The Duke

by Katharine Ashe

  “It would displease me if he were harmed.” The words shook a bit. “And . . . if you harmed anyone, I think it would displease me,” she said brazenly. “Rather, I know it would.”

  “I’ve harmed plenty o’ men, lass.”

  “Of course you must have. You have fought in battles.”

  “No’ only in battle. In cold blood. In hot blood. With drink in my head at times, an’ at others clear as rainwater. You were right to think me a beast. I am—a monster o’ a man, damned a dozen times over by what I’ve done willingly, gladly. An’ I’ve no apologies for it.”

  She swallowed across the thick scald in her throat. “I see,” she whispered.

  “I would give it all up to have you.”

  She closed her eyes. This was what she had been waiting for in her heart.

  “Why—” Seizing the courage that had propelled her over vast hills and through dark woods and across an ocean, she opened her eyes. “Why have you not touched me since that night?”

  “If I touched you even once,” he said quietly now, like the rumble of an oncoming storm, “I wouldna be able to cease.”

  She could hardly breathe. “You do want me.”

  “More than I have ever wanted anything.”

  The laughter of pure joy burst through her lips. “I am not a thing.”

  “Aye. You’re a woman. An’ I thank the Almighty that he made you so.” He smiled with such unguarded pleasure she nearly threw her arms about his neck and gave herself to him there, between the wagons, with dawn upon the harbor and the cries of gulls in the sky.

  “You thank God?” Her lips would not be still; they smiled, and she laughed again. “I thought you were a heathen.”

  “Basking in the light o’ an angel.” In the burgeoning day, she could see his face entirely now, the boy who had had death and responsibility thrust upon him, who had embraced it, and who could still gaze so tenderly at her.

  “A fallen angel,” she whispered.

  The roguish smile returned. “My favorite sort.” The brogue was a seductive caress. It sent heat skittering into every crevice of her body. She balanced on the balls of her feet to be closer to him—his face—his lips.

  “What shall we do next?” she said.

  “You’ve told me I’m no’ to throttle him. So you’ll be needing to take matters into your own hands.”

  She was certain she should not feel this elation. She wanted him to kiss her more than she wanted to breathe. She wanted him to throw caution to the wind and seize her in his arms and make her his.

  “I’ll no’ kiss you, lass,” he said. “No’ until you are no other man’s.”

  “How did you know that I—”

  The gleam in his eyes sealed her lips. By all reports he had kissed many women. Certainly he would recognize when a woman was longing to be kissed.

  He backed away.

  “Do what you must,” he said, lengthening the distance between them with easy, confident strides now. “Then come find me.” His smile was wide. “I’ll wait.”

  She watched him disappear around the corner of the wagon at the very moment the sun crested the Theia’s mainmast, and in a glorious shower of gold and pink the day broke.

  Chapter 7

  The Promise

  Amarantha could not sleep. After breakfast, with nerves in her throat but certainty in her steps, she walked to the mission. She would make a clean confession and beg Paul’s forgiveness. He would give it. He was fair-minded and compassionate. And if he could not give her his forgiveness, she already knew that she did not deserve it.

  Arriving at the church, she was told that he had ridden to an inland village for the day.

  Anticipation deflated, she returned to the hospital. With her nerves stretched as tightly as her lips, which would not cease smiling, she lavished her bubbling love onto the patients and waited for the captain to appear.

  He did not. But her disappointment soon turned to appreciation. It was best for them to remain apart until she had spoken to Paul. That the naval officer showed this restraint proved his character. The thought gave her such pleasure that when the eternal day finally ended, her excitement overcame her frustration at Paul’s untimely journey. Again she barely slept.

  At dawn, a maid woke her and whispered that Captain Hume awaited her in the parlor. Swiftly she pulled a gown over her head and flew down the stairs.

  The stiff propriety of the furniture and the very walls of the room made seeing him alone now jarring. He did not suit the modest setting. He was a great, powerful man who needed the sky above and the sea nearby. Despite his neat naval uniform, indoors he seemed almost feral.

  “Where is Mrs. Jennings?” he said.

  “Still asleep,” she said, suddenly ridiculously shy. “She requires at least thirty minutes to dress.” Her tongue felt awkward. “I did not wish to keep you waiting.”

  “You wanted no one to see me here?”

  “No. I—That is to say, why are you here? At this hour? Is it not because you are cautious of being seen calling upon me?”

  “I’ve received Theia’s orders. She is to put to sea today.”

  “Today?” She started forward involuntarily. But she caught herself up and her heart was beating too hard. “Is this not sudden? Where are you bound?”

  His eyes were troubled. “’Tis confidential, lass.”

  “But—”

  A pot rattled in the kitchen nearby. The open parlor door gave them no privacy.

  “Follow me,” she whispered.

  Behind the hotel, the ground floor of a shop remained empty and boarded up. Closing the shop door almost entirely, he came to her in the single strand of light that remained. His gaze swept over her face.

  “Have you broken it off with him?”

  “I haven’t yet found opportunity. Yesterday morning he traveled to the interior. When he returns today I will tell him. But I . . . I cannot bear to imagine . . .”

  “What is it?” he said.

  “I cannot bear to imagine the days without you here.”

  A gentle smile pulled at the corner of his mouth.

  “I will think o’ you every one o’ those days, lass. An’ I will write.”

  “You mustn’t!”

  His brow dipped. “No?”

  “This society is too small. Someone would certainly discover it. If a letter arrived for me from—”

  “A man o’ my reputation.” His voice sounded hard.

  “From a man who is not my fiancé. I would be shamed. And—and he would be shamed.”

  “He.”

  “He is a good man. He is not perfect, but neither am I. I cannot hurt him, not like that, not publicly. You understand, don’t you?”

  He only studied her eyes, then her cheeks, then her hair.

  “Tell me you’re no’ teasing,” he said.

  “Teasing?”

  He bent his head, casting his eyes into shadow, and his chest rose on a hard breath. “Playing games with a man’s heart.”

  “With his—?”

  “Mine.” It was a growl.

  “No!” she said on a gasp. “No.”

  But she had done so with Paul. Not intentionally. Yet now it all seemed so clear.

  “I could not—” She stumbled over the words. “I could not play a game. Not now.” She looked directly into his eyes. “Not with you.”

  “Lass—”

  “I want you to write to me. But you must not.”

  There was barely an inch between them but she was not afraid. The shape of his lips entranced her and made her fingers long to stroke them. In so many weeks she had memorized the hollows of his cheeks, the contours of his neck, the sinews in his hands, and the desire in his gaze on her. She could smell the sun on him, and she longed to touch it, to feel it on him. She was wicked, wanton, and aching.

  “Promise me that you will return soon,” she said.

  “My ship goes where the admirals send it.”

  “Then quit the navy.”
/>   He smiled, and a sob filled her throat. Desperation swelled within her.

  “Return soon,” she whispered. “Give me your word.”

  “Aye. You have my word. But I’ll have something from you now as well.”

  Her stomach roiled. What a fool she was. But she had, after all, expected this. Paul preached that the devil conquered hearts by donning attractive guises and leading men into carnal sin. Since women were even more easily duped, a woman of virtue must be ever-vigilant to guard against temptation.

  Obviously, she had failed at that task entirely.

  “What do you want?” she said, but she already knew. She wanted it too. She wanted his arms about her, his lips taking hers, the thrill of him all over her. She wanted him encompassing her and it made her weak inside.

  “To touch your cheek.”

  Her eyes popped wide. “That is all you want?”

  “No,” he said quite seriously. “’Tis all I’m asking.”

  She stifled a moan. Heaven could not be so cruel to have created him, to allow her only moments of him, and then to steal him away.

  “Yes,” she whispered.

  For a moment neither of them moved. Then she felt the heat of his hand, and the brush of his fingertips came like a whisper across her skin. Tingles skittered down her neck.

  Holding her breath, she looked up into his face of angles and shadows that was more beautiful to her than anything else she had ever seen. His eyes were dark, his gaze upon her fevered. Wanting her.

  His palm cupped her cheek and her breaths stopped. His hand was so large, so strong, yet he held her gently. His fingertips at her hair sent pleasure in more tingles down her throat and into her belly. The soft slide of his thumb along her jaw was the sweetest caress—too sweet. She could not remain still. Her lips parted.

  He touched her there, on her lip, stroking, barely a caress. It tore the air from her lungs. She struggled for more air, with a gasp then with a long sigh. He caressed again and she was liquid, fire. Her heavy eyelids closed and she felt him everywhere, across her lips and in the deep core of her where she ached so fiercely now. She wanted him to touch her and touch her and never cease.

  “Wait for me,” she heard him whisper. “Dinna marry him.” The raw heat of his words came against her brow. “Wait for me.”

  Her throat had closed entirely. She nodded.

  Abruptly, he released her. His footsteps were hard and swift crossing the shop’s floor. She opened her eyes and was alone.

  She walked to the rear door, her chest a tight morass of loss. Leaving the shop, she went to the path behind the hotel that wended toward a cane field, then into the field. As she passed along the rows of decimated stalks, dry sobs collected in her throat.

  He would not return. Not for her. She understood this as well as she had ever understood anything. Nine weeks ago she had known little of men of the world. She did now. She had heard all the gossip, the whispers.

  Libertine.

  Carouser.

  Not the marrying sort.

  Slowing to a halt amidst stalks broken by the hurricane, she let her tears fall silently. She did not believe that a gift of two such perfectly sympathetic hearts could be false. She felt it. And he, who might have demanded anything of her at the last moment, who might have asked her to give everything, had asked only to touch her cheek.

  When he touched her, she had felt his trembling.

  That afternoon in the port, the departure of the Theia was like a festival, with musicians on the docks and a great send-off of cannon blasts from the fort. A ship once believed to be dead had returned to life, just as the island would again. Everyone in town came out to celebrate. The sun shone, Theia’s banners snapped on her masts, and as her sails filled, the spectators cheered and applauded.

  Amarantha could not enjoy it. She bought split coconuts from the vendors and carried them to the hospital where she gave the sweet milk to the children and the bright flesh to the men to cut up with their knives. Mrs. Jennings told her that Reverend Garland had called in her absence, but Amarantha found herself too occupied with tasks to walk to the mission. She wrote a letter to Emily, confessing that she had made a mistake and that she would book passage on the next ship home. But she tore it up.

  On the third day after the Theia’s departure, Paul again called at the hospital. He seemed more tired than ever. But their wedding was imminent, he announced. In his restored house of God they would soon become man and wife.

  “I will be especially glad,” he said, “when you are no longer spending your days in this place.”

  “But I enjoy my work here.”

  “Despite the secret you have been concealing from me? Yes, Mrs. Jennings finally informed me.”

  Nausea slithered through her. “The secret?”

  “I am not happy that you have practiced this deception with me. But I forgive you for doing so. The young often make mistakes.”

  “I—”

  “Your father always indulged you so thoroughly, you believe every man to be as indolently honorable as he.” He squeezed her hand. “You cannot possibly understand the rapaciousness of most men.”

  In shock, she managed to find her tongue.

  “You are generous to forgive my—my mistake.” It hurt to say it. “But it needn’t affect my work here now.”

  “Of course it must. My wife cannot spend her days under the same roof with a man living in sin with a woman, their claims to marriage notwithstanding.”

  “But—Their claims to marriage? I don’t—”

  “God sanctions marriage between likes. It hardly matters that these colonials turn a blind eye to liaisons of this sort. Mr. Meriwether’s unsuitable marriage cannot be condoned. After our wedding you may not return here.”

  He did not know.

  But her relief lasted only moments before she took his meaning. When he left, she went directly to Eliza.

  “It was love at first sight,” Eliza said. “Mr. Meriwether and I married while he was still going to sea. It was years before he returned here permanently, after the birth of our second child. It can be a challenge to love a sailor,” she said with a chuckle.

  Love, children, fidelity of decades, and a humble life devoted to caring for those less fortunate than themselves: yet Paul believed the surgeon and his wife lacked virtue.

  Paul Garland was not the man she had thought him to be. Twelve months earlier, in that white church surrounded by sparkling snow, she had heard him preaching all about love and she had invented a fantasy. That she had so blindly believed in that fantasy now appalled her.

  Gabriel Hume had been no more than a fantasy too.

  She understood herself now. It was simple: she had needed relief from the suffering around her. So she had created the profound attachment between them, imagining the violent, hedonistic sailor some sort of hero, a Prince Charming who would sweep her off her feet and make every moment of her life an adventure of passion and laughter.

  He had left her.

  In her heart she knew that if he wanted her—if he loved her—he would have found a way to remain, or he would have taken her with him. And the most damning evidence: he had never asked for her hand. Instead he had tempted her in secret, pretending friendship, even charity, because she was too foolish to insist that he mustn’t.

  With new resolve to never again make such horrible mistakes, she returned to the hospital the next morning.

  Mr. and Mrs. Meriwether greeted her with momentous news: because of the sailors’ excellent carpentry, the sick-house had been given permission to become permanent. They wanted her to assist in the venture.

  It was the answer to her prayers. She needn’t run home to Willows Hall. Instead, she would make an entirely new start here where she was finally finding her place. She would forget him—someday. But even then, Paul Garland would not be her future.

  As though she conjured him, her fiancé appeared.

  “The repairs to the church are complete,” he exclaimed, graspin
g her hand. “The house is eager to receive its mistress. Amarantha darling, we will marry on Friday.”

  She tried to pull her fingers free. “I—”

  “Forgive me. But I must call you darling, for you are that to me.”

  “I have work now. Will you return here at dusk and walk with me to the hotel?” However difficult, the deed must be done. A new life awaited her.

  “Of course!” He chuckled and released her hand. “Go about your bandaging duties, my lady. I shan’t require your undivided attention until Friday, and every day thereafter,” he added with a soft smile.

  She returned to her usual tasks, dreading the end of the day.

  At midday, when Mr. and Mrs. Meriwether took their lunch in the shade of the office, and the other volunteers left for their homes, Amarantha visited each patient, moving quietly from cot to cot, feeling brows for fever, holding a hand here and there, and refreshing compresses. Lifting her head to stretch her neck, she saw Jonah Brock across the street.

  From Mrs. Jennings’s friends, Amarantha knew that after the hurricane, when the Theia limped into port, Mr. Brock quit the navy and took a post on an inland plantation. With a reputation no less shocking than his cousin’s, but without the advantage of noble rank, in the months since then Mr. Brock had rarely ventured into town. Only once had he passed by the hospital, and another volunteer had been quick to point him out to Amarantha.

  Now from the other side of the sun-drenched street he watched her and, through subtle signs, made it clear that he wished conversation with her.

  She could imagine only two reasons for it: he assumed she would be an easy conquest and had come to take up where his cousin had left off, or he had word from the captain. The violent disparity of the two reasons proved she had not yet rid herself of insanity. She was wild for news of him.

  While she awaited opportunity to leave the hospital, Mr. Brock remained, idly lounging in the shade. When finally she was able to walk to a nearby fruit stand, he arose and followed her inside.

  He was not what rumors had made her expect. Attractive, gentlemanly, and entirely sober, he waited for the fruit seller to leave the shop’s interior before approaching her.