Roselyn kept her victory smile in check. “Of course, Major Hansen. I’ll be very careful.” She remained steadfast, her hand gripping the back of the chair so hard her knuckles turned white until Major Hansen’s footstep faded completely.
“What are you doing here, you crazy woman?” Jack was already at the bars with his right arm extended towards her when she turned from the sound of Major Hansen’s retreat. His grasping fingers hooked her skirt and, with a little giggle, she let him pull her to him. They twined their arms through the bars and managed a deep kiss even while the iron pressed tightly against their faces.
“I am part of Plan A,” she told him when they finally came up for air.
“You shouldn’t be here,” Jack told her before he pressed his lips to hers again.
“But if I didn’t come how would you ever get this?” Roselyn gave a little shimmy until she heard a thud on the stone floor. With a broad smile, she took a side-step. The skirt of her dress swayed enough that Jack saw the gun on the floor.
Jack bent quickly, scooped up the gun, and shoved it in the back waistband of his trousers.
“You’re the loveliest jail breaker I’ve ever had the pleasure of being sprung by.” Jack chuckled, the familiar sound shimmering over her body in the most delightful way.
“I suspect that’s not saying much,” Roselyn teased. “I’ve seen your regular crew.” She emphasized her point with a comical shudder.
“True.” He nodded. “I’ve rarely ravished my accomplices in gratitude either.” He squeezed her waist.
“Ow! You won’t get to ravish this one either if you stab me to death.”
Jack loosened his grip. “That little quip calls for all kinds of bawdy comments.”
“We don’t have time.” Roselyn slid her finger into a hole at the sash of her dress and withdrew a throwing knife which she promptly handed through the bars. She did the same with four more in the hem of her dress.
“Good Lord, woman.” Jack slid the knives in his boot. “What else you got in there?
“Just one other thing.” Feeling quite coy, she enjoyed seeing Jack’s eyes widen when she dipped her hand down the bodice of her dress and pulled out the cell key.
“How?”
“Amos.”
“Amos is with you? Who else?” Jack slid the key soundlessly into the cell door and, with concentrated slowness, swung the door open enough to slip out.
“Big Jim, Little Bess, Blake, and some of the other men from the crew. The rest are back preparing the Revenge.”
Jack drew her to him, her body finally flush against his without the hindrance of the jail bars between them. “You don’t have anything else lethal or poky in there, do you?”
Roselyn giggled again. The man made her giddy. She shook her head. This kiss was much more satisfying.
“How did you know to find Big Jim?” He asked and took her hand. He led her to the hall way where they backed flush against the wall so he could peer around the corner.
“Amos knew. I had no idea.”
Jack chuckled again. “Amos! And how did you come to know Amos?”
“Quite by accident I assure you.”
“You’ll have to tell me everything later. After I’ve given you your reward.” When he ogled her and raised his eyebrows suggestively it affected her in a completely different way than when the repulsive soldiers outside did the same thing.
“You promise?”
Jack snorted and then crushed her against the wall in a brief but mind numbing kiss. “You’d have made a lousy preacher’s wife, my buxom rose.”
Roselyn knew her happiness must be evident on her face. How she loved this man, this pirate, her pirate.
“What’s the signal?”
“Big Jim said we’d know it when we heard it.” Right on cue, a roar like a cannon blast sounded outside.
“There we go.” Jack stuck his head around the corner. “Come on.”
Excitement surged through her body. Roselyn had never been so exhilarated. Major Hansen was nowhere to be seen when they reached the outer office. Gray smoke poured in through the windows and she could see the flames of a burning building through the open doorway.
“They blew up the powder stores!” Jack hooted.
Outside, the flames shot so high from the outbuilding some of the palms trees had caught fire, too. Another blast rocked the compound sending debris flying. She was sure she screamed but the roar of the fire and yelling men drowned her out completely. Jack pulled her further away from the chaos, his arm draped over her head to protect her from the fallout.
“Here! Over here!” Amos appeared seated on a mule and holding the reins of a horse. Tied to the saddle horn of a stallion were two white bags.
“Good man.” Jack clapped the smiling boy on the back. Roselyn knew the boy must be feeling very proud of himself.
She gave the boy a kiss on the cheek. “Are you having fun?”
“Best time ever.” Amos’ grin was epic. Roselyn nodded in agreement.
Jack swung a leg over the saddle and pulled her up behind him. Amos followed behind when Jack spurred his stallion into a gallop.
Roselyn marveled that the escape had gone so smoothly. She wasn’t sure what she’d expected but certainly more of a fight from the soldiers.
“Hold tight, Rose,” Jack called over his shoulder. “Here they come.”
A glance behind them confirmed a phalanx of soldiers had just joined the chase with Major Hansen in the lead. Amos peeled off and headed down a side street, but Jack stayed the course down the main drag of town. Cresting a hill, Roselyn could see the harbor. The Revenge looked poised to sail at a moment’s notice.
A shot whizzed past their heads, then another. “Hurry, Jack, they’re gaining.”
“Almost there,” he answered back, “keep your head down, sweetheart.”
They were close enough to the harbor now that she could smell the water. But the soldiers were also near enough behind them that she could hear the labored breathing of their horses. Another shot fired off now would hit them for certain. Roselyn closed her eyes and clung to Jack’s back, her fingers laced around his chest.
Jack yanked the reins and the horse’s feet skidded over the cobblestones. She yelped, certain her brief career as a jail-breaking accomplice was over. With her head pressed against his back, she felt Jack’s laugh rather than heard it, the deep rumble vibrating through his body.
“I love you, Jim,” Jack yelled and raised his arm in a salute.
Roselyn risked lifting her head to glance behind them. Huge carts loaded with casks and crates lumbered into the street cutting off the pursuing soldiers. Big Jim gave a subtle nod in their direction before turning his attention to the cart drivers. All the yelling of directions and the horses bucking created a scene of total chaos that Big Jim managed to subtly make even more complicated.
By the time the horses clattered over the boards at the pier, Roselyn knew they were home free. Amos trotted up seconds later and the rest of the landed crew from the Revenge were already waiting for them with the boats. With no time to lose, Jack got them back to the ship in great haste – Amos included.
Only, it wasn’t Neptune’s Revenge that bobbed in the bay where they’d left her. Roselyn looked out across the water and spied a different ship in its place, the Sea Rose flying the Union Jack.
“Sea Rose?” she asked him.
Her pirate smiled at her, a scoundrel’s gleam in his eye and a rogue’s smile on his lips. “The captain named her after his lover.”
She stared at him quizzically.
“The time has come, sweet Rose. The world’s changing and I’m changing with it. It’s time for me to go home.”
“What’s at home that you don’t have here? I thought this was your life.” A little spark lit in her chest and flickered with hope.
“Respectability is home, in England,” he told her on the skiff that took them back to the ship. “I’m going to need respectability when I get there.”
>
“Why? Are you afraid of what your father will say?” she asked after the sailors pulled her into the makeshift swing to the deck of the ship.
“My father’s dead. My brother is earl now and I don’t give one whit what he thinks,” he told her matter-of-factly. “I need the respectability for my wife and my children.”
“Is this wife and children waiting for you in England then?” The flicker of hope died out.
He gazed at her and shook his head when he gave the order to cast off and a flurry of activity erupted on deck. Jack steered her to his cabin.
“You’re getting married then?” A giggle bubbled in her throat, confidence and hope building again.
“If my Sea Rose will have me.” Jack closed his cabin door, and bolted the lock. The giggle did escape when he knelt in front of her. “Miss Weldon, Roselyn, I have a name that’s still good, and more money than Midas. And, I give you my heart.”
She pulled him to his feet and answered him with a long, sweet kiss.
“If your name’s not Jack, then what is it?”
The pirate dipped a low bow before her. “Honorable John Wallingham, brother to the Earl of Harrington.”
“So, John,” she purred to her new fiancé, “Do you want to play cards? I still have a lot of questions.”
He raised an eyebrow. “I’m fairly sure that I’m not going to want to answer many questions,” he teased.
“Too bad,” she said, loosening the laces of his shirt, “because we’re playing by Pirate Rules.”
The End
Wonder what happened to Jack and Roselyn’s children?
Lady Belling’s Secret
The first in the Secret Series is available in print at most online retailers
Chapter One
“Thomas? Is that really you?”
In fact, it was. Thomas had not yet cleared his solicitor’s office doorway before the stunning redhead nearly launched herself at him from across the well-appointed lobby.
“You are addressing the Earl of Harrington, miss.” The solicitor was a stuffy blowhard, as all good solicitors surely must be.
“I know exactly who he is,” the redhead declared. She beamed at him from less than an arm’s length away.
Thomas opened his mouth to say he was sorry he couldn’t say the same for her, though he would be more than pleased to make her acquaintance, when her identity struck him like a lightning bolt. “Frankie? Oh my God.”
“How long have you been back?” She smiled at him, all teeth and perfect lips. Thomas suspected it was her glorious smile that reminded him who she was. Once he knew it was her, he was flabbergasted that he hadn’t recognized her instantly, but it had been five years—five years which had treated her extraordinarily well. “Don’t tell me you’ve been back in London for days and didn’t come home because of what happened.” She took a step back and her excitement paled.
“Of course not. I docked last night. I was going to come to the house today.” He ran a hand through his hair and made an effort not to ogle.
“I certainly hope so, because if Mama found out you had arrived in town without coming to see her, she’d flay you.” She reached out a long-fingered hand and touched his coat sleeve. Her grin had faded not one bit. She was beautiful. She’d always been a pretty girl, but now she was a lovely, lovely woman.
A little blonde stepped up next to Frankie with her hand extended. “Good to see you home safely, Thomas.”
“Miss Sinclair! This is such a surprise. I surely hadn’t expected such a greeting at my solicitor’s this early in the morning.”
“I just can’t believe you’re home,” Frankie repeated, shaking her head.
“Yes, yes, he’s home indeed.” The impatient voice of the solicitor broke through the happy reunion. “I have a very busy day, Miss Sinclair. I don’t have time to dawdle between appointments.”
Thomas had forgotten what a spitfire Frankie’s friend was until she turned and gave Mr. Berger a look. “Certainly, sir, I’ll be with you in a moment. Frankie, you needn’t stay with me. I can take care of what I need to without you.”
“Are you certain?” Frankie asked, hope filling her voice.
“Absolutely. If you’re here with me, you’ll drive me crazy fidgeting and wishing you were elsewhere. You visit with Thomas. I’ll find you later.”
Thomas knew his grin was enormous. “Superb. You’re the one who can help me with my next errand.”
“Are you sure you want me?” Francesca asked. Her eyes filled with hope.
“Will you be able to control yourself in my carriage?” He grinned at her, pleased that his jest was taken in the spirit it was intended when she flashed her toothy smile back at him.
“Miss Sinclair? I really do have a very busy day.” Mr. Berger made a grand, sweeping gesture towards his office.
Frankie kissed her friend on the cheek. “Thank you. I’ll see you at home later.” She linked her arm through Thomas’s, and he swung her out the door.
“I was so sorry to hear about your brother,” Frankie told him and squeezed his arm. Thomas raised an eyebrow at her. “Well, I wasn’t sorry exactly, but that’s not a very nice thing to say. When I noted that the accident couldn’t have happened to nicer people, Mama lectured me for over an hour.”
Thomas grasped her about the waist—a tiny waist, he duly noted—and set her up in his high phaeton. He snapped the reins, and they were off, gamboling down Chancery Lane headed for St James Square. Silence stretched for a few long moments while Thomas navigated the carriage through the busy morning traffic. Most of ton society would still be in bed for hours yet, but the working class of London was busy going about their business.
He glanced at Francesca’s face and could almost see the wheels spinning in her head while he suspected she was weighing her options of what to say next. Of course, he could ease her mind and tell her that all was forgiven, that he never thought of the incident anymore, but that would be a lie.
“So what is this errand?” Apparently, she wasn’t prepared to dive into murkier waters yet. That was fine. Thomas had time.
“It’s about the house.” He turned the horses onto Upper Brooks Street. His home loomed at the end of the block, a giant white-and-gray stone building. It hunkered there, regal and important, as if it had a more strenuous job than holding down the dirt. “I can’t very well have it torn down, even though it is a monument to my father’s desperation for status.”
Frankie turned on the seat and gazed at him in shock. “You can’t really mean you want to tear it down? I understand your feelings, but it’s a beautiful house regardless.”
He slowed the horses as he approached the front. Already a lad from the stables waited at the walk for his return. Thomas took in the façade and tried to appraise it with an unjaded eye. From an architectural standpoint it was a beautiful building. His mother and father would have demanded no less from their London residence. But, unlike his parents, Thomas had no love for the bricks and stone that made up the three stories of Wallingham House.
“I think I understand how you feel.” Frankie’s tone was soft and quiet, soothing. “But it’s your house now. You can do anything you want with it. It would be a shame, though, to let him win. Wouldn’t it?”
Thomas pulled his eyes from the second-story corner window that had been his when he stayed there and turned to the lady on the seat next to him. Her eyes were such a vivid shade of kelly green they mesmerized him for a moment until she blinked and he pulled himself out of his reverie. He hopped down from the carriage and extended his hand to her. “I guess it would.” He smiled at her, and the concern in her eyes lessened.
“So how can I help?”
“If it’s not to be demolished, then I need to make it mine.”
Frankie brightened. “Oh. Can I help redecorate?”
His butler swung open the massive oak door, revealing the foyer and the first of the sculptures and paintings which had been his mother’s obsession. Thomas followed Frankie dow
n the hall, staying close behind her as she surveyed each objet d’art. Her scent, a beguiling combination of rosemary and lemon, lingered behind her, urging him to press his nose to her hair.
“You know, I think I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve been here,” Frankie told him, “which is funny considering the amount of time you spent in ours.”
“Even after I left?” He slipped a hand to the small of her back, a gesture which should have been entirely innocent yet felt anything but. He could feel the flex of her hips and spine as she continued her stroll, and the intimacy of that sensation warmed him.
“Especially after you left.” She turned to face him, and Thomas had to step back in order to avoid her breast grazing his arm. What a shame, really, since at this very moment he had a great deal of curiosity about Frankie’s breasts. “There was no way Mama was going to support your mother socially after that, and I quite agreed with her.”
“Your mother never said anything in her letters.” The duchess’s letters had been few and far between, but still as frequent as one would have expected considering there was a war and he was at sea much of the time.
“Well, she wouldn’t have, would she?”
No she wouldn’t. The duchess had been his most stalwart protector. Thomas had long known where the Belling family’s loyalties lay. Even after leaving on a bad note, he’d still believed that he would be welcomed back into that family upon his return. That knowledge was what had kept him sane when the cannonballs were flying. If he’d not had them… Thomas shuddered. There would have been nothing to live for.
“What should I do with all this…” Thomas waved his hand in a sweeping gesture, encompassing all the nonsense his mother amassed, “…stuff?”
“Is the whole house like this?”
“Indeed.” He steered her into the front parlor where there was no shortage of useless items for her to assess, then he turned to the patiently waiting butler. “Masters, have someone bring tea and something to eat. I’m starving.”
The Sea Rose Page 7