Too Dangerous to Desire

by Cara Elliott

  “Cam knows how to sail?” asked Connor.

  “Our friend could most likely steer Charon’s ferry across the River Styx if need be,” answered Gryff dryly. “God only knows where he acquired such a skill, but I hope it was somewhere other than a duck pond. Dirty weather is coming on, and my guess is that it will get even dirtier as the night goes on.”

  “Damnation,” swore Connor.

  “Bloody hell is more like it,” replied Gryff, “for Morton and Dudley set off in pursuit.”

  “Now what?”

  “It appears that Miss Georgiana was right in suggesting that we might have need of a traveling coach. The wind is blowing like a banshee, so with these rough seas, they can’t be headed in any other direction but north.” Raindrops began to patter on the overhanging leaves. “So, I suggest that we should ride to the inn, and prepare to follow the same course along the coast.”

  In the hide-and-seek moonlight, Cameron studied the chart. In his experience, knowing the lay of the land—or sea—was always an advantage in battle. For now, the tide and wind would not allow them to seek refuge in one of the harbors that dotted the coastline. But the sleek design of the racing sloop should allow him to pull away from their pursuers. As long as the weather didn’t get much worse. In rough seas, the bigger, heavier yacht would gain the advantage.

  He glanced up at the scudding clouds and felt the first spit of rain.

  “I found some oilskin coats below,” said Sophie, coming up through the hatchway and handing him one of the hooded garments. She crouched down in the shelter of the cockpit. “Is it my imagination, or are they getting closer?”

  “They are gaining on us,” confirmed Cameron. He edged the tiller over a touch. “We are the lighter and faster vessel, but in a storm, the advantage shifts to the yacht. Because of its weight, it can cut through the waves better than we can.”

  “What will they do if they catch us? They aren’t carrying cannons, are they?”

  “No, they’ll not be firing a broadside at us, but most likely they will have muskets or hunting rifles,” he replied. “My guess is that they mean to board us.”

  “Won’t that be difficult in this storm?”

  “Morton is an expert sailor.”

  Sophie lowered her rain-spattered lashes, trying to hide the worry in her eyes.

  “But so am I, Sunbeam.”

  “You need not try to cast a bright light on a dark situation,” she replied with a watery smile. “I can see that our situation is not good.”

  “Trust me, I’ve been in far worse.” He tapped at his chin. “There was the time off the coast of Tripoli that my friends and I ran into a pair of heavily armed corsair ships cruising for plunder. We were carrying a cargo of smuggled silks, spices, and oils from Venice to the English coast.”

  “Good heavens, what did you do?”

  “We used our wits as weapons. With our load, we couldn’t outsail them, and as they came closer, their cannon fire began to hit home.”

  Her eyes widened. “And?”

  “And then, I thought of emptying all of the oil we were carrying onto the water.”

  “In hoping of slowing them down?”

  “No, in hoping of blowing them to Kingdom Come.” Cameron grinned, deliberately distracting her from their own dire troubles. “We waited until they were smack in the middle of the slick and then Jem, our bosun from Yorkshire and a former poacher, took his bow and with a few well-aimed flaming arrows set the oil ablaze. Whoosh—their sails caught fire, and several of their cannons exploded.”

  “You,” she said, “are exceedingly resourceful. Not to speak of exceedingly mad.”

  “I am,” he agreed, gratified to see that she was no longer looking so deathly pale. “This is just another one of our daring little adventures. And I must say, I much prefer it to the bats.”

  Her laugh stirred a swirl of warmth in his chest.

  “I daresay that Georgiana and Penelope will find this story far more thrilling,” said Sophie. “Perhaps you can convince your friend Lord Haddan to write a horrid novel, once he’s done with his essays.”

  “Perhaps. Gryff is a very imaginative fellow.” As a shaft of moonlight cut through the clouds, Cameron took another peek at the chart and then at the compass set in the middle of the cockpit. “Interesting,” he murmured after a moment of gauging the wind and the currents.

  Sophie scooted a little closer. “What?”

  “See this?” He pointed to a line of black dots curling up toward the town of Skegness. “It’s a reef, located some distance offshore. According to the notation here, at high tide, it’s well under water. But with the sea ebbing, as it is now, the rocks are a hazard to some larger vessels.”

  She frowned. “Are we in danger?”

  Cameron looked back at the yacht. It was now close enough that he could make out several figures on the bow, working to raise another sail. Damnation. Some members of Morton’s crew must have been working in the boathouse, for the boat looked to be well manned.

  “No, not us. We’ve a shallow keel, but our pursuers do not.” He altered course. “Can you hold the tiller steady while I tighten the mainsail sheets? We need go a few knots faster…”

  Dark water foamed over the rail as the sloop heeled over and picked up speed. Wind whipped through the rigging, spray whirled in the chill air, the salt and rain stinging his face.

  “They are still gaining,” called Sophie.

  “All we have to do is cross the reef ahead of them. Unless they are utter fools, they will have to come about, and in this wind, it will take them quite a while to tack around the danger. By the time they do, we will be well away and can lose ourselves in the storm.”

  A gust buffeted her sideways, but she clung resolutely to the tiller.

  Do I dare trim the sail any more? Cameron slanted a look upward. Already the mast was bowing from the strain. “In for a penny, in for a pound,” he muttered, hauling in another half turn of the manila rope. The varnished wood groaned but held firm.

  Scrambling back to the stern, he took over the steering.

  Through the swirling fog, he could just make out a riffling line of white-capped water up ahead. “We must head for the center,” he muttered through clenched teeth. Praying that his pirate instincts were still sharp, he angled their vessel for the gap in the surf.

  Kicked up by the crosscurrents, the waves steepened and slapped against the hull. The sloop shuddered and he saw Sophie hunch down inside her hooded coat, like a turtle withdrawing into its shell.

  Despite his own inner turmoil, he managed an encouraging smile. “Remind me to tell you about the chase off the isle of Madagascar.”

  “Can it wait until we are back on dry land?” she called back. “I would rather—”

  The rest of her words were drowned in a clap of thunder.

  A brilliant burst of lightning slashed across the sky, and for an instant the two sailing ships racing across the churning sea were brightly illuminated. As Cameron came back to take over handling the tiller, he caught sight of Morton on the bucking deck of the yacht, trying to take aim with a hunting rifle before darkness once again swallowed them up.

  His arms were aching like the devil from fighting the currents, but somehow he held his course. Catching the crest of a wave, the sloop shot forward and skimmed through the opening in the treacherous rocks. A scrape, a bounce, a shudder. And then suddenly they were past the danger and back in the open sea.

  Sophie expelled a whoop of excitement. “Oh, you did it, Cam! You are the very Prince of Pirates.”

  “Just a marquess,” he called dryly.

  With the prevailing winds forcing him out to sea, Cameron had to tack before venturing a look back.

  “Bloody hell, even I wouldn’t be that reckless,” he muttered.

  Sails drumming in the wind, hull surging through the eddying waters, the yacht was following in the sloop’s wake. Its long, dark bowsprit was cutting wildly through the mists, like a saber seeking to strike a
mortal blow to an enemy.

  For a moment, Cameron thought that his dare had failed. Outgunned and outmanned, he and Sophie had little hope of fighting off an attack at close quarters.

  And then…

  And then with a shuddering crack, the yacht’s mainmast snapped. In a tangle of canvas and ropes, it plunged into the sea, spinning the yacht in a yawing circle. Out of control, the hull smashed against a submerged rock, splintering the mizzen mast. It, too, fell in a jumble of cordage just as a large wave rose up and broke over the deck.

  Foam flew through the air, streaking the darkness with a ghostly spray. A moment later, what remained of the battered yacht capsized.

  “Good God.” Sophie let out a horrified gurgle as the wreckage sank beneath the swirling waters.

  “Poetic justice, I suppose,” murmured Cameron as he stared into the darkness. “I wasn’t lying when I said that I had personal reasons for wishing to help you fight these men,” he added after a long moment. “This was the second time that Morton tried to destroy me. He was the blackguard who was beating the tavern girl—the smarmy weasel whose purse I took, and who then ran to Wolcott proclaiming me a thief.” The vortex of ink-black water spun round and round and round. “If you navigate through life using greed and evil as your compass, you deserve to founder on unseen shoals.”

  Sophie nodded. “I cannot mourn Dudley and Morton,” she said in a tight voice. “But still, we should search for survivors.”

  “I would if I could, Sunbeam. But it’s simply not possible to sail into the teeth of this storm,” replied Cameron. “Already the wind has risen to gale force. We must go with it and even then, we’ll be hard-pressed to keep ourselves afloat.” Seeing her stricken expression, he added, “The chances of finding anyone alive in that maelstrom are virtually nil.”

  “Poor Neddy,” she murmured softly.

  Cameron did not feel quite so charitable. “We must all live—or die—with the choices we make. Wadsworth knew right from wrong. So he must accept the consequences for his actions.” He shook a hank of sopping hair from his brow. “As I said, if you live by the proverbial sword, choosing to take by violence that which is not rightfully yours, you must be prepared to die by the sword.”

  “You know, for all your devil-may-care bluster, you are the very soul of honor.” She turned and slid her arms around him in a fierce hug. “A hero in every sense of the word.”

  “Don’t exaggerate my nobility, Sophie.” And yet, for all his carefully calculated detachment, he found her words lit an odd warmth in a certain region of his chest.

  You are becoming a soft-hearted sentimentalist, scoffed one of the demons in his head.

  Yes, and what is so wrong with that? he asked wryly.

  Somewhat to his surprise, the demons and devils had no answer. Slinking away, their red-hot pitchforks melting into limp little twists of metal, they disappeared into the darkest crevasses of his brain.

  “You are noble,” she said, pressing her lips to his stubbled cheek, “And I have the paper to prove it.”

  “I never thought I would live to see the day…” The waves surged and tiller smacked into his side, nearly knocking them both overboard. “And I may not yet if we don’t keep our minds on the challenge at hand.” Cameron brushed a kiss to her brow, and then reluctantly released her. “I fear the blow is going to be a bad one. We will have to use every ounce of effort to keep ourselves afloat.”

  Muttering under his breath, Gryff crunched his way over the piles of broken oyster shells and hurried back to the coach.

  “No luck here, either?” asked Sophie’s uncle, trying to keep the disappointment from his voice.

  “The fishermen of Lincolnshire and Yorkshire all seem to take fiendish delight in telling me that no vessel could make it to land in this storm,” grumbled Gryff. All of them were tired and testy. They had been traveling hard for nearly two days, following the coast road with precious few stops for rest or sustenance. “According to the fellows of this harbor, anyone caught out on the water when the gale started will likely end up in the Shetland Islands—or the arctic port of Spitzbergen.”

  “We just have to keep going north,” said Georgiana stoutly. “The storm has to blow itself out sometime, and when it does, Sophie and Cameron will find a safe harbor.”

  Hermione tried to smile, but worry was etched around her eyes.

  Gryff and Connor exchanged glances, neither one giving voice to the increasingly obvious fact that the continuing violence of the ocean was fast sinking any chance of survival.

  “Er, is Mr. Daggett an expert sailor?” asked Edward.

  “He excels in any number of different skills,” replied Connor tersely.

  A silence. “You did not say that sailing is one of them,” pointed out Georgiana.

  Gryff cleared his throat with a cough. “Let us take some refreshment at the local inn while we arrange for a fresh team of horses. Then, if I may be so bold as to make a suggestion…”

  “Please do, milord,” said Edward.

  “Here is what I propose.” He slanted a look up at the leaden clouds, which showed no sign of lightening. “We all continue on to the Scottish border together. If we still haven’t found Miss Lawrance and Daggett by then, you three should return to Terrington to await word while Connor and I continue the search into the Highlands on horseback. The roads there are barely more than cart tracks and your coach would soon come to grief.”

  Edward gave a reluctant nod. “That is a sensible plan, milord, and much as it hurts me to abandon the effort, I can’t argue that we would be more of a hindrance than a help.”

  Hermione blew out a sigh.

  “It can’t be helped, my dear,” said her husband.

  “Well, I, for one, haven’t given up hope,” announced Georgiana. “If you knew some of the scrapes that Sophie and Cam have survived in the past, you might have a little more faith in their chances.”

  At that, Gryff chuckled, the first show of amusement since the journey had begun. “Quite right, Miss Georgiana. Being intimately acquainted with Daggett’s uncanny knack of staying a hairsbreadth ahead of disaster, I shall, like you, remain optimistic.”

  To Cameron’s dismay, his prediction regarding the storm’s strength proved all too true. For the next day and night he and Sophie battled the relentless elements, the rain, wind, and the surging seas all swirling together in an iron-gray blur. Wet, cold, exhausted, they stumbled through the arduous task of trimming the sails to keep the sloop from being broached by the waves, subsisting on old biscuits, moldy cheese, and a keg of cider that Sophie had found in one of the lockers.

  Gray, gray, and more gray—there seemed to be no end to the raging storm in sight.

  Muzzy from lack of sleep, Cameron had no idea where they were, save for the fact that the needle of the compass kept pointing relentlessly north. Rubbing his salt-reddened eyes, he felt himself drifting into a daze, despite the thrumming of the gusts against the taut canvas.

  “Go below for a nap,” insisted Sophie. “I can handle the steering for a bit.”

  “Maybe just for a short while,” he mumbled.

  “Go!” she ordered, and this time he didn’t argue. Nodding off at the helm could spell disaster.

  Cameron wasn’t sure how long he had been asleep, but he suddenly awoke with a start, aware that the motion of the sloop had changed dramatically. Scrambling up the hatchway, he found himself blinking into a blaze of diamond-bright sunlight. The wind had dropped to a gentle breeze and the water shimmered with shades of celestial blue.

  “Look—oh, look!” Sophie was pointing to a faint line of gray cliffs just visible in the distance. “Land!”

  Terra firma.

  The sight of earth and stone, however hardscrabble, had never looked more divine.

  “Let us haul these sails around one last time and head for shore.” Rubbing his chafed hands together, he moved to the tiller and altered course. “I don’t know about you, but for me a pot of coffee, hot and strong as the
fires of Hell, would be nothing short of heavenly.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  I look like a drowned muskrat.” Sophie looked down at her tattered dress and grimaced as the sloop glided into the calm waters of the cove. The salt-crusted muslin was liberally streaked with pine tar and pitch from the rigging. “And my hair must be more hideous than a tangle of smelly seaweed.”

  Cameron scratched at his bristly chin. “Honesty compels me to admit that you are not shining with your usual light, Sunbeam.”

  He wasn’t exactly a paragon of perfection, either, she observed. And yet somehow his disheveled appearance—scruffy beard, ripped shirt, windsnarled locks, raffish earring—looked sinfully dashing rather than woefully drab.

  “I hope we do not frighten the locals,” she murmured. “They may think we are dreadful sea demons, spit up from Neptune’s underwater kingdom to wreak mischief here on land.”

  “I’m sure they have seen much worse,” he quipped. “Like hairy horned Vikings in monstrous dragon ships.”

  “I suppose we are not quite as threatening as that.” She patted back a yawn. “Any idea where we are?”

  “Not a clue,” responded Cameron. The sloop nudged up against a weathered wharf piled high with fishing nets and eel traps. “And at the moment, the question is not of paramount importance. As long as there is a bed and blankets—preferably free of fleas—we could be in Xanadu or Hyderabad for all I care.”

  “A bed,” repeated Sophie with a wistful sigh. “I am so fatigued that I may simply curl up on those burlap sacks and sleep for a day…or maybe a week.” The mention of time suddenly snapped her thoughts into sharper focus. “Oh, Lord. But the first thing I must do is send word to Georgie—”

  “Rest assured that I’ll have a message sent, but not until I get you tucked between the sheets,” said Cameron, lifting her unresisting body up to the slatted walkway.

  “Oh, I can’t think of a more blissful suggestion.” Even if she had wanted to, Sophie was too tired to protest.

  “No?” His brows gave a suggestive waggle. “I may have to refresh your memory. But that, too, can wait until later.” He finished snugging the mooring lines to a set of brass cleats and then took her hand. “Come, there looks to be an inn across the way.”