Jade Star (14 page)

“Yep, and he was hanged, finally. After some sixteen-odd folk ceased to exist due to his greed. The medical school paid handsomely for bodies.”

“You have quite a talent,” she observed.

“It comes in handy, like last night,” he added, smiling down at her. “Patients, in my experience, need to be distracted. You're sure you feel fine this morning?”

“Please . . . yes.”

“We're married, goose,” he said, tucking her hand through his arm. “And I'm a doctor. Two valid reasons why you should never be embarrassed with me.”

“If you say so,” she said doubtfully.

“I do say so. Now, onward to food. I have a lot of body to maintain.”

 

The day was warm, the weather calm and clear. Jules became acquainted with the remainder of the
passengers, met Captain Drake, and listened to her husband charm everyone who came into his orbit.

She felt little or no embarrassment until Michael left her again that night so she could change into her nightgown.

She wasn't asleep when Saint slipped into the bed beside her. She reached out to touch his arm, and realized he was quite naked. She gulped.

“Michael? Would you tell me a story?”

He laughed and turned onto his side to face her. It was probably a fine idea, he thought. He himself needed to be distracted this time. “Well,” he began, “let me see. Did you ever hear the story . . . ? No, I think I'll tell you about some of my friends in San Francisco. You've probably heard me mention their names—Delaney and Chauncey Saxton.”

She nodded.

“Well, Del is a very rich man. He wasn't, not at first. He was one of the argonauts—that means he came to California in 1849 with the first group of men to search for gold. He found it. Unlike most others, he used the gold he'd discovered wisely. He owns a bank, is a partner in many other businesses in the city, and owns three or four ships that go to and from the Far East. He'll make you laugh within three minutes of meeting him. He's very witty, you see, and gives his witty wife, Chauncey, quite a time of it. She's English, beautiful, and now a mother. She's also very rich in her own right. You'll like her, I'm sure of it.”

“Won't she think I'm . . . well, not a very nice person, after what happened?”

“Jules, if you don't stop that foolishness, I'm going to beat you!”

He reached out his hand to touch her shoulder, but instead connected with her soft breast. He sucked in his breath and drew back his hand as if burned.

“I'm sorry,” Jules gasped.

“No, no,” Saint managed. He grinned ruefully into the darkness. “You see, Jules, I'm not in the habit of sleeping with my wife.”
In fact, I'm not in the habit of sleeping with anyone, much less lying in the same bed and not making love.
“Are you sleepy now?”

“Yes,” she said, lying without hesitation.

She lay awake a long time, listening to her husband's deep, even breathing.

Saint, the light sleeper, awoke the next morning aware that something was very strange. Jules was lying on top of him, her head resting against his throat. His manhood was hard and throbbing against her soft belly.

“Damn,” he said very softly. He realized then that he was lying in the middle of the bed, and in her sleep, she'd just tried to find some space. “Damn,” he said again. Very slowly he eased her off him.

“Michael?” she said in a sleepy, slurred voice.

“Yes, sweetheart. Go back to sleep.”
Please!

To his relief and regret, she did, curled up on her side, her hand fisted beneath her cheek.

When he rose from the bed, he cursed himself, even as he turned again to look at her. Her nightgown was bunched about her thighs—long, slender legs, so white and so soft-looking. He pulled a sheet over her.

Saint learned in the next several days that his young wife was quite a storyteller in her own right. He came into the dining room one afternoon after treating a fellow passenger for an abscess on his leg, and saw Jules sitting at a table, her hands gesticulating while she talked. He moved closer, saying nothing, his eyes intent on her vibrant face. When he'd known her as a young girl, he'd thought her fascinatingly aware of everything around her, but in the endlessly curious manner of children. Not so, he had come to realize. She'd managed to nurture her curiosity, her complete excitement with life itself. Even the events of the previous month and a half had only dimmed her spirit for a while.

“The whole thing about the
kapus,
you see, was to curtail the native women's freedom. They couldn't eat with the men, couldn't eat certain foods—bananas, coconuts, pork, even baked dog!”

“Good heavens,” said Miss Mary Arkworth, “what was there to eat then?” Miss Arkworth, who had lived on Oahu for a number of years and who knew the answer very well, could have added that all the
kapus
were supposedly religious in nature, but she
didn't. She was enjoying the very bright Mrs. Morris' enthusiasm too much to dampen it.

“Sounds fine to me,” said Nathan Benson. “Let them eat cake if they're not allowed baked dog.”

“Well, Mr. Benson,” Jules said in a tart voice, “it's all well and good to joke about it, but there was a story about a little five-year-old girl who ate a banana. Instead of killing her, which was the punishment for breaking a
kapu,
they ripped out her right eye.”

Amid the gasps of outrage, Saint asked, “Weren't all the eating
kapus
gotten rid of by a woman?”

She smiled at him, as if he were a very bright pupil, and nodded. Her audience quieted, leaning forward to listen. “You see,” she said in a confidential voice, “after King Kamehameha I died, his queen, Kaahumanu, announced to her young son that she would be his
kuhina-nui,
or vice-king.”

“Smart lady,” said Mr. Benson.

“Indeed,” said Jules. “And she was a very brave woman. To break the eating
kapu,
she ate a banana in front of the king, Liholiho. He, dear boy, ignored it. Then she had the temerity to eat a meal in his presence!” Jules paused dramatically.

A natural storyteller, Saint thought, smiling at her.

“What happened?” Miss Arkworth demanded.

“Nothing, not a single thing. Kaahumanu broke him down. Finally, at a banquet, the king went to the women's table and began piling pieces of food into his mouth. The vice-king—a woman—won!”

“What became of her?” asked Mrs. Benson.

“She died of old age,” said Jules.

“Odd,” said Saint. “I thought she died from overeating.”

Jules shot him an impish grin. “Well, like most Hawaiian women, she was immensely fat. That, you know, is what is considered beautiful on the islands.”

“Now, Jules,” Saint said when they were alone a few minutes later, “Victorian prejudices have started taking hold. Many of the Hawaiian women are forcing their healthy bodies into those awful whalebone corsets. You didn't tell all the truth.”

She nodded and said sadly, “Civilization is not always such a wonderful thing, I think. And,” she added, grinning up at him, “I didn't want to ruin the impact of my story.”

Saint cupped her face between his large hands. “You, Mrs. Morris, are a natural.”

“A natural what?” Jules asked, her eyes coming to rest on his mouth. She felt a bit breathless and somewhat strange, as if his fingers and his palms were warming her from the inside out.

Saint felt her lean toward him and immediately dropped his hands, saying lightly as he did so, “A natural teller of tall and not-so-tall tales. Now, would you care to stroll on deck?”

“I suppose even naturals must have exercise,” she said.

 

His dreams became vividly erotic, jerking him awake to stare into the darkness, his body covered with sweat and pounding with painful need. He rose several mornings before dawn, unable to lie quietly next to Jules, listening to her even breathing, the soft sighs that made him wonder what her dreams were made of. Certainly not of sex, he told himself. Perhaps of fear and dread of men, but not of sex, not of him.

They were but four days out of San Francisco when he could bear it no longer. He stayed in the small parlor where the gentlemen smoked and gambled until very late, unable to face lying down in that damned narrow bed beside his young wife. He drank too much, lost one hundred dollars at vingt-et-un, and made his way to the cabin well past midnight.

Jules was on her side, facing away from him, the sheet pulled to her chin. He sighed with some relief, eased out of his clothes, and slipped in beside her. She didn't stir.

He slept fitfully, until finally he was lost in that vague, blurred state that seemed so real, so very vivid. Jane Branigan was beside him, touching him, laughing and teasing him, and he was in such great need of her he thought he would die. Then they were lying together and he was stroking her body, calling, “Jane, my God, Jane.” He felt her soft breasts, felt her nipples tauten from the teasing of his fingers. God, he wanted her, and now.

“Jane,” he whispered, nuzzling against her throat. She wasn't naked, as she should have been. She was wearing something, and the starchy material scratched his mouth. He felt nothing but urgency, and rose over her, pulling the offending nightgown up above her breasts. The touch of her warm flesh made him crazy. His hands and mouth covered her breasts, her smooth, soft belly. He lay atop her, moaning aloud. His manhood, throbbing, urgent, pressed against her closed thighs.

“Jane,” he whispered, moving restlessly over her. “I can't wait, Jane.”

He pulled her legs apart and felt his manhood surge
forward. But she wasn't ready for him, wouldn't let him enter her. He was frantic now, not understanding.

“Jane,” he said again, “what's wrong?”

Jules came abruptly awake. She heard Michael's voice repeating a name. Not her name. Jane. She was suddenly aware that a man, a huge man, was covering her, pressing her down into the mattress, and she cried out, her mind, blurred with sleep, thinking it John Bleecher or Jameson Wilkes. Then something deep within her cried out, refusing to accept the terror of a dream. No, she was with Michael. It was he covering her, pressing against her.

She tried to rise, bewildered, not understanding. She heard him moaning deeply, telling her between gasping breaths to relax, to give in to him. But something was terribly wrong.
Telling Jane to relax!
Suddenly she felt his hand probing against her, felt that male part of him pushing forward against her.

Saint felt wild with need, frustrated and angry that he couldn't enter her body. He felt Jane trying to push him away; then he heard a sharp cry of pain.

“Michael! No . . . please!”

He came awake with jolting awareness. “Jane,” he said stupidly, then drew in his breath sharply. In the dim light of dawn, he saw Jules sprawled helplessly beneath him, and he was trying to force himself inside her.

“Oh God, no!” He pulled himself up and rested on his haunches, his head in his hands. He'd very nearly forced his wife without realizing what he was doing.

Jules lay very still. He was on his knees between her widespread legs. “Michael?” she whispered.

“I'm sorry,” he managed, hating himself more at
that moment than at any other in his entire life. “I'm sorry, Jules. I didn't hurt you, did I? Are you all right?”

She frowned at him, uncertain, becoming more bewildered by the moment. “I don't understand.”

He retreated quickly, rising from the bed and shrugging into his dressing gown. Of course she didn't understand. Lord, it was difficult enough for him to comprehend.

“Who is Jane?” he heard her ask.

He turned slowly to face her, and was relieved to see that she'd pulled down her nightgown and was leaning against the pillows.

He walked to the bed and sat down beside her. “I know you don't understand, Jules.” He paused a moment, uncertain what to say. Finally he continued. “I was dreaming, a result of all the damned whiskey, I suppose.”
Liar! You're randy as hell and supposed to only
sleep
with your wife, not rut her!
“I didn't realize what I was doing. Jules, I didn't hurt you, did I?”

“Jut a bit. I was surprised. Who is Jane?”

He slashed his hand through the air. “It's not important. Look, sweetheart, I can't continue sleeping with you. I can't trust myself not to . . . well, take advantage of you. You were frightened, weren't you?”

Of course she'd been frightened! What could one expect? But he hadn't been trying to make love to her; it had been another woman he was dreaming about. She closed her eyes against the awful hurt. She turned her head away from him. She had to know, even though it hurt so much. “Who is Jane? Who is this woman you were dreaming about?”

How could he tell her that in a dream he could act
out what he wanted, that his immense desire for her, to be justified even in the recesses of his mind, had to transfer itself to another woman, a woman he wouldn't hurt, a woman he knew wanted him?

His head was aching abominably, and he needed to clear his mind. He rose and began to dress. He knew Jules was watching him, he could feel her eyes on him, but he said nothing. All his concentration was on escaping, both from her and her question and from himself and his repehensible behavior.

He sat down in the single chair and pulled on his boots. “I'm going out for a while, on deck.” He was out the door and gone before she could gather two words together.

She didn't cry. She didn't do anything, save lie there looking up at the darkened ceiling of the cabin. He didn't return by the time she fell asleep, the sun rising brightly in the morning sky.

 

Jules saw him immediately when she came into the dining room late that morning. He'd returned to bathe and change while she'd still slept, she realized from the wreckage in the cabin. He was avoiding her.

Who was Jane?

She drank a cup of coffee and nibbled on a slice of bread and butter. He made no move to separate himself from his cohorts and come to her.

Saint was aware of her the moment she walked into the dining room. She looked a bit pale and tired. He himself felt like the proverbial piece of cow dung, but he'd refused to dose himself to ease the hangover. God, he deserved every shard of pain that sliced through his damned head. This can't
continue, he thought sometime later, so weary of pretending to listen to his fellow passengers that he couldn't bear it. He rose finally and managed to escape. He made his way to their cabin. She wasn't there.

With a lagging step he went on deck, finding her seated beneath the mainsail on a pile of coiled rope.

“Jules,” he said, greeting her.

She looked up at him but only nodded.

He ran his fingers through his windblown hair. “Look,” he said abruptly, “I've come to . . .”

“To apologize?” she supplied when he faltered. “You have already apologized. It isn't necessary for you to do so again.”

“Perhaps ‘explain' is the more apt word.”

“Is Jane your mistress?”

He said sharply, “I told you I don't have a mistress.”

“I don't know any other word for it. You make love to her, don't you? You care for her.”

“Yes and yes, but it's not the same thing.”

“Does she live in San Francisco?”
Is she there now, waiting for you to come back?

She was speaking so calmly, with far less enthusiasm than she used discussing the dolphins they'd seen yesterday.

“Yes,” he said, frustrated, “she does. She is a very nice person, Jules.”

“Why didn't you marry her?”

“Because I don't love her, dammit!”

You don't love me either.
“I see,” she said aloud. “A pity you didn't rescue her. Then perhaps you would have—married her, that is.”

“I did rescue her, but not in the same way.”

She arched a questioning brow, saying nothing.

He eased down beside her on the coil of rope. The mailsail flapped overhead and the wind whipped through his hair. The smell of salt permeated everything. He wanted to tell Jules to get into the shade, for her fair complexion was turning a distinct red, but he didn't. “Her name is Jane Branigan, and she's a widow with two boys. Her husband died in one of the gold camps and I simply helped her to get started on her own. She owns a seamstress shop and is doing well now.”

“Does she know about me?”

“She knows that I was taking you back to Maui.”

Jules closed her eyes, fighting against the burdensome pain. He'd more than likely made love to Jane Branigan while she, Jules, was staying in his house.

“She will be . . . upset?”