“Hell hasn’t frozen over yet,” Alyson replied cheerfully.
William threw an anguished look to Angelo, but the cook was struggling to maintain his usually stern demeanor and wouldn’t meet his eye. Perhaps the lady was like the simpleton that used to live in the village, and she really didn’t know what she was saying. That thought gave him courage, and he hurried to report to the captain.
He wasn’t so certain of his conclusion a few minutes later when the captain raised up on his elbows and stared at William as if he had just removed his head and put it under his arm.
“She said what?” Rory glared at the terrified boy and began a string of curses. Then, realizing he was taking out his temper on a go-between, he sank back against the pillow and contemplated what he should do now.
Hell hasn’t frozen over, indeed. He didn’t want to know where she had learned that particular phrase. Working in the galley would undoubtedly teach her a good many more. It would be much easier if she did stay in the galley, but this was a smuggling ship, and some of his crew he wouldn’t trust in a dark alley, and certainly not with a woman like Alyson.
His gaze fell on the stack of neatly folded undergarments that had taunted his imagination all morning. She was out there roaming the ship wearing practically nothing. It didn’t take a great deal of thought to discover what had caused her anger. Or he assumed it was anger. The boy had said she seemed quite cheerful. With Alyson, who the hell could tell the difference?
Angelo would look after her for a while, but she was Rory’s responsibility. He would have to learn to deal with it. Staring at the ceiling, he ordered more calmly. “Tell her she cannot go about barefoot, and that if she does not put on her shoes and stockings, I shall personally come after her.”
“Aye, aye, sir.” The boy leapt to do his bidding once more.
Alyson contemplated this new message with more interest. The weather had turned warm again, and the kitchen fire provided a nice heat, but she was not accustomed to going barefoot. She would dearly like to have her shoes and lovely petticoat back, but she had no privacy in which to don them. That was the whole problem with this ship. She had no place in it.
She puckered her bottom lip in a frown. It wouldn’t do to have Rory coming after her. He should be resting. If anything happened to him, she could be in serious trouble. With a sigh, she threw the bread dough back in the bowl, covered it, then wiped her hands on the apron Angelo had given her. She would have to confront Captain Rory Douglas Maclean and find out his intentions.
Rory’s eyes were closed when she entered the cabin, and Alyson hesitated, letting her gaze anxiously sweep over him. Someone had helped him to shave, and he had obviously felt well enough to sit up and allow someone to change his bandages. He now wore no shirt at all, just the binding around his chest. With fascination she noted his shoulders were as sun-browned as his face, and her cheeks reddened.
She was still hesitating, daydreaming, when he opened his eyes and stared back at her. The look on his face was almost tender, but he hid his expression quickly, pointing at her clothing. “I will not have you go about catching your death of cold. Put those on.”
Alyson did nothing so simple as picking up the offending articles and donning them. Instead, she drifted to the side of the bed and touched cool fingers to the portion of his brow not covered by bandages.
“You’re still warm. I think you’re supposed to be drinking lots of liquid. Can you sit up?” She sat down on the edge of the bed beside him, like the lamb beside the lion.
Rory closed his eyes and groaned as his body leapt in response to her proximity. Without her stays, her gown would not close tightly, and she was practically spilling out of her bodice. It was so much easier to play the part of gentleman when everybody concerned was wrapped in several dozen layers of clothing and surrounded by people. This forced intimacy was harsh retribution for past sins.
He would have to keep reminding himself that she was an innocent, that it was his fault she found herself in this situation, and that she was now his responsibility. She thought of him as an uncle or older brother. That would have to be the attitude to take.
“I am fine, lass. I’ll keep my eyes closed. Put on yer stockings and things. It’s not so warm that ye can be cavortin’ about in yer bare toes.”
Obediently she rose, and turning her back to him, pulled the heavy petticoat up under her skirts. Then she sat down and began to work on her stockings. She adjusted her garters and slipped on her large-heeled shoes.
He moaned. When she glanced over her shoulder, Rory covered his eyes with his arm.
“Rory?” she questioned softly.
That was the first time he had ever heard her use his name, and he slid his arm away to look up into the full loveliness of her face. Was it God or the devil taunting him for his sins? She was so beautiful standing there with her black cloud of hair tumbling about her shoulders and wide gray eyes watching him with trusting innocence. She was everything he had ever imagined a woman could be, and he had no right to be in the same room with the likes of her, even if she were but a poor orphan. The fact that she was the granddaughter of an earl and as rich as Croesus put her beyond the pale. Fate was almighty cruel.
“Pull up a chair, lass, and don’t look at me as if I’m dying. I’ve survived worse than this.” While she actually did as told, Rory struggled to sit upright. His ribs felt as if all the demons in hell were ripping out his insides while the devil pounded at his head, but he had to make things straight with the girl.
Alyson brought the chair but poured a glass of water from the pitcher and handed it to him before she would sit down. Rory grimaced at the stale taste, but drank it as she settled into her chair.
“Lass, we’ll have to learn to live together these next weeks. I’m that sorry about it, but I couldna do aught else at the time. I could save you or the ship, but not both, without taking you with me. Do you understand what I’m telling you?”
Alyson knit her hands together and studied him. “I don’t know anything about Charleston. I’ve never met savages before, and I don’t think I’d like living in log cabins. Do we have to go to the colonies?”
Rory grinned at the odd tack her mind took. Here he was worried about their sharing sleeping quarters, and all she wanted to know about was red Indians. Maybe he ought to let her lead the conversation, just to see what fascinating byways they found themselves on.
“Charleston is a lovely little town, lass. I think you’ll like it. I have friends there who come from a fine old family in England. They have a daughter who must be about your age by now. It’s the best place for you while I finish my trading.”
Alyson’s eyes widened. “You will be leaving me there? You can’t do that. What will they say? What will they think? I have no clothes. I have no money. Why would strangers wish to take me in?”
Rory could see she was near tears, and the tremble of her bottom lip created a manic urge to take her in his arms and tell her everything would be all right. He wanted to say, “marry me and I’ll take care of you forever.” He wanted . . . Lord, but he wanted. And couldn’t have.
Steeling himself, Rory tried to respond sensibly, knowing that applying logic to Alyson was a futile quest at best. “I will tell them you are my ward, that your maid died on the voyage, your luggage was washed overboard—anything you like, lass. They will take you in because they are my friends and will want to be yours. I’ll buy you some new clothes, and you can go to parties and teas and whatever else young ladies do with their time.”
“But I don’t know if I can repay you! I’ll have disappeared off the face of the earth, and Mr. Farnley will think I’m dead! I’ll be penniless and homeless, and all because of you, Rory Maclean! You can’t do this to me. You have to take me home.”
“Alyson, I can do any damn thing I want!” he cried in frustration. “I don’t know why in hell you were wandering the streets of London looking like a char girl when I told you to go with Deirdre to Lady Hamilton’s, but y
ou did, and you’re bloody lucky I found you before you ended up in some French brothel. You haven’t got the sense God gave a goose, and if I were to send you back to London, Cranville would have you for dinner, and that could be a lot worse than being stuck on a ship to the colonies. So for now consider yourself penniless and homeless and let me take care of things.”
He couldn’t have hurt her worse if he had slapped her. She had thought that, out of all the greedy, mean people in the world, Rory Maclean was her one true friend, but he just considered her a foolish nuisance. She had spent too many years hiding from the snide, cutting comments of the outside world to allow him to see that he had hurt her, however. Gathering her ruffled feathers, Alyson rose and walked toward the door.
“Thank you for saving my life. I shall do my best not to disturb you for the duration of the trip.”
“Alyson, wait!”
His cry came too late. The door closed softly behind her.
8
Rory did not allow the feather-brained female to escape so easily, of course. Whatever he might have become in these last years of exile, he had been brought up to treat ladies with respect and courtesy. True, he had encountered very few ladies since being forced from his home at the tender age of fifteen, but that did not mean he didn’t know what was proper.
Alyson glared at him mutinously when he sent two of his more trusted men to fetch her from the galley at day’s end. He had given her time to cool off, given himself time too, although anger wasn’t exactly the worst of Rory’s problems where Alyson was concerned.
She had not trusted him enough to take off her gown so she might don her stays this morning. Her ripe figure taunted him with every move she made.
“You summoned me, my lord?” The sarcasm was laced with sugar as she stood between two huge sailors and defiantly met his gaze.
Rory had donned a clean shirt over his bandages, and tied his hair back in a queue, but he was still too lightheaded to stand up for long. He sat up in bed and leaned against the bulwark.
“Jake, Dougall, you can go now.” He dismissed his officers with a nod. They obeyed with alacrity, although he detected the wry lift of a brow from Dougall. No matter how it might look, Rory was no pirate intent on kidnapping innocents. He owed the man explanations, but he was damned if he knew how to give them.
He turned his gaze back to Alyson. “There is good reason for the superstition that a woman on board is bad luck. Men who have been without women for long periods of time tend to go a little crazy. I’ll not have knife fights and brawls over your tender little body. From now on, Dougall or I will escort you to the galley and back when you wish to go. Only William and Angelo will be allowed in the galley when you are there. If any other man enters, William has orders to take a chopping knife to them. At all other times, you are to stay in here or with me. Do you understand?”
He couldn’t tell if she even heard him. She jammed her hands in her pockets and let her gaze wander to the curtain of sheets and ropes that he had had constructed during her absence. The bunk and a small table and the cabin door were on this side of the curtain. His desk and trunk were on the other side.
“I should think it would be easier to dry your linens in fresh air,” she observed.
Rory closed his eyes and prayed for divine guidance. He had spent the entire afternoon composing that impressive sermon, and it had drifted right past her like the wings of a dove. What did he have to do to connect with the intelligence he knew existed behind all that innocence? Remembering a night when they had discussed men and marriage, he tried to appeal to that lucidity.
“Unless you wish us to live as man and wife, I thought to offer you some privacy. I have no strong objection to making a lass such as you my wife, but I thought you stated your dissatisfaction with that happy state.”
That brought her back to reality, Rory noted dryly. She stared at him as if he had grown horns and tail. With some effort he raised himself from the bed and, standing, poured a swallow of Scotch from his flask to a tumbler on the table. He would be a drunkard by the time this journey ended.
She flashed him a puzzled look, but Rory just drank his whisky and waited to see where her mind had wandered this time.
“I have considered what you said about Mr. Farnley putting my inheritance in a trust so a husband could not touch it,” she said politely, “only I doubt that Alan could be made to marry me now. But if Mr. Farnley thinks me dead and gives away my funds according to my instructions, I will have no choice but to marry you.”
Rory gulped the whisky down the wrong way, spluttered, coughed, and grabbed for the flask to take another drink. She would drive him mad before she killed him. Marriage! He had introduced the topic as so patently ridiculous that she would have to wake up and realize her position. Never had it entered his head that she would in any way entertain the idea. He would have to disillusion her quickly. He knew he couldn’t have what he wanted, but Alyson still lived in a fantasy world.
“I daresay Mr. Farnley will not be too amenable to giving away all that money without a fight. Does Cranville get it then?” he calmed himself and tried to think his way out of this one.
Alyson took the chair he offered and settled her homespun skirts as if they were silks and satins. “I expect he thinks so, but he will be rudely disappointed. When Mr. Farnley suggested that I needed to have a will, I told him I wanted it all to go to homes for mothers and children who have no family to care for them. I think he started drawing up something he called a trusteeship that will build a home and operate it. I do not understand the details, but I do know Cranville won’t get a farthing of it.”
Rory chuckled. He could just imagine Cranville’s black expression when presented that instrument. He would take it to court, undoubtedly. The solicitors would eat it up for years. Alyson might be naive, but she was no simpleton.
“I don’t think you have to worry about your inheritance, then. By the time I return you to London, Cranville will be in debtor’s prison, and you will be free to choose a more suitable husband. If Alan is so foolish as not to want you, there will be a hundred more better than he. You might even meet a better man in Charleston.”
Alyson accepted the glass of wine he poured for her. “How long do we have to live like this?”
“Depending on the winds, six weeks, more or less. I’ll try to make it as easy for you as I can, lass. We’ve not had an auspicious beginning, I know . . .” Rory gestured helplessly. He would never understand what went on behind those inscrutable light eyes.
“Perhaps it is just the blow to your head. You have not quite been yourself,” Alyson decided, biting her finger thoughtfully. “That would explain many things. If you don’t want to marry me, you really shouldn’t look at me as you did earlier. Perhaps you don’t realize you’re doing it?”
Rory gave a sigh and took another gulp of whisky as William carried in their meal. Maybe another blow to the head was what he needed to bring him to his senses. He was almost ready to agree with her that he was out of his right mind.
Later, when he lay in the hammock hung on the far side of the curtain from the bunk, listening to Alyson undress and wash, he again contemplated a good solid blow on the head to put him out of his misery. He could hear the rustle of her petticoats as she slipped them off and could almost see her standing there in her billowy sheer chemise. She would take that off too, so she might wash. He already knew she wore nothing else beneath that, and he tried not to groan as he imagined all those soft round curves uncovered. Why couldn’t she be one of those gangly women who needed all the hoops and stuffing to make them round? Or even one of those stout females who needed extra stays to cinch them in, and even then looked as broad as they were tall? Why did she have to be so confounded perfect that he could find no fault or flaw?
“Shall I turn the lantern out, Maclean?”
He felt her voice whispering in his ear even though he knew she had not gone beyond the curtain. He let the hammock sway and couldn’t bring himself t
o answer. It took all the strength he possessed just to stay where he was and not get up to see what she wore to bed.
Assuming he was already asleep, Alyson contemplated checking on him to be certain the fever had not returned. Some second sense warned her that might not be wise, and she turned down the lantern instead and climbed into the empty bunk. It would feel very strange to sleep there alone. She almost wished Rory would join her. She had liked having him beside her. He made her feel warm all over, almost as if he were kissing her. Did that have something to do with why men and women married?
If Rory didn’t want to marry her, then she didn’t think any man would. She wasn’t as foolish as he seemed to think. Still, if her inheritance was safe, she need not marry at all.
Curling up inside the blanket, she tried to imagine what it would be like to be married to Rory. He had never even kissed her. His one brief touch had been more exciting than anything Alan had done. She tingled down to her toes just thinking about it.
The day had been a wearing one, and these thoughts carried her off to sleep.
The vision came to her during the night, so Alyson could not tell what was real and what was not. She only knew it was dark, and that she was someplace strange, and that she was afraid. She opened her eyes to see a man hovering over her, pressing against her, pinning her down. His masculine nakedness filled her vision, and terror shivered down her spine as she realized she was naked too.
Whimpering, she lifted her gaze to the man’s face, but she did not need the sight of his wild eyes to tell her it was Rory. When she felt something piercingly hard pressing between her thighs, she started to scream, but he smothered her with his kisses. His hands were hot as they ran down her cold flesh, and she struggled oddly, rising against him as if to push him off. His kisses fed on her mouth, and his hands held her imprisoned. Only when she felt the final pain of his possession did she scream. And scream.
Moon Dreams Page 8