The Winds of Fate (20 page)

“What were you thinking? I would have fetched it for you.”

Claire grimaced. The tug of shards from her hand hurt terribly.

“You’re a brave girl,” he calmed her. “You have gentle hands. Hands that offered a lowly slave such as me a friendship.”

Friendship?

He finished bandaging her hand.

Claire rubbed her forehead with her good hand. Since their understanding in the sacristy, they had worked side by side, yet he yielded
nothing but polite cordiality. There was no mention of the kiss they shared or any inclination toward that end. His polite cordiality hurt her the most. He need only to look at her−really look at her, to let his eyes fall on hers, deeply green and penetrating, to see her soul laid bare. Worst of all, he seemed to have no idea the ache he caused in her heart.

Claire grew stubborn. She had seen him shiver from her touch and decided on an entirely different tactic. With deliberate intention, she became bold, and let both her hands rest upon his face. She saw a light smolder in his eyes, heard his indrawn breath, before he grabbed her wrists.

“Stop this Claire. I can offer you nothing.”

They stood like characters in an artist’s portrait, rooted in the bosom of the sun’s dreamlike haze. Claire saw him gazing tenderly into her eyes, her senses ascending to a keen awareness. She smelled the sweet spicy scents of tamarind and nutmeg trees, and she felt the warm caress of the gentle breeze on her face. She listened to the low drone of bees buzzing in the hibiscus flowers that glowed red in layers of verdant foliage. It was as if they stood alone in the palm of the world, as if the sequestered beauty of the garden existed only for them.

The world seemed to close in on her, and she realized it was because he still held her wrists, his thumb moving in lazy circles across her skin. His gentle caress set off an intense yearning in her. She wanted to be closer to him, but he deliberately held her at a distance. She yearned for him to let down his defenses, to erase the differences that kept them apart. It hurt more than when he had taunted her with his sarcasm and neglect.

“This can go no further.” He shoved her away from him.

His denial scourged her like a knotted whip. Tears stung her eyes, but she refused to shed them, refused to let Devon have the satisfaction of his denial of her. Frustration slashed a deep, agonizing wound of what could be, and what could never be, and it spiraled uncontrollably, yielding to resentment. Resentment with the way things were, anger for the differences dividing them, and rage against the prospects of no future.

It galled her that he stood pious enough to make the moral decision for both of them. Her weakness toward him chafed raw and blistering. Her mind wavered and shook like a wind-swept leaf, twisting and perverting, she projected months of tension and aggravations, channeling all her vexations on Devon. “What were you really talking about with Mr. Dooley in the courtyard two weeks ago?”

“Now lass, never mind your pretty head about minor things like that.” His face hardened.

“What did Dooley want or what did you want?” He was defensive, hiding something. She was furious with her vulnerability.

“Ah that man,” Devon commented. “For sure, he’s a rascal, that one. He desired counsel on an infirmed relative, is all.” Devon narrowed his eyes. “Is it not right for a man to have a private discussion? His curt voice lashed out, fueling a cruelty rising inside her. She wanted to wound him where it would hurt the most because thorns were weaving around her heart.

“You are a slave. You have no rights.

He glared at her with savage fury.

“What about husbandly rights?” he blasted her. “Ah then−” he bit out with ruthless sarcasm. “There would have to be a woman for that. I believe there will never be enough of a woman in you for that notion. You guard your independence, yet freedom comes with the chains of a desperate promise made long ago in a faraway gaol. One simple promise, Madame, yet you are not woman enough to keep it nor ever will be.” He stalked away from her.

S
ummoned to a patient living up the coast, Devon enjoyed his temporary freedom. In the brilliant sunshine, an extra spring rose to his step for good fortune smiled down on him. He looked out to the windswept sea and counted his blessings, gold to buy his freedom, Dooley’s confirmation of a skiff to carry him away. His crew of slaves came with talent, a shipwright, a cooper, a gunner, but of most importance, a navigator to lead them through a desert of waters. Bloodsmythe and twelve others had been carefully recruited. Young Johnnie, Old John, Robert Ames had all joined the bid for liberty, secretly separating into one hut within the stockade to make their plans. A ladder had been built, concealed in the rafters to scale their prison walls and win the open reaches of the forest. All would be accomplished with silent tread for not one footfall could be detected by the guards or those they left behind.

Except for Jarvis and King James, he held no ill will to mankind, not even Claire. Since his argument with her that last day at the hospital, he had not clapped eyes on her.
Did she not remind him, he was a slave?
He considered it odd, in his present happy state, even his anger against her diminished.

He thought of her often and wished her well, little did it assuage the increasing desire he felt for her. Their association could go nowhere, and he contented himself with the rationalization of the way things existed in the world. He−a slave and she−nobility, a social chasm as wide as the ocean separating them. Devon’s fists clenched. He remained far from content. With every ounce of desperation, he wanted her. He sought all her goodness. It was insanity.

His enslavement created degenerate needs in him. Some island ladies offered easy sampling. But he did not choose them. When he was released, pathetically by his own hand, he hadn’t suffered from this constant torture and need. It was Claire who created the constant torture and need. It was Claire who created the degenerate in him. It was surely, Claire.

On the other side of a steep sandy bluff, he arrived in sight of a small hut, crouched between a knot of swaying palms, descending steeply in front to the sea, and sweeping away at the top in heavy forests. He speculated upon its occupant, desiring its chosen remoteness a good jaunt from town. With curiosity, he contemplated the open door. A triangle of sunlight splashed onto an interior planked floor. No signs of life stirred. Under further consideration, it seemed vacant. Believing he’d been sent by Jarvis’s servant on a fool’s errand, he knocked, and then entered, his eyes adjusting from the bright light of day to darkness. He sensed a presence. Alert, his senses fathomed an alarm. To his right, stood a table, laid with white linen, hosting a basket, two wine glasses and a bottle of wine. He thought that strange. Summoned to treat a very ill patient, it appeared the tenant planned a small celebration. Still, his instincts warned him. The air ceased to shift. A barely discernible footfall padded from the back room. He turned. An apparition glided toward him. Devon stared.

Claire. Never had he seen her look so beautiful, so soft and feminine and−alluring. She wore a white clinging robe, her hair pinned upon her head, with graceful tendrils escaping. She stepped before him, the gown outlining every line of her body. Impulse roared through his veins.

He frowned. “What is this game you play?” He remained concerned with his own problem of escape−his survival.

Her fingers slowly pulled the pins from her hair. When she shook it out, her breasts rose and fell with the movement. Devon’s hands convulsed into fists, then he forced them to relax.

Beneath his stare, color heightened on her cheeks, turning nearly as rosy as her lips. “To a condemned and desperate man in a faraway gaol, I gave my promise. I offer you full payment of my promise, one
full day of conjugal rights. I am honor bound for only that period of time.”

Devon’s mouth went dry, flaring high with long-starved passions, interfering with the remaining hostility he held toward her. Suspicions nagged. Yet his wariness lay in tatters, smothered with his desire. He rejected every instinctive warning.

“To be a woman?” he taunted, enduring her pretty little speech with haughty disdain.

“To know, I will be released from my promise. I want my freedom.”

“I am a slave. I cannot grant your freedom,” he lashed out, bitterness coloring his words.

She cleared her throat. “As I am indebted−I wish to be free of my commitment. When my debt is paid, I will be relieved, for I don’t wish to be obligated to you further.”

Devon swallowed hard for what was being offered. “When I have you, I want you free and willing.” She submitted for all the wrong reasons. He did not want that. Devon looked at her a few moments and smiled. “By my troth, Madame, you amaze me. But I’ll make a deal with you. A gamble on your part−for argument’s purposes, a give and take so to speak. That is, if you are
woman
enough to take the challenge,” he dared, pleased her anger flared.

“I fear−”

“Aye, but I fear−” He looked around. “Like a boar encircled by hunter and hounds. An overseer, your wretched uncle, beneath the bed? A half dozen guards out in the yard?”

She stiffened. “There is no one here.” She motioned with a sweep of an arm. “But look for yourself, if you like.”

“Never underestimate your uncle.” He looked in the back room, glanced out both doors, before returning. No one.

Devon strived to maintain detachment. All the while, a persistent battle raged against his most primal needs. His muscles tightened in an almost vise-like pain as he checked himself from moving toward her. The promise he had made himself not to touch her disintegrated along with his ability to master his animal passions. She stood there soft…yielding, all for the taking, a fulfillment of every waking dream
that had tormented him since he’d first met her. She took a tentative step toward him. Her fingers undid the clasp of her dressing robe. Did her fingers tremble? Did he see her bravado slip for the briefest second? Devon itched to touch the smooth expanse of bare flesh revealed between her breasts. She tossed the garment onto a chair and looked to him.

He tensed−afraid she would dissolve like some faded vision.

He scarcely breathed.

She stood there, beautiful chestnut hair fell about her, rippling and shining like a cascade of brown waters. Her full ripe breasts thrust impudently through the diaphanous material like dark rose buds ready to be plucked. Wholly consumed with her, he memorized every curve, every detail. The gossamer gown molded itself to her, the trimness of her waist melding down over rounded hips, revealing the dark triangle of her womanhood. Like a magnificent goddess, and he, a mere mortal. Devon swallowed, imagining a hundred wicked things from her.

She poured a glass of wine and offered it to him. “I am new at this, so you will have to help me.”

Devon frowned. How many other men had known such a request from her? At the governor’s ball, did they not all cloy after her like dogs behind the butcher’s cart? Devon craved to banish the memory of them from her mind, craved to rub out every last trace of them from her body, if in fact, any had ever touched her. His doubts ate at him.

Her fingers brushed against his as he took the glass from her. Her slight touch bolted through him like lightening. She moved across the room, almost floating, the silky material as transparent as a dragon-tail’s wing, clung and slid with the swaying of her sweetly rounded hips. Devon closed his eyes. Torturous thoughts of long, slow lovemaking aroused him to a fevered pitch, as nothing he had experienced before. He wanted to kiss her there. To taste the sweet saltiness of her skin, to tease his tongue down the soft curvature of her spine. He kicked the door behind him shut.

Claire stirred. Conversation wasn’t working. His voice alone brushed over her skin, deepening her breath.

Or perhaps it was the intimation of privacy and isolation that cultivated a sensual aura.

Or perhaps her hands itched to touch him. She swayed with the need to press her face against his chest, to inhale the earthy male scent of him.

“Perhaps you would like to eat first?” Her voice sounded husky to her ears. A wicked spell wielded and weaved its power over them, sustaining a surreal quality. Carnal desire curled inside her. Claire, nearly naked, breathed a raw feminine power that made her potent. She saw him swallow. His gaze never left her.

She moved to a basket on the table, putting warm buttered bread, slices of roast beef, creamy potatoes, and cheese on a plate. “Come and eat,” she motioned to him.

Devon sat down, swept his booted feet upon a chair and leaned back to watch her. He fingered his fork then placed it down on the table. He folded his arms in front of him and smiled expectantly. “I prefer to be fed.”

Claire closed her eyes and itemized all the reasons to hate this man.

His arrogance.

His recklessness.

The way he chipped away at her defenses, ripping her away from the life she sought for so long, the independence she craved, the peace she desired. His revengeful nature could bury her. She would not let him succeed. What had brought her to this decision? Was it the fear of sharing a matrimonial bed with the likes Teakle or any other lord who vied for her hand that persecuted her? Or guilt and the handmaiden of shame of what she owed her real husband the catalyst that brought her to this place?