Grayson greeted her at the door. “Good morning, Charlie. I thought you’d bring Jaxon.”
“There was an emergency at Imelia’s. He’ll send word if you’re needed.”
“Fine, let’s get started. Come inside. This is Judge Brady and this is my secretary Robert Evers.”
Each man shook her hand. “Robert will witness your signature and Judge Brady’s signature will be required to declare your father legally dead so you can inherit.”
“Can we get on with this, Bloodworthy,” the judge said. “My wife will never let me hear the end of it if we’re late for church.”
Grayson handed her a quill and opened the inkwell on his desk. He briefly explained each paper before she signed it, then Robert Evers signed each paper after her. The judge asked her to place her hand on the Bible and swear to tell the truth. He explained the consequences of perjury then asked her to tell him about her father’s death. Within a few minutes, everything was done and the judge left with Robert Evers close on his heels leaving Charlie alone with Grayson.
“I want to congratulate you on your story. I thought it was more convincing than the first time you told it. I guess you’ve had time to practice,” he said in a condescending drawl.
“You still think I’m lying?”
“I’m no fool. There is no way you can convince me that you met my brother two weeks ago and now you are going to marry him. I am not going to stand still while you take advantage of him. Over the last five years, he has been through too much rejection and heartache and I’m not going to stand by and watch while you lead him on and blow through his money.”
“You disgust me, Grayson,” Charlie gritted. “How dare you? What you’re saying is because he has a scar on his face, I couldn’t possibly love him? Is it just me or can no woman love him?”
Grayson looked thoughtful for a moment as though carefully considering the question. “There’s a woman out there who could overlook his scars. But that relationship is going to start as a friendship and grow into a fondness. This ‘attraction’ you have doesn’t ring true.”
“Grayson, just because you can’t see past that scar, you think nobody can. When I look at Jax, I only see his eyes and his features. To me that scar is like a moustache, I see it, but it’s just there. It doesn’t detract from his looks and it certainly is not who he is. I can’t believe you’re questioning my love for him. You should be happy that we found each other.”
“I’m questioning more than that. I don’t believe any of it; not the ship, not the money. I think you are some man’s cast off who saw an opportunity to better your situation. You saw Jaxon and knew just by looking at him he would be an easy mark and you took advantage of the situation,” he said tersely. “I’m leaving for Charleston immediately and I’m going to prove you aren’t who you say you are.”
“Then why even have me sign these papers?”
“In a court of law, one must have proof of wrong doings. When you signed these papers and swore in front of the judge, you put the nails in your coffin, sweetheart. I’m going to prove if there is a Charlie Sinclair, you are not her or him.”
“That’s fine, Grayson, go. The harder and deeper you look, the more you’re going to find. Talk to the old-timers. Talk to the doctors and find the one who delivered me, and the one who treated my burns after our house burned down.”
Grayson met her gaze. “And when was this supposed house fire? I would think something like that would have made the newspapers. And most newspapers have archives.”
Charlie paled. She hated to think that there was a written record of that fire. She’d always thought her secrets were safe as long as she kept them to herself.
“It-it would have been seventeen years ago—sometime in the autumn,” she said casually. If she sounded upset, she knew he would pick up on it and that would be exactly where he would start.
“Find the orphanage where I stayed until my father came home from sea. I know there are people in Charleston who knew me before the fire and after my father forced me to pretend I was a boy. You just have to find them. And when you find your proof, I want you to go to the harbor and find out if my ship has come home. Leave these two letters with the harbormaster, one with the post office and this one leave at the bank. Leave half the money from the business account. I don’t want Dr. Kirk to think I’ve stolen anything from him when he comes back. It’s a long shot, but I have to hope that someday the English will release him and he’ll make his way home.”
“What names are these supposed accounts under?”
“Mine is under Charlie Sinclair. My father’s should be under John Sinclair and the business was run under the name Sinclair-Kirk Shipping Company.”
“It would be under Charlie, not Charlotte or Charlene?”
Charlie’s expression went blank as she tried to remember if she was called something different when she was a toddler. She could only remember being called ‘Honey’ by Gertie, their housekeeper. It was irrelevant. That account had been opened when she was much older.
“It’s under Charlie unless someone at the bank wrote it down as Charles since I was a boy when I opened the account. If I were you, I’d always refer to me as ‘he’ when you’re in the bank. No reason to make this more difficult than it’s going to be.”
Charlie had just stepped out of Grayson’s office when Jaxon appeared walking as fast as his uneven stride allowed. His brow was knitted and his expression angry.
“Was everything all right at Imelia’s?”
“Imelia didn’t send for me. Grayson sent that boy so I wouldn’t be at this meeting. He didn’t…?”
“No, nothing like that.” She hesitated. “Grayson doesn’t believe me.” She debated how much to tell him. She didn’t want to make his relationship with Grayson any worse, but she also didn’t want to have secrets from Jaxon. She took a deep breath and decided she would not protect his twin. “He thinks I’m using you and I don’t really love you.”
“Son of a….” Jaxon charged into Grayson’s office. “Grayson, I’ve had it!”
“Am I supposed to sit idly by and let this woman take advantage of you?”
“How is she taking advantage of me?”
“Just look at the bill she’s accumulated at the dress shop. I’ve heard it rumored that she ordered two dozen dresses.”
“I ordered those dresses. She’s going to be my wife. Does my future wife deserve less than what our sisters wear? Shall I buy her two dresses and make her wear those all week long? She came onto my ship with nothing, but the clothes on her back and I had those taken from her and put on our cousin’s corpse. She’s been wearing Jimmy’s garments since.”
“You’re obsessed with her not in love with her. How can you possibly be in love in two weeks’ time? She must be great in bed.”
“No!” Charlie shouted, jumping between them before Jaxon could hit Grayson.
“When you get back, you are going to apologize to Charlie,” Jaxon shouted bowing up on his brother. The vein in Jaxon’s forehead bulged and Charlie could visibly see his pulse.
“When I get back, I’m going to have enough proof to throw her in jail—if she hasn’t run,” Grayson stated with a smirk. “You are so blinded; you just refuse to see what’s right in front of you.”
“For once in our lives, I’ve got something you don’t have and you can’t steal from me. And you can’t stand it.”
“Come now, surely you’re not so naïve that you think she loves you? You were just in the right place, at the right time and ripe for the picking. The whole family tiptoes around you and pretends everything is the same as it was before you were scarred, but it’s not the same. You’re not the same. Then this little chit pays you a little attention and poof, you’re in love. Well, I have news for you. She is never going to fill the hole those scars left in you.”
Jaxon’s lips straightened into a line and Charlie could feel his already tense muscles tightening as he clenched his fists.
“Jaxon, let�
�s go,” Charlie said pushing him towards the door. “The sooner he leaves, the sooner he’s going to find out the truth.”
“And the sooner he’ll be apologizing!” he shouted at his twin over her shoulder.
~ * ~
They walked nearly all the way home in silence before Jaxon spoke.
“Be honest with me; is he going to find anything I should prepare myself for?”
Charlie looked pensive. “I mentioned the fire to him. He may find out the truth.”
“That was hardly a crime, Charlie. That fire was an accident. That’s not the sort of thing he’ll be looking for. He’ll try to prove you have a history of being with men for their money, or you were posing as a man to swindle people, or you owe people money and you ran off without paying.”
“When you mess up with such dire consequences, you try to toe the line. I rebelled a little when I was older, but I’ve never been in any real trouble.”
Jaxon’s eyebrows lowered, knowing that she rarely volunteered information. If he wanted to know something, he had to specifically ask her.
“I’d like to know what you call rebelling.”
“Getting drunk, smoking cigars, bar fights, wenching with my friends,” she said with a mischievous grin.
His eyes opened wide. A lopsided grin crossed his countenance as his imagination pictured it. “Wenching?”
“I couldn’t let the men think of me as wet behind the ears, so I would take a woman to her room and pay her to keep her mouth shut. When I was angry with my father, I would take the women back to my cabin on the ship.”
“And were you often mad at your father?”
The smile died on her lips. “He was a hard man to please.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“The last few years I really began feeling trapped. So, aye, I was often mad at him.”
Jaxon’s grin left as quickly as it came.
“Have you ever thought that maybe it’s not me you love, but the freedom from being trapped in a situation you couldn’t control?”
She interlaced her fingers with his. “Jaxon, never doubt my love for you,” she said stopping. “You’re not having second thoughts?”
“No.”
21
Jaxon stood outside Charlie’s bedroom door clad in a hastily thrown on pair of breeches and a half-buttoned shirt. The cries she made when having a nightmare, filtered out into the corridor. He debated with himself whether to go in. She suffered these nightmares all her life and had been fine, but hearing her in distress bothered him more than he could stand. Clear as a bell, he heard her shouting for her mother. He put his hand on the doorknob. If it turned, he decided, he would go in. Her scream of No! prompted him to turn the knob. It opened without resistance. Jaxon padded unevenly to her bedside. The light from the moon peeked in between partially separated curtains and a lick of golden flames from small fire on the grate in the hearth dimly lit the room.
“Charlie, baby.” He reached out and stroked her hair. “Charlie, wake up, baby.”
She woke up with a start and cussed.
With any other woman, he would have been shocked, but it was a bit endearing when she blasphemed. “Anyone tell you, you swear like a sailor?”
“What are you doing here?” she asked groggily. “Oh, I was having another dream. Did I wake you?”
“No.” He had been lying awake in bed thinking of her and worrying about what Grayson would find. “Do you have these dreams every time you talk about that day?”
She pushed herself into a sitting position and rubbed her face. “No. I think about the fire nearly every day. When I was going to sleep, it occurred to me, if the newspaper had a story about the fire, my father might have read it. What if they knew it was my fault and he read that?”
Jaxon sat on the edge of the bed, took her in his arms and held her.
“I used to wonder if he knew. It would explain a lot.”
“Like what?” he asked placing his lips against her forehead.
Charlie shrugged and seemed hesitant to tell him. “He knew one of the cabin boys used to beat me up when I first came aboard, but he never did anything to stop it. Later, he said he was trying to make me tough and learn to defend myself. But when I did fight back, he took his strop to me. Not once did he as much as cuff Zeb.”
“Surely, you’re joking.”
“Not a bit. But I suppose it worked. When I couldn’t take it anymore, I took my knife and I tried to stab him. German George stopped me. That boy was twice my size and the only ones who ever helped me were the crew.”
“Twice your size and beating up a girl.”
“Zeb didn’t know that.”
He held her away from his chest for a minute. “But your father did. He could dress you in breeches and make you do a man’s day of work, but that in no way makes you anything, but what you are.”
What kind of man would let his daughter get beaten up by a boy twice her size? The bastard probably did know she started the fire and took perverse pleasure out of seeing her bruises. Jaxon stroked her cheek. “I just can’t imagine what your childhood was like.”
“You make it sound worse than it really was. You never got bullied by an older boy?”
“There was safely being a twin with another brother and sister close to being the same age. We may not have gotten along with each other all the time, but we banded together when someone from outside the family threatened us.”
She smiled and leaned against his chest. “Do you think Daniel and Grayson will ever stop seeing me as a threat?”
“They will if they know what’s good for them.”
“Grayson wouldn’t make anything up to keep us apart, would he?”
A moment passed before Jaxon spoke. “No. He believes in logic and evidence. He’s very thorough. When he comes back, he’ll know the truth and he’ll let that determine his course of action.”
“That’s a relief.” Charlie closed her eyes. “Hmm, I could sleep right here in your arms all night.”
“Oh, baby, I wish I could stay and hold you until morning,” Jaxon murmured. “But I know if I stay, I’m not going to be able to resist taking you.”
Charlie bit her lip. She wasn’t sure what she wanted. In truth she was more than a little apprehensive about making love. In the past three years, she had several conversations with the bar wenches she paid to make her crew think she was a man of healthy appetite. She was more than confused about whether the sex act was something that a woman merely endured or actually enjoyed. She had asked so many questions of so many women and there was certainly no consensus. None of the women really liked what they did and admitted they rarely or never got enjoyment when they were working, but sometimes, if they were with someone special, they liked it.
Charlie had seen more than her share of naked men and she could not fathom how something that large being put inside her could possibly be pleasurable and she hoped Jaxon would not be one of those man who was overly large. They were always so proud of it when it was big and when they used expressions like “split the wench in two” it scared the bejesus out of her.
But Charlie knew she loved Jaxon with all of her heart and knew he felt the same. If he wanted to make love to her, she wanted to do it for him. Their wedding was approaching soon and it was inevitable.
“I-I want you to stay,” she whispered. “I want to please you.”
The corner of Jaxon’s mouth turned up. It was just like her to think about his pleasure, when he worried about hers. Would he be able to control his ardor long enough to please her?
Jaxon kissed her lingeringly, then stood up and removed his hastily donned clothing. He was already engorged with need, but tried to keep his body turned away so he wouldn’t embarrass her.
He sat down on the edge of the bed and kissed her. He entwined his fingers in her thick sable hair. He moved his lips against hers until her lips parted and his tongue made its first invasion into her mouth.
Charlie moaned. Her t
houghts melted away as they had the first time he’d kissed her. She darted her own tongue to his lips and tentatively deepened her kiss until her tongue slipped into his mouth. His tongue found hers and chased her back into her mouth then lured it back into his. The kiss stole her breath away.
How was it possible that a kiss could make other parts of her body tingle and twitch? Her body seemed to be writhing of its own accord, searching for something that she dared not think about.
“Jaxon,” she panted.
She pushed against his chest even as he tried to pull her closer. The sound of panic rose in her throat. The tension in his arms suddenly went slack.
“What’s wrong, baby?” he said pulling back.
“I can’t breathe,” she said then realized it wasn’t quite true. “I can’t catch my breath.” Charlie didn’t know how to explain that every fiber in her body seemed to be charged with static electricity. She half-expected the hairs on her head to stand up—the hairs on her arms already were.
“You’re just nervous, Charlie.”
“No,” she jumped in. “I mean, I am, but that’s not it. I think there’s something wrong with me. It’s too….” Charlie wasn’t sure if there was a word for what she was feeling that she spoke the word that most closely encompassed what she was feeling. “It’s too strong.”
“It’s too strong?” Jaxon removed one hand from her hair and traced his finger from her earlobe down her neck to her collarbone. “Is it overwhelming? Is that what’s wrong?”
She nodded vigorously. “If we were standing, I would’ve crumpled to the floor because my knees would have become too weak to hold me up.”
“All we’ve done is kiss,” Jaxon pointed out. “We’ve kissed before. Do you want me to stop?” he asked, trying to keep a hard edge from his voice.
“No, I’m all right now. I was just overcome.”
Jaxon exhaled the breath that he was holding as his pent up tension relaxed. His need ached and he didn’t know what he would have done if she had changed her mind.
An Officer but No Gentleman Page 18