"I do." He set his jaw. Looking at him, stubborn and proud and the least likely slave that she had ever met, Lilah made up her mind. He would have his freedom if she could, by her silence, give it to him. It was no more than she had meant to do later, with her father's consent.
"All right then. You can send the money if you want, but my father actually bought you, not me. I just… bid."
"So I'll send the money to your father. You agree?"
She looked at him, and slowly nodded. "I agree."
He smiled at her, a sudden charming smile that reminded her heart-stoppingly of the man she had teetered on the brink of falling in love with that first enchanted night.
"Then I apologize for my behavior of two nights ago, and give you my word that it won't happen again. Until we're rescued, you're as safe with me as you would be with your own father."
He got to his feet as he spoke, and held out his hand to help her up. Lilah put her hand in his with mixed emotions. If he went back to England she would never see him again; certainly he would never willingly set foot on Barbados. And for the rest of their enforced stay on the island she would be as safe from his advances as she would be if he were her father. She should be overjoyed on both counts, she knew-but she wasn't.
"Shall we be friends, then?"
He pulled her up beside him as he spoke, and let go of her hand. Lilah nodded, though there was an oddly hollow feeling inside her.
"Friends," she agreed.
"In that case, I'll share my fish with you. If it hasn't burned to a crisp, that is. I was cooking it when I saw that ship."
She smiled at him, but it was an effort. "Lead on, Macduff," she quoted lightly, but her heart was not as light as her words. Maddening as he was, and totally forbidden to her as well, it still hurt to imagine never seeing him again. With a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach Lilah wondered if, once he was gone, her heart would ever be the same.
XXI
The fish was slightly blackened around the edges, but it was still delicious. Lilah ate it off the plantain leaf Joss had cooked it in, licked her fingers, and then rolled up the leaf and ate that too. Joss, sitting across the fire from her, watched her quizzically.
"Is eating one's dishes another of the quaintly barbaric customs you were raised with?"
"On Barbados, baked plantain leaves are considered a delicacy," she informed him with a lift of her chin.
He rolled his up and took a bite, then made a face. "Barbados must be a mighty strange place."
"It's lovely," she said, and proceeded to tell him all about it. From there she progressed to telling about her family, about her mother's death and Kevin's arrival on the scene soon after her father married Kevin's aunt Jane. A shadow must have clouded her face when she mentioned Kevin, because Joss frowned.
"In love with him, are you? Don't worry, if we survived he may well have too. I don't doubt you'll have a touching reunion when you get home to Heart's Ease." There was the slightest trace of sarcasm to his words.
Lilah shook her head. "I hope so. I'm very fond of Kevin. But I don't think I'm in love with him. My father thought he would make me a good husband, and I'm twenty-one, you know. It's time I was married."
"Fond of him?" Joss snorted. "You almost make me sorry for the bastard."
"Don't call Kevin that-he's a very nice man, actually. You just met him under, um, unfortunate circumstances. But why should you feel sorry for him?"
He looked at her without the smallest bit of humor in his face. "I wouldn't want the woman I marry being 'fond' of me. 'Fond' is cold comfort when the two of you are in bed together.''
"Joss!"
He smiled crookedly. "Does that shock you? Listen, my girl, I'll give you a piece of advice. Don't marry a man you're just 'fond' of. You'll be miserable inside a year."
"How would you know?" A thought then occurred to her and her eyes widened on his face. "You've never been married, have you? For goodness' sake, you're not married now?"
"No, I'm not married, and I never have been. And I'll be thirty next month, in case you're wondering."
She smiled, her expression smug. "So you don't know any more about marriage than I do. You just like pretending to be wise to impress me."
He shook his head at her. "Now there's where you're wrong. I do know more than I ever wanted to about the kind of marriage you'll have with your precious Kevin- a loveless marriage of convenience, whether you like to look at it that way or not. My mother was 'fond' of my stepfather when she married him. He had been my real father's best friend, and when my father died-I was eight years old-my mother leaned on him for advice and comfort. She was a very feminine woman, thought she couldn't function without a man, and she was 'fond' of my stepfather. They married a year after my father died. Within another year they were fighting constantly, and within two he had turned into a bitter, mean- tempered man who drowned his unhappiness in drink.
He couldn't stand the idea that she didn't love him, you see. Five years after they were married, he fell off a Bristol pier. Drunk again, after he and my mother had had yet another fight. If truth were told, I think by that time she was glad to be rid of him. Certainly I was. He was a mean drunk, and I was afraid that one day when I was no longer living under their roof to protect her he'd hurt her during one of his binges."
"You were close to your mother, weren't you?" Lilah asked softly, remembering that it had been his mother's deathbed behest that had sent him to Boxhill.
He nodded, the single bob of his head curt. "She was soft and gentle and sweet and didn't have a brain in her head. She needed a man to take care of her. My stepfather just wasn't that man."
"You didn't know she was, uh…" Lilah's voice trailed off as she couldn't think of a way to phrase the question that wouldn't anger him.
"The daughter of a slave?" he supplied, looking at her keenly. Then he shook his head. "My mother was as pale-skinned as you are. She had red hair and green eyes and was lovely. My black hair and dark skin are from my father, who as far as I am aware was descended from upright British merchants who could trace their ancestry clear back to William the Conqueror. All I got from my mother were her eyes. And she got those from her mother, the notorious Victoria."
"Uncle George seemed to recognize your eyes."
"He did, didn't he? And the shock of finding out that his past sins had come back to haunt him killed him. I'm sorry about that for your sake if you loved him, but the old bastard deserves to roast in hell. My mother never stopped talking about her father, or hoping to see him again. All she knew was that he had sent her and her mother away when she was a little girl and that they were never to return or contact him again. He supported them, though; there was always plenty of money even after I was born. But my mother wanted her father, and could never understand why he was so adamant about not seeing her. Of course she guessed, eventually, that she was illegitimate. But I'm almost certain that she never knew her mother was an octoroon slave. Brainless as she was, she never would have sent me to Virginia if she'd known. My grandmother died when I was young, but I remember her as looking very like my mother. Pale-skinned and lovely."
"I've heard that the octoroons of New Orleans are very beautiful."
He nodded. "She must have been. She caught old George's eye, didn't she? But then, almost anything must have been an improvement over that witch of a wife of his."
"Amanda is my great-aunt." Her voice was mildly chiding, though she wasn't a whole lot fonder of Amanda than he seemed to be. Still, Amanda was an old woman and her kin, and Lilah had been raised to show both estates respect.
"Then I beg your pardon. But you can't expect me to exactly love her after what she did."
"No." She looked at him, smiled. "I'm glad you're going to be free again. Being a slave doesn't exactly suit you."
His eyes met hers, and he grinned. "It doesn't, does it? I swear to you, Lilah my dear, that ordinarily I'm really the most charming of fellows. You've seen me at my worst."
"You
have been rather short-tempered."
"I apologize." He looked at her for a moment and his expression changed. "I promise that my disposition will improve now that we've agreed to be merely fellow castaways."
Lilah laughed. "Castaways? Is that what we are?"
"For the time being." He stood up and flexed his back, then grinned down at her. "On your feet, fellow castaway, we've work to do.
"What kind of work?" She eyed him suspiciously.
"If we ever want to be rescued, we need to make a few preparations. I doubt that many ships actually drop anchor in our bay here. But as we've seen, they do pass by the island. So I think what we need is a signal fire."
Lilah watched him kick sand over the small fire, then come around its smoking ruin and hold out his hand to her. For a long moment she just looked at it, then she placed her hand in his. His fingers closed warm and hard around her palm as he pulled her up to stand beside him.
XXII
That night, Joss cursed himself for what had to be the hundredth time for being rash enough to ever make her that fool promise.
"You're as safe with me as you would be with your own father," he mimicked in disgust. They'd gathered driftwood and piled it atop the dune together, practiced lighting the tender with the crude flint and steel he'd fashioned out of a rock he'd found on the beach and a buckle from the cuff of his breeches. This way she would know what to do if she should happen to be alone and see a ship. Then they had come down to feast together on a crab he killed with a rock. All the while she'd smiled at him, touched him, enticed him without, he thought savagely, even knowing quite what she was doing. Now it was full night, the moon was high in the sky, and they were going to bed. In his hut. Together. And he'd promised not to touch her. Christ in heaven!
Watching Lilah as she crawled before him into the hut, Joss groaned inwardly. He'd given her his word. And however much she might tempt him, with her silky pale skin and rag of a dress that was nearly transparent without the added thickness of her petticoat, he would not go back on his word.
"Damn it to hell and back!"
He hadn't meant to say the words aloud. Lilah heard him, and looked around inquiringly from just inside the hut. She was still on her hands and knees, her tantalizingly round little bottom barely veiled by the thin dress that was pulled tight around it by her position. Her soft eyes that were the exact color of one of Bristol's doves blinked at him over her shoulder as he failed to answer, and he was recalled to himself in a hurry.
"I'll-uh, there's something I need to check. I'll be back in a little while. You go on to sleep."
"I'll come with you." She started to back out of the hut. The soft blue cloth tightened even more around her bottom until Joss, watching with fascination, both hoped and feared it might split.
"No!" His protest was too loud, too vehement, but he couldn't help it. He needed a little time alone, a little time to get a firm grip on his baser instincts. "No, I'll be right back."
That was better, calmer. Christ, he couldn't let her guess how he felt! He strode away into the moonlit darkness, heading for the bay. A swim was what he needed. It might serve to cool him down.
He swam for what seemed like hours, then, exhausted, emerged from the water confident that he was safe. By now she'd be asleep. And he was tired…
But she wasn't asleep. She was sitting on a rock near where the incoming tide lapped at the white sand. Her hair was pulled over one shoulder, the ends resting in her lap as she wrestled with the tangles that snarled it. The moonlight struck the silken strands and gave them a life of their own, so that they glinted and glittered like molten silver. She looked like a damned mermaid. His breath caught at the sight of her.
"What the devil are you doing out here?" There was more frustration than anger in his voice as he stalked up to her. She smiled at him, her face tilted up so that he could see each lovely feature washed by moonlight. Even the faded blue of her dress took on a silvery sheen in the otherworldly light that poured over the bay.
"Combing my hair. See?" She held up a crudely fashioned comb for his inspection. "I made it by twisting sticks together with vines while I waited for you. You were gone so long I was beginning to be afraid you'd had an accident."
"I was swimming."
"So I see." The dry amusement in her voice warned him. He looked down at himself, turned scarlet, and glared at her furiously before stalking over to where his breeches awaited him in the sand. Soaking wet, he pulled them on, buttoned them, and turned to face her. The brazen wench was still calmly combing her hair, her eyes fixed with serene propriety on the gentle waves rolling in across the bay. But from the small smile that played hide-and-seek across her mouth, he guessed she'd gotten quite an eyeful. His face burned hotter as he planted his fists on his hips and glared at her across the few feet of sand that separated them.
"Damn it, I couldn't swim in my breeches!"
"I realize that."
"I told you to go to bed! How could I know you'd be sitting on a rock like a damned Lorelei when I came out of the water?"
"Nobody's blaming you for anything." Her voice was soothing, her eyes still fixed on die bay. He would have been mollified-if it hadn't been for that damned sneaky smile that kept flickering around her mouth.
"So you got an eyeful!" He sounded belligerent, he knew he did, but he couldn't help it. The notion of her seeing him naked in such circumstances was oddly embarrassing to him. And it infuriated him that that should be so. He'd bedded dozens of females over the course of his life, all of whom had seen him in the altogether. Having a woman's eyes on his body had never bothered him before. Maybe it was because he wanted the minx so badly, and knew he could not have her. Their paths would never cross again once they got off this damned island. And he couldn't just take her body and then cooly abandon her afterwards. She was a virgin, he'd stake his life, and a lady, and a gentleman did not seduce and abandon virgins. Or ladies.
Sometimes it was hell being a gentleman.
"It's all right, Joss," she said gently, sliding around on her rock so that she was looking right at him. With the moonlight pouring over her and the twinkling stars in their midnight velvet background high overhead framing her, she was so beautiful that he felt his blood start to heat. So beautiful that his body reacted independent of his mind. "I wasn't embarrassed."
For a full minute all he could do was stare at her, not quite sure whether or not to believe his ears. She wasn't embarrassed? Was this the haughty lady who would barely tolerate his hand on her arm? Who slapped him and bit him the last two times he'd lost his head and kissed her? Who made no bones about thinking he was so far beneath her that he was hardly fit to dust the ground she walked on? She wasn't embarrassed?!
"Well, I sure as hell was!" he growled, and turning his back, stalked off in the direction of the hut.
If she had laughed, he would have killed her.
But she didn't, or if she did at least he didn't hear her. She followed him meekly to the hut and crawled inside behind him. Joss had built the shelter to accommodate one person-himself. It was scarcely high enough to sit upright in, a little longer than his length if he stretched out flat, and perhaps three feet wide.
Definitely not wide enough for two people. Not when one of them was a man in an acute state of arousal and the other was the woman who had aroused him. Not when he'd given his word not to touch her. Hell and the devil!
He sat with his legs crossed in the far corner, glaring at her as she crawled inside. She sat, curled her legs beneath her, and smiled at him.
"Were you really embarrassed, Joss?"
"I'm going to sleep," he announced, his eyes narrowing to forbidding slits. Suiting the action to the words, he scooted down until he was stretched out full length, and turned his back to her. The palm fronds he had dragged in for bedding stabbed him in the side, but there was no way he was going to turn over and face her.
Not when it was all he could do to keep his hands to himself.
"All right.
Good night."
Even the softness of her voice grated on him. He imagined that her skin would feel like she sounded, soft, silky, and exquisitely refined. He gritted his teeth as behind him he heard the sounds of her making ready for bed. Please God she would not take off any of her clothes.
She didn't. She lay down fully dressed, and curled up smack against his back.
He felt the softness of her with every fiber of his skin. The imprint of her shape was seared indelibly into his back.
"This is much nicer than sleeping by myself. I was always afraid something would get me in the middle of the night."
He could feel her warm breath against the back of his neck. Christ, if she got any closer she'd be lying on top of him. Did she want what she was inviting? he wondered savagely. Did she even know what she was inviting?
"I got cold by myself, too. There's quite a breeze that blows in off the bay at night."
Her voice reminded him of the sleepy purr of a kitten. But her shape told him that it was no kitten who was curled against his back.
"Joss?"
"What?" If he sounded irritable, it was because he was. She was driving him insane, either deliberately or out of criminal ignorance. He'd give almost anything he'd ever possessed to turn over and enlighten her in the most basic way possible.
"I'm a little cold now."
She snuggled closer. Joss lay rigid as a board, gritting his teeth as he fought the impulses that threatened to overwhelm him. Finally, no longer able to help himself, he began to tremble.
"Joss! What's wrong?"
"Not a single bloody thing." The words were forced out between his teeth.
"Are you sure?"
"Yes, I'm sure!" He had the trembling under control again, thank God, but for how long he couldn't guess.
"All right, then." She sounded doubtful, but to his relief she quit talking. The softness of her breath stirred the hair at his nape, her breasts burned holes in the skin of his back, and her bare arm rested against his waist.
A gentleman he was. A saint he wasn't.
Desire in the Sun Page 14