed on the pirate Captain. She still had the shots and command over however many minutes remained of her life. ‘Lady Cassandra Shepherd.’
He ground his jaw, and she wondered if it was a pirate’s grudge against the King and nobility that made him tense at the mention of her name instead of smiling with delight at the grand ransom a prisoner of her station might bring. He rested one hand on the hilt of his sword. ‘Cassandra, the mythic Greek woman doomed to be ignored by men?’
‘Most of whom perished for not heeding her warnings.’
‘Are you a goddess, sweet lady?’
She cocked one pistol hammer. ‘I’m as mortal as you are.’
‘And tempted like me by the weaknesses of the flesh.’ He rubbed his square chin with his thumb and forefinger and watched her with an admiration she’d not seen in a man’s gaze for far too long. ‘You wish to discuss surrender?’
‘I do.’
Captain Rose approached her with long strides, and Cassandra shifted back until she hit the side of one trunk and could go no further. She braced herself, waiting for him to knock the pistols aside and press his wide body against hers. He didn’t, but clasped his hands behind his back, the stance stretching his shirt tight across his massive chest. If she pulled the trigger, she couldn’t miss him. If she killed him, his crew would set on her and the others like rabid dogs.
He swept the length of her with an appreciative look, lingering on the round mounds of her breasts as they rose and fell with each of her anxious breaths. She rolled her shoulders in a feeble attempt to raise the neckline of her floral-print cotton dress.
‘Imagine what a surrender it could be.’ His low voice reverberated through her, cutting through the heat of the cabin and adding to it. If he weren’t a rogue and she a lady in danger of losing more than her valuables, she could well imagine it. To hear such tones in her ear in the dark of night, with jasmine scenting the air, his warm hands on her moist skin. A temptation even the devil could not create stood before her. ‘I see you agree.’
‘No, not at all.’ Cassandra gripped the pistols tighter, horrified not only by her scandalous thoughts but that he’d seen them in her eyes. Now was no time to lose her head like some ridiculous servant girl wooed by her manor lord. She needed her wits. Whether he was strangely charming or not she had no desire to be ravished by this man. ‘I will kill you first.’
He tilted closer to her, so she could see the shadow of his beard and the small drop of sweat sliding down his chest in the V of his shirt. ‘And deny yourself the pleasure of my company?’
Cassandra swallowed hard, horrified and intrigued all at once by this man. ‘It would be no pleasure.’
‘It could be.’ Something familiar lingered in the curve of his full lips as they drew to one side in a wry smile, as though she’d seen the expression before in a painting viewed in low light, although she couldn’t recall when or where. It couldn’t have been in London. None of the fops there possessed the sheer presence of this man, nor the grace laced with a lethal edge. ‘Tell me, what brings such a classical lady to these waters?’
‘I’m on my way to Virginia and I should very much like to reach it.’
‘I’m not a man to stand between a lady and her desires.’ He drew out the word like an invitation, making it sound as wicked as a curse and as tempting as an inheritance.
‘You’re a wicked man,’ she spat out, as irritated with herself as she was angry and wary of him.
‘Yes, I am.’ His eyes turned from languid to hard and he flexed his fingers over the silver hilt of his sword. Judging by the reverence his crew had paid him at his entrance, Captain Rose wasn’t used to being spoken to like a common seaman and didn’t take lightly to being upbraided in front of his men by a woman.
The slosh of waves against the hull of the ship and the rough voices of pirates shouting orders on the main deck filled the drawn-out quiet in the cabin while everyone waited for Captain Rose’s response.
‘Name your terms and we’ll see if they’re agreeable to us both,’ he said at last.
The man in the Monmouth cap let out a relieved sigh, but Cassandra, too aware of the danger, could barely exhale. ‘No harm is to come to me, my child or her nurse.’
Cassandra nodded for Jane to come out from behind her and she did, hugging Dinah close. Dinah watched with wide eyes while Jane trembled so violently she could hardly stand.
Captain Rose ignored the young and comely nursemaid and focused on Dinah. ‘I hope we haven’t frightened you too much.’
Dinah, more curious than afraid, clutched her doll to her chest and shook her head, making the light curls near her cheeks bounce.
‘Good. It was never my intention to scare a child.’ The unexpected remorse in his voice echoed inside Cassandra. It was the same one that coloured her words whenever she spoke of her troubles in England, the ones driving her back to Virginia.
‘Dr Abney must be under your protection, too,’ Cassandra added, recapturing the Captain’s attention. The rogue didn’t deserve her sympathy and he should be ashamed of his conduct.
‘Granted.’ Captain Rose turned to address his men. ‘No man is to touch the women, the child or the good doctor. Anyone who does will sing falsetto.’
‘It ain’t right, you saying what men can and can’t have for a prize when it should be laid out in articles signed by us all.’ Mr Barlow sneered at the Captain. ‘On any other pirate ship, the crew would overthrow you for acting so mighty and thinkin’ yourself above them.’
‘You’re not on any other ship but mine.’ Captain Rose brought the back of his hand down hard across Mr Barlow’s cheek, knocking him to the ground and making Cassandra gasp in horror. Captain Rose towered over the weasel who clasped his face and shrank back against the hull, a line of blood dripping from his cracked lip. ‘I’ll brook no mutinous talk from any of my crew. If you don’t like how I run my ship, then you’re free to leave it at the next port, or sooner if I deem it necessary. Do I make myself clear?’
‘Yes, sir,’ Mr Barlow whimpered.
‘Good. Then find some work on deck and get out of my sight.’
Mr Barlow stumbled to his feet and pushed through the men still clogging the cabin door to watch the drama between their Captain and Cassandra, no doubt wondering when she would receive the same treatment for her defiance. Cassandra feared it, too, thinking this man’s patience already at an end, but when he turned back to her he laid one wide hand over his heart, as sincere as a magistrate.
‘I’m sorry you had to see such a thing, Lady Shepherd. My apologies.’ Before she could tell him what she thought of his despicable behaviour, he fixed on Dr Abney. ‘Sir, are you a man of the cloth or one of those useless physicians who know nothing more than to bleed and purge a man?’
‘I’m a physician and a surgeon.’ Dr Abney’s voice carried a slight warble of fear.
‘Then would you be so kind as to assist our surgeon in treating the wounded?’ It was an order dressed up in a request.
Dr Abney exchanged a hesitant glance with Cassandra. After what they’d witnessed, it was clear they were in no position to refuse. Even if he did, and despite being a spry man of fifty with a thick chest leading down to solid arms, Dr Abney couldn’t protect her against this mob and they both knew it. It was better for him to co-operate and hope for the best than to fight. He placed his pistol on the top of the chest he stood behind. ‘If it means the continued safety of the ladies, I will.’
Captain Rose turned to the slender man standing next to the one in the Monmouth cap. ‘Mr O’Malley, take Dr Abney to Mr Perry.’
‘Yes, sir.’ Mr O’Malley motioned for Dr Abney to follow him and, with hesitant steps, Dr Abney complied, as reluctant to leave as Cassandra was to see him go.
‘Everyone else, back to your stations.’ Captain Rose’s thundering command strained Cassandra’s already tense nerves. Despite his manners, he was mercurial and she wondered when he’d finally turn his temper on her. ‘The lady and I have a great deal to discuss.’
The pirates scrambled to obey, exiting the cabin as quickly as they’d entered it, except for Mr Rush and one other man who picked up the legless desk and the scattered papers and carried them out.
When they were gone, a quiet louder than the battle settled over the cabin, broken by the creak of the rigging and the snapping of sails. Cassandra nudged Jane and Dinah back behind the trunks, then stepped forward to face Captain Rose, unwilling to relinquish her weapons. ‘When you’re done plundering the ship, will you let us go, unharmed?’
He strode in a semicircle around her, once again eyeing her like the hungry tiger did its prey. ‘What are you willing to offer me in return for your safe passage?’
She swallowed hard against the thick heat in the cabin and his expression, taking small comfort in the door lying on the floor instead of on its hinges. Though she doubted anyone would rush to her aid should she cry out. ‘Anything not on or of our persons.’
He stopped in front of her and raked his hand through the thick tangle of his ebony hair hanging loose about his shoulders. ‘A tall order for one with so little to bargain with.’
‘I have two guns pointed at you.’
‘Do you intend to aim at me all the way to Virginia?’
‘If I must.’
‘Then let me propose another solution, one more pleasurable for us both.’ He straightened and fixed her with a smile charming enough to make him the toast of every bawd in the Bahamas. ‘I will allow you, the Captain and the crew to continue on your journey in exchange for two favours. First, you will honour me with your presence at dinner in my cabin aboard the Devil’s Rose. Cultured dinner partners are difficult to find among seafaring men. I miss the pleasures of a well-set table, of hearing London gossip and the delight of dining with a charming and beautiful woman.’
Cassandra’s arms ached from holding the guns, but she didn’t lower them, their slight protection offering her some comfort. If she dined with him, alone, aboard his ship, she’d be entirely at his mercy and the restraint he’d shown with her might finally vanish. ‘Drawing-room prattle won’t interest you.’
‘Perhaps, but I can’t help but be captivated by anything spoken in your melodious voice.’
‘It isn’t conversation I’m concerned about.’ She cursed the slight tremble in her words and her hands.
He shifted closer until the barrel of the pistols touched the white of his shirt. The smell of man, leather and sea cut through her like lightning until she couldn’t tell if it was the ship or her that rocked.
‘You have nothing to fear, Lady Shepherd. I assure you, you will be safe with me.’ A change came over him, so subtle it was like a shadow seen along the periphery of her vision. The planes of his face softened and he reached up behind his head to where the strings of his mask were tied, as if his true identity would vouch for his trustworthiness. She held her breath, waiting for him to undo them and reveal what it was about him he believed would comfort her. She couldn’t imagine what it might be but she waited, curious to see the man behind the mask. A breeze drifted in through the narrow pane of open glass in the window, heavy with the tang of salt air and fading gunpowder. Then he dropped his hands. ‘Do you agree to my terms?’
She shouldn’t trust her life or her sanctity to this rogue, but the depths of his blue irises and the softness of the lines at the corners told her he would honour his word. She slid her fingers off the warm metal triggers and rested them on the cool mother-of-pearl handles. If agreeing to his terms meant the freedom and safety of those aboard the Winter Gale, then she must do it. ‘I will dine with you, as long as Dr Abney is allowed to remain with my child and her nurse while I’m gone.’
‘Granted.’
‘And the second favour?’
‘I’ll explain that when we dine.’ He laid his hands on the barrels of the pistols and, with a subtle pressure, lowered them, leaving nothing between them to protect her. He slid his hands off the silver, his fingers never touching hers although she was keenly aware of how close his skin was to hers. ‘I’ll send Mr Rush for you in an hour. Bring both pistols when you come. Unloaded.’
‘Why?’
‘You’ll understand in an hour.’ He shifted back into a bow worthy of a courtier, then turned and strode out of the cabin.
Cassandra sagged against the crate beside her in brief relief before the next wave of tension gripped her. She laid the pistols on top of the trunk, dropped to her knees in front of Dinah and clasped her close. Dinah and the others were safe, for the moment, but she didn’t know how long it would last. She might trust the Captain, but it was clear the rest of his crew weren’t as honourable as him. If one of them decided to sneak in here while she was gone... No, she couldn’t think about it. Dr Abney would be here to watch over them.
‘Everything all right now, Mama?’ Dinah asked in her little voice and wrapped her arms around Cassandra’s neck.
‘Yes, honey. It is.’ Cassandra inhaled her daughter’s clean scent tinged with the salty damp and almost wept. They were so close to Virginia and the safety of Belle View. As in London, before her husband’s death, the peace of their lives was dangerously close to being stolen from them. It all rested in the hands of yet another disreputable rake.
* * *
Richard stepped out of the Captain’s cabin into the sunlight and took a bracing breath of sea air, but it failed to ease the tightness in his chest. He’d seen numerous female passengers quake with fear while he’d assured them no harm would come to them and been proud afterwards to have kept his word. He’d patted their crying children on the heads and offered them treats, confident their ordeal would end the moment his men finished loading the stolen cargo. Not once in all that time had he been forced to face the ugly, twisted thing he’d become as he had through Cas’s wide, terrified eyes today.
He rubbed the back of his hand where it’d cracked against Mr Barlow’s cheekbone, a bruise forming there beneath an old scar. Richard’s presence had made her winsome voice tremble with fear and the sound of it had cut him deeper than the edge of a cutlass. In it had been the echo of everything Vincent Fitzwilliam had stolen from him five years ago, including the man he’d abandoned to become Captain Rose and the woman he’d loved.
Richard stormed across the deck, adjusting the sash across his chest. It was yet another reason why he must destroy the man.
‘Your report, Mr Rush,’ Richard demanded of his old friend and first mate when he approached the shattered mainmast. The deck surrounding it was a tangled mass of rigging and sails. Beside the mess, a few of his men guarded the Winter Gale’screw, knives and blunderbusses at the ready. The seamen were the usual riff-raff the Virginia Trading Company hired, the toughness of their lives etched on their scarred and gnarled hands. Their dubious pasts and need for regular pay made them indifferent to the numerous maritime crimes their employer committed but it didn’t mean they wouldn’t strike at or kill Richard and his men if given the chance.
‘The Winter Gale’s cooper says there’s rumours some Virginia Trading Company ships are trading with pirates.’
‘We’ll have to find out if they’re true and, if so, put a stop to it. Vincent can’t be allowed to recover from our strikes.’ The owner of the Virginia Trading Company had stolen everything from Richard and his crew. Richard would make sure he took everything from Vincent, including his company, his standing in Williamsburg and some day, his life.
‘Perhaps we should press the cooper into service in exchange for Mr Barlow. He’d certainly be more use to us than that bilge rat,’ Mr Rush suggested.
‘As tempting as it is to get rid of Mr Barlow, I won’t force any man into this life or invite more trouble than we already have.’ After their cooper had died of a fever, they’d needed a new one to build and repair the fresh-water casks. Mr Barlow had been the best they could find and his presence made their complicated lives even more difficult. The men didn’t trust him enough to tell him their real names, or the reason behind their piracy, and Richard made sure he never saw him without his mask. He felt certain the rat, when faced with the lure of coin or the threat of the gallows, would betray them all. They didn’t need to add another questionable man to their ranks and risk more danger. ‘Have you found anything?’
‘I searched the papers I pulled from the Captain’s desk. Nothin’ official there where they should be. Captain probably hid them before we boarded, like the last one did on your Mr Fitzwilliam’s orders.’
‘Then let’s ask the Captain.’ Richard marched up to where two of his men held the Captain and his first mate a short distance from his crew. The wiry first mate stepped back, but the Captain, a round man with a leathery face full of deep lines, stood firm against Richard’s approach.
‘Where are the ship’s papers?’ Richard demanded.
‘The papers?’ the thick man snorted. ‘You’re taking our cargo, what need can you have for our papers?’
‘I don’t have to explain my reasons. Tell me where you’re hiding the shipping passes and whatever else the Virginia Trading Company gave you before you set sail.’
‘There aren’t any papers.’ The Captain threw out his wide hands in feigned innocence and glanced at his first mate to reinforce his claim, but the first mate, silenced by his cowardice, stared at the deck.
‘Bollocks there aren’t.’ Richard snatched a pistol from his sash, then grabbed the Captain by the back of his thick neck and jerked him close. The stench of rum and dirty clothes engulfing the man was more pungent than rotting fish and so different from the faint scent of roses that had surrounded Cassandra. ‘Where are they?’
‘I don’t know,’ the Captain sputtered, struggling against Richard’s grasp.
Richard cocked the pistol hammer with his thumb and jammed the muzzle beneath the Captain’s chin, determined to find the documents. ‘Is hiding them worth your life?’
The man’s small eyes widened with the same fear Richard had witnessed in Cassandra’s and guilt tripped up Richard’s spine. At one time he’d been an admired and respected gentleman who only had to ask politely to receive things, not a brigand willing to kill a man over flimsy pieces of parchment. ‘Where are they?’
The Captain raised a shaking hand to point at something behind Richard. ‘There, in the cask by the mizzen mast.’
Richard shoved the man back to his first mate, holstered his pistol and stormed to the cask. He knocked aside the lid and reached inside. His fingers brushed nothing but a rough twist of rope before, near the bottom, he touched the smooth leather of a folio. He pulled it out and flipped through the air-dampened and watermarked contents, his hope fading with each turn of the vellum. He removed a shipping pass and held it up to the sun.
‘Anything?’ Mr Rush examined the pass over Richard’s arm.
‘I can’t tell. Either it’s real or Vincent is hiring more talented forgers.’ Richard laid it on top of the other papers in the folio and snapped it shut.
Curse the bastard. Vincent would pay for all his sins. Richard would make sure of it, but it wouldn’t be because of what they’d found on this ship.
‘Maybe we should search the Captain’s quarters?’ Mr Rush suggested. ‘Might be something more damning in there, something we missed.’
Richard looked at the Captain’s cabin and the crooked door which had been returned haphazardly to its jamb. Cassandra sat inside, preparing for their meal. He could almost see her dark blonde hair arranged in soft rows of curls framing her face, with the long curls at the back just brushing the nape of her neck when she tilted her face up to his, her eyes the same rich green and brown he used to lose himself in during those spring evenings in Williamsburg.
What the hell is she doing here? She should be in London, the grand lady of the manor like she’d always wanted to be in Virginia, not aboard one of Vincent’s ships complicating Richard’s plans and threatening his peace of mind. The accusations of selfishness she’d flung at him before he’d set sail from Yorktown five years ago came back to him like a punch in the gut. She’d gloat if she knew how right she’d been and still was. She might yet get the chance. ‘No. We’ve unsettled the lady and her child enough. I won’t disturb them again.’
Mr Rush hooked his thumbs in the belt of his breeches. ‘You’ll risk letting good evidence go because of the nerves of some titled woman?’
Richard folded the folio in half and used it to motion Mr Rush to join him at the balustrade, out of hearing of the others. ‘The lady in the cabin isn’t simply a titled passenger. She’s Walter Lewis’s niece.’
Mr Rush let out a low whistle. ‘Did she recognise you?’
‘No, and there’s no reason she should. Like everyone in Virginia, she thinks I’m dead.’ He tapped the folio against his palm, thinking of Cas and the odd opportunity that had all but landed in his lap. ‘I may resurrect myself before we leave. Walter’s a mere solicitor. He doesn’t have the connections in Williamsburg to collect information or wield influence, but a woman whose family used to be among the finest in Williamsburg might. Arrange for a meal in my cabin in one hour. I’m going to dine with the lady.’
‘And try to win her to our side, to have her risk the hangman’s noose for helpin’ pirates after you lied to her and attacked her ship?’ Mr Rush crossed his arms in disbelief. ‘I don’t care how skilled you are with the ladies of Port Royal, no man is that good.’
‘I am.’ He tapped the folio against Mr Rush’s chest with an arrogance he didn’t feel. If Richard revealed himself to her, Mr Rush was right, she would despise him for having lied to her, but he’d seen the faint flashes of recognition in Cas’s eyes and the desire that had clouded them when he’d teased her. Her mind might not have allowed her to believe he was still alive, but her heart had recognised him. It had been there in the faint blush that had coloured her cheeks when he’d stood close to her. It was wrong to play on this, but he’d long since stopped caring about right and wrong. All he wanted now was justice. Revenge. ‘See to the meal.’
Richard grabbed a hold of the rigging and swung himself up on to the planks connecting the two ships. He strode across the wood and dropped down on to the deck of the Devil’s Rose. Men stepped aside to allow him to pass as he bounded up the forecastle stairs. ‘Progress, Mr O’Malley.’
‘Another excellent haul, Captain,’ Mr O’Malley congratulated from where he stood at the helm while the rest of the crew continued to load the Winter Gale’s cargo into the hold. There it would stay until the next time they careened the ship at Knott Island when they’d bury it with the rest of their seized wealth.
‘It is.’ Richard clapped the helmsman on the back. ‘We’ve struck another well-deserved blow. There’ll be more to come before we’re through and we won’t stop until the Virginia Trading Company is wrecked.’
Richard’s triumph faded at the sight of Dr Abney watching him. Dr Abney knelt beside one of Richard’s men, treating the gash on his forearm. He looked away the moment he caught Richard’s eye, but there was no mistaking the accusation and disgust in his expression. Justice for his men was what Richard had sought since the beginning, but in Dr Abney’s aged eyes Richard caught a shadow of the darker man beneath the mask, the one who didn’t care about wealth or the future. Only bringing Vincent down.
He wondered if this was what Cassandra would see, too, when she dined with him.
He snatched up a map and rolled it out with a quick flick.
It didn’t matter what Cas saw or thought so long as she agreed to help him.
Chapter Two (#uced9615f-2791-52fb-84aa-4909a95516a0)
‘It isn’t wise to dine alone with him, Lady Shepherd,’ Dr Abney cautioned from where he stood guarding the door. She and the Virginian surgeon had become friends during the crossing. He was one of the few people who’d heard the rumours about her in London and chosen not to believe them. Cassandra appreciated his fatherly attitude and the many pieces of advice he’d offered her about returning to Williamsburg since they’d set sail.
‘I have no more choice in whether to join him than you did in assisting his surgeon.’ Cassandra sat on the edge of Dinah’s bed, stroking her daughter’s dark hair and watching the child’s eyelids flutter while she slept. Jane stood on the other side, her small face with the snub nose still white with fright.
‘I understand, but others may not see it the same way and think you went to him willingly. It might bring you more heartache than you left behind in London.’
Cassandra paused in her stroking of Dinah’s hair. She was going to him willingly because he’d asked her to in exchange for the crew and the passengers’ freedom, not because he’d demanded it, but it didn’t change her lack of choice in the matter. Her daughter was her most prized possession and the only good to come from her marriage and she would do anything to protect her. ‘If I have to meet privately with Captain Rose to ensure we reach Virginia, and Dinah has a real home and a future, then I will.’
‘What future will she have if you are ruined?’
She leaned down and kissed Dinah’s chubby cheek, then rose to face Dr Abney. ‘Belle View plantation is mine and nothing, not rumours, my reputation or any man, can take it away from me.’ Though heaven knew what condition she’d find it in once she reached it. ‘Besides, if there’s one thing that can always be counted on, either in London or in Williamsburg, it’s the English love of titles and land. Thankfully, I possess both.’ It was money she lacked. She had enough fine gowns and jewellery to give the illusion of wealth so necessary for securing one’s place in society, but it wouldn’t last for ever. She hoped it worked in Williamsburg long enough for her to succeed for it was the only card she had to play.
She wandered to the window, desperate for a cool breeze to ease the heat. On either side of the open pane, the swirled leaded glass distorted the view of the water. The cloying humid air sat heavy over the ship and she dabbed her sweat-soaked chest with a small handkerchief, unable to find relief. The prospect of facing all the old ghosts waiting for her in Virginia unnerved her as much as the man she was about to dine with. ‘Captain Rose gave me his word that no harm will come to any of us and so far he’s kept his promise.’
‘Then for your sake, I pray he continues to do so.’
‘Me, too.’ She smoothed her hands over the light blue silk of her robe à la française, trying not to let Dr Abney’s concerns increase hers. If the Captain proved as untrustworthy as Giles, it would add another salacious story to the ones from London already trailing her like a wake behind a ship and make everything she hoped to regain in Williamsburg that much more difficult.
A knock at the door tightened the already strained air of the room.
‘Enter.’ Cassandra faced the door, lacing her hands together in front of her. She’d changed from her simple cotton day dress to a deep maroon silk one, with lace along the half sleeves and silver embroidered flourishes on the skirt and bodice. Although it was heavier and hotter than the other, it was thicker in the front and wider at the hips, revealing less of her narrow waist. The bodice was a touch higher, but it still emphasised a good deal more of her décolletage than she would have liked. Witty conversation was how she intended to charm Captain Rose into keeping his promise to send them on their way, not the more carnal assets Giles had once accused her of using to ensnare lovers. As loathsome as her late husband’s touch had been, there hadn’t been anyone but him. It no longer mattered. By wearing the fine gown, she’d give Captain Rose the cultured dinner partner he’d asked for. Besides, if he proved to be a rogue, none of her gowns, no matter how high the bodice or how wide the skirt, would stop him from taking what he wanted.
The man with the Monmouth cap entered, tugging at the dirty red scarf tied around his neck while he struggled to keep his eyes on hers and not her chest. ‘Mr Rush, milady. I’m to escort you to the Devil’s Rose.’
Cassandra took a steadying breath. She must be brave for Dinah’s sake and for everyone else aboard the Winter Gale. ‘Then let’s be off.’
Mr Rush offered her his arm. ‘Milady, if I may?’
She slid the slender walnut pistol box off the table and tucked it under her arm, wondering why Captain Rose had asked her to bring it. There were more valuable items he could take from her, though two fine weapons were probably of more use to a pirate than jewellery. She placed her free hand on Mr Rush’s coarse, sea-spray-stiffened coat and allowed him to lead her on deck and to an unknown fate.
The Winter Gale crew, guarded by the pirates, watched Cassandra and Mr Rush walk side by side to the wide planks laid between the ships. Pity filled a few of the older men’s eyes, but she ignored them as she’d ignored the vicious stares and whispers of London society. The plank bobbed and rolled while the two ships, held together by grappling hooks and lines, tossed about on the sea. Captain Rose stood on the other side, some of his men flanking him at the balustrade, the change in him from earlier remarkable.
He wore a black frock coat without facing. A row of silver buttons curved down along the front and decorated the bootleg cuffs folded back to reveal his large hands. A red waistcoat hugged his trim torso, the line of it broken by a wide belt pulled down on one side by the weight of his sword. Black breeches tucked into tall cuffed boots covered his long legs. The severity of his dark attire was lightened by the white shirt beneath his waistcoat and the silver embroidery about the edge of the tricorn he wore low over his forehead to meet his mask. His exposed cheeks and jaw beneath the mask revealed a smooth face freshly shaved. If she hadn’t seen him an hour ago, his shirt wild and loose about him, his hair hanging to his shoulders, she might have mistaken him for any gentleman in a ballroom in Mayfair.
When she approached the plank, he examined her with a gaze intense enough to ignite every cask of gunpowder on the ship. Panic gripped her harder than when the pirates had first burst through the door, and her hand tightened on Mr Rush’s arm. She wanted to rush back to the cabin and reload the pistols, but she held her ground, refusing to reveal her fear to everyone, especially Captain Rose.
‘You needn’t worry,’ Mr Rush offered when they stopped before the plank. ‘Captain Rose is a gentleman. No harm will come to you.’
The older man’s faith in his Captain bolstered hers and her courage. With Captain Rose and both crews watching, she couldn’t turn back or betray her word and risk placing the ship, herself and Dinah in danger. ‘Thank you for your concern, it’s very much appreciated.’
‘I’ll hold the box while you cross.’
She handed Mr Rush the pistol case, then took his hand and stepped up on to the plank. The timbers of the ships and the thick ropes lashing them together groaned and creaked with the movement of the swell and every once in a while the hulls banged together, sending up a small spray of water.
Captain Rose stepped up on to the plank on his side. He clutched the rigging in one hand and offered Cassandra the other. She ignored it and took hold of the sides of her dress and began to walk regally across the splintered wood. She didn’t look down, aware that if she fell between the ships they might slam together and crush her. She was halfway across the boards when the Winter Gale lurched, throwing her off balance.
In a flash of black fabric, Captain Rose caught her about the waist and whirled her around to set her on the deck of the Devil’s Rose. He held her close, his arm tight about her waist, his wide chest hard against her stomach. The potent smell of sandalwood shaving soap and leather surrounding him made her dizzier than the near fall. He’d been imposing in the confines of the cabin with little more than the distance of the pistols between them. With his body pressed against hers, the fine wool of his frock coat brushing her bare chest above her bodice, he was overwhelming.
‘The trick is to move quickly.’ His husky voice rumbled deep inside her. She peered up at him, her breath stolen by his closeness. His suntanned skin showed no evidence of the weathered grit of a sailor too long at sea and the fine colour of it heightened the black of his hair. She shouldn’t think a rogue striking, but she did.
‘Thank you.’ She inhaled the spice of wood and salt emanating from him and another memory, faint like the fading scent of smoke, rose up in the back of her mind. It was of Uncle Walter’s Williamsburg garden and the flowering dogwood tree in the centre of it. Beneath it stood Uncle Walter’s young apprentice solicitor waiting to steal a kiss from her. That young man was dead, but this one was very much alive, his chest hard beneath her fingertips, his thigh firm against hers.
She tucked her fingers in against her palms, resisting the urge to slide them up over his stoic chin, across his angled cheeks and under the silk to reveal his face. She wanted to see the gentleman beneath the pirate, to view the full effect of the sharp, straight nose covered by the black silk and the intense blue eyes making her recall so many things she longed to forget.
She lowered her hands and his grip on her eased. She stepped out of his embrace, steadying herself against the roll of the ship and the enticing power of him. He wasn’t a curiosity, but her enemy, and she must remember it and remain on guard.
Mr Rush crossed with the box and handed it to his Captain.
Captain Rose tucked the pistol case under one arm and offered her the other. ‘Shall we?’
‘Yes, please.’
The supple wool of his dark jacket shifted beneath Cassandra’s palm with each sure step of his boots during the walk to his cabin. She matched his stride, holding her head high as if they were parading across Hyde Park and not a pirate ship. The crew stood at respectful attention, with only the weasel Mr Barlow leering as though he expected Captain Rose to ravish her in plain view. She should have shot the nasty man, but heaven knew what repercussions his death would have brought down on her, Dinah and the crew of the Winter Gale. Even now she couldn’t say what fate awaited her. Alone, with the door to Captain Rose’s cabin firmly closed, she would be at his mercy. However, the lives of many depended on her being a pleasant and charming guest, so with purpose she swept across the threshold and into the semi-darkness of his cabin.
A bank of diamond-shaped glass windows made up the far wall of the narrow cabin situated at the back of the ship. A faded, red-velvet curtain graced the top of the window, cascading down each side and edged with faded gold tassels. One end hung next to a small desk, the other end pooled near the head of the narrow bed built into the hull. Her attention darted from the sumptuous pillows and fine coverlet to the small, square table in the middle of the room. A woven rug lay beneath it and two sturdy nail-head-trimmed chairs flanked either side. An assortment of exotic fruits including pineapples covered the well-set table. Everything from the silverware beside each plate to the books arranged on the desk spoke of the refined tastes of a gentleman, not the vulgar clutter of a hardened sailor new to comfort. It was a strange contradiction. He was commanding, but he hadn’t forced her; charming and yet violent; a scoundrel and at the same time a man of station. She wondered what had driven him to this life. Perhaps through witty conversation and grace of manners she could bring out more of the gentleman she was sure he’d once been and appeal to him for her and the Winter Gale’s freedom.
‘Do you approve?’ He set the walnut box down beside a pewter service at one end of the table, then pulled out a chair.
‘It’s far more refined than I expected.’ She sat down, conscious of how close he stood, his hands near her shoulders, the cuffs of his coat brushing against her skin when he slid the chair in until the seat touched the back of her thighs. She glanced over her shoulder at him towering above her, dark and impressive, her curiosity giving her more to consider than her worries that he might turn on her at any moment, and a reason for her to be brave and bold. She sensed he would respect her for it. ‘Though it’s ill-gotten.’
* * *
Richard trilled his fingers once on the chair, then gripped the leather tight. The delicate curve of her bare shoulders above the bodice of the dress was so close that if he reached out one finger he could touch it. The skin would be warm, but not her reaction. The uncertainty in her eyes when she’d stepped out of his embrace on deck had undermined her defiant crossing of the planks. She was afraid of him, but determined to show otherwise. He could remove the mask and prove that she had nothing to fear, but he didn’t. Despite her having upheld her end of the bargain, being a charming partner at dinner was one thing. Colluding with a pirate in a place as hostile to them as Virginia was quite another. Until he was sure he could win her to his cause, he would remain Captain Rose. A woman scorned could be a lethal enemy in Virginia at a time when he needed all the allies he could cultivate.
‘Not as ill-gotten as the way the Virginia Trading Company obtained it through the misery of slaves, seamen and countless other ruined lives.’ He let go of the chair and took his seat across the table from her.
She raised her rich eyes framed by dark lashes to meet his. ‘You dislike the Virginia Trading Company?’
He opened and closed his hand beneath the table, thinking he should have stayed behind her and not faced her. The white mounds of her breasts were supple and smooth against the dark fabric of her gown, tempting him to break from her gaze and admire them. ‘I do. Their ships are the only ones I attack. The others I let go.’
‘Why?’ She tilted her head to view him, making the teardrops of her earrings brush the line of her delicate jaw. ‘Were you an officer on one of their ships and the Captain disciplined you too harshly?’
He tapped the chair’s arm, wishing he could taste a little of her discipline again. ‘No.’
‘Then a rival perhaps, a gentleman of some means who had his own company but couldn’t keep it in the face of competition?’ She speared a piece of pineapple off her plate with the fork and set it between her lips, using her teeth to draw it off the tines.
Richard, his pulse racing in his ears as well as places lower down, took hold of the thin neck of the wine decanter and reached over to fill the crystal goblet in front of her. Its red depths danced with the candlelight from the chandelier above the table, the heady vintage as tempting as her. ‘No.’
She set down the fork, rested her elbows on the table and steepled her fingers beneath her chin. The delicate lengths of them almost begged Richard to take them in his calloused hands and kiss the tips of each one the way he used to do during their afternoons in the Belle View barn. How beautiful she’d been beneath him then, her languid body curled around his, eager and ready for him. ‘Then tell me why?’
The amethyst jewels around her neck winked with the candlelight and the largest of the descending teardrops rested between the swells of her full breasts. One close to her throat had turned over, hiding the gem. He reached across the table and righted it, his fingers lightly brushing her neck and bringing a chill to her skin and his. ‘Because not all scoundrels sail under a black flag.’
She didn’t lean away despite the nervousness flickering through her eyes, but met his steady gaze. ‘How unfortunate I chose one of their ships for my passage.’
‘If you hadn’t, we may not have met.’ He raised his wineglass to her. She held up her goblet before taking a sip, watching him over the rim of the crystal, except it wasn’t her sparkling eyes that held his attention, but the gold wedding band sitting like an ugly scar on her finger. It killed the desire for her coursing through his body. ‘What does your husband think of you sailing by yourself?’
He nearly choked on the word husband and everything it meant. She was not his to enjoy and tease, she hadn’t been for a long time and all because of the choices he’d made. It didn’t matter—nothing did except securing her help. She’d be no use to him if her lord and master put a stop to things.
She set down the wine and glanced at the ring as if she wanted to snatch the cursed thing from her finger and hurl it into the sea. ‘He thinks nothing of it. He’s dead.’
Richard sat back in shock, her reason for being at sea and on her way home suddenly clear. He’d despised the man who’d taken his place, but he didn’t want Cas to suffer in mourning. She didn’t deserve it—however, the man’s being gone would make many things so much easier. ‘I’m very sorry for your loss.’
‘I’m not. He did nothing but make my life miserable.’ She stared at the reflection of the candles in the surface of the wine, the shape of them widening and narrowing with each tilt of the ship making the liquid sway. The teasing, alluring woman from a moment ago was gone, revealing the wounded one she’d hidden so well with her bravery and her charming words, the one he’d failed to recognise because he’d been too intent on getting what he wanted.
Just like when he’d left her at Yorktown five years ago.
Richard picked at the nail head on his chair, a guilt washing over him such as he hadn’t experienced since the first time he’d taken a ship what seemed like a lifetime ago. He was quickly proving to be as big a bastard as his enemy. ‘I’m sorry things did not turn out as you would have liked.’
‘It’s been a long time since anything has.’ Defeat draped her like a sail cut loose from a mast. It was the same futility he’d experienced when word had reached him of her marriage and then of his father’s death. Regret crept along the back of his mind, resisting all his efforts to kill it. He’d worked hard for so long to dampen those emotions because there was nothing he could do to change what had happened. He could change things today. He’d done nothing to earn the right to ask her for any favour, especially one that might cause her more grief than Richard’s selfishness had already visited upon her. Let Walter tell her the truth in his own time, if at all. It would keep her untarnished by the hate enveloping Richard and grant her some peace of mind.
He rose, ready to escort her back to the Winter Gale, to bid her goodbye as he had five years ago, except this time she was ignorant of who he was and he was all too aware that they would not meet again. ‘I hope you find solace with your family in Virginia.’
She slowly spun the amethyst bracelet she wore around her delicate wrist, then spoke in so low a voice he almost didn’t hear her. ‘I have no family in Virginia.’
Every sense that told him when an enemy ship was approaching on the horizon raised the hairs along the back of his neck, and he pressed his fingertips into the top of the table. ‘What?’
‘My uncle, my only family, was sick with a fever,’ she choked through heavy words. ‘He died three months ago.’
Richard worked to steady himself as everything around him came apart like a ship in a hurricane. Walter Lewis, his only ally in the colonies, was gone and with him went Richard’s greatest chance of seeing himself and his men exonerated, and Vincent ruined. Panic filled him, and he struggled to keep it under control.
Before Richard could speak, Cassandra jumped to her feet, making the plates on the table rattle. ‘I’ve entertained you at supper as you asked. Will you let us go now?’
Her plea didn’t move him this time and neither did the anguish in her eyes. Everything Richard had spent the last five years working to accomplish teetered on the edge of ruin and he would not see it go over the side. He balled his hands into fists. Vincent had defeated him once before. He wouldn’t allow Walter’s death to let him do it again. ‘No, Cas, I’m afraid I can’t, not yet.’
* * *
Cassandra gripped the side of the table as the ship tilted. ‘What did you call me?’
He reached up and untied the strings of his mask, allowing the silk to slide down his face and drop to the floor.
‘Richard!’ It couldn’t be, but it was. ‘You’re alive!’
Hard work at sea had broadened his chest and arms and everything else about him. The sun had lightened his hair, making some strands near red, and turned his skin tawny. His eyes were almost the same except for the small lines about the corners and the steel of experience hardening them. She wouldn’t believe it was him if it weren’t for the small scar beneath his left eye formerly hidden by the mask. It was a reminder of a wherry accident from when he was a boy, a tale his father had laughingly recounted to her once when she and Uncle Walter had dined at Sutherland Place in the early days of their engagement. Tears blurred her vision. During too many lonely nights Richard’s memory had haunted her and made her wail over their lost future. She’d cursed the sea for luring him away and when the strangling weight of her marriage bonds had chafed, Richard’s memory had fed the faint hope she might some day find happiness again. It had all been a lie, like Giles’s love during their courtship and Lord and Lady Chatham’s concern for her. ‘When they said you’d turned from privateer to pirate, I thought they were mistaken. I told everyone you were innocent. I lost friends and was ridiculed because of my faith in you and all along they were right.’
‘No, they weren’t.’ He banged his fist against the table, overturning a bowl and sending the oranges inside it rolling across the table and on to the floor. ‘I was innocent. I am innocent.’
‘You aren’t. Look at you. I wish you had died, then I could remember the man who loved me and not this...’ she flapped her hand at him, no name black enough to describe what he’d become ‘...pirate.’
‘I didn’t choose this life,’ he hissed with a fierceness to make her shift further behind the chair. ‘I and my crew were forced into it by Vincent Fitzwilliam and I have no choice but to live it until either he’s ruined or I’m dead.’
‘How can that be?’
‘The ship we attacked was a Virginia Trading Company sloop shipping cargo under Dutch colours and a forged Dutch pass. We attacked it because the Dutch had joined the war and their ships were fair prizes. I didn’t realise what Vincent was doing until I saw the Captain’s papers. By then it was too late. The Captain escaped in a launch and made it to Virginia before I could. To protect himself, Vincent had me and my men declared pirates and bounties placed on our heads. His company was foundering under the weight of his father’s gambling debts and when the embargo was issued against the French, shipping cargo illegally under a Dutch flag was the only way he could maintain his business. He sank me, his oldest friend, to save himself.’
‘If you had the fake papers, then why didn’t you fight the charges?’
‘Vincent had the Governor’s ear—he still does—and his Captain’s testimony. I had nothing except my ship, my men and my disgraced word.’ He pressed his fist into his hips, his fury easing, but not the tightness along his shoulders. ‘I renamed the Maiden’s Veil the Devil’s Rose and we’ve plundered Virginia Trading Company ships in search of evidence and to destroy Vincent’s business ever since. What little evidence I’ve found I’ve sent to your uncle, hoping it would one day be enough for him to take to Lord Spotswood and see the man convicted and me and my men pardoned of all charges, but it hasn’t been enough.’
He bent his head in a frustration she could feel because like him, she knew what it was to fight and struggle and to keep failing. But she couldn’t comfort him, not with the realisation of the truth behind his words cruelly dawning on her.
‘Uncle Walter knew you were alive? He lied to me about your death?’ She dropped into the chair, her legs no longer able to support her and the grief weighing her down. Uncle Walter had been a steady rock for her to cling to in the midst of the storms of her life in Williamsburg after her parents’ deaths and again in London when his letters had offered advice and affection when no one else would. All the while he’d been lying to her, and in the cruellest of ways, like almost everyone she’d ever cared for including Richard, Giles and the Chathams.
Why am I not worthy of love and honesty? She longed to bury her face in her hands and cry, but she couldn’t. All she could do was continue on, as she always did, adding this new grief to the old ones already bruising her.
‘He lied to you and to my father because I didn’t want either of you to see what I was forced to become in order to destroy Vincent.’ He righted the bowl, his fingers lingering to trace the engraving on the edge of it. ‘I was aware of the dangers when I went to sea, how it could kill a man. I didn’t think it could destroy the very essence of who he is, or was.’
The pain of his strained words made her heartache slide away. The man she’d once loved was suffering in a way she understood and longed to ease. She laid a comforting hand on his and curled her fingertips to press against his palm. His muscles tensed, but he didn’t pull away. He clutched her hand in a firm embrace which reached deep into her soul. ‘Then leave this life. Take the money you’ve made from it and go to the islands and establish yourself as a planter. Many have done it before.’ And I could come with you. London, Williamsburg and all the torment of her past and the uncertainty of starting over at Belle View could be set aside. She would no longer be alone and he no longer a faded dream.
He brushed the back of her hand with his thumb, as tender as he’d been during all the evenings they’d spent together in the garden. She wasn’t foolish enough to think he would walk away from his ship and crew at her mere suggestion, but still she wished it might happen, as she’d done so many times since he’d first set sail, until she’d learned he was dead.
Then, he slid his hand out from under hers, drawing away like he used to when he’d tire of her arguments against his becoming a privateer. ‘Not until Vincent is ruined.’
She stepped back, fighting the urge to sweep the dishes from the table. He was choosing the sea over her again and not caring whether it destroyed them both. This wasn’t the Richard she used to cherish and, for the first time since she’d seen him come up the walk at her uncle’s house, she wondered if she’d been as wrong about him as she’d been about Giles. ‘It’s just like when you left before. All you care about is what you want and you don’t care who it hurts, not innocent travellers, yourself or me.’
He snatched the mask off the floor and gripped it hard in his fist, holding it out to her. ‘You don’t know what it’s like to be accused of something you didn’t do and to have everything, your family, your property, your life, your very identity, stolen from you because of it.’
‘Yes, I do,’ she shot back, twisting the gold band on her finger. ‘Giles stole almost everything from me, my meagre dowry, my good name, my belief in his affection for me. He even tried to take Dinah away before he killed himself riding home drunk from his mistress’s house in the rain, but not even his death spared me from more pain and humiliation. Without a son to inherit, the estate went to a cousin and I was turned out and left with nothing except a reputation blackened by his mistress and her catty London friends. I’d never done anything wrong and it didn’t matter because he still ruined my life.’
Tears stung her eyes, and she wiped them away with the backs of her hands, refusing to appear more desperate and lonely than she already did. She still had her pride and the chance to rebuild her life. She had to believe in that for there was nothing else. She raised her chin to Richard in defiance, but her stiffness eased at the change in him.
His fury dimmed and he lowered his hand, opening his fist to let the silk drop to the floor. The man who’d stood beside her at her parents’ graves and listened to her wail over their loss and how it had irrevocably changed everything stood before her again. The life of a brigand had altered him almost beyond recognition, yet echoes of the old Richard remained in the softness of his expression while he studied her.
‘Your husband was a fool. He should have loved you and worshipped you, not cast you aside. He should have been faithful to you, not left you to be torn down by society.’ He brushed her cheek with the back of his fingers, the delicate touch burning her skin. She should knock his hand away, take up the knife beside her plate and stab him for what he’d done to her and countless others, but she didn’t, she couldn’t. His caress disturbed places long forgotten in her marriage and widowhood. It had been too many years since anyone had spoken to her of love and here it was on Richard’s lips, just as it had been in the Williamsburg garden a lifetime ago. They’d both been wounded, their innocence torn from them by the machinations of others and their own mistakes, but with his warm skin caressing hers, she could almost believe that if she pressed her lips to his she might regain everything they’d once meant to one another. She wouldn’t have to face the trials of life by herself and he wouldn’t be a rogue, but the man to help and protect her, to love her as he’d once vowed he would.
As if hearing her silent longing, he slid his fingers behind her neck and drew her to him. She closed her eyes and five years fell away when their lips met. She was sixteen again, her life and heart filled with love and promise. He was no longer a privateer captain turned pirate, but an apprentice to her uncle with a passion for the sea and eager to make his fortune so they could marry. Her tongue tasted his, the spice of wine still lingering on his lips. In the strength of his kiss there existed traces of the honourable Richard she’d loved, the one who might live again if he abandoned Captain Rose. It wasn’t possible, but with his arms around her, his hands firm against her back, she could almost imagine it was.
* * *
Richard broke from her kiss and rested his forehead on hers, the press of her against him like touching his old life. Except all of it was gone and there was no gaining it back. His father, Sutherland Place, his life in Virginia were only memories, just like Cas had been. Except she was here in his arms. For the first time in five years the possibility that there might be more for him in this world than revenge teased him like her fingertips did the back of his neck. Maybe he could reclaim something of what he’d lost, let his men go on to enjoy the treasure they’d collected, to raise families and own land and be free of the threat of the hangman’s noose. He could take his share of the money and become something more than an outlaw driven by hate, but a respected planter once again.
He rested his cheek against hers and over her shoulder caught sight of the desk and the folio with the Virginia Trading Company papers lying on top of it. Bitterness flooded in to kill his hope. If he walked away from this life to chase some dream, he would have to live every day with the knowledge that Vincent was out there, enjoying the very things he’d stolen from Richard, and all the misery Richard had brought on himself, his men and countless others would have been in vain.
‘Captain!’ Mr Rush called from outside, making the door rattle with a frantic knock. ‘Mr Tibbs has spied a Royal Navy ship. We must set sail at once.’
‘See to it, Mr Rush,’ Richard ordered, jerking back from Cas.
‘Aye, sir.’ Mr Rush’s voice faded as he hurried off, shouting orders to the men.
‘Our time together is over.’ Richard slid his arms from around Cas, addressing her with the same sharpness he did the passengers on other ships he’d taken—except she wasn’t like them. He dismissed the thought and the slight prick to his conscience. ‘I asked you for two favours in exchange for your freedom. I must insist on the second one.’
‘You can’t.’
‘With Walter dead, I have no choice.’
‘Of course you do. You always have a choice and, now that I see the kind of decisions you prefer, I thank you very much for sparing me from making the worst mistake of my life by marrying you.’
He ignored her jibe as he removed a pouch of money from the desk. He deserved her scorn, but it wouldn’t stop him from securing her help to bring Vincent down. This was why he’d brought her here and not for any other reason. ‘You will soon have control of the evidence I sent Walter. You must promise me you’ll safeguard it and help me when I request it.’
‘I won’t! Do you know what they’ll do to me if they discover I’m colluding with a pirate? I’ll be hanged and my daughter left an orphan with no one to care for her.’
He stamped out the guilt scratching at him the way he did every time he boarded a ship and faced the terrified souls on board. What he was doing was wrong and might cause her more heartache than anything he’d done before, but she was his only link to Virginia and he needed her help. ‘There are risks, but I will make it worth your while.’ He held up the leather pouch between them, the bottom sagging beneath the weight of the coins.
‘That’s blood money.’
‘If anyone’s hands are tainted, it’s Vincent. At least a small portion of it will finally go to good, to help you start over in Virginia.’ He gently encircled her wrist with his fingers and raised her hand to lay the sack in her palm. Her pulse raced beneath his fingertips and he waited for her to throw the money back at him along with a parcel of curses, but her fingers curled around it instead and he knew he had her. ‘I will only call on you if I absolutely have to and, when I do, there will be more.’
‘I don’t want it, or anything to do with you.’ She dropped the money on the floor.
He scooped it up and set it on the table beside the pistol box. He lifted one pistol out of its velvet bed and held it up between them. ‘This will be our signal. When I send this to you, you’ll follow the man who bears it and he’ll provide you with further information about what is required.’
He slipped the weapon into the deep pocket of his coat, binding her to him in a most dangerous way. He laid the money in the empty space in the case and closed and locked the lid.
‘The Richard I loved wouldn’t have done this.’
He pressed his fingers into the smooth surface. ‘That Richard is gone. Vincent killed him.’
‘No, you did!’ She snatched the case out from beneath his hands and clutched it to her chest, pinning him with a look more filled with hate than any captain or passenger he’d ever captured at sea.
He flashed her a wicked smile to conceal the remorse making her harsh words sting. ‘Take heart, Cas, I could be killed long before I ever call in my favour.’
‘I hope you are.’
* * *
Cassandra swept around him and out the door, marching across the deck and to the plank joining the two vessels. The pirate crew paid her little heed while they rushed to disengage the grappling hooks and ready the ship. Overhead, the large sail filled with wind and pulled the rigging taut. Over the noise, she caught the faint clink of the coins inside the case. She should open it and throw the money overboard, but to do so would mean revealing something of their conversation and the fact that she’d accepted money from a pirate.
I did it for Dinah. The money was significantly more than she presently possessed and it would help them start over in Virginia.
She hurried to the balustrade, ready to cross to the Winter Gale. No activity marred its deck where the sails and rigging lay torn and shattered. They needed the Royal Navy ship to reach them and help the sailors repair the mainmast before they could continue.
Dr Abney stood in front of the mess, anxiously waiting for her, his full cheeks sagging with relief when he saw her approach the rails. He’d warned her about going willingly to Richard, but she hadn’t listened. She wished she had, then Richard would have remained a treasured part of her past instead of another person who’d betrayed her.
In a few long strides Richard was beside her, his mask fixed over his face, his tricorn settled low over his forehead to further shade his eyes. They stopped at the plank and he took the box from her and tossed it across the gap to Dr Abney. Cassandra held her breath, hoping the lock didn’t break open and scatter the money about the deck. Dr Abney caught the box without reaction, unable to hear or feel the weight of the coins shifting inside over the noise of the sea and the pirates.
Cassandra gathered up the sides of her skirt, ready to rush across when Richard held out his hand to help her. She peered up at him, loss consuming her as it had when she’d watched him climb the gangplank to the Maiden’s Veil in Yorktown. He’d left her with promises that he’d return to her and she’d lived off their hope for so long, until there hadn’t been any more.
‘If things had been different, would you have come home to me? Would we have been happy together?’ she asked, desperate for something in her life to have been real and good.
He closed his fingers over his palm, then opened them again, still holding it out to her, silently urging her to accept it and his help. ‘Yes.’
The wind whipped at her, making her eyes water as much as her desire to weep. She despised what he’d become, but it pained her to let him go again. It was like learning of his death for a second time, except he wasn’t dead, but achingly beyond her reach. Beneath the black silk, in the touch of yellow about his irises, there lingered something of the man who’d almost become her husband, the one she’d been willing to wait for until he’d lied about his death.
I don’t believe in that man any more.
She brushed past him, stepped up on the plank and rushed across. On the other side, Dr Abney took her hand and helped her down, staying close beside her as she wiped the moisture from the corners of her eyes.
‘My lady, are you all right?’ Concern made the lines of his face deepen. ‘He didn’t take liberties with you, did he?’
‘No. He was a perfect gentleman.’ Until he’d changed into a rogue and made it clear he wanted nothing more from her than her word.
She took the pistol box from Dr Abney and made for the Captain’s cabin and Dinah. Behind her, Richard called out orders to his crew, his voice reverberating across the water even as the growing distance between the ships swallowed it. The sound of it called to her, but she didn’t look back. She refused to mourn him a second time.
* * *
Richard marched to the opposite side of the ship, unwilling to watch the Winter Gale, and yet another thing torn from him, disappear over the horizon. He gripped the rigging and leaned out over the rail to take in the salty air. Even in the stiff breeze the echoes of Cassandra’s rosewater-scented skin continued to torture him.
‘Captain?’ Mr Rush approached him. ‘We’ve caught a good wind and should outrun the Navy vessel. Mr O’Malley wants to know what course to plot.’
Richard stared out at the whitecaps breaking over the tops of the wind-driven chop, ignoring the weight of the pistol in his coat pocket. The news of Walter’s death and Cas’s appearance had hit him broadside like a wave, but he wouldn’t let it capsize him, nor would he pine for her like some abandoned dog. Let her return to Virginia cursing him. It made no difference as long as she helped him. He couldn’t be certain she would until the moment came to send her the pistol. Until then, like the rest of his past, his time with her was over. With the evidence in jeopardy, he must find another way to ruin Vincent. He’d promised his crew they’d clear their names and have a future free from the threat of the gallows. It was a promise he would damn well keep. ‘Set a course for Nassau, Mr Rush. Let’s find out if those rumours of Vincent trading with pirates are true.’
Chapter Three (#uced9615f-2791-52fb-84aa-4909a95516a0)
One month later
‘Milady, scrubbing floors is no task for a titled lady!’ Mrs Sween, the Belle View housekeeper, gasped from the dining-room door. She’d come up from the cellar and the underground passage leading to the kitchen building in the garden. The earthy scent of the lavender she’d hung in the cellar clung to her and it filled the dining room where Cassandra knelt on the floor with a bucket of warm water and a scrub brush. Cassandra’s arms burned from her effort to make the old floorboards shine again. Over the years, Uncle Walter had given little thought to the house, focusing instead on rents and the annual crops, neither of which had ever brought in enough money, as Giles had complained every quarter when her meagre payments had arrived.
‘I’m afraid I’m not much of a titled lady.’ There were few young ladies who’d left Virginia as an impoverished orphan and returned a dowager baroness. At one time the achievement had seemed like the pinnacle of success, a finger in the eye of everyone in society who’d abandoned her after her parents died and her family’s fortune was lost. It hadn’t been the triumph she’d hoped for. ‘Mother would’ve been ashamed at the way I used to sit idle at Greyson Manor. Giles never let me do more than decide on the dinners.’ Even if she’d been able to work beside him, she doubted he could have taught her much. He’d driven the estate deeper into debt than when he’d inherited it, caring more for his mistress than the careful management of his income. ‘Mother always insisted I take a hand in the affairs of Belle View. I intend to teach Dinah to do the same thing.’
Dinah played next to her with a small brush, a wide smile on her cherubic face, making more of a mess than a difference in the condition of the floors. Cassandra’s efforts hadn’t achieved much either. The scrubbed boards stood out against the surrounding dull ones, many of which were in need of repair. The carpenter was too busy fixing the barn to see to something as trivial as the unused dining room.
She glanced about the room and sighed at the faded and dusty furnishings, the best pieces having been sold off years ago to pay debts. What was left would have made her mother cry to see it. It almost made Cassandra weep, too, when she recalled the many family dinners she’d enjoyed here. Some day, Dinah would enjoy them, too.
If I can continue to make something of Belle View and to cultivate Williamsburg society. She thought of the money from Richard hidden upstairs and how much of it she’d already spent to purchase seed stock, hire labourers and pay for the carpenter’s work on the barn. She shouldn’t spend it, but hoarding it away didn’t free it from the taint of piracy or do anyone any good—not her, not Dinah, not the workers who relied on Belle View for their living. Not spending it would also make maintaining the illusion of wealth more difficult, especially if she had to go begging for loans to keep the plantation from sinking into debt.
‘Lady Shepherd, I don’t mean to trouble you...’ Mrs Sween’s brogue muddied by a Virginia twang interrupted Cassandra’s thoughts ‘...but I heard one of the field hands say Mr Marston quit this morning.’
‘He did.’ Cassandra snatched up the brush and started scrubbing again. ‘He insisted I evict the tenant farmers and commute the tenure of the indentured servants and replace them with slaves. I refused and, because I failed to “see the future”, he felt he could no longer remain as overseer.’
‘He was also being paid far less than most of the overseers around these parts.’
‘It did make his decision to leave a little easier.’ Cassandra sat on her heels and wiped her forehead with the back of her hand. Belle View’s numerous windows and doors stood open, allowing the breeze coming off the James River to move through the rooms and the main hallway, but it did little to lessen the oppressive humidity.
‘What will you do without him?’ Mrs Sween tucked an escaping wisp of grey hair beneath her white cap. She was stout and shorter than Cassandra with a ruddy face like a farmer’s wife. She’d come to Virginia from Scotland as an indentured servant to Uncle Walter twenty years ago and had helped raise Cassandra after her parents’ deaths. Cassandra wished Mrs Sween had been with her in London. She would’ve seen through all of the Chathams’ lies and Cassandra’s ignorance.
What about Richard’s lies?
Cassandra studied the matronly woman standing before her, wondering if she knew the truth about Richard. She was desperate for someone to speak with about him, but if Mrs Sween was ignorant of the truth, then asking her meant inadvertently revealing what had happened on the Devil’s Rose.
She glanced at the burled-wood pistol box resting on the mantel across the room. Inside, the missing weapon marred the beauty of the presentation of the pewter against the red velvet. She twisted the gold band on her finger, her stomach tightening with worry. Every day she thought about his pistol, both anticipating and dreading its return.
She plunked the scrub brush in the bucket, sending a wave of soapy water cresting over the side. She refused to live in fear here as she had in London with Giles. She’d turn Richard in before she’d allow his bargain to threaten her or Dinah. ‘I’ll manage the farmers as best I can until I can engage a new overseer. Heaven only knows how I’ll pay one.’
‘Better find a way. A place like this is too much for one person to run alone.’
Cassandra stood and wiped her hands on her old plain cotton dress, one of many she’d left in trunks in the attic before her trip to England, thinking she’d return within the year. She’d never expected such a long and heartbreaking delay. ‘At present, I don’t have a choice but to do it myself. Besides, I enjoy the work. It takes my mind off so many things.’ Like Richard.
Learning he wasn’t dead had been like having fabric pulled off a dried wound. She’d cursed him for weeks after coming home, but in the still of the dark nights, with the cicadas singing their old familiar song, his resurrection had created another, more startling feeling in her heart—hope. He was still alive and perhaps, like her place in Williamsburg society and the grandeur of Belle View, the future they’d once imagined could be reclaimed. She had no idea how it might come about but, with the memory of his lips still vivid on hers, a small part of her believed in it and him, even if he no longer wanted her and she should want nothing to do with him. Emotion had led her to make a grave mistake with one man. It was a mistake she couldn’t afford to repeat, but surrounded by the humid aroma of dirt and trees, the smells of her childhood, it was hard not to believe in the old dreams again.
‘Don’t worry, my lady, all will be well. You’ll have this place soon set to rights and Belle View will be one of the finest plantations on the James River.’ Mrs Sween rested a wrinkled hand on Cassandra’s shoulder and Cassandra smiled gratefully at her. Mrs Sween’s presence eased the loneliness surrounding Cassandra like the netting covering the portraits of her parents to protect them from the beetles. It didn’t banish it completely. Only during the brief moment in Richard’s arms aboard his ship had the isolation swathing her seemed to lift. The feeling had been fleeting, like his comfort and his shallow love.
‘Shall I take the little one to have her lunch?’ Mrs Sween offered, brushing a lavender flower off her apron.
‘Yes, please.’ Cassandra picked up Dinah and kissed her on one soft and chubby cheek, then handed her to Mrs Sween, who carried her off, promising her fresh butter and bread.
The voices of men calling to one another caught Cassandra’s attention. She went to the window, passing the large dining table dominating the centre of the room. She paused to trail her fingers over the dull and dusty top of it. Of all the meals she remembered enjoying with her parents at this table, the last stood out as the most vivid. Her father had listened while she and her mother had made plans for the upcoming holiday balls and dinner parties marking the start of Cassandra’s first season. They’d laughed and revelled in talk of dresses and dance lessons, blissfully unaware that three weeks later a hurricane would level Belle View’s crops and force the creditors to call in her parents’ debts, ruining them. A month later, the fever that often followed hurricanes had risen from the carcase-filled fields and riverbeds to claim her parents and the bright future they’d all imagined for Cassandra.
With a heavy heart, Cassandra walked to the window overlooking the back lawn. Green grass covered the slope of the land to the dock where two farmers loaded sacks of grain into the shallop tied there, the single-masted boat bobbing with the current. When she was a child, she used to watch the small boats coming and going from her bedroom window, waving to the farmers from the Shenandoah Valley who brought their crops down the James to sell at market or ship to England. Her father would greet the incoming vessels, collecting gossip and passing on information from the latest session of the House of Burgesses. He was gone, but this small hub of activity remained, although it was, like her old life here, only a shadow of what it had once been. Over the years, many people had offered to buy Belle View, but Uncle Walter had advised her not to sell, saying it would be a safe haven for her if she ever needed it. He’d never had the chance to see how right he’d been.
But is he right about Richard?
Cassandra left the dining room and walked down Belle View’s long central hallway, barely sparing a glance for the dusty sitting room, office and library flanking either side of it. The paint on the walls of the main hall had once been a vibrant red, but it had dulled to a rusty colour. Like everything at Belle View it needed seeing to, but she couldn’t spend money on paint when there were labourers to be paid. She passed the wide front door and the tall clock standing beside it, her mother’s wedding gift from her parents. It chimed the half hour, the bells as clear today as they’d been when Cassandra was a child. They were the one thing age and the hurricane hadn’t appeared to touch in the old home. She climbed the staircase to the second floor, her hand brushing over the rough banister in need of a polish before striding down the upstairs hallway to her bedroom.
Once inside, she locked the door. Her large, four-poster bed filled most of the room. A turned wooden chair sat between the opposite window and the fireplace covered with an embroidered screen. Even without an overabundance of fine furnishings, this room was simple and comfortable in a way that none of the rooms in any of Giles’s houses had ever been.
It wasn’t comfort she sought at present, but something more disturbing.
She knelt in front of the fireplace and worked loose a brick near the bottom. The hiding place had once held her childish treasures, but today it concealed a darker secret. She pulled out the pouch of money, disappointed by how much lighter it was. The coins wouldn’t last much longer and, to her shame, she almost wished Richard would send the pistol if it meant another bag and the slight easing of her financial concerns.
No amount of money is worth the misery he’d bring if he returned. The misery he’d already visited on her by pretending to be dead and convincing Uncle Walter to support his lie. She set the money aside and tugged out a letter tied with a ribbon and encompassing a number of folded, weathered and water-stained parchments.
A few days after Cassandra’s arrival, Mrs Sween had given Cassandra Uncle Walter’s travelling desk. Inside, beneath the mundane accounts and letters from friends had been the items Richard had sent him. They’d been sealed between the pages of a letter to her from Uncle Walter, one that had proved more unsettling than the illicit documents and the memories of Richard they’d conjured up.
She untied the ribbon and set aside the documents to read Uncle Walter’s last letter again.
Dear Cassandra,
By the time you read this I will be gone, but know that I loved you like a daughter and cherished you as if you were my own. However, for all the love I bore you I have also lied to you in the most grievous of ways.
I’m sorry I cannot tell you this in person, so that I may beg for your forgiveness, and I hope once you read what I have to say you will find it in your heart to forgive me and to understand why I did it.
‘I’m the one who should have asked for your forgiveness. I never should have left you,’ she whispered, and tears blurred the paper while she read his account of what had happened with Richard five years ago. The effort it had taken for him to unburden himself was evident in every scraggly curl and shaky line of each word. It broke her heart to imagine him, ill with fever, struggling to confess to her. If only he could have known she’d discover it for herself, it might have saved him the pain and effort. Yes, he’d lied to her about Richard, but in the weeks that had passed since she’d first read his letter, she’d come to forgive him. His one sin didn’t erase the years of love and his hard work on her behalf at Belle View.
She flicked the edge of the paper with a fingernail, wishing she’d never left him or Virginia. After everything Uncle Walter had done for her, she hadn’t been there for him in his final illness, and it tore at her. He’d deserved her love and thanks and care, and she hadn’t been able to offer it to him. It was another of the many things Giles, the Chathams and even Richard had stolen from her.
She continued to read, trying to hear Uncle Walter’s voice in each word, to remember his face and his smile, but all she could glean were a few snatches of expressions. Her inability to clearly recall the man who’d taken care of her after her parents’ death stung as much as the words of his letter. The tone of them reminded her of the one she’d written to him shortly after Dinah’s birth when she’d admitted her mistake in marrying Giles and had asked for his advice. He’d never judged her for the failure of her marriage, but had helped her as best he could. He might not be here, but he was asking for her help now, not for himself, but for Richard.
I’mentrusting Richard’s evidence to you. Please protect it and assist him as I have. Neither one of us has the right to ask this of you, not after the way we deceived you, but please understand it was all done with the best of intentions.
I spent my life in Virginia fighting for those who’d been wronged by others. I could not allow Richard, a man who was once my apprentice and your fiancé, to be falsely accused and do nothing.
I failed to help him see justice done, but perhaps you can find a way to succeed.
She folded the letter, then picked up the shipping passes and other papers. The contents made no more sense to her today than they had the many times she’d perused them in the past few weeks. Beside her, the cold fireplace beckoned her to strike the tinder and set the lot of it on fire and be done with Richard. There was no reason she shouldn’t.
Except Uncle Walter asked me to help him.
She tucked the papers inside the letter and returned them and the money to the space behind the mantel and replaced the loose brick. For Uncle Walter she would keep the papers safe until she could return them to Richard, but she would do no more. She’d damaged her already weak position in Williamsburg once by defending Richard. She wasn’t about to risk everything to do it again. Belle View and Dinah’s future were all that mattered now.
* * *
Richard pulled the collar of his light coat up higher around his face and hurried through the dark streets of Nassau. He’d put aside his mask, frock coat and breeches for the simple clothes of a first mate. In this pirate haven, everyone minded their own business and he could move unnoticed through the riff-raff without fear of discovery. As he approached the centre of town, evidence of the hurricane from ten years ago marked the buildings on either side of the road. Many rose into the sky, their stone structures devoid of roofs, their walls pocked with gaping holes. People moved in and out of the shadows and small alleys, their shuffling footsteps followed by the gravelly voices of whores trying to entice clients inside. Richard stepped over a filthy drunk sleeping against a wall, ignoring the sodden wretch and the faint inkling of disgust and shame the sight of him conjured up. All this filth was too familiar to him, like the currents of the James River that he and Vincent used to navigate as boys or the smell of the tobacco ripening in the fields of Sutherland Place.
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию (https://www.litres.ru/georgie-lee/captain-rose-s-redemption/) на ЛитРес.
Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.
Georgie Lee
From gentleman to rogueWho had her former fiancé become?Captured by pirates off the Virginia coast, Lady Cassandra Shepherd is shocked to see in the blue eyes of Captain Rose the young man she loved and lost. What has caused him to exchange his honour for a chance at revenge? But now he needs her help. Dare Cas believe the captain can reclaim his life as an upstanding gentleman and with it, her hand in marriage?
From gentleman to rogue
Who had her former fiancé become?
Captured by pirates off the Virginia coast, Lady Cassandra Shepherd is shocked to see in the blue eyes of Captain Rose the young man she loved and lost. What has caused him to exchange his honor for a chance at revenge? But he needs her help. Dare Cas believe the captain can reclaim his life as an upstanding gentleman and with it, her hand in marriage?
“An exciting spy novel with a Gothic twist.”
—RT Book Reviews on Courting Danger with Mr. Dyer
“The Governess Tales series starter is charming.”
—RT Book Reviews on The Cinderella Governess
A lifelong history buff, GEORGIE LEE hasn’t given up hope that she will one day inherit a title and a manor house. Until then she fulfils her dreams of lords, ladies and a Season in London through her stories. When not writing she can be found reading non-fiction history or watching any film with a costume and an accent. Please visit georgie-lee.com to learn more about Georgie and her books.
Also by Georgie Lee (#uced9615f-2791-52fb-84aa-4909a95516a0)
Engagement of Convenience
The Courtesan’s Book of Secrets
The Captain’s Frozen Dream
It Happened One Christmas
The Cinderella Governess
The Business of Marriage miniseries
A Debt Paid in Marriage
A Too Convenient Marriage
The Secret Marriage Pact
Scandal and Disgrace miniseries
Rescued from Ruin
Miss Marianne’s Disgrace
Courting Danger with Mr Dyer
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk).
Captain Rose’s Redemption
Georgie Lee
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ISBN: 978-1-474-07375-2
CAPTAIN ROSE’S REDEMPTION
© 2018 Georgie Reinstein
Published in Great Britain 2018
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.
® and ™ are trademarks owned and used by the trademark owner and/or its licensee. Trademarks marked with ® are registered with the United Kingdom Patent Office and/or the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market and in other countries.
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To the little one who was with me through much of this story.
Contents
Cover (#u2f070558-e1cf-5db7-97bd-303bcb45b629)
Back Cover Text (#u5466e81b-960f-5bb1-857f-25d6381684f9)
About the Author (#u83387796-b276-5a2c-8c78-8be02f4b95d6)
Booklist (#u1788af69-4de9-57e8-a553-c7d7a4a83fff)
Title Page (#ua1c8d548-ed25-5f51-8587-0195f6b92e73)
Copyright (#ue0a24b7b-a01e-55b9-9cac-49e7269ef6a9)
Dedication (#ub328646d-4d32-50d6-acdb-31750e4ccee6)
Chapter One (#uc9493a6a-5554-5dba-b72f-81da86e4bd6f)
Chapter Two (#ue0d7c639-4099-50de-9569-49100fe6f8c6)
Chapter Three (#u10768856-9cb4-5599-8e72-e951f41ea2b8)
Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#uced9615f-2791-52fb-84aa-4909a95516a0)
Off the coast of Virginia—1721
‘Open the door or we’ll break it down.’
Lady Cassandra Shepherd flexed her fingers over the butts of her father’s matched duelling pistols and remained silent. Dread and the humid air of the mid-Atlantic nearly smothered her and made the mother-of-pearl handles stick to her skin.
‘What’ll we do, my lady? What’ll they do to us if they get in here?’ asked Jane, the young nurse, her weak whisper nearly lost beneath the pounding boots, screaming and gunfire overwhelming the small cabin from the pirates pouring on to the Winter Gale.
Cassandra could answer the question, but didn’t. ‘Don’t worry, Jane, all will be well. I promise.’
Cassandra smiled at Dinah, her two-year-old daughter, who clung to the nurse’s skirts, her eyes wide with concern. Innocence made her braver than Jane, but not immune to the panic of the adults. Dr Abney stood beside Cassandra, clutching his old sea service pistol. All four of them watched the door from behind the trunks where they’d barricaded themselves inside the Captain’s cabin at the outset of the attack.
No further demands were made. Beyond the door, the air cracked with blunderbuss fire and the continued commands and hollering of the pirates on deck, their voices much closer and more commanding of the crew than before. The pirates on the other side of the door didn’t repeat their demand.
‘Perhaps they’ve gone away,’ Jane choked out.
‘They won’t be put off so easily.’ Dr Abney exchanged an uneasy look with Cassandra and cocked his pistol. His ball wasn’t for the pirates, but for her. Hers were for Jane and Dinah, to spare them from slavery or a worse fate at the hands of these brigands if Cassandra couldn’t think of a way to save them all. The reality of it almost shattered her nerves and she prayed, if the time came, she’d have the courage to do the unthinkable.
No, it won’t come to that. She gripped the weapons tight and focused on the door. There was still a chance they might survive, no matter how slim, and she would seize it. She must.
Everyone jumped when a blow rattled the flimsy door along with the narrow and spindly desk and the low trunk they’d shoved against it. The hit shook the iron hinges loose in the jamb and the wood bowed under the pressure. It was clear the rusted hinges wouldn’t hold against another assault and the desk and trunk would only delay and not stop the intruders.
A final strike wrenched the hinges free and sent the door crashing down to crush the desk and seesaw across the top of the trunk. Filthy men squinting to see in the dim light stumbled into the cabin, tripping over the broken wood.
Cassandra raised the pistols, demanding her hands remain steady. She didn’t have enough lead shot to send these dogs to hell, but she wouldn’t give up, not before she tried to save herself and her daughter.
‘How dare you enter here,’ she scolded loudly.
The pirates jerked to a halt and their grimy jaws fell open at the sight of her.
‘Pardon us, lady, we weren’t meaning to intrude,’ a slim man with weasel-like eyes over a pointed nose replied, his hands slipping one over the other in their eagerness to be on her. ‘If you’ll be puttin’ down the pistols, we’ll be gettin’ to business.’
‘Mr Barlow, ’tis Captain’s orders no woman is to be forced and no passengers molested,’ a man in a red Monmouth cap, his grey hair sticking out from beneath it, warned, more interested in the contents of the damaged desk than Cassandra. He searched through the papers that had been scattered about when the door had broken it, probably searching for any gold or jewellery the Captain kept there.
‘I don’t give a fig for Captain’s orders,’ the weasel spat. He turned back to Cassandra and licked his lips. ‘I’ll be tastin’ a little of the finery he keeps for himself.’
Mr Barlow took a menacing step forward, and Cassandra cocked the pistols. ‘Come closer and you’ll regret it.’
‘Don’t go givin’ orders, missy. There are twelve of us and only two shot.’ His lascivious smile revealed a mouth of yellow and missing teeth.
A shudder slid down Cassandra’s spine, but she kept her stance strong. ‘Then you’ll be the first to die.’
The weasel exchanged an uneasy glance with the other men who took a step back, willing to let the weasel take the first ball before they attacked.
‘Thar be no need for anyone to die.’ Mr Barlow held out his hands in a forced friendly way, but Cassandra didn’t relax.
‘Then fetch your Captain. I’ll discuss the terms of my surrender with him.’
‘No need to fetch him. He’s here.’ The deep voice rolled through the room from the doorway, the Virginia accent drawing out the vowels sounding familiar, like a hummed song she couldn’t remember the words to.
Mr Rush jerked to his feet, still clutching a handful of papers, while the other pirates hustled to shove aside the broken desk and door and make way for their Captain.
The sheer mass of the man blocked the light from outside when he crossed the threshold, his presence shrinking the already tight quarters. He stood above six feet tall with shoulders like a thick yoke draped in a white shirt open at the neck. Perspiration soaked the linen, making it cling to the dark tan of his chest and each ripple of his taut stomach. Dark breeches tucked into high boots covered the solid muscles of his legs. A Spanish sword swung from a belt at his hip and a leather sash slung across his torso held two pistols fine enough to make Lord Chatham, her great-uncle, jealous. The butts of the pistols clanked together when he jerked to a halt at the sight of her. From behind the thin black half-mask that swept the bridge of his nose, leaving his cheeks and mouth free, his rich blue eyes with a hint of yellow near the irises widened, his shock striking Cassandra harder than the cannonball that had shattered the Winter Gale’s mainmast.
He didn’t expect to find a lady on board, she thought. And yet there was more to his shock than her sex, station or even her weapons, especially when he glanced to the side, avoiding her eyes the way Giles, her late husband, used to do whenever Cassandra had confronted him about his mistress.
Something in the slight tilt of the pirate Captain’s head while he studied the rough floorboards shifted an old memory deep inside Cassandra, of Virginia pine trees and warm fields, and sitting on the porch at Belle View reading Greek myths aloud with her former fiancé in the days before he’d gone to sea and then died. Anger rushed in with the memory and, when the Captain met her gaze again, she stepped back, stunned to find the same indignation blazing in his deep blue eyes.
He’s angry at me for resisting. She ran one finger down the curve of the trigger, afraid her act of defiance might have placed her, Dinah and the others in more peril. She tensed, waiting for him to yell or lunge at her the way Giles had whenever she’d defied him. Instead, the Captain swept into a deep bow, his posture concealing the confusion in his eyes. ‘Captain Rose, at your service, Miss—?’
Captain Rose straightened, his brow above the mask rising a touch while he waited for her answer. However, his lips moved slightly as if he already knew it and was about to say her name.
Impossible. He didn’t know who she was and she shouldn’t enlighten him. It risked him taking her hostage, though he’d get nothing for her. Lord and Lady Chatham would probably answer a ransom letter with a request for the rogue to dispatch her. It would spare them and London society further embarrassment. Her solid aim slackened at the memory of their betrayal, but she made her arms rigid again, keeping the pistol fixed on the pirate Captain. She still had the shots and command over however many minutes remained of her life. ‘Lady Cassandra Shepherd.’
He ground his jaw, and she wondered if it was a pirate’s grudge against the King and nobility that made him tense at the mention of her name instead of smiling with delight at the grand ransom a prisoner of her station might bring. He rested one hand on the hilt of his sword. ‘Cassandra, the mythic Greek woman doomed to be ignored by men?’
‘Most of whom perished for not heeding her warnings.’
‘Are you a goddess, sweet lady?’
She cocked one pistol hammer. ‘I’m as mortal as you are.’
‘And tempted like me by the weaknesses of the flesh.’ He rubbed his square chin with his thumb and forefinger and watched her with an admiration she’d not seen in a man’s gaze for far too long. ‘You wish to discuss surrender?’
‘I do.’
Captain Rose approached her with long strides, and Cassandra shifted back until she hit the side of one trunk and could go no further. She braced herself, waiting for him to knock the pistols aside and press his wide body against hers. He didn’t, but clasped his hands behind his back, the stance stretching his shirt tight across his massive chest. If she pulled the trigger, she couldn’t miss him. If she killed him, his crew would set on her and the others like rabid dogs.
He swept the length of her with an appreciative look, lingering on the round mounds of her breasts as they rose and fell with each of her anxious breaths. She rolled her shoulders in a feeble attempt to raise the neckline of her floral-print cotton dress.
‘Imagine what a surrender it could be.’ His low voice reverberated through her, cutting through the heat of the cabin and adding to it. If he weren’t a rogue and she a lady in danger of losing more than her valuables, she could well imagine it. To hear such tones in her ear in the dark of night, with jasmine scenting the air, his warm hands on her moist skin. A temptation even the devil could not create stood before her. ‘I see you agree.’
‘No, not at all.’ Cassandra gripped the pistols tighter, horrified not only by her scandalous thoughts but that he’d seen them in her eyes. Now was no time to lose her head like some ridiculous servant girl wooed by her manor lord. She needed her wits. Whether he was strangely charming or not she had no desire to be ravished by this man. ‘I will kill you first.’
He tilted closer to her, so she could see the shadow of his beard and the small drop of sweat sliding down his chest in the V of his shirt. ‘And deny yourself the pleasure of my company?’
Cassandra swallowed hard, horrified and intrigued all at once by this man. ‘It would be no pleasure.’
‘It could be.’ Something familiar lingered in the curve of his full lips as they drew to one side in a wry smile, as though she’d seen the expression before in a painting viewed in low light, although she couldn’t recall when or where. It couldn’t have been in London. None of the fops there possessed the sheer presence of this man, nor the grace laced with a lethal edge. ‘Tell me, what brings such a classical lady to these waters?’
‘I’m on my way to Virginia and I should very much like to reach it.’
‘I’m not a man to stand between a lady and her desires.’ He drew out the word like an invitation, making it sound as wicked as a curse and as tempting as an inheritance.
‘You’re a wicked man,’ she spat out, as irritated with herself as she was angry and wary of him.
‘Yes, I am.’ His eyes turned from languid to hard and he flexed his fingers over the silver hilt of his sword. Judging by the reverence his crew had paid him at his entrance, Captain Rose wasn’t used to being spoken to like a common seaman and didn’t take lightly to being upbraided in front of his men by a woman.
The slosh of waves against the hull of the ship and the rough voices of pirates shouting orders on the main deck filled the drawn-out quiet in the cabin while everyone waited for Captain Rose’s response.
‘Name your terms and we’ll see if they’re agreeable to us both,’ he said at last.
The man in the Monmouth cap let out a relieved sigh, but Cassandra, too aware of the danger, could barely exhale. ‘No harm is to come to me, my child or her nurse.’
Cassandra nodded for Jane to come out from behind her and she did, hugging Dinah close. Dinah watched with wide eyes while Jane trembled so violently she could hardly stand.
Captain Rose ignored the young and comely nursemaid and focused on Dinah. ‘I hope we haven’t frightened you too much.’
Dinah, more curious than afraid, clutched her doll to her chest and shook her head, making the light curls near her cheeks bounce.
‘Good. It was never my intention to scare a child.’ The unexpected remorse in his voice echoed inside Cassandra. It was the same one that coloured her words whenever she spoke of her troubles in England, the ones driving her back to Virginia.
‘Dr Abney must be under your protection, too,’ Cassandra added, recapturing the Captain’s attention. The rogue didn’t deserve her sympathy and he should be ashamed of his conduct.
‘Granted.’ Captain Rose turned to address his men. ‘No man is to touch the women, the child or the good doctor. Anyone who does will sing falsetto.’
‘It ain’t right, you saying what men can and can’t have for a prize when it should be laid out in articles signed by us all.’ Mr Barlow sneered at the Captain. ‘On any other pirate ship, the crew would overthrow you for acting so mighty and thinkin’ yourself above them.’
‘You’re not on any other ship but mine.’ Captain Rose brought the back of his hand down hard across Mr Barlow’s cheek, knocking him to the ground and making Cassandra gasp in horror. Captain Rose towered over the weasel who clasped his face and shrank back against the hull, a line of blood dripping from his cracked lip. ‘I’ll brook no mutinous talk from any of my crew. If you don’t like how I run my ship, then you’re free to leave it at the next port, or sooner if I deem it necessary. Do I make myself clear?’
‘Yes, sir,’ Mr Barlow whimpered.
‘Good. Then find some work on deck and get out of my sight.’
Mr Barlow stumbled to his feet and pushed through the men still clogging the cabin door to watch the drama between their Captain and Cassandra, no doubt wondering when she would receive the same treatment for her defiance. Cassandra feared it, too, thinking this man’s patience already at an end, but when he turned back to her he laid one wide hand over his heart, as sincere as a magistrate.
‘I’m sorry you had to see such a thing, Lady Shepherd. My apologies.’ Before she could tell him what she thought of his despicable behaviour, he fixed on Dr Abney. ‘Sir, are you a man of the cloth or one of those useless physicians who know nothing more than to bleed and purge a man?’
‘I’m a physician and a surgeon.’ Dr Abney’s voice carried a slight warble of fear.
‘Then would you be so kind as to assist our surgeon in treating the wounded?’ It was an order dressed up in a request.
Dr Abney exchanged a hesitant glance with Cassandra. After what they’d witnessed, it was clear they were in no position to refuse. Even if he did, and despite being a spry man of fifty with a thick chest leading down to solid arms, Dr Abney couldn’t protect her against this mob and they both knew it. It was better for him to co-operate and hope for the best than to fight. He placed his pistol on the top of the chest he stood behind. ‘If it means the continued safety of the ladies, I will.’
Captain Rose turned to the slender man standing next to the one in the Monmouth cap. ‘Mr O’Malley, take Dr Abney to Mr Perry.’
‘Yes, sir.’ Mr O’Malley motioned for Dr Abney to follow him and, with hesitant steps, Dr Abney complied, as reluctant to leave as Cassandra was to see him go.
‘Everyone else, back to your stations.’ Captain Rose’s thundering command strained Cassandra’s already tense nerves. Despite his manners, he was mercurial and she wondered when he’d finally turn his temper on her. ‘The lady and I have a great deal to discuss.’
The pirates scrambled to obey, exiting the cabin as quickly as they’d entered it, except for Mr Rush and one other man who picked up the legless desk and the scattered papers and carried them out.
When they were gone, a quiet louder than the battle settled over the cabin, broken by the creak of the rigging and the snapping of sails. Cassandra nudged Jane and Dinah back behind the trunks, then stepped forward to face Captain Rose, unwilling to relinquish her weapons. ‘When you’re done plundering the ship, will you let us go, unharmed?’
He strode in a semicircle around her, once again eyeing her like the hungry tiger did its prey. ‘What are you willing to offer me in return for your safe passage?’
She swallowed hard against the thick heat in the cabin and his expression, taking small comfort in the door lying on the floor instead of on its hinges. Though she doubted anyone would rush to her aid should she cry out. ‘Anything not on or of our persons.’
He stopped in front of her and raked his hand through the thick tangle of his ebony hair hanging loose about his shoulders. ‘A tall order for one with so little to bargain with.’
‘I have two guns pointed at you.’
‘Do you intend to aim at me all the way to Virginia?’
‘If I must.’
‘Then let me propose another solution, one more pleasurable for us both.’ He straightened and fixed her with a smile charming enough to make him the toast of every bawd in the Bahamas. ‘I will allow you, the Captain and the crew to continue on your journey in exchange for two favours. First, you will honour me with your presence at dinner in my cabin aboard the Devil’s Rose. Cultured dinner partners are difficult to find among seafaring men. I miss the pleasures of a well-set table, of hearing London gossip and the delight of dining with a charming and beautiful woman.’
Cassandra’s arms ached from holding the guns, but she didn’t lower them, their slight protection offering her some comfort. If she dined with him, alone, aboard his ship, she’d be entirely at his mercy and the restraint he’d shown with her might finally vanish. ‘Drawing-room prattle won’t interest you.’
‘Perhaps, but I can’t help but be captivated by anything spoken in your melodious voice.’
‘It isn’t conversation I’m concerned about.’ She cursed the slight tremble in her words and her hands.
He shifted closer until the barrel of the pistols touched the white of his shirt. The smell of man, leather and sea cut through her like lightning until she couldn’t tell if it was the ship or her that rocked.
‘You have nothing to fear, Lady Shepherd. I assure you, you will be safe with me.’ A change came over him, so subtle it was like a shadow seen along the periphery of her vision. The planes of his face softened and he reached up behind his head to where the strings of his mask were tied, as if his true identity would vouch for his trustworthiness. She held her breath, waiting for him to undo them and reveal what it was about him he believed would comfort her. She couldn’t imagine what it might be but she waited, curious to see the man behind the mask. A breeze drifted in through the narrow pane of open glass in the window, heavy with the tang of salt air and fading gunpowder. Then he dropped his hands. ‘Do you agree to my terms?’
She shouldn’t trust her life or her sanctity to this rogue, but the depths of his blue irises and the softness of the lines at the corners told her he would honour his word. She slid her fingers off the warm metal triggers and rested them on the cool mother-of-pearl handles. If agreeing to his terms meant the freedom and safety of those aboard the Winter Gale, then she must do it. ‘I will dine with you, as long as Dr Abney is allowed to remain with my child and her nurse while I’m gone.’
‘Granted.’
‘And the second favour?’
‘I’ll explain that when we dine.’ He laid his hands on the barrels of the pistols and, with a subtle pressure, lowered them, leaving nothing between them to protect her. He slid his hands off the silver, his fingers never touching hers although she was keenly aware of how close his skin was to hers. ‘I’ll send Mr Rush for you in an hour. Bring both pistols when you come. Unloaded.’
‘Why?’
‘You’ll understand in an hour.’ He shifted back into a bow worthy of a courtier, then turned and strode out of the cabin.
Cassandra sagged against the crate beside her in brief relief before the next wave of tension gripped her. She laid the pistols on top of the trunk, dropped to her knees in front of Dinah and clasped her close. Dinah and the others were safe, for the moment, but she didn’t know how long it would last. She might trust the Captain, but it was clear the rest of his crew weren’t as honourable as him. If one of them decided to sneak in here while she was gone... No, she couldn’t think about it. Dr Abney would be here to watch over them.
‘Everything all right now, Mama?’ Dinah asked in her little voice and wrapped her arms around Cassandra’s neck.
‘Yes, honey. It is.’ Cassandra inhaled her daughter’s clean scent tinged with the salty damp and almost wept. They were so close to Virginia and the safety of Belle View. As in London, before her husband’s death, the peace of their lives was dangerously close to being stolen from them. It all rested in the hands of yet another disreputable rake.
* * *
Richard stepped out of the Captain’s cabin into the sunlight and took a bracing breath of sea air, but it failed to ease the tightness in his chest. He’d seen numerous female passengers quake with fear while he’d assured them no harm would come to them and been proud afterwards to have kept his word. He’d patted their crying children on the heads and offered them treats, confident their ordeal would end the moment his men finished loading the stolen cargo. Not once in all that time had he been forced to face the ugly, twisted thing he’d become as he had through Cas’s wide, terrified eyes today.
He rubbed the back of his hand where it’d cracked against Mr Barlow’s cheekbone, a bruise forming there beneath an old scar. Richard’s presence had made her winsome voice tremble with fear and the sound of it had cut him deeper than the edge of a cutlass. In it had been the echo of everything Vincent Fitzwilliam had stolen from him five years ago, including the man he’d abandoned to become Captain Rose and the woman he’d loved.
Richard stormed across the deck, adjusting the sash across his chest. It was yet another reason why he must destroy the man.
‘Your report, Mr Rush,’ Richard demanded of his old friend and first mate when he approached the shattered mainmast. The deck surrounding it was a tangled mass of rigging and sails. Beside the mess, a few of his men guarded the Winter Gale’screw, knives and blunderbusses at the ready. The seamen were the usual riff-raff the Virginia Trading Company hired, the toughness of their lives etched on their scarred and gnarled hands. Their dubious pasts and need for regular pay made them indifferent to the numerous maritime crimes their employer committed but it didn’t mean they wouldn’t strike at or kill Richard and his men if given the chance.
‘The Winter Gale’s cooper says there’s rumours some Virginia Trading Company ships are trading with pirates.’
‘We’ll have to find out if they’re true and, if so, put a stop to it. Vincent can’t be allowed to recover from our strikes.’ The owner of the Virginia Trading Company had stolen everything from Richard and his crew. Richard would make sure he took everything from Vincent, including his company, his standing in Williamsburg and some day, his life.
‘Perhaps we should press the cooper into service in exchange for Mr Barlow. He’d certainly be more use to us than that bilge rat,’ Mr Rush suggested.
‘As tempting as it is to get rid of Mr Barlow, I won’t force any man into this life or invite more trouble than we already have.’ After their cooper had died of a fever, they’d needed a new one to build and repair the fresh-water casks. Mr Barlow had been the best they could find and his presence made their complicated lives even more difficult. The men didn’t trust him enough to tell him their real names, or the reason behind their piracy, and Richard made sure he never saw him without his mask. He felt certain the rat, when faced with the lure of coin or the threat of the gallows, would betray them all. They didn’t need to add another questionable man to their ranks and risk more danger. ‘Have you found anything?’
‘I searched the papers I pulled from the Captain’s desk. Nothin’ official there where they should be. Captain probably hid them before we boarded, like the last one did on your Mr Fitzwilliam’s orders.’
‘Then let’s ask the Captain.’ Richard marched up to where two of his men held the Captain and his first mate a short distance from his crew. The wiry first mate stepped back, but the Captain, a round man with a leathery face full of deep lines, stood firm against Richard’s approach.
‘Where are the ship’s papers?’ Richard demanded.
‘The papers?’ the thick man snorted. ‘You’re taking our cargo, what need can you have for our papers?’
‘I don’t have to explain my reasons. Tell me where you’re hiding the shipping passes and whatever else the Virginia Trading Company gave you before you set sail.’
‘There aren’t any papers.’ The Captain threw out his wide hands in feigned innocence and glanced at his first mate to reinforce his claim, but the first mate, silenced by his cowardice, stared at the deck.
‘Bollocks there aren’t.’ Richard snatched a pistol from his sash, then grabbed the Captain by the back of his thick neck and jerked him close. The stench of rum and dirty clothes engulfing the man was more pungent than rotting fish and so different from the faint scent of roses that had surrounded Cassandra. ‘Where are they?’
‘I don’t know,’ the Captain sputtered, struggling against Richard’s grasp.
Richard cocked the pistol hammer with his thumb and jammed the muzzle beneath the Captain’s chin, determined to find the documents. ‘Is hiding them worth your life?’
The man’s small eyes widened with the same fear Richard had witnessed in Cassandra’s and guilt tripped up Richard’s spine. At one time he’d been an admired and respected gentleman who only had to ask politely to receive things, not a brigand willing to kill a man over flimsy pieces of parchment. ‘Where are they?’
The Captain raised a shaking hand to point at something behind Richard. ‘There, in the cask by the mizzen mast.’
Richard shoved the man back to his first mate, holstered his pistol and stormed to the cask. He knocked aside the lid and reached inside. His fingers brushed nothing but a rough twist of rope before, near the bottom, he touched the smooth leather of a folio. He pulled it out and flipped through the air-dampened and watermarked contents, his hope fading with each turn of the vellum. He removed a shipping pass and held it up to the sun.
‘Anything?’ Mr Rush examined the pass over Richard’s arm.
‘I can’t tell. Either it’s real or Vincent is hiring more talented forgers.’ Richard laid it on top of the other papers in the folio and snapped it shut.
Curse the bastard. Vincent would pay for all his sins. Richard would make sure of it, but it wouldn’t be because of what they’d found on this ship.
‘Maybe we should search the Captain’s quarters?’ Mr Rush suggested. ‘Might be something more damning in there, something we missed.’
Richard looked at the Captain’s cabin and the crooked door which had been returned haphazardly to its jamb. Cassandra sat inside, preparing for their meal. He could almost see her dark blonde hair arranged in soft rows of curls framing her face, with the long curls at the back just brushing the nape of her neck when she tilted her face up to his, her eyes the same rich green and brown he used to lose himself in during those spring evenings in Williamsburg.
What the hell is she doing here? She should be in London, the grand lady of the manor like she’d always wanted to be in Virginia, not aboard one of Vincent’s ships complicating Richard’s plans and threatening his peace of mind. The accusations of selfishness she’d flung at him before he’d set sail from Yorktown five years ago came back to him like a punch in the gut. She’d gloat if she knew how right she’d been and still was. She might yet get the chance. ‘No. We’ve unsettled the lady and her child enough. I won’t disturb them again.’
Mr Rush hooked his thumbs in the belt of his breeches. ‘You’ll risk letting good evidence go because of the nerves of some titled woman?’
Richard folded the folio in half and used it to motion Mr Rush to join him at the balustrade, out of hearing of the others. ‘The lady in the cabin isn’t simply a titled passenger. She’s Walter Lewis’s niece.’
Mr Rush let out a low whistle. ‘Did she recognise you?’
‘No, and there’s no reason she should. Like everyone in Virginia, she thinks I’m dead.’ He tapped the folio against his palm, thinking of Cas and the odd opportunity that had all but landed in his lap. ‘I may resurrect myself before we leave. Walter’s a mere solicitor. He doesn’t have the connections in Williamsburg to collect information or wield influence, but a woman whose family used to be among the finest in Williamsburg might. Arrange for a meal in my cabin in one hour. I’m going to dine with the lady.’
‘And try to win her to our side, to have her risk the hangman’s noose for helpin’ pirates after you lied to her and attacked her ship?’ Mr Rush crossed his arms in disbelief. ‘I don’t care how skilled you are with the ladies of Port Royal, no man is that good.’
‘I am.’ He tapped the folio against Mr Rush’s chest with an arrogance he didn’t feel. If Richard revealed himself to her, Mr Rush was right, she would despise him for having lied to her, but he’d seen the faint flashes of recognition in Cas’s eyes and the desire that had clouded them when he’d teased her. Her mind might not have allowed her to believe he was still alive, but her heart had recognised him. It had been there in the faint blush that had coloured her cheeks when he’d stood close to her. It was wrong to play on this, but he’d long since stopped caring about right and wrong. All he wanted now was justice. Revenge. ‘See to the meal.’
Richard grabbed a hold of the rigging and swung himself up on to the planks connecting the two ships. He strode across the wood and dropped down on to the deck of the Devil’s Rose. Men stepped aside to allow him to pass as he bounded up the forecastle stairs. ‘Progress, Mr O’Malley.’
‘Another excellent haul, Captain,’ Mr O’Malley congratulated from where he stood at the helm while the rest of the crew continued to load the Winter Gale’s cargo into the hold. There it would stay until the next time they careened the ship at Knott Island when they’d bury it with the rest of their seized wealth.
‘It is.’ Richard clapped the helmsman on the back. ‘We’ve struck another well-deserved blow. There’ll be more to come before we’re through and we won’t stop until the Virginia Trading Company is wrecked.’
Richard’s triumph faded at the sight of Dr Abney watching him. Dr Abney knelt beside one of Richard’s men, treating the gash on his forearm. He looked away the moment he caught Richard’s eye, but there was no mistaking the accusation and disgust in his expression. Justice for his men was what Richard had sought since the beginning, but in Dr Abney’s aged eyes Richard caught a shadow of the darker man beneath the mask, the one who didn’t care about wealth or the future. Only bringing Vincent down.
He wondered if this was what Cassandra would see, too, when she dined with him.
He snatched up a map and rolled it out with a quick flick.
It didn’t matter what Cas saw or thought so long as she agreed to help him.
Chapter Two (#uced9615f-2791-52fb-84aa-4909a95516a0)
‘It isn’t wise to dine alone with him, Lady Shepherd,’ Dr Abney cautioned from where he stood guarding the door. She and the Virginian surgeon had become friends during the crossing. He was one of the few people who’d heard the rumours about her in London and chosen not to believe them. Cassandra appreciated his fatherly attitude and the many pieces of advice he’d offered her about returning to Williamsburg since they’d set sail.
‘I have no more choice in whether to join him than you did in assisting his surgeon.’ Cassandra sat on the edge of Dinah’s bed, stroking her daughter’s dark hair and watching the child’s eyelids flutter while she slept. Jane stood on the other side, her small face with the snub nose still white with fright.
‘I understand, but others may not see it the same way and think you went to him willingly. It might bring you more heartache than you left behind in London.’
Cassandra paused in her stroking of Dinah’s hair. She was going to him willingly because he’d asked her to in exchange for the crew and the passengers’ freedom, not because he’d demanded it, but it didn’t change her lack of choice in the matter. Her daughter was her most prized possession and the only good to come from her marriage and she would do anything to protect her. ‘If I have to meet privately with Captain Rose to ensure we reach Virginia, and Dinah has a real home and a future, then I will.’
‘What future will she have if you are ruined?’
She leaned down and kissed Dinah’s chubby cheek, then rose to face Dr Abney. ‘Belle View plantation is mine and nothing, not rumours, my reputation or any man, can take it away from me.’ Though heaven knew what condition she’d find it in once she reached it. ‘Besides, if there’s one thing that can always be counted on, either in London or in Williamsburg, it’s the English love of titles and land. Thankfully, I possess both.’ It was money she lacked. She had enough fine gowns and jewellery to give the illusion of wealth so necessary for securing one’s place in society, but it wouldn’t last for ever. She hoped it worked in Williamsburg long enough for her to succeed for it was the only card she had to play.
She wandered to the window, desperate for a cool breeze to ease the heat. On either side of the open pane, the swirled leaded glass distorted the view of the water. The cloying humid air sat heavy over the ship and she dabbed her sweat-soaked chest with a small handkerchief, unable to find relief. The prospect of facing all the old ghosts waiting for her in Virginia unnerved her as much as the man she was about to dine with. ‘Captain Rose gave me his word that no harm will come to any of us and so far he’s kept his promise.’
‘Then for your sake, I pray he continues to do so.’
‘Me, too.’ She smoothed her hands over the light blue silk of her robe à la française, trying not to let Dr Abney’s concerns increase hers. If the Captain proved as untrustworthy as Giles, it would add another salacious story to the ones from London already trailing her like a wake behind a ship and make everything she hoped to regain in Williamsburg that much more difficult.
A knock at the door tightened the already strained air of the room.
‘Enter.’ Cassandra faced the door, lacing her hands together in front of her. She’d changed from her simple cotton day dress to a deep maroon silk one, with lace along the half sleeves and silver embroidered flourishes on the skirt and bodice. Although it was heavier and hotter than the other, it was thicker in the front and wider at the hips, revealing less of her narrow waist. The bodice was a touch higher, but it still emphasised a good deal more of her décolletage than she would have liked. Witty conversation was how she intended to charm Captain Rose into keeping his promise to send them on their way, not the more carnal assets Giles had once accused her of using to ensnare lovers. As loathsome as her late husband’s touch had been, there hadn’t been anyone but him. It no longer mattered. By wearing the fine gown, she’d give Captain Rose the cultured dinner partner he’d asked for. Besides, if he proved to be a rogue, none of her gowns, no matter how high the bodice or how wide the skirt, would stop him from taking what he wanted.
The man with the Monmouth cap entered, tugging at the dirty red scarf tied around his neck while he struggled to keep his eyes on hers and not her chest. ‘Mr Rush, milady. I’m to escort you to the Devil’s Rose.’
Cassandra took a steadying breath. She must be brave for Dinah’s sake and for everyone else aboard the Winter Gale. ‘Then let’s be off.’
Mr Rush offered her his arm. ‘Milady, if I may?’
She slid the slender walnut pistol box off the table and tucked it under her arm, wondering why Captain Rose had asked her to bring it. There were more valuable items he could take from her, though two fine weapons were probably of more use to a pirate than jewellery. She placed her free hand on Mr Rush’s coarse, sea-spray-stiffened coat and allowed him to lead her on deck and to an unknown fate.
The Winter Gale crew, guarded by the pirates, watched Cassandra and Mr Rush walk side by side to the wide planks laid between the ships. Pity filled a few of the older men’s eyes, but she ignored them as she’d ignored the vicious stares and whispers of London society. The plank bobbed and rolled while the two ships, held together by grappling hooks and lines, tossed about on the sea. Captain Rose stood on the other side, some of his men flanking him at the balustrade, the change in him from earlier remarkable.
He wore a black frock coat without facing. A row of silver buttons curved down along the front and decorated the bootleg cuffs folded back to reveal his large hands. A red waistcoat hugged his trim torso, the line of it broken by a wide belt pulled down on one side by the weight of his sword. Black breeches tucked into tall cuffed boots covered his long legs. The severity of his dark attire was lightened by the white shirt beneath his waistcoat and the silver embroidery about the edge of the tricorn he wore low over his forehead to meet his mask. His exposed cheeks and jaw beneath the mask revealed a smooth face freshly shaved. If she hadn’t seen him an hour ago, his shirt wild and loose about him, his hair hanging to his shoulders, she might have mistaken him for any gentleman in a ballroom in Mayfair.
When she approached the plank, he examined her with a gaze intense enough to ignite every cask of gunpowder on the ship. Panic gripped her harder than when the pirates had first burst through the door, and her hand tightened on Mr Rush’s arm. She wanted to rush back to the cabin and reload the pistols, but she held her ground, refusing to reveal her fear to everyone, especially Captain Rose.
‘You needn’t worry,’ Mr Rush offered when they stopped before the plank. ‘Captain Rose is a gentleman. No harm will come to you.’
The older man’s faith in his Captain bolstered hers and her courage. With Captain Rose and both crews watching, she couldn’t turn back or betray her word and risk placing the ship, herself and Dinah in danger. ‘Thank you for your concern, it’s very much appreciated.’
‘I’ll hold the box while you cross.’
She handed Mr Rush the pistol case, then took his hand and stepped up on to the plank. The timbers of the ships and the thick ropes lashing them together groaned and creaked with the movement of the swell and every once in a while the hulls banged together, sending up a small spray of water.
Captain Rose stepped up on to the plank on his side. He clutched the rigging in one hand and offered Cassandra the other. She ignored it and took hold of the sides of her dress and began to walk regally across the splintered wood. She didn’t look down, aware that if she fell between the ships they might slam together and crush her. She was halfway across the boards when the Winter Gale lurched, throwing her off balance.
In a flash of black fabric, Captain Rose caught her about the waist and whirled her around to set her on the deck of the Devil’s Rose. He held her close, his arm tight about her waist, his wide chest hard against her stomach. The potent smell of sandalwood shaving soap and leather surrounding him made her dizzier than the near fall. He’d been imposing in the confines of the cabin with little more than the distance of the pistols between them. With his body pressed against hers, the fine wool of his frock coat brushing her bare chest above her bodice, he was overwhelming.
‘The trick is to move quickly.’ His husky voice rumbled deep inside her. She peered up at him, her breath stolen by his closeness. His suntanned skin showed no evidence of the weathered grit of a sailor too long at sea and the fine colour of it heightened the black of his hair. She shouldn’t think a rogue striking, but she did.
‘Thank you.’ She inhaled the spice of wood and salt emanating from him and another memory, faint like the fading scent of smoke, rose up in the back of her mind. It was of Uncle Walter’s Williamsburg garden and the flowering dogwood tree in the centre of it. Beneath it stood Uncle Walter’s young apprentice solicitor waiting to steal a kiss from her. That young man was dead, but this one was very much alive, his chest hard beneath her fingertips, his thigh firm against hers.
She tucked her fingers in against her palms, resisting the urge to slide them up over his stoic chin, across his angled cheeks and under the silk to reveal his face. She wanted to see the gentleman beneath the pirate, to view the full effect of the sharp, straight nose covered by the black silk and the intense blue eyes making her recall so many things she longed to forget.
She lowered her hands and his grip on her eased. She stepped out of his embrace, steadying herself against the roll of the ship and the enticing power of him. He wasn’t a curiosity, but her enemy, and she must remember it and remain on guard.
Mr Rush crossed with the box and handed it to his Captain.
Captain Rose tucked the pistol case under one arm and offered her the other. ‘Shall we?’
‘Yes, please.’
The supple wool of his dark jacket shifted beneath Cassandra’s palm with each sure step of his boots during the walk to his cabin. She matched his stride, holding her head high as if they were parading across Hyde Park and not a pirate ship. The crew stood at respectful attention, with only the weasel Mr Barlow leering as though he expected Captain Rose to ravish her in plain view. She should have shot the nasty man, but heaven knew what repercussions his death would have brought down on her, Dinah and the crew of the Winter Gale. Even now she couldn’t say what fate awaited her. Alone, with the door to Captain Rose’s cabin firmly closed, she would be at his mercy. However, the lives of many depended on her being a pleasant and charming guest, so with purpose she swept across the threshold and into the semi-darkness of his cabin.
A bank of diamond-shaped glass windows made up the far wall of the narrow cabin situated at the back of the ship. A faded, red-velvet curtain graced the top of the window, cascading down each side and edged with faded gold tassels. One end hung next to a small desk, the other end pooled near the head of the narrow bed built into the hull. Her attention darted from the sumptuous pillows and fine coverlet to the small, square table in the middle of the room. A woven rug lay beneath it and two sturdy nail-head-trimmed chairs flanked either side. An assortment of exotic fruits including pineapples covered the well-set table. Everything from the silverware beside each plate to the books arranged on the desk spoke of the refined tastes of a gentleman, not the vulgar clutter of a hardened sailor new to comfort. It was a strange contradiction. He was commanding, but he hadn’t forced her; charming and yet violent; a scoundrel and at the same time a man of station. She wondered what had driven him to this life. Perhaps through witty conversation and grace of manners she could bring out more of the gentleman she was sure he’d once been and appeal to him for her and the Winter Gale’s freedom.
‘Do you approve?’ He set the walnut box down beside a pewter service at one end of the table, then pulled out a chair.
‘It’s far more refined than I expected.’ She sat down, conscious of how close he stood, his hands near her shoulders, the cuffs of his coat brushing against her skin when he slid the chair in until the seat touched the back of her thighs. She glanced over her shoulder at him towering above her, dark and impressive, her curiosity giving her more to consider than her worries that he might turn on her at any moment, and a reason for her to be brave and bold. She sensed he would respect her for it. ‘Though it’s ill-gotten.’
* * *
Richard trilled his fingers once on the chair, then gripped the leather tight. The delicate curve of her bare shoulders above the bodice of the dress was so close that if he reached out one finger he could touch it. The skin would be warm, but not her reaction. The uncertainty in her eyes when she’d stepped out of his embrace on deck had undermined her defiant crossing of the planks. She was afraid of him, but determined to show otherwise. He could remove the mask and prove that she had nothing to fear, but he didn’t. Despite her having upheld her end of the bargain, being a charming partner at dinner was one thing. Colluding with a pirate in a place as hostile to them as Virginia was quite another. Until he was sure he could win her to his cause, he would remain Captain Rose. A woman scorned could be a lethal enemy in Virginia at a time when he needed all the allies he could cultivate.
‘Not as ill-gotten as the way the Virginia Trading Company obtained it through the misery of slaves, seamen and countless other ruined lives.’ He let go of the chair and took his seat across the table from her.
She raised her rich eyes framed by dark lashes to meet his. ‘You dislike the Virginia Trading Company?’
He opened and closed his hand beneath the table, thinking he should have stayed behind her and not faced her. The white mounds of her breasts were supple and smooth against the dark fabric of her gown, tempting him to break from her gaze and admire them. ‘I do. Their ships are the only ones I attack. The others I let go.’
‘Why?’ She tilted her head to view him, making the teardrops of her earrings brush the line of her delicate jaw. ‘Were you an officer on one of their ships and the Captain disciplined you too harshly?’
He tapped the chair’s arm, wishing he could taste a little of her discipline again. ‘No.’
‘Then a rival perhaps, a gentleman of some means who had his own company but couldn’t keep it in the face of competition?’ She speared a piece of pineapple off her plate with the fork and set it between her lips, using her teeth to draw it off the tines.
Richard, his pulse racing in his ears as well as places lower down, took hold of the thin neck of the wine decanter and reached over to fill the crystal goblet in front of her. Its red depths danced with the candlelight from the chandelier above the table, the heady vintage as tempting as her. ‘No.’
She set down the fork, rested her elbows on the table and steepled her fingers beneath her chin. The delicate lengths of them almost begged Richard to take them in his calloused hands and kiss the tips of each one the way he used to do during their afternoons in the Belle View barn. How beautiful she’d been beneath him then, her languid body curled around his, eager and ready for him. ‘Then tell me why?’
The amethyst jewels around her neck winked with the candlelight and the largest of the descending teardrops rested between the swells of her full breasts. One close to her throat had turned over, hiding the gem. He reached across the table and righted it, his fingers lightly brushing her neck and bringing a chill to her skin and his. ‘Because not all scoundrels sail under a black flag.’
She didn’t lean away despite the nervousness flickering through her eyes, but met his steady gaze. ‘How unfortunate I chose one of their ships for my passage.’
‘If you hadn’t, we may not have met.’ He raised his wineglass to her. She held up her goblet before taking a sip, watching him over the rim of the crystal, except it wasn’t her sparkling eyes that held his attention, but the gold wedding band sitting like an ugly scar on her finger. It killed the desire for her coursing through his body. ‘What does your husband think of you sailing by yourself?’
He nearly choked on the word husband and everything it meant. She was not his to enjoy and tease, she hadn’t been for a long time and all because of the choices he’d made. It didn’t matter—nothing did except securing her help. She’d be no use to him if her lord and master put a stop to things.
She set down the wine and glanced at the ring as if she wanted to snatch the cursed thing from her finger and hurl it into the sea. ‘He thinks nothing of it. He’s dead.’
Richard sat back in shock, her reason for being at sea and on her way home suddenly clear. He’d despised the man who’d taken his place, but he didn’t want Cas to suffer in mourning. She didn’t deserve it—however, the man’s being gone would make many things so much easier. ‘I’m very sorry for your loss.’
‘I’m not. He did nothing but make my life miserable.’ She stared at the reflection of the candles in the surface of the wine, the shape of them widening and narrowing with each tilt of the ship making the liquid sway. The teasing, alluring woman from a moment ago was gone, revealing the wounded one she’d hidden so well with her bravery and her charming words, the one he’d failed to recognise because he’d been too intent on getting what he wanted.
Just like when he’d left her at Yorktown five years ago.
Richard picked at the nail head on his chair, a guilt washing over him such as he hadn’t experienced since the first time he’d taken a ship what seemed like a lifetime ago. He was quickly proving to be as big a bastard as his enemy. ‘I’m sorry things did not turn out as you would have liked.’
‘It’s been a long time since anything has.’ Defeat draped her like a sail cut loose from a mast. It was the same futility he’d experienced when word had reached him of her marriage and then of his father’s death. Regret crept along the back of his mind, resisting all his efforts to kill it. He’d worked hard for so long to dampen those emotions because there was nothing he could do to change what had happened. He could change things today. He’d done nothing to earn the right to ask her for any favour, especially one that might cause her more grief than Richard’s selfishness had already visited upon her. Let Walter tell her the truth in his own time, if at all. It would keep her untarnished by the hate enveloping Richard and grant her some peace of mind.
He rose, ready to escort her back to the Winter Gale, to bid her goodbye as he had five years ago, except this time she was ignorant of who he was and he was all too aware that they would not meet again. ‘I hope you find solace with your family in Virginia.’
She slowly spun the amethyst bracelet she wore around her delicate wrist, then spoke in so low a voice he almost didn’t hear her. ‘I have no family in Virginia.’
Every sense that told him when an enemy ship was approaching on the horizon raised the hairs along the back of his neck, and he pressed his fingertips into the top of the table. ‘What?’
‘My uncle, my only family, was sick with a fever,’ she choked through heavy words. ‘He died three months ago.’
Richard worked to steady himself as everything around him came apart like a ship in a hurricane. Walter Lewis, his only ally in the colonies, was gone and with him went Richard’s greatest chance of seeing himself and his men exonerated, and Vincent ruined. Panic filled him, and he struggled to keep it under control.
Before Richard could speak, Cassandra jumped to her feet, making the plates on the table rattle. ‘I’ve entertained you at supper as you asked. Will you let us go now?’
Her plea didn’t move him this time and neither did the anguish in her eyes. Everything Richard had spent the last five years working to accomplish teetered on the edge of ruin and he would not see it go over the side. He balled his hands into fists. Vincent had defeated him once before. He wouldn’t allow Walter’s death to let him do it again. ‘No, Cas, I’m afraid I can’t, not yet.’
* * *
Cassandra gripped the side of the table as the ship tilted. ‘What did you call me?’
He reached up and untied the strings of his mask, allowing the silk to slide down his face and drop to the floor.
‘Richard!’ It couldn’t be, but it was. ‘You’re alive!’
Hard work at sea had broadened his chest and arms and everything else about him. The sun had lightened his hair, making some strands near red, and turned his skin tawny. His eyes were almost the same except for the small lines about the corners and the steel of experience hardening them. She wouldn’t believe it was him if it weren’t for the small scar beneath his left eye formerly hidden by the mask. It was a reminder of a wherry accident from when he was a boy, a tale his father had laughingly recounted to her once when she and Uncle Walter had dined at Sutherland Place in the early days of their engagement. Tears blurred her vision. During too many lonely nights Richard’s memory had haunted her and made her wail over their lost future. She’d cursed the sea for luring him away and when the strangling weight of her marriage bonds had chafed, Richard’s memory had fed the faint hope she might some day find happiness again. It had all been a lie, like Giles’s love during their courtship and Lord and Lady Chatham’s concern for her. ‘When they said you’d turned from privateer to pirate, I thought they were mistaken. I told everyone you were innocent. I lost friends and was ridiculed because of my faith in you and all along they were right.’
‘No, they weren’t.’ He banged his fist against the table, overturning a bowl and sending the oranges inside it rolling across the table and on to the floor. ‘I was innocent. I am innocent.’
‘You aren’t. Look at you. I wish you had died, then I could remember the man who loved me and not this...’ she flapped her hand at him, no name black enough to describe what he’d become ‘...pirate.’
‘I didn’t choose this life,’ he hissed with a fierceness to make her shift further behind the chair. ‘I and my crew were forced into it by Vincent Fitzwilliam and I have no choice but to live it until either he’s ruined or I’m dead.’
‘How can that be?’
‘The ship we attacked was a Virginia Trading Company sloop shipping cargo under Dutch colours and a forged Dutch pass. We attacked it because the Dutch had joined the war and their ships were fair prizes. I didn’t realise what Vincent was doing until I saw the Captain’s papers. By then it was too late. The Captain escaped in a launch and made it to Virginia before I could. To protect himself, Vincent had me and my men declared pirates and bounties placed on our heads. His company was foundering under the weight of his father’s gambling debts and when the embargo was issued against the French, shipping cargo illegally under a Dutch flag was the only way he could maintain his business. He sank me, his oldest friend, to save himself.’
‘If you had the fake papers, then why didn’t you fight the charges?’
‘Vincent had the Governor’s ear—he still does—and his Captain’s testimony. I had nothing except my ship, my men and my disgraced word.’ He pressed his fist into his hips, his fury easing, but not the tightness along his shoulders. ‘I renamed the Maiden’s Veil the Devil’s Rose and we’ve plundered Virginia Trading Company ships in search of evidence and to destroy Vincent’s business ever since. What little evidence I’ve found I’ve sent to your uncle, hoping it would one day be enough for him to take to Lord Spotswood and see the man convicted and me and my men pardoned of all charges, but it hasn’t been enough.’
He bent his head in a frustration she could feel because like him, she knew what it was to fight and struggle and to keep failing. But she couldn’t comfort him, not with the realisation of the truth behind his words cruelly dawning on her.
‘Uncle Walter knew you were alive? He lied to me about your death?’ She dropped into the chair, her legs no longer able to support her and the grief weighing her down. Uncle Walter had been a steady rock for her to cling to in the midst of the storms of her life in Williamsburg after her parents’ deaths and again in London when his letters had offered advice and affection when no one else would. All the while he’d been lying to her, and in the cruellest of ways, like almost everyone she’d ever cared for including Richard, Giles and the Chathams.
Why am I not worthy of love and honesty? She longed to bury her face in her hands and cry, but she couldn’t. All she could do was continue on, as she always did, adding this new grief to the old ones already bruising her.
‘He lied to you and to my father because I didn’t want either of you to see what I was forced to become in order to destroy Vincent.’ He righted the bowl, his fingers lingering to trace the engraving on the edge of it. ‘I was aware of the dangers when I went to sea, how it could kill a man. I didn’t think it could destroy the very essence of who he is, or was.’
The pain of his strained words made her heartache slide away. The man she’d once loved was suffering in a way she understood and longed to ease. She laid a comforting hand on his and curled her fingertips to press against his palm. His muscles tensed, but he didn’t pull away. He clutched her hand in a firm embrace which reached deep into her soul. ‘Then leave this life. Take the money you’ve made from it and go to the islands and establish yourself as a planter. Many have done it before.’ And I could come with you. London, Williamsburg and all the torment of her past and the uncertainty of starting over at Belle View could be set aside. She would no longer be alone and he no longer a faded dream.
He brushed the back of her hand with his thumb, as tender as he’d been during all the evenings they’d spent together in the garden. She wasn’t foolish enough to think he would walk away from his ship and crew at her mere suggestion, but still she wished it might happen, as she’d done so many times since he’d first set sail, until she’d learned he was dead.
Then, he slid his hand out from under hers, drawing away like he used to when he’d tire of her arguments against his becoming a privateer. ‘Not until Vincent is ruined.’
She stepped back, fighting the urge to sweep the dishes from the table. He was choosing the sea over her again and not caring whether it destroyed them both. This wasn’t the Richard she used to cherish and, for the first time since she’d seen him come up the walk at her uncle’s house, she wondered if she’d been as wrong about him as she’d been about Giles. ‘It’s just like when you left before. All you care about is what you want and you don’t care who it hurts, not innocent travellers, yourself or me.’
He snatched the mask off the floor and gripped it hard in his fist, holding it out to her. ‘You don’t know what it’s like to be accused of something you didn’t do and to have everything, your family, your property, your life, your very identity, stolen from you because of it.’
‘Yes, I do,’ she shot back, twisting the gold band on her finger. ‘Giles stole almost everything from me, my meagre dowry, my good name, my belief in his affection for me. He even tried to take Dinah away before he killed himself riding home drunk from his mistress’s house in the rain, but not even his death spared me from more pain and humiliation. Without a son to inherit, the estate went to a cousin and I was turned out and left with nothing except a reputation blackened by his mistress and her catty London friends. I’d never done anything wrong and it didn’t matter because he still ruined my life.’
Tears stung her eyes, and she wiped them away with the backs of her hands, refusing to appear more desperate and lonely than she already did. She still had her pride and the chance to rebuild her life. She had to believe in that for there was nothing else. She raised her chin to Richard in defiance, but her stiffness eased at the change in him.
His fury dimmed and he lowered his hand, opening his fist to let the silk drop to the floor. The man who’d stood beside her at her parents’ graves and listened to her wail over their loss and how it had irrevocably changed everything stood before her again. The life of a brigand had altered him almost beyond recognition, yet echoes of the old Richard remained in the softness of his expression while he studied her.
‘Your husband was a fool. He should have loved you and worshipped you, not cast you aside. He should have been faithful to you, not left you to be torn down by society.’ He brushed her cheek with the back of his fingers, the delicate touch burning her skin. She should knock his hand away, take up the knife beside her plate and stab him for what he’d done to her and countless others, but she didn’t, she couldn’t. His caress disturbed places long forgotten in her marriage and widowhood. It had been too many years since anyone had spoken to her of love and here it was on Richard’s lips, just as it had been in the Williamsburg garden a lifetime ago. They’d both been wounded, their innocence torn from them by the machinations of others and their own mistakes, but with his warm skin caressing hers, she could almost believe that if she pressed her lips to his she might regain everything they’d once meant to one another. She wouldn’t have to face the trials of life by herself and he wouldn’t be a rogue, but the man to help and protect her, to love her as he’d once vowed he would.
As if hearing her silent longing, he slid his fingers behind her neck and drew her to him. She closed her eyes and five years fell away when their lips met. She was sixteen again, her life and heart filled with love and promise. He was no longer a privateer captain turned pirate, but an apprentice to her uncle with a passion for the sea and eager to make his fortune so they could marry. Her tongue tasted his, the spice of wine still lingering on his lips. In the strength of his kiss there existed traces of the honourable Richard she’d loved, the one who might live again if he abandoned Captain Rose. It wasn’t possible, but with his arms around her, his hands firm against her back, she could almost imagine it was.
* * *
Richard broke from her kiss and rested his forehead on hers, the press of her against him like touching his old life. Except all of it was gone and there was no gaining it back. His father, Sutherland Place, his life in Virginia were only memories, just like Cas had been. Except she was here in his arms. For the first time in five years the possibility that there might be more for him in this world than revenge teased him like her fingertips did the back of his neck. Maybe he could reclaim something of what he’d lost, let his men go on to enjoy the treasure they’d collected, to raise families and own land and be free of the threat of the hangman’s noose. He could take his share of the money and become something more than an outlaw driven by hate, but a respected planter once again.
He rested his cheek against hers and over her shoulder caught sight of the desk and the folio with the Virginia Trading Company papers lying on top of it. Bitterness flooded in to kill his hope. If he walked away from this life to chase some dream, he would have to live every day with the knowledge that Vincent was out there, enjoying the very things he’d stolen from Richard, and all the misery Richard had brought on himself, his men and countless others would have been in vain.
‘Captain!’ Mr Rush called from outside, making the door rattle with a frantic knock. ‘Mr Tibbs has spied a Royal Navy ship. We must set sail at once.’
‘See to it, Mr Rush,’ Richard ordered, jerking back from Cas.
‘Aye, sir.’ Mr Rush’s voice faded as he hurried off, shouting orders to the men.
‘Our time together is over.’ Richard slid his arms from around Cas, addressing her with the same sharpness he did the passengers on other ships he’d taken—except she wasn’t like them. He dismissed the thought and the slight prick to his conscience. ‘I asked you for two favours in exchange for your freedom. I must insist on the second one.’
‘You can’t.’
‘With Walter dead, I have no choice.’
‘Of course you do. You always have a choice and, now that I see the kind of decisions you prefer, I thank you very much for sparing me from making the worst mistake of my life by marrying you.’
He ignored her jibe as he removed a pouch of money from the desk. He deserved her scorn, but it wouldn’t stop him from securing her help to bring Vincent down. This was why he’d brought her here and not for any other reason. ‘You will soon have control of the evidence I sent Walter. You must promise me you’ll safeguard it and help me when I request it.’
‘I won’t! Do you know what they’ll do to me if they discover I’m colluding with a pirate? I’ll be hanged and my daughter left an orphan with no one to care for her.’
He stamped out the guilt scratching at him the way he did every time he boarded a ship and faced the terrified souls on board. What he was doing was wrong and might cause her more heartache than anything he’d done before, but she was his only link to Virginia and he needed her help. ‘There are risks, but I will make it worth your while.’ He held up the leather pouch between them, the bottom sagging beneath the weight of the coins.
‘That’s blood money.’
‘If anyone’s hands are tainted, it’s Vincent. At least a small portion of it will finally go to good, to help you start over in Virginia.’ He gently encircled her wrist with his fingers and raised her hand to lay the sack in her palm. Her pulse raced beneath his fingertips and he waited for her to throw the money back at him along with a parcel of curses, but her fingers curled around it instead and he knew he had her. ‘I will only call on you if I absolutely have to and, when I do, there will be more.’
‘I don’t want it, or anything to do with you.’ She dropped the money on the floor.
He scooped it up and set it on the table beside the pistol box. He lifted one pistol out of its velvet bed and held it up between them. ‘This will be our signal. When I send this to you, you’ll follow the man who bears it and he’ll provide you with further information about what is required.’
He slipped the weapon into the deep pocket of his coat, binding her to him in a most dangerous way. He laid the money in the empty space in the case and closed and locked the lid.
‘The Richard I loved wouldn’t have done this.’
He pressed his fingers into the smooth surface. ‘That Richard is gone. Vincent killed him.’
‘No, you did!’ She snatched the case out from beneath his hands and clutched it to her chest, pinning him with a look more filled with hate than any captain or passenger he’d ever captured at sea.
He flashed her a wicked smile to conceal the remorse making her harsh words sting. ‘Take heart, Cas, I could be killed long before I ever call in my favour.’
‘I hope you are.’
* * *
Cassandra swept around him and out the door, marching across the deck and to the plank joining the two vessels. The pirate crew paid her little heed while they rushed to disengage the grappling hooks and ready the ship. Overhead, the large sail filled with wind and pulled the rigging taut. Over the noise, she caught the faint clink of the coins inside the case. She should open it and throw the money overboard, but to do so would mean revealing something of their conversation and the fact that she’d accepted money from a pirate.
I did it for Dinah. The money was significantly more than she presently possessed and it would help them start over in Virginia.
She hurried to the balustrade, ready to cross to the Winter Gale. No activity marred its deck where the sails and rigging lay torn and shattered. They needed the Royal Navy ship to reach them and help the sailors repair the mainmast before they could continue.
Dr Abney stood in front of the mess, anxiously waiting for her, his full cheeks sagging with relief when he saw her approach the rails. He’d warned her about going willingly to Richard, but she hadn’t listened. She wished she had, then Richard would have remained a treasured part of her past instead of another person who’d betrayed her.
In a few long strides Richard was beside her, his mask fixed over his face, his tricorn settled low over his forehead to further shade his eyes. They stopped at the plank and he took the box from her and tossed it across the gap to Dr Abney. Cassandra held her breath, hoping the lock didn’t break open and scatter the money about the deck. Dr Abney caught the box without reaction, unable to hear or feel the weight of the coins shifting inside over the noise of the sea and the pirates.
Cassandra gathered up the sides of her skirt, ready to rush across when Richard held out his hand to help her. She peered up at him, loss consuming her as it had when she’d watched him climb the gangplank to the Maiden’s Veil in Yorktown. He’d left her with promises that he’d return to her and she’d lived off their hope for so long, until there hadn’t been any more.
‘If things had been different, would you have come home to me? Would we have been happy together?’ she asked, desperate for something in her life to have been real and good.
He closed his fingers over his palm, then opened them again, still holding it out to her, silently urging her to accept it and his help. ‘Yes.’
The wind whipped at her, making her eyes water as much as her desire to weep. She despised what he’d become, but it pained her to let him go again. It was like learning of his death for a second time, except he wasn’t dead, but achingly beyond her reach. Beneath the black silk, in the touch of yellow about his irises, there lingered something of the man who’d almost become her husband, the one she’d been willing to wait for until he’d lied about his death.
I don’t believe in that man any more.
She brushed past him, stepped up on the plank and rushed across. On the other side, Dr Abney took her hand and helped her down, staying close beside her as she wiped the moisture from the corners of her eyes.
‘My lady, are you all right?’ Concern made the lines of his face deepen. ‘He didn’t take liberties with you, did he?’
‘No. He was a perfect gentleman.’ Until he’d changed into a rogue and made it clear he wanted nothing more from her than her word.
She took the pistol box from Dr Abney and made for the Captain’s cabin and Dinah. Behind her, Richard called out orders to his crew, his voice reverberating across the water even as the growing distance between the ships swallowed it. The sound of it called to her, but she didn’t look back. She refused to mourn him a second time.
* * *
Richard marched to the opposite side of the ship, unwilling to watch the Winter Gale, and yet another thing torn from him, disappear over the horizon. He gripped the rigging and leaned out over the rail to take in the salty air. Even in the stiff breeze the echoes of Cassandra’s rosewater-scented skin continued to torture him.
‘Captain?’ Mr Rush approached him. ‘We’ve caught a good wind and should outrun the Navy vessel. Mr O’Malley wants to know what course to plot.’
Richard stared out at the whitecaps breaking over the tops of the wind-driven chop, ignoring the weight of the pistol in his coat pocket. The news of Walter’s death and Cas’s appearance had hit him broadside like a wave, but he wouldn’t let it capsize him, nor would he pine for her like some abandoned dog. Let her return to Virginia cursing him. It made no difference as long as she helped him. He couldn’t be certain she would until the moment came to send her the pistol. Until then, like the rest of his past, his time with her was over. With the evidence in jeopardy, he must find another way to ruin Vincent. He’d promised his crew they’d clear their names and have a future free from the threat of the gallows. It was a promise he would damn well keep. ‘Set a course for Nassau, Mr Rush. Let’s find out if those rumours of Vincent trading with pirates are true.’
Chapter Three (#uced9615f-2791-52fb-84aa-4909a95516a0)
One month later
‘Milady, scrubbing floors is no task for a titled lady!’ Mrs Sween, the Belle View housekeeper, gasped from the dining-room door. She’d come up from the cellar and the underground passage leading to the kitchen building in the garden. The earthy scent of the lavender she’d hung in the cellar clung to her and it filled the dining room where Cassandra knelt on the floor with a bucket of warm water and a scrub brush. Cassandra’s arms burned from her effort to make the old floorboards shine again. Over the years, Uncle Walter had given little thought to the house, focusing instead on rents and the annual crops, neither of which had ever brought in enough money, as Giles had complained every quarter when her meagre payments had arrived.
‘I’m afraid I’m not much of a titled lady.’ There were few young ladies who’d left Virginia as an impoverished orphan and returned a dowager baroness. At one time the achievement had seemed like the pinnacle of success, a finger in the eye of everyone in society who’d abandoned her after her parents died and her family’s fortune was lost. It hadn’t been the triumph she’d hoped for. ‘Mother would’ve been ashamed at the way I used to sit idle at Greyson Manor. Giles never let me do more than decide on the dinners.’ Even if she’d been able to work beside him, she doubted he could have taught her much. He’d driven the estate deeper into debt than when he’d inherited it, caring more for his mistress than the careful management of his income. ‘Mother always insisted I take a hand in the affairs of Belle View. I intend to teach Dinah to do the same thing.’
Dinah played next to her with a small brush, a wide smile on her cherubic face, making more of a mess than a difference in the condition of the floors. Cassandra’s efforts hadn’t achieved much either. The scrubbed boards stood out against the surrounding dull ones, many of which were in need of repair. The carpenter was too busy fixing the barn to see to something as trivial as the unused dining room.
She glanced about the room and sighed at the faded and dusty furnishings, the best pieces having been sold off years ago to pay debts. What was left would have made her mother cry to see it. It almost made Cassandra weep, too, when she recalled the many family dinners she’d enjoyed here. Some day, Dinah would enjoy them, too.
If I can continue to make something of Belle View and to cultivate Williamsburg society. She thought of the money from Richard hidden upstairs and how much of it she’d already spent to purchase seed stock, hire labourers and pay for the carpenter’s work on the barn. She shouldn’t spend it, but hoarding it away didn’t free it from the taint of piracy or do anyone any good—not her, not Dinah, not the workers who relied on Belle View for their living. Not spending it would also make maintaining the illusion of wealth more difficult, especially if she had to go begging for loans to keep the plantation from sinking into debt.
‘Lady Shepherd, I don’t mean to trouble you...’ Mrs Sween’s brogue muddied by a Virginia twang interrupted Cassandra’s thoughts ‘...but I heard one of the field hands say Mr Marston quit this morning.’
‘He did.’ Cassandra snatched up the brush and started scrubbing again. ‘He insisted I evict the tenant farmers and commute the tenure of the indentured servants and replace them with slaves. I refused and, because I failed to “see the future”, he felt he could no longer remain as overseer.’
‘He was also being paid far less than most of the overseers around these parts.’
‘It did make his decision to leave a little easier.’ Cassandra sat on her heels and wiped her forehead with the back of her hand. Belle View’s numerous windows and doors stood open, allowing the breeze coming off the James River to move through the rooms and the main hallway, but it did little to lessen the oppressive humidity.
‘What will you do without him?’ Mrs Sween tucked an escaping wisp of grey hair beneath her white cap. She was stout and shorter than Cassandra with a ruddy face like a farmer’s wife. She’d come to Virginia from Scotland as an indentured servant to Uncle Walter twenty years ago and had helped raise Cassandra after her parents’ deaths. Cassandra wished Mrs Sween had been with her in London. She would’ve seen through all of the Chathams’ lies and Cassandra’s ignorance.
What about Richard’s lies?
Cassandra studied the matronly woman standing before her, wondering if she knew the truth about Richard. She was desperate for someone to speak with about him, but if Mrs Sween was ignorant of the truth, then asking her meant inadvertently revealing what had happened on the Devil’s Rose.
She glanced at the burled-wood pistol box resting on the mantel across the room. Inside, the missing weapon marred the beauty of the presentation of the pewter against the red velvet. She twisted the gold band on her finger, her stomach tightening with worry. Every day she thought about his pistol, both anticipating and dreading its return.
She plunked the scrub brush in the bucket, sending a wave of soapy water cresting over the side. She refused to live in fear here as she had in London with Giles. She’d turn Richard in before she’d allow his bargain to threaten her or Dinah. ‘I’ll manage the farmers as best I can until I can engage a new overseer. Heaven only knows how I’ll pay one.’
‘Better find a way. A place like this is too much for one person to run alone.’
Cassandra stood and wiped her hands on her old plain cotton dress, one of many she’d left in trunks in the attic before her trip to England, thinking she’d return within the year. She’d never expected such a long and heartbreaking delay. ‘At present, I don’t have a choice but to do it myself. Besides, I enjoy the work. It takes my mind off so many things.’ Like Richard.
Learning he wasn’t dead had been like having fabric pulled off a dried wound. She’d cursed him for weeks after coming home, but in the still of the dark nights, with the cicadas singing their old familiar song, his resurrection had created another, more startling feeling in her heart—hope. He was still alive and perhaps, like her place in Williamsburg society and the grandeur of Belle View, the future they’d once imagined could be reclaimed. She had no idea how it might come about but, with the memory of his lips still vivid on hers, a small part of her believed in it and him, even if he no longer wanted her and she should want nothing to do with him. Emotion had led her to make a grave mistake with one man. It was a mistake she couldn’t afford to repeat, but surrounded by the humid aroma of dirt and trees, the smells of her childhood, it was hard not to believe in the old dreams again.
‘Don’t worry, my lady, all will be well. You’ll have this place soon set to rights and Belle View will be one of the finest plantations on the James River.’ Mrs Sween rested a wrinkled hand on Cassandra’s shoulder and Cassandra smiled gratefully at her. Mrs Sween’s presence eased the loneliness surrounding Cassandra like the netting covering the portraits of her parents to protect them from the beetles. It didn’t banish it completely. Only during the brief moment in Richard’s arms aboard his ship had the isolation swathing her seemed to lift. The feeling had been fleeting, like his comfort and his shallow love.
‘Shall I take the little one to have her lunch?’ Mrs Sween offered, brushing a lavender flower off her apron.
‘Yes, please.’ Cassandra picked up Dinah and kissed her on one soft and chubby cheek, then handed her to Mrs Sween, who carried her off, promising her fresh butter and bread.
The voices of men calling to one another caught Cassandra’s attention. She went to the window, passing the large dining table dominating the centre of the room. She paused to trail her fingers over the dull and dusty top of it. Of all the meals she remembered enjoying with her parents at this table, the last stood out as the most vivid. Her father had listened while she and her mother had made plans for the upcoming holiday balls and dinner parties marking the start of Cassandra’s first season. They’d laughed and revelled in talk of dresses and dance lessons, blissfully unaware that three weeks later a hurricane would level Belle View’s crops and force the creditors to call in her parents’ debts, ruining them. A month later, the fever that often followed hurricanes had risen from the carcase-filled fields and riverbeds to claim her parents and the bright future they’d all imagined for Cassandra.
With a heavy heart, Cassandra walked to the window overlooking the back lawn. Green grass covered the slope of the land to the dock where two farmers loaded sacks of grain into the shallop tied there, the single-masted boat bobbing with the current. When she was a child, she used to watch the small boats coming and going from her bedroom window, waving to the farmers from the Shenandoah Valley who brought their crops down the James to sell at market or ship to England. Her father would greet the incoming vessels, collecting gossip and passing on information from the latest session of the House of Burgesses. He was gone, but this small hub of activity remained, although it was, like her old life here, only a shadow of what it had once been. Over the years, many people had offered to buy Belle View, but Uncle Walter had advised her not to sell, saying it would be a safe haven for her if she ever needed it. He’d never had the chance to see how right he’d been.
But is he right about Richard?
Cassandra left the dining room and walked down Belle View’s long central hallway, barely sparing a glance for the dusty sitting room, office and library flanking either side of it. The paint on the walls of the main hall had once been a vibrant red, but it had dulled to a rusty colour. Like everything at Belle View it needed seeing to, but she couldn’t spend money on paint when there were labourers to be paid. She passed the wide front door and the tall clock standing beside it, her mother’s wedding gift from her parents. It chimed the half hour, the bells as clear today as they’d been when Cassandra was a child. They were the one thing age and the hurricane hadn’t appeared to touch in the old home. She climbed the staircase to the second floor, her hand brushing over the rough banister in need of a polish before striding down the upstairs hallway to her bedroom.
Once inside, she locked the door. Her large, four-poster bed filled most of the room. A turned wooden chair sat between the opposite window and the fireplace covered with an embroidered screen. Even without an overabundance of fine furnishings, this room was simple and comfortable in a way that none of the rooms in any of Giles’s houses had ever been.
It wasn’t comfort she sought at present, but something more disturbing.
She knelt in front of the fireplace and worked loose a brick near the bottom. The hiding place had once held her childish treasures, but today it concealed a darker secret. She pulled out the pouch of money, disappointed by how much lighter it was. The coins wouldn’t last much longer and, to her shame, she almost wished Richard would send the pistol if it meant another bag and the slight easing of her financial concerns.
No amount of money is worth the misery he’d bring if he returned. The misery he’d already visited on her by pretending to be dead and convincing Uncle Walter to support his lie. She set the money aside and tugged out a letter tied with a ribbon and encompassing a number of folded, weathered and water-stained parchments.
A few days after Cassandra’s arrival, Mrs Sween had given Cassandra Uncle Walter’s travelling desk. Inside, beneath the mundane accounts and letters from friends had been the items Richard had sent him. They’d been sealed between the pages of a letter to her from Uncle Walter, one that had proved more unsettling than the illicit documents and the memories of Richard they’d conjured up.
She untied the ribbon and set aside the documents to read Uncle Walter’s last letter again.
Dear Cassandra,
By the time you read this I will be gone, but know that I loved you like a daughter and cherished you as if you were my own. However, for all the love I bore you I have also lied to you in the most grievous of ways.
I’m sorry I cannot tell you this in person, so that I may beg for your forgiveness, and I hope once you read what I have to say you will find it in your heart to forgive me and to understand why I did it.
‘I’m the one who should have asked for your forgiveness. I never should have left you,’ she whispered, and tears blurred the paper while she read his account of what had happened with Richard five years ago. The effort it had taken for him to unburden himself was evident in every scraggly curl and shaky line of each word. It broke her heart to imagine him, ill with fever, struggling to confess to her. If only he could have known she’d discover it for herself, it might have saved him the pain and effort. Yes, he’d lied to her about Richard, but in the weeks that had passed since she’d first read his letter, she’d come to forgive him. His one sin didn’t erase the years of love and his hard work on her behalf at Belle View.
She flicked the edge of the paper with a fingernail, wishing she’d never left him or Virginia. After everything Uncle Walter had done for her, she hadn’t been there for him in his final illness, and it tore at her. He’d deserved her love and thanks and care, and she hadn’t been able to offer it to him. It was another of the many things Giles, the Chathams and even Richard had stolen from her.
She continued to read, trying to hear Uncle Walter’s voice in each word, to remember his face and his smile, but all she could glean were a few snatches of expressions. Her inability to clearly recall the man who’d taken care of her after her parents’ death stung as much as the words of his letter. The tone of them reminded her of the one she’d written to him shortly after Dinah’s birth when she’d admitted her mistake in marrying Giles and had asked for his advice. He’d never judged her for the failure of her marriage, but had helped her as best he could. He might not be here, but he was asking for her help now, not for himself, but for Richard.
I’mentrusting Richard’s evidence to you. Please protect it and assist him as I have. Neither one of us has the right to ask this of you, not after the way we deceived you, but please understand it was all done with the best of intentions.
I spent my life in Virginia fighting for those who’d been wronged by others. I could not allow Richard, a man who was once my apprentice and your fiancé, to be falsely accused and do nothing.
I failed to help him see justice done, but perhaps you can find a way to succeed.
She folded the letter, then picked up the shipping passes and other papers. The contents made no more sense to her today than they had the many times she’d perused them in the past few weeks. Beside her, the cold fireplace beckoned her to strike the tinder and set the lot of it on fire and be done with Richard. There was no reason she shouldn’t.
Except Uncle Walter asked me to help him.
She tucked the papers inside the letter and returned them and the money to the space behind the mantel and replaced the loose brick. For Uncle Walter she would keep the papers safe until she could return them to Richard, but she would do no more. She’d damaged her already weak position in Williamsburg once by defending Richard. She wasn’t about to risk everything to do it again. Belle View and Dinah’s future were all that mattered now.
* * *
Richard pulled the collar of his light coat up higher around his face and hurried through the dark streets of Nassau. He’d put aside his mask, frock coat and breeches for the simple clothes of a first mate. In this pirate haven, everyone minded their own business and he could move unnoticed through the riff-raff without fear of discovery. As he approached the centre of town, evidence of the hurricane from ten years ago marked the buildings on either side of the road. Many rose into the sky, their stone structures devoid of roofs, their walls pocked with gaping holes. People moved in and out of the shadows and small alleys, their shuffling footsteps followed by the gravelly voices of whores trying to entice clients inside. Richard stepped over a filthy drunk sleeping against a wall, ignoring the sodden wretch and the faint inkling of disgust and shame the sight of him conjured up. All this filth was too familiar to him, like the currents of the James River that he and Vincent used to navigate as boys or the smell of the tobacco ripening in the fields of Sutherland Place.
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию (https://www.litres.ru/georgie-lee/captain-rose-s-redemption/) на ЛитРес.
Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.
Georgie Lee
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современная зарубежная литература
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
Отзывы: Пока нет Добавить отзыв
О книге: From gentleman to rogueWho had her former fiancé become?Captured by pirates off the Virginia coast, Lady Cassandra Shepherd is shocked to see in the blue eyes of Captain Rose the young man she loved and lost. What has caused him to exchange his honour for a chance at revenge? But now he needs her help. Dare Cas believe the captain can reclaim his life as an upstanding gentleman and with it, her hand in marriage?