Heart of the Storm (Harlequin Historical)

by Burton, Mary

  A tear trickled down her cheek. She wiped it away. “I’m normally not so ungrateful. There was a time when I was a happy woman.”

  He lifted the hem of the black dress. Absently he rubbed it between his fingers. “Tell me about Peter.” No command this time.

  His question caught her off guard. She wiped another tear from her cheek and faced him. “I don’t want to play this game anymore.”

  “I’m not playing.” He took her left hand in his, absently rubbing her ring finger. The indent left by her wedding ring had vanished. “Tell me why you are running.”

  Wind whipped her hair as she stared into his steady gaze. Power, strength and gentleness radiated from him. He’d been so good to her. And she sensed he was a decent man. He’d keep her secret. But it was a burden he didn’t deserve.

  “No,” she said.

  He frowned.

  “You can trust me, Rachel,” he said softly. “Talk to me. Tell me what is bothering you, who you are afraid of. I can help.”

  Oh, Lord, but she wanted to tell him everything. “Ben, there are some problems no amount of talking or wishing can fix.”

  Ben stared at her a long moment, his face full of questions. He clearly didn’t like it when he couldn’t control a situation.

  Finally he dragged in a deep breath, releasing it slowly as if he’d come to a decision. “The living is hard here, and we don’t have many fancy things, but the water and the ocean are natural barriers to the outside world. If you’re looking for a place to start over or hide, Rachel, this place is it.”

  A place to start over.

  The words tumbled in Rachel’s head. “I need to keep moving.”

  “You’re a beautiful woman. You will stick out when you arrive on the mainland. I’ve no doubt the sailors on the Anna St. Claire took note of you.”

  She remembered the lean, hungry gazes of the sailors. “I’ve been noticed here.”

  “Aye, but we are a close-knit group here. No one will say a word about you if I ask it.”

  So tempting.

  Sunshine glinted on the crests of the rippling waters. The crests sparkled. A fish jumped out of the water.

  Ben laced his fingers between hers. “I can understand if you don’t want to tell me about your past for now. I was there once myself. But you can’t keep running. It’s not safe.”

  He offered a truce. He was willing to let the past be forgotten. A place to start over. “I don’t know if I have the courage to stop running. I’ve turned into a coward.”

  He raised their interlocked hands to his chest. “You are not a coward.”

  Tears burned her throat. Rachel shielded her eyes and stared toward the mainland over the Sound’s waters. It seemed so far away.

  Rachel’s racing heart slowed. She leaned her shoulder against his. He made her feel safe. “I would like to stay for a while.”

  He squeezed her hand. “Good.”

  For the first time in days, Rachel didn’t have the anxious knot in her stomach.

  His gaze dropped to her lips. For a moment neither moved. Then, very slowly, he leaned toward her. She didn’t retreat.

  The kiss was gentle, tentative almost. His lips were soft. They tasted of salt.

  She sensed pent-up energy in Ben but he didn’t demand any more of her. It was Rachel who relaxed into the kiss. The black dress slipped from her grasp and fell to the beach.

  Footsteps sounded on the narrow beach.

  “Ben!”

  Ben pulled back seconds before Timothy hurried up to them. The young man’s face was flushed, his shirttail out, as if he’d run all the way from the lighthouse.

  Embarrassment burned Rachel’s cheeks. She felt wanton. She scooped up her dress and stood. She fussed with the buttons on her borrowed jacket as if they’d suddenly become important.

  Ben rose slowly. There was no hint of apology in his dark eyes.

  Timothy stopped. His gaze darted briefly between the two. “Ben,” the young keeper said. He was out of breath, his face flushed. “Bodies from the Anna St. Claire have washed up on shore.”

  Chapter Eight

  Ben saw the panic that registered on Rachel’s face.

  The idea of seeing bodies from any wreck always set his teeth on edge. He’d been a sailor for many years and had served with many good ones. None deserved to end this way—bloated and deformed from their time in the water.

  However, finding the bodies from the Anna St. Claire meant more to Rachel. They represented a link to a past she desperately wanted to escape.

  “Where are they?” Ben said.

  The young man’s face paled. He’d not seen many dead bodies and the grim task unsettled him. “They washed up about a half mile down the beach.”

  Ben didn’t relish the identification process. He’d seen too many dead seamen this past winter. “How many?”

  Timothy swallowed. “Seven.”

  Rachel smoothed her hands over her hips, clearly nervous. “There were eight men aboard the ship.”

  “Are you sure?” Ben said.

  “Yes, I remember the captain referring to his ‘eight-man crew.’”

  Ben placed his hand in the small of her back. “That’s helpful. Now we know there’s only one man missing.”

  “Will we find the other one?” Timothy asked.

  “Hard to say. Often we don’t find all the bodies. It’s a miracle so many washed up so close to one another.”

  “The first mate talked about the men lowering the lifeboats,” Rachel said.

  Ben nodded. “They were likely in the lifeboat together when it capsized.”

  “By the looks of them, they’ve been on the beach since last night.”

  “I’ll take Rachel back to the cottage,” Ben said. “And then I’ll meet you on the beach.”

  Rachel hesitated. “I’d like to go with you.”

  Ben squinted into the noonday sun. “It’s not a pretty sight.”

  She lifted her chin. “One of the men has something that belongs to me. It’s quite valuable. I’d like it back if it’s possible.”

  He remembered the indention on her ring finger the first night he’d found her. “If there is anything of value on those men, it’s long been stripped off by one of the scavengers. But we can check the bodies for it.”

  She shook her head. “I promise to stay out of your way, but I want to go.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  They arrived at the northern section of the beach an hour later. Timothy had recruited two men from town and together they’d led a cart pulled by donkeys up the beach. Rachel walked behind the cart, Ben several paces ahead of everyone.

  “I claim the best pair of boots,” said a man she’d come to know as Oscar Derbyshire. A grizzled fisherman with stoop shoulders and a deeply wrinkled face, he looked to be past sixty.

  “You got the best boots last time,” said the younger man next to him. A fisherman, also, Clayton Stump wasn’t more than thirty yet his lined face, roughened hands and bent shoulders testified to the countless hours spent handling nets and lures in the hot sun.

  The men’s attitudes toward the dead was mercenary, yet Rachel couldn’t fault them. She’d come for her own selfish reasons. She wanted to know which of the sailors had survived. Captain LaFortune had her ring, the one true link to her past. He and the sailor Rubin had also seen her face.

  Ben stopped and held up his hand. Rachel looked up and one hundred feet ahead saw the bodies. Whatever thoughts she’d had of searching for her ring faded. The lifeless forms lying in the sand tore at her. The men had not been reputable, but they had been living, breathing men just days ago and now they were dead.

  Grim faced, Ben walked ahead while Rachel and the others waited behind. Timothy looked green, but he started to follow Ben.

  Ben turned. “Stay.”

  “I want to help,” Timothy said.

  “You will soon enough. Get your bearings first.”

  The young man nodded, clearly grateful for the reprieve.
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  Oscar shook his head. “I’ve collected dozens of bodies in my time and it never gets easy. The sea can do nasty things to a man.”

  Timothy swallowed.

  Ben moved ahead alone. He knelt in front of one body. Using a piece of driftwood, he lifted the man’s coat.

  “What’s he doing?” Rachel said.

  Oscar pulled chewing tobacco from his pocket and bit off a piece. “Looking for anything that’ll identify the man. Ben likes to notify next of kin if he can.”

  Though the bodies rested over a hundred feet away, the wind carried the smell of the dead. Rachel’s stomach roiled. Clayton leaned against the wagon and shoved his hands into his pockets. “It’s a waste of time if you ask me. No one cares about a bunch of sailors.”

  Oscar spit. “Ben does.”

  Rachel folded her hands over her chest and watched as Ben moved from man to man, checking pockets. He didn’t rush the grim task. Thirty minutes passed before he returned.

  Ben nodded to Oscar and Clayton. His face had paled and his expression had tightened. “You can pick them up.”

  The fisherman nodded and started forward with their cart.

  Timothy glanced over at the dead sailors. “You find anything?”

  “The redheaded one is named Sebastian. There is another named Michaels and one named Rubin. The rest have nothing on them.”

  Rubin—the big sailor that had sailed the seas for forty years—was dead. The one that had called her cursed. An unexpected wave of sadness washed over her.

  “I don’t think the captain is among the dead,” Ben said.

  “He is a big man with a black beard and a blue vest. His name is Antoine LaFortune,” she said.

  Ben stared down at her, his expression unreadable. “He wasn’t there.”

  “Do you think that he’s alive?” she said.

  Ben shrugged but he studied her face closely. “My guess is that he’s dead. And that his body will wash up somewhere else on the beach.”

  Rachel hated the wave of relief that slid through her body.

  “He has what you were looking for?”

  “Yes.”

  “Likely then it’s lost for good with him.”

  Rachel stared out at the calm sea. She didn’t wish harm to LaFortune, but she prayed her ring rested at the bottom of the ocean.

  Ben took her arm. “Let’s get back to the cottage.”

  She offered no argument. “Thank you.”

  Ben gave the sailors’s belongings to Timothy and ordered him to make a note in the keeper’s log, while Oscar and Clayton set about the grim task of collecting and burying the bodies.

  Taking Rachel’s arm, Ben started back toward the cottage with her. They walked in silence most of the way.

  “Have you dealt with many bodies before?” Rachel asked Ben as they approached the cottage.

  “Twenty-nine this winter alone.” His hands were shoved into his pockets. The wind blew his hair.

  “I don’t think I’ll ever be able to get that sight out of my mind.”

  “It’s a sad part of life here, Rachel.”

  “When I look at the lighthouse this morning, I thought about rescues, not death.”

  “There’d be a lot more deaths without the light.”

  “You make a difference here,” she said. “That must feel good.”

  “On the good days when I can save someone it does. Days like today, I wonder if I’m not fighting an uphill battle.”

  She laid her hand on his arm. “You’re not.”

  He stopped and stared at her a long moment. Only inches from her, the energy from him felt like a touch.

  “My shift doesn’t start until sunset,” Ben said as they approached the cottage. “There’s a tub there if you’d liked to take a bath. I can set it up for you.”

  Ben could not have given her a greater gift. She wanted nothing more than to wash away the memories of the sailors. “Truly? My skin is coated with salt and sand.”

  “A good scrubbing will take care of that.”

  As they walked up the steps, Rachel’s spirits buoyed. She breathed deeply, grateful to be alive and, for now, safe.

  “I’ll fill the tub for you,” Ben said.

  Rachel followed him up the back steps to the porch and into the kitchen. On the table sat her black dress that she’d dropped off at the cottage before they’d gone to see the bodies. Next to it sat a package wrapped in brown paper.

  Attached was a card. Rachel picked up the card and read, “From Ida.”

  She shrugged off her coat and hung into on a peg next to his. “Ida has sent me a package.”

  Ben raised an eyebrow. “What is it?”

  She undid the twine and unwrapped the brown paper. Inside was the blue ready-made dress. She touched the soft package. “Did you have anything to do with this?”

  Ben peered over her shoulder. “No.”

  “Why would Ida give this to me?”

  “I’ve never known her to give a dress away. I think she has a soft spot for you.” Then, as if reading her thoughts, “If you accept the dress, it will mean more to her than you.”

  Tears choked her throat. Ida understood Rachel as if she’d once been in the same position herself.

  “Let’s get that bath of yours ready,” Ben said.

  She wiped a tear from her face. “You don’t have to do that for me.”

  “It’s no trouble.”

  “Just show me where everything is. I’ll take care of it.” She had a chance to start over and she needed to learn how to live outside her gilded cage. In truth, she didn’t know the first thing about caring for herself.

  He shoved his fingers through his windswept hair. “You ever filled a bath before?”

  Rachel shrugged. “No, but I imagine its not complicated.”

  He smiled indulgently. “The simplest chores can take hours if you don’t know how to do it.”

  “Good heavens, I’m not helpless.” She’d be grateful for a task now. “I can turn the knobs and fill my own tub.”

  “Trust me,” Ben said. “You want me to do this job.”

  “If you show me to the bathing room, I can take it from there.”

  “No bathing room here, princess.”

  “Then where on earth do you keep your tub?”

  He went to a small door off the kitchen and opened it. From a peg on the wall, he pulled down a tin tub and set in the middle of the kitchen. The tub looked more like an oversize bucket.

  Amused, Ben raised an eyebrow. “Expecting something a little different?”

  She could sit in the tub but she wouldn’t be able to stretch out her legs. “It’s so small.”

  He stared at her, amused.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend.”

  He grinned. “As long as we’re just talking about the tub, none was taken.”

  The innuendo wasn’t lost on her. She’d heard the servants in her father’s house often enough. She blushed. “Of course, I referred to the tub.”

  He laughed. “Don’t look so scandalized, princess. I was joking.”

  Her face grew redder by the minute. She’d never joked with a man before and didn’t know what to say. “It won’t take long to fill at least.”

  “Its more work than you’re used to, I’ll wager.”

  “I can do it.” She glanced around the room and spotted the pots on the stove. “Where’s the water?”

  “There’s a cistern outside,” he said patiently.

  “Outside.”

  “Gets better and better, doesn’t it?”

  He’d read her mind. “No, no, its fine. I should have no problem.”

  Ben snatched up a pot from the stove. “Come with me.”

  She followed him outside to a large drum next to the house. “It looks a hundred years old.”

  “Mental rusts here in a matter of months. It’s the salt air. The only fresh water here is rainwater. The cistern catches it.”

  She watched as he dipped the pot in the wa
ter. She looked in the pot. “The water is a little yellow.”

  “The rust. But its safe.”

  He carried the bucket inside and placed it on the stove. “Let me fill the others.”

  “I can do it.”

  “It’s hard work, princess.”

  “I’m not afraid of work.”

  He took her hand in his and turned it over. “Not one callus. Lily-white.”

  Shivers danced down her spine. “Its time they had a few calluses.”

  He traced his finger over a small scar that hooked around her thumb. “How’d you get this?”

  She’d cut it when Peter had forced her to pick up a broken tumbler he’d smashed against the wall.

  Rachel pulled her hand away, curling her fingers over the scar. “I was careless.”

  He held her fist in his hand. “I doubt you had a careless day in your life.”

  She saw the questions in his eyes. “I need to get ready for my bath.”

  He shrugged. “How about I hang around while you fill the tub, just in case it’s more work than you realized.”

  “That’s not necessary.”

  “It is to me.”

  The quiet determination in his words touched her. She tore her gaze from his. “It’s no great mystery. Fill the pot with water and heat it.” She went to the stove and picked up an empty pot. The pot weighed more than she’d imagined. Ben had made it look so effortless.

  The bucket thumped against the side of the stove and then her legs as she pulled it off the stove. Her life had changed forever and the time had arrived for her to learn independence. However, it would have been nicer to tackle this little task without an audience.

  Pot in hand, she headed out the back door to the cistern. She dunked the bucket in the water but discovered that with it full, it was too heavy to lift.

  “Good Lord, it weighs a ton.”

  “Had enough?” Ben said.

  The wind had swept his black hair over his eyes. He looked quite handsome.

  She blew a strand of hair out of her eyes. “No. One way or another I’ll get the pot inside.” The pot handle bit into her fingers as she tried to lift it.