Page 13 of Once an Angel
Emily silently whispered frantic words of hope to herself.
Perhaps the handsome pirate had kidnapped Justin Connor, tossed his fat corpse overboard, and
kept her father's watch as booty.
"Here you go. Careful, it's hot." The man's husky voice interrupted her reverie.
She took the cup he offered and watched him settle his lean hips against the windowsill. The breadth of his shoulders blocked the sunlight, leaving him in silhouette. At least she was to be spared the temptation of gawking openly at his face. She took a swig of the coffee, but its bitter warmth failed to ease her chill.
Maybe the cannibal had eaten Justin Connor but been unable to digest the watch.
Her spirits lifted at the thought. She tilted the cup to hide her grin. Ending up as an English delicacy at some native feast was more than equal to the various tortures and lingering deaths she had devised for
the scoundrel over the years. This man simply couldn't be Justin Connor, she assured herself. If he were, he'd be living in a mansion, not a ramshackle hut with only a prim valet and an overeducated cannibal
for company. She opened her mouth to ask him his name, then closed it again, part of her quailing from what he might answer.
"I could hardly sleep last night, wondering about one thing," he said. Suspicion shaded his voice and Emily sensed he was a man who did not trust easily. They had that much in common.
She set down the cup, embarrassed to discover how badly her hands were shaking. "I should hate to be the cause of your insomnia. Do satisfy your curiosity."
Pulling off his hat, he fixed her with a gaze of disarming candor. "Were you naked before or after you
fell off the boat?"
A fierce heat burned her cheeks. She resisted the urge to tug the coat down over her pale calves. "After," she croaked dutifully. "My dress was pulling me under the water, so I tore it off."
Justin knit his hands at the small of his back, struggling not to smile at her bold ingenuity. "Most of the women I once knew would have gracefully drowned before shedding their precious petticoats and corsets."
Anger surged through Emily. This scowling stranger suddenly represented all the narrow-minded prigs she'd left behind in London. "Forgive me if I offended your delicate sensibilities. Better dead than immodest. Wasn't it our noble Victoria who said that?"
Except for a faint quirk of his eyebrow, he ignored her sarcasm. "So you're English."
"No. I'm Chinese," she snapped.
She knotted her hands in Penfeld's coat, struggling to control her temper. Miss Winters always said it would be her downfall, along with her profanity, her ardor for green apples, and her penchant for
sliding down the banister in her Sunday pinafore.
"Why were you expelled from boarding school?"
Damn. Could the man read her very thoughts? she wondered. "Which time?" she replied innocently.
The questic n took him aback. "The most recent?" he offered.
She crossed her arms over her chest, mentally arming both barrels. She liked to see how well a man
stood up under fire.
Drawing in a deep breath, she recited, "I ate a bucket of green apples and threw up on the headmistress's best cloak. I put a snake in Cecille du Pardieu's bed. I substituted firecrackers for the candles on last year's Christmas tree. I cut off the buttons on the teacher's boots . . . while she was teaching. I sawed
off the newel post at the end of the banister. I replaced all the pepper in the kitchen with saltpeter, and
I called the neighborhood curate a pompous, lily-livered, Satan-spawned, son-of-a—"
"Enough!" he shouted. "Thank you very much. That will be quite enough. There's really no need for further explanation."
She ducked her head modestly and cast him a shy look from beneath her lashes. "Oh," she added as if
