She had long ago given up wearing Mama’s scarf at her waist. In fact, Mama had taken it from her and declared it unfit for a proper lady to wear. But as she sat here quietly mulling over what she had read, Maribel wished for the gentle comfort of the scarf that tied her to a home she thought she knew.
Though she preferred to remain exactly where she was rather than return to what she’d left in her grandfather’s home, Maribel nonetheless stretched her legs and then reached for the branch that would aid her in climbing down.
A loud crack split the air and the world tilted. The valise slid from her shoulder and landed with a thud on the ground.
She, however, did not.
Rather, she landed in the arms of a man with silver eyes and a broad smile. “Reading in the dark will damage your eyes, you know.”
The same thing the captain said almost every night when he came to check on her. “Yes, sir,” she responded out of habit.
The captain. Maribel’s heart soared. The captain!
“Captain,” she finally managed to say aloud. “When I saw you in the office this morning, I knew it was you,” she said. “Well, not exactly you, but someone like you. You see, Mother Superior told me that what I thought were memories was just my imagination, but I never was certain if she was correct. I mean, she is a nun and I am sure she would never tell me anything but the truth, but it always seemed as though I was reliving something that had happened and not making something up. Anyway, I knew you would turn out to be a nice man. I prayed for that, you know, and I have been for all these years, and now—”
“Maribel. Stop. Talking.”
She clamped her lips shut against the torrent of words still demanding escape. Still, she could not look away from those eyes. From that smile.
“I just should have known it was you,” she said. “I sat in that office and made all sorts of demands on behalf of my family and all the time I was in front of the one person I had always wished I would find again. I never really stopped hoping you were alive, you know.”
“I looked for you,” he told her. “Looked everywhere. We sent out boats and search parties and scoured every inch of any place we thought you might be. When you walked into my office, I couldn’t believe it was you. I thought you had died out there on that ocean. The cannonball took out the entire lookout post and part of the mainmast. How could you have survived?”
“Captain. Stop. Talking,” she said as she nestled her head against his chest and felt, for the first time since she left the island, as if she was once again in a familiar place.
“You can’t call me Captain here in New Orleans,” he finally said as he set her on her feet.
She looked up at him. Really looked this time instead of ignoring the fine details of the once-familiar face that had aged very little. “Why not?”
“It would compromise certain things and complicate others,” he said, apparently reluctant to go into any further detail.
“Are you still a privateer?”
The captain ducked his head and then lifted it again. “When the French set a bounty on my head and then nearly killed me, I decided it was time to leave that part of my life behind, so no, I am not.”
Her face must have registered surprise, because he shook his head. “No, I don’t suppose you would have known any of that.”
“You were working for the French,” she said. “Why would they want you dead?”
“It all comes down to politics, I suppose. Or maybe it was just God’s way of letting me know that it was time to stop and follow Him instead of trying to do things my way,” he said as he reached down to retrieve the valise. “This is heavy.”
She nodded, but when her gaze collided with his, she found words nearly impossible. “Important papers.”
“That’s what you were reading in the tree? So have you given up your adventure books?”
“Of course not.” Maribel shook her head, as much in response to his question as to dislodge the fog that was surrounding her now.
The captain lived, and he was standing right here in front of her. All those prayers, all those times she wondered if he lived, wondered if it had all been something her imagination conjured up, and now here he stood.
“Is there something wrong?” he asked.
“No,” Maribel said, tears now shimmering as the realization hit her with full force. “It’s just that …” Again she shook her head. “You’re real and you’re alive and you’re not just someone I imagined.”
His chuckle was exactly as she recalled. “Yes, I am very real.”
She fell into his arms again, and this time she held on tight, until he stepped back to drop the valise. “I don’t want to let you go,” she said, reaching for him again. “I am just so very happy you’re alive.”
After a while, the captain held her at arm’s length. “You’re not a little girl anymore, Red.”
“It has been eleven years since we parted, so I would hope not,” she said. “You, however, look exactly the same.”
“And that, Miss Cordoba, is your imagination speaking. I am eleven years older and many decades wiser.” Jean-Luc retrieved the valise. “Walk with me. I would prefer to escort you somewhere that is more secure so we can speak without being seen. I have a few things to tell you that I prefer not be overheard.”
She shook her head. “There is nowhere more secure than up in that tree.”
“You’re joking.”
“I am serious.” She nodded toward the valise. “Would you like me to take it up with me, or do you think you can manage it? What with your advanced age and all.”
“Pick the limb,” he said as he threw the valise over his shoulder.
When Jean-Luc managed to settle himself on the limb beside Maribel without doing anything more than minor damage to himself, he made a solemn vow. He would never climb a tree again.
Yet here he sat quite a distance from the ground with a leather valise in his lap and a beautiful redhead beside him. So, overall, he could not complain.
Much.
Though he would likely pay for his exertion with sore muscles later.
“All right,” she said. “Which of us is to go first?”
“You,” he said, not because he had any particular interest in hearing all the details of the past eleven years but because he did enjoy looking at her when she talked.
The girl had become a woman in their time apart. And though she still rattled on incessantly at times, he found he rather enjoyed listening to her now.
“And so when I arrived at the orphanage on Isla de Santa Maria, Mother Superior despaired of convincing me that the things I recalled were not real. She said they were just products of my imagination and that a girl like me couldn’t have possibly been on a privateer’s ship or watched for approaching vessels in the top of the mast or even—”
“Wait,” he said as he shifted the valise off his lap and hung the strap over a sturdy limb. “Are you telling me you were at St. Mary of the Island Orphanage this whole time?”
“Until recently, yes,” she said. “Why?”
All the warnings he’d been given by Israel, Rao, and the others rose up in his mind. Every time he brought a ship into the inlet he had risked Maribel Cordoba recognizing him. And to recognize him was to jeopardize everything.
Jean-Luc shook his head. “No reason. I’m just surprised.”
“Yes, well, apparently my grandfather was not surprised at all.” She nodded toward the valise. “I found his ledger. He has been paying my maintenance since the second year I was at the orphanage.”
“Who paid the first year?”
She gave him a strange look. “I never thought of that. I don’t know. But still, don’t you find it strange that my grandfather would know where I was, pay for my upkeep, but only send for me recently? When I arrived, he behaved as if I were his long-lost granddaughter returned. Yet he knew where I was all along.”
“Not so strange when all the facts are known,” he said. “I wonder if your gran
dfather might have been protecting you from something. Or someone.”
“You mean my father?”
Maribel asked the question in such a matter-of-fact manner that it took him aback. “Yes,” he said. “I assume there are payments in the ledger to him as well.”
“You assume correctly.” She looked away. “Apparently my father is very much alive and has been draining my grandfather dry.” Her gaze returned to him. “It is not what I had hoped when my mother told me Abuelo was destitute.”
“What did you hope?” he said gently.
“Oh I don’t know. That he had spent all his fortune searching for me, maybe, although that would bring its own guilt too. Or perhaps he was just a man who did not have as much as I remembered, and he had outlived his funds.” She shrugged. “Anything but what I saw there.”
Jean-Luc let out a long breath and then chose his words carefully. “Never judge a person’s heart by what you see on a balance ledger. And never assume you know the motivation behind someone’s actions by that measure either.”
She nodded. “I understand. But the truth is there.”
“The truth is, you cannot go back to your grandfather’s home. It is too dangerous.”
“I must warn my mother,” she protested.
“She knows, Maribel. She has known from the beginning.” The breath seemed to go out of her. Finally she shook her head. “Yes, I believe you. Mama is capable of many things, but being unaware of what is going on around her is not one of them. She has always been a strong and intelligent woman. I assume my father has either charmed her or frightened her.”
“Have you sensed that your mother is frightened lately?”
“Only of not being able to retrieve the valuables placed in your care.”
Jean-Luc gave the statement a moment’s thought. “But she does not fear for her safety?”
“Her comfort, yes,” Maribel said, “but her safety? I would say no.”
“That answers your question in regard to how your mother feels about your father. You will not go back to that house,” he said. “I won’t allow it.”
She shook her head. “I have nowhere else to go.”
He reached to take her hand in his. “Not as long as I am here to protect you. It is my job as your captain.”
“I do remember you saying that a time or two, oh, about eleven years ago.” She smiled even as tears shimmered in her eyes. “I am never supposed to call you that, remember?”
“That doesn’t mean it isn’t true,” he said. “As long as I draw a breath, you will be under my protection. For eleven years I have believed I failed you when I lost you to French cannon fire. I will not fail you again.”
Maribel smiled and then she leaned toward him. “While I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself, I do very much thank you,” she said as she briefly touched her lips to his cheek.
The action, obviously spontaneous, seemed to surprise her. Then a beautiful pink color rose in her checks.
“I’m sorry. That was terribly presumptuous of me.”
“No, Maribel,” he said as he gathered her closer. “It was wonderfully presumptuous. I wonder if you would mind doing it again.” She leaned in, and Jean-Luc was ready. As soon as she got close enough, that kiss on the cheek would be a kiss on the lips.
“Wait a minute.” Maribel leaned back, her eyes wide. “If my grandfather knew where I was, then who in the world is Mr. Lopez-Gonzales, and why did he pretend to be the person who found me and brought me home to my family?”
“I don’t know,” he said as he struggled to change his focus. “Who did he say he was?”
“When he came to the island, he told Mother Superior that he had been employed at great expense by my grandfather to find me. He said he was the one who encouraged my family to move to New Orleans so they would be closer to the place where I had last been seen.”
She shook her head and gave Jean-Luc a look that said she was still mulling over the facts in her mind. Silence fell between them as he allowed her to continue thinking this through.
“Only here is what I do not understand. How could anyone know where I was last seen other than my father? Was there ever a location given for where the Venganza went down?”
“I am sure dispatches were sent from Cuba once the news arrived that the ship was lost,” he said.
“Yes, likely,” she said, warming to her topic. “But the ship was headed from Spain to Havana. Why relocate to New Orleans, which is a French territory, not a Spanish one, when there are a number of other cities in the Caribbean that would have been much closer and friendlier to a Spaniard?”
“Perhaps the answer to that question will provide the clue as to who this man Lopez-Gonzales is,” he offered.
“And for that matter,” she continued, “why not Havana itself? Abuelo obviously had friends there if he was able to secure a position for my father in the city.”
“Perhaps he had friends here too.”
A thought occurred, but he would not be sharing it with Maribel. There was a connection to this city that might explain it all, especially in light of Father’s complaints of pirates operating in the region.
“You need to be taken to safety,” he told her. “Once I know you cannot be harmed, then I will solve this mystery.”
“We will solve this mystery,” she told him. “You have a poor memory if you think I am going to run and hide when I am confronted by something unpleasant. I did not do that when I was twelve, and I will not do that now.”
Jean-Luc ignored her attempt at argument in regard to who would do the solving. “Never did I use the word run. I am simply stating that we need a place of safety for you so that a plan of action can be developed.”
“I am a grown woman, and as such, I will take complete responsibility for figuring out just what has happened and remedying it.”
He chuckled. “And yet we are having this conversation while sitting in a tree.”
She offered him the beginnings of a smile. “You do have a point.”
“I do,” he said, “and so does this branch where I have been sitting. If I am still able, I would very much like to climb down to solid ground. You and I have work to do, and we cannot do it up here.”
“What kind of work? It is obvious what these entries are.”
“Is it?” He shrugged. “Often there are patterns in these things. Entries that repeat and others that are possibly encrypted so that their true purpose or recipient is not evident. I would like to take a look at the ledger to see if any of those things might be true.”
“Yes,” she said. “There were a few things that made no sense. I think that’s a brilliant idea.”
Much more brilliant than allowing himself to be convinced to climb a tree. Although if he examined his actions closely, Jean-Luc had to admit that it had not taken much in the way of convincing to get him to follow the redhead up into the branches of the old live oak.
Somehow he managed not to make a fool of himself as he climbed down. His only explanation for this miracle was that the Lord had taken pity on him, because his knees were aching and his legs had very little feeling at all.
He was, indeed, an old man.
Twelve years older than the beauty who easily slid down the tree trunk to land nimbly on her feet. Apparently his thirty-five years to her twenty-three made a huge difference in how well a person might scale a tree.
However, with no plans to repeat that performance, he felt decently secure in offering her his arm and taking the heavy valise with the other. “Surely all of this weight cannot be the valise and ledger.”
She shrugged. “I put nothing else in.”
He adjusted the leather strap and continued on, glad to finally set the thing down on his father’s desk. Abigail and Gaby were thankfully absent as he shooed away the servants and closed the library door.
If Father was around, he would soon find them. If not, they would manage nicely without him.
Setting the valise aside, they opened the le
dger on the desk between them and began looking over the entries. At some point, a servant came in and lit the lamps. Awhile later, Cook brought a tray of food. By the time the noise of female voices sounded outside, they had made substantial progress.
“What will I tell them?” Maribel said as the front door opened and the voices of Gaby and Abigail drifted through the closed library door. “If we are to decipher all of this, I need a reason to spend time here.”
“I, um …” His usual wit failed him, as apparently did his brain.
The door flew open with Gaby leading the way. An instant later, Maribel leaned over the desk and kissed him soundly.
On the lips.
“Oh,” Gaby said. Out of the corner of his eye, Jean-Luc saw his sister stop so quickly that Abigail ran into her.
“Oh,” Abigail added as she adjusted her hat to peer around Gaby.
“Oh,” Maribel said sweetly as she removed her lips from his and smiled at his family. “We didn’t expect you home so soon.”
“Apparently not,” Abigail said, her attention squarely focused on him and not on Maribel. “Might I have a word, Jean-Luc?” She gave Maribel a look that might have been interpreted as sweet and welcoming by anyone who did not know her. “Please excuse us for just a minute, won’t you?”
He spied Maribel’s expression and couldn’t believe what he saw. The redhead actually looked amused. Did she not realize she had practically ruined her reputation in this city if either of these two chatty women decided to speak of their little adventure in falsifying a romance?
Apparently not, for she was still smiling when Abigail led him from the room.
Though he expected she would give him a brief lecture in the parlor, Abigail bypassed the welcoming front room to grasp his elbow and haul him back through the house and out into the courtyard.
Sticky evening heat remaining from the afternoon enveloped them as they stepped out into the evening shadows. There she finally released her grip, but she was only just getting started on showing how she felt about what she had seen. “Your sister’s friend? Truly, Jean-Luc, could you have found anyone more unsuitable?”
The Pirate Bride Page 20