A Wedding Story (22 page)

The boy hunched over in the chair, the loose folds of his headgear hiding his face. Even under the enveloping robes, his shoulders were narrow. He looked small, and very young.

“Jim,” Kate said, “he probably doesn’t understand a word you say.”

“Oh, I think he understands me just fine.” Quick as a cobra strike, Jim snatched the robes back, baring the boy’s head.

Thick chestnut brown hair, damp with sweat, lay smooth against his head where the robes had pressed it. He had the angular look of a boy who’d shot up too fast and not quite grown into his bones yet, long forehead and chin, cheekbones a hard slash. Eyes that, out of the shadows, now appeared shades lighter peered out from beneath thick brows set too low.

“Who are you?” Jim demanded.

The boy tried to summon a scowl and managed only to appear sulky. And more than a little scared.

Jim gave him three seconds. And then he reached out, grabbed fistfuls of robe at his neck, and hauled him out of the chair.

His feet, clad in black lace-up boots, so worn the leather was nearly white across the toes, the heels ground thin as a dime, dangled two inches from the floor. Not, Kate decided, the typical footwear of an Amir’s son.

“Who are you?”

The boy tried to hold his gaze and failed miserably. He hung limply in Jim’s grasp, his toes barely grazing the ground.

“You heard what I did to the major, didn’t you?”

The boy’s head snapped up, his eyes going big as dinner plates. “That’d be murder, way out here.”

“Yes, it would,” Jim agreed mildly. “Your English is excellent, by the way.”

“Now stop that.” Kate tugged at Jim’s biceps, rock-solid, holding the boy easily. “You’re scaring him.”

“I should hope so.”

“Oh, just put the child down. For now, at least.”

Jim dropped him back into the chair. Kate placed herself in front of him, giving him a warning look over her shoulder, and addressed their reluctant captive. “Now, then.”

The boy peeked at her from underneath his brows. He slumped back into his chair, looking more relaxed. “I’m not a boy.”

“My apologies. How old are you?”

“Nineteen.”

Kate merely lifted one brow and waited.

“Seventeen.”

Kate beamed approvingly. His eyes glazed and red suffused his lean cheeks.

“Careful, Kate. Cooperative is one thing, but a full dose of you might strike him dumb.”

“Oh, hush,” she said over her shoulder before addressing the young man again. “While we’re on a roll—what’s your name?”

“I—” He pressed his lips together and shook his head unhappily.

Behind her, she felt Jim take a forward step. She put one hand behind her back and flapped her hand at him to get him to stay in place. Threatening the young man was only going to get his back up. She had much more efficient ways.

“My dear,” she said. “Unless you are the result of several generations of captured European brides, you are obviously not the son of the Amir.”

He shifted in his chair. “Didn’t say I was.”

Ah. New York, she thought; there was a telltale broadness to the vowels. She reached down and touched him gently on the knee. “Your name?” she prompted.

He gulped. “Johnny. Ah, Jonathan. Jonathan Duffy.”

“Thank you, Jonathan. I’m very pleased to meet you.” She extended a hand. Johnny stared at it for a moment, then started to stick out his own. He thought better of it and swiped it quickly down the front of his robes before he took her hand and pumped it with enthusiasm. “So. You stole the Amir’s invitation so you could win the contest?”

“I—” He darted a worried glance at Jim.

“Oh, don’t worry about it,” she assured him. “We’re not going to run to the
Sentinel.
And I rather preempted an invitation myself.”

“Wasn’t trying to win. I’m not stupid. I know I’ve got no chance against someone like him.” He jerked his narrow chin toward Jim.

“What, then? Where’d you get the invitation?”

“I sold newspapers. I
knew
I could write, I just knew it. But they wouldn’t give me a chance, no matter how many times I asked. Kept hiring all those college boys who looked good in their suits but who didn’t know a thing about New York, not the way I know New York. And sure as hell—pardon ma’am—don’t know a thing about wanting something so bad you’d be willing to do anything to get it. I tried to get them to read something, to give me a chance, any chance. But they just kept looking at me and seeing a newsie.”

“I see.” Sympathy welled. “Very few people can look beyond seeing what they expect to see.”

“That’s it.” On surer ground, Johnny sat up straight. “I knew the only chance I had was to
show
them what I could do. Everybody at the paper was buzzing about the contest, about all the famous people who were going to participate, and how much the paper was putting into it and when the invitations were going out. I figured, why not? If I found a story nobody else did, I’d have a way in. And if not, so what? I wouldn’t be any worse off than I was to start with.” He shrugged. “I don’t even know whose invitation I took. There was a whole pile of them in the mailroom. I arranged to send the articles to my sister so she could sneak them onto the editor’s desk, took up this disguise, and here I am.”

“You wrote the article,” Jim said flatly.

Johnny eyed him warily. “Which article?”

“Mrs. Latimore.”

Johnny winced. And then he lifted his chin, mustering his courage. “Nobody else got that story.”

“You had no right,” he said, danger threading low and sharp through his voice.

But this time Johnny held his ground—a little paler, but his shoulders were square, his gaze steady. “It’s my job.”

“Your job to spread people’s private business out for the world to poke and prod and judge?”

“The people have a right to know.”

“The people have a right to know things that are none of their goddamn business?”

Johnny surged out of the chair. “You mean the people who pay for your books, your lectures and swallow every word you tell them? Every word that you feed them through the newspapers you use to drum up interest in your expeditions? You mean
those
people?”

“There’s a difference between news and plain old gossip.”

“Lord Bennett, I—”

“Johnny,” Kate said softly. “You can’t write about what you just heard.”

His expression turned glum. “I’m sorry to disappoint you, ma’am. You can’t know how truly sorry I am, but—”

“You can’t,” she said again. She moved nearer and put her hand gently on his forearm. “You heard the entire story, didn’t you? You
can’t
.”

“It’s a good story, ma’am.”

“People will get hurt.”

He shook his head. “It’s not the truth that hurts people. It’s the lies.”

“Johnny—”

“He’s not going to write it.” Jim moved between them, bumping her arm away, towering over the young reporter. His voice was pitched low, his posture a clear threat. “He’s not going to write it, because he’d like to be able to write another story some day. Wouldn’t you, Duffy?”

Johnny gulped but held his ground. “You’re not going to kill me,” he said, with only one tremor at “kill.”

“I’m not? Are you sure? You did hear about the major, didn’t you?”

Johnny managed a nod. “You weren’t trying to kill him. He was only fifty feet from shore, there were dozens of boats around, and you threw him a life ring.”

“You’re very well informed. Planning on writing that one, too, were you?”

“I intend to be very good at my job, Lord Bennett.”

“And you’re so sure you’re right about me? This wouldn’t be about getting a story wrong. If you’re mistaken, you’re dead.”

“You’re not a murderer,” Johnny said, growing more certain with every word. “I should have realized that right off, but you caught me by surprise.”

“You’re
sure
?” He edged closer. Johnny’s nose was even with Jim’s collar. His left eye twitched but he didn’t back away.

“I’m sure,” he squeaked.

Jim sighed deeply. “Oh, all right. You’re right.”

“I am?”

“I won’t kill you.” His eyes narrowed. “But I’m not opposed to making your life so very painful that you’d spend every second wishing I had just pitched you overboard and been done with it.”

Kate stepped closer, ready to intervene if necessary. Not that seeing Jim so fierce and protective, so utterly sure of himself, didn’t have her heart thumping like a schoolgirl’s. Not that she didn’t find him more appealing at that precise second than she ever had, and she’d found him quite outrageously appealing before.

Later, she promised herself. Later.

“This is not helpful,” she said.

“Give it a chance,” Jim said.

“No.” She’d no doubt that he could instill fear-of-Jim quite effectively in Johnny. But all his threats would last about as long as the reporter was within fist’s reach. It was too good a story to forget. As soon as they hit land, Johnny would put a few miles between himself and Jim and start writing. “Johnny, it’s crucial that your sources can trust you and your word, isn’t it? Otherwise no one would ever reveal anything important to you.”

“Yes,” Johnny agreed slowly.

“And so if you gave a promise,” Kate continued, “you would be bound to keep it, wouldn’t you? Otherwise your ability to do your job would be irretrievably compromised.”

He had the look of a deer being drawn to a blind. As if he sensed there were danger ahead but couldn’t quite see it. “Yes.”

“Then perhaps you would be amenable to a trade. If I give you another story, one you could write freely without worry of retribution from Lord Bennett, you would have to promise to keep his quiet.”

“Kate, shut up,” Jim said.

“I would,” Johnny said.

“Well, then.” She extended her hand.

“Kate,
shut up!
”

“Hello, Mr. Duffy. I’m Kathryn Goodale.”

“Kathryn Go—” His eyes widened, popping back and forth between the two of them. “Ohhhh.” He took her hand but was too lost in thought to shake. Already forming sentences in his head, Kate decided.

“Damn it.” Jim disengaged her hand and kept it in his, pulling her back. “If you write about her, Duffy, I wouldn’t count on
‘no retribution.’
I wouldn’t count on it at all.”

“He has nothing to say about it,” Kate said briskly. “I’m giving you the story. You’re welcome to it, as long as you keep Matt Wheeler and anything that happened on the Arctic expedition out of it.”

Johnny eyed her speculatively. “You two seemed very friendly.”

“Oh, we are. In fact—”

“For God’s sake, Kate, if you don’t shut up I’m throwing
you
overboard.”

Johnny stepped back, a thoughtful look on his face. “There might be another possibility.”

“Sure there is,” Jim began. “I could—”

“Oh, be quiet,” Kate said. “Nobody believes your threats anymore. Continue, Mr. Duffy.”

Johnny tapped his hand against his thigh, then nodded, as if he’d made up his mind.

“There’s a girl.”

“Son,” Jim said, “there’s always a girl.”

H
alf an hour later they strolled through the narrow passageway to Kate’s cabin. Jim’s hand was light at the small of her back, outwardly polite, but sensation radiated from his touch, a promise of what was to come.

Kate sighed, long and wistful.

“What was that for?”

“He’s so in love.”

“Kate, he’s seventeen and he met her three days ago. Love’s not what I’d call it.”

“I know, but…” Their bodies brushed as they walked—a hint of contact, barely there, enough to make him want to throw her over his shoulder and sprint to her cabin. “It’s sweet, isn’t it?”

Something in her voice made him pause. Her eyes were hazy, her mouth soft. “Kate?”

“The way he looked when he spoke of her,” she went on dreamily.

Of course, Jim thought in sudden realization. She’d spent her teens caring for her sisters, her twenties as Dr. Goodale’s wife. “Wait in the cabin,” he said.

“What?” she asked. “I thought we were…”

“I’ll be back in half an hour.”

“But—”

He bent, stamping her mouth with a quick, hard kiss. “Half an hour,” he said, and sprinted away.

Twenty-five minutes later Jim stood in front of Kate’s door. His palms were sweating. His heart couldn’t figure out whether to beat too fast or too slow and so bounded uncomfortably between the two, unsettled and uneasy.

He stood in front of the door for a good long time, trying to steady his breath, his hands.

It shouldn’t be this hard, he kept reminding himself. He knew Kate. Knew he could please her, knew how to touch her so she trembled and sighed. It was a simple affair, carefully bounded by the requirements of their lives and the frame of the contest. Mutual pleasure without complications.

But he wanted it to be right for her.

Maybe she’d have
right
again, with other men, other times. But he wanted to be the first to give her that. If she’d remembered fondly that evening in the gazebo, he wanted this time to burn its imprint irrevocably upon her soul. Because he knew for damn sure she’d already seared her image on his.

He lifted his hand to knock, letting it waver in the air six inches from the door while he gathered his courage. And then the door yawned open.

“Oh, there you are,” she said. She smiled slowly. “I was getting lonely.”

His brain froze. He lost the power of speech, the ability to reason.

Kate.

Her hair tumbled down, a loose cloud of gold around her shoulders, begging a man to sink his hands in deep and hold her head steady for his kiss. Her skin gleamed—face, neck, shoulders—as if sprinkled by stardust.

She wore that confection of a nightgown she’d pulled out of her trunk that first night. It had been seductive enough in her hands, the thought of her in it devastating to his restraint.

No matter how much he’d imagined—and he’d imagined a lot—he’d come far short of the reality. She was a vision, a dream, the kind of beauty that spawned legends. If, over a campfire, someone had described her to him, he would have called them the worst kind of liar.

Glacier blue silk hugged her curves, the fabric so sheer he could see the indention of her navel. Except for straps so thin he could snap them with one finger, it bared her shoulders, dipping low across her breasts. Wide bands of loosely knitted lace wound diagonally around her, allowing glimpses of the skin beneath. The gown dipped low over her chest, the lace edging there, too, giving head-spinning glimpses of dark pink nipple.

“Aren’t you coming in?” There was a note to her voice he’d never heard before. She’d been consciously seductive, certainly. But this note of open invitation…if she’d sounded like that, looked like this, that night in the gazebo, he never would have let her walk away from him, Doc Goodale be damned.

“Oh. Here.” He thrust out the clutch of orchids he’d stolen from the greenhouse. They trembled in his hand, waxy white petals the color of her skin. His head whirling, he picked out the remnants of his plan. “Miss Bright, these are for you.”

“Miss Bright?” She blinked in surprise, then quickly recovered. She glided toward him, hips moving with sinuous grace beneath the waterfall of silk. “For me? They’re beautiful. But I’ve nothing to put them in.”

“Here.” From behind his back where he’d hidden it, he pulled out the slender silver vase he’d borrowed from the dining room.

“Don’t you think of everything?”

“I try.” He thought he had, planning out each detail to the very last. But he hadn’t counted on
her,
the fact that he wasn’t sure he could set foot in the same room with her and retain his sanity.

When she moved to the tap to fill up the vase, she turned away from him, giving him a view of her back. The blue silk flowed as she moved, clinging to curves, her lower back, the cleft that separated her buttocks. His gaze fastened there, clung as determinedly as the fabric.

What he had planned was going to be a thousand times harder than he thought. And he figured it to be pretty hard to begin with.

He ducked out of the cabin for an instant and shook his head, hoping to clear it. Two deep breaths, a quick reminder…yes, that was better. A little.

The little silver cart rattled as he rolled it in.

She turned at the sound, vase sprouting orchids in hand. “What this?”

“Dinner.” He made a waiter’s flourish, indicating the gleaming silver domes.

“Jim, it’s barely noon.”

“Pretend.” He went to work, pulling a small table into the middle of the room and pairing it with two curvy, thin-legged chairs upholstered in cream. He snapped out a snowy tablecloth and lifted the cover of the first dish. “Oysters,” he said. “I don’t know if you like them, so…”

“I do,” she murmured. She set the flowers down in the middle of the table and moved to him, very close, bare pink toes peeping between the glossy black leather of his shoes. With one finger she traced the lapel of his coat. “Nice clothes. Where’d you get them?”

He tugged at the stiff collar. The black long-tailed jacket pulled tight across the shoulders. The charcoal-striped pants hung on only with the help of three pins and ended an inch shy of his ankles. “When the major went overboard, his clothes stayed behind.”

“Hmm.” She rubbed the lapel between her fingers, as if testing the satin. “Where?”

“His cabin.”

“Cabin? As in, there was a perfectly good empty cabin for you to stay in all this time, and you lied to me so you could stay here?”

“I—” Caught, he considered any number of half-truths. That he would have felt uncomfortable with her out of his sight, that even with the major off the boat he didn’t want to risk a saboteur, that he had to be there to beat off the count or any of the other males who’d fallen under her spell.

Or that he simply couldn’t stand to be that far away from her. “Yes.”

Her palm flattened against him and his vision blotted. He took hold of her upper arms and set her away from him with as much gentleness as he could muster. “Miss Bright.” He pulled out one of the chairs and sketched a bow. “If you’ll allow me?”

Half puzzled, half intrigued, she slid into the chair.

He’d brought candles, six of them, which he clustered around the orchids and lit. And then the food, dish after dish on thin bone china, as many as he could fit on the small table, though there were a half dozen left on the cart.

“I didn’t know what you liked…” he began.

“Jim,” she said. “Beef tenderloin, poached turbot, endive salad. Not to mention a very lovely pudding. You’ve thought of everything.”

“I tried.” He found his own seat, his knees bumping the table, and spread a napkin in his lap. “Wait just a minute.”

He dashed to the porthole and closed the thick blue velvet drapes, blocking all light but a thin strip before he returned to the tables. “There. That’s better.”

“Jim, it’s all very lovely, but…what is this?”

“Miss Bright,” he said, “I am so very pleased that you consented to dine with me.”

Her brows drew together. And then, apparently deciding to play along, she said: “How could I not? When you asked so prettily?” She leaned forward and the fabric fell away, giving him a clear view of the inner curves of her breasts, the wide, bare expanse of her upper chest.

“I cannot help but be curious.” He served her a portion of fish but left his own plate with but a token slice of beef. He wasn’t going to be able to eat a thing, not unless he spent the rest of the meal with his eyes shut. “I know you have two sisters. What are they like?”

“Anthea’s only a few years younger than I am. Emily is—well, suffice to say she is a far bit younger than me.” She overlooked the fish and instead plucked a chocolate from a gold foil box. Her eyes sparkled at him as she ate, her lips wrapping around the sweet, a flash of teeth as she bit in. That mouth…sweat broke out on his temples.

He looked down at his plate, sawing away at the beef until his heartbeat settled down again. Now he could look at her, he judged, and not lunge across the table.

Wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong.

She’d slid the straps off her shoulders, her nightdress down to her waist, leaving her breasts bare and beautiful. His mouth went dry; blood pounded in his temples.

“I—” He dove for the decanter and sloshed wine into his glass. “Wine?”

Twin lines appeared between her brows. “Thank you,” she said, and lifted her glass for him to fill. Her breasts rose with her movement, a lush sway. The decanter clinked against the goblet, ringing a death knell for his good intentions. He tried to focus on the tabletop, the clutter of dishes and flatware and crystal swimming together.

“Jim?”

“Huh?”

“What is this?”

“This?”

“Yes, this.” He heard the muffled thud as she set her glass back on the tabletop. “Jim, why won’t you look at me?”

“I can’t.”

“You can’t?” Silk swished. The chair scraped back. Footsteps padded around the table. “Jim, please,” she said.

Still looking down, he moved his gaze a fraction. Toes peeped out from beneath her gown. And then—
swish
—blue silk puddled on the floor.

“Lord, Kate.” He closed his eyes, his head falling back while he struggled to remain rooted in the chair, every muscle rigid. If he moved, if he breathed, he’d have her on that berth in an instant, plans be damned. “I should have known you couldn’t just
cooperate.
”

“It might be easier to cooperate, Jim, if I had the faintest idea what I was supposed to cooperate with.” Her voice was soft, fluid, like a whisper of silk. The silk she was no longer wearing—oh, he was a dead man.

“I’m
trying
to court you.”

“Court me? Isn’t it a little late for that?”

He heard her move, a rasp—and then silk fell across his face, his mouth—soft, warm from her skin, smelling of her. It fluttered against him as he pulled it off, butterfly wings of sensation.

The gown slipped through his numbed fingers and fluttered to the floor. “I saw your face.” He kept his eyes squeezed shut, because he knew if he looked at her the power of speech would leave him. “When you talked about Johnny and that girl. You wanted the romance you never had. The courting. So I’m going to give it to you.”

She chuckled softly, champagne bubbles of laughter that frothed in his brain, muddling his plans. “Look at me, Jim.”

He shook his head. “I told you, I can’t.”

“Look at me,” she said, patient, waiting.

She had the advantage, because it was what he wanted, even if he knew it would only make it all the harder. And so he lifted his head.

Sights had taken his breath away before. Waterfalls, mountaintops, jeweled icons buried away for thousands of years. And all of those memories paled next to her.

She was all creamy skin and lavish femininity. Soft. Nothing angular, nothing abrupt, just big flowing curves, unstinting, generous. Her hair swung free, thick and golden, spilling down her back. Her breasts were lavish, rising and falling softly with each breath, the nipples tight, rose-tipped.

“I—” His mouth was dry. He swallowed and tried again. “Let me—”

“You know something, Jim?” She glided one hand over her torso, lightly, slowly—neck, breast, waist, belly—and his gaze followed. He couldn’t have looked away if someone held a gun to his head. “I rarely indulge in regrets. Not useful, I’ve found. That does not mean that I am not sometimes, very seldom, slightly nostalgic for the things I missed.” Slowly, drawing out his suffering with every fluid movement, she climbed into his lap, facing him, one leg on either side of his thigh, looping her arms around his neck.

“Kate—”

“Hush. I’m not finished.” He could feel the damp heat of her against his thigh. He struggled to follow her words, hanging on to coherence by the merest thread. “But the truth is, given the same choice, I would have made the same one again. My sisters are well, healthy, grown. I was aware what I was sacrificing when I gave it up and it was worth it. An occasional passing twinge does not a regret make.” She leaned forward, the tips of her breasts searing his chest. He gripped the seat of the chair, fingers biting in as if they could dent the wood. “Forget the courting. Forget the romance. Do you know what else I gave up, Jim? What I missed more than some silly adolescent wooing?”

Knowing speech was beyond him, he shook his head.

“This.” She kissed him, full on, hard and deep. She burst upon him, the wonder of her—naked, passionate woman in his lap, his arms. Her hands tangled in his hair, pulling his mouth closer, her tongue plunging deep.

Somewhere back in his brain—dim, barely recognized—he knew he should go slow. Gentle, tender. But she was right there, exploding full upon his senses, and his blood was pumping hard and fast, too fast, but he didn’t know how to slow them down.

He swept his hands down her back, his palms sliding through the textures, the springy, wavy silk of her hair, then the satin sweep of her back. Her waist narrowed abruptly and then flowed out again. Her buttocks, generous, soft, filled his hands, his fingertips slipping into the cleft that separated them.