The Unraveling of Lady Fury

by Shehanne Moore

  “You always did have an answer for everything, Fury.” He creased his all too sensuous lips into a smile. “But after that little business you got up to in Jamaica, I’d watch my tongue.”

  Jamaica? She straightened, steadying herself. Wasn’t he just mean enough to remember that. And the damned place she wished she’d never seen let alone been born in.

  “How did you—” Find me, were the wrong words to use. James Flint Blackmoore was not a man to look. How well did she know that. “What do you want?”

  His crystal blue gaze slid over her face. Looking at the jewels, no doubt. What else would he look at, after all? She had never truly interested him.

  “A moment of your time.”

  That was nothing, she supposed. A great deal less than he’d demanded the last time she had asked him that question. But it would still be a huge mistake to give that moment here. Malmesbury might have been fifty, but his hearing was acute.

  They could go to her bedroom. With Susan in it, it would be safe. But it wasn’t just that Flint wore no cravat—he wasn’t gentlemanly enough to have ever worn one. She adhered to the mantra no bedroom was safe with Flint Blackmoore in it. There was also the matter of her book of secrets. As for the cellar, she couldn’t possibly take him there.

  “Downstairs. And hurry up. I don’t have all night.”

  “Isn’t that an offer a man might find hard to refuse?”

  She regretted speaking to him so unpleasantly. Not because he was Flint Blackmoore. No. Those feelings had long departed her heart. She would rather spit on him than butter him. But he had been in the cellar and seen Thomas. Although quite how he had seen Thomas…he must have opened the box.

  “This way.” Reaching the foot of the staircase, she threw open the doors to the sitting room.

  She entered and smiled. Why not? Flint did not look as she remembered him now that she considered it, after the first shock had passed and she could take in the details. Tall, yes. The lean limbs, easy gait, and sloping shoulders that had so beguiled her, oh, yes. That was unchanged. But his sharp-angled face seemed different somehow, although only a little more lined than before. The corn-colored hair framing it was tidier and therefore lanker than when he had stood on the deck of the Calypso with a sea breeze ruffling it. Although he had never been one for elaborate garments, the starkness of the worn corded breeches, even the tricorne hat, was astonishing.

  “Sit down, won’t you?”

  “Is it safe?”

  Ignoring him, she lit the candles beneath the hanging of Salome. It seemed apt somehow for her to stand there to recollect herself. She had always understood the strength of these women better than most. The villa was only the second she and Thomas had looked at when they arrived overland from France, and it sat further from the center of the town than Susan would have liked. A place at the mercy of cicadas and church bells. But the hanging of the white-gowned, barefoot Salome had determined her. Coupled with the crimson opulence of the room, the frowning portraits of nameless contessas, she saw now she could not have chosen a better place to face this man and show him just how well she was doing.

  It might even have been that the whole thing was preordained. It was not the kind of room he would blend in to. Rather the kind to highlight the poverty-stricken nature of his scruffy breeches and the worn boots that stretched to his thighs.

  “So, James.” Knowing how much it was always Captain Flint to him, she said it deliberately. “What brings you here?”

  As if she could not guess. There was only one thing he could want: money.

  Removing his hat, he eased down into the satin upholstered chair. Of course, he wasn’t going to look anything other than ridiculously uncomfortable on that, with his long legs and tall body. Flint Blackmoore and cream satin. It was probably why his sigh came all the way from his bones.

  “What do you think? I’m Malmesbury’s valet.” He adjusted his beige coat.

  “What?” She had wondered about his valet, hadn’t she?

  “Yes. I—”

  “But how—”

  “I lost the Calypso.”

  “The Calypso?” His pride and joy. The thing he loved best in the whole world. The only thing, she remembered with a pang. For an instant she couldn’t speak, thinking how precious that creaking hulk was to him. “That still doesn’t explain why you’re a valet.”

  He shifted uncomfortably and gritted through his teeth. “He bought me, right? Privateer’s life, sweetheart. Of course, I should never have listened to De Wolfe. I know that now.”

  “But you said sailing under a United States flag gave you work.”

  “Eight years ago, sweetheart. Before I met you. I thought it was enough to tell you that much.”

  “And the British deserved everything they got?”

  “Sure they did. It was war, wasn’t it? But that was then. This is now. Now, we got hunted down. Stopped from bringing our booty into ports. I got captured for trying. Among other things.”

  How like him to hedge around the specifics. Even when she’d first known him, the only person he’d served was himself. In fact she was never clear whose side he was on, apart from his own.

  “That’s how I got wind of this little scheme of yours.”

  “Mine?” For a second she wondered if she could blame Susan for the whole sordid thing. Truth to tell, she was so stunned she struggled to wonder anything. James Flint…James Flint Blackmoore could not have been caught and sold as a servant. A valet, of all things.

  “Look. The years obviously haven’t been any kinder to you than they have to me.”

  The remark astonished her. If she removed the bruises from the equation, she felt she was doing not so badly. But how like Captain Flint to think otherwise.

  “Look, I mean…you know what I mean.” He gestured wearily.

  “No. Not really. I can’t say as I do.”

  She considered asking him to leave, but because he was Malmesbury’s valet, she swallowed the consideration. Where would he go, after all, except back upstairs to tell Malmesbury everything?

  “It’s like this, James. They have and they haven’t been.” She assumed the armchair opposite. She even fingered her throat, largely to mask the shudder of unease that passed through her that he knew of her scheme. Although it wouldn’t have surprised her in the least to find the paste sapphire absent from her neck. The chain it sat on too. Without her even noticing it had gone.

  “Thomas is dead. In fact I think you may even have seen him in the cellar. Unfortunately, his mother never liked me and has made that disdain plain, for reasons I have never been able to understand.”

  He glanced at her. “Me neither, sweetheart, you want to know the truth.”

  The truth? It would be a first. Him pretending to like her too. All the same, it didn’t matter. She’d do anything not to lose this now. “Look, if it’s money you want, I can help you, for old time’s sake. I just can’t do it right now. The fact is these jewels are all I have.” Naturally she wasn’t about to impart the fact they were paste, although if he tried to blackmail her—something he was adept at—he could have them and be welcome.

  His gleaming blue eyes stared as if he had no idea what she meant. As if he didn’t have the foggiest what a jewel was. Or money either. “So? What the hell will you do, Fury?”

  She tightened her mouth. One thing was for certain, she wasn’t going to be touched by his concern. No. The jewels weren’t the only fake thing around here. Did he think she didn’t see through this…this novel hangdog approach? He wasn’t interested in her welfare any more than he was in her. He never had been.

  “What about?”

  “What do you think? This mess you’re in.”

  “What else can I do? I need to produce an heir. That’s why Malmesbury’s here.”

  “Malmesbury?”

  Why did he look so astonished, as if Malmesbury were some drooling idiot and she needed her head examined? Why? Her plan was perfect.

  “And the others,
yes.” Her voice was vaguely strangled.

  “You think this will work?”

  “Since Thomas’s mother is in England, yes.” She didn’t feel it was a mistake to blurt this. Not when she’d promised him money. The one thing he understood. Even if he’d have to wait for it. “I am going to bury him. Just not yet. How can I?”

  “I’m not meaning that. You think Malmesbury and the others can have children?”

  “Oh, yes. I have every dirty little secret there is to be had on them. As some of these secrets include bastards, I think we can conclude they can. That’s also why I know they won’t talk.”

  “Impressive.” For a second his gaze held hers in the candlelit darkness. Subtly. Acknowledging. So much like old times she thanked God he did not ask about her own ability to produce a child. Then he eased back, setting his long legs forward. “Actually I have a proposition for you.”

  She rose from her chair. “I don’t think I am in the mood for any business proposition of yours right now. Not with so much at stake. I’ve said to you I have no money to hand, and I am a little busy trying to secure—”

  “Let me do it.”

  “W-what?” Her face reddened. Never mind the intense focus of his regard made her jittery. Was it any wonder? Him?

  He curved his sensuous mouth upward. “You heard.”

  She had heard. She just hadn’t wanted to.

  “No.” The word burst from her before she could stop it. Burst nastily, forcefully, in a way that struck her dumb. But James Flint Blackmoore? What was there to consider about this, after all? Nothing, which was why she hadn’t wanted to consider it even before he asked, before he strolled in here, before she saw him in that flickering candlelight arc.

  “What’s so wrong with that, sweetheart?” He didn’t shift his gaze, his body, anything. “That way, you at least know what you’re getting. Not like with these monsters.”

  She did know, which was why the tiny flicker of memory of the nights spent in his bed shamed her. Nights where she had sought his touch, his embrace, and her fingers had tangled in that same hair now framing his scholarly-looking face in unrestrained passion.

  She also remembered how he had abandoned her on a London quay and the words he had used to dismiss her.

  When it came to monsters, she’d known the very best. She was not even going to consider this. It would give her such pleasure to refuse him now she saw he was every bit as desperate as she’d been that day and had lost everything he had.

  She tilted her chin. Of course she could and would keep it civil, no matter that her hands quivered in the folds of her gown. Revenge was always best executed cold. Heat only showed passion. She had none for him.

  “And why should I do that?”

  “Haven’t I just said? Isn’t what we were before reason enough?” He looked at her, and for a second not only was the old Flint in his eyes and the tilt of his jaw, but she saw what the damned man wore didn’t matter. Whatever he wore, he wore with that casual air. No woman would look at the clothes, but would instead think about what lay underneath them.

  “Look, I’m not even asking you to buy my freedom, seeing as you’ve got no money. I’m just asking you to use that information you said you have. Then we can get to it. Just like old times. Never knew another woman like you, Fury.”

  How like him to pretend not to see what she really meant. Oh, yes, this would be a pleasure through and through.

  “No, James. Why should I? Why should you? Never mind what you did to me. A valet? The father of my child? The Beaumont heir? I think not. You know, one must be fussy about these things.”

  His gaze froze, still focused on her face. She swept across the elegant floor tiles, past the eroded statues of Cupid, toward the doors.

  “It’s not just that I don’t think so. In fact you may even say that first I would rather rot in everlasting hell.” She grasped the handles and drew the doors open. Oh, she felt good about this. “Now, if you don’t mind…”

  She waited for him to rise and amble out. He would do so, surely? Instead his voice came from the darkness behind her, as only Flint’s could. Calm. Quiet. Measured. Enough to send chills sweeping up her spine.

  “You might not think that when it happens, sweetheart.”

  She laughed, discomfited. “I’ll take my chances. Preferable to taking you.”

  “Not really. You see, as it happens, when it comes to putting my cards on the table, I have the ace.”

  “Oh, do you?”

  “You want me telling these gentlemen upstairs who you really are?”

  “You wouldn’t dare.”

  His gaze met hers. “Try me.”

  Chapter Two

  Fury gained the darkened hallway in an instant. He’d tell them who she was? Damn him. How dare he think he could hold anything over her head like this? Hadn’t she spent seven years insuring herself against the moment that ever came out? Chiseling, cajoling, bribing? Extorting every piece of information she could so she would be safe?

  Hearing his footsteps thundering behind her, she grasped her skirts and swept toward the curved staircase.

  “No, James. It distresses me to shatter your illusions, but you try me.”

  In a bound he reached the bottom stair before her, his eyes blue-ice slits, his mouth set, his muscle working in his stubbled jaw. He did, at least, have the common decency to lower his voice as he stood glaring.

  “Confound and damn you to hell, Fury. Obviously you’re not paying enough attention to what I’m saying to you here.”

  A lesser woman might have quaked. Fury was not a lesser woman. Astonished perhaps. James Flint Blackmore always held his temper. Perhaps because he never felt passionate enough about anything to lose it, the Calypso aside. Yet he contorted his handsome face in rage. It may have been one of the first times in his life anyone had denied him anything.

  Too bad.

  She tilted her nose a few degrees higher and sailed past him. Not paying attention? Just because she wasn’t listening to him? “Oh, I think when it comes to the dunce’s cap, your head’s a much better fit than mine.”

  “My head?” He pounded his feet up the stairs beside hers, and she had to hold her skirts higher before he stood on the hem. “How’s that when your head’s the one made of muffin dough?”

  “Mixture. And mixture, dough or not, you’re not holding any rods over it. Not anymore.”

  “Over your head? I been halfway over the Caribbean, sweetheart, and let me tell you that’s one position that ain’t never been heard of. You? Do something I told you? When was this exactly?”

  The fury he reeked astounded her. The cheap jibe more so. Pride, a man’s most tender part. Flint, the great and mighty, would naturally find it hard to believe any woman could possibly be impervious to his charms.

  Grasping her skirt tighter, she hurried on. “Now, you know how very vexed you get when you start sounding like a Savannah farm boy instead of the scourge of the Caribbean. But perhaps you haven’t been taking yourself them damned fine elocution lessons since you wound up top of the bill at a lil’ ole slave auction.”

  Why she mocked him like this, bringing up things he’d sooner die than admit to, she had no idea, except perhaps because her heart beat too fast and her hands shook until she felt as if a fever lay on her skin.

  “Damn you, Fury, it’s ‘little old,’ not ‘lil’ ole,’ and well you know it.”

  “Yes. The old Flint, now there’s a man I might conceivably have been frightened of. But this new you? Hmm…”

  “What I remember, you weren’t exactly scared of the old me either.”

  “First impressions can on occasion be misleading.”

  Before she could stop him, he lunged for her wrist and she crashed into the metal banister. Remembering last night’s unfortunate debacle with Thomas at this same spot, she muffled a horrified shriek.

  “Then just you tell me if I’m wrong here. About that little business with Celie.” He gritted his teeth and tightened hi
s fingers until she swore he would leave bruises—even more for Susan to deal with. “And now, your lately shuffled off this mortal coil husband lying face down in a box. In your cellar, Fury.”

  She made a sterling effort to stand on her heels. So, she was right about that? Just what Celia had been to him? She’d thought she was, all that time on the Calypso, although he’d always denied it. Now he had just given it away.

  Taking a breath, she looked at him squarely. “I believe she would have been Lady Celia to you.”

  The choking sound that issued from the back of his throat told her all she needed to know, except for whether Lady Celia had known him as Captain Flint, scourge of the Caribbean, or the more respectable Captain Blackmoore, who could pass himself off at a governor’s dinner table as a legitimate seafaring man. He could fool an enemy ship into thinking it was all he was.

  “Whatever her name was, Celie or Celia, doesn’t make no difference seeing as she’s dead.” Another grit of his teeth. “Like everyone else who comes into contact with you. You ever think that’s why people don’t like you?”

  People didn’t like her? She had known Flint never cared a jot for her. But to hear it confirmed…

  She swallowed the burning constriction. In truth she wanted to cry at her own stupidity. But after she first eviscerated his cheekbones with her nails, if he would only free her. But it was as if he knew her intention to damage that handsome damned face of his.

  “No, docile’s hardly the word for you. It never was.”

  “Why should it be?” She steadied herself. No. She would not debase herself before him. No matter how much he hurt her. “The things you did to me.”

  He frowned. “What things?”

  “Oh, please, allow me to spend the night telling you when I’ve nothing better to do. But since you’re asking, why don’t we start with the way you took my virginity?”

  “Took it? Hell. You were giving it away.”

  “So it pleased you to believe.”

  “Never saw you refusing, sweetheart.” His gaze picked over her face. Then he narrowed his eyes seductively. “Leastways…” He stepped closer in that way that had always made him very dangerous. “I’m offering now to get you out this little hole you’re in.”