Sweet Fire

by Jo Goodman

  Scattered among the clothes she also found a deck of cards, two books, one of Shakespeare’s sonnets, the other a dry account of sheep farming, and at the very bottom of one of the valises Lydia’s hand closed around a nickle-plated derringer.

  She was holding it in her open palm, staring at it, completely unaware that her hand was shaking, when Nathan walked into the cabin. He stopped in his tracks and held onto the tray he carried with white-knuckled pressure.

  “Put the gun down, Lydia,” he said, forcing calm.

  Until he spoke Lydia hadn’t known Nathan was in the room. Surprised, she looked at him over her shoulder. “Why do you have a gun?” she asked.

  He tried not to show his relief because surely she would wonder at it. The first thing he thought when he saw her holding the derringer was that she had somehow remembered everything. It could happen that suddenly, Dr. Franklin had told him, and though Nathan had little respect for the doctor, he also had no other information to contradict him.

  Setting down the breakfast tray, Nathan went to Lydia and took the gun from her hand. “Why does anyone carry a gun?” he asked, putting it back in the valise. He shoved the valise and its companion under their bed and dragged the empty trunk to the foot of it. “For protection,” he said when she didn’t respond.

  “A derringer? It’s a lady’s weapon.”

  “How is it that you can recall such odd things and can’t remember important ones?” It was strictly a rhetorical question. “It’s a weapon that can be easily concealed and that suits a man as well as a woman.”

  “I don’t like it, Nathan. Can’t you get rid of it?”

  He went to the table and began unloading the tray, setting two places. There were orange slices, biscuits, butter and honey, link sausages, and hard-boiled eggs. “Did you take a good look at the men on this ship last night, Lydia? We’re not taking a voyage to do the Grand Tour of Europe, remember. This is a trader’s vessel and there are only six other paying passengers on board. Besides the missionary’s wife, you’re the only woman. Mrs. Wilson, by the way, is nearing sixty, hatchet-faced, and skinny as a sixpence standing on edge.” He poured black coffee into two mugs while focusing most of his attention on Lydia. “You understand what I’m saying? We’ll keep the derringer.”

  “All right,” she said. Picking and choosing her battles, this was not one she cared to fight. And there was also the matter of breakfast. Nathan held out a chair for her and she sat down, thanking him. She waited until he was seated opposite her to begin eating, unfolding her napkin first and smoothing it on her lap. After the first few bites of his food, she noticed Nathan did the same. The napkin was an afterthought.

  “How is that a convict on Van Dieman’s Land knows the niceties of laying a table?” she asked. “I wouldn’t think that sort of life was conducive to refinement or such fastidiousness.”

  “It wasn’t. And don’t start thinking I was the scion of some titled family in Britain, or the bastard son of a landed lord before I was transported.” Her expressive eyes, wide and startled now, gave her away. “Before I was named a murderer I was a sneaksman.”

  “Sneaksman?”

  “A thief. You’ll learn the language. Most of the men you’ll meet at Ballaburn were thieves of one sort or another. Star-glazers. Till friskers. Area sneaks. Some were poachers, poor sods down on their luck and trying to feed their families.”

  “And your employer? What sort of thief was he?”

  “Mad Irish?” Nathan paused in buttering his biscuit. “None at all. He was a political prisoner in the early forties, hence the moniker. He served out a sentence in Sydney, struck gold on the banks of the Turon River, in an outcropping not much above one hundred and fifty miles from where he had labored for his crimes, and bought the land at Ballaburn. His station is ten times larger than the estate that was confiscated from him in Ireland. Mad Irish appreciates the irony.”

  Nathan broke off a piece of his biscuit and put it in his mouth, chewing thoughtfully. “But you were asking about my manners, weren’t you? All Mad Irish’s doing. He’s one for a plan. Plotting runs in his blood, I think, and he saw something in me he that either liked or thought he could use. I was as rough and ill-bred as a dingo before he took me in.” He held Lydia’s fascinated glance and said softly, “And I still haven’t smoothed all the edges.”

  She smiled, understanding that it was his apology for this morning.

  “God, Liddy. When you look at me like that...” Like he was adored. Worshiped. It took his breath away, and it made him want to sweep the table clean and take her right there.

  Lydia’s glance dropped away from his darkening one, but she felt her nipples harden as if he had brushed them with his thumbs, and between her thighs the ache was insistent. Her fingers trembled ever so slightly as she began to peel her orange.

  “What sort of things did Mad Irish teach you?” she asked.

  “More reading than I knew. Writing. Enough ciphering so I couldn’t be cheated by the freemen traders. I learned how to talk to the aristocracy without revealing my stain, and how to converse with a woman who wasn’t a whore. He taught me how to dance, though I never took to it well.”

  “Perhaps Mad Irish wasn’t the right partner.”

  “I’ve danced with you,” he said. “I didn’t do well then either.”

  Lydia’s features tensed as she tried to remember. “It’s no good,” she said finally. “I can’t bring it to mind.”

  Nathan reached across the table and took the orange from her fingers. Lifting her hand as he stood, Nathan skirted the table and drew Lydia into his arms. “There are memories best left in the past, I think,” he said. His smile was beautiful, and when Lydia’s gaze dropped to his mouth he knew she was looking for his dimples. He did not think he disappointed. “But some things you have to learn for yourself. You choose the tune.”

  Lydia began humming a waltz, unwittingly the last melody she and Nathan had danced to at the Newberrys. She was sublimely unaware of the floodgate of memories she had opened for Nathan as he turned her in elegant circles about their cabin. He was remembering a certain beaded blue dress with a bodice that cut across her breasts at an almost indecent depth. She had mesmerized him wearing that gown. Blinking, lifting the veil of the past from his eyes, Nathan realized she had captured him again wearing one of Madame Simone’s severest creations. He was glad he had gone to the salon and picked up the gowns she had ordered; it was well worth the risk to be able to look at her now and bask in the warmth of the artless smile.

  “You lied to me, Nathan,” she said, interrupting her humming.

  He was momentarily disoriented. He had told so many lies. Which one was she going to take him to task for? “Lied?” he asked.

  “You dance beautifully.”

  His steps faltered and she trod on his toes.

  “Or at least you did,” she said.

  She was laughing at him and Nathan surprised himself by not minding. He pulled her closer and bent his head. “You have a mouth that should be kissed thoroughly and often, Liddy.”

  “I’m glad you think so.” Her arms went around his neck and she pressed her body flush to his. She raised her face and felt the warmth of his breath. “I’m very glad you think so.”

  His kiss was a heady nectar of coffee and honey, a bittersweet taste that Lydia savored and held precious among her new memories. The breakfast kiss, she called it, and the thought made her smile because of all the breakfasts they would share and all the kisses just like this they would exchange.

  It might have become something more if it hadn’t been for the knock that intruded on their privacy. Nathan broke the embrace reluctantly and set Lydia from him.

  “That will be Mrs. Wilson,” he told her. “The hatchet-faced missionary’s wife. She’s come to take her morning constitutional with you.” He couldn’t help but be flattered by her disappointment. “I didn’t know you intended to ravish me after breakfast,” he said. “I would have told Mrs. Wilson to wait until
lunch.”

  Reigning in her frustration, she said cheekily, “Now you’ll have to wait.”

  Nathan was well aware of that. “I know,” he said huskily, thinking of the swelling in his trousers. “Lord, how I know.”

  Chapter 8

  Samoans called them papalagi. Sky-burster. The first clipper ship, with its sails spread wide, swelled by the tropical winds, must have looked very much like an albatross or some other enormous white bird as it pierced the horizon where heaven and ocean met. Many ships had come since that time, bringing strange customs and influences to the islands that made up Samoa: Tutuila, Upolu, and Savai’i. Now papalagi had come to describe the white man and took on all shades of meaning when contrasted with fa’a Samoa—the Samoan way.

  Forty years ago Reverend John Williams of the London Missionary Society had traveled half the world to bring Christianity to the Samoans. His memory was still regarded with great respect and the message that he brought had long since been incorporated into fa’a Samoa.

  Merrily Wilson hardly possessed the hatched-faced features that Nathan purported her to have, but neither was she aptly named. Her disposition was best described as solemn and serious, though words like puritanical, dour, and grave also came easily to mind. She was almost four inches taller than her husband, large-boned and angular. Lydia spent a fair amount of time with her on deck each day, taking part in the constitutional ritual, or in her cabin, embroidering the linens that Nathan had given her while Merrily read from the Bible or told her stories about the Samoa Islands. Lydia managed not to disgrace herself by falling asleep when Merrily read in her somber monotone, but she had come to enjoy listening to the missionary talk about the Samoans themselves. It was clear to Lydia that while Merrily did not always understand the people she ministered to, she clearly loved them.

  Hugh Wilson was opposite his wife in appearance, but not in affect. Balding, bespectacled, and bandy-legged, Hugh was round where Merrily was sharp. Though his features lent him a certain joviality on first acquaintance, it soon faded as one came to know him. Lydia had as little to do with him as was politely possible, and strove not to be too critical of Hugh. He, like his wife, would never be anything but papalagi, but he loved his calling.

  The Avonlei had followed the northeast trade winds since leaving San Francisco. Equipped with an auxiliary steam engine, the clipper ship easily passed through the breezeless doldrums when her sails failed her. The captain of the Avonlei planned a two-day stop in Apia harbour on the island of Upolu. The delayed departure was first and foremost an opportunity for trade; the Avonlei took on bananas, copra, green coconuts for non-intoxicating refreshment, and cacao. An alternate reason for the delay, one that was only whispered about among the crew because of the presence of Mr. and Mrs. Wilson, was the island women. Zealously guarded by their men, shy and retiring, each sailor hoped he might be the lucky fellow who could entice one girl from her aiga—her extended family group, upon whom she depended for protection. Nathan paid little attention to the stories. He suspected the women on Upolu had long since learned to be wary of the papalagi who traveled on the wings of the great white birds.

  Rushing water was a steady, somehow soothing, roar in his ears. Nathan barely noticed it, his attention fully caught by Lydia’s play in the blue crystalline pool below him. She ducked beneath the water and came up with her dark hair sleekly pulled back over the crown of her head. Turning her head sharply from side to side, her hair whipped back and forth, showering the pool with beads of water as clear and brilliant as diamonds. For a brief moment, each bead that caught in a ray of sunlight scattered a rainbow of color that delighted Lydia and took Nathan’s breath away.

  She closed her eyes, head tilted to one side, and combed her hair with her fingers. The ends of it floated on the surface of the pool. She hummed softly to herself.

  Her expression was serene and sensual, and Nathan kept watching her, drawn by her pleasure, fascinated by her calm. Water glistened on her face and shoulders and the exposed cord of her neck. Dark, spiky lashes fringed her eyelids and a pale rose wash of color heightened the arc of her cheeks. Without warning, she raised her slender arms above her, stretched, and dove backward. Nathan had a glimpse of her breasts, her hips, before she disappeared under the water. She stayed under for a long time, gliding to deeper parts of the pool so that Nathan all but lost sight of her, then she shot up suddenly, spraying water in all directions and smiling and laughing happily with the sheer force of her abandon.

  The pool was a sanctuary of sorts, circled by a lush growth of ferns. Except for the outcropping of lava rock where Nathan sat and the waterfall that fed the pool, the greenery was unbroken in any place. The dense rain forest had grown right to the water’s edge, powerful and oppressive, then yielded to the placid pool.

  The single most beautiful thing in nature’s setting of emerald ferns, diamond and crystal water, ruby petals, and amethyst blossoms, the jewel that caused the others to sparkle less brightly, was Lydia. Even when she moved out of the sunlight into the cool shadows of a canopy of ferns, Lydia was radiant. Her wet hair was like polished ebony, her skin as smooth and warm as ivory. And yet it was more than the cobalt blue eyes that were centered on him now, or the soft smile that invited him to join her. In the passage of time since leaving San Francisco, Lydia’s spirit had been set free. It touched him now, enfolded him, and drew Nathan to her as surely as if she had taken him by the hand.

  He stood and tugged at the brightly colored lava-lava that was hitched at his waist. The wraparound skirt fell on the rock beside the one Lydia had taken off earlier. Naked, he waded into the pool. The water lapped at his waist almost immediately. It was cool against his heated skin. He dove under and came up in front of Lydia, his flesh sliding smoothly and wetly against hers. He felt all of her, knew the contours of her body as she was pressed to him: the lush curves of her breasts, the taut plane of her belly, the inviting line of her thighs as they cradled him.

  Her arms circled his neck and she raised her face, eyes wide, guileless, and open in the expression of her need, her desire. Her mouth was damp, parted. Her breath was sweet. Nathan lowered his head as his hands rested lightly on her waist and his mouth touched hers lightly, briefly, in a tantalizing promise of passion. It was Lydia who pressed for more and Nathan who slipped away, ducking below the water and out of her reach.

  She was a much better swimmer than he. Lydia caught him easily, grabbing him by the ankle and pulling him back. He came to the surface sputtering and Lydia landed him a hard kiss on his mouth that stole the last of the breath from his lungs. They gulped air simultaneously, and when he dipped below the water this time it was by mutual agreement. Lydia held on, her tongue spearing his mouth, greedy for the rough pleasure of his kiss. They surfaced closer to the falls, where the water churned and frothed with more force, bubbling up around them and rising in a mist above their heads. Standing in the middle of it, it was as if they had created the steamy turbulence. Seeing Lydia’s sultry smile, feeling the heat of her body, Nathan found it easier to believe in her life force than the rushing cascade of water at his back.

  “Liddy.” He said her name softly, as if tasting the preciousness of it on his tongue. “Come with me.”

  She thought he was going to lead her to the densely carpeted forest floor and make love to her on a blanket of fallen ferns. Instead, he took her to where the water was calmer and a few inches less deep. He kissed her then, his mouth sliding over her cheeks, her forehead, and her temples. His fingers threaded in her hair and held her still while his lips slipped damply along her jaw and down her throat. At the curve of her neck and shoulder he paused, sipping lightly on her skin, tasting her, and raising a whimper born of wanting from Lydia.

  He thwarted her efforts to return his kisses until desire had welled so forcefully inside her it could not be held back. She tore away from his hands and stopped offering her neck for his pleasure. She became the aggressor, wrapping her arms about Nathan’s shoulders. Buoyed by the wa
ter, Lydia lifted herself easily to his height, met the impassioned look in his darkening gray eyes, and kissed him full on the mouth. Her lips touched his dimples, or rather, touched his skin where she sometimes saw them emerge. The tip of her tongue traced his upper lip, then the lower one, and pressed inward to the slightly uneven ridge of his teeth. He frustrated her entry, and Lydia smiled because she knew what he wanted. Retreating, her mouth caressed his face: the bridge of his nose, his cheeks, the underside of his jaw. Her tongue teased the edge of his earlobe, flicking, and her teeth nipped him gently.

  His mouth opened to call her a name. Siren, perhaps. Or beautiful temptress. It remained unspoken, a thought unshared, as Lydia’s mouth covered his and gained the sweet entry she had sought earlier. Her hands tightened on his shoulders, each caress harder and more deliberate than the last. Their mouths held tight, tongues engaged in delicious conflict. Water lapped at their skin, supported and caressed them.

  Nathan’s hands slid along her rib cage and cupped her breasts. The shell-pink tips were hard, her breasts slightly swollen. His thumbs brushed her tender, sensitive nipples once. Twice. Then he stopped and waited, anticipating the moment when she would move sinuously against him, rubbing, desiring the pleasure of his flesh against hers. Her hands dropped to cover his, then she moved his hands slowly against her breasts in the motion she wanted him to imitate, and she watched him all the while with eyes that were darkening to obsidian.

  He surprised her, lifting her easily, raising her breasts to the hot suck of his mouth. She gasped as he took one nipple, laved it with his tongue, and worried it gently with his lips and teeth. His face was pressed briefly in the valley of her damp flesh as he moved to the other breast. He kissed the spot where her heartbeat fluttered against his mouth then he suckled her breast, drawing on Lydia’s responsive flesh until she cried out.