The Notorious Lady Anne: A Loveswept Historical Romance (17 page)

Surely …

Feeling the back of his neck prickle, he turned to find Emmaline, not looking at the island as everyone else was, but staring at him. He turned away, disconcerted by the uneasiness inside him, at the guilt he felt for what his heart was telling him were treasonous thoughts.

Phin swept through the sailors, urging them to return to their duties, reminding them of all that needed to be done before they dropped anchor. With a lightness to their step and laughter in their voices, they went back to their work with the knowledge that the reward would come soon.

“I can’t let you go.” Without him realizing it, Emmaline had stepped up beside him.

“You could. I wouldn’t tell anyone about you.”

“Come now, Captain Addison, don’t insult me with lies.”

He meant it. Or at least he meant it for now. Somehow, somewhere along the Atlantic, his ideals had shifted. He’d seen this woman in all her variations, yet it was only in the cabin while they struggled to save Shamus that he had seen the real Emmaline. Dedicated, hardworking, strong in both spirit and body, pigheaded, opinionated and yet beneath it all, fragile.

He reached out to touch her, needing the contact they’d had in Shamus’s cabin, but she stepped away, lowering her lids, hiding her true thoughts from him.

“We both know you want to escape,” she said, finally looking at him with a small smile. “And you’ll do anything to flee.”

She emphasized the word
anything
, which made him pause. There was meaning behind
that, meaning he couldn’t quite grasp.

“What are you saying, Emmaline?”

She swallowed and looked away. Night was falling, dragging the vision of the beautiful spit of land into obscurity.

“I’m saying that if I were in your place, I’d do what it took to escape. I don’t blame you.”

His brows came down. “What did I do?”

She laughed, but the sound was forced, almost desperate. “You tried to seduce me into freeing you.”

Is that what she thought? That their kiss was merely an escape attempt? For three torturous nights he lay in his bunk, on fire with the memories of her pressed against him, his imagination running wild at what they would have done if Phin hadn’t interrupted them, and she thought it was an
escape attempt
?

“If that was an escape attempt, it was a poor one.” He stepped closer, trapping her hand in his, and held tight when she tried to disengage. There were newly healed blisters on her palm, evidence of how hard she worked on the other ships. “Instead of escaping, the opposite happened. I was ensnared.”

Her eyes widened. He stepped closer.

“I didn’t kiss you with thoughts of escape on my mind. I kissed you with thoughts of lovemaking on my mind.”

“Don’t,” she whispered.

“No, Emmaline. That’s not how it works. If you are to accuse me of something, I have the right to refute the accusation, whether you want to hear it or not. You want to believe I had an ulterior motive, but I didn’t, other than offering you my lap to sit on and my shoulder to cry on.”

She shook her head. Tears sparkled in her eyes, but she blinked them away. Never one to cry, his Emmaline.

“We both know nothing can come of this,” she said.

A dagger to the stomach wouldn’t have hurt less, because, damn it, he wanted something to come of it. “I know.”

“I’m a pirate.”

“I’m well aware.”

“You hate pirates.”

“Very true.”

“So you hate me.”

“I will admit I hated you when I first discovered you were Lady Anne.”

“I’m still Lady Anne.”

He dipped his head in agreement. “But to me you are Emmaline Sutherland.”

She broke away and spun around. “No, I’m not.”

Lost without her touch, he stood there, his hand outstretched, reaching for her. “Pardon?”

“I’m not Emmaline Sutherland.”

“Then who are you?” As if cold water had been poured into his veins, an iciness started at his feet and worked its way up.

She turned back to him and straightened her shoulders. “I was born Emmaline Blackwell.”

“What did you say?”

Emotions crowded Nicholas’s expression. Denial, swiftly followed by outrage, until his features settled on stunned disbelief.

Emmaline lifted her chin. “I am Emmaline Blackwell, daughter of Daniel Blackwell.”

He shook his head as if the action would make what she said untrue. But it was true, and she was no more able to deny her heritage than he would be able to deny his.

“How?” His voice sounded strangled, as if he couldn’t get the word out.

“I assure you, the way any other person on this earth came to be.”

“But …”

At one time, she would have found delight in finally silencing Captain Addison’s acerbic tongue, but not this time. Not when humiliation burned through her. Only Phin knew her entire story. And now Nicholas.

She shouldn’t have told him. He now possessed the power to bring her world down.

“I don’t understand,” Nicholas said. “Daniel Blackwell is from the colonies and you are from England.”

“He hasn’t always been from the colonies.”

She turned away and looked out over the ocean. Night had fallen. The island they’d glimpsed earlier was nothing but a memory. Tomorrow they would have passed it, on their way to another island. Her home.

Nicholas stepped up beside her and the silence stretched between them, as it had in Shamus’s cabin. Except, in Shamus’s cabin it had been a comforting silence, now it was an expectant silence.

“My father was married before he left for the colonies. He left my mother and me behind, because I was too young to travel. Or so he said. I don’t think he had any intention of sending for
us.” A pain settled in the area around her heart. A pain she’d carried with her for so long she forgot about it most times. Or ignored it.

“My grandfather was the Baron of Donmoyer. Both my mother and Aunt Dorothy were expected to make good matches. Dorothy married the Marquess of Simington.”

“That is quite a good match,” Nicholas said, obviously impressed by Dorothy’s rise.

“Grandfather and Grandmother were pleased.” She shrugged and drew in a trembling breath, bracing herself for the rest of the story. “My mother made the mistake of falling in love with the captain of one of my grandfather’s ships. Knowing my grandfather would not approve the match, Mother and Father eloped to Scotland.”

Emmaline thought herself long over the bitterness, but it came rushing back. She knew her father’s actions weren’t her actions. But sometimes the knowledge didn’t help.

She and Nicholas strolled the deck, the evening breeze cool, Nicholas’s presence strangely comforting. She’d thought to drive him away with her heritage. Maybe even to disgust him, as she’d been disgusted many times before. Instead he stayed to listen, not passing judgment. At least not out loud.

“So your parents were a love match,” he said.

She snorted, an indelicate sound, but she didn’t care. She was far from delicate. “Maybe in the beginning. Maybe for my mother, but I highly doubt it in regards to my father.”

There was that bitterness again, something she couldn’t seem to overcome. Or maybe she didn’t want to overcome it. Without her bitterness, without her hatred, what did she have? What was her life about?

“I think my father had plans to rise in the world, and assumed my grandfather would give him control of the shipping business when he married my mother. Grandfather was most enraged when they returned from Scotland. He refused to give them her dowry, and tossed them out of the house with only the clothes on their backs.”

Deep breath, Emmaline. Let it go for now. But only for now
.

“They were quite penniless, I’ve been told, but mother was optimistic. After all, they had
their love for each other and a baby on the way.”

Nicholas kept pace beside her, hands clasped loosely behind his back, head bent. He didn’t seem at all shocked or disgusted that she’d been conceived out of wedlock, but then that was the least of her story.

The night watchman walked by on the upper deck and she nodded to him.

The night was quiet, the waves gentle, the wind brisk but warm. If only they could stay like this, sailing forever, without making land. Leaving all their troubles behind. But then she wouldn’t get the revenge that fed her anger, and she would never be able to put the past behind her.

“They lived in a small cottage while Father worked for a different, less prosperous company. I came along, and everything wasn’t all roses and sunshine, as my mother hoped it would be.”

“No marriage is made entirely of roses and sunshine,” Nicholas said.

“True. But after it became clear my grandfather was serious about cutting my parents out of his life, my father became bitter and angry. He blamed my mother for their misfortune.” She swallowed the hurt, angry she was feeling hurt at all. Ridiculous feeling. Especially when it came to her father. “Eventually Father decided that if he wanted to rise in the world, the colonies were where he needed to be.” She drew in a shaky breath and forced out what she needed to say next. “He set off, promising to send for Mother and me when he settled.”

“I gather he never did,” Nicholas said.

“No. The money he left us quickly ran out, probably before he even landed in the colonies. Mother and I moved in with Aunt Dorothy. Her husband died a most tragic, sudden death the year before, and Dorothy was still beside herself with grief. Mother moved in to console her. At least that’s the story they told. In reality, Mother and I were penniless, and had been tossed out on the street by the landlord when we couldn’t pay the rent any longer. Dorothy was more than happy to have us. Grandfather was fit to be tied, but Dorothy didn’t need Grandfather’s approval, or his money. She was quite well off on her own.”

This was where the story became difficult, almost too difficult to tell. As if the beginning weren’t heartbreaking enough.

“The man is a heartless bastard to do such a thing to his wife and daughter. I can understand why you feel you need revenge.”

She chuckled. “Oh, that’s not why I want revenge, Captain Addison, though it would be reason enough.”

Nicholas took her elbow and guided her to the railing and the shadows. Here the wind was a little more brisk, a little more chilled. He shrugged out of his coat and gently placed it around her shoulders. His scent rose around her, of soap and man and the essence of Nicholas. She inhaled, discretely, she hoped, and pictured the scent wrapping around her.

“You don’t need to tell me the rest, if it’s too difficult,” Nicholas said.

She pushed away the anxiety and anger, the bitterness and hurt. They were her constant companions, riding the waves beside her, fighting with her when she captured yet another Blackwell ship. Without them, she would be a penniless, helpless female, living off the generosity of her aunt. With them, she’d become the most talked about woman of the day, and the most feared pirate on these seas.

If she had the opportunity to change her past, she wouldn’t. She liked who she was and what she’d become. She wasn’t her mother, weak and spineless, pining for a man who left her. And she never would be.

“It’s not difficult, Captain Addison. But it is necessary. You need to understand what you are up against, and why I can’t allow you to go back to Kenmar.”

’Twas dark where they stood, but she didn’t miss the flash of surprise crossing his face. He didn’t think she knew about Kenmar, but she did. She knew everything pertaining to Blackwell Shipping. Probably more than her foolish father.

No, she wasn’t like her mother, and neither was she like her father. She was smarter and more dangerous.

She rubbed her arms, not because she was chilled, but because it caused Nicholas’s scent
to rise, and she very much liked the way he smelled.

“Mother died when I was sixteen, telling me until her last breath to be ready to travel when he sent for us. By then, I knew we would never see him again. I’d heard the rumors of his success, but Dorothy and I kept them from Mother. I believe, deep down, she knew the truth as well, but her mind refused to accept it. I think the day my father sailed away to find his fortune, not only did my mother’s heart break, but her mind shattered.”

“I’m very sorry, Emmaline.”

She shrugged the sympathy away, having come to terms with what happened to her mother. She loved her, but she also felt pity for her, and disappointment the woman hadn’t been strong enough to live to see her daughter grown.

“It was best for her,” she said. “She couldn’t face life without him, and she certainly wasn’t living life with him. Dorothy, of course, opened her home to me. She had no children, and I became her daughter. At least, in her mind I did. She promised to find me a very respectable husband with the generous dowry she put on me. As if the scandal of my parents could be bought and forgotten. I wasn’t a fool. I knew no decent man would offer for me, and neither did I want to be offered for. I saw what my father did to my mother, and I vowed a long time ago I wouldn’t fall to the same fate.”

“You would have had offers.”

She laughed. “From whom, pray tell? Impoverished lords looking to fill their coffers? Gamblers needing to pay off debts?”

“Your aunt must love you very much to take you in and offer a dowry.”

“She does. And I don’t fault her for trying to help, but it wasn’t the life I wanted.” And still wasn’t. “I set off for the colonies on my own.”

He stiffened. “Tell me you did not.”

“Oh, I did.”

He blew out a breath and shook his head. “Alone? Emmaline, that is dangerous and foolhardy.”

Emmaline. She liked when he called her Emmaline. It made her feel like a woman. Not a pirate, not a captain, but a woman. “Of course it was, but do you see me doing any other thing?”

“No, I suppose not. Let me guess what happened. Your ship was attacked by pirates and you decided to become a pirate yourself.”

She faced him for the first time since she started telling her sordid, embarrassing tale of love gone bad. The breeze teased the ends of his hair. In London it had been short and nicely combed. Now it blew about his head, curling at the tips, a little ragged and in need of a cut. His skin had darkened to a deep tan, creases of white fanning out from the corners of his navy-blue eyes. The moonlight highlighted the angles of his face, making them appear harsher, and giving him the appearance of being chiseled from marble. But she knew firsthand those hard angles could soften into heated desire.