Once Upon a Midnight Sea

by Ava Bradley

  "You and Ollie go ahead," Christian told him. "I'll post watch for a while. My share, you know."

  Once alone on deck, he stared off at Florida's coastline. He'd never seen colors as vivid as this. A vibrant ribbon of malachite green vegetation separated the azure sky from an almost blindingly white beach.

  He was in a new world and felt like a fish out of water. All this was familiar to Adriana; her ship, her sea, her tropics. Why did he feel so utterly useless? For five days he'd tramped down the cold uncertainty of his future, but no longer could he escape the truth.

  He was afraid. Afraid he would fail his quest. Fail his father. Fail himself.

  * * *

  "How long have you been in my father's employ, Mrs. Bailey?" Adriana asked. She held Lady Luck twenty miles off the coast for safety. In the tropics, the waters were shallow and random reefs stretched for miles in some places. The far off strip of beach was hardly visible against a sky gray with overcast that, since noon, had grown increasingly darker.

  "I came to America in August of fifty eight. Almost one year after your mother passed."

  The irritable weather brought with it a warm breeze but left the sea amiable. They would reach Hutchison's Island by late afternoon, ahead of schedule. Adriana could have set the wheel and sat beside her on the stern bench, but she was more comfortable with the distance between them to ask her difficult question.

  "Did you ever notice anything out of the ordinary about him?"

  "As in what, exactly?" Mrs. Bailey's voice held thin disquiet.

  "Illicit behavior. Unseemly associations." Adriana sighed. The words were hard to form, but no longer so hard to believe.

  "Absolutely not. Do not tell me you trust anything that thieving itinerant has to say. Why, do you know he can't even swim?"

  Adriana turned around. "How do you know?"

  "When you were dislodging the anchor, Mr. Dupree questioned him about some long ago swimming accident, and he admitted it. He's afraid of the water."

  No wonder Christian looked as though she'd asked him to cut off two fingers when she proposed he go in after the anchor.

  Mrs. Bailey's expression softened. "No, I never discovered your father in illicit behavior."

  Adriana turned back to the wide-open sea ahead of them. Calm and almost without waves, it looked like a vast tundra of ice under the pale sky. "Are you certain? Because I believe I did. Things I didn't understand then, which now seem to make sense."

  Mrs. Bailey rose and stood by her side at the wheel. "Child, faith is believing what you know is right, even though you can't see it. You have to learn to trust."

  Those words stung. "I do trust."

  "You don't," Mrs. Bailey argued gently. "You said so yourself. You don't trust Cecelia, you don't trust Mr. Dupree, and you don't trust Mr. De la Croix, albeit with good reason." The matronly woman tossed a grimace in the direction of the hatch. "Now you don't trust your father, and he's not even here to defend himself. I wonder what it would take for you to lose your trust in me."

  Adriana met her eyes. Mrs. Bailey's held a dark shadow of pain. Adriana had long suspected her guardian kept something unpleasant hidden in her past, but she had never spoken of it.

  "Mrs. Bailey, I don't care what may have happened in your life before you came to us. As long as you have never done anything to hurt me or my father, I could never lose my trust in you."

  The woman's gaze slipped away, but she quickly forced cheerfulness back into her eyes. "Your wellbeing is my foremost interest, as it is your father's. You know he would never do anything to hurt you."

  Adriana nodded.

  "Then you have no reason to lose your trust in him."

  She turned her gaze back to the sea. "That is different."

  Mrs. Bailey placed a hand on her arm. "How is it different, child?"

  The words caught in her throat as she tried to speak them. "I've always believed my father to be a good man to others. It is the reason I am so proud of him." Hot tears welled in her eyes. Annoyed with herself, Adriana blinked them away.

  "But if what Christian says about him is true, if he could actually turn on another man and abandon him to such a horrible fate, then he is not the man I have always believed him to be."

  Agonizing hurt burned in her throat. She glanced into the sky. Dear Lord in heaven, I cannot bear to lose that man.

  Chapter Nine

  She walked down the aisle alone toward an empty pulpit. The priest, her father, Preston Weiss, and Henri sat around a card table off to the side. Instead of chips or coins, they threw tiny figurines into the pot to represent items from her inherited estate. Molded replicas of the ships in her father's fleet. Toy buildings representing the mansion in Baltimore, the hunting cabin in Nova Scotia, and the winter house in Port Arthur. Prancing horse statuettes symbolized her father's stable of prized Arabians.

  She stopped at the end of the aisle and watched them play. The shouted out their desires, bargaining for her property while completely unaware of her in her flowing, beautiful dress.

  She struggled to turn as though neck deep in slushy ice water. In the shadows at the rear of the church Christian stood idly, hands in his pockets, watching her with a cold expression.

  Adriana woke gasping for breath. She was still in her cabin aboard Lady Luck. Twelve days had passed since Christian seized the ship in Chesapeake Bay. She was twelve days closer to her impending marriage.

  Anchored off the coast of Grand Turk, Lady Luck rolled lazily as the current in Turk's Passage tugged at her hull. On deck, the soft thud of a loose rope on deck repeated in a slow staccato. Adriana sat up. There could be nothing wrong with merely going topside to make sure everything was in order.

  She rose and pulled her silk robe over her shoulders, leaving her feet bare. Just a quick peek, and I'll return to my cabin.

  The moon cast a glittering path across the water leading directly to Lady Luck. Silvery-blue light illuminated her gleaming deck. Christian was sitting on the low roof on the forecastle, staring across the water as if he could see his destination through the darkness.

  Hearing her approach, he glanced over his shoulder with an expectant expression. When he saw her, his alarm faded and he turned back toward the sea. "You thought I was asleep at my post."

  "I...the main spencer line was flopping," she said hesitantly, suddenly feeling wretched for expecting the worst of him. She glanced at her bare toes. "Yes."

  She stepped closer, causing her heart to race with the daring of it. If Mrs. Bailey were to catch her out here, she'd have hell to pay.

  She saw he held a worn piece of paper. "That is the letter from your father?"

  He didn't answer, only refolded it and tucked it into his breast pocket. A woeful breeze brushed past them, lifting the longish ends of his hair away from his face. Adriana glimpsed it then, the misery creasing his brow.

  "May I see it?"

  He whirled around and the anger in his face made her cringe. She expected him to explode with her as the target of his fury. Instead he let out a long sigh and the tension left his shoulders.

  "You needn't fear I will toss it overboard," she said defensively.

  Christian's eyes met hers again. He watched her for a painful minute, as if weighing her trustworthiness. Almost reluctantly, he drew it from his pocket and handed it to her.

  Adriana sat near him on the edge of the fore cabin and unfolded it. The date at the top read September 17, 1872. It was almost two years old. The paper was crumpled and well worn, as if it had been read a million times. Written in French, Adriana had to hold it close to make out the faded words in the moonlight.

  My Dear Son,

  I pray this letter gets to you so that I can unburden my heart before I meet my end. For many years I believed the best favor I could do was remain banished from your life, but as I reach my old age I start to look back on events with a different eye. Such is the curse of old men, I suspect. Please, I beg of you, if this letter reaches you, read it in entirety bef
ore you burn it. I wish only to tell you how wrong I was in abandoning you, in believing the lies your mother told me, and in so quickly and impulsively surrendering what may have been a beautiful life together. But I do not write to ask your forgiveness. I do not deserve it. I led a life of sin, and I have only myself to blame for losing what I now realize mattered most.

  I am guilty, I did rob the innocent whose only misdeed was to be rich. I now realize that with the love of my son I was the richest man in the world, and I robbed myself of that. It is my true crime, and to look at my situation, the irony is that I am being punished for it.

  I was a foolish young man, and when my partner and I found ourselves in the clutches of the gendarmes, I acted impulsively. I was scarred by your mother's claim that you were not my son, and in sacrificing myself I believed I was doing a favor by freeing her to be with the man she loved; the man she claimed was truly your father. But as I look back and imagine the unique jade color of your eyes, the dimple in your cheek that is now undoubtedly more pronounced, the way your hair could never be tamed of that unruly flip by your ears, I have not a single doubt that you are my flesh and blood.

  Adriana took a deep breath to sooth away the choking sensation in her throat. His father hadn't seen him since Christian was a six-year-old boy, but he had described him perfectly.

  If I could change my fate, I would, for nothing other than to see your face once again. I endure the long, hot days in the steamy, mosquito infested misery of tiny Île du Diable, living out my punishment. My sentence is not as much handed down by the French government as it is by God, for death would be more merciful than this. I have survived the anguish of solitary confinement, the misery of dysentery and the curse of Malaria, all so that I can exist on in the agony of my crimes. Île du Diable is aptly named, for it is truly Hell, even if the Devil himself has turned his back on it. It is only this year that I have been put from St. Joseph to the small island of political prisoners where convicts are allowed certain freedoms and I am able to write this letter. I hope that you will learn the truth, as you so deserve. From what is left of my heart, I apologize for the wrongs my crimes have brought you.

  Your father, Gilbert De la Croix

  Adriana handed the letter back. She hardly felt her own feet as she stood and walked to the ship's bow. Stretching before her, the ocean shimmered in the moonlight as though made of diamonds. The sea she loved so much only served as a ferocious warden to the prisoners of Île du Diable.

  "Your father sacrificed himself."

  "Yes."

  Boiling hot emotion she couldn't identify welled in her gut. Christian's father sacrificed himself without fear, and her father abandoned him just as easily. It couldn't be true!

  "Are you certain the letter is from him? It could be from anyone who knows what you look like. How did you this letter even find its way to you?"

  Christian grabbed her and turned her around to face him. His face glowed with emotion, but when his eyes fixed on the tear spilling down her cheek, he relaxed his hold on her forearms. He reached up and wiped it away with his thumb.

  "You still don't believe, do you, heiress?"

  His grip turned hard again and he gave her a shake that brought her against him. She pressed her hands against his chest and felt the rapid beat of his heart. She stared up into his eyes, watching as his gaze slipped to her lips.

  "Christian..."

  He twisted away. "Perhaps this will convince you." Holding firmly to one wrist, he dragged her behind him and toward the main hatch. "Down."

  Once in the main cabin, he unhooked the lamp hanging over the galley table and stepped into the captain's office. She followed hesitantly, watching as he flipped through the pages of Lady Luck's logbook.

  "Is this your father's handwriting?" His finger stabbed down on the page.

  She saw that it was and nodded.

  "Read it." He stood back, gesturing to the stool. Adriana reluctantly sat and peered down at the entry.

  What she read made her blood to thicken and slow until it seemed it stopped altogether in her veins. Thunder roared in her ears as she read the one line that made her certain beyond any doubt. She read it a second time to convince herself she wasn't imagining what she saw.

  I have lived with the fault of not one ruined life, but two. It is I who must live alone with my shame.

  "Lord in heaven." Only after she'd uttered the oath did she realize she'd whispered it aloud. She stood and numbly started out of the tiny cabin.

  Christian grabbed her arm. "Adriana–"

  She stopped, frozen like some helpless marionette.

  "I am sorry," he said on a gentler breath.

  Sorry? He was sorry? It was all true, everything he'd said. Christian had no reason to be sorry. It was she who felt so utterly to blame, she who carried the shame of her father. She who owed more than could ever be repaid. As if she were a flame, the life she'd believed to be true had simply been snuffed out.

  "Go back on deck, Mr. De la Croix." Her voice shook with a welling grief that threatened to consume her. "Henri will relieve you at dawn."

  He stayed where he was for a long moment, then his hand released her forearm. His fingers lingered, drifting across her exposed skin. She closed her eyes, listening to the whispery soft sound of his departure.

  Once alone in her cabin, the agony welling inside her roared like a fueled flame, then suddenly vanished. She took a deep breath, searching for the emotion she thought should be there. It wasn't. Instead, a great weight had been lifted from her soul.

  Her father was the same man he'd always been. Just because she learned the truth about him didn't change who he was.

  But Christian. Tonight, he'd been transformed from a thief, a scoundrel, and a kidnapper, into a man who had been honest and true, a man who fought with the courage of a titan for the honor of his family. A man who had not turned his back on his father, a man whom she didn't need to be told had never expected an apology from his father. He had never blamed his father, never hated him.

  Christian was suddenly a different man in her eyes. He was still the impossibly handsome rake who seemed unaware of the charm of that devilish smile and the enchantment of those pure jade eyes. Only now, he was no longer the man who had insulted her with his affront, but one who had made a desperate plea for her help the only way he knew how.

  Adriana draped her robe over her chair and slipped into bed. She drew the covers up to her chin.

  Most stunning of all was that she'd allowed herself to become smitten with the young man before she knew any of this.

  She chewed her lip as she recalled she hadn't let herself do anything of the sort. It had simply happened without her consent.

  Her mind flashed to the dream and her future husband, Preston Weiss. Allowing herself to develop feelings for Christian only made her situation worse. She reminded herself Christian still had an agenda. Not only did he want to rescue his father, but he wanted to ruin hers, and she along with him.

  Chauncy hopped onto the bed and curled up beside her. His little tail thumped on the bed.

  "Are you my only true friend, Chauncy?"

  Even Mrs. Bailey seemed to be keeping secrets from her. Adriana wasn't so concerned about whatever the woman hid in her past, but she was clearly lying about the incidents concerning her father. How could she not have seen him the nights he'd come home staggering and stinking? She and Mrs. Bailey both had rooms on the north side of the house in Baltimore, above the carriage entry. More times than she could count, he had emerged from his cab in the mid of night making a shameful ruckus with a slurred tongue.

  Adriana rolled on her side and tucked her little dog under her arm. Whatever was past, was past. Her father was a harmless old man who had been shot in the face. He didn't deserve to die. At first, she'd believed Henri's unyielding claim Christian hadn't done it, but after all she'd learned, it seemed he had more reason to hurt her father than anyone.

  A million emotions whirled inside her head, each one m
ore confusing than the last. She wanted to admire Christian for these new revelations, for standing up against all odds for what he believed was right. But how far would he go to achieve his goals? Would he stop at murder? His sharing the letter with her had been an act of courage and of trust, but had it been an honest gesture, or just a ploy to weaken her defenses?

  Adriana pressed her hands over her eyes. I don't know! But one thing she did know, she still didn't fully trust him. He was still harboring deep resentment, still had a plan to carry out. Would she be sacrificed in that plan?

  Christian De la Croix was still an adversary, and her fascination with him only made him more dangerous.

  Chapter Ten

  Adriana dressed quickly and emerged on deck to discover Henri, Christian and Mrs. Ling already topside. An amazing golden sunrise colored the sky, bringing with it the hope of new possibilities.

  They looked up at her when Ollie shouted from the crow's nest.

  Both men greeted her warmly. The sparkle in Christian's eyes as she responded sent her heart racing. She caught a glimpse of the laugh lines around his eyes and the strong planes of his chin as he smiled.

  "Mr. Dupree, you look rested. I am glad to see it. You're looking better as well, Mr. De la Croix." As if that were at all possible, Adriana thought to herself. "Mrs. Ling's tea must be helping with your sea sickness."

  He gaped at her, clearly stunned by her graciousness. "Er, oui, merci. I am feeling better. I have, how do you say it? Found my sea legs."

  How strange it felt, but Adriana wished they might exchange pleasantries more often. They'd hardly spoken two kind words to each other during the entire voyage and it had begun to press laboriously on her soul.

  I was taught to be a lady, and a lady is kind even to those who are not kind in return. The decision to be more pleasant made her feel better, inside and out.

  When Henri strolled away to check the aft lines, Adriana casually approached Christian. He eyed her warily as she took a position beside him at the starboard rail. She lifted her chin and went right to the point. "I wish to strike a bargain with you."