Patricia Potter (36 page)

“Hmm,” Meredith answered. “Too handsome.”

“No one can be too handsome.”

Meredith lifted an eyebrow in disagreement.

“He looks at you as though he’s passionately in love.”

“Looks can be deceiving.”

“And you looked as if you were passionately in love with him.”

“They can be
very
deceiving.”

“Then why are you sketching his boat?”

“A promise. Nothing more.”

“I think there’s a lot more.”

“He’s a gambler, Sally.”

“All the more fascinating.”

“And a rogue.”

“I know,” Sally said with satisfaction. “He’s just what you need.”

Meredith tried to look insulted, but it came to no more than a silly grin. “Sally!”

“Besides, he has a wonderful voice. You two can come visit, and we can sing together.”

“I can’t sing.”

“I know that.” Sally giggled. “I meant your captain and me.”

“And what will Garrett think?”

“He thought we were wonderful last night. Garrett is very broad-minded. Besides, everyone noticed your captain had no eyes for anyone but you, certainly not for an old married lady like me.”

Sally looked so unlike an old married lady, Meredith had to laugh. Her friend had never looked happier, and never laughed nor teased so much. Marriage had been very good to her. Meredith wondered what marriage would be like with Quinn Devereux. He was so unlike the industrious but amiable Garrett Bailey. She couldn’t imagine him being satisfied, or happy, with one place, one person.

“Nonsense,” she said, surprised when it came out aloud. She had intended the comment only for herself.

Sally’s eyes twinkled. “I’ll bet he calls on you as early as he did yesterday.”

“Nonsense,” Meredith repeated, yet the idea had definite appeal.

As if on cue, an impatient rapping sounded on the door, and Sally grinned. “Nonsense?” She laughed at the blush on Meredith’s cheeks, then ran quickly to the door, opening it to find Quinn Devereux, looking as baffled at being there as Meredith was in seeing him. Sally couldn’t resist an “I told you so” smile to Meredith before she turned back to Quinn and grinned broadly.

“Mrs. Bailey,” he said formally to Sally, “Meredith said she had some errands to run this morning. I thought I might escort her.”

“I think that’s a fine idea,” Sally said. “I have to go out, and we were just wondering how we could amuse Meredith today.” She avoided Meredith’s glower. “Do come in, Captain. She can be ready in a few minutes. She just needs a cloak, don’t you, Meredith?”

“More like a gun,” Meredith muttered just within Sally’s hearing, making no secret that her intended prey was her friend.

“Oh, and a bonnet, of course,” Sally ran on heedlessly. “I’ll get them for you.” With a wink, she went out of the room, leaving Meredith alone with Quinn.

He couldn’t prevent a slight grin of his own at Sally’s obvious matchmaking and Meredith’s discomfort. He saw the sketchpad in her hands and moved to her side, studying the lines intently. “That’s very good.”

Meredith’s hands trembled slightly. He always had that effect on her. “It would be better if I could see it again.”

He gave her a level stare with unblinking blue eyes. “You can,” he said. “Go back with me. We can take the
Ohio Star
to Cairo and wait there for the
Lucky Lady.
The timing should be just about right.”

Quinn didn’t know where the suggestion had come from. He certainly hadn’t considered it earlier. He had intended something quite opposite in fact. He had planned to escort her to the attorney’s office for Daphne’s papers and then say good-bye and leave. Leave her, Cincinnati, and all the turmoil she created within him. Over a breakfast he couldn’t eat this morning, he had decided that course was the only wise one. Yet now he held his breath for her answer.

“Yes,” she said simply, quite unable to say anything else. She could barely breathe as she looked up at him. Was Quinn, fresh-shaven and smelling of those enticing spices, even more irresistible this morning, or was it just that he was becoming more important to her? Piece by piece she was fitting together the puzzle that was Quinn, and the more she learned, the more intrigued she became.

She liked his friendship with Cam. She liked his easy charm with her friends. She liked the emotion in that fine voice of his. She liked the gentle way he touched her with his hands and especially with his eyes. She even liked the way he glowered at her because it meant he was as confused as she.

And he was glowering now, as if he couldn’t believe her easy assent. “You know what I mean?” he added roughly.

But he no longer intimidated her. She had wondered last night whether she was seeing the real Quinn Devereux, or merely a shadow figure he wanted her to see. Perhaps a part of her still wondered. But she was willing now to take a chance. Not only willing, compelled.

She nodded, watching a quick flash of life in his eyes before he shuttered them once more.

He sighed with something like surrender. “I don’t know what in the hell we’re doing, Meredith, but I can’t seem to do anything about it.”

“I know,” she said.

The simple affirmation made him grin. He had never met a woman with so little guile. When, he amended silently, she was not playing the role of a ninny.

“It could be dangerous,” he warned. “And most assuredly not prudent.”

Now she grinned. “Is this the way you conduct all your seductions, by warning the lady off?”

He shrugged, drowning his laughter in his throat. He was beginning to wonder who the seducer actually was. “There haven’t been enough to establish a pattern,” he replied with roguish modesty.

She gave him a skeptical stare. “The notorious Captain Devereux?” she teased. “I’m disappointed.”

“I can always try to improve,” he retorted, but his eyes said something entirely different.

Her heart beat at an accelerated rate, and she had to strain for breath. Quinn Devereux was undoubtedly the most wickedly attractive man she had ever known, with that devilish smile on his lips and laugh crinkles around his eyes. Yet, she noticed abruptly, his eyes, so deep a blue they made her ache inside, still didn’t smile. It was…almost as if they were unreachable, a part of someone else, a stranger who stood apart and watched.

She stood, forgetting about the pad in her lap. It fell, and he quickly swooped down and picked it up. “Such carelessness with my present,” he admonished her.

“It’s your fault,” she said. “You have a way of…”

“Confusing you?”

She nodded.

“Good,” he said with satisfaction. “Now let’s go see Levi’s attorney. I have a most impatient friend.”

He waited, not very patiently himself, she noted, as she found her cloak and hat and gloves. When she presented herself, he took her arm.

“How—” she started to ask how they would travel.

“The coachman from the other night,” he interrupted, seeing the question in her face. “He learned my name from Levi and presented himself at the hotel early to say he would be at our service. I think he believes me an eccentric millionaire.”

“Eccentric, anyway.” She giggled.

“Only where you’re concerned. Usually, I’m quite practical.”

“No gambler is practical.”

“Ah, but you’re wrong, my proper Miss Seaton. I win far more than I lose, which makes gambling a very practical profession.”

“But I’ve always heard the opposite.”

“The opposite is usually true.”

“Then how…”

They were at the carriage, and the driver took off his hat and bowed from his seat, smiling as if they were old friends. Perhaps they were. They had spent practically all of Christmas Eve together.

Quinn helped her inside, then sat down beside her, smiling at her until she thought she would spin off the confines of the earth. She sought to right herself, struggling to return to a conversation that hopefully would tell her more about him.

But it was a conversation that no longer interested him. Nothing interested him except her proximity. Nothing except the smell of flowers in her hair, the gently shaped bones of her face, the defiant tilt of her chin, the rosy glow in her cheeks. “You’re enchanting,” he observed with a rueful smile as if he wished she were anything but.

She blushed, and he knew she was unaccustomed to compliments. It was, to him, astounding. And it made him ache for her. She had missed so much, was so unaware of her own beauty. She had tried so hard over the years to disguise it, he reasoned to himself, she had actually come to believe it didn’t exist.

His arm went around her. Even through the heavy cloak, he could feel the softness of her body and it brought back images of that afternoon in his cabin. Quinn felt his body tighten, and tiny flames lick its mid-environs.

Levi’s mercantile store was only blocks away, and Quinn was both relieved and regretful that they arrived before the heat spread. He helped Meredith out, hoping that his physical reaction to her didn’t show.

Levi greeted them with a smile. “I see thee have solved thy differences.”

Quinn didn’t exactly know how to respond. He and Meredith had solved old differences only to find new complications. So he merely nodded noncommittally before turning a smile on Levi. “Meredith wishes to obtain manumission papers for a former servant. I understand you have an attorney who can handle it.”

Levi’s smile broadened. “Yes, indeed. Mr. Fletcher. He’s just two buildings down. He’s handled such matters many times.”

“Due to your persuasion, I’m sure,” Meredith remarked.

“And others,” he said. He turned to Devereux. “How long will thee be staying?”

“A few days, no more,” Quinn said. “I have to get back to the
Lucky Lady.
There can be no shipments as long as I’m gone.”

“So many owe thee thanks,” Levi said gently. “Thee has been as effective as anyone we have.”

Quinn shrugged, and Meredith noted the awkward, uncomfortable way he accepted the praise. “We’d best be going, Levi,” he said abruptly, obviously not wanting anymore of it. “I’ll probably not see you again before I leave.”

Levi nodded his head. While one or two business visits would not be suspicious, it was well that they not be seen together often. “God go with thee.”

Quinn had learned years ago not to depend on God, but he merely nodded his acknowledgment, and he and Meredith took their leave and started out toward Lawyer Fletcher.

It had been a most unusual and disconcerting day, Meredith decided later as she snuggled down beneath the warm quilts. At times moody and quiet, at others teasing, Quinn had stayed by her side. Once they had taken care of the manumission papers, Quinn had located Cam, who gifted Meredith with a rare smile when he took the papers and when Quinn said they would meet him in Cairo in ten days. The
Lucky Lady
was due there on January third. Cam would rent a horse and travel on to Cairo so he could spend some time with Daphne.

Throughout the rest of the day, Quinn was the perfect proper gentleman, returning her to the Meriweathers and again taking dinner with them. He spoke easily of politics, and the prospect of war between the North and South.

“You don’t think it will really come to that?” Henry Meriweather said.

Quinn shook his head thoughtfully. “Here in the North you have no idea of the depth of feeling about slavery in the South. The regional economy rests on it, of course. But that’s only part of it. Every attack on slavery is not only an assault on the planters, but a condemnation of their parents and their grandparents, of a way of life proudly carved from a wilderness. Their heritage. To admit slavery is wrong is to convict their own roots. They become so defensive that nothing can change their mind; they only see the threat to everything they value. Like a cornered bear. It’s not ordinarily dangerous but, backed into a corner, it’ll strike out mindlessly. The addition of each free state is like another dog rushing for the jugular, threatening extinction, and they will fight back, even knowing they can’t win.”

“But surely…”

“You’ve been taught, Henry, from childhood that slavery is wrong. They’ve been taught from childhood that slavery is right. They’re not going to change their opinion any more than you are.”

“Only a small percentage of Southerners are slave owners,” Henry continued to argue.

“Ah, but many others are dependent upon them. The merchants who give credit, the brokers, the shippers, the fishermen. If the great plantations go, so will the towns that service them. Their economic interest is as strong as the slave owners’ in maintaining the status quo. And then,” he added wryly, “there is the natural resentment of being told by others that they are wrong. Even the poorest farmer who may oppose slavery, resents outside interference.”

“You’re a Southerner,” Henry observed. He had not been told of Quinn’s Underground Railroad activities, but the fact that he was friendly with both Meredith and Levi told him where the captain’s sympathies must lie.

For the first time during the conversation, Quinn looked uncomfortable. “I was abroad for many years. That…influenced my thinking.”