Jo Goodman (31 page)

His body stirred. Hiding the effort it cost him to do so, Decker pushed himself up. It was just last night that he'd told himself it would be Jonna who initiated their lovemaking the next time. He wondered how long he was obligated to keep a rash promise known only to him. Decker sighed. Probably longer than twelve hours. His brief grin mocked himself. He was quite capable of being as senseless as Jonna.

"Here," he said, helping her up. "If you think you can manage it, I'll take you on deck myself. Just a few feet out at first and you have to hold my arm."

Jonna thought she would be grateful for the opportunity, but now that it was presented, she wasn't as certain. "What if I faint again?"

"Then I'll bring you back here and you can try tomorrow if you like. Or the day after that."

"But the crew... I don't know if I want them to realize I'm afraid of the water. That won't look very good, will it? I mean, what must they be thinking?"

"They think you fainted because I was caught upside down in the rigging. I've already been scowled at and cursed for scaring you." He saw Jonna's eyes widen. Panic flashed briefly. "Don't worry. I didn't tell them that my imminent demise would have had quite the opposite effect."

"That's not true," she said softly, looking away. "I don't wish you ill."

"But you wish me gone."

"Something like that."

Decker nodded. He had expected nothing better than the answer she gave him. "Will you come topside? The men will want to know you're feeling better. I think they'll believe me if you're on my arm."

"Did someone really curse you?" she asked suspiciously.

"Under his breath."

"And scowl?"

"Every one of them."

"Oh."

Her surprise amused him. "They admire you, Jonna. They'd string me up sooner than see me hurt you." He stood and held out his hand. "Ready?"

She wasn't, but neither did she hesitate. She placed her hand in his and let him pull her to her feet. "Just a yard or so from the entrance," she told him. "That's as far as I want to go. And if my sea legs turn to water you'll have to prop me up. Don't carry me. I don't want anyone to know I've fainted, so you mustn't make a fuss."

Decker let Jonna continue to chatter her orders and conditions while he led her along the companionway. When they reached the narrow steps that would bring them topside he placed one finger lightly over her lips. She quieted immediately. Satisfied, Decker pulled the hood of her cape over her hair. For a moment his hands remained on either side of her cheeks, framing her face. "Follow or lead?" he asked.

"Hmmm?" She was staring up at his face, at the blue eyes that were watching her with unwavering intensity. Jonna couldn't make sense of what he was asking.

"Do you want to follow me or lead the way?"

She decided it depended on whether she wanted to be pulled or pushed. "I'll lead." Jonna glimpsed the smile he couldn't quite conceal. She supposed he had expected that answer as being part of her character. What he couldn't know was that when fear made her faint, she wanted to be in a position to fall into his arms, not out of them.

Decker gave Jonna a nudge at the small of her back. It was like lighting a fuse. Jonna was up the steps before she could think better of it, and Decker had to scramble to stay with her. When she fairly exploded out of the hold it was only Decker's hand on her cape that kept her from going too far. Brought up short by the fistful of material he held, Jonna vibrated like a plucked string.

She was aware of several things at once: winter sunlight on her face, the surprised expressions of the crew, and how difficult it was to breathe. Decker stood at her back, his arms closing around her waist. She could feel his chin nudge her head and heard his soft command.

"Breathe."

Jonna sucked in air. Cold North Atlantic wind filled her lungs, almost robbing her of a second breath. She tasted frozen nettles of sea spray on her tongue.

"Smile."

She fixed the corners of her lips upward.

"Open your eyes."

Her smile actually became a genuine one. "They're open."

"You are fearless. Can you look around?"

Jonna's eyes darted from crew member to crew member, but her head remained perfectly still. Her lips barely moved as she spoke. "No, I can't mo—" The clipper rolled beneath her, and Jonna felt herself begin to lose balance.

"Spread your legs."

That intimately spoken order brought Jonna's head around. Her violet eyes were wide. "What?"

Decker grinned. His hands moved to either side of her waist to steady her. "You have to meet the ship's pitch," he said. "Widen your stance."

Jonna's lips pursed prudishly. "You might have said that in the first place."

"I might have," he agreed easily. "But then you'd still be as immobile as
Huntress's
figurehead. Stiff-armed, stiff-legged..." There was a decidedly teasing light in his blue eyes. "Stiff-necked."

Jonna marveled at his ability to make her laugh at herself. "How do you do that?" she wondered aloud.

"What?"

She shook her head, bemused. "It's nothing." More relaxed now, Jonna turned in his arms and quite naturally leaned back against him. This time she was able to tilt her head in greeting to Mr. Leeds and to nod hello to an astonished Jeremy Dodd. When the ship rolled again she shifted her weight naturally. "I want to go to the rail," she said.

"Are you certain?"

"No," she said honestly. "But it's what I'm going to do."

Frigid air buffeted Jonna's cape and skirt about her legs. It wasn't the icy wind that caused her to shiver as she approached the taffrail. It was terror. White-capped swells of water were all she could make out for as far as she could see. When
Huntress
rolled, the rail seemed to dip so low she could imagine herself simply stepping over it and disappearing in a froth of churning water.

"Head up," Decker said. "Eyes on the horizon."

That meant she would have to open them again. For a moment it seemed the safest recourse had been to close them tight. Jonna looked out. She felt Decker's hands curl in the material of her cape. She was secure in the knowledge that he wasn't going to let her go.

"Put your hands on the rail."

Jonna steadied herself.

"Breathe."

A whisper of a smile crossed Jonna's features. It was good of him to remember what she had forgotten. She took a shaky breath and confronted the vastness of the ocean.

"You're right to respect it," Decker said.

Jonna laughed uneasily. "That's putting it kindly."

"Not at all. There's not a man on board who doesn't share some of the same fear."

She wondered if he included himself. Jonna started to glance over her shoulder, but Decker caught her head and turned it back to the horizon.

"Including me," he said. "I'd be a fool to think I could tame this force. The best any of us can hope to do is outwit it."

Jonna's stomach sank as
Huntress's
deck seemed to fall out from under her feet. She grasped the taffrail with fingers that turned white at the tips. The hood of her cape fell back. The wind flattened tendrils of glossy black hair against her temples.

"Steady," Decker whispered near her ear. "I'm not going anywhere."

Jonna held on to the rail, but it was not really her support. "I think I should go below," she said.

"All right."

She wished he would try to persuade her otherwise. A few more minutes like this were what she wanted. Her smile was a trifle sad, a trifle self-mocking.

"What is it?" Decker asked.

She shook her head at first, not certain she wanted to answer him. Then she said it anyway. "I'm reminded again that my life is a cliché," she said. "Here I am standing between the devil and the deep blue sea." Jonna didn't have to see his face to know that he was amused by her observation.

"And if you were forced to choose?"

Jonna felt his hands resting lightly on her waist and the warmth of him at her back. His chin nudged her hair. In front of her were the relentless north wind and an ocean of icy water. It should have been an easy choice. Jonna's hesitation spoke when she could not.

"Never mind," Decker said. "It was wrong to ask."

If it was possible the sun seemed to grow colder. Jonna missed Decker's support immediately as he stepped back to allow her room to move away from the rail. She hurried to the entrance to the hold and braced herself on the stairway by putting a hand on each wall. She was in the gangway below before she realized he was no longer following her. Glancing back, she saw him silhouetted in the entrance, his expression shadowed. Jonna did not think he was smiling. He had never looked more alone.

* * *

"Tell me about your parents," she said. They were lying side by side in the bunk, eyes on the ceiling, arms at attention beside them. The covers were virtually undisturbed. Jonna had hoped he would reach for her this night, at least to put an arm around her waist. He hadn't, and she was angry at herself for being disappointed. By her reckoning it had been ten days since he had been with her. The last kiss they had shared was the one he'd given her before taking her topside. She had been on the bridge every morning since then and on three evenings besides, but short of taking her arm in his, Decker had not touched her. He had never given the slightest indication that he wanted to do so.

The devil was now as cold and remote as the deep blue sea.

"I don't remember them very well," he said. "Most of what I know I've learned from Colin."

"I was thinking of Marie Thibodeaux and Jimmy Grooms. Mercedes told me you consider them your parents."

"In a way I do, it's true. What do you want to know?"

His tone was not particularly inviting, but Jonna was not going to let that deter her. "Were they really actors?"

"Always," he said. "Though not only on the stage. Every pinch we made was a little drama to Jimmy. He had a certain flair for it, and Mere liked that about him."

"Mere," Jonna said softly. "That means mother, doesn't it?"

"Yes. That's what I've always called her."

Jonna turned carefully on her side. She slid one arm under her pillow to raise her head a notch and studied Decker's shaded profile. "Were there other children?"

"No. Just me. Mere couldn't have babies. Before Jimmy found her she had been used pretty roughly."

"She was a prostitute?"

Decker smiled faintly, remembering how Marie would have answered. "She'd tell you that was putting too kind a light on what she was. 'Until Jimmy came into my life,' she'd say, 'I was a whore. But it took you, Pont Epine, to make me a saint.' "

"And was she a saint?"

"I thought so. She was smart and funny and cheerful. She had an almost endless well of patience, and she loved me and Jimmy to distraction."

"Did she always call you by that name?"

"Mostly. It was my professional name, she said. Part of the drama."

"How were Jimmy and Marie caught?"

Decker didn't answer immediately. Finally he told her what he had told no one else. "They weren't. Not really."

"But—"

"I was."

That silenced Jonna for several minutes as she considered what it meant. "Mercedes didn't tell me," she said quietly. "I wouldn't have—"

Decker interrupted her. "Mercedes doesn't know."

"Oh."

"Mercedes and I shared a cell, Jonna. Not every detail of our lives."

"She was too refined to ask some direct questions, you mean."

"Something like that," he said dryly.

"I can be very forthright, you know, even tactless. I'm not good at diplomacy. I don't have the patience for it. And I'm almost insatiably curious."

He had observed all that about her. Her guileless approach to most things still had the power to charm him. He wondered if tonight would be the night she would reach for him. Better the devil you know, he wanted to say. If she thought her life was a cliché, then she should grasp one that could change these intolerable circumstances. "Well?" he asked finally. "Have you really finished the inquisition?"

Knowing that she was being challenged didn't make Jonna think better of responding to it. "How were you caught?"

"I got careless," he said. "I let my mind wander while I was lifting a watch fob. I had done the very same maneuver twice already that day. I had done it hundreds of times since Jimmy first let me try it on my own on my tenth birthday. This time I forgot the cardinal rule."

"The cardinal rule?"

"Jimmy's rule, anyway. 'Every mark is different,' he'd tell me. 'Them that seem to have their mind engaged elsewhere, might be they're just thinkin' about the time.' He only meant that the mark's preoccupation might not be quite what it seemed. I reached for the fob, my little blade ready to cut it free from a certain dandy's breeches, at the same time the dandy decided to check the hour. He caught me by the wrist, and I sunk the blade into his palm. I thought it would make him let me go, but he held on tighter and started shouting for the constable."