Swept Away (21 page)

Despite the elegance of her manners, Eden displayed a remarkable innocence at times. Her lashes had nearly swept her brows as she had apparently imagined him and his crew dining on vegetables cooked in dirty bath water. “I’m teasing you,” he readily admitted. “The tub is only used for bathing, never for cooking. It was just a joke. I wanted to make you laugh too.”

“Am I supposed to be flattered by that?” Eden asked, still disconcerted by his peculiar sense of humor.

Eden looked insulted rather than amused, and Raven grabbed a biscuit as he rose to attend to the promised errand. He leaned down to kiss her cheek, then left before he was tempted to push his luck any further.

“Strange man,” Eden whispered to herself. He could be direct to the point of cruelty. He had a terrible temper, but he certainly didn’t brood over their disagreements. He would just go off by himself and the next time she saw him, more often than not, he would tease her as though no angry words had ever passed between them.

“It must be a trick of some kind,” she mused with a perplexed frown, “some sort of bizarre strategy.” She picked up her diary, and took care when she left the table. She still did not feel truly well, though, and nibbled a biscuit as she made up the bunk, hoping that having something more than tea in her stomach would be a help, and it was. She would just have to remember to move more slowly in the mornings, and pray she did not feel so ill she could not hide it until a babe was a certainty rather than merely a fond desire. She had absolutely no idea how she would reveal such monumentous news to Raven, but hoped by the time she had to do so, she would know him well enough to be able to do it in a manner that would make him as proud as she was sure to be.

Chapter Eleven

August 1863

As the day progressed, Eden was pleased to find Raven retained his good humor. She soon discovered it was the prospect of returning to Jamaica that had him in such an expansive mood. While his conversation at supper was again limited, he did not make another of his absurd accusations and she was too grateful for that to feel slighted that he made no effort to keep her constantly amused as Alex had.

They had reached London in late afternoon and she could hear the noisy traffic along the docks as she prepared for bed. Raven had again excused himself and gone up on deck, and when he had not returned in what Eden considered a reasonable length of time, she began to become concerned about him. Her worry soon turned to anger when it appeared he did not plan to return to his cabin at all that night. Disgusted to think he had abandoned her in favor of more amusing pursuits available along the waterfront, she climbed into his bunk and yanked the covers up to her chin.

She had suggested he seek out other women, and despite his emphatic refusal to do so at the time, where else could he have gone? If everything went well on the morrow, this might be their last night in London for some time. Had Raven chosen to make good use of it? She had been hurt and angry when she had accused him of being interested in her for only one reason. She had never made such a petty, vengeful remark in her entire life, but she had never before been so sorely provoked either.

Raven was not the only one with a temper, it seemed, but they continually brought out the worst in each other. Hot tears of frustration welled up in her eyes and she tried to blink them away. It was pointless to complain she did not understand her husband well enough to get along with him. The fact was Raven was her husband and she did not want him involved with other women, be it prostitutes who plied their trade along the docks or a pampered mistress in Jamaica.

Fuming over Raven’s prolonged absence, Eden gave free rein to her imagination. She knew him to have not only a young man’s natural appetite for making love, but the necessary stamina to sate that desire as often as he wished. For all she knew, he might have two or three women in bed that very minute rather than only one!

Thinking he had again given Eden sufficient time to fall asleep, Raven opened the door to his cabin slowly. He stepped in, pulled the door shut, then walked quietly to the cupboard that held the blackberry brandy. It wasn’t until he had poured himself some and taken a sip that he glanced toward his bunk and saw Eden observing him with a darkly threatening glance.

“I’m sorry I woke you. I tried to be quiet.”

Despite the tardiness of his return, Raven did not look in the least bit guilty to Eden. His clothes were not wrinkled as though they had recently lain on the floor of some loose woman’s room. He did not reek of cheap perfume. His hair was slightly windblown, but that was to be expected if he had spent the last couple of hours up on deck.

“I wasn’t asleep,” she informed him coolly, trying to hide the anxiety he had caused her and failing rather badly.

Raven noted her preoccupied frown and cautiously remained where he stood. “I hope you’ve not been worrying about how your aunt and cousin will respond to our visit tomorrow. There’s just no way we can leave for home without telling them goodbye. Your wardrobe can be replaced easily enough, but I don’t want anyone to get the mistaken impression that we’re too ashamed of ourselves to show our faces in public.”

He was providing the perfect excuse for her wakefulness, but Eden was in no mood to take it. “I’d planned to worry about Lydia and Stephanie tomorrow. It’s you I’ve been worrying about tonight.”

Confused by that remark since he had gone out of his way to be pleasant all day, Raven responded with a helpless shrug. “I can take care of myself. Why would you be worried about me?”

Thinking this conversation was going to be a long one, Eden sat up and made herself comfortable. “Did you mean what you said about being faithful to me?”

Raven downed the remainder of his brandy in a single gulp as he attempted to figure out why she had asked him such a ridiculous question, and why now of all times? It had been his experience that women were never direct. Even when they asked what appeared to be a direct question, the answer they truly wanted was never the most obvious one. What was Eden after then, some heartfelt vow of devotion? If so, he knew he would have to disappoint her.

“If I hadn’t meant that, I wouldn’t have said it in the first place. I think you must have noticed by now that I’m not given to idle chatter.”

“Do you think that I am?” Eden asked, fearing he had meant to insult her again.

“No, thank God, that’s why I married you.”

“No it isn’t,” Eden promptly pointed out, but she was too proud to cite the passion each aroused in the other as the reason.

“Is that what you’ve been brooding over tonight? That I’ve been forced into a marriage I’m bound to regret?”

“Not exactly,” Eden admitted. Unconsciously she had tied the corner of the blanket in a knot and embarrassed to have displayed her inner turmoil so clearly, she smoothed out the covers and folded her hands in her lap.

“It’s rather late for guessing games,” Raven warned as he approached his bunk. He sat down on the end and pulled off his boots. “Since you asked if I were sincere about being faithful to you, is that what you’ve been worrying about?”

It was a question that had never crossed her mind with Alex, but Alex had seldom let five minutes pass without telling her that he loved her. Oh how she missed that! A single tear slid down her cheek and she hurriedly brushed it away. “I miss Alex terribly,” she confessed softly. “It’s very different being married to you. I fear that we’ll never be as close as Alex and I were, and I don’t want to settle for anything less.”

Neither do I, Raven thought to himself. The first couple of times they had made love, he had thought that their passion for each other would bind her to him, but she had changed somehow and he had become determined to make her want him. If she was worried that he might be unfaithful, did that mean that she already did? Jealousy had to mean she felt something for him, but he rebelled at the thought she wanted him to be faithful to her while she spent her time weeping over Alex.

Raven rose to his feet and began to unbutton his shirt. “I think you expect too much from me too soon. I know I rushed you into marrying me, but don’t you make the mistake of trying to rush me into being as adoring as Alex was. I might not ever be capable of it.” Raven knew that was a long way from the truth when just looking at Eden made his blood race. It did not matter if she was wearing the finest satin or a sleep-rumpled nightgown or, best of all, nothing. He’d be damned if he’d make a fool of himself by admitting that to her though.

Eden did not know how to reply to a man who had just said he might never love her. She lay back down and moved over as far as she could to give him plenty of room, but when he joined her, he turned on his side with his back toward her. Knowing him to be a hot-blooded man rather than a cold one, Eden did not know what to make of his aloof pose. He had refused to allow her to sleep in Alex’s cabin, but sharing a narrow bunk with a man who wanted to avoid her seemed ridiculous in the extreme. It made her feel even more lost and alone than she had when she had imagined him being with another woman.

“Raven,” she called as she moved close and slipped her arm around his waist. “Couldn’t you at least hold me?”

Rather than turn to face her, Raven merely laced his fingers in hers so that she could not move away. “I wouldn’t stop there,” he confided, thinking that if she wanted him, she would tell him that he needn’t stop, but she did not speak again. She lay curled against his back and did not pull her hand from his, but she did not utter so much as a tiny moan that he could have construed as being a word of encouragement or acceptance.

Bitterly disappointed, he began to wonder if he had not made an incredibly stupid blunder by giving her a choice. When he had not given her one, she had returned his affection eagerly, but as soon as he had backed off, she had lost interest in him. Had Alex been able to make sense out of the actions of such a contrary female? Probably, he surmised, but of the many skills Alex had taught him, he had never mastered any of his uncle’s lessons in charm.

Instead, he had been perfectly content being a brash, headstrong rake, at least until that summer he had. Now he wished he had watched Alex more closely so he could have learned his far more gentlemanly techniques. The trouble was, the only woman Alex had attempted to charm had been Eden, and whenever the four of them had been together, Raven had not heard a single word that his uncle had said he had been so fascinated by his attractive blond companion.

Eden could feel the tension drain from Raven when he finally fell asleep, but she lay awake far longer. She wished she could ask her mother for advice, and overwhelmed with homesickness for her parents, it was all she could do not to sob out loud. That was the problem, she realized—all her thoughts led inevitably to sorrow. Alex’s death, Raven’s perplexingly perverse personality, the war that kept her from returning to those she loved, everything she cared about caused her pain.

Now she was sorry she had not pretended to be asleep when Raven had entered his cabin, for she was certain he would have embraced her as he fell asleep. What did that mean? Did he like her better when she was asleep than awake? Fearing she was making herself more sick with worry than she would already feel in the morning, Eden forced herself to breathe deeply and contemplate nothing but dreamless sleep, but a long while passed before she was successful.

Raven placed his hand over Eden’s in a comforting clasp as they climbed the steps of the Lawton townhouse the following afternoon. She was clinging to his arm with a fierce grasp that revealed the true feelings her sweet smile failed to disguise. He knew he was partly to blame for her fright, but her imagination had clearly supplied a more vivid picture of a horrid confrontation than even he had predicted.

“Wait a minute.” Raven paused as they reached the door. “If your aunt does not have the courtesy to treat us well, we’ll leave immediately. I’ll not subject you to a moment’s unpleasantness. You have my word on that.”

Raven wore such a determined frown Eden did not doubt him for an instant. “I’m not in the least bit ashamed for eloping with Alex, or marrying you, so nothing my aunt can possibly say is going to bother me. Nothing will ever hurt me as much as Alex’s death has, and a person can only feel so much pain. All I feel now is numb. I just want to get this over with as quickly as possible.”

She looked tired as well as sad, and taking her at her word, Raven gave the large brass doorknocker several loud raps. “This is the first time we’ve appeared in London as Lord and Lady Clairbourne. Let’s hope it does not prove to be an ill omen.”

When the butler swung open the heavy oak door, there was not the slightest sign of trepidation in Eden’s expression as she stepped over the threshold. Admiring her courage, Raven followed her inside. As they were shown into the drawing room, he saw Lydia glance at Eden’s gray gown and stylish bonnet and wince, as though the sight of her recently widowed niece in anything but jet black was actually painful. Stephanie rushed to his side then, and he had to brace himself in order to hide his disgust at her touch.

Stephanie gave Eden only a hasty kiss in passing before she threw herself into Raven’s arms. “We are so dreadfully sorry about Alex. By the time we learned of his death, we knew we could not possibly arrive at Briarcliff in time to attend his funeral, so there was no point in our making the trip.”

“We would have appreciated your expressions of sympathy, regardless of when you arrived,” Raven instructed her coldly. It had not even occurred to him until then, but as Eden’s close relatives, he really should have invited them to make the trip to Devon with him. Doubting their presence would have been any help to anyone, he decided that oversight had definitely worked in his favor.