A Wedding Story (19 page)

“H
ave you seen this?”

“Have I seen what?” Kate set aside her hairbrush and took a couple of breaths—easy, calm—before she turned to face Jim. Last she’d seen him, he was headed for the gymnasium to search, while she’d elected to start in the Moorish smoking lounge, which was empty this early into the journey. She’d found nothing of interest before one of the lounge’s waiters, dressed in flowing trousers and a gold-tasseled fez, reported for work and told her in no uncertain terms that women weren’t allowed in the smoking lounge.

She’d returned to her cabin to freshen up for dinner, all the while eyeing Jim’s pack, a stained and fraying interloper slumped against one of the gilded chairs, and the still-damp clothes he’d draped over the back.

It made her…uneasy. She’d grown so accustomed to traveling with him, just the two of them, outside the normal bounds of society. This ship was so much more her usual world, and he was so far outside of it. It was almost unsettling to run into so many people when she stepped out of her cabin—curious, judging people. She didn’t know where she fit anymore, how
they
fit.

As unsettled as she felt, however, he seemed perfectly comfortable. “This,” he answered her and tossed a folded paper onto the table.

“Hmm?”

“It’s a recent edition of the
Sentinel
. They’ve got quite a collection in the library. Read it.”

She pinched the edge of the paper between her thumb and forefinger. It was folded carefully to reveal one article.

“Oh, no.” Kate raised worried eyes to meet Jim’s serious ones.

“I know. Damn reporters. It’s probably been splashed up and down half the eastern seaboard by now, laid out bald for the curious, and it’s nobody’s business but theirs if they don’t choose it to be.”

“But
I
was interested,” Kate said guiltily. “I couldn’t wait to tell you, I—”

“It’s not the same.”

“Isn’t it?” she asked, troubled.

“No. You didn’t go looking for it, you ran smack into it, and you didn’t tell anyone else.”

“No, I didn’t.” Her brow creased. “Was that a question?”

“No.” When her frown deepened, he repeated, “No, Kate, no. I never thought it was you.”

She nodded, accepting. “But she’s going to think it was me.” She headed for the door and had the handle in her hand before she stopped and glanced back at him. “Jim?”

“Two decks down. Room 43.”

Mrs. Latimore was exactly where he had promised, in a tiny but comfortable second-class cabin, although the only response to her initial knock was a firm “Go away” from Miss Dooley.

“It’s us. Katie Riley and Lord Bennett.”

“Go
away.
”

“No, please.” She exchanged a worried glance with Jim. “Please, I really need to speak to Mrs. Latimore.”

Miss Dooley pulled open the door and waved them inside. “Hurry up. Quickly.”

Mrs. Latimore, wearing her usual khaki garb, sat perfectly upright on the narrow bunk. But this time, Ming Ho was beside her, his arm looped comfortably around her waist. Wearing a deep, flowing blue tunic and loose pants, he was at least three inches shorter than his wife. But there was something in his posture, in the way his body leaned toward hers and shielded her, that had turned him from servant to husband. They looked so at ease together that Kate wondered why she hadn’t pegged it right off.

“So you’ve read the article,” Mrs. Latimore said flatly.

“Yes.”

“Everyone has.” She nodded. “It goes against my grain to hide in here. But when we first tried to get on the ship—the reporters, they—”

“They were like vultures,” Ming Ho said. His hand moved up from her waist, making soothing circles on her back. “We had to hide Anne and Miss Dooley in a crate and have them loaded as cargo.”

“And you? How did you slip onboard?”

“Ming Ho is quite…creative when necessary,” Mrs. Latimore said with warm pride. “Are they all still out there?”

“Most of the reporters were just let on board to report on the launch and are long gone. I saw Hobson, of course. Maybe two or three others. That’s it,” Jim said.

“Then they won’t be a problem,” Ming Ho said, and Kate didn’t doubt him for a moment.

“The other passengers will, though,” Miss Dooley said softly. “It’s exactly what you’ve been trying to avoid all these years. People staring, judging, commenting, interfering in something that’s none of their business.” Her expression turned fierce.

Kate flinched. “I’m so sorry, Mrs. Latimore. It might have been my fault. I don’t think so, but…I’ve been racking my brain on the way over here, wondering if I might have dropped a hint, if something in my expression might have given it away, but—”

Mrs. Latimore’s head snapped up, her eyes narrowing on Kate. “You knew?”

“Well, yes,” she admitted. “The night you took us in. The next morning…I saw you two”—her cheeks heated—“well, it was obvious there was more to the two of you than you were allowing the world to know. I didn’t know you were
married,
of course, but…” She stopped. “This is getting worse, the longer I try to explain it.”

“Yes, but you blush so prettily while you do so,” Jim supplied helpfully.

“Yes, and thank you
so
much for jumping in to help me explain. In any case, Mrs. Latimore, if in any way I revealed your secret, truly it was not my intent.”

“I’m sure it wasn’t you,” Mrs. Latimore said. “And I’m not sure it matters who, either.”

“It matters to me,” Miss Dooley said with more heat than Kate would have thought her capable of.

“And to me as well,” Ming Ho said. “As for the one who wrote that piece of…”

“Darling.” Mrs. Latimore put a calming hand on Ming Ho’s knee. “It doesn’t matter now. And perhaps it was time it came out.”

“It should have been your choice,” he said. “It was taken from you. From us.”

“I’d put it off too long,” she said. “It was unfair of me to ask you to pretend for so long just so that I could continue my career unfettered.”

“I didn’t mind,” he said softly, and Kate thought,
Oh, there it is
. What she’d never had, never would, had sacrificed so many years ago without even truly understanding what she was surrendering: a love so pure and solid and shining that just the witnessing of it pierced her heart. She dared a glance at Jim to find him watching her, his eyes intense, dark, impossible to decipher, and the pain in her chest went deeper.

Oh, no, not him.
She couldn’t be that unwise. Quickly, she turned away.

“But I did,” Mrs. Latimore replied.

“So what are your plans now?” Kate asked.

“We’ve land on a little island near Borneo. Nobody there cares much about our marriage; we’re both outsiders anyway, and no threat to them. So we’ll grow cinnamon and nutmeg and enjoy each other. It’s time.”

“You’re retiring?” Kate asked in surprise. She’d always doubted that people with adventure in their system had it in them to quit; certainly it had run so deeply in her husband’s blood that he’d never been able to live settled and civilized again without longing to return to the wild.

“Yes.” Mrs. Latimore smiled broadly. “After we win this competition, of course.”

Jim managed quite successfully to avoid Kate for the next two days. Oh, it had been tempting not to. Her clear consternation when he’d mentioned sharing the cabin had been both amusing and pride-deflating, and he was powerfully inclined to make it as uncomfortable for her as possible.

But the simple truth was he no longer trusted himself around her. He couldn’t think with her around, couldn’t plan or resist or
decide.
Or do anything else that required his brain, for that matter. It simply ceased to function when she was near—or, if it functioned, any commands it sent were quickly overcome by the demands the rest of him made. And then he’d forget that he could promise her nothing and give her even less.

So for two days, he’d worked. He’d dove to the bottom of the Pompeian-style swimming pool. He’d tugged on every piece of equipment in the gymnasium. He’d spent six sweaty, sooty hours crawling around behind every one of the twenty-five boilers. He’d talked his way into the cardroom and spent a good portion of the evening and a fair chunk of the night there, watching his competitors carefully to see if any of them looked too pleased with themselves or gave any other sign of having dug up a clue. He’d even swallowed his distaste and bought Charlie Hobson a whiskey, hoping to pry a hint from the weasel.

And when he returned to the cabin each night, bone-tired, frustrated, he allowed himself one carefully measured minute to admire Kate curled up in her bunk, her hair streaming over her pillow, her mouth relaxed in sleep, before he plopped himself down on a makeshift pallet on the carpet—which wasn’t nearly as plush as it looked—and tried to sleep.

They mumbled a few words at each other each morning, rushed and awkward, carefully circumspect. Kate had been busy as well. She’d poked in flower and vegetable pots in the greenhouse on the afterdeck. Prodded carved cherubs on the columns in the three-story, glass-topped grand dining room. Shook out gold, tasseled drapes in the ladies’ salon.

Tonight Jim was taking a break, competition be damned. Nobody else had found anything, either; that much he was sure of.

The topmost deck of the ship had become his refuge. Nobody bothered to come up here much. The lower decks were warmer, sheltered from the wind, and stocked with deck chairs and blankets. Only the sturdiest souls braved the tennis court between the two foremost funnels for a chilly half hour of exercise. The lifeboats lashed to the railings spoiled the view of the water.

And so now, approaching seven o’clock, he had the place to himself. Or so he’d thought.

He’d propped his back against a ventilation pipe and watched the slate gray clouds shift and slide across a sky that was as restless as he felt. He wasn’t fond of being confined on a boat, even a floating palace like this one. He sailed when he had to because he was on his way to the jumping-off point of an expedition, his time and head always fully occupied with the challenge ahead.

Though he had to admit that his current impatience likely had far less to do with the ship and the contest than it did with Kate.

Out of the corner of his eye he caught a flutter of fabric to his right. Damn, he thought, not inclined to share his hideout.

A slim figure leaned at the railing, braced into the wind. Robes, a deep magenta worked with glittering gold threads, draped her completely, the wind snapping them like the flags overhead. One of that eastern prince’s brides, no doubt, though the women had been rarely seen since they, completely swathed, had been herded on board the day they sailed. Rumor had it the women took their meals in their quarters, the doors guarded by massive men with equally massive swords, only glimpsed when one of them was summoned to the prince’s suite.

Suddenly she turned his way, as if something had caught her attention. The thin scarf of silk covering her head fell and dark hair streamed back. She was very young, far too young to be a wife, and she was smiling, her lovely face alight with anticipation as she looked toward the stairs from below decks.

And then her smile vanished as a man lumbered up the stairway and headed straight for her. One of her guards, undoubtedly; he was built like a bull, dark-skinned, bald-headed.

Uh-oh, Jim thought.
Trouble.

Neither one of them seemed to notice he was there. The guard dwarfed the girl, his size and posture a clear threat. She said something to him; Jim saw her mouth move, though the wind carried the sound of her voice away. The giant shook his head. Then the girl swept by him, heading for the stairs, the guard falling into place right behind her.

She breezed right by Jim. For an instant her head turned his way. Her expression was serenely composed, her face a vision of lovely, unlined skin and soft, inexpressive mouth. But her eyes shimmered with moisture.

And then the guard stepped between them, giving Jim a clear view of his powerful back, before the two of them disappeared down the stairway.

Jim’s muscles clenched. There was no point in going after them, Jim reminded himself. What was he going to do? The girl probably didn’t speak a word of English. And even if she did, she wouldn’t admit to a stranger what was wrong, if there was even something there to admit. It would be utterly pointless for Jim to hurl himself against that brick wall that was her guard. Although it would be a convenient outlet for all the frustration and restless energy that had gnawed at him.