The Notorious Lady Anne: A Loveswept Historical Romance (21 page)

He probably should stop this fevered pacing and prop his leg up, douse the pain with a few gulps of brandy, but even he understood there was more to his unease than the pain in his leg. Not to mention, drinking at dawn was not the best idea.

What he wanted was Emmaline’s trust, and she was holding tight to it. Her father treated her horribly, of that there was no doubt. Nicholas didn’t blame her for her anger or her skittishness, but she had to understand that not all men were the same as Daniel Blackwell.

More specifically, she had to understand Nicholas Addison wasn’t the same as Daniel Blackwell.

He stopped his pacing before the window in the sitting room, and stared blindly outside. Defeat pushed at him, an angry presence urging him to give up. He could walk away. No one watched his movements or marked his presence. He could leave Emmaline’s house and make his way to the docks, board a ship and return to London in a matter of weeks.

Someone would allow him on board if he told them his name and promised payment at the end of the voyage.

He would return to London, report to Kenmar and put all of this behind him.

However, by honoring his promise, by finishing what he started, he would put Emmaline in jeopardy. More than that, he might possibly condemn her to death.

On the other hand, by not divulging the identity of the pirate attacking Blackwell’s ships, Nicholas would fail in his duty. There would be no promotion. No ship to command. No career. And he would lose his sense of honor.

Before meeting Emmaline, Nicholas believed in right and wrong. Pirating was wrong. Fighting against pirates was right.

Now?

He pictured Emmaline as he first saw her, in her white gown, with all that ebony hair, the sun-darkened skin and the twinkle in her eye drawing him irrevocably toward her. She was simply, beautifully, irresistible. But beneath all the finery lay the heart of another woman. A pirate.

No. He still believed pirating was wrong. What Emmaline was doing was wrong. Certainly her father had betrayed her and hurt her in ways he couldn’t imagine, but there were other means of revenge.

He pressed a fist against the cool windowpane, his mind in turmoil, his thoughts a roiling mess of contradictions.

Save his reputation, retain his sense of honor, and earn a captaincy at the expense of Emmaline’s life.

Or …

Throw his lot in with Emmaline, and hope his family name would save his sorry ass.

He closed his eyes and pressed his forehead against his fist. The second option was not an option at all. He must do what was right and just. He must inform Kenmar that Emmaline was Lady Anne. After all, good men, decent men,
honorable
men lost hard-earned money on the ships she’d attacked, and that was wrong.

Simply put, it was his duty to right a wrong.

Knowing he’d made the correct decision, yet also sickened by what he had to do, he lifted his head and spied movement in the tree line. A swish of an emerald skirt, a flip of an ebony curl off a creamy shoulder, and she was gone, but he had no doubt of what he saw.

Emmaline dressed in a gown and heading toward town.

What in God’s name was she up to now?

Emmaline walked with purpose. The day was still new enough that the intense heat of the Caribbean hadn’t rolled in yet, but the air hinted at it.

She mentally reviewed all she needed to accomplish before the sun set. She would be hours behind schedule, because this trip into town hadn’t been on her list of things to do.

Fear drove her forward, leading her feet closer to the docks. That was ridiculous. Lady Anne didn’t feel fear. She identified the threat and eliminated it. And wasn’t that what she was doing now?

Eliminating a threat.

Ridding herself of Captain Nicholas Addison.

Her stomach cramped, but she marched onward, sweat collecting in the small of her back because she wore two stones’ worth of material in this ridiculous skirt.

However, her comfort, and more important, her feelings, had nothing to do with her purpose this morning. This was business. After her conversation with Nicholas the day before, she knew in her heart she needed to rid herself of him. Send him back to England. Send him
anywhere
, but get him away from her.

More than likely, he would tell Kenmar her identity. It was a chance she was willing to take. Besides, by the time Nicholas reached England, she would have finished her last mission, and it wouldn’t matter that Kenmar and his cronies knew who destroyed Blackwell’s ships.

Her mission would be complete.

A scream had her reaching for the stiletto strapped to the inside of her wrist before her mind even processed the sound. She turned, only to find two boys on the opposite side of the street fighting with wooden swords. Their laughter was almost contagious. She smiled, stopping to watch their play.

They looked to be brothers, both with toffee-colored hair and mischievous, gap-toothed smiles. One was a bit taller than the other, but a mere year older, she guessed.

“Take that,” the older one yelled, lunging forward with a thrust of his sword.

The youngest staggered back, but fought on, the dull thud of wood on wood echoing off
the surrounding buildings, as pedestrians stepped into the street to bypass them. Emmaline’s smile widened. How carefree they were. Had she ever been that young? Had she once held the innocence of youth in her hand, the way these boys did? Watching them, she felt as old as the ocean floor, as sluggish as the rain-filled clouds easing their way west, and as jaded as the worst dockyard doxy.

The younger one’s foot snaked out and hooked around the other’s ankle. The older one teetered, a look of astonishment in his rounded eyes. Emmaline covered her mouth to keep from laughing out loud.

The older boy fell on his backside, his sword clattering a few feet away. The younger one pretended to run him through the heart, then danced around him whooping and hollering.

“I killed the filthy pirate! I killed the filthy pirate!”

A few spectators clapped.

Emmaline’s smile slipped away. That wooden dagger of his seemed to penetrate and twist what was left of her soul.

Filthy pirate
. The boy’s words resounded in her head until they became one word.
Filtypirate, filthypirate, filthypirate
.

She was no more and no less than what the boy labeled his brother. Her thoughts flew to Nicholas, and their conversation the day before. He thought there was a better life for her than this, and for a wild moment, she’d entertained the idea. But watching these children drove home how utterly foolish Nicholas was, thinking she could be more, that another life was waiting for her over the horizon. ’Twas merely a desperate reach for an impossible reality.

She was Lady Anne.
A filthy pirate
. She wasn’t some fresh-faced debutante from the “right” bloodline, who excelled at embroidery and the pianoforte.

She turned away from the bickering boys and continued toward the docks, her heart so heavy it seemed she was dragging it behind her. Although she was dressed in one of her best gowns, she felt soiled with the accumulation of a lifetime of grime ground into her very essence.

“Why, Mrs. Sutherland. What a pleasure.”

Emmaline stopped and closed her eyes.
Hell and damnation
. Could this day get any worse? Wasn’t it enough the two boys stripped the wool from her eyes and allowed her to see herself as she truly was? Did she have to contend with
this
now? Slowly she turned, stretching her lips into what she hoped was more smile than grimace.

“Mr. Lansing.” She dipped her head in acknowledgment of the man standing in front of her.

Was it better to be a filthy pirate, or a rat-faced rodent of a man who used his position as the son of the governor of Barbados to shoulder his way through life?

Cook was the first to note that Peter Lansing looked a little too much like a rat. The resemblance was alarming and amusing. Lansing’s face was a tad too long, his eyes slightly too close together and on the smallish side, his nose a bit too pointed. Sometimes she swore that nose twitched.

She didn’t know why he’d taken a fancy to her. She wished he’d point those beady eyes in another woman’s direction. Hoped every single damn time she encountered him that his feelings would have waned, but they never did.

“I called on you the other day. Did your … butler … not inform you?”

She narrowed her eyes at the derogatory intonation of the word
butler
.

“He did.” Lie. Clarence never said a word, but it wasn’t surprising. No one in her household liked or trusted Peter Lansing, and Clarence made it his duty to protect her from the man.

Lansing sniffed, as if affronted. The fool never got the hint that she had no feelings other than dislike for him. At first, she’d been kind, unwilling to hurt him. That had been a mistake, for her kindness merely fanned the flames of his infatuation. Soft rebukes didn’t help. Neither did outright rudeness. He simply refused to be deterred.

“If you’ll excuse me,” she said, stepping around him. “I have errands to accomplish, and I’m behind schedule today.”

Lansing fell into step beside her. “Where are you heading? I will accompany you. I too have business in town.”

Lord above, what will it take to get rid of this man?

“Thank you, but my business is of a personal nature.” She’d heard her aunt Dorothy use such an expression. Aunt Dorothy said that would scare any man away.

But apparently not Peter Lansing.

He frowned. “Unchaperoned?”

She barely bit back her snort of derision. Unchaperoned, indeed. Since when did Widow Sutherland ever go anywhere chaperoned?

She walked quickly for a woman lugging around so much fabric, but Lansing kept step. For the first time, she wished she’d brought someone with her, but whom? Certainly not Cook or Clarence. Phin was entirely out of the question, because she didn’t want him knowing what she was about. And the others were busy careening the ships.

And Nicholas … Well, Nicholas was the reason for this excursion.

Lansing cleared his throat. His walking stick tap-tapped along the cobbled street, and she had to grit her teeth against the sound of it. Strange custom, using a walking stick, when you had two perfectly good legs to carry you around.

“Mrs. Sutherland, the reason I came calling the other day was to ask if I could escort you to the Governor’s Ball.”

Oh, Lord, this was worse than she thought. “Is it that time of year already?”

“Yes, it is.” His voice was flat, as if he knew what was coming.

Emmaline stopped and faced him. Like the waters parted by the bow of a ship, people moved around them. Sailors, native women in their colorful clothes and vendors toting their wares were nothing but foam-tipped waves next to the floating debris of this man. “Mr. Lansing—”

Lansing took her hand in both of his, squeezing her fingers until they ached. She tried to yank them away, but he held tight, desperation in his close-set eyes. “You must know how I feel about you by now, Mrs. Sutherland. I would like nothing more than to escort you to—”

“Mr. Lansing.” She managed to tug her hand free. “Please. Don’t. You know I am unable
to return your feelings.”

His lips thinned. His eyes narrowed, and a frisson of concern crawled up her spine. Lansing was always pleasant with her. Pleasant and proper. But she’d suspected there was more to him. Something not quite pleasant and proper.

“It’s unnatural for a woman to live all alone, as you do, Mrs. Sutherland, with male servants who appear disreputable.”

“My servants are none of your concern.”

“People talk.”

“I care not what people say. How I live my life is my business.”

He folded his hands over the top of his cane and gave her a stern look. “You make a good profit off your sugarcane, do you not?”

What the hell? Where was this going?

People bustled around them, jostling them. Emmaline stepped closer to the buildings lining the street, recognizing the infamous pub, the Elegant Sword, a few feet away. Were there sailors in there she knew? Someone who would come to her rescue?

She was certainly able to defend herself, but if she did, people would talk about a lot more than her servants.

“What does my sugarcane have to do with this?”

Lansing shrugged, but there was a light in his eyes that set her on edge. “Barbados used to be the major exporter of sugarcane to England. But things are changing. England’s importing more and more from the Leeward Islands and Jamaica. I’m sure you’ve felt the pinch.”

Little of her “profits” came from her sugarcane. She kept her home as a working plantation because it gave her native workers a job, and it served as a front, to cover her other … duties.

“I’m aware,” she said.

“The other plantation owners are becoming desperate, because competition is tight. With no man to run your plantation …” He spread his hands as if to say,
What can you do?

Enough of this nonsense. Emmaline didn’t take kindly to being threatened, and Lansing was clearly trying to threaten her. She stepped closer to him.