A Gentleman 'Til Midnight. Alison DeLaine

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ drinking her wine and sleeping on her linens. She watched him shift his weight from one foot to both and brace his hands on the railing. Her eyes followed the angle of his legs past his buttocks and across the broad expanse of his back, over his shoulder and down the line of his arm to the fingers that curled around smooth wood. She didn’t need to be any closer to know exactly what those fingers looked like. Strong, solid, lightly callused. Gripping the Possession as though he owned it.

      A hot lick of sensation shot through her belly as though he touched her.

      Captain Warre. He was Captain Warre. Perhaps if she thought the name enough times, her body would stop reacting to him. To think that if Danby hadn’t recognized him, before the voyage ended she might have been foolish enough to—

      Good God.

      Petrels soared above the sails as Katherine returned to the upper deck. The sound of the waves and the familiar shouts and laughter of her crew were a comfort, but everything had changed. William still chatted with India, but she would deal with him later. Oh, yes. She would deal with William. But for now, she rejoined Captain Warre at the railing.

      “Everything all right?” he asked. His scent—Turkish soap borrowed from William, plus some musky undertone that was uniquely him—wafted over her on the breeze.

      “A misunderstanding among the riggers.” She put her own hands on the railing and tried to cleanse her lungs with sea air, but his subtle spice lingered.

      “That required your intervention? I would have guessed your boatswain capable of handling such problems.”

      “Rafik is capable of handling any number of problems—” as Captain Warre would soon discover “—but my crew is free to speak with me whenever they wish. No doubt that seems strange to you. I’m sure your Captain Warre would have abhorred such a policy.”

      He made a noise. “To the extent it would have meant five hundred men queued up outside his cabin, I’m sure you’re correct.”

      No doubt he planned to play the role of Lieutenant Barclay for the entire voyage. He probably reasoned that once they reached London and he rejoined the upper echelons of society, it wouldn’t matter if she finally discovered his true identity. Hot anger simmered beneath her skin, so much easier to tolerate than the attraction. And infinitely more acceptable than that old vulnerability.

      Her life held no room for weakness, not when so many depended on her strength.

      Captain Warre, hiding like a coward behind the persona of a dead inferior officer. How many lies would he tell to protect his identity?

      “You were about to tell me a little more about yourself, Lieutenant,” she said, deciding to find out. “Are you the eldest son?”

      “Hardly.” One lie. “My eldest brother, Theodore, will inherit the baronetcy.” Two. Three. According to Philomena, Captain Warre was an earl by virtue of his older brother’s death five years earlier.

      “I merely wish to leave the sea and all its tedium behind and live a quiet life,” he continued.

      Without a doubt, four. “Leave the navy? But surely you would become a captain soon.”

      He nodded. “In a few years, I likely would have had my own command.” Five. The real Lieutenant Barclay may have had a few years to wait, but the renowned Captain Warre had risen quickly through the ranks and attained his first commission twelve years ago.

      “That seems an excruciatingly slow wait,” she said. “Surely you’ve been at sea twenty years now.”

      The corners of his eyes creased when he glanced at her. “You pull no punches about a man’s age, Captain. Just shy of half that, I’m afraid.” Which, for the real Lieutenant Barclay, may have been true. Six lies. The only thing she didn’t know was whether Captain Warre was hiding his identity for fear of her reputation or because he knew she’d been aboard the Merry Sea. More likely the former. He would hardly remember one violent encounter among the hundreds that spanned his career.

      “I can’t imagine Captain Warre approved your plan to leave the navy, battle-hardened as he must be,” she said. “With his record and reputation, I’ve no doubt he’ll order ‘Fire the cannons!’ with his dying breath.”

      He laughed, full and real with a smile that gleamed white as the sails and creased his cheeks with wicked merriment. “First, there would have to be a war on.”

      “Which there undoubtedly will be again.”

      “Bite your tongue. And second, he would have to remain in the navy. The reason the captain approved my plan most heartily was because he planned to resign his own commission as soon as our voyage was over.”

      He did? “For what reason?”

      His smile dimmed. She refused to be disappointed. “Fatigue,” he said. “Jadedness, perhaps. Battle-weary, rather than battle-hardened. I fear you would have been sorely disappointed had you met him—he was hardly the bloodthirsty predator you imagine.”

      Seven. If the calculating bastard standing next to her was fatigued and weary, it was only the lingering effects of his ordeal at sea. “He could hardly have attained such notoriety otherwise,” she said. His actions against the Merry Sea supported that opinion.

      He turned his head and looked straight into her eyes, piercing her with a memory. As she stared back, suddenly she knew. He had not forgotten the Merry Sea or his own hand in her fate.

      “Even the most driven of men make miscalculations, Captain Kinloch.”

      “Do they.” She was speaking to Captain Warre now, not Lieutenant Barclay. Desperately she fought back an onslaught of emotions and memories. “I rather wonder if they don’t simply become complacent with regard to any unfortunate consequences of their actions.”

      “I can assure you, they do not.” For a heartbeat those green eyes looked as weary as he claimed. “If he were here, I have no doubt he would tell you he has many regrets.”

      And she would tell him to go to hell. “If Captain Warre were here,” she said, “I have no doubt that he would have many regrets—and none would have to do with his naval career.”

      * * *

      KATHERINE WAITED UNTIL William had retired to his cabin that evening and knocked once on his door. Captain Warre was not the only one who would have regrets.

      “A word, please,” she said tightly when William opened. He’d removed his turban, and his golden hair glinted in the lamplight. She stepped into his cabin and waited until he shut the door. An atlas lay open on the desk against the wall.

      “Thought I’d see where I might go after you’ve claimed your title,” he said. “What do you think of Madagascar?”

      “You betrayed me,” she said. William was her best friend in the entire world, and he’d lied to her. Was still lying to her. Her chest felt tight and hot as though she’d been speared.

      William studied her for a long, quiet moment. Everything in his cabin glittered—the gold in his ears, the gilded scrollwork on the bedstead and dressing table he’d purchased in the Levant, the bejeweled waterpipe he’d taken from a ship bound from Tangier. “I would fall on my sword before I would betray you, Katherine.” There СКАЧАТЬ