Lord of Temptation (7 page)

After the brief flirting on the deck, he’d been content to simply hold her in his arms. He wondered if she was aware of the sigh she’d released as she nestled against him. If she hadn’t been wearing a gown with so many layers of skirts and petticoats she’d have realized how very difficult it had been for him not to kiss her then. She’d have been aware of his immense desire.

He wouldn’t be sleeping tonight. Not unless he took a quick dive into the waters to cool his ardor. Not a wise move at night, but then he was beginning to doubt that he was as smart as he’d always thought he was.

When it came to Lady Anne Hayworth, it seemed he had no sense whatsoever.

Chapter
7

H
e ignored
her. A new strategy, Anne was fairly certain, he’d adopted, designed to torment
and lure at the same time. He would discover she was made of sterner stuff. He
had, however, gone to the trouble of having some sort of sheeting suspended so a
portion of the quarterdeck was in shade. She and Martha could sit there without
having to worry about winds whipping away her parasol. In addition, Martha
discovered two wide-brimmed gentlemen’s hats tied to the outside knob on their
door that morning. Squinting against the sunlight reflecting off the water, they
wore them now as additional protection against the harsher elements. In the
distance she could see dolphins frolicking. She found herself wishing she could
be so carefree.

She also felt a tad guilty that she was doing
little more than enjoying the day while around her the men worked. Some scrubbed
the decks, others wove rope, a few scampered up the sail rigging. She suspected
if she and Martha weren’t out on the deck that a good many of them would be
running about without shirts. As it was a good many buttons were left undone.
From what she could see of their skin, the men were dark from the sun beating
down on them. Leathery, tough skinned. But not the captain. His flesh was more
bronzed than anything. Perfectly shaded.

“How old do you suppose he is?” she asked.

Martha startled and Anne realized she’d been
absorbed in watching Mr. Peterson going about his labors. “Who?”

“The captain.”

“Oh, I don’t know. Late thirties, early forties, I
suppose.”

“So old? No, I think he’s much younger.”

“He has his own ship.”

“Still, I can’t quite picture him not being captain
of a ship. I think he would pull at the traces if someone else were holding the
reins. I think gaining his own ship would have been a priority for him when he
was very young.”

“You seem quite infatuated with him.”

“You must admit he’s a fascinating specimen. He’s
nothing at all like the gentlemen I’ve met in ballrooms.” Nothing like Walter,
or his brother. Or
her
brothers for that matter.

“He could bring you a great deal trouble,
m’lady.”

Oh, she didn’t half know that.
But only if I let him.
“Please give me some credit, Martha. I’m not
completely without experience when it comes to gentlemen.”

“But they were gentlemen. He’s more scoundrel.”

He was temptation. Anne couldn’t help but think
that if the devil wanted to lure women into sacrificing their souls for
pleasure, he’d have used the captain as his lure.

“The lords will be glad to have you back in
Society,” Martha said.

“Oh, yes, I suppose.” She came with a nice dowry,
something the captain certainly didn’t need. “I don’t think ladies should come
with a dowry,” she mused. “Makes it difficult to know if the gentleman is
choosing the lady or security.”

“Any gentleman would choose you.”

She smiled at her maid’s devotion. “Perhaps.” She
pointed toward the horizon. “What do you suppose is going on out there?”

Martha glanced toward the black clouds that seemed
to be touching the water. “Oh, I don’t like the look of that.”

“Mr. Peterson!” Anne called. When he glanced over,
she said, “What do you make of that darkness in the distance?”

“Storm coming in.”

“Don’t you think someone should make the captain
aware of it?”

“He’s aware, m’lady. He’s busy now trying to
determine how best to avoid it.”

“Ah, well, then,” she said half to herself, half to
Martha, “we’ve nothing to worry about.”

A
couple of hours after sunset, the storm caught up with them—or they caught up
with it. Anne wasn’t quite certain of the particulars except for the fact that
she was exceedingly disappointed in the captain’s navigating skills. When the
ship had begun tossing her and Martha about the cabin as though they were
ragdolls, they both ran up to the deck and watched in horror as water lashed
over the sides.

The captain grabbed her arm in a bruising hold and
jerked her about. The fury reflected in his eyes rivaled the storm’s. “Get below
and stay there!”

“What about you?”

“Now!”

And he shoved her.
Shoved
her!
Then the bulk that was Peterson was doing the same with Martha
and blocking the doorway. “Into your cabin immediately!”

Now she and Martha were curled on the bed, taking
turns hanging over a bucket, even though neither had anything left to bring up.
She tried to console herself that the ship had no doubt been through many
storms, that the captain no doubt knew what he was doing. But the fierceness
with which the boat lurched was terrifying. Her stomach sank and rose with the
swells of the sea. She wanted to die, wished she was dead.

The ship groaned and creaked. How could it
withstand the bombardment? What if it didn’t?

She thought she heard a knock. Was it the ship
splitting apart? Then it came again and the door opened. The captain stood there
with strands of his drenched hair having worked free of his leather thong. He
removed his greatcoat and tossed it to the floor where it landed with a wet
slap.

“Are we going to sink?” she asked.

“No, we’re through the worst of it.”

“It doesn’t feel like it.” She wanted to tell him
that if anything it felt worse, but at that moment her stomach pitched and she
grabbed the bucket. Oh, it hurt, it hurt to heave and have nothing come up.

Suddenly he was crouched beside her, rubbing her
back. “Easy now,” he cooed, before yelling, “Peterson!”

The large man stepped through the doorway. “Aye,
Cap’n?”

“Take the maid to your quarters.”

“Aye, Cap’n.”

He leaned over the bed and lifted a feebly
protesting Martha as though she were a feather pillow. “Easy, woman. No one’s
going to hurt you.”

To Anne’s surprise, Martha sagged against him and
began crying.

“I know, I know, girl. It’s frightening, but it’s
all over now. You’ll feel right as rain soon enough.”

She was also surprised by the soothing tone of his
voice, and she wondered if he’d been watching Martha that afternoon as much as
Martha had been watching him. The painful cramps stopped, and she rolled back.
“He won’t . . . hurt her, will he?”

“No, but with the bed bolted down and one side up
against the wall, it’s too difficult to try to take care of you both here. He’s
big, but he’ll be as gentle as a lamb.”

“And you?”

“Gentle has never been my style. I can’t believe
you’re still in your blasted corset.”

“I thought we might have to abandon ship.”

“Which is exactly why you should have taken it
off.”

“I didn’t want to wash up onshore improperly
attired.”

“Sweetheart, we’re so far from any reachable land
that you would have been drowned. You wouldn’t have cared.”

She didn’t like his scolding her and was going to
explain that Martha had loosened it some, but she was distracted by his fingers
rapidly unbuttoning her bodice. She slapped at his hands with what little
strength she could muster. “Don’t.”

He’d already completed the task and was working on
her corset. She was wearing a chemise beneath it, but still she tried to roll
away from him, only he held her in place.

“Don’t be so modest,” he growled. “I’m not
looking.”

She relaxed. “Truly?”

“Of course I’m looking. I’m a man, aren’t I?”

She laughed, then groaned as her stomach protested
the movement. “You’re so refreshingly honest. I think I may have done some
damage here.”

“It’s always harder on your body when your stomach
is trying to empty itself and there’s nothing to bring up.”

“Hardly polite conversation.”

“But the truth. You’ll be sore for a couple of
days.”

If she survived. At that moment she couldn’t quite
believe that was a possibility. Her corset loosened, he removed it with an
efficiency that she would have protested if it didn’t feel so lovely not to be
confined. He dragged the gown and petticoats down her legs and whipped a blanket
over her before she could complain about the precarious immodesty of her
position. Through half-lowered lids she watched him making his way around the
room, but couldn’t quite find the strength to ask him what he was doing. The
ship was still bucking. How did he maintain his balance so easily?

She imagined him moving about a dance floor with
the same grace. He would be poetry in motion, and the woman held within his arms
would be swept away. How could she not? He returned to the bed, sat on its
edge.

“Face the wall,” he ordered.

“Why?”

He held up a brush. “So I can do something with
your hair before it becomes a tangled rat’s nest.”

“I can sit up.” She was halfway to her goal when
the room swirled around her and her stomach roiled. She fell back and rolled to
her side, wishing the world would stop spinning.

“Ah, Princess, I bruised you when you came up on
deck.”

She felt his callused fingers skimming over her
upper arm so lightly, as though he was afraid of hurting her again.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have treated you
so roughly. Forgive me.” He brushed his lips over her discoloring flesh, and in
spite of her misery, she felt pleasurable tingles all the way down to her
toes.

And disappointment. A kiss. The time of his
choosing. She opened her mouth—

“That does not qualify as a kiss,” he said in a low
purr.

She released a small laugh. “I could argue that,
but I won’t.”

She felt a tug here, a gentle pull there as he
began removing the few pins that remained in her hair. It tumbled down and he
gathered it up. She thought she heard him mumble, “Glorious.” But how could
anyone consider anything about her glorious at that moment? She was a miserable,
tired, aching wretch.

Then the brush was gliding through her hair and
nothing had ever felt so marvelous.

“You’ve done this before,” she murmured.

“Never, actually.” He slid a hand between her head
and the pillow, carefully lifted, dragging the brush through the strands,
pulling them taut, before lowering her.

“You’re very good.”

“I’m a quick study.”

She was being lured into sensations she wasn’t
quite comfortable feeling. They seemed naughty. She should send him away now.
Instead, she didn’t want him to ever stop his tender ministrations. She had
never expected such care from him. She thought he would be like a tempest:
powerful, uncontrollable.

Nothing about this man ever seemed to be as she
anticipated.

“Peterson said you were going to go around the
storm,” she chided, not quite pleased with herself for making the words seem
accusatory.

“We didn’t have enough room to maneuver. We could
have possibly outsailed it but I thought it better to continue forward, skirt it
as much as possible. It didn’t look too threatening.”

“But it was.”

“Not really.”

She glanced back. “You’ve been in worse?”

He grinned. “Much worse. Cape Horn is notoriously
treacherous. At least in these waters, we don’t have to deal with icebergs.”

“Does nothing frighten you?”

He grew somber, his gaze gliding over her before he
began once again to concentrate on her hair. Knowing that he wasn’t going to
give her an answer, she turned her attention back to the wall, studying the
knotholes in the wood, relishing the feel of his hands gathering up the silken
strands, taming them with the brush. She supposed she should be scandalized to
be wearing the barest of undergarments beneath the blanket while a man sat on
the bed stroking her hair. If she didn’t feel so awful she would demand he
leave. But she did feel awful, except for where he touched her. Why should she
not take comfort in that?

He parted her hair and began to plait it.

“You’re really quite nice, aren’t you?” she asked
of the wall.

“Because I won’t take advantage of a woman who
might heave her stomach contents over me? You don’t have very high standards,
Princess.”

Oh, dear God, but she wanted to laugh hard, but she
knew her sides and belly would protest, so she settled for a wide smile that he
probably couldn’t see. When he was finished with his task, he draped her braid
over her shoulder and she fingered the strip of leather that had been holding
his hair in place.

With his large warm hand, he began stroking her
back.

“I’m feeling somewhat better,” she said. “You don’t
have to stay.”

“I’ll stay until you drift off.”

It felt so lovely. She couldn’t remember the last
time someone had given her so much attention. That it was him could not have
surprised her more. He was a man of varying facets, complex and interesting.

Her eyes grew heavy. She didn’t want to go to
sleep, didn’t want to give up the press of his fingers along her spine, the
circling of his palm over her shoulders. But the lethargy weighted her down and
drew her into oblivion.

“D
oes
nothing frighten you?” she’d asked.

She frightened him, terrified him in fact. When
he’d seen her first come to the deck during the storm, terror had ripped through
him. She could have tumbled, been hit by a broken mast, washed overboard.
Anything could have happened and it had rocked him to his core to consider her
gone . . .

Before he acquired his payment. That was what was
so troubling about the whole blasted situation. The woman seemed to have no care
regarding debts owed. He’d follow her into hell to claim what was due him.

Unfortunately, he suspected she was headed for
heaven, which was barred to him.

Rubbing her neck, Tristan listened to her soft
breathing. Her arm was bared, and his gut again clenched at the sight of the
mottled flesh where he’d grabbed her. She’d have a nasty bruise by tomorrow. If
he could only touch it and draw it upon himself, he’d gladly do so. He doubted
she’d ever been so brutally handled.