The Raider

by Jude Deveraux

  Jessica rolled out of the line of fire while Alex said a few words meant to discipline sailors.

  “Gor…” Philip said, impressed.

  Sam laughed and jumped on Alex’s belly.

  “Jessica, get him off of me. He’s wet me through to my backbone. Can’t you control these brats?”

  Jess had already picked up Sam but at Alex’s last words, she dropped him so that his diaper made a splat sound. But Alex didn’t notice because when Jess leaned over, he could see all the way down her nightgown.

  “Ah, here they are,” Eleanor said, opening the door. “Out!” she commanded. “Let them have some privacy. Alex, did you sleep in that wig?”

  “Privacy!” Alex grumbled. “No one in this house knows the meaning of the word.”

  Eleanor closed the door and while Alex watched in open-mouthed astonishment, Jess stripped off her nightgown and pulled on underwear and her dress. “Alex, you look awful. Have you been sleeping well? Stay there, I’ll bring you some milquetoast. On second thought, you don’t smell so very good. I could bring you a bath. Wash your hair and back for you. And your feet. I don’t guess you can reach your feet over that belly too well.”

  “Get out of here, Jessica,” Alex said through clenched teeth.

  “Are you always in a bad mood in the morning?”

  “Out,” was all he could manage to say.

  Jess gathered the ledgers on the floor and left him alone.

  By the end of the second day of their marriage, Jessica was ready to call it quits. She was trying her best to be a good wife to Alex, just as she’d promised, but everything she did displeased him. First of all she’d brought him a tray of food, all of it carefully chosen so he didn’t have to chew very much.

  But when she’d tried to feed him, he’d pushed her halfway across the room. He said she was not to treat him as an invalid. Jess said she thought he was an invalid. It had been her experience that he couldn’t even walk a few feet that she didn’t have to put her arms around him and support him. She said she had gone into marriage with him with her eyes open and she had known she would have to be a nurse and was willing. He’d growled at her to bring him two pounds of beef or anything that he could chew.

  He’d left the house after that and returned when Jess was scrubbing Samuel down in a tub set before the fire in Alex’s room. Sam had decided to play with the new piglets and the sow had chased the terrified boy through several feet of mud and manure until Nick had pulled the boy out by his collar. Nick had comforted a crying Eleanor while Jess dumped buckets of water over Sam before taking him inside and giving him a proper bath.

  Alex stood in the doorway and gaped at her for a moment, then turned his back. “Jessica, you are indecent.”

  She glanced down at her wet, clinging underwear. “I didn’t want to get my dress wet. Alex, you have to get over your shyness. We did get married, you know. Sam, stand still so I can dry you. Alex, do I remind you of when you were a man?”

  He whirled to face her. “I’m a man now. God, Jess, you look—” Sam launched himself into Alex’s arms, his damp arms hugging Alex with all his might. Alex smiled and hugged the nude little boy back, nuzzling his damp neck. “For once, Sam, you smell good. You want me to read to you?”

  Sam laughed in answer.

  Jess took the boy. “I’ll put him down before he has an accident on your fine coat.”

  “Jess, please cover up. There are men about the house.”

  “Ah yes. Sorry. I’m not used to a house full of men.”

  Minutes later she was back, bending over, cleaning out the tub.

  “Jess,” Alex asked. “What would you do if you’d married your Raider?”

  She paused in scrubbing. “Help him. I’d know where he was going to be when and I’d be there to cover his back. I’d ride with him.”

  “What if he refused to let you know where he was going to be?”

  She grinned. “Oh, he’d tell me. I could persuade him.”

  “Yes, I believe you could. Then when he was shot at, you’d be there too, is that right?”

  “You take the bad with the good.”

  “Jess, I’m glad you didn’t marry the Raider.”

  Jessica didn’t answer.

  * * *

  Three days after the Montgomery wedding, nearly everyone in town was standing on the wharf, their eyes turned up toward the admiral and his soldiers, who were standing on the bow of a ship.

  For a full minute after the announcement, no one could speak. Everyone just stood there, mouth open, and blinked in disbelief. The admiral had announced that three of Warbrooke’s young men would be taken away to serve in His Majesty’s honor. All three of the men were big, strapping, healthy young men, all three were intelligent and had an air of independence about them.

  One of the young men was Ethan Ledbetter.

  “He thinks he’s sending the Raider away,” Jessica said under her breath.

  The next moment the air was split with Abigail’s screams. Everyone turned to see Ethan put his strong arms around Abby and lead her away.

  Jessica started to follow them, but Alex caught her arm.

  “Leave them,” Alex said, pulling her away.

  She struggled to free herself, but Alex held her fast as he forcibly guided her away from the crowd and toward the forest.

  “Alex, will you stop mothering me? I want to go to Abigail.”

  “For what reason? Jess, you’re to keep your nose out of this. The admiral thinks he has the Raider or he’s sure the Raider will try to rescue the men.”

  She jerked out of Alex’s grip. “And the Raider will rescue the men. Everyone in town knows that.”

  Alex rolled his eyes, his hands in fists at his sides. “Jess, the admiral will have twenty soldiers guarding those three. Not even your Raider can attack against odds like that.”

  Jess smiled at him in a patronizing way. “Alex, cowardly men don’t know what it’s like to not be cowardly. The Raider will be bound by honor to save those three.”

  “Honor? What about blood? The red kind that gets spilled when a man’s shot or stabbed.”

  Jess turned on her heel. “I have no time to talk to you. You’d never understand.”

  He grabbed her arm and spun her around to face him. “I understand more than you do. You’re so overwhelmed by the romance of the Raider that you can’t see the consequences. And as for being a coward, let me point out that I have repeatedly saved your hide.”

  Jessica leaned forward until she was nose to nose with Alex. He was actually several inches taller than she but he slouched so badly that they were usually about the same height. “The Raider will be there. I know he will. He could never allow such an injustice to be carried out. Twenty men, a hundred men, a thousand—they’re all the same to him. He doesn’t think about his own safety. He puts others before himself. He can dance before the enemy because he knows he has right on his side. Alex! Are you all right? Sit down here. You look a little pale.”

  Alex sat down on a tree stump, and Jess, worried about him, touched his cheek. He pulled her to him and placed his head on her breast. “Does he mean so much to you?”

  “He means so much to the town. Without him we’d have no hope. Someday maybe all of us will have the courage to stand up against the English, but today there’s just a select few of us.” She was holding him to her, stroking his back as if he were a child.

  “Us?” Alex asked. “I thought only your Raider was standing up for America, that he was the only one braving the English bullets.”

  “Alex, don’t start getting jealous again.”

  “Jealous?” He moved his head so he could look at her but he kept her upper arms pinned down. “My wife rhapsodizes about another man, a man who is bigger than life, a man who makes the gods on Mount Olympus seem like cowards and you tell me not to be jealous.”

  “Alex, you’re hurting me.”

  “Good!” He stood, still gripping her arms. “This little pain is nothing to what
you’ll feel if you expand on that ‘we’ and try to involve yourself in freeing those men.”

  “I never said I’d—ouch! Alex, let go of me.”

  “So help me, I’ll have a leash forged for your neck if you do anything stupid.”

  She started to tell him she’d do as she pleased but the look in his eye stopped her. “Sometimes you’re quite like Adam.”

  Immediately, Alex slumped down to the stump again and pulled her to him, hiding his blazing eyes from her view. “Swear to me, Jessica. Swear you won’t involve yourself.”

  “Alex, I can’t—”

  She stopped because he was squeezing her so hard she couldn’t breathe.

  “Jess, I couldn’t bear for anything to happen to you.”

  Jess was completely surprised by this and she lifted his face to look at him. “Alex, why did you ask me to marry you?”

  “Because I love you,” he said simply.

  “Oh.” She let him put his head back on her breast. Two men loved her, one a virile, handsome devil who refused to marry her, and now Alex said he loved her, and Alex was everything the Raider was not: where the Raider used brawn, Alex used brains.

  “Alex,” she said softly, “I won’t do anything foolish. I won’t get hurt. The Raider will—”

  “Hell!” Alex stood, again glaring at her. “He’ll not be able to help you. He’s going to be shot to death by the hundred soldiers guarding the draftees. Who’s going to save your precious town if the Raider is full of holes?”

  She stepped away from him. “Alex, your love for me doesn’t excuse this disgusting display of jealousy. At least I can think of something grander and bigger than a single life. America needs—release me.”

  Alex was pulling her out of the forest and back to the road. “You’re not leaving my sight until your precious Ethan is out of town.”

  “Ethan! You’re jealous of him too? Still? After what you did to that poor man? Alex, I think you have an odd idea of what constitutes love.”

  “And you don’t know anything about death. I’m going to save you no matter how hard you work to thwart me. Now come along and we’ll find you something to keep you busy.”

  * * *

  “Jessica, are you listening?” Abigail Wentworth asked, her voice angry, her eyes sunken and dark from worry.

  Jess straightened in her chair. It had been two days since the admiral’s announcement of the draft and during that time, she had worked about twenty hours each day. Alex had suddenly become very ill and she’d had to tend to his needs as well as run the disorganized Montgomery household. Plus, Alex had given her household accounts from the years he’d been at sea to verify. She’d run from fetching a book for Alex to directing a bondswoman in scouring a floor, to climbing onto the roof because Alex was sure there was a leaky place, to trying to add columns of fifty numbers while Alex talked to her.

  When the invitation to tea had come from Mrs. Wentworth, there had been words. Alex’s health had immediately returned in such vigorous form that Eleanor had come to tell them their shouting was drawing a crowd outside.

  After she’d threatened to run away in the middle of the night, Alex had relented and let Jess visit Mrs. Wentworth. After all, the old lady was highly respectable, wasn’t she? And what trouble could Jess get into attending a tea party?

  “There he is again,” Abigail said, looking out the window.

  Jess looked out to see Alex walking past—for the fourth time in the last thirty minutes. She held up her teacup and waved to him.

  “How can you bear it?” Abigail said in a melodramatic tone. “How can you bear to be married to that…that glittering, lazy—”

  “Leave Alex out of this!” Jess snapped. “He may not be much to look at but he’s a good man. And now he’s only concerned about my safety. Ethan may have the muscle, but Alex’s little finger is smarter than—”

  “Are we going to waste time while you two compare husbands?” Mrs. Wentworth snapped. “We have work to do and not much time. Jess, I like your idea of the gypsies.”

  “Women can always distract men, especially soldiers a long way from home.”

  “The Raider will save him,” Abigail said.

  “And get himself shot,” Jessica said. “There’ll be many men guarding Ethan and the others and they’ll be on the lookout for the Raider. You two need to distract the soldiers while I release the men.”

  Abigail smiled. “Oh, I can distract them all right. Mother has made me a delightful costume. When Ethan sees it, he’ll—”

  Jessica could not tolerate one more reference to Ethan’s virility. It had been much too long since she’d been alone with the Raider. She set her cup down with a click. “Let’s just hope the soldiers are interested.” She couldn’t help giving a glance toward Abby’s thickening waist. Married so recently and already with child. Jess refused to let herself think that she’d probably never have a child. At least not Alex’s child. No! She wasn’t going to think about the way he’d told her to get out of his bed. He had said he couldn’t sleep with her near him and he wanted her as far away as possible. Alex’s idea of love was quite different from hers.

  “I’d better go,” Jess said as she stood. “Alex will be in here in another couple of minutes. You’ll have everything sewn by tomorrow night?”

  Mrs. Wentworth put her hand on Jess’s arm. “I knew we could count on you, Jessica. The rest of this town may be willing to sit back and wait for the Raider to save them, but I knew I had to do something.”

  “And, too, we knew you had to hate the admiral as much as we do since he’d made you marry Alexander,” Abigail said.

  Jessica clamped her jaws together over a nasty retort. “Do you hate Alex because he tricked Ethan into marrying you?”

  Abigail’s face changed to an expression of love. “I guess I owe Alex a favor.”

  “Will you be able to get away?” Mrs. Wentworth asked Jess.

  “That’s going to be the hardest part. I might get Alex’s father to help.”

  “Sayer? He wouldn’t go behind his own son’s back, would he?”

  Jessica frowned. “Mr. Montgomery is…disappointed in his youngest son and he’s very interested in what is being done to us by the English.”

  Mrs. Wentworth nodded. “Go on now, there’s Alexander again. You know, dear, there’s more to marriage than what happens at night. Alex seems to care very much about your welfare.”

  Jess looked out the window to see a scowling Alex starting up the porch steps. “Yes, he does. I’ll meet you tomorrow night at ten o’clock. Have everything ready.” She left the house, opening the door just as Alex raised his hand to the door knocker.

  “What did you talk about?” Alex demanded.

  “Good afternoon, Jessica,” Jess mocked. “Did you have a good time? Were the cakes-fresh?” She looked at him. “We’re planning to single-handedly overthrow the English government and start our own rule. What do you think someone talks to Mrs. Wentworth about? She showed me some silk she’d bought, she complained about the servants and told me what a delightful houseguest the admiral is.” Jessica was amazed at how easy the lie was. Probably because it was for a good cause, she decided.

  Alex squinted his eyes at her, as if he were trying to decide whether or not to believe her. He pulled her arm through his. “Come on, let’s get home. There’s work to be done.”

  Jessica groaned. “Alex, couldn’t we take a walk together? Down to Farrier’s Cove maybe.”

  Alex looked at her hair, her face, held her fingers against his arm and thought of the secluded, private little cove. “I’d never survive that,” he said and started toward the house.

  Jessica went with him, wondering how bad his health really was. She was becoming rather attached to this man. In fact, there were times when she thought he was handsome.

  * * *

  Alex removed the heavy satin coat and hung it on a peg on his bedroom wall. He glanced at his watch before putting it on the chest by the window. Three minutes a
fter midnight. His father had insisted he play chess with him until this hour, ignoring Alex’s many hints that he’d like to go to bed. The past few days of following Jessica had nearly exhausted him. He was constantly on the alert, sure that she was going to do something utterly foolish, and he’d not been able to slip away to Ghost Island for some exercise. Also, being around Jessica so much, the way she constantly touched him, the way she bent and moved, all of it so unconscious on her part but so very exciting to him, was wrecking his health. He’d had to throw her out of his bed just so he could get some sleep.

  All in all, he didn’t know how much longer he could withstand his agony. But every time he decided he had to tell her he was the Raider, something would happen, like Ethan Ledbetter being sent off to serve in the King’s Navy. Then Alex saw the light in Jess’s eyes, that light of the crusader, and knew that if she knew she was so close to—and had so much power over—the Raider, he’d never be able to deny her anything. He had a sickening vision of Jessica tearing across the countryside wearing black, her hair flowing behind her. The English would arrest her within minutes.

  So for days since the announcement of the conscription, he’d not let her out of his sight except to comfort Mrs. Wentworth and Abigail. He’d not wanted to do that, but Jess had asked so nicely and had leaned forward so far that her scarf had gaped open. He’d said yes before he had known what he was doing.

  With a grimace, he remembered her saying that she could persuade the Raider to do whatever she wanted. Alex didn’t like to think of what Jess would try to get away with if she knew she were married to the Raider.

  He removed his vest and started to unbutton his shirt when he thought he’d better check on Jessica. She’d been asleep when his father had asked to see him. This morning Jess and Sayer had spent two hours closeted together and, twice, the household had heard Sayer’s voice raised in protest.

  When Jessica had left the room, she’d looked somewhat subdued but with a light of triumph in her eyes. Later, Alex had been asked to play chess with his father. Alex had been angered at the invitation. Jess, it seemed, had spent two hours trying to persuade a father to spend time with his own son.