His Duchess at Eventide

by Wendy Lacapra

  “The tunnels, of course.”

  “Show me, show me now.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  CHEVERLEY OPENED HIS eyes to darkness and the damp stench of cave. He was trussed and laying on his side in the dirt. His arms were bound at his back by the elbows. His ankles had been strapped together.

  He calmed his rapid heartbeat by deliberately slowing his breath.

  What the hell had happened?

  Last he remembered he’d been making arrangements for the competition with his son. He’d stayed behind to consider Ithwick’s long shadow, and then—?

  Well, the sting on the back of his head provided one clue.

  But who had hit him? And why? Anthony? Thomas?

  A man moved to the front of the tunnel carrying a watering can.

  But no—the metal vessel the man carried wasn’t a watering can, it was a smuggler’s lamp, a lamp with a long, thin funnel to keep the light within from being seen from the side—light used to wave in a ship.

  Chev lowered his lids, so it would appear he hadn’t awoken. Slowly, he stretched his fingers down toward the binds around his ankles.

  “Something’s wrong,” the man called back from the mouth of the tunnel.

  Chev recognized Sir Jerold’s voice.

  “They should have delivered the prisoner by now,” he continued. “The smugglers must have been intercepted. And if they have—”

  “It doesn’t matter. This one is of far more value to me.”

  “I don’t know what you plan to do with him,” Sir Jerold said, “but he can’t be worth the three hundred guineas we were promised to free the French captain.”

  “Bricon!” Fool.

  The momentary satisfaction of having guessed right evaporated when the woman answered in French.

  “Do you not recognize Lord Cheverley?”

  Dread’s icy fingers seized Cheverley’s throat.

  “Lord Cheverley! My God. Don’t think you can ransom him—Anthony will never pay.”

  “Non. Il est à moi.” No. He is mine.

  Jerold sighed. “Well, he lost his ship, didn’t he? Do what you will. I’ll check for the signal.”

  Jerold’s boots crunched on the gravel as he retreated.

  The pirate crouched by Cheverley’s side. “Bonjour, mon Jouet.”

  Every muscle in Cheverley’s body tensed. Though she was petite, he knew better than to underestimate her.

  “Tu m’as manqué.” I have missed you. She sucked in her angled cheeks. “Et moi? Je t’ai manqué?” And me? Have you missed me?

  “No,” he answered in English. He’d be dammed if he’d make any of this easy.

  “Let me see.” She reached down toward his manhood.

  He jerked away. She laughed as she shrugged.

  “I do not need to feel you to see you are not properly impressed,” she replied in English. “Do not worry. I will train you again.”

  “No.” It was a vow.

  He’d risk whatever he must. He would not be kept from his family again.

  “Ah, mon Jouet, you know you do not belong here. You belong with me.”

  “Go to hell.”

  “Ah. The fire within you has returned. I am intrigued.” Her hard, green eyes glittered in the light of her lamp. “I will make an agreement with you. Come with me willingly, and you can share in all that I have—ships, gold, freedom.” She ran her hand down his face. “I am queen of my dominion, and you can be my king.”

  “No.”

  “But why?”

  “Every day apart from home is a day of suffering.”

  “Your wife plans to wed another. Just today she confirmed the banns.”

  A pain seized his chest. The pirate lies.

  The pirate softened her voice. “Why would you wish to stay where you are not wanted?”

  He held her gaze with pleading eyes, ever inching his ankles upward behind his back.

  “I’ve always told you.” She brushed his cheek a second time. “You are weak inside.”

  “I will endure,” he replied.

  She shoved his shoulder, knocking him onto his back.

  “You will survive only if I allow!” she shouted. “Tu es rein!”

  His nightmare’s refrain scratched against his heart like fingernails on slate.

  “Le capitaine grand et courageux,” she shook her head, lip curled in disgust, “impuissant et frémissant.” The great and brave captain, helpless and quivering.

  Yes, he was helpless. Yes, her voice had left him quivering.

  However, he would not give up.

  Inside, he knew.

  Inside, he trusted.

  “I will survive,” he replied.

  She could try and take him. She would not get far.

  Sir Jerold swiveled back from his spot at the entrance to the cave.

  “We have a problem. Men are coming down the beach—a whole crew.”

  The pirate cocked her head. “Your soldiers?”

  Sir Jerold shook his head. “Not mine.”

  “Have you signaled the ship? Has the ship responded?”

  “Yes and yes.”

  “Then prepare the dinghy!” She hooked an arm beneath Chev by the shoulder and dragged him toward the opening.

  Chev lost hold of the partially loosened knot.

  “Help me with him!” she demanded.

  “Are you mad?” Jerold asked. “There isn’t time. Leave him!”

  “No!” She answered in a low, gravelly voice Chev knew well. “I never leave a prize behind. He is mine!”

  “I said,” Sir Jerold raised a sword. “leave hi—”

  Sir Jerold crumpled, a look of open-mouth shock still on his face. The acrid scent of saltpeter filled the air.

  “Bricon,” the pirate said. “Fools—all of you. Why didn’t he listen?”

  Chev’s heart lept. She’d used her one ball. He ran his gaze up and down her breeches—she didn’t appear to have a second flintlock...

  Chev forced a swallow and attempted to look contrite. “Jerold did not know you like I do.”

  She smiled, slowly. “That’s better, mon Jouet. Soon, we will be back on my ship and you may pleasure me.”

  She yanked him outside the cave and into the near-dead day, pulling him across the piles of rocks and sand that had, until recently, blocked the entrance to the tunnels. She dropped him by the side of a small boat.

  Her ship—with Danish flag still flying—had anchored a few hundred yards from shore.

  Had Emmaus failed? Chev’s heart sank.

  Chev lifted his head above the stones and gazed as far as he could down the shore. There were, indeed, men traversing sand—but they weren’t soldiers.

  They were a motley collection of former sailors. And at their fore?

  A woman whose long blonde hair flowed down her back and past the breeches she’d donned—as beautiful in her controlled fury as she’d ever been.

  Thank God the pirate had already fired.

  “My wife is deadly with a knife,” he warned.

  “She is too late.” The pirate bent down to lift him into the boat.

  Somewhere behind them, a bowstring pinged. An arrow pinned the pirate to the boat by her sleeve. With a cry, she tore the fabric, freeing her arm.

  “There are plenty more,” Thaddeus said from within the tunnel.

  “Thaddeus!” Chev yelled. “Get back.”

  “He’s not alone,” Thomas spoke from the darkness at the mouth of the cave. A barrel of a musket raised. “And my aim is just as good as yours, madame.”

  With a cry of frustration, and a quick, angry glance at Chev, the pirate turned, waded into the water, and then dove beneath the waves.

  Thaddeus sprinted toward the shore.

  “Let her go,” Chev commanded, raw. “She doesn’t matter.” Nothing mattered but Penelope and his son. “Take cover, Thaddeus.”

  Cheverley freed his ankles, his eyes fixed on the pirate as she climbed the ropes, shouting commands and slinging
insults in French.

  Her crew would fire. They were sitting targets. He had to move.

  He had to get Penelope and Thaddeus away.

  He had to make sure they were safe before—

  Suddenly, the deck lit with torches.

  Emmaus stood, legs spread, at the center of the ship. A beautiful, equally dark-skinned woman flanked him, her musket—like everyone else in the crew—aimed toward the pirate.

  “Traître!” Traitor. The pirate yelled at the woman. “Merdaille!” Scum. She yelled at the rest of her crew.

  “You should have treated them better, madame,” Emmaus yelled back.

  “C’est fini!” Cheverley cried, voice breaking with fury. “Tu n’es rien!”

  The pirate whipped around to look back and her grip on the rope faltered.

  And then came a loud boom and the crew was engulfed in a cloud of smoke.

  Impossible to tell which one had fired the fatal shot, but with a desperate, guttural cry, the pirate fell. The darkened circle spread outward from her body as her blood pooled in the salt water.

  The pirate was no more.

  Felled by her own crew.

  He couldn’t imagine a more fitting end.

  The sailors of Pensteague took to the water and Penelope fell to her knees by his side.

  “Penelope! Pen! Are you hit?”

  “No,” she cried working the knots out of his binds. “I can’t breathe,” she freed him, but—”

  “What if she’d shot you?”

  “I told you—I won’t lose you again.”

  He caught her by her waist with his elbow and then drew her close. Winding his fingers into her hair he claimed her lips in a searing kiss.

  He touched his forehead to hers. “Thank you.”

  “You aren’t alone, Chev.” She gripped his face. “For as long as I am alive, you will never be alone.”

  He held her close, fingers tight against the back of her neck, breathing the night air as one. He closed his eyes, pressed his lips to Penelope’s hair and sighed.

  ~~~

  Penelope cast her leg over the side of the pig-skin lined hammock, pushed off from the wall, and then snuggled up against her husband’s chest as, together, they swung.

  “Is this what it feels like in a ship?”

  “A little,” Chev replied.

  She kissed him beneath his chin. His skin tasted of salt water...or tears. Or maybe both.

  She could not describe the terror she’d felt when she realized Madame LaVoie was the pirate who’d kept Chev captive. However, it hadn’t been she who had alerted Madame LaVoie to his presence. She’d known he was there and had only been waiting for the right time to signal her ship.

  According to her former first mate—now aligned with Emmaus—MadameLaVoie had come close once before. She’d convinced Anthony to set the trap in the same place Anthony had set one for Piers. Anthony had believed the trap was for Thaddeus.

  Penelope and Cheverley had settled both Thaddeus and Thomas at Pensteague for the night before taking refuge inside Emmaus’s cabin. Thomas, who was not a villain, but a man who’d truly believed LaVoie had proof Cheverley was a traitor and was desperately trying to protect Thaddeus.

  “I wish you would have allowed me to take you home to Pensteague, too.”

  “No,” he replied. “Not until tomorrow, when everyone will know the truth. I want to publicly claim you, Thaddeus, and my home in a way that leaves no doubt.”

  “And then a deputy lieutenant will arrest Anthony?”

  “Yes,” he replied. “That is all arranged.”

  She lifted her head. “So you are still going to go through with the competition?”

  He lifted a brow. “Are you afraid I will not win?”

  “Don’t be absurd.” She settled back down and traced his collarbone. “I never doubted you. I only counseled patience.”

  “I understand,” he replied. “And you were right. As angry as I was at the way Anthony had ordered you to appear, I might have done him serious harm.”

  “Why, Chev, are you apologizing?” she asked lightly.

  “I am,” he replied, all seriousness. “And I am sorry I did not send word as soon as I returned. I was court-martialed, and the Admiralty did insist I aid them, but I—I wasn’t well. I wasn’t thinking correctly. If it’s any consolation, Hurtheven, quite literally, tried to knock me back to sense.”

  The hammock listed as she sat straight. “Hurtheven hit you?”

  Chev ran the back of his hand down her arm. “There now, my lioness. He was right—I thought you and Thaddeus were better off without me. I was haunted by the pirate’s repeated insistence I was nothing. And I thought—” He lifted his injured arm. “I thought you wouldn’t be able to bear this.”

  “I love you.” She grasped his arm and held his scars against her cheek. “All of you. You are everything.”

  “Not everything.” He smiled. “You created all of this without me.”

  She shook her head no. “You were in every thought, in every plan. And every day, I saw more of you in Thaddeus.”

  His Adam’s apple moved as he swallowed. “I love you, too.”

  She leaned down, kissed him lightly against his lips, and settled back by his side. She made the hammock rock with another kick.

  “If you were supposed to help resolve the matter between the admiral, his wife, and his mistress, how did Ashbey end up wedded to the widow?”

  “That,” he sighed, “is another story. But it certainly helped that she is carrying his child.”

  “Ash?! Ashbey is going to be a father?”

  “And he’s so happy, he constantly grins.”

  “That I have to see to believe.” She sighed. “But I’m glad.”

  So glad. Everyone knew the admiral had long ago scorned his wife in favor of his mistress. And she knew the Duke of Ashbey had vowed never to wed again, even though she’d always known there was something unique and precious under the exterior of the serious duke.

  “Well, that’s one good thing that’s come of this.”

  “That and Emmaus has a ship.”

  “I hope he will be happy. Where will he go?”

  “I believe the proper question is where won’t he go. And, he will be in charge, and for him, that with bring the greatest satisfaction.”

  “For anyone, no?”

  “Yes. For anyone.”

  “I’m sorry you did not have the chance for vengeance.”

  He angled his body toward hers. “I’m not.”

  “You aren’t?”

  “No,” he said sincerely. “It is enough she is gone.”

  She rested her hand over his heart. “Is it?”

  “I rest easier knowing she cannot hurt anyone else,” he replied. “As to whether or not the terror will fully fade? I do not know.” He kissed her crown. “But I know your love is as fierce as it is tender, and that will be my light.”

  She closed her aching eyes and inhaled his scent.

  “Rest, darling.” He made the hammock rock. “Tomorrow you become a future duchess.”

  Chapter Twenty

  THE NOISE OF the crowd swelled in the courtyard. Chev pushed down the cap resting low on his head, and glanced urgently to Emmaus, still engaged in animated conversation with Ithwick’s most loyal tenant, who’d heard Emmaus was to leave, following a competition for Penelope’s hand.

  Chev ran his fingers over the cobalt bead fastened to the special string hidden in his pocket. Still there.

  As planned, the competition had begun without him. But they were due inside. Now.

  Readiness surged within his body.

  “Patience,” Emmaus said. “Do not make a decision of this magnitude in haste.”

  “Even if there are no other farms to let in the whole of the county,” the renter argued, “I will not renew my lease.”

  “Has Ithwick sunk so low?” Cheverley interrupted.

  “Ithwick was never an easy place, but now it’s run by unscrupulous me
n. I cannot in good conscience continue to fill their coffers with my rent.”

  Emmaus and Cheverley exchanged a glance.

  “Listen to Emmaus,” Cheverley said.

  The renter shifted his position and gazed at Chev in surprise, as if he only just noticed him. His eyes settled on Cheverley’s missing hand and then slowly returned to Cheverley’s face.

  The renter squinted as he studied.

  “Lord Cheverley!” The renter paled. “Are you ghost or man?”

  “Quiet! I beg you.” Chev gripped the man’s shoulder. “I am very much a man.”

  “How can I be sure it is you?” the renter asked.

  “You cannot,” Chev replied. “When I am duke, Ithwick will have stewardship akin to Pensteague, not greedy abuse of the land. Ithwick and Pensteague will again be one. Her ladyship will guide the transition.”

  “Lady Cheverley shows excellent judgement,” the renter said.

  Chev agreed, although he wasn’t sure he would have given himself the same second chance as she had given him.

  “Well, let us go in then,” the renter exclaimed. “What are you waiting for?”

  Emmaus snorted.

  Cheverley opened the gate and, together, the three of them headed into the courtyard.

  All the residents of Ithwick and Pensteague combined lined the courtyard’s walls. Cheverley made his way through the crowd, listening to Thaddeus speak.

  “Both you and Thomas have failed to even string the bow,” Thaddeus said. “If I shoot the arrow through all twelve axes, you will you swear to leave my mother and my land alone?”

  “As it is an impossibility, I give you my word,” Anthony replied.

  Thaddeus stepped through the bow, just as Cheverley had shown him the very first day he returned. He could have easily finished stringing the bow, but he looked up, scanned the crowd and caught Cheverley’s eye.

  Cheverley shook his head no.

  Thaddeus made an exaggerated attempt and then hung his head.

  Anthony chuckled. “Looks like you have failed as well.”

  Keeping his head down, Cheverley stepped out from the hedge. “May I attempt the feat?”

  “Why it’s the captain-turned beggar!” One of Anthony’s coterie exclaimed. “And he’s gone to great lengths to clean himself up.”

  “Insolence!” Anthony cried. He stalked toward Cheverley. “You should not be allowed to set foot on this land, you aren’t fit to look on Penelope, let alone compete for her hand.”