THE PRICE OF PASSAGE
“You wish to strike a bargain, but I warn you the price may be high. Tell me your terms”—he smiled coldly—“and I’ll give you mine.”
He finally seemed to have had an effect on her. The color in her cheeks rose; her steady gaze faltered. “I wish to reach another port.” She hesitated only a moment. “Take me, and I will be yours.”
Brent McClain arched his brow still higher and kept silent for a moment. “Perhaps I should get you something to eat.”
“Then you accept my offer?” she asked.
“Not yet,” he drawled. “But whether I do or not, I don’t care to have you swooning upon me again. I want a few more minutes to decide whether or not you will be worth the passage.”
For a moment she lost her elusive calm; she stared at him as if she meant to slit his throat. But the color drained from her face, and the murderous gleam left her eyes. She stared at him and smiled. “I assure you, Captain, I’ll be worth the passage.”
More sweeping historical romance by Heather Graham
Lie Down in Roses
Blue Heaven, Black Night
Princess of Fire
The King’s Pleasure
Come the Morning
Conquer the Night
Knight Triumphant
Seize the Dawn
The Lion in Glory
When We Touch
Ondine
TOMORROW THE GLORY
HEATHER GRAHAM
ZEBRA BOOKS
KENSINGTON PUBLISHING CORP.
http://www.kensingtonbooks.com
All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.
Table of Contents
THE PRICE OF PASSAGE
More sweeping historical romance by Heather Graham
Title Page
Dedication
Copyright Page
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Epilogue
About the Author
To my husband Dennis Frank Pozzessere,
with love and thanks for Gettysburg, Appomattox,
Fort Sumter, and all the rest.
ZEBRA BOOKS are published by
Kensington Publishing Corp.
119 West 40th Street
New York, NY 10018
Copyright © 1985 by Heather Graham Pozzessere
Previously published under the name Shannon Drake.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.
To the extent that the image or images on the cover of this book depict a person or persons, such person or persons are merely models, and are not intended to portray any character or characters featured in the book.
If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the Publisher and neither the Author nor the Publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”
Zebra and the Z logo Reg. U.S. Pat. & TM Off.
ISBN: 978-1-4201-3821-4
eISBN-13: 978-1-4201-4702-5
eISBN-10: 1-4201-4702-1
Prologue
Charleston, South Carolina
December 1860
The night was dark, the weather cold and damp, yet on no other December twentieth had the holiday spirit ever so charged Charleston. Church bells tolled, cannons thundered, guns burst out in revelry.
The cheers of the crowds could still be heard upon the Battery. Madness had come to the people.
South Carolina had just declared herself out of the Union.
There were a few men who did not celebrate the final coming of secession, although most had realized it was inevitable after the election of the Illinois farmboy, Lincoln. As long ago as May, South Carolina’s governor had sent letters to the leaders of sister cotton states regarding secession.
Yes, most men of intellect had seen this day as inevitable. But there were a few men, loyal to the South, who did not join in with the drunken crowds and dream of glory. A few men knew that conflict would come, that brother would face brother, and that the land they cherished would be bathed in blood before any declaration of independence could stand as fact . . .
One of these men stood on the wall of the Battery, his rugged face turned seaward, his powerful work-roughened hands stuffed into the pockets of his frock coat. He was a southerner, and yet he mourned tonight. He was well traveled and well versed in politics and he knew damned well that Abe Lincoln wasn’t going to bow a courtly goodbye to any state....
It was early yet, of course. Today South Carolina stood alone. But Mississippi and Florida were ready to spread their wings of independence. Texas, Georgia, Arkansas—many would follow the lead of the Palmetto State and secede from the Union.
Already Brent McClain had been approached by prominent leaders in the South. More states would certainly vote for secession; a southern coalition would be formed. And just in case the damned Yankees felt like causing trouble, the South would need to form an army. And a navy. And when the navy was formed, the South would call upon her loyal sons to give of themselves and of their ships.
With his steel-gray eyes focused broodingly on the water, Brent thought wryly that his reputation as a sea captain who could face any tempest at sea and maneuver safely among the most treacherous shoals would now cast him into the thick of things. Well-informed men knew already that the North would try to block southern harbors; when that happened, men of cunning and courage would be needed to run the blockades.
Brent felt a sharp stab of pain as a shiver riddled through him. No one could prevent what was unfolding; time and destiny were upon them all. Yet he had a fear that everything that was unique and beautiful about a certain breed of men and women was about to come to an end. He pictured South Seas, majestic beneath magnolias and Florida moss, and with just that vision of his family’s St. Augustine plantation in his mind, he felt a warmth seep into him. He eschewed a number of the so-called gentlemanly pursuits, but he had loved the drawing room where his mother had once played the spinet; he had a penchant for fine brandy after the hunt, for sleek Georgian columns that stood graceful sentinel.
He had built South Seas with his father and brother. He had tended the fields along with the freed blacks and Indians. The plantation had cost them blood and sweat and tears, and he’d die before . . .
He sighed. When the fight came, he’d be ready. But he couldn’t believe that the Yankees were all damned cowards. Or that it would all be over in a few months. He had sailed into too many northern ports to live with such a delusion.
It was cold on the Battery. Why he continued to stare seaward, facing the brisk breeze of winter, he didn’t know. He should seek shelter within his comfortable master cabin aboard the Jenni-Lyn. A good tot of brandy and he could forget the portent of things to come.
Something, some slight movement, attracted his attention northward along the Battery.
A woman stood there, a silhouette framed by the harbor light and the
glow of the moon. She was too far away for him to have actually heard her; the movement alone must have caught his eye.
She stood perfectly still now, her attention focused on Fort Moultrie, a Union outpost.
First curiosity, then irritation, compelled him to move toward her. The hour was approaching midnight; no respectable woman would be alone on the harbor at this time. Yet as he closed the distance between them in a long-legged stride, he discovered to his surprise that she could be no common harlot; her clothing was far too rich. Beneath a mantle of deep black velvet she wore a silk receiving dress in shimmering silver pearl. The bell of her skirt informed him that her crinoline was of the latest fashion, as was the waterfall effect of her honey-blond hair.
She was a lady of consequence, and yet she was alone in the darkness when even some good men were so filled with bourbon that they were potential rapists and thieves.
He came to an abrupt halt within feet of where she stood, and she remained still, shivering against the cold.
Brent uttered a curse of exasperation beneath his breath; he was not taken in by the lures of the female sex; he had known too many women, both ladies and harlots, not to realize that most members of the “gentler sex” were capable of conducting themselves like spitting alley cats. The finest drawing room tactics in the world couldn’t always hide the claws of some of the female sex. In fact, he thought a bit dryly, he preferred the company of a good honest whore over that of the southern belles who were determined with wide-eyed innocence to drag him into their bedrooms.
But he had been raised in the gallant South. And he couldn’t leave a woman standing alone on the Battery when the streets were full of overzealous revelers. She might deserve whatever came her way, but . . . hell, he had to find out what she was doing. It would plague his conscience if something happened to her.
“Madam,” he began, only to stop short when she whirled to him, emitting a startled cry of alarm, obviously shocked to have her silent vigil broken. It was apparent she had thought herself alone.
And as she turned, he discovered that she was incredibly beautiful. Stunning blue eyes as dark and turbulent as the night sea met his, eyes that hypnotized, framed by lashes of darkest midnight velvet. Her nose was small and straight, set between high cheekbones in the slender face of an aristocrat. Her mouth, ruby red from the cold, was compressed in a grim line, yet it gave hint of defined fullness and passion.
She was one cat he’d be glad to meet in the night, no matter how sharp her claws.
“Madam,” he began again as a strong breeze whipped in from the sea. The wind caught the balloon of crinoline and skirts, and before he could say anything else he found himself reaching out to fold her swaying form into his arms before she could plummet to the icy waters below the wall.
She was very light, and very, very cold in his arms. As he held her he heard a sound that was part whimper, part sigh. Her face turned parchment white, and her slight body went limp.
“Jesus,” he murmured, his tone harsh with both concern and irritation. He should have left her alone. Now he had a swooning woman on his hands, and he hadn’t the faintest notion where she belonged.
He stood in uncharacteristic indecision for several seconds, wondering what to do with his fallen beauty. He was not a native of Charleston; he had nothing to offer but the hospitality of his ship, and with his crew aboard, it was hardly the hospitality one would want to offer a well-bred lady.
If she was a well-bred lady. Despite all outward appearances, no southern lady should have been alone on the Battery in the midst of the city’s celebrations. He shrugged. The majority of his crew were probably still celebrating. And just as he had no delusions about Yankees, he had no great delusions about women. He’d spent many an amusing night in the bedroom of a “chaste” widow.
She grew colder in his arms. With another exclamation of irritation he turned smartly on his heels and briskly carried the woman to the berth of the Jenni-Lyn.
Thankfully, most of his men were still reveling within the taverns and whorehouses of Charleston. He met only Charlie McPherson as he boarded the Jenni-Lyn, and one look from the captain’s storm-gray eyes silenced any mocking comments that might have come from McPherson’s tongue. Charlie stood aside as Brent strode the deck toward the master cabin, curiously eyeing the lovely burden his captain carried, but asking only if Brent would be requiring anything.
“Brandy, Charlie,” Brent replied. “And smelling salts.”
“We don’t carry no smelling salts!” Charlie declared indignantly.
“Then brandy,” Brent replied impatiently. “And fast.”
“Aye-aye, Captain McClain! Aye-aye!”
Grumbling something about women, Charlie moved to carry out his errand. Brent kicked open his cabin door and carefully laid the woman on his bunk.
She was still deathly pale, deathly cold. He reached for a heavy wool blanket and attempted to cover her, then gave up in disgust as the hoop of her crinoline sent the blanket flying back at him. Cursing softly in annoyance, he slipped his hands beneath the cumbersome silk folds of her gown until he found the hooks of the crinoline, released them, and eased the monstrosity of fashion from its wearer.
His annoyance abated somewhat as he touched her. He felt the curve of her hips, and the trim roundness of her buttocks. Her belly was smoothly flat, and as he drew the crinoline from her, his hands grazed over flanks that were long and lean and wickedly shapely. Heat rose in his loins from the intimacy he had begun with irritation, and it created a greater anger within him. He didn’t know who the hell she was, and he’d be damned if he’d be trapped into marriage by accusations of having compromised someone’s daughter. He’d seen the innocent little trick played one too many times.
She moaned slightly as he maneuvered her frame, but still she remained pale, the thick curls of her lashes never leaving her cheeks. Brent wrapped her in the blanket, cradling her onto his lap and against the warmth that exuded from his own frame. Charlie appeared with the brandy; Brent gruffly requested that he pour a glass.
“Where’d ye find her, Captain?” McPherson inquired curiously, studying the girl and apparently gaining interest as he discovered her startling beauty.
“On the Battery,” Brent replied briefly. “That will be all, Charlie. I can handle things from here.”
Charlie scratched his grizzled face, loath to give up the excitement of the captain boarding his ship with the beautiful mystery creature. And stone cold out, as it were! Charlie could barely suppress a chuckle, he was so dying to rib his captain. Last he’d seen, Captain Brent McClain would need to knock the ladies out to make them leave him alone, not to secure their company. McClain liked women well enough; and his steel-gray stare seemed to devastate them. But whether he chose his conquests from the streets or the plantations, he assessed them with his bold gaze first, playing his bedroom games only with those who knew the rules. He was reputed to be a daredevil rogue, and though he lacked the polish of a number of his contemporaries, women seemed drawn to the very rough edges that set him apart. His hands were callused and his muscles hard from the work he chose to do; his features were ruggedly hewn with determination and his manner was never that of indulgent flattery. It was damn surprising that he was ministering to a woman with the vapors; normally if a girl thought to flutter her lashes and faint, Brent would step back with contempt for her airs and let others do the “rescuing.”
But though Captain McClain could drink and roar and whore with the best of them, he was, in general, a discreet man, a gentleman, born and bred in the South. He was a second son who had won his own fortune with the sweat of his brow and the strain of healthy muscles, but still he had been raised to uphold a certain code of honor. He did not seduce innocents.
In short, Charlie found it hard to believe Brent had accosted a young lady for immoral purposes.
But then what the damned hell else was he doing with her in his cabin? No man in his rational senses could look upon the face and form of
that girl and not think a few immoral thoughts . . .
“Charlie!” Brent growled.
“Aye-aye, Captain,” Charlie mumbled, backing toward the cabin door. “But I’d get rid of her corset, if’n I were you, Cap. I seen a lady pass out in a play at Richmond, and they blamed it on those damn bone traps. Yep, Cap,” Charlie repeated, meeting McClain’s frosty eyes and moving backward more hastily. “That sure is what I’d do.”
Charlie closed the door behind him. Brent eyed the woman and with an irate growl, took a long swig of the brandy.
Then he touched the fiery liquid to her lips, tilted her head and the glass, and allowed the brandy to trickle into her mouth. She choked and sputtered and coughed, whimpered slightly with a limp wave of a hand, and slowly opened her indigo eyes.
There was pain in them, Brent thought at first, pain so sweeping that it darkened the color to something deeper than the sea, more tempestuous than a storm that thundered and lashed the oceans, but that look of pain was gone so quickly that he thought his own eyes had played a trick.
Still, she didn’t appear at all horrified to find herself in his cabin. She glanced at him, straightened, and allowed an astute gaze to ascertain her surroundings. Her eyes returned to his.
“Where is this place, please, sir?”
“You are aboard a ship, madam, the Jenni-Lyn.”
“And you cared for me?” she queried, her cheeks at last darkening with the hint of a blush. Apparently she did realize she was minus her crinoline.
Tomorrow the Glory Page 1