by Untamed
He scowled down at her for so long Barbara was sure he’d repudiate her demand. She’d questioned his honor. Refused to accept his word. She was bracing herself for a scathing retort when he turned and strode to the fold-down writing table. As sumptuous as the rest of the cabin, the desk was fitted with a heavy blotter, sheets of vellum and a brass-capped inkwell. A few scratches of a quill later, he returned.
“You can present this at the Bank of Virginia when we reach the capital. They’ll honor it.”
He’d made the draft out for U.S. dollars. Barbara translated the amount into pounds and felt her throat go dry.
“I didn’t ask for this much.”
He let his glance slide to the slopes of her breasts. “You underestimate your value.”
Heat rushed to her cheeks. He was taunting her, daring her to end this farce here and now.
She wanted to. God knew, she wanted to. She ached to fling the bank draft back in his face. Had she been the only one to consider, she would have done so with great relish. Almost choking on her pride, she waved the document to dry the ink, rolled the stiff vellum and slipped it into her reticule. Her smile was blade-sharp and mocking when she turned to face him.
“I’ll try to give you a good return on your investment.”
He made no move to stop her when she loosened the ribbons at the scooped neck of her chemise. They’d both crossed the line now. There was no going back.
A roll of her shoulders sent the soft linen sliding to her elbows. From there it drifted to the floor. She stood stiff before him as he took a slow inventory. It was as insulting as it was thorough.
A corner of Barbara’s mind registered the whistle of the ship’s calliope and rhythmic slap of the paddle wheel on the river. She counted each sharp note, each watery churn, until Zach nodded.
“Continue.”
She fumbled with the ties of her drawers and let them fall. This was what she was, she reminded herself once again. What she’d become.
“Turn around. Slowly.”
Her hands fisting at her sides, she performed a slow pirouette. Her chin jutted when she faced him once again.
“Well? Are you satisfied with the merchandise?”
“Not yet. But I soon will be.”
His hands went to his trouser flap. Spinning on her heel, she started for the bed.
“Not there,” he rapped out. “Here.”
She swung back, saw the hard set to his jaw.
“You’re the one who insists on playing the whore. Any two-penny trollop can service a man where he stands.”
She didn’t move. Her heart hammering against her ribs, she tried to imagine how she was to accomplish what he demanded of her.
He must have seen, or sensed, her confusion. “You use your hands,” he drawled. “And your mouth.”
Stone-faced, she moved toward him. Her palm slapped against his trouser front. He grunted, but stood his ground. Barbara stared a hole in his shirt-front as she moved her hand in a tight circle.
He was already rampant. She could feel the length of him, the bulging hardness. His shirt became a blur of white as she pressed the heel of her hand against him.
His breath hissed in. He didn’t move, but she felt his stomach muscles coil.
Her mouth. He wanted her to use her mouth. The thought of closing her lips around him made her throat go dry and her heartbeat thunder in her ears. When she slipped a hand inside his trouser flap, the heat of him also stirred a wanton thrill deep in her belly.
The intensity of it sickened her. She was, indeed, no better than a two-penny trollop. She would have quit the field then and retired in ignominious defeat, but she’d pushed him too far.
Muttering a fierce oath, he grabbed her wrist and yanked her hand free of his trousers. A savage twist brought her arm up behind her back and her body slamming into his.
She knew an instant of panic. The memory of that awful night in Naples came crashing back…and was obliterated by the crush of Zach’s mouth on hers. She was caught between terror and molten heat. Between the stupid girl she’d once been and the woman who’d found a searing passion in this man’s arms. Shutting her mind to everything but the prod of his shaft against her belly, Barbara wrenched her arm free and locked both arms around his neck.
Zach knew the moment she yielded her body, if not her heart. He was desperate to have her, to drag her up, hitch her legs around his hips, drive into her. That’s what she’d asked for. What she’d demanded. Hell, she’d all but begged him to treat her like the strumpet she believed herself to be.
Zach might well have believed it, too, if not for her clumsy responses that day at Morgan’s Falls. She’d been eager, as eager as he, but so unskilled he’d come near to spilling himself before he’d brought her to a panting, writhing peak.
He was perilously close to that state now. Too close to spin this out any longer. Whirling her around, he backed her to the wall. Her shoulders hit the polished oak with a thump. In the next breath, he had her just where he’d imagined her a moment ago, her legs locked around his waist, his rod probing at her wet heat.
“Look at me.”
Her head came up. Her cheeks were flushed, he saw with savage satisfaction, and a pulse beat frantically in her long, slender throat.
“I want you. So bad I hurt with it. I won’t take you in payment for a debt but…”
“But what?”
“I’ll take you every other way I know.”
With a flex of his thighs, he thrust into her. She was ready for him. Wet and ready. Gritting his teeth, he pleasured her. When she cried out and convulsed around him, it near killed him to pull away and spill himself.
Barbara was slick with sweat when Zach tumbled her to the velvet-covered bunk.
Mewling with pleasure when his teeth and tongue stirred her once again to pleasure.
Limp and near boneless with exhaustion when he reached for the coverlet that had fallen to the floor.
“What…?”
The hoarse croak startled her. Her throat was raw from trying to suppress her groans. Wetting her lips, she tried again.
“What are you doing?”
“The coals in the stove have burned out. It’s cold in here.”
She hadn’t noticed the chill or the prickly bumps it had raised on her skin. Both disappeared when Zach dragged up the coverlet and curved her body into his.
“I should go back to my cabin,” she protested as he bent his legs and made a nest for her on his thighs.
“Not tonight.”
She tried to squirm around, but he held her warm and fast.
“Not any night, I’m thinking.”
“Zach…”
“We’ll talk about it tomorrow. Let me sleep.” His arm was heavy on her waist, his voice a soft rumble in her ear. “You’ve well nigh killed me, woman.”
Hattie sat alone in the cabin she shared with her mistress. Like a small, rapacious barn owl, she stared unblinking at the wall separating this stateroom from the one adjoining it.
Darkness surrounded her. She’d trimmed the wicks on the oil lamps and hadn’t bothered to feed coals into the stove. The gay notes of the calliope and tinkle of glass from the dining salon at the end of the passageway had died away. Faint whiffs of cigar smoke had curled through the louvered door for some time after that, bringing with them the chink of poker chips and a murmur from the smoking salon. Eventually those echoes had died, too. Now there was only the steady thump-thump of paddle wheel against river to break the silence.
With every splash of the wheel, the jealousy and resentment roiling inside her churned and thickened. The mixture was like a rancid stew, heavy as a stone in her gullet, with a foul, disgusting aftertaste. When she added hate to the pot, her throat became so thick and clogged she could scarce draw a breath.
Damn the woman! Her and her haughty ways. She liked to look down that long nose of hers, but lifted her skirts as quick as any round-heeled whore. Small wonder Zach went after her like a hound after a bitc
h in heat. What man wouldn’t? She should rot in hell, right alongside that bastard, Thomas.
That vicious thought gave birth to another.
Accidents happened, didn’t they? Particularly aboard steamboats churning through sleeting rain and darkness. People fell overboard and drowned all the time. Mostly drunks who lost their footing, but there were snags aplenty in the river. Who’s to say the Natchez Star wouldn’t hit one? Or bump up against another steamer fighting for space in the narrow, twisting channels? In the resulting confusion, all it would take was a quick shove, like the one she’d given Thomas.
Hattie’s heart began to thump. Eyes burning, she stared at the dark, shadowy bulkhead. She could almost see the future unfolding on the oak paneling.
With that blond bitch out of the way, Zach would turn to her. Hattie knew he would. He’d smile at her in that particular way of his and take her hand the way he did the night of the Cotton Balers’ Ball. And he’d take her to his bed.
Barbara Chamberlain wasn’t the only one with an itch that needed scratching. Swine that he was, Thomas had given Hattie the rare moment or two of pleasure. With Zach, those moments would pile one on top of each other.
All she had to do was find the right chance.
15
Hattie watched and waited. She was sure an opportunity would present itself, but she hadn’t counted on the suicidal desire for speed that possessed the captain of the Natchez Star.
With so many steamers competing for river traffic, every steamboat company tried to lure passengers with new speed records to augment the luxurious accommodations. Ten years ago, the run from Fort Gibson to Cincinnati had taken twenty-five days. Now the same journey took only nine. The captain of the Star seemed determined to best even that record.
Despite the ever-present hazards of sunken stumps, shifting river channels and busy river traffic, he kept the boilers roaring night and day. The boat docked at the major towns along the route only long enough to discharge and take on passengers, but didn’t stop between. Not even to take on fuel. The bargemen who supplied wood for the boilers tied their flat-bottom skiffs alongside in mid-channel and tossed cut logs to Natchez Star’s crew and passengers, who stacked them willy-nilly on the deck.
A mere sixteen hours after departing Fort Gibson, the Star hit the confluence of the Arkansas and the Mississippi. The following day, the boat had docked at Memphis. Sometime during the next night, it left the muddy waters of the Mississippi for the Ohio. Louisville lay behind them now, Cincinnati just ahead. There they’d take another steamer to Wheeling, West Virginia, where Zach intended to hire a coach to convey them over the National Pike to Washington.
With each passing mile, Hattie’s hate festered like an open, oozing wound. With each hour the Star drew closer to Cincinnati, her frustration mounted. She barely saw Barbara. When she did, the woman was almost always in Zach’s company. The two took their meals together in the elegant dining room. Strolled the upper deck in the frosty morning air. Joined the other first-class passengers for cards or a minstrel show each evening.
Worse, far worse, the whore spent every night in the lieutenant’s bed. The only occasions she spoke to her maid were when she came to her cabin to bathe or change her dress.
Between times, Hattie prowled the decks. By day she watched Zach with Barbara and ached inside. By night she pawed through her mistress’s things. It was during one of those sessions alone in the cabin that she found the folded oilskin. The small packet was tucked inside the lining of the valise Barbara had shoved under her unused bunk.
“What’s this now?”
Carefully, she unfolded the oilskin. The parchment inside rustled. Curious as a cat, she smoothed the document out and scanned its lines. She couldn’t read or write except to make her “X,” but the red wax seal at the bottom looked properly impressive. Frowning, Hattie traced the seal with a fingertip.
Instinct told her the document had something to do with Louise Morgan. Maybe this was proof of the tie between Louise’s first husband and the Chamberlain woman. Maybe the English cow had brought it to back up her claim of kinship. And maybe it was something else altogether.
Pursing her lips, Hattie glanced at the stateroom wall. Zach and the whore were on the other side of the partition. If the past few nights were any measure, they’d go at each other for hours before falling asleep in Zach’s bunk.
Folding the parchment, Hattie slipped it into her pocket. A moment later, the stateroom door closed quietly behind her. Surely there was someone still roaming about who could read the lines to her.
The task took longer than anticipated. The first cabin steward she approached could read English, but this, he informed her, was written in what he guessed was Spanish or French. Finally she found a farmer’s wife among the steerage passengers with Creole blood and a knowledge of both languages.
The steerage compartment on the upper deck reeked of sweat-stained woolens and boiled onions. Closing her nose to the stink, Hattie hovered at the woman’s shoulder as she translated the document in exchange for a copper penny filched from Barbara’s purse.
“Near as I can tell, ma cher, this is written by the bishop of Reims. It’s a place in France, you understand. With a big cathedral.”
Hattie wasn’t interested in the where. “What does this bishop say?”
“Something about another priest. A Jesuit. Ahhh, he was a rogue, this Jesuit. The bishop declares him défroqué.”
“What’s that?”
She waved a hand. “He loses his sanctity and cannot perform baptisms or marriages. Any that he performed while here, in America, hold no validity. Including the marriage of…”
Frowning, she squinted at the document. Hattie held her breath and guessed the answer before the Creole supplied it.
“The ink is blurred here, but I believe… Yes, it refers to the marriage of one Henri Chartier to a woman of mixed French and Indian blood.”
Hattie almost snatched the paper from the other’s hand. With a muttered word of thanks, she hurried back downstairs. She didn’t fully grasp the import of what she’d just learned, but she knew it must be significant. Why else would Barbara have hidden away this bit of paper?
Alone in the stateroom once again, Hattie debated whether or not to take the parchment to Zach. She’d have to think on the matter, she decided. Be certain showing him the paper would be to her advantage.
Carefully, she wrapped the oilskin around the document and slipped it back into its hiding place. A small, sly smile played at her lips as her glance went once again to the bulkhead separating this cabin from Zach’s.
On the other side of the partition, Barbara stretched lazily. Zach lay sprawled beside her, magnificent in his nakedness.
After their first night, he’d taken care to feed the potbellied stove before stripping off his clothes and peeling away Barbara’s. The stateroom was now warm and cozy and pungent with the scent of sex.
Idly, she propped her head in one hand and traced a fingertip through the curling hair on his chest. He opened one eye and flashed her a grin.
“Again?”
“No!” she protested, half laughing, half alarmed. “Not yet.”
Folding his hands over his naked belly, he closed his eye. “Tell me when you’re ready.”
She couldn’t help but smile at his blatant male complacency. The man had every right to feel smug. In the past week he’d pleasured Barbara in ways she’d never imagined possible.
She found it hard to believe an entire week had passed since they’d boarded the Star. The days had flown. And the nights…
Sweet heaven, the nights!
Every one of them was branded on her soul.
The realization they had only one more left aboard the Star crept into her mind and slowly pushed aside the pleasure. Tomorrow they’d dock in Cincinnati. Three more days aboard another steamer would bring them to Wheeling, where they’d board a coach for Washington. By this time next week, Barbara would be searching out a ship to take h
er to Bermuda.
Chewing on her lower lip, she played with the wiry curls on Zach’s chest. She could tell him her plans, confess that the evidence against Harry was too damning to overturn his conviction and secure his release from prison by any legal mean. She could also admit the bank draft tucked safely in her reticule was intended to fund outrageous bribes and a dangerous escape.
She could tell Zach all, but should she?
He’d sail to Bermuda with her. She knew him well enough now to accept without question that he’d hold true to his promise to help her and, by extension, Harry.
The problem was she was fast tumbling into love with the man. The thought both thrilled and disturbed her. She wasn’t sure quite how to deal with it or the emotions Zach stirred in her.
Should she confess her feelings and draw him further into her schemes? Allow him to risk his reputation, his career, and perhaps his own freedom by helping Harry escape?
For the first time in her selfish, tumultuous life, Barbara found herself worrying more about the prey she’d snared in her web than about her brother or herself.
“Easy, sweeting!”
Zach’s mumbled protest startled her out of her thoughts. He snared her wrist, and Barbara looked down to see she’d twirled his chest hair into a tight corkscrew.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
“You didn’t, but I’m thinking one good pull deserves another.”
With a lazy move, he levered up, rolled her onto her back and pinned her wrist to the tangled sheets. His eyes glinted as he dipped his head and took her nipple between his teeth.
Barbara gasped at the small pain and gave a whimper of pleasure when he began to suckle.
Later, she thought. She’d decide later what to tell Zach. When her mind wasn’t spinning with delight and her body curling in desire.
Five days passed, and still she couldn’t come to a decision.
They’d transferred to the John Hawley for the trip upriver to Wheeling. As she had aboard the Star, Barbara spent almost every waking hour with Zach. Each night she fell asleep in his arms.