Page 8 of Lord of Temptation
She spun on her heel and stormed from the tavern with the magnificence of the fiercest tempest he’d ever encountered. Dear God, he should accept her offer, take her money, anything to have her on his ship. Once on the sea, she couldn’t walk away.
Once on the sea, he would have her.
Anne was furious, so furious that she could pull out her hair. No, no, that would not do at all. It was ridiculous to cause harm to herself. She was angry enough to yank outhishair. That’s what she should have done: simply reached across the table and jerked out a clump of those long ebony strands. That would show him that she was not a lady to be trifled with.
“I don’t understand,” Martha murmured meekly as though she feared Anne would turn her fury on her. “My brother speaks so highly of the captain—”
“Yes, well, how he treats his men is quite obviously very different from the manner in which he treats ladies.” But why? To ensure captains wouldn’t accept her offer, why would he pay double what she would pay them? He could have any woman he wanted, of that she was certain. Why her? Why did he want her on his ship? So he could lift her skirts? He’d damned well discover that where she was concerned, they’d be made of lead. “Tell your brother to find me one more captain. I shall offer to pay him five hundred pounds.”
“My lady,” Martha gasped. “This goes too far.”
Anne didn’t bother to inform Martha that she’d overstepped her bounds. They’d been together too long for her to chastise the maid, especially when she knew she was right. “We’ll see how Captain Crimson Jack likes paying a thousand.”
Martha reached across and took her hand. “Talk to your father again, explain why you need to make this journey. Surely he’ll arrange it.”
“It will take longer to journey on someone else’s schedule.”
“Not that much longer.”
She released a defeated sigh. “No, not that much longer. I’m being stubborn, I know.” But this captain had made her angry, and to go by other means now would make her feel as though he’d somehow won.
“It would be safer,” Martha added.
Would it? A woman traveling alone with only her maid? She might run across someone she knew and tongues might wag. She didn’t want anyone to know. That was the thing of it. It was her business and hers alone. “I just want to make this sojourn in my own way.”
“Lord Walter won’t care.”
With the tears stinging her eyes, she said quietly more to the night than to her maid, “No, he won’t.”
Her fury dissipated into sadness. They spoke no more as their carriage journeyed through the fog-shrouded London streets. Dear Walter. She longed to see him once more, to hear his laugh, to have him tease her, to have him hold her in his arms as he swept her over a ballroom floor in time to the music. Ever since he left, she’d avoided the balls, soirees, dinners. She’d devoted her time, along with Florence Nightingale’s sister, to gathering the much-needed supplies for the hospitals in the Crimea. She’d visited the returning soldiers in hospital, bringing them what comfort she could. And then she’d gone into mourning when she received word that Walter had died. Any chance for forgiveness had died with him.
Two years. Two years of being dead as well. Of feeling nothing. Of walking around like a silent wraith. She lost weight. She took joy in so little. Even her favorite pastime of reading brought no pleasure. She would reach the end of the book with no memory of any of the words, of the tale. Yet she had dutifully turned pages, thought she had been concentrating on the task. She forgot things so easily.
Then a month ago her father had barked that she needed to snap out of this melancholy mood, as though she was a pea that could be snapped in half and the shell of her life discarded, while the soul remained. He wanted her to return to Society, to find another husband before she grew much older. She was all of three and twenty. So difficult to look back and realize how very young she’d been when Walter left.
Now she felt so remarkably old.
She knew her father was right. She needed to get on with her life. She knew Walter was not returning home to her, but she wanted the opportunity to say good-bye to him on her schedule, in her way.
Dear Lord, but she missed him. So much. Even after all this time.
She didn’t want to admit that the fury tonight felt good. So good. It had been so long since she’d felt anything other than grief. Well, except for the night when she’d met Crimson Jack and felt a slight stirring of—dare she admit it?—desire. When he removed her glove, when he touched her. Afterward she’d been glad that he declined her offer. She couldn’t imagine being enclosed on a tiny ship with him. Martha would be with her, of course. Perhaps even a second maid. The sensuality that oozed off the man would require an entire army of maids to protect her.
And here she was thinking about him again, the blackguard. He’d begun invading her dreams, her waking moments. She still seemed incapable of reading a book and absorbing the story. She would find herself drifting off with thoughts ofhim. She didn’t think of the old sea captain or the scarred one or the toothless one she’d approach about passage. She didn’t even think of the fair handsome one who had sat with a buxom redhead on his lap during their meeting. He had a boisterous laugh and a ready smile, but it wasn’t him she thought of. It was the captain with icy blue eyes that seemed to melt the longer they spoke. The one who made her wonder what it would feel like to trail her fingers over that unshaven jaw.
Walter had never been in her presence with stubble shadowing his face. All of his buttons were always properly done up. Not a single strand of his wheat-golden hair was ever out of place. The two men were complete opposites. The captain was not the sort to appeal to her in the least, so why did he plague her so?
She had no answer to that question as the carriage drew to a halt outside the manor. Suddenly she was incredibly weary. It seemed she only managed to attain any sort of energy when she was facing an encounter with Crimson Jack.
A footman handed her down from the carriage and she trudged up the stone steps, each one more laborious to reach than the one before. Once inside she felt the oppressive weight of despair. She would talk with her father. She didn’t want to enter the London Season. Not this year. Perhaps next.
“Martha, please give me a half hour or so of solitude and then bring me some warm milk with cocoa,” she ordered.
“Yes, m’lady.”
Grabbing the banister, Anne dragged herself up the stairs. The melancholy could overtake her without warning or invitation. It just seemed to slam into her of its own will. She didn’t like it, she didn’t want it. She needed Walter to conquer it. Her father didn’t understand that. He’d never needed anyone, not even her mother. Theirs had been an arranged marriage. They’d been content, but when her mother had passed away from influenza three years ago, her father had carried on.
Anne wanted to be that strong, but it seemed love made her weak, left her floundering when the one who held her affections departed this world.
