by Sara Orwig
He laughed. “Hardly, love.”
“Where are we going?”
He ran a rough thumb lightly along her chin. Suddenly he swept his arm around her and bent over her. “Miss Lianna Melton, will you marry me?”
17
Aghast, Lianna stared at him. His mouth quirked in amusement. “Ah, my love, such burning rapture, such eagerness to become my bride!” he said sardonically, stirring a shocked reaction.
“I have no inclination to wed a jackanapes pirate who most likely came from the London slums and stowed aboard ship at age fifteen!” Her mind reeled while the words she hurled at him had far from their desired effect. With a flash of white teeth he laughed. She continued relentlessly, “You’re very handsome, and quite entertaining, but I have no desire to wed you. You’re also a cutthroat pirate and a ruffian, as ignorant of the refinements of life as any dog on the wharf!”
His grin widened. Was the man immune to insults? In a sweeping gesture he waved his arm. “And all these books count for nothing?”
“I suspect you gained them in a raid upon another ship!”
“‘Ser o no ser…’” he quoted.
“I can’t wed you!” She shook with anger and fright. And another emotion rippled like a surging wave, yet she wouldn’t recognize it or the breathless effect it had.
“Aye, you shall.” Laughter faded from his eyes. He straightened and held her. “Lianna, our destinies are entwined. We can have a good marriage. You have no home to return to—I need a wife.”
Her mouth felt dry, and her heart pounded. His green eyes held her captive and it was an effort to think. “Let me go to a Spanish convent. Then I’ll get passage on a ship to England.”
“And then what? You can’t return home, can you?”
“No, but I—”
“Lianna, wed me before we sail to the New World. We can’t wed there. It can be annulled when this is over.”
“I can return to England if you’ll let me. I don’t have to go home.”
A flinty, shuttered look crossed his features. Emerald eyes became slivers of ice, hard and unyielding. “Would you rather sail as my wife—or my mistress?”
She drew in her breath sharply and clenched her fists. Trembling, she probed his cold eyes. “Do you want a wife whom you have coerced into marriage?”
For a fleeting moment a look of pain crossed his features, but it vanished swiftly, replaced by an impassive coldness.
“Why, when you’ve taken me and made me your mistress—in truth, your captive as much as any slave—why do you want to wed me?”
“I can be a far more convincing marqués with the Spaniards in Chile if I arrive with a wife,” Josh stated simply, wanting to wipe the hurt expression from her face. Didn’t she realize the precarious position she was in?
“You could lie as you had planned, and they wouldn’t know. Why are we to wed?” she persisted, and he felt a deep ache. He had given her time and he had hoped she would change.
He closed his mind to the thought. “It’s time I have a wife,” he said flatly. “You’re young and healthy and very beautiful.” An eyebrow quirked as he added, “As well as passionate.”
Something hurt inside, yet what choice did she have? As if he saw her dilemma, his features softened.
“Love, it can be good between us. Give me your trust.”
His voice was gentle, but Lianna wanted something more. “You won’t gain my loyalty by a forced marriage!”
“And the possibility exists that you’re embarazada, already with child.”
“I pray not!” she gasped. Searching wildly for something to dent his cool manner, she cried, “I love another man! I love Edwin—”
Hard fingers locked around her arms, lifting her to her toes.
“Don’t say his name! Dammit, you’re not his! Did you pledge your love to him?”
“Yes!” It wasn’t true, but it might stop the wedding. Her answer brought an unexpected reaction. Captain Raven paled, his eyes narrowed. He looked as if he truly cared! Startled, she drew a deep breath, peering at him intently.
“Enough of this!” he snapped, his patience waning. He placed her cape around her shoulders. “Come along. A priest awaits us.”
Scooping her into his arms, he strode across the cabin.
“Put me down!”
“No, you’re light as a wren, and we’re off to our wedding!”
He lifted her into a hansom carriage. The driver closed the door behind them. As the carriage began to roll, Josh held her on his lap, her gauzy white skirt billowing over their knees. She couldn’t be deeply in love with Edwin Stafford if all she had told him were true. Her blue eyes danced with excitement now, and while she frowned at him, he saw the vein in her throat pulse rapidly.
“Lianna, I’ll try to make you happy.”
“Your arrogance is beyond bounds!” she snapped, but her voice sounded breathless.
“Lianna,” he said huskily, “it can be so good between us. No South Sea or summer sky ever held the clear blue of your eyes.” His voice was a rumble that made her blood heat.
Lianna wondered at the many facets to the man. A seafaring pirate who was hard and scarred from battle, yet now said poetic words to her while he gazed warmly at her. If only, deep in his green-gold eyes, there was another emotion…
While she studied him intently, her thoughts swirling like tossed leaves, the moment changed. The sparkling tension that could flare quickly between them ignited. All her nerves pulsed to life. She became aware of every contact of her flesh with his, even though separated by thin layers of clothing. And it seemed that he felt it as much as she. His eyes narrowed while his fingers drifted over her, sliding beneath her cape, touching her throat and moving down over her shoulder. “Mrs. Joshua Raven, my wife. I…”
She waited, holding her breath while her heart, her lungs, ceased to function.
“I’ll have a beautiful wife,” he finished abruptly.
A constriction squeezed her heart, and she felt a flicker of disappointment that she couldn’t understand. What had she expected from him? What had she wanted—a declaration of undying love? Ridiculous! She tossed her head and slipped off his lap to face him across the aisle.
She tilted her head to regard him. Would there be any last chance to talk him into letting her go? She leaned forward to place her cold fingers over his warm ones. “Please, Captain Raven, release me from this arrangement.”
“I couldn’t if I were dispositioned to do so,” he answered flatly.
“Why, in heaven’s name?”
“Because we’re in Spain. I’d run too great a risk of you relating my plans to the Spaniards.”
“I swear I wouldn’t! Who would believe me anyway?”
“They would believe you, all right. The Spanish have spies spread in ports from here to New Spain, to the Cape and back. Almost three centuries ago a papal decree—the Line of Demarcation—gave them claim to half the world. Since that time, they’ve protected their territories. Ships can’t gather against them, countries which send forth their ships toward the New World know they can’t put in to shore for long periods. The Spaniards dominate a large portion of the world. They would get wind of my mission and it would be useless then.”
“I swear I won’t reveal a word. And if you’ll release me to go back to England, I’ll return your payment.” She didn’t know how, but if he agreed, she would find a way.
“Why do I doubt that?” he said with infuriating stubbornness.
“You already have taken my purity,” she said.
One damnable eyebrow climbed, giving him a wicked, devil-may-care appearance that set her teeth on edge. How could she melt beneath the onslaught of the rogue’s kisses!
“You would repay me fully? Ten thousand pounds’ worth?”
Stunned, she felt as if he had plunged a knife in her heart. “You paid that price for Quita?” she gasped.
“Aye,” he answered calmly.
She stared at him again in wonder. The m
an must be wealthy as Croesus to hand over such a figure for a mere serving girl. “It is an incredible amount!”
“It is, and I intend to get what I paid for.”
She sank back and looked out at the Spanish city, the buildings with their plaster walls and red tiled roofs and Moorish architecture, so different from London. She could never earn such a sum to repay him. Even if she could go home and ask her father, he would refuse. Her father’s love of gold exceeded his love of all else.
“Lianna.”
The word rolled off his tongue slowly, drawn out with a velvety tone that brought back her acute awareness of him as a man. She raised her lashes to watch him lean forward to grasp her chin, his face only inches away. “Lianna, this will be a good marriage if we both try.”
She wanted someone who loved her, who wanted to marry her because he loved her, not because it was convenient for a revolution! Something tightened in her throat. She remembered the nights as a small child when she had cried herself to sleep after sessions with the maids or her father, when they had made it clear she was merely tolerated, not loved! And Edwin came to mind, the look in his eyes as he swore helplessly over her departure. Edwin, the one person in her entire life who had cared!
“Dammit,” Captain Raven said in a low voice so filled with fury that her thoughts immediately jerked back to the present. “You’re thinking of him, aren’t you!”
An angry flush darkened his cheeks, turning them the color of weathered copper, and his eyes were sharp daggers, threatening her with fiery pinpoints of gold. He reached out to grip her shoulders painfully. “I’ll drive him out of your thoughts if it’s the last thing I do!”
“Why do you care if I love another?” she cried. “All you want is my aid in your deception of the Spanish.”
“I don’t care to share my possessions!” he snapped.
She drew her breath and turned to the window. His possession! The man was arrogant, impossible, as contradictory as snow falling in a tropical wilderness! Mrs. Joshua Raven. What lay ahead? What life would she have from this forced marriage? His head turned and green eyes wrapped their clinging tendrils around her heart. Oh, why couldn’t they have met under other circumstances? Why couldn’t there have been a chance for love to grow?
His brows narrowed and she held her breath. The man had the most uncanny way of guessing her thoughts. At the same time, his were absolutely unreadable.
“What are you thinking, Lianna?”
“I wondered the same about you, captain.”
“It’s Josh.” His voice lowered to that furry depth that came over her nerves like soft cat paws. “Let me hear you repeat it.”
“Josh.” It came out breathlessly and she was ensnared in clouds of emerald, drifting above earth without a solid footing, drifting toward a golden sun that blazed into her soul. She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move. His lips parted, his firm, well-shaped lips. He leaned toward her, and her breath stopped as he whispered, “We can have happiness, Lianna.”
The carriage jerked to a halt and she blinked, reason returning to her. She watched while the door was opened and Captain Raven jumped down, then turned to take her hand.
As Lianna stood before the priest, her icy fingers held by Captain Raven, she heard dimly the vows intoned until the priest stated, “And do you, Joshua Cathmoor Brougher Raven, take this woman as your lawful wife…”
A jog of memory took Lianna from the present as she recalled her father’s fury one winter’s day not so long ago. He had paced the library, waving his fist in anger, his blue eyes snapping, while he denounced the snobbery of two English peers, the Marqués of Cowden and his grace, William Brougher Raven, the Duke of Cathmoor.
Orphans and street urchins, commoners, seldom bore names such as Joshua Cathmoor Brougher Raven. Who was this man? Why would he leave a life of wealth and ease, give up a title, for the danger and discomfort at sea?
He raised her hand to slip a band of gold onto her finger. A tiny golden ring of slavery, binding her to an iron-willed rogue whose green eyes bewitched and whose lips enchanted, when all she had ever wanted was love.
The priest gave permission for a kiss, and her new husband leaned down to whisper, “My love…”
His lips brushed so gently and she looked up to see him smiling at her. He was handsome, this tall man who could be charming—if only he loved her! Her throat tightened with an ache because she had no illusions. Joshua Raven had married her for convenience, for some purpose in his scheming plans. In spite of that knowledge, her heart beat faster as she walked down the aisle, out of the church with her new husband.
As soon as they were in the carriage to return to El Feroz, Lianna asked the question foremost in her thoughts. “Who are you?”
“Captain Raven of El Feroz, and now, your husband.”
“Who’s your father?” she persisted.
He laughed, a harsh, mirthless sound. “So, you know the duke?”
“No,” she replied. “I’ve heard my father speak of him.”
As he gazed steadfastly at her, she wondered what had caused the rift between Josh and his father. It occurred to her that Captain Raven’s childhood might have been as devoid of love as her own. Was that what had driven him to sea? “Why did you leave home at such an early age?”
“The duke was a very cruel man,” he responded flatly.
So Josh Raven was vulnerable too! Her sympathy stirred; she reached across impulsively and touched his hand. “I’m sorry.”
Something flickered in his eyes and he gazed at her intently. She withdrew her hand swiftly and locked her fingers together in her lap. “You’re the son of a duke. Do you have other brothers?”
A cynical note came into his voice as he answered her, “No, but I won’t be the Duke of Cathmoor.” She drew a quick breath at the smoldering anger in his expression. “Don’t raise your hopes, love. I’ve been disinherited.”
“My hopes!” she snapped, forgetting the rising tide of sympathy she had felt for him. “I’m here now because I fled from marriage to a nobleman, one of the wealthiest in Spain! There is only one reason I’d want to marry, but unfortunately, I had no choice.”
“And what is that one reason?”
She raised her chin defiantly. “Marriage should be because of love.”
“There are some fine substitutes,” he answered sardonically, leaning forward, his dark coat falling open over the ruffled expanse of his white shirt. Her heart skipped as he tilted her chin up and placed his mouth on hers with deliberation.
Her arguments dissipated into nothing, burned away by the passion he could arouse effortlessly. He shifted to look at her, arching an eyebrow in satisfaction.
She blinked, her befuddled senses reeling before she realized he had proven a point. She flounced her skirts, turning to the window while he rode in silence for the remainder of the journey back to the ship.
Catching sight of El Feroz, with its gun-deck ports closed, the snarling lion’s head at the black prow, and its tall masts stretching skyward, Lianna again experienced a bounding feeling of adventure when she gazed at El Feroz. What lay ahead in the New World? Excitement rippled in her at the prospect of seeing new lands and new people.
“You like my ship,” Josh observed softly.
She brought her gaze down and her spirits lowered as swiftly. “It’s a prison.”
One corner of his mouth raised in a crooked, cynical smile. “Nay, my love. I’ve seen sea captains and sailors with the same gleam in their eyes. You love adventure, my lady, just as surely as you draw breath.” He reached out to stroke her chin. “It can be so fine between us, Lianna.”
With his words came awareness of the deep possessive way he said her name. It sent a warmth into her being. He swung her into his arms, and his long legs covered the gangplank in easy strides. One of his men caught sight of them and whistled, then shouts went up from the crew for their newly wedded captain. As they came aboard, Fletcher stood beside a keg of rum, unplugging it to pour the firs
t deep flagons for Captain Raven and his bride.
“Here’s to our captain and his new bride—may they embark on a successful venture and happy life!”
As the men cheered and drank, Fletcher gazed with solemn gray eyes across the rim of his cup at Lianna. “Here’s to the captain’s beautiful bride—be good to him,” he said softly.
“You ask that I be good to him. If only you knew the circumstances—”
“I do.”
Startled, she peered intently at the first mate. “He told you?”
The answer was lost as Josh turned around to circle her waist with his arm. Looking down at her, he said, “To a long, happy life—together.”
She lifted the silver flagon as he lightly touched his against it, and they both drank. She couldn’t fathom his expression. Did he hope she would love him? Did he think someday he would feel love for her? What an unreadable man she had married, this tall stranger whose life was now forever linked intimately with her own. He sipped, lowering the cup to smile at her, a radiant, flashing smile that brought one to her lips in return. Captain Josh Raven had his winning moments! She felt breathless as she thought of how charming he could indeed be.
For the next quarter-hour they drank toasts with the men; then Josh lifted her into his arms again to carry her below, and her heart began to pound violently as she remembered their first night. Inside his cabin he set her on her feet, holding her close.
“My wife,” he whispered, reaching up to remove the pins from her raven hair. Lianna’s heart pounded. She was wed to him, yet at the moment fears rose to haunt her. All she could think about was his cavalier treatment, the pain and embarrassment she had suffered from him, and never again would she see in a man’s eyes the look of love that she had seen in Edwin’s. Certainly not in the eyes devouring her now. Captain Raven wanted her, but it wasn’t love.
“Lianna,” he breathed huskily, leaning forward to kiss below her ear, then letting his warm breath fan over her throat as his lips trailed downward to the soft hollow between her throat and her shoulder. He paused and raised his head. “Seldom have I looked back with regret, but now I do.”