Pleasure showed on his face. "Julia!"
"We thought you were dead!" Julia flung herself across the room and wrapped her arms around his neck. Will not only welcomed the embrace, he enveloped her in a genuine hug.
Angel clamped her teeth together, spilling the spoonful of soup down the front of the white cloth, causing Sukie to stammer apologies.
But Angel's attention was riveted to the lady in the rose-colored, beribboned bonnet. If Will was a prince, surely this must be his princess. Tall and slender as a reed, she was as graceful as an island doe, with dark cunning eyes that missed nothing.
She was no beauty, Will's Julia. Her nose was too long, her chin too short, her lips too thin. But her skin glowed, and her soft voice was pleasing to the ear.
"I thought I was dead myself," Will said heartily when he and Julia finally parted amid flushed cheeks and more laughter. Her bonnet strings had come undone, and the hat was slightly askew, but Angel saw that each dark curl bounced in perfect twists on either side of her face.
"Don't laugh, it was terrible." Julia averted her eyes as Will caught her hand to brush the back of her knuckles with his lips.
Angel felt the prick of a demon's pitchfork again, but knew it for what it was: not her injury, but plain, unwashed jealousy. The realization made her feel small and mean, and she resolved to give Will's lady a chance.
"But I'm back, all in one piece," he continued. "Eager to organize an expedition to destroy the pirates."
Destroy? Angel stared at Will in astonishment. Destroy the Brethren? The traitorous bastard!
"No more of that now," Julia admonished as she tapped Will's wrist teasingly with her fan. "You must save every word for supper tonight. Father insists you come." She flashed a radiant smile. "I do, too."
"Oh, Will, dearest, you don't know how many tears I've shed for you in the past weeks. And not only me. Half the ladies in South Carolina were desolate."
Then she glanced toward the bed and smiled. "And this must be your mystery woman. Your angel? Will, she's lovely."
For long seconds, her intelligent gaze met Angel's angry one. "I'm so pleased to meet a genuine heroine," Julia bubbled, hurrying toward the bed and extending a dainty hand.
Angel caught a whiff of violets. "Were you expectin' a swamp bear?"
Julia laughed. "She's delightful," she said to Will.
"Ye, as well," Angel replied sarcastically.
Julia smiled with her mouth, but Angel could read the wariness in her walnut-brown eyes. "Welcome to Charleston," the woman said, speaking slowly as if to a dull child. "I simply couldn't wait another moment to thank you for bringing Will home safely to me."
Chapter 13
The following morning, Will ushered his neighbor, Lady Graymoor, into the small parlor on the first floor of his home. This chamber, known as the blue room, was his favorite, the place his family had spent most of their private hours together.
He was tired. He'd had little sleep the night before. Angel's fever had risen again, and he'd spent most of the time from midnight until dawn sitting at her bedside. Angel had barely spoken a civil word to him and, by her attitude, she seemed to have taken a dislike to Julia. He couldn't help but wonder if dealing with her would be much more difficult than he'd expected.
Once Lizzy was comfortably seated, Will leaned against the marble fireplace, folded his arms over his chest, and tried to think how best to explain his attachment to Angel.
Lizzy broke the silence. "William, it is perfectly obvious to me that you've contracted brain fever." She waved impatiently at the maid who hovered by the door, waiting to see if they needed anything.
"Go. Shoo!" Lizzy said airily. "Out of here. If I'd wanted eavesdroppers, I would have asked for them."
When Sukie left the room, Lizzy sat up straight in the French gilt chair and turned her full attention on him. "You've suffered an ordeal, poor darling, but that doesn't excuse stupidity. What can you be thinking? To bring this woman here to your home and put her in your mother's bedchamber?"
Will had expected Lizzy to descend on him in full battle mode. He just hadn't expected it so early this morning. No one had ever accused Lady Elizabeth Graymoor of holding her tongue when she had something to say.
When she'd arrived, Lizzy had insisted on seeing Angel with her own eyes. Will had taken her up to Angel's bedroom, but fortunately Angel had been sleeping.
"You must think how this looks," Lizzy persisted.
"Angel saved my life," he said, trying not to lose his patience with the regal woman who was closer to him than any of his living relatives. "Angel is ill; was wounded defending me. I could hardly put her in the servants' quarters, could I?"
What he couldn't tell Lizzy was how raw fury had boiled up in him when Archie had threatened Angel, or how frightened he'd been that she would die of her injury or the fever that followed. It was impossible to relate how deeply he'd become attached to Angel... even with the full realization that she might be as guilty of piracy as her comrades.
Heat coiled in the pit of his gut as he thought of Angel lying upstairs, her face pale against the pillow, her shapely form covered by a thin linen sheet. Remembering how she'd felt in his arms, her naked body next to his, was enough to make him stir to life.
Self-consciously, he turned toward the window to hide the evidence of his forbidden musing.
"William! Pay heed to what I'm saying."
He glanced back to see Lizzy—the indomitable Lady Graymoor—glowering at him.
"She's very beautiful."
"As are you." His neighbor was as always the height of fashion, slim and elegant, and looking far less than her seventy-odd years. "You make me wish that I were twenty years older," he teased.
He didn't want to think about Angel, her face or her body. He wanted to shake off the spell she'd cast over him on the islands and get on with his life. Trading words with Lizzy would soon clear his head and prevent him from showing a rising condition that no gentleman should exhibit when entertaining a lady.
"Stop that," Lizzy scolded. "You're as bad as Griffin, constantly trying to manage me. I realize that people think I'm crazy. But I'm neither senile nor foolish."
He smiled at her. "I have the greatest respect for your intelligence. And I've never doubted the state of your mind."
Had she been an American privateer instead of an English countess, Lizzy would have driven the British navy out of the Caribbean. She was smart, and tough, and as business-minded as any man he'd ever known.
"I'm sure you regard me highly," she answered. "You've always seemed to recognize my worth, other than your unreasonable dismissal of my search for my granddaughter as a lost cause."
"Other than that," he agreed, drawing a chair close and straddling it. "Have I ever insinuated that I thought you lacking in wits because you wouldn't abandon your search for the child?"
Lizzy's lips thinned. "There was no need for you to say so, William. I could read it in your eyes." She snapped open her ivory fan and moved it rapidly beneath her chin. "You're very like your father. Neither of you could ever tell a convincing lie."
"Would it help if I could? If I pretended to believe there was a possibility that a five-year-old girl was the sole survivor of a twenty-year-old tragedy?" He took her hand gently in his. "I know what it's like to lose family, Lizzy. My mother. Father. I know what kind of tricks your mind can play on you."
"You mean well." She pulled her hand free and began to twist the square-cut emerald ring on her middle finger. It was one of Lizzy's habits, always followed by a heavy dose of grandmotherly advice.
Will steeled himself.
"In spite of your good qualities, and you have many, you are a male. You can't be expected to understand a sixth sense, which we females possess, that often defies logic. It is my belief that the Creator—who denied to my weaker sex physical strength—gifted us with special powers of perception. One of which is—"
"No more," he interrupted. "You've wasted enough years of your li
fe on this tragedy. Elizabeth is gone. If she were alive, someone would have collected the reward long ago. God knows, enough charlatans have tried to deceive you over the years. How many false Elizabeths have appeared? Three?"
"Four." Moisture glistened in the faded hazel eyes. "None of them real." Her lower lip trembled, then firmed. "One babe was too young; another, twice Elizabeth's age." She sighed heavily. "The most outlandish was by a Methodist minister who produced a mulatto girl with a port-wine birthmark on one cheek and hair bleached the color of hemp."
"Five thousand pounds reward," Will said. "You offered too much. A hundred pounds is more than most Carolina dirt farmers, white or black, see in a lifetime."
"I would gladly have paid a hundred times that. You know I could. The Graymoor fortune..." Lady Graymoor cleared her throat. "But I wasn't gulled by their foul knavery. I will not be duped by fortune hunters."
"So far."
"Not ever." Lizzy tapped one kidskin slipper firmly. "But we weren't speaking of my personal affairs, were we? We were discussing that exotic creature lying upstairs."
"Angel is attractive," he said, releasing Lady Graymoor's hand. "I will concede that much." Even the fever hadn't stripped away any of Angel's beauty. If anything, her weakness, her vulnerability, made him even more determined to protect her... and even more confused.
"What does she mean to you?"
"Honestly?" Will looked away in an unconscious attempt to hide his inner turmoil. "I don't know."
A smile softened Lizzy's overly powdered features. "Yours is the household of an unmarried gentleman. And this is Charleston. I don't need to remind you that word of your exquisite little houseguest will spread through this city in hours."
"I told you, Angel saved my life at great risk to her own."
"Then she must be more precious to me than diamonds. For I could not continue without you, William. I simply could not." Lizzy fixed him with a shrewd stare. "Regardless of how highly you regard her; of how we all must, this arrangement won't do. It won't do at all. Your Mistress Angel must leave this household at once."
"She isn't my mistress!"
"I meant no harm. You mistake my meaning. You are too sensitive."
"I can't turn her out. I feel responsible for her. She's an innocent, and she doesn't know a soul in this town."
Sighing, Lizzy leaned down to scratch behind her spaniel's ear. "You chose an odd way to protect your ward's reputation." The dog laid a feathery paw on Lizzy's knee.
"I realize that your intentions are—"
She cut him short. "Have you thought of what this will mean to Julia? How it will look to her father?"
"I've nothing to hide. Julia and I are not betrothed."
"Not formally perhaps, but can you deny there has been an understanding?"
He stiffened. "I do deny it." He rose. "Julia and I have our differences. She wants a stay-at-home husband, not one who will spend eight months of the year at sea."
"She's a good person. She cares deeply for you. And you are long past the time when you should have chosen a wife."
"I won't tie myself to a desk, Lizzy. Not even for Richard's money."
Lady Graymoor pushed the dog down. "Why do the young believe that wealth and marriage are not compatible? Don't be a fool, William. Don't throw away the best thing that's ever happened to you because she's the answer to your financial problems. You and Julia have been friends for years, long before the Falcon fortune vanished."
"Yes, we've been more than friends. And in all this time, she still can't realize that I'm not a man to be content on shore. I'd be bored senseless in six months. Impossible to live with in ten."
"Don't avoid the subject. Keeping a woman like Angel in your home is a public slap in the face to Julia, so long as there's the slightest chance you two might wed."
Guilt, thick as island fog, washed over him. "Julia doesn't think that way. She was here today. She knows that—"
"Stuff and nonsense. You talk like a green boy." Lizzy leaned back in the chair, gripping both armrests. "People will assume that you and this woman are intimate."
"I don't care about gossip. I'm not turning her out into the streets."
"Did I say anything about turning her into the street? What do you think I am? A heartless old woman? If I care for anyone in the world, other than my silly dogs, it's you, William. If this brave young creature saved your life, then she deserves our support. But I refuse to allow you to ruin your reputation, and this... this Angel's by keeping her here."
"I won't send her back to the island. She'd be in great danger."
"And she's not in danger under this roof?" Lady Graymoor rapped his forearm sharply with her folded fan. "She will stay with me."
"Absolutely not."
"Ridiculous. It's the perfect solution. Looking after her will give me something useful to do."
"You don't know Angel."
"No, I don't. But for that matter, what do you know of her?" She hesitated and went on with a rush. "There's no possibility that she could be—"
"Your grandchild?"
"Elizabeth would be about twenty-five years of age. If this girl Angel—"
"No, Lizzy. No chance. I met her mother. She's little better than a common dockside trollop. Once you've talked to Angel, you would realize that she's not of gentle blood. I'll not have you give a moment's thought that she could be."
Lady Graymoor nodded. "I still want to help."
He hesitated. "Damn it, the truth is, I'm not certain that I entirely trust her. She might be dangerous."
"And I'm not?" Lady Graymoor laughed. "Leave your Angel to me. I'll set her on the straight and narrow."
"She may object."
"What young woman knows what's good for her? She's to come at once. Today. See to it, William."
Will grimaced. It didn't take a shot across his bow to recognize defeat when it stared him in the face. "Yes, ma'am, if you think that's best."
"It's not only best, it's all there is to be done."
* * *
"And you're certain you can lead us to this pirate settlement?" Richard Hamilton asked as he tamped tobacco into the bowl of his long-stemmed pipe.
Will nodded. "I think so." After a simple dinner with Julia and her father, during which Will had related an abbreviated account of his adventures, the two men had retired to Richard's library. As was the custom, Julia had excused herself, presumably to do whatever properly brought-up Charleston ladies did for amusement when there were no gentlemen present.
"I can't tell you what a shock it was to see your face," Richard said. "Fletcher was beside himself. He felt at fault, not being able to find you after you went over the side of the ship."
"I searched half of Charleston last night, looking for him. Then I met Reeve Williams. He told me you'd made Aaron master of the Katherine, and she'd sailed for Martinique last Monday." If someone else had to take command of the Katherine, he was glad it was Aaron. But the schooner was his pride and joy, and he couldn't help feeling regret over losing her.
Richard, a small, dapper man with thinning brown hair and a slight paunch, poured brandy for them both and offered him a glass. Will took it and returned to his seat near the window.
"Did Williams tell you what our cargo consisted of?"
"No." Will kept his expression bland. "Said he didn't have any idea. He saw wooden crates being loaded, but didn't believe the boxes contained chairs or bedsteads. What are we shipping to Martinique?"
"Pennsylvania rifles. Black powder from a small company on the Brandywine. The Indies are about to go up in flames, Will. All this abolition nonsense. Do you know the ratio of freemen to slaves down there? People haven't forgotten the slave revolts of the nineties. Plantation owners and merchants need to protect their interests. And we can command top dollar for what makes them feel safe." Richard lit his pipe.
"Dangerous cargo if the British stop Aaron and search the ship," Will answered. If they found guns, they'd not be content with confiscating
them and conscripting the crew into service. Aaron would end up at the end of rope or rotting in some English prison hulk.
"Fletcher has a good head on his shoulders."
"None better," Will agreed. And no better friend. "He should have had his own ship long ago." He frowned. "But I hate to see Aaron and his crew risk their lives for—"
"Profit?" Richard supplied. "Without it... you're witness to what comes of running a shipping company without making a profit. When you cut to the core, it's all about—"
"Profit," Will finished. "I'm aware of that. And that's why I'm so anxious to put an end to this nest of coastal pirates. If it hadn't been for them, my father might be alive today."
"And you'd still be helping to run Falcon Shipping."
Will took a sip of the brandy. It was French, very good, and very expensive. It slipped down his throat smoothly, leaving a warm tingling in his mouth. "I need to close that chapter in my life before I can move on."
"Your father was my friend for half a century," Richard said. "No one misses him more than I do. And no one regrets the downfall of your house more." He tapped his pipe against the brick hearth. "This time, we won't be content to throw one ship against these wreckers. We'll send enough men and firepower to be certain that none of them lives to stand trial. I'll speak to the governor. He is—"
"I believe in the law. If I have to kill an opponent in battle..." Will left the rest unsaid. He'd killed men before, in the Caribbean, but he'd slain them in defense of his life and those of his crew. It wasn't an act he talked about.
Richard's statement made him uneasy. Will didn't want to consider leveling a pistol at Cap'n or Bett, or even the one-armed Nehemiah who'd conducted the sham marriage ceremony. "I'll go," he said. "I'll do my part to bring the Brethren to justice. But if they drop their weapons and ask for mercy, I'll bring them back here to stand before a judge and jury."
Will's host turned away and extracted a map of the East Coast from a desk drawer. "I'm more convinced than ever that these villains haven't been working alone. They're too organized, and they know too much about shipping schedules. Easily transported, valuable cargoes are most at risk. Tobacco ships are never waylaid. Someone's giving the wreckers information."
Falcon's Angel Page 12