The sharks stayed close the whole morning. The biggest one—a long black monster who surfaced long enough to cock a lidless bloodshot eye at Ella—made a point to bump the bottom of the dinghy every third pass or so.
Every time he did it, she screamed.
Could he smell blood? Was her little boat just the only thing happening in a very big, otherwise very boring ocean? Was this just the ûber bully of the sea? Ella imagined all the other creatures of the deep relieved not to have to dodge this asshole and his gang for a little bit while he was busy working on upending the human tapas on a plank.
When she still had the Constantine in sight she knew which direction to row—away from it. But now that it was no longer in view, and hadn’t been for hours, she found she’d gotten turned around. The waves were rough and many splashed inside the little boat so that she was drenched. The cloud cover meant she stayed that way.
Bam! The large shark hit the bottom of the dinghy right below where she sat and she shrieked. Looking down, she was certain she saw a crack had been created from that last hit. The inside of the boat was already so wet it wasn’t possible to determine whether or not it was now leaking.
“Dear God, help me!” she screamed to the heavens. “Have I really come all this way to lose my child, my husband and end up a shark chew toy?” Her words came back to her on the wind, tossed in her face, which made her realize that it had picked up. Far from needing the hat to shield herself from the sun, her arms were covered in goose bumps underneath the jacket.
She looked up at the clouds she had just appealed to and noticed the sky was darkening.
Oh, don’t even tell me.
Fury and panic coursed through her. When the big shark nudged the bow of her dinghy with his back, without thinking she brought the oar down hard on its fin. He reacted violently, twisting away from her and thrashing in the water. He wasn’t badly hurt that she could see. His explosion of physical frenzy looked more like a tantrum than a death roll.
When she glanced away from his gyrations she realized she was holding a broken oar in her hand.
Oh, my God, no. She set the oar down gingerly on the floor of the boat. How was she supposed to row with only one oar? She tossed the other oar down and gripped the sides of the boat as a rolling swell rocked the boat and tipped her far to one side before righting itself. When the wave receded in preparation for another attack on the boat, Ella looked worriedly into the water to see where the shark had gone.
She saw blood.
There was more gore than she could possibly have created whacking the beast with her puny oar and she felt her hopes rise. Had she wounded it? Were his pals now doing what came naturally? She strained to see movement in the water but there was nothing. Maybe the big shark was hurt and running away from them?
When the second wave hit, Ella wasn’t watching and the impact jolted her over the side of the boat. She hit the icy water with her mouth open and felt herself plunging down as if she were wearing weights. In a panic, she kicked off her leather shoes and began thrashing the water to return to the surface. She’d only had time to suck in a quick breath before she hit the water.
A large shadow swam slowly next to her.
She broke the surface with a gasp, her chest heaving with the effort to inhale air, her lungs burning. The dinghy was two strokes away but her arms felt like she was swimming in quick sand. She went under once and bobbed back up, her terror further slowing her efforts to swim even one stroke toward the boat.
Desperate and waiting any minute for the tug on her leg that would tell her the sharks had found her, she tried to dog paddle toward the boat and forced herself not to think of the sharks or the pelting rain as it assaulted her in sharp needles. Just the boat. Just get to the boat.
Her fingers reached the side and she began to try to pull herself up but she was too terrified, too cold and too heavy from her sodden clothes to manage it.
An image snapped into her head of what her legs—kicking frantically—must look like to the circling sharks below.
And she was still on her period.
Forcing the image out of her mind, she gave a scream of frustration and brought to mind a picture of Tater’s face the last time she saw him. The time when she promised she would return to him.
Just like her mother had promised her.
A burst of unholy anger launched from her throat as she clutched the rim of the dinghy and, feeling the splinters jam under her fingernails, she hauled herself up and over the side and into the bottom. For a moment, she lay there in the puddle of water that was quickly filling the boat, feeling the rain pummel her face. Her chest heaved with her exertion, her terror, her fury.
By God this is not going to be how it ends! She sat up and grabbed one of the oars, her wrist still aching and tender. If I have to beat to death every goddamn shark and backstroke all the way to Casablanca, I’ll bloody do it.
As she lifted the oar to plunge it into the water she saw the hull of a sloop appear from the mists on the horizon. She stared at it with her mouth open. It was a shadowy form that moved eerily forward, tacking as it progressed, its sails trimmed against the rain and the wind.
Ella stood up in the boat and instantly it wobbled and she lost her footing, forcing her to sit down on the single bench with a hard thud.
Could it see her? Was she too far away?
The water in the bottom of the dinghy was up past her ankles now. Even if she could figure out a way to start bailing, she’d never keep up with the onslaught of the rain as it filled the boat.
She was probably thirty minutes from sinking.
She watched the ship inch closer and then, just when she was sure they might hear or see her, it changed tack.
Away from her.
“No! I’m here! Help! SOS! Ahoy! I’m here!” she screamed until her last words were soundless croaks but she knew the wind was snatching them from her mouth and flinging them further out to sea.
Where no one would ever hear them.
Desperately, Ella looked around the boat. After four hours, she was sure she knew every inch of it and every bit of its contents but still she searched for something.
I would kill for a flare gun.
And then she saw it. Her white cabin boy shirt, although sodden and plastered to her body, might be visible in the gloom and the rain. She ripped it off and quickly tied it to the end of the unbroken oar. Bracing her legs against the sides of the boat for support, and with the rain beating into her face, she stood up and began to wave her flag. Bare breasted and shaking with the wet and the cold, she stood mutely, desperate prayers on her moving lips, her eyes willing the ship to see her, and slowly waved the oar from side to side with her trembling arms.
Just when she was sure it was about to disappear from view—as silently as it had appeared—she saw the sloop unfurl its sails and tack right into the storm as it turned back.
An hour later, she didn’t care forty French sailors had seen her naked from the waist up. She didn’t care she’d let them haul her onboard their ship, their hands grabbing whatever part of her that might help them do that. She didn’t even care where the ship was heading.
But it was heading to Casablanca.
Ella sat huddled under a blanket drinking a hot cup of coffee that was more brandy than coffee, and as she watched the storm abate and blue cloudless stretches begin to creep across the late afternoon sky she knew more intensely than she knew anything in her life that nothing and nobody would stop her now.
She curled up in the quartermaster’s hammock and slept dreamlessly, the sleep of exhaustion and relief, all the way back to port. After thanking the French captain—who had his own ideas of how she could repay him if she really wanted to—Ella hailed a carriage at the docks. Although she was finally dry, she knew her clothes would get her arrested before she could get a cab, so she borrowed dry clothes from the boatswain on the ship. When she still received a suspicious look from her cab driver, the ship’s quartermaster stepped in and paid the fare to
her hotel.
Ella couldn’t help but compare these helpful men with the ones who’d kidnapped her and set her adrift in the Atlantic Ocean. The French captain admitted it was a fairly busy shipping lane and that the captain of the Constantine had every reason to believe she would be picked up.
If I wasn’t turned into shark sushi first, Ella thought grimly.
When it pulled up in front of the Salim Hotel, Ella bolted from the carriage and hurried inside. The last thing she wanted to do was answer questions about her appearance from anyone.
Fortunately, the nosy desk clerk was busy when she entered. Although other guests gave her appalled glances as she ran up the stairs to the hotel rooms, Ella made it into the darkened hall without being intercepted. Her fingers quickly found the key on the hidden ledge and she let herself into her room.
A quick inspection showed that everything remained untouched. Ella sank onto the bed.
She’d done it.
She’d discovered where Rowan was and she hadn’t died in the process. Now all she had to do was go after him. Before she let the exhaustion of that thought—and the exertion of her last two days—totally overwhelm her, she stood up and stripped off her borrowed clothes. A hot bath, a hot dinner and a long sleep in a soft bed with clean linens. She nearly groaned at the prospect when there was a knock at the door.
She stiffened and looked at her bedside table where she kept a serviceable hand knife.
“Who is it?” she called through the door.
“It’s Lord Bingham, Miss Pierce,” the voice came back smooth and friendly.
What the hell?
“I’m not decent, Lord Bingham,” Ella said, not bothering to keep the annoyance out of her voice.
“I am indeed getting that impression.”
Her temper getting the best of her, Ella slipped on her silk robe, cinched the belt and strode to the door, jerking it open.
“What do you want?”
She could see she’d shocked him. His eyes went to her body beneath the thin silk. She knew the fabric showed the fullness of her hips and breasts and left little to his imagination.
“I…I…” He tore his eyes from the outline of her body to her face. “I saw you come in.”
“Congratulations,” she said. “Although I’m not sure I owe you an explanation.”
He cleared his throat and she found herself a little charmed by his awkwardness. He was actually embarrassed. “Of course you don’t, but I couldn’t help but think I might be of service to you.”
“Of service how?”
“May I…may we discuss it over dinner tonight? In the hotel dining room?”
He was clearly not comfortable talking with her in her robe—which suited her fine.
“No, I’m going to have an early night tonight. But you’re welcome to come in.”
She was right. His eyes grew wide in alarm and it was all she could do not to laugh out loud.
“I say, I’m sure I would not be able to…I say. I really don’t…”
“Look, Lawrence, is it?”
He nodded, swallowing and again clearly having trouble dragging his gaze from her body.
“Well, Lawrence, I’ve just had a catastrophic last twenty-four hours and I really need a bath and a good night’s sleep. So if you don’t mind—”
“I noticed you left the hotel two days ago. In the night.”
She hesitated. “You followed me?”
“Hardly. A proper gentleman venturing to any of the facilities I saw you approach would be murdered outright. I must say, I feared for your life, Miss Pierce! Especially when you didn’t reappear at the hotel that night. Or the next.”
“I ran into a few snags.”
“Please, Miss Pierce, I beg you to allow me to help you in whatever way I can. I entreat you to trust me with your mission.”
“My mission.” Ella rubbed her eyes. She was so tired. “Why in the world would you want to help me?”
“Why? That must be obvious to a blind man. I must say, I’ve become quite captivated by you. But even if that was not the case, helping a woman in need—especially one with no obvious family or support—is the only gentlemanly thing to do.”
“I see.”
“And women, if you don’t mind my saying so, often create larger problems than originally existed. I cannot imagine, for example, what prompted you to dress the way you did and go where you went.” He gestured to Ella’s cropped hair as if it were a wild monkey sitting on her shoulder.
“My husband was captured by pirates, Lord Bingham,” Ella said, the trials of her day beginning to seriously wear her down. “My recent excursion has helped me determine which pirates and now I am going to go after them.”
Bingham looked at her in shock and then blurted, “I say!”
“Quite.”
“Pirates?”
“It appears so.”
“Where have they taken him?”
“I’m told he is on a ship heading to the Florida Strait.” She watched his eyes light up as she spoke. “You know someone there?”
“What amazing fortune! As it happens,” he said, an excited grin coming over his face for the first time since he’d appeared at her door, “I, myself, am going to Thompson Island. I have been engaged to tutor a Miss Adele Morton, the daughter of the Federal Judicial Authority, William Morton. I am in Casablanca awaiting the arrival of the Miranda—the next westbound passenger ship—which leaves for Florida in two weeks time. Frankly, it was the prospect of my imminent departure that prompted me to—”
Ella clasped her hands to her chest, redirecting his attention back there. “Two weeks?” She felt the long day and the disappointments settle on her shoulder like a rusting anchor. It didn’t matter. Even if the ship were leaving tomorrow morning, it didn’t matter. She wouldn’t be on it.
She turned her attention back to him. “Why would a duke or earl be homeschooling a judge’s daughter in America?”
Bingham looked at her with surprise and his gaze shifted away as if trying to come up with a good explanation.
“You’re not really a duke,” she said.
“The Americans prefer it if you have a title.”
“Well, naturally we do. So, Lawrence, it looks as if our point of intersection has come to an end.”
Bingham frowned and she could see he was going to try to argue with her.
“But since you know my secret and I know yours,” she continued, “what do you say we help each other out?”
“I am at your service, Miss…er…Mrs?”
“Okay, first, it’s Ella. Second, I have an important errand that I would be happy to pay you to run for me if you would be so kind. Will you do that?”
“I must refuse payment of any kind.”
“Nonetheless,” Ella said as she noticed for the first time the frayed cuffs on his dinner jacket. “I insist. You would be helping me immensely, and if you could use the money, then that’s a way I can help you, too. What do you say?”
“If I can help you in any way…”
“Great.” She turned and went to her armoire, where she pulled out a wallet of Moroccan notes. “I need you to return these clothes to a French merchant ship called the St-Buvard, along with this money. Please keep fifty for yourself. You don’t have to do it tonight but first thing in the morning would be great.”
She could tell he was torn between the pleasure of her obvious trust in him and the pain of the fact that she was also dismissing him. He took the bundle of clothes and put them under his arm and stuffed the money in his jacket pocket.
“I’ll take care of it,” he said. “And may I say—”
“Yes, I know, me, too,” Ella said as she began to shut the door. “And now if you’ll allow me to retire to my much longed for bath, I promise I will see you downstairs in the dining room for breakfast tomorrow.”
“Jolly good…Ella. Goodnight.”
“Goodnight, Lawrence. I’m glad we talked.” Before he could respond, she closed the door
and locked it.
11
Regardless of what she had told Lawrence Bingham, Ella knew she couldn’t stay even an hour longer in 1825. And since there was a possibility she would transport back to 1925 in the same toilet stall at the Majestic Hotel—only this time when it wasn’t vacant—she needed to go in the middle of the night. Every molecule of her being wanted to take one day—one night—to rest before going back. But every other fiber of her longed to see her child again. And since she knew even the chance to see Rowan now was five long months away no matter what she did, she wanted to go home. Now.
After folding up the cost of last night’s room in an envelope and placing it on her bed, she left her room—the door unlocked—and walked out the front door, heading for the same back alley where she’d arrived. It was late, a little after midnight, and the night creepers and gonifs were sliding into the shadows as she stood at the alley opening. She would have to be fast in order to make the trip and not lose her valise in the process. This time she held her small short-handled knife in her free hand.
She didn’t expect it to take long. She was exhausted and the heartbreaking disappointment of her failure was enough to fuel her emotions for the trip back to 1925. She brought an image of Tater to mind: his laughing face, his twinkling eyes. She walked to the very spot she’d sat in four days earlier and stood with her back to the wall. She held her suitcase with both arms and grabbed the necklace. When she did, memories of Tater mixed with thoughts of her mother. For a moment, it was almost as if they had been in the same timeline, as if her mother had known her grandchild. The feeling of longing and loss and desire was so great Ella felt her knees begin to shake. The locket in her hand began to burn and it had never done that before.
Ella closed her eyes and refused to let go. Let it burn me. Let it mark me for life. That I never knew her and she never knew my baby will be my life’s biggest regret. As she thought the words, a blinding pain like she had never experienced before came roaring through her head forcing her to drop the suitcase at her feet and cry out. She released the locket to clutch her head. The pain was splitting her skull in radiating arcs that grew smaller and smaller until she was trying to claw her very eyes from their sockets.
Race to World's End (Rowan and Ella Book 3) Page 11