Brazen Temptress (22 page)

"And why did you think that?" she asked, sarcasm dripping from each word. "Could it be possible that it was a day of your own making that made you think me dead? A day you plotted and planned against my father?"

Obviously, he didn't like what he heard. He caught her in his arms and pulled her against his chest. "I made a mistake. Do you think there hasn't been a day since then that I haven't regretted it? That I haven't thought of you?" His fingers dug into her bare arms as if he'd never let her go. "That I haven't replayed that day in my mind a thousand times? That I haven't wished I could turn back time and change what happened?" He closed his eyes, and she watched his jaw tighten as if in pain, as if he were there once again.

"When I saw you ..." His voice trailed off, then he abruptly set her aside. "But you lived. You and our son. Ethan." Julien took a deep breath. "Why didn't you send word? Once you found out. Once you knew. I would have come; I would have helped." His insistence was underlined by his anger for the years with Ethan she'd taken away from him.

"You'd helped enough at that point," she said. "And why should I have? I had no reason to trust you." It was her turn to pause. "I still don't."

She stepped past him to the single nightstand in the room. The darkness was unnerving her. His wrath seemed to fill the room, closing the tight space around her.

She lit a single taper, then turned around, wrapping the blanket tighter around her. The tiny yellow light illuminated the merest of circles, but it was enough for her to see him clearly.

His face seemed carved of stone, his fury pulling his mouth in a tight line, his hard-edged jaw set against her, and his eyes ... she'd never seen a green so cold and impenetrable.

But the moment she stepped closer, his gaze flickered and his shoulders eased some of their bellicose stance. "What happened to your face?"

Her fingers went to the tender spot on her cheek. "Nothing. It was an accident. I slipped."

"You?" he scoffed. "You've never fallen in your life."

She turned from his searching gaze. "I'm not used to being ashore, that's all," she said over her shoulder. "I lost my bearings."

"You expect me to believe that, Reenie? Besides, I don't want any more lies between us." He stepped closer, his hand brushing hers aside while his fingers traced the edge of the bruise. "Who did this to you?"

She twisted away from his tender touch. "You know damned well who did it to me."

"Why didn't you send for me? Tell me about this?"

The concern in his voice edged at her own anger. "If you hadn't been gone for the last four days, I would have been able to tell you."

"So you thought I'd left you."

She shrugged, still unwilling to turn and face him. "Why wouldn't I? You promised to come to me, and you didn't. What was I to think? I have only the past to judge by."

He moved closer until he stood right behind her. His words whispered in her ear. "Never the past, Reenie. Haven't these last few days taught you that?"

She clamped her mouth shut, unwilling to tell him the truth: The past week had brought a change in her. One she didn't like. One she didn't want to trust.

"Perhaps," she finally conceded. "But what was I to think? I've looked for you everywhere. I wanted to warn you —" She looked away.

"You wanted to warn me? Why is that, Reenie?"

"Not for the reasons you think," she said, annoyed at the way he kept twisting her words.

"Then why care about my welfare?"

She moved from him, putting the narrow bed between them, not so unlike the channel that had once separated the
Destiny
and the
Forgotten Lady.
"Your welfare is my welfare. You promised to see my men freed and get my ship back. I'm going to hold you to that, de Ryes. You owe me that much, if not a hell of a lot more."

"And what do you owe me for withholding my son from me for all these years?"

She laughed, a bitter, tight sound, even to her ears. "Ethan is mine. He has been from the moment you tossed me aside. Me and everything that was important to me." The ground beneath her felt more solid. If he thought to take her son away from her, he had another thing coming.

"I didn't toss you aside," he said, leaning across the narrow space. "If I recall correctly, you left of your own accord."

"Not before leaving you with a little memento," she shot back, fingering her knife.

He straightened and grinned at her. Then his hand went to the top button on his shirt. "Would you like to see the damage you wrought?" Slowly, he started to open his shirt, his grin changing to something else.

That smoldering look she remembered all to well.

Her legs started to quiver. Unwanted and unbidden, her memories rose up. She knew what she would see if he took his shirt off. The tanned, smooth planes of his chest, the thick, all too masculine muscles, the soft curls that ran from a triangle at the top of his chest down in a straight line to his —

Shaking her head, she turned away from him. "No, thank you. Since you lived, I obviously missed my mark. I was aiming for your heart." She glanced up at him, wishing her own wasn't hammering in her chest. She had to stop herself, stop him from believing that they had a future. Her words came out harsh and bitter. "I should have realized then that you didn't possess one."

He looked up at the ceiling. "How long are you going to continue punishing me for what happened that day, Reenie? Eight years? Eighty years? Forever?"

"And why shouldn't I?" she challenged, glad to be back to a subject where she could control her emotions. "You murdered my father. You took away everything. Did you think when I married you that I would go along with your plans? Or was that all part of your ruse? To pretend to love me to gain my father's trust and sponsorship?"

He shook his head. "No, Reenie. That wasn't what was supposed to happen. I never meant to fall in love with you. And I thought ... I thought I could stop it all, or at least save your father and his ship. But I couldn't. I was so young and stupid. I thought I could stop even the fates. But it was too late, and only after I lost you did I realize how powerless a man is to stop destiny." He took her hand and looked directly in her eyes. "Can you tell me that you've never made a mistake in command? Never lost a man?"

She stared at him. "Not like that. I never betrayed anyone."

"What about yourself? Have you betrayed your own heart? Your own judgment?" he asked, stalking around the bed and closing in on her. "Why were you at Sheerness? Can you tell me that you were in control of your fate that night? It was folly to offload so large a cargo that near the shipping lanes. And well you knew it, or at least you should have."

"It wasn't like that at all." She backed up until she found herself imprisoned in a corner.

Cornered like she'd been at Sheerness.

"Then how was it?" he asked. "How could you have believed that you wouldn't be caught?"

He was right. Damn his rotten hide, he was right. She had risked everything that night. Her life, the lives of her crew, everything, all because she thought she could salvage what had become a costly mistake.

She closed her eyes, hoping to block out the memories.

"Tell me, Reenie," he said. "Did you make a mistake that night?"

She nodded. "A terrible one. I never should have taken that cargo. You're right, it was pure folly that found me there." She glanced back at him. "I haven't even youth to blame. I knew better."

He took her hand and led her to the bed, where she slumped down on the mattress. "What happened?"

She chewed at her upper lip. She hadn't spoken of that night to anyone, and suddenly the need to tell her story bubbled forth.

"I took on a load of French brandy just south of Calais," she began, "and was about to depart when a merchant I'd never met asked me to ferry across a load of tea." She paused, the events and fateful memories flooding her senses. "I never take on cargo from someone I don't know or if I can't find someone to vouch for them. But this man was so insistent, and I had half a hold free. He claimed he was being pressed on all sides for gambling debts and if I would buy the tea, he'd let me have it at cost. He offered it so cheaply, all I could see were the profits. And then he told me of a 'merchant' in Sheerness who would pay ten times the going rate, since it was of such fine quality."

"So you took on the tea."

"Yes. It was too much money to pass up. Enough money to pay for Ethan to attend a boarding school, a good one, for the next year or two." She paused and looked up at him.

He sat down on the narrow bed beside her. "But you didn't feel right about it?"

She shook her head. "Every instinct told me to turn the man down. Something wasn't right. But there was that tea and an empty hold going to waste. I'd been crossing the Channel for several years without a mishap, and my men trusted me." Looking over at him, she suddenly saw that their situations weren't so different. "I thought if anything happened we could outrun it, or at the very least dump the load."

"But it didn't happen that way."

"No." She sighed. "The merchant's contact in Sheerness wanted the tea brought in to shore all at once or else he wouldn't take it. He also wanted my crew to bring it in, claiming that his usual boys were busy elsewhere that night."

"Isn't that unusual?"

"Yes. But it was a moonless night. Dark as pitch. I figured we'd offload the tea and be gone before anyone saw us."

It should have worked that way, Maureen knew. She closed her eyes to the wretched memories — for when she and her men arrived at the beach, everything had gone terribly wrong.

Suddenly, the darkness erupted into a hundred torches. Light illuminating their cover. Uniformed soldiers surging over the dunes, some on horseback and others on foot.

Shouts and orders to halt echoing across the beach. And then shots. So many shots.

"Two of my men died there. On the beach. Shot down trying to get back to the
Retribution.
One of them only fifteen. He died in my arms, and after that I don't remember much. I was struck down, and when I awoke we were all in a cell." Her lips drew together. There had been many wounded men, men who sailed with her father. She'd tried her best to help them, encourage them, promise them she'd see them freed, but their eyes had told another story. Fed her guilt with the same foul taste as the bread and water they'd been offered by their guards.

Julien stretched his legs out in front of him. "So you made the deal with the Lord Admiral."

"Yes. At the time it was a perfect solution to two problems."

At this Julien grinned. "And now?"

"I was wrong, as wrong as I was to take that cargo. And again I've run out of time."

"Why is that?"

"Because if I don't turn you in by the stroke of midnight tomorrow, I'll hang in your place."

Julien shook his head. "You think I would let that happen?"

"It would give you Ethan."

"You said I haven't a heart. Reenie, I haven't one. I gave it to you years ago. You've held it all this time." He reached over and cradled her face in his hands. "Give it back to me with your trust, and I vow I will never break faith with you again. We can start over. We can put our mistakes in the past. I haven't been idle the last few days. I've found your men, and I plan on freeing them tomorrow night. And since you need a ship, I'll find a way to get back your
Retribution.
Then, if you want, we'll sail side by side, as we planned to all those years ago." He grinned, the pirate once again. "I've a prize in my sights that will satisfy even your greedy smuggler's desires."

"The payroll ship," she said aloud before she could stop herself.

This brought Julien to his feet. "How do you know about that?"

She looked up at him and knew she stood on a threshold. Perhaps she'd meant to tell him, knew it was time to tell him.

There was only one answer. One she gave with her heart.

"Because I overheard the Lord Admiral and Captain Johnston talking." When his eyes grew wide with stunned disbelief, she continued. "The ship you want is the
Bodiel,
a packet bound for Halifax. It will be sailing alone out of Portsmouth at the end of the week."

Julien stared at her as if she couldn't possibly be telling the truth.

"Take the ship, Julien," she told him. "Ruin the Lord Admiral."

He knelt beside the bed, clasping her hands in his. "Aye, Reenie. I'll take it, but only with you at my side. We'll take it together." With that he brought her fingertips to his lips and kissed them, as if sealing his promise.

For a moment they stared at each other, their hands still bound together. His impassioned gaze told her he wanted much more than just a kiss. That he would erase the years between them this night and pledge a new beginning.

Maureen knew she was risking everything, allowing her heart to trust Julien again. But the risk seemed a small thing compared to her need for this man.

It seemed she couldn't escape her destiny.

Julien leaned forward and kissed his wife. His mouth covered the warmth of her lips; for the last eight years, all he'd had were haunting dreams of the only woman he could ever love.

Maureen.

Their kiss the other day in his carriage had been only a teasing glimpse into the past, and a hope for the future. But now, as she surrendered herself to him, offered him her trust, he wanted this night to go on forever.

For, as with his dreams, he feared waking and finding himself alone.

Her lips teased his, a soft sigh whispering his name.

"Julien."

He reveled in the sound of it, and he pulled her closer. "I thought for so long that I'd lost you."

"I was lost," she told him. "Lost in anger and hatred and things that ate away at my soul."

"And now?"

She looked out the window. "I don't know. The past ... how will I ever forget it?"

"You won't," he told her. "I haven't. I don't think I ever will." He drew her chin back so she looked directly at him. "Perhaps someday you'll see it in a different light. Your father's death was entirely my fault, but believe me, I tried everything I could to stop it. To save his life. If only ..."