Once Tempted (22 page)

“I’m sorry about what happened to him,” Robert told her. “He sounds like a good man. I know he was highly respected. Well, before—”

Olivia glanced at him, her expression guarded. “Yes. Before.” She paused for a moment. “But, thank you. He was a good man. And very intelligent. He spoke over thirty languages and was a master of codes and encyphering. I had hoped to learn them all from him . . .  one day.”

“Thirty!” Robert shook his head. “Wellington would have loved him. He’s always looking for someone with a head for decoding the French missives we intercept.”

“Perhaps I could volunteer for that duty,” she suggested, glancing up at him from beneath her lacy lashes, a sly smile on her face.

“I’ll make that recommendation when we get to headquarters,” he told her, trying to ignore the wry twist of her rosy lips and the way his body tightened at the memory of them pressed to his.

She laughed, and then they settled into an awkward silence for a time, with only the creaking of the ship and whistle of the wind overhead.

Robert did his best to shake off his wayward thoughts—of the day in the park or when he’d awakened from his fever with her asleep on his chest, her hair splayed over his bare chest, her arm flung possessively over him.

For her part, Olivia plied her needle, her movements steady and sure, obviously unaware of the turmoil within him. As far as he could tell, her thoughts still dwelled with her father and Lord Chambley’s revelation. She held her work out to examine it and sighed.

It was then that he noticed what she was sewing. “Isn’t that Aquiles’s jacket?”

“Yes,” she said, holding up the tattered coat. “I told him he needed a new one, but he says this is his lucky jacket and will not part with it. Where have you two been? It looks as if you’ve taken on the entire French army single-handed.” She turned it one way, then the other, revealing several long slashes and patches where the jacket had been mended before. “What happened here?” she asked, pointing to a long slash.

Robert laughed. “What did Aquiles tell you?”

She snorted, and then said in a perfect imitation of his servant, “That is like a little mosquito bite. A pesky Frenchie nipped at me, but I swatted him away like a fly.” She shook her head. “It looks to me like the French have nipped at you often.”

“You could say that the French are not fond of us.”

Suddenly her head slanted to one side, and she cast him a sly, almost seductive glance. “Is there anyone who is fond of you, Robert Danvers?”

Her question startled him, for he realized she was not just asking about his enemies, she was also inquiring about his life. And his heart.

Once again, she’d pulled at that strange, tenuous bond that had a way of drawing him closer to her. Of making him forget everything that needed to be said. . .  and what was better left unsaid.

Before he could stammer a reply or deny the answer that clamored to be said, Jemmy Reyburn came bounding up to where they sat.

“I say, Major, ‘bout time you and I had that match we’ve been discussing.” The young man grinned at Olivia. “Unless you’re still too weak and sickly.”

Robert rose to the youthful challenge, only too thankful to be leaving the powder keg her question had opened. “Now is a perfect time. I wouldn’t want to be back to full strength and completely humiliate you.”

Olivia watched the two men posture and challenge each other and almost threw up her hands in disgust. She had just about been able to breach the walls surrounding Robert’s well-guarded heart when Jemmy had interrupted them.

She wanted to know what he knew about Hobbe and why since she’d mentioned that name he had been holding her at arm’s length—as if he suspected her of some heinous crime far beyond shooting Chambley.

What she really needed to know was that she wasn’t just a duty to him, that he believed in her, trusted her, that he would give her his loyalty as he obviously had this Lando.

She glanced up to see Robert and Jemmy clearing a section of the deck. And not far from where they stood, two polished swords glinted in the sunshine.

Fencing
? The man’s arm was barely healed and he was going to fence? She rose from her spot and began to cross the deck, the crew clearing a path for her. For a moment, she sympathized with the French. There were times when she wholeheartedly shared their displeasure with Robert Danvers.

Halfway across the ship, Aquiles caught her by the arm. “Leave him be, little miss.”

“I will not. I did not spend all that time seeing him healed only to see him hurt again.”

Aquiles shrugged. “He needs to get ready to go back to the field. Why, the last time he was shot, I just stitched him up and we kept riding for the next two weeks.”

“It’s a wonder he has any lives left,” she muttered.

“It is not so good for a man to be contained,” Aquiles continued. “The major is a man who needs his
freedom
.”

His freedom. Olivia suspected what his servant meant was freedom from her. From anything that would keep him from his work. From his duty to Wellington.

Aquiles kindly smile and shrug seemed to tell her—no, warn her—of what to expect. That in Robert’s life, there was no room for her. No room for matters of the heart.

When she glanced back up at him, he’d stripped off the shirt he’d been wearing and was down to only his breeches.

Olivia took a deep breath and glanced away to avoid staring. Yet with her eyes shut, her memories gave her just as clear a vision, for she couldn’t, nay, would never forget the sight of him as he’d awakened from his fever and what a truly magnificent spectacle his bared body was to behold.

And to touch. The warmth of his chest against her cheek. The tangy, manly scent of him, so close, so intimate.

It was one thing to have him gone with fever, naked and helpless, but a vital and alive Robert Danvers was a dangerous temptation. Even as she watched him take up his sword and stretch, flexing the blade back and forth in the air, Olivia imagined those same arms entwined around her, pulling her close and hauling her against the bare heat of his body.

She blinked away the image, but what she saw before her was just as sensual.

Robert paced back and forth, his long legs and muscled body moving with fluid elegance as he tested his weapon against an unseen foe, his every gesture showing his incredible skill and grace. A deadly grace.

Deadly?

“Those blades are blunted, aren’t they?” she asked.

Aquiles eyed them. “Oh, they can’t hurt themselves with those.”

She relaxed a bit, but still she couldn’t help but worry about him.

As the younger man drew his weapon and turned it right and left with a great flourish, the crew began to take notice. Soon men were dropping their chores and gathering in knots about the fringes, and from the looks of it, wagering with abandon over who would be the victor.

Jemmy, she knew, was a skilled fencer, so she didn’t cast too much concern in his direction, but Robert was still healing.

Within a circle drawn in chalk on the deck, Jemmy and Robert faced off.

Her mending forgotten, Olivia watched, along with the crew, mesmerized.

The two men eyed each other, their intense focus only on their opponent. Neither of them seemed to notice the cheers and cries as their blades first hit.

The steel collided with a mighty crash, and Olivia flinched.

Those blades certainly didn’t look dull to her. “Are you sure they’re safe?”

Aquiles waved off her concerns. “They are just boys. What harm is a little practice?”

Without even realizing what she was doing, she edged her way along the deck, her back pressed to the railing, her gaze fixed on the combatants.

Back and forth the two men moved, steel clashing between them with deadly precision.

Deadly . . .

Despite Aquiles’s assurances, she had a feeling there was more to this sport than met the eye.

Robert moved as if he were one with the steel, as if the blade were a mere extension of his arm. He followed Jemmy’s every advance with a determined stance, and then just as quickly it was Jemmy who found himself on the defense, as Robert suddenly pushed forward.

Olivia took a quick breath at this swift reversal.

Slashing every which way to defend his position, Jemmy lost ground rapidly. Though the young man would probably have found it humiliating at his club to be beaten back with such ease, instead the youth grinned with unabashed pride, especially as the crew shouted encouragement to him.

That seemed to rally Jemmy’s confidence, and he made a driving push forward, using Robert’s wounded side to his advantage—something Olivia thought hardly fair.

But she learned very quickly that Robert had been just baiting his partner. Suddenly his arm arced over his head, bringing his sword crashing toward Jemmy.

Sparks flew as their blades hit, and then Jemmy’s spun wildly out of his hands, going end over end until it crashed into the railing next to Olivia, the point imbedded a good inch into the polished wood.

It teetered and wobbled back and forth.

Olivia knew how it felt, for her legs were doing the same thing. She took several quick breaths, trying to find the air that had whooshed out of her lungs with the same speed as the blade that had nearly shorn her in half.

As she turned and surveyed the steel blade not a foot from her heart, it struck her—they hadn’t been practicing with dulled blades. The sword could easily slice a man in half.

Or a woman.

“What were you thinking?” she said to Robert.

“Or you?” she said, turning the other half of her wrath on Jemmy.

They both turned sheepish.

Robert shrugged, while Jemmy blurted out, “We hadn’t meant it to get out of hand.”

“Out of hand
? You could have killed each other,” she scolded. Olivia crossed the deck until she stood toe to toe with Robert. “And you. I didn’t sit up for a week just to see you throw away all my hard work. You’ll put yourself right back in that berth, and then where will I be?”

Robert only seemed to have gained more energy from the exertion. He grinned at her, then leaned down and whispered into her ear. “Hopefully right beside me.”

“Oh!” she sputtered. “You’re impossible.” She turned on one heel and marched back to the spot on the deck where she had been doing her sewing. Picking up her mending with new vigor, she wielded her needle like a small blade, stabbing the material and mercilessly sewing the frayed edges together.

Jemmy sidled up beside Robert. “The Queen is in rare form there. She’ll be mad for at least an hour, then she’ll simmer down. Never fails.”

“The Queen?” Robert asked.

“My own name for her. She came to live with us when I was young. Hate to admit it, but I had nightmares and used to scurry to her room to hide from them. She would tell me the story of Queen Mab to explain them away. She said it helped her when she had bad dreams.” Jemmy glanced over at Olivia again. “I took to calling her my Queen Mab. Silly, I suppose.” He grabbed the hilt and pulled the sword out of the deck rail. “Go another round?”

Robert nodded and followed the young man back to the chalk circle.

So Olivia suffered from nightmares.

He wondered if they were from what she had witnessed or what she had done all those years ago.

“Hey there,” Jemmy said, flopping down on the deck beside Olivia. “Did you see that last round? I very nearly beat him.”

“I’ve been busy.”

“Oh, don’t be mad at him. His arm is fine. A man can’t be cooped up and mothered for too long.” Jemmy stretched out, his hands behind his head. “Major Danvers says I’m a fine hand with a blade and if my riding is as capital, I would fit right into one of the better cavalry units. He’d even recommend me for a posting.”

She put down her mending. “Since when did you become his admirer? Do you remember a few days ago when you were going to challenge him to a duel?”

Jemmy waved her off. “That was when I thought he was Bradstone.” He leaned forward. “Do you know who Major Danvers is?”

“A kidnapper? A scoundrel? A beast of a man?”

He blew out an exasperated breath. “He’s a demmed hero. Everyone knows who he is. If you and mother weren’t so busy reading the social pages and gossip columns, you would know he was instrumental in saving hundreds, probably thousands of lives during Moore’s retreat to Corunna. And I’ve heard his work behind the lines is legendary. Why, he once intercepted a packet of missives filled with directives signed by Napoleon. It enabled Lord Wellington to cut off vital French supply lines and drive an entire battalion across the border.”

Olivia glanced across the deck to where Robert was cleaning up with a rough cloth and a bucket of seawater. He appeared, as Jemmy had described, the immortal warrior, muscled, unstoppable, righteous in his cause.

As she imagined her Hobbe would be in the same situation.

But despite Jemmy’s assurances, she still wished she could trust Robert as she knew she would innately trust her imaginary hero. This living, breathing man, her occasional hero, was holding something back from her. He wasn’t telling her the entire truth.

There was more to his search for the secrets behind The King’s Ransom than just finding the treasure, and it had to do with her. And Hobbe.

But how they were connected she couldn’t fathom.

And until she uncovered that piece, Olivia wasn’t about to trust Major Robert Danvers.

For she feared he already held her heart, and that, she knew from experience, was perilous enough.

Colin had asked her to dine with him that night, not that she hadn’t dined with him before, but tonight would be different, he explained, a small celebration. It seemed they were drawing near to Lisbon and their journey would be over shortly.

As Olivia made her preparations, as meager as they were with her limited toilet, she decided to wear the beautiful sprigged muslin gown she had found in Georgiana Danvers’s trunk. Colin had offered her his wife’s store of clothes, since Olivia had brought nothing aboard ship other than the bloodstained dress she’d been wearing.

The captain’s wife was about her size, and her clothes were as practical as they were well made. Olivia liked the lady immediately, the more so when she found the most unusual article of clothing at the bottom of the weathered trunk. A small pair of unfinished britches that couldn’t possibly fit the tall captain but certainly couldn’t belong to his lady wife.