Wild Willful Love

by Valerie Sherwood

  “You probably frightened him, Esthonie,” laughed Imogene. “He may have heard how quickly you arrange marriages!”

  Esthonie gave her an uncertain look, but her expression softened as Virginie danced by with Jean Claude. “They make a handsome couple, don’t they?” She was staring proudly at the bridal pair.

  “Yes, they do.” Imogene accepted a glass from a tray brought by one of the brightly turbaned servants.

  “I shall hate to see them go. Do you know, Jean Claude actually suggested they sail on the Goodspeed tonight? Tonight!” Esthonie rolled her eyes.

  Rushing home to spend the dowry! thought Imogene cynically, but she did not tell Esthonie that.

  “I told him poor little Virginie should not lose her virginity on board a bouncing vessel!” Esthonie sounded indignant, remembering the soft, giggle-smothering feather bed in which she had lost her own virginity—a full two years before she had met Gauthier!

  “I don’t imagine it will mean much to her where that event takes place,” said Imogene ironically. And then to soften that she added quickly, “I mean, it isn’t where but who, Esthonie, that counts.”

  Esthonie, poised to give her a withering look, was mollified. A slight frown crossed her face. “How much do you think a girl needs to be told on the day she is wed?” she asked bluntly.

  “As much as she needs.” Imogene gave Esthonie a wry look, for gossip had it that Virginie might well instruct her mother in such matters.

  “Perhaps I had best have a talk with Virginie,” said Esthonie uneasily. “Before they retire.” She heaved a sigh. “Poor little Georgette. All this excitement has been too much for her. Do you think I was too hard on her about the pearls? She threw up—not half an hour ago! I would hate to think—”

  “It was probably all the heavy food she ate at supper,” laughed Imogene, who had observed that teenage Georgette consumed enormous amounts for one so thin.

  “Yes, I suppose that was it. I told her to go to her room and not to stir until she is quite recovered. Ah, here is Captain van Ryker to claim a dance with you.”

  Van Ryker offered her a gray silk arm and swept her away. “What was Esthonie looking so perturbed about?” he wondered.

  “She is contemplating instructing Virginie in the art of sex,” laughed Imogene. “Do you think she is too late?”

  “I would doubt it.” Van Ryker looked across the room at the flushed-faced bride who was fast acquiring a hunted look in her eyes. “I rather think Virginie’s vaunted wantonness is a fake.” He gave her a knowing smile.

  “You could be right,” said Imogene thoughtfully. “Anyway, Esthonie is obviously having second thoughts about pushing her daughter unadvised into the arms of a roué.”

  “She should fare very well in the arms of a roué.” Van Ryker’s brows rose. “Better than in the arms of some untried youth!”

  Their eyes met in perfect agreement—and amusement. Meanwhile, Esthonie had sought out her daughter and was having—perilously close to some paint-spattered green leaves— a belated talk with her.

  “Virginie,” said her mother, her voice necessarily low, for people were dancing by. “I know I have been late in counseling you, but I cannot caution you too strongly: Do not let Jean Claude get the upper hand!”

  Virginie, who had been dwelling in her mind more on the physical aspects of losing her virginity, looked harassed. “How am I to avoid it?” she asked plaintively, for it seemed to her that men—except for Papa, of course, and he was the exception—always seemed to take and hold the upper hand.

  “By taking firm measures,” said her mother impressively.

  She was thinking bitterly of that Josie Dawes she was always seeing Gauthier with down on the quay. How a woman of that sort could appeal to a man of Gauthier’s fine sensibilities she could not imagine. Ah, she should have taken a firm hand with Gauthier early on!

  “What sort of measures. Mamma?” Virginie was growing impatient. Her bridal bed was growing nearer by the minute and she could use all the advice she could get.

  Dragged back to Virginie’s immediate problem, Esthonie asked sharply, “Did Veronique tell you nothing} About the—ways of men?”

  Virginie sighed. “Veronique is Georgette’s special friend. They are always together, laughing, talking—I am never sure about what.”

  Too bad! thought her mother. Veronique could have had her uses at a moment like this. Instead, she had chosen to ignore the wedding altogether! Across the room she noted that two of her guests—one a dissolute aristocrat who made his living arranging ransoms, the other a cardsharp who had been banished from a good county family back in England—were beginning to shout at each other. Red-faced and angry, their voices rose clearly over the sound of the harpsichord and the viola and the stamping feet of the dancers. In another moment swords might be drawn and Virginie’s wedding might be remembered for the amount of blood shed rather than the number of toasts drunk to the bride’s health!

  “I am sure you will manage,” Esthonie told Virginie vaguely, keeping her eye on what was going on across the room. “There is really nothing to it. Just—” Her voice rose to a shriek as the ransom arranger gave the cardsharp a dusting across the teeth with his fist, and the cardsharp slid back with a snarl and snaked out his rapier. “Gauthier!” shrieked Esthonie. “Do something!”

  But it was van Ryker who did something. He was suddenly there with his blade out, encouraging the pair of them to settle their differences tomorrow in gentlemanly fashion beneath the oaks instead of here tonight on the ballroom floor. After a few wild moments during which Esthonie rushed forward and clung to Gauthier’s arm with a numbing grip, wondering if van Ryker’s suave words would work, both gentlemen put away their swords and settled down to serious drinking in different parts of the room.

  Esthonie forgot Virginie, allowing herself to be claimed for a dance, and Gauthier bore down on Imogene, expressing his relief to her that van Ryker had acted so quickly.

  Imogene could hardly refuse to dance with her host. The plump, panting governor whirled her away. And then another partner claimed her. And another. The music of the harpsichord and the viola tinkled on. She made polite conversation, she danced—and she kept an eye on the clock. She wished van Ryker would rescue her. But van Ryker—and now her gaze swept the room searching for him—was nowhere in sight. He had been missing now for some twenty minutes and the party, full of Tortuga hangers-on, was beginning to wear on her nerves. She knew she must endure it, must wait until nearly midnight to make her escape, but this rather tawdry wedding was not the way she had meant to leave Tortuga. She would have liked to slip away in the dusk through the flower-scented air and skim with her memories across the silvery phosphorescence of Cayona Bay and let that tall ship, the Sea Rover, take her where it would. But, obviously, it was not to be.

  She took another goblet of wine and turned to see Esthonie approaching.

  Esthonie’s gaze traveled up and down the flamelike gown Imogene was wearing. Why was it, she asked herself, that Imogene always looked marvelous? Surely she must have off days like the rest of us! But Esthonie had never caught her looking otherwise than wonderful; it was most upsetting. As she reached Imogene’s side, her dissatisfied gaze traveled to the blaze of topaz and diamonds at Imogene’s neck, which were only matched by the large topaz and diamond pendants hanging from her ears and the brilliant emerald that flashed from her peach-gloved finger.

  “Your jewels are stunning,” she said enviously.

  Imogene had at first intended to wear the van Rappard diamonds but now she was glad she had not. They were so overpowering it was best to let them repose in their little jewel case. If ever she were presented at court—which was unlikely—she would wear them. In the meantime, the topaz and diamond jewelry flashed brilliantly and complemented her striking gown.

  “Is that a new ring?” Esthonie seized her hand and studied it.

  “Yes, it is. Van Ryker gave it to me yesterday.” She smiled down at the square-cut emer
ald set in gold—an exact duplicate of the one he wore himself. If ever we become separated and you should need me, he had said earnestly, send me this ring and I will know the message comes from you. / will do the same. She had tried to laugh it off as melodramatic but she had been touched all the same. Now she touched the ring gently to her cheek. “I intend to wear it always,” she said softly.

  “But then you have so many jewels! Lord knows when you will find time to wear them all!”

  Imogene was spared a retort, for van Ryker showed up at just that moment. She knew it must be near midnight.

  “Esthonie,” she said apologetically, “you must forgive me, I have a splitting headache. I have asked van Ryker to take me home!”

  Van Ryker had been right. Getting away from the governor’s house proved easy. Perhaps Esthonie was even a little glad not to have Virginie’s wedding reception overshadowed by the beauteous Imogene!

  Van Ryker took her outside where the music and the laughter from the “governor’s palace” drifted out to them. The wind sighed through the palm fronds and the night was full of stars. Black velvet studded with diamonds. Imogene breathed deep of the heady air.

  “On a night like this,” she murmured ruefully, “it seems a shame to leave Tortuga.”

  “We cannot put it off,” he said. “Arne will take you to the ship.”

  From somewhere Arne materialized, carrying a yellow silk shawl.

  “Aren’t you coming with me, van Ryker?”

  “No, I want to close up the house. A few details. Go with Arne. I’ll be along.”

  He swung away from her, a tall broad-shouldered figure disappearing into the night. Imogene stood and watched him go. Then she drew the light yellow silk shawl over her head to conceal her bright hair and the blaze of her jewels and accompanied Arne down toward the quay.

  They were halfway there when Arne stopped. “That little jewel case of yours,” he said suddenly. “I saw it in the hall when I left—I’ll wager the Captain will pass it by and leave it.”

  And that little jewel case contained the van Rappard diamonds!

  “Oh, he mustn’t leave it, Arne,” exclaimed Imogene. She would never be able to wrest those jewels away from Esthonie once she occupied the house. Esthonie would be vague, she would say she had not found them, someone else must have taken them. “Go back and get them, Arne.”

  Arne hesitated. “The Cap’n said I wasn’t to leave you. Not even for a minute.”

  “I’ll go back with you, then. We can catch van Ryker there if we hurry. Perhaps we’ll meet him coming this way—with the jewel case.”

  Arne grunted and the two of them set off through the darkness toward the house.

  It loomed up before them, that massive pile of lime-washed stone that she was seeing for the last time. A pattern of waving shadows played across it as palm trees bent in the moonlight, driven by the trade winds. Imogene paused wistfully for a moment. Since she had married van Ryker she had really known no other home than this and now all was to change.

  Silent and pensive now, she let big Arne push the well-oiled iron grillwork door open; in silence she moved into the dark familiar hall vaguely illuminated by moonlight filtering down into the inner court where the fountain tinkled. No, not entirely illuminated by that. There was a light burning in the chart room. Van Ryker was still here, then!

  Moving quickly and soundlessly on her satin slippers, Imogene moved toward that light and stood in the door of the chart room.

  Like the rest of the house, the chart room had been evacuated. Left in it was only a rude table, adjudged too insignificant to move, and a long red velvet divan that Esthonie had fancied and which Gauthier had asked to be included in the sale of the house. Tonight a single candle burned on that small table, stuck into a bottle, tavern fashion. The red divan’s back was to her and the rest of the room was bare.

  But on that divan was such a tableau as caused Imogene to stop short, her breath catching in her throat.

  A man and a woman reclined on that red divan. Their backs were turned toward her but it was easy to see who they were.

  The man was unmistakably van Ryker. That dark head she knew so well, the long sinewy arm in gray silk with a ruffle of white lace at the wrist, the fine bronzed hand with its square-cut emerald ring that matched her own.

  But that familiar sinewy arm was loosely thrown about a woman who was equally unmistakable. A spill of shining black curls in a distinctive coiffure that seemed to cry out for a high-backed Spanish comb cascaded down the woman’s long neck, over her black satin back, and spilled over the carved back of the long divan. Imogene saw that one of her slender languorous arms was extended and lay caressingly along van Ryker’s broad silk-clad shoulder. The long fingers that toyed lightly with a lock of his dark hair were encased in black gloves. But between the glove top and the beginning of a spill of black lace from the woman’s elbow-length sleeve was a small expanse of creamy skin—and the mark of a strawberry heart was plain upon it.

  Veronique.

  Veronique and van Ryker trysting before the Sea Rover sailed.

  A kind of thunder roared through Imogene’s head. It had all been a lie, then. . .. Veronique had not gone anywhere with Diego. She had come here to meet her lover—as she must have been doing in the pimento grove every day. Esthonie had said men craved variety and here before her was the solid proof of those words!

  As she watched, frozen into immobility, beyond speech, that dark head she had often stroked so lovingly bent toward the gleaming mass of black curls. He was going to kiss her!

  A strangled protest rose in Imogene’s throat—and was instantly stilled by the hand that fled to her mouth. Everything in her revolted. Warring forces roiled within her—dismay and disbelief. Veronique was not—could not be—van Ryker’s mistress. Van Ryker loved her, she was sure of it. His eyes, his face, his body told her that every day, every night. No, this was something else... .

  What, then? In sudden shock, she understood.

  A feeling cold as death stole over her.

  This was revenge.

  Van Ryker, the master planner, the man who thought everything out, was taking his final revenge on Don Luis of Spain. With cold-blooded premeditation he was seducing the fiery young wife Don Luis had sought to isolate from the world. When he had taken Don Luis’s woman and made her his own, then left her and sailed away, that revenge would be complete.

  And tonight in the great cabin of the Sea Rover he would embrace his wife as if nothing had happened. Fresh from his triumph over Don Luis, he would take his wife in his arms.... The lips that had pressed Veronique’s full sensuous ones would press her lips, the exploring fingers that had brought forth moans of rapture from Veronique would then rove over her own body—oh, no, they would not!

  Quivering, she backed away from the sight of them. She would have crashed into Arne, who stood waiting outside, save that he reached out and caught her. As he let her go he opened his mouth to speak but she motioned him to silence. The big man inclined his head in deference to her wishes and followed her, stumping along on his coin-blazoned wooden leg, as she moved unsteadily down the street.

  Around them was the warmth of the Tortuga night, wrapping them breathlessly as a blanket. A breath of air from the sea ruffled Imogene’s fair hair and found tendrils stuck to a forehead gone damp with the turbulence of her emotions. A large land crab, disturbed by her footsteps, scuttled away from her slippers with a rattle. Normally Imogene would have shied away from the awkward creature, but tonight her tangerine skirts swept by it as if it did not exist. Her heart was too full, her feelings too tumbled, to care.

  They had walked halfway to the quay before she could make her voice obey her.

  “Arne,” she asked shakily, “has the Goodspeed sailed?”

  “Not yet.” Arne peered ahead. “I can see her lights up ahead. But she sails with the tide.”

  Like the Sea Rover. ... sailing with the tide.

  Imogene came to such a sudden stop that
Arne almost ran into her. In the moonlight she had drawn herself up and her blue eyes flashed dangerously. He would tell his captain later how fiery she had looked, standing there.

  “Then you’ll take me aboard her, Arne. No”—she held up her hand to ward off his protestations—“I’ll brook no interference in this matter. Van Ryker has already paid for my passage aboard her and he told me the Goodspeed's captain refused to refund the money. I will take up that passage now!”

  Before Arne could reason With her, she was again moving toward the quay. Her feet began to pick up speed, putting distance between her and that house with its scarring memory.

  “But what’ll I tell the Cap’n?” cried Arne in real distress.

  “Tell him—” Feelings too overwhelming for words drowned her voice. Betrayer, betrayer—the words hammered a litany in her heart. “Tell him I’ve gone,” she choked. “And that I’ll not be back. Tell him I’m leaving him. Tell him that, Arne.”

  “But your baggage, my lady!” gasped practical Arne.

  “I care not if I wear this same dress all the way to Plymouth!” she cried.

  And suddenly it was all too much. It crashed in on her in a single mighty wave, sweeping away all her reserves. She gave a great gasping sob and flung away the light yellow silk shawl that was meant to obscure her glitter and her worth.

  Picking up her light skirts, she began to run, sobbing. Tears streaked her face and the wind felt cold where they fell. She was running away from all that she had loved, down toward the quay, and those who saw her pass stopped to stare, jaws dropping. For she passed them like the perfumed wind, like a wraith in the night, a woman with flying golden hair and flying flame-colored skirts, ablaze with topazes and diamonds.

  Her present destination was the Goodspeed, about to take sail. But her real destination was much farther than that.

  She would go anywhere—anywhere that led her away from /an Ryker!

  BOOK II

  The Runaway Lovers

  Jealousy drove deep the knife—