Merline Lovelace (14 page)

“Where’s Lady Barbara?” he asked Hattie.

“In the back parlor, with your mother. She said they needed to finalize a few matters before we departed.”

Zach started for the closed parlor door. Hattie’s nervous twitter delayed him.

“I’ve never been on a steamboat before. I’m all sixes and sevens.”

“So I see.”

Amused, he watched her make several unsuccessful attempts to tie the ribbons of her bonnet.

“Here, I’ll help you.”

Despite his big hands, Zach fashioned a neat bow. “There, you’re all set. That’s a fetching hat, by the way.”

“Do you like it?”

“Very much.”

“Lady Barbara said it got too crushed in her trunk for her to be seen wearing it again. She was going to toss it on the rubbish heap, but I asked if I might have it.”

She was about to say more when the parlor door wrenched open and Barbara emerged. High spots of color burned on her cheeks.

“Your mother informs me you’ve assumed responsibility for all financial arrangements relating to this journey.” Her glance speared Hattie before slicing back to Zach. “And for the matter that brought me here.”

“That’s right. I would have informed you myself if I’d had ten minutes to spare these past two days.”

“Indeed?”

The scream of the steamboat’s whistle snapped her head up. Her jaw tight, Barbara snatched up her traveling valise. “We’ll finish this discussion later.”

They finished it that same evening, as Zach was preparing to leave his cabin and escort Barbara to dinner in the
Natchez Star
’s opulent dining room.

Like most of the steamboats vying for the lucrative river-passenger trade, this one boasted crystal
chandeliers, linen-draped dining tables, a private salon for the ladies and a smoke-filled poker room for the men. Zach was considering the possibility of a few hands of five-card stud later that night when knuckles rapped sharply against his door.

Barbara stood on the threshold. Her eyes glittered as bright and hard as apothecaries’ glass. “May I come in?”

“Of course.”

He stood back to allow her entry and closed the door behind her rustling skirts. She still wore her traveling gown, he saw, but she’d put off her hat and gloves.

It soon became apparent she intended to put off her dress as well. She tossed her reticule on the bed, spun around to face him and began, methodically, to push the buttons of her bodice through their loops.

W
ith every button Barbara worked free, her anger burned hotter. She didn’t so much as glance around the sumptuous stateroom. It matched hers, she supposed, with rich wooden scrollwork, crystal tear-drops on the oil lamps and a potbellied stove that glowed with a cheerful heat. Her entire attention was concentrated on the man who stood watching her with an air of polite interest.

Barbara considered herself something of a master at manipulation, yet Zachariah Morgan had out-maneuvered her at every turn. Worse, he’d played her for a fool. Not once, but several times over. By acting the backwoods ruffian. By promising so very earnestly to speak to his mother on her behalf. And, damn him, by feeding her that slop about how much he desired her.

How could she have been so stupid as to believe
him? How could she have imagined he’d really look beyond her face or her past? He was like all the others. Dazzled by her beauty. Excited by her body. Determined to have her. The only difference between Lieutenant Morgan and the Bohemian baron who’d gifted her with a diamond bracelet was the price each was prepared to pay for her.

Barbara supposed she should feel flattered that he thought her worth five thousand pounds. Harry would certainly have chuckled with glee. Lightening men’s purses was what they did best, after all. This time, though, she intended to give full service for payment rendered. She couldn’t have said whether that rash decision sprang from anger or hurt or the perverse desire to prove what was said about her was true.

Her jaw set, she pushed the last button through its loop. Her hands were clumsy as she peeled off the puff-sleeved bodice and tossed it onto the bed to join her reticule.

Zach followed its course with every appearance of interest. He didn’t say a word, however. Instead, he merely folded his arms and propped his shoulders against the oak-paneled bulkhead.

Barbara’s chin came up. Her voice could have etched glass. “Shall I continue?”

“By all means.”

The lazy drawl set her back teeth on edge. She fumbled at the hooks at the back of her skirt, finally released them, and then kicked the garment aside to
form a puddle of green on the cabbage-rose carpet. He let the pile of linen settle almost at the toes of his boots while Barbara yanked at the tapes of her petticoat. It, too, dropped to the floor. She stepped out of it and reached for the strings of her corset.

Still he didn’t move.

Her jaw clenching, she gave the strings a tug. Of course they had to knot. She tugged again and snapped one string off at the gusset.

She stood there with the thin cord clenched tight in her fist. For reasons she couldn’t begin to fathom, the broken lace seemed to represent everything that had gone wrong these past months.

“How is it you always manage to tangle yourself up in some manner?”

The amusement in his voice brought her head up. “It seems to be a particular talent of mine,” she replied with bitter irony.

“Do you want assistance with that knot, or has your fit of temper played out?”

“No, to both.”

Hooking her thumb in the strings, Barbara yanked hard. The knot gave. She plucked at the cords and pulled them through the metal gussets. A moment later her corset fell away.

“Do you wish me naked?”

“How could I wish anything else?”

She refused to acknowledge the laughter glinting in his eyes. She was done with games, done with being taken for a fool.

“Very well.”

Removing to the velvet-covered corner chair, she perched on the edge of the seat and bent to unbuckle her shoes. Her garters went next. Carefully, she rolled her silk stockings down her calves.

When she stood, she could feel the deck vibrating under her bare soles. And when she pulled at the ribbons gathering the neck of her chemise, Zach at last acknowledged that she was indeed serious. The laughter disappeared from his eyes and from his face.

“What the devil is this about, Barbara?”

“I merely wish to make sure you receive full value for your money.”

He pushed away from the wall. “You know damn well I’m not trying to buy you or your affections.”

“You can’t imagine how relieved I am to hear it, as my
affections
are not for sale.”

His eyes hardened. “But you are?”

“Didn’t the inestimable Mr. Irving tell you so? Isn’t that what your mother and sister think?”

The mark hit home. She saw it in his face even as the bitter truth cut into her with the savagery of a lash.

They were right, she thought on a wave of disgust. Irving. Louise Morgan. Prim, disapproving Vera. Barbara Chamberlain was nothing more than a high-born slut. She smiled. She enticed. She promised. That she’d never before intended to make good on those promises placed her several rungs below the whores who sold themselves on street corners. They, at least, were honest in their dealings.

“It doesn’t matter what anyone says of you,” Zach bit out. “I told you as much not two nights ago.”

“Yes, you did.”

She covered the hurt of that with a brittle laugh. “To be frank, I find your nobility rather tedious. I’d rather be done with all pretense and act the strumpet we both know me to be. At least then you’d receive a proper measure of payment for your coin.”

“Dammit, Barbara…”

“I want to see it first, though.”

“What?”

“The color of your coin. I should like to have a bank draft in hand before we proceed any further.”

As angry now as she, he raked her with a withering stare. “You don’t trust me to make good on my promise to aid you?”

“I trusted your mother when she said she’d help me. As circumstances appear to change with the wind, I think it wisest to settle the matter of payment now.”

He scowled down at her for so long Barbara was sure he’d repudiate her demand. She’d questioned his honor. Refused to accept his word. She was bracing herself for a scathing retort when he turned and strode to the fold-down writing table. As sumptuous as the rest of the cabin, the desk was fitted with a heavy blotter, sheets of vellum and a brass-capped inkwell. A few scratches of a quill later, he returned.

“You can present this at the Bank of Virginia when we reach the capital. They’ll honor it.”

He’d made the draft out for U.S. dollars. Barbara translated the amount into pounds and felt her throat go dry.

“I didn’t ask for this much.”

He let his glance slide to the slopes of her breasts. “You underestimate your value.”

Heat rushed to her cheeks. He was taunting her, daring her to end this farce here and now.

She wanted to. God knew, she wanted to. She ached to fling the bank draft back in his face. Had she been the only one to consider, she would have done so with great relish. Almost choking on her pride, she waved the document to dry the ink, rolled the stiff vellum and slipped it into her reticule. Her smile was blade-sharp and mocking when she turned to face him.

“I’ll try to give you a good return on your investment.”

He made no move to stop her when she loosened the ribbons at the scooped neck of her chemise. They’d both crossed the line now. There was no going back.

A roll of her shoulders sent the soft linen sliding to her elbows. From there it drifted to the floor. She stood stiff before him as he took a slow inventory. It was as insulting as it was thorough.

A corner of Barbara’s mind registered the whistle of the ship’s calliope and rhythmic slap of the paddle wheel on the river. She counted each sharp note, each watery churn, until Zach nodded.

“Continue.”

She fumbled with the ties of her drawers and let them fall. This was what she was, she reminded herself once again. What she’d become.

“Turn around. Slowly.”

Her hands fisting at her sides, she performed a slow pirouette. Her chin jutted when she faced him once again.

“Well? Are you satisfied with the merchandise?”

“Not yet. But I soon will be.”

His hands went to his trouser flap. Spinning on her heel, she started for the bed.

“Not there,” he rapped out. “Here.”

She swung back, saw the hard set to his jaw.

“You’re the one who insists on playing the whore. Any two-penny trollop can service a man where he stands.”

She didn’t move. Her heart hammering against her ribs, she tried to imagine how she was to accomplish what he demanded of her.

He must have seen, or sensed, her confusion. “You use your hands,” he drawled. “And your mouth.”

Stone-faced, she moved toward him. Her palm slapped against his trouser front. He grunted, but stood his ground. Barbara stared a hole in his shirt-front as she moved her hand in a tight circle.

He was already rampant. She could feel the length of him, the bulging hardness. His shirt be
came a blur of white as she pressed the heel of her hand against him.

His breath hissed in. He didn’t move, but she felt his stomach muscles coil.

Her mouth. He wanted her to use her mouth. The thought of closing her lips around him made her throat go dry and her heartbeat thunder in her ears. When she slipped a hand inside his trouser flap, the heat of him also stirred a wanton thrill deep in her belly.

The intensity of it sickened her. She was, indeed, no better than a two-penny trollop. She would have quit the field then and retired in ignominious defeat, but she’d pushed him too far.

Muttering a fierce oath, he grabbed her wrist and yanked her hand free of his trousers. A savage twist brought her arm up behind her back and her body slamming into his.

She knew an instant of panic. The memory of that awful night in Naples came crashing back…and was obliterated by the crush of Zach’s mouth on hers. She was caught between terror and molten heat. Between the stupid girl she’d once been and the woman who’d found a searing passion in this man’s arms. Shutting her mind to everything but the prod of his shaft against her belly, Barbara wrenched her arm free and locked both arms around his neck.

Zach knew the moment she yielded her body, if not her heart. He was desperate to have her, to drag
her up, hitch her legs around his hips, drive into her. That’s what she’d asked for. What she’d demanded. Hell, she’d all but begged him to treat her like the strumpet she believed herself to be.

Zach might well have believed it, too, if not for her clumsy responses that day at Morgan’s Falls. She’d been eager, as eager as he, but so unskilled he’d come near to spilling himself before he’d brought her to a panting, writhing peak.

He was perilously close to that state now. Too close to spin this out any longer. Whirling her around, he backed her to the wall. Her shoulders hit the polished oak with a thump. In the next breath, he had her just where he’d imagined her a moment ago, her legs locked around his waist, his rod probing at her wet heat.

“Look at me.”

Her head came up. Her cheeks were flushed, he saw with savage satisfaction, and a pulse beat frantically in her long, slender throat.

“I want you. So bad I hurt with it. I won’t take you in payment for a debt but…”

“But what?”

“I’ll take you every other way I know.”

With a flex of his thighs, he thrust into her. She was ready for him. Wet and ready. Gritting his teeth, he pleasured her. When she cried out and convulsed around him, it near killed him to pull away and spill himself.

Barbara was slick with sweat when Zach tumbled her to the velvet-covered bunk.

Mewling with pleasure when his teeth and tongue stirred her once again to pleasure.

Limp and near boneless with exhaustion when he reached for the coverlet that had fallen to the floor.

“What…?”

The hoarse croak startled her. Her throat was raw from trying to suppress her groans. Wetting her lips, she tried again.

“What are you doing?”

“The coals in the stove have burned out. It’s cold in here.”

She hadn’t noticed the chill or the prickly bumps it had raised on her skin. Both disappeared when Zach dragged up the coverlet and curved her body into his.

“I should go back to my cabin,” she protested as he bent his legs and made a nest for her on his thighs.

“Not tonight.”

She tried to squirm around, but he held her warm and fast.

“Not any night, I’m thinking.”

“Zach…”

“We’ll talk about it tomorrow. Let me sleep.” His arm was heavy on her waist, his voice a soft rumble in her ear. “You’ve well nigh killed me, woman.”

Hattie sat alone in the cabin she shared with her mistress. Like a small, rapacious barn owl, she stared unblinking at the wall separating this stateroom from the one adjoining it.

Darkness surrounded her. She’d trimmed the wicks on the oil lamps and hadn’t bothered to feed coals into the stove. The gay notes of the calliope and tinkle of glass from the dining salon at the end of the passageway had died away. Faint whiffs of cigar smoke had curled through the louvered door for some time after that, bringing with them the chink of poker chips and a murmur from the smoking salon. Eventually those echoes had died, too. Now there was only the steady thump-thump of paddle wheel against river to break the silence.

With every splash of the wheel, the jealousy and resentment roiling inside her churned and thickened. The mixture was like a rancid stew, heavy as a stone in her gullet, with a foul, disgusting aftertaste. When she added hate to the pot, her throat became so thick and clogged she could scarce draw a breath.

Damn the woman! Her and her haughty ways. She liked to look down that long nose of hers, but lifted her skirts as quick as any round-heeled whore. Small wonder Zach went after her like a hound after a bitch in heat. What man wouldn’t? She should rot in hell, right alongside that bastard, Thomas.

That vicious thought gave birth to another.

Accidents happened, didn’t they? Particularly aboard steamboats churning through sleeting rain and darkness. People fell overboard and drowned all the time. Mostly drunks who lost their footing, but there were snags aplenty in the river. Who’s to say the
Natchez Star
wouldn’t hit one? Or bump up against another steamer fighting for space in the narrow, twisting channels? In the resulting confusion, all it would take was a quick shove, like the one she’d given Thomas.