by Raven, Sandy
"All I'm saying is that you don't have to do everything. Delegate. Hire more men."
"I shall take your comments under advisement, and consult with Mr. Watkins." Lifting her sharpened pencil, she asked, "Are you ready to finish our work here, Captain?"
As they worked on completing the last appointments list, he realized he'd made a mistake. He was wrong about her, and about walking away with no attachments. Something in his soul knew a short sordid tumble or two with this woman was wrong. He knew it when their gazes would meet and he could see a spark of permanence. Almost as though her eyes were a window into the future. The longer he remained in this woman's presence, working together as closely as they were—side-by-side, the light floral scent of her enveloping him—the more her spell wrapped around his brain and heart until the only thing he could think of was her. Cherishing her. Protecting her. Loving her.
Her. This woman, Mary-Michael. Not Spenser Watkins' wife, but Mary, the woman who intrigued him and attracted him like the proverbial moth to the flame. At that moment, he realized an affair would cheapen the woman she'd become, and that one day she would be his. But he'd have to wait.
Lucky watched her as the morning wore on, her head bent over her desk while she worked. Her knotted hair loosened, a strand falling across her face and his heart lurched. It was yet another outward sign of her vulnerability. A slight breeze carried the humid salty tang of ocean into the room and that, mixed with the smell of tar and salted timbers reminded him that she was, by her own choosing, working in a man's world. She was not safe from harm here, not as she would be if she kept to the traditional woman's role of caring for hearth and home. She worked in this enormous building with who knew how many men, and she had no fear at all of them. Which was far preferable to her cringing in fear at every moment. He didn't want that for her either.
At home, women of his station never left the house without a footman for protection, even to spend the afternoon shopping. This must be an example of what Ian meant when he said that Americans were a fiercely independent lot. It was an admirable trait in the men from this country he'd met thus far, though he couldn't say the same for the women, as Mrs. Watkins was the only one he'd met thus far. And the more he learned about her, the more he realized she needed someone to take some of the workload off her shoulders.
"Captain Gualtiero?" Mrs. Watkins' voice broke through his musings.
"Yes?" he replied, embarrassed at being caught daydreaming.
"I asked if there was anything that you might have forgotten. Are we ready to sign off on this final order?"
He took the pages she offered for his perusal and gave them a quick once over. "Yes, I believe we are."
She was beautiful, in a pure, fresh, unadulterated sense. There was no pretense in her, the kind instilled by conforming to societal rules. Having worked closely with her these past three days to start this construction process, he believed she could easily handle every aspect of running this business. And the incident that morning with the thieves reminded them both that she was still a lady. A lady who would one day soon become a widow and would have to do what all widows do, redefine her life and find a new passion to devote herself to.
Lucky wanted to be that passion.
"Good." Mrs. Watkins smiled at him as she tapped the pages against the table to them into order. "I shall send Victor to get Mr. Watkins and our attorney."
Lucky nodded. "While we wait, care to walk into the village for luncheon?" He didn't think she would, but she agreed. "Good. I found a place the other night that has sliced meats over a thick chunk of bread with cheese and vegetables on top. It was rather delicious and quite filling. The woman who served me said they were also open for luncheon."
She smiled at him. "I see you found my friend Becky's place. Let's go now. I'm famished, and she's soon to get very busy."
After lunch, they returned to the office and found Mr. Watkins and another man, Mr. Frank Baxter, their firm's legal counsel, already waiting inside the office. Lucky greeted both men, and smiled when he realized that this part of the process was finally at an end.
"Mrs. Watkins," said the woman's husband, "I hope you two had a delicious lunch. Was Becky busy today?"
"Yes sir," Mrs. Watkins replied, "as she usually is." She turned to the attorney and greeted him, then stepped around the desk to place a kiss atop her husband's gray-haired head. Lucky felt no jealousy at all. In fact, suspecting what he did—even though he'd had no confirmation—it rather made sense. She treated him as a father more than she did a husband.
Mrs. Watkins unrolled the drawing that rested on the edge of her desk and showed the completed plan to her husband. The man's face beamed with pride and his rheumy eyes shone with unshed tears. "Mr. Watkins," his wife said, "may I present the Lady S and the Lady M. Identical sister clippers of the Empire Tea Importers."
"My dear, she is beautiful. Perfect, even, in her symmetry and balance," Watkins said. "She doesn't appear under-sparred at all, as the sail plan and deck arrangements hide any disproportion you feared."
"Thank you, sir." She beamed as she glanced up at Lucky.
The attorney, Baxter, looked at the drawing as well and declared it a very fine vessel, indeed.
Watkins asked Baxter to produce the contracts and within thirty minutes, Lucky and, by his proxy, Ian were the proud future owners of two Baltimore clippers made of the finest of materials by the most experienced craftsmen the eastern seaboard could produce. Discussion touched on the topic of delivery dates and Lucky was surprised to learn that both ships would be completed in less than one year's time.
"This yard is capable of so much more than you see currently underway," Watkins said. "A decade ago, we had six to eight new builds ongoing at any time, as well as the dry dock operation for repairs. At our peak, we employed over six hundred craftsmen, not to mention the numerous subcontractors like the sail makers." He looked at his young wife, then back at Lucky. "When I realized that, despite my fondest hopes and wishes, I was getting no younger—" Baxter and Mrs. Watkins chuckled at Watkins' quip, —"I had to plan for a future without me in it. So I began to scale back the new construction, leaving the dry dock yard in full production." The old man smiled at his wife. "I am now certain that I will be leaving the shipyard in good hands. As Mrs. Watkins grows more confident in her ability to manage, she can always expand again."
Watkins sounded like a man who wanted to make the transition of the shipyard from his management to his wife's as smooth as possible for her. It amazed Lucky that the man didn't think the enormity of the business to be too much for his wife.
Baxter rose and said his goodbyes, saying he had an appointment later that afternoon.
"Captain," Mrs. Watkins said when the man was gone, "dinner shall be at six, and I am requesting there be no talk of business at all."
She helped her husband up and handed him his cane, then turned to Lucky and smiled a full, two-dimpled smile. And he thought it the most beautiful sight ever. "Tonight is about our family honoring the company of a new friend."
"I am honored," was all he said as he followed the two out of the building. Curious about Mrs. Watkins' future plans, he looked forward to what the evening ahead would reveal to him.
Chapter Five
After Mary-Michael arrived at the house with Mr. Watkins, her husband asked her to join him in his study. When she crossed the threshold, he closed the door behind her. She didn't have to wonder what he would ask. He wanted to know if she'd made a decision, and she wouldn't lie to him. In fact, she wanted him to know because—if she was fortunate enough to conceive—she would need his help.
Mr. Watkins gave her a somber grin as he passed her on the way to his favorite corner chair in front of the open window. "Well, Mrs. Watkins, the captain appears to be smitten with you."
She went to the side table and poured them each a glass of water, gulping half of her glass before filling it again. She needed it to cool her heated body from within. Forcing her hands not to tremble
as she handed her husband his glass, she couldn't meet his gaze for surely he'd catch her blushing. He would notice and think she was afraid when she wasn't. Oh no, she felt exactly the opposite. In fact, her entire being thrummed with quiet excitement, and maybe a bit of anxiety. But she wasn't fearful of the captain, nor the situation. She just didn't know how to proceed with the planning of a seduction. "No, sir. He is not smitten. In fact, he called me a frustrating female."
She took the seat opposite him and sipped more from her glass. While the breeze coming off the bay was refreshing, she didn't feel it. She reached for a fan and began to wave it in front of herself as she continued to contemplate the gravity of what Mr. Watkins was saying. "It's obvious the man is attracted to you, lass," her husband said softly. "It wouldn't take much to convince him to have a brief affair."
How well she knew this! "Well, it would be brief, as he sails home on Monday," she replied.
"I shall bring Victor and Sally with me to the farm," he said quietly, staring out onto the street. "Sally has told me she would like to see her grandchildren. If I bring them with me, it will leave you alone here until they return," she tried to cut him off, but he lifted his hand silencing her. "I can send them back on the Tuesday train. Or you can come up to the farm on the Wednesday train." He gave her a reassuring smile. "I plan on staying in the mountains until this heat breaks."
She shot out of her chair and began to worry a tiny circle in the room. "I'm afraid if the neighbors suspect I'm here alone they will talk. You know they will! I don't want them thinking I'm cuckolding you. And Constable Potts—
"Quit putting up barriers to this gift that has just dropped into your hands," her husband insisted. "I know how much you've wanted this. I've heard you weep at night. This is the best, most perfect option you have. I'm trying to help you so you are not alone later." He reached for the newspaper that rested neatly on the table between them. "And Potts will not be an issue. He is being called to Baltimore as of tonight."
"Thank God," Mary-Michael whispered before she offered up a quick prayer of thanks that Mr. Watkins and General Smith were old friends.
"In fact, according to Frank Baxter, we can press charges of harassment on him if you'd like."
She nodded. "Thank you, sir. I would like to think on that."
"You don't need anyone interfering with your plans for the weekend. Not the servants, and especially not Potts and his deputies." He got a little twinkle in his eye as he thought of another far-distant time, likely with his Abigail. "Believe me when I say, it would be far easier for you if no one was around." He leaned back into his high back wing chair, and for the first time, Mary-Michael realized how much more fragile her friend and mentor appeared. He'd physically changed so much in the past year. "But, however you decide, my dear. This could well be the answer to your prayers."
The fan in her hand stilled as deafening silence roared in her ears, his words reverberating in her heart. The air in the small office grew warmer by the second, and she found it difficult to breathe. Standing, she moved to another window and fanned herself furiously. "Why are you doing this for me? Really?" Her voice cracked as she asked it. "This is more than just giving me an opportunity to be a mother."
"I see that you are attracted to him as well," he stated. "It's obvious. And please sit down before I call Sally to come with smelling salts."
Oh, God, if he could see it how many others could? Could Andrew, Robert or William? She spent most of her time in the close confines of the upstairs offices at the shipyard with the three of them. And during the past few days, she and the captain had been working long hours in the privacy of her husband's office, with two of those men just outside the door. A sudden panic welled up inside. She'd tried so hard to keep her emotions for the captain contained within her own heart. Unsuccessfully, apparently, for Mr. Watkins' expression took on a little alarm.
Mary-Michael lowered herself onto the damask covered settee, and stared into her husband's wrinkled and weathered face. She couldn't tell him that she thought about their new client even when they weren't working together. Most especially, she could not tell him that she thought of this other man at night, when she lay alone in her bed. To do so would hurt him, the one honest and good man in her life. The one who had given her so much. On her honor, she would never intentionally hurt him. Except he wanted her to have this. He wanted her to have an opportunity at the very least to conceive a child.
So she would never have to suffer the pain of having her child taken from her arms and given to another. He was doing this for her .
"That man is attracted to you and if I am not mistaken, you are attracted to him as well," Mr. Watkins said again.
Shame rushed through her yet again. That familiar knot grew in her throat, the one that gave way when her flood of tears would begin. But tonight she would not cry. "Mr. Watkins, you are mistaken, sir. He feels no such emotion for me. If he feels anything at all toward me it's frustration because I keep having to prompt him to stay on task."
"You just proved my point, dear."
She stared at her husband, this generous man who had done what no one could understand in order to help two children to whom he owed nothing. He gave her brother the education he needed to pursue his calling of the priesthood. And he gave her the opportunity to learn everything she could from him about building ships and running a shipyard, giving her an unconventional education for a woman in an unconventional profession.
As outlandish as it sounded, her husband was pushing her into the arms of another, so she could have what every woman wants in her deepest, most basic part of her soul. A child.
A single tear escaped her eye, and she swiped it away.
"He looks at you the way I used to look at my Abigail all those many years ago." Her husband sighed. "I married you to protect you from the gossips, while you gained the education and training you could never get as an unmarried woman. What I didn't consider at the time was the idea that you might one day want a real marriage with children of your own."
"I have a real marriage," she countered. "To you."
"Oh, dear child, you have no idea what a real marriage is." His voice became filled with painful remorse. "When we married, I knew that we would never share a bed, for I was already beyond having that ability. But you made me laugh again and impressed me with your superior intelligence. You reminded me of Abigail in that. Like her, you challenged me to think differently when it came to a girl's ability to learn the subjects previously taught only to young men. Your mind is such a sponge, my dear girl." He sipped from his glass and took a moment to gather more of his thoughts, so Mary-Michael just waited for him to say what he felt he needed to say. "With you, I saw an opportunity to avenge my Abigail to those who denied her an education in the sciences. She wanted more than to just teach. She wanted to study the sciences, and felt all women could be much more than wives." Mary-Michael could tell he struggled to control his emotions. "But, in the end, she died doing what most women do without issue—bearing a child."
Mary-Michael gave up holding back her own tears when she saw Mr. Watkins wipe his across his face. She wanted to run upstairs and cry in the privacy of her room, but right at that moment she felt it more important to listen to Mr. Watkins than to wallow in self-pity.
"Marrying you opened doors that would not have been opened to you had I adopted you and George. With no wife, adopting you would have those with sordid minds looking at you askance. Society would never have allowed you to dress as you do and work as you do, while being a daughter of a wealthy businessman. You would be encouraged to partake of the distractions of society, and... if those highfalutin' society hens had judged you and found you lacking it could have ruined your chances to find a good man for a husband.
"No, I do believe I did the right thing in marrying you. Even knowing that I didn't have much longer left. Doing so gave you the chance to learn all you wanted and needed to know to run the shipyard. And soon, you will be a wealthy widow, with the abili
ty to do whatever your heart desires and not be scorned for doing so."
"I will never give you a reason to second guess your decision, Mr. Watkins, for I have cherished our time together. And remember, I agreed to your marriage proposal knowing full well that I could either learn a great deal, or nothing at all if you had died before teaching me." Mary-Michael collected herself and sipped from her glass. She pasted on a smile. "However would I have discovered—and disputed—the works of Colonel Beaufoy and his collaborators if not for you."
"Do you understand that what we have is not even a valid marriage in the eyes of the church—or the law—because it was never consummated?" Her surprise obviously showed, because he continued. "That's right, it's invalid. Only two people know it—Gideon and Frank. One is my priest, the other is my attorney. And neither one can tell a soul, for similar reasons."
Mary-Michael felt guilty that she had confided in her girlfriends, but didn't have the heart to tell him. So she said, "No sir, I'd say more than two know. I believe neither Sally nor Victor is slow-witted. They know what happens in this house."
Her husband chuckled. "You're likely right. Either way, having seen how our young client looks at you, I think this is an opportunity you should not pass up."
She shook her head. "But I can't—"
"Yes, you can! Think on this, Mrs. Watkins," her husband began, "While I live, any child you give birth to will be my heir. He will have my name and for as long as I live, I will love and protect him as my own."
Mary-Michael laughed through her tears. It was a maniacal sound almost, and she almost frightened Mr. Watkins. Until she said, "No... you don't understand... I don't know what to do."
Now the old man laughed, as he pulled the kerchief from his pocket and wiped his face. "Oh, my naive little wife. Let the captain lead. He impresses me as one who knows his way around a woman's boudoir."