by Meg Hennessy
Without warning, he lifted her into his arms and carefully put her on the bed. His gaze roamed her face and settled on her mouth, only inches away.
In a desperate, wanton moment, she moistened her lips in anticipation, parting her legs slightly atop the bed.
“You have forgiven me?” he asked.
She nodded that she had, not wanting to be angry, but instead waiting for his kiss.
“Thank you, Madame, I don’t wish you angry with me. Hattie will fetch you some ice to put on that ankle.” He backed away, throwing her an easy smile, leaving her adrift atop the coverlet. At the door, he bowed slightly. “Good night, Miss Aurèlie.”
“Bonne nuit,” she whispered. “I mean—”
“Good night, Aurèlie.” He waved off her explanation and closed the door behind him. Aurèlie rolled onto her side and brought her legs up. This was not at all what she had expected. She had expected to dislike him, to find it easy to deceive him, to keep all her focus on reclaiming Yellow Sun. Instead, her heart reached out to him, and had felt the tender pain that surrounded him. She had to be careful not to lose sight of the fact that she’d never be his equal.
…
Jordan filled another goblet while he waited to hear from Loul about the new barrel, having dropped it off upon their arrival. His head throbbed from the evening or perhaps from having had too much wine or maybe it was Aurèlie.
“The child is asleep.” Hattie joined Jordan in the small eatery.
He dropped a key on the table. “Lock Aurèlie’s door as soon as I leave.”
He refilled his glass then set the bottle down on the table. Hattie watched him, disapproval woven through her entire face. Damn, he hated that, too. The night had been too long and Aurèlie’s outburst on the way back this evening had worn down his defenses.
Having a brother of mixed blood and Hattie as a black stepmother, both whom he loved with all his heart, he hated the prejudices that innocent people suffered. Maybe his racially mixed family made him all that more sensitive. After all, he was the white American among them and over the years, they’d all used Jordan’s position to their advantage, just as they had his father. Aurèlie had taken him to task on the subject and though he felt it unfair, he had to admit he had been trying to change her style for the American guests. But she had seen through his attempt to be discreet. He had only been trying to spare her but had instead, insulted her.
Jordan looked up to find Hattie still standing there. “Leave me be.”
“If I had convinced your father to stop, he’d be here with me and his two sons, who he loved very much.”
“He loved his daughter, too, Hattie. I refuse to give up. I am close, so close.”
Hattie reached over and poured herself some wine as she sank into the chair across from him. She swirled it in the glass before downing it all in one swig. “Rum is better.”
Jordan admired the woman; she could match him and Loul drink for drink, whether wine or rum. He refilled her glass. “I can’t keep up with you tonight.”
“You are close to findin’ the killer?” She finished off the second glass.
He nodded, sensing she would remain his steadfast ally. “I think father figured Colette was in Port au Prince.”
“He didn’t say so in his letter.”
“No, but that’s the only explanation. There was a slave auction the day before we arrived. Corsairs are known to sell their captives there. I think Colette had to have been one of them.”
“She could be anywhere by now, and you can’t forget, you’re a wanted man.”
“Part of the game.”
“I don’t enjoy this game. If they be hangin’ you, they be hangin’ me as well, and Loul.”
“Probably.” He nodded again, adding a little smile, knowing she’d capitulate as usual. “I’d understand if you and Loul would rather leave.”
“And you?”
“I have to stay here. Colette would think to return here. As I search for her, I also wait for her…here.”
“You’re buildin’ your own trap. How will y’all get out of this life? You’ve become a pirate, Jordan.”
“Privateer,” he corrected but halted when something drew his attention toward the hall.
Aurèlie stood in the doorway.
Chapter Nine
“Ah…Aurèlie….”
Hattie nearly flew out of her chair and whirled around as Aurèlie eased into the room with a hesitant step, holding the bag of ice in her hand. Jordan stood, silently cursing, wondering how much she had heard. Damn, he had to lock that door sooner. He reached over and pocketed the key.
“Mon pardonne.” She handed the ice back to Hattie. “I could not sleep and wished to eat a little.”
Hattie rushed over to her. “You’re hungry. I’ll fix you a plate. Sit, child, sit.”
Aurèlie didn’t sit but instead watched Jordan. He had no idea what she may have heard. He motioned toward the table. “Sit, Aurèlie. Hattie will get you something. Is the ankle better?”
“Oui, much so.” Slowly, she sank into the chair. He saw her note the two empty glasses on the table.
“You did not eat at your mother’s tonight?”
“Hungry, I was not.” She held her back as stiff as her voice sounded.
She wore a deep rose-colored robe with a white nightdress peeking out from beneath her hem. Had she buttoned it to her throat to ward off his interest? A complete contrast to the dress she had worn the night they had been married. Her attempt failed for he could still envision her deep, enticing cleavage, full, soft breasts, and he could still imagine the sweet scent of her.
Hattie reappeared from the storeroom with a small plate of bread and a fruit paste. She set it down in front of Aurèlie, then politely returned to the outside kitchen.
Jordan strode over to the window. He could see his men coming up from the back swamp. He turned to face Aurèlie, her mood pensive as something smoldered in those dark eyes. He searched for some common ground. “Those dishes your mother makes, do you know how to make those?”
She nodded, pushing her plate away.
“Foreign to you, I know. Oui, I make them,” she added in a cold, dispassionate voice, “because you ask.”
She thought to be clever, but he caught her inference. Slowly, he leaned on his hands to be eye to eye with Aurèlie. “You can break this contract anytime. I bought your services. You are not a slave nor bound to me in any way. If you have changed your mind and our business arrangement is not what you want, you are free to go at anytime.”
Aurèlie coughed hard, reaching for a quick drink. “I…”
“I know, you misspoke. I’m sorry I mentioned the damn dress. Hell, you can entertain in what you have on now, as far as I’m concerned.” He grabbed her wrist and reeled her out of her chair and into his arms. “You want to act the slave, make me the master? Should I have you beaten for insolence if you are my slave?”
She placed her hands against his chest, small, delicate hands, but she did not push to escape him as she whispered, “I know you do not do such a thing.”
Anger deflated, he swallowed hard, feeling more the brute with every tick of the clock. “No, I would never harm you. I aim to protect you.”
She ran a tongue over her soft lips, then looked up at him with deep, sultry eyes that nearly reeled him inside of her. A fine mist reflected within them. “I cook, oui?”
“This is not about cooking.” He released her and stepped back. “You make reference to me as master again and I’ll break the damn contract. I made you uncomfortable and for that I apologize, but remember, I’m just as sensitive about my color as you are about yours.”
He had grown overly tired tonight. He suddenly felt afloat on rough waters, though not at sea. Emotions churned around within his gut and he couldn’t sort them out. Yet, they were there, chewing up his insides, his strength. He was on a path forged by his sister’s abduction and the murder of his father. He must see this to the end, but for some reason he fel
t challenged by his own motives.
Without another word, he slammed out of the back door, crossed the loggia, and took the steps two at a time. Hell, it was time to get to work, anyway. He glanced back at the house. Aurèlie was sitting at the table, her head resting in her hands and her shoulders shook slightly. She was crying.
Damn, he knew it would be complicated to bring a woman into the house, into the mess he called his life. She hated him. He hesitated at the bottom of the steps, then slowly walked back through the loggia and took one step upward until he stood in the doorway of the small dining room.
“Aurèlie,” he said, just above a whisper.
She looked up at him with those gorgeous dark eyes rimmed with sadness. He shrugged, leaning against the doorjamb, uncomfortable with the fraudulent way in which they were locked together.
“It is just the times in which we live, you and me.” He glanced out over the fields, seeing a ghostly shape of a pirogue, loaded with barrels, a partial payment to the Lafitte brothers for their help in finding a certain French corsair gone rogue. He had to leave, but instead his interest swung back to Aurèlie when he heard the shuffle of the chair as she rose to her feet. “You have not eaten.”
“No.” She shook her head. Her long dark hair wavered slightly down her back. “I am hungry no longer.”
“What do you want from me, Aurèlie?” She turned to face him before he continued. “You lived in France as an educated, free woman. You knew what life was here. Yet you returned, knowing your fate.”
“This is my home.” She wiped a tear from her eye. “I have no family in France. Family is most important, n’est pas?”
Jordan shrugged off the cold feeling that rolled over his chest at the mention of family. “I wouldn’t know about that, and since I have little family, what do I have that you want? My land? Did you sell yourself to me for the land?”
She blinked, followed by a tight swallow and perhaps an admission of guilt. “Would not the merging of the two plantations benefit us all?”
“Perhaps, perhaps not, but you have recklessly gambled on the unknown—me. You don’t know what kind of man I am or how I feel about this land.”
“I see a kind man,” she spoke, barely above a whisper.
The trust in her voice almost hurt. He looked out over the wasteland he had once called home. “Be careful of what you wish for, Aurèlie. Rumors are, this land is cursed.”
She started to shake her head and opened her mouth to speak.
He raised his hand to silence her. “If you choose to leave, I will shoulder all responsibility. It’ll be known you’re still pure. The house on Rampart Street in New Orleans is, of course, yours, as per our agreement, since I have not yet sold it.”
“If I leave?”
He nodded.
She wiped tears from her eyes, and he hated knowing he had put them there. “I am not in need of such a house.”
“It is in the contract. I will await your answer in the morning.”
She looked at him for a moment with those dark eyes that nearly pulled him within and oh, how he wanted to go. She turned toward the door but hesitated with her back to him. “If I am not here, who will plan your dinner party?”
“So you worry about my pompous, grandioso American guests, who will not only bore the life out of you but believe you inferior to them?”
She turned. “Non, monsieur, just wish to wear my most colorful Creole dress.”
A surprised chuckle escaped his lips, enjoying this little intimate peek into the saucy Aurèlie. She suddenly looked a hell of a lot sexier, if that were possible. “It matters not what you wear. You would dazzle them with your beauty. If…you choose to remain.”
“I so choose.” She failed to hide the slight crack in her voice.
“No, there is more to that decision, Aurèlie.” Jordan pushed away from the wall to stand in front of her. With a finger beneath her chin, he kissed her lightly on the lips, not enough for a taste, but just enough to know what he imagined as fact. Her lips were as soft as honeydew, sweetening his most bitter memories. “Consider this when making your decision. I will never give Liberty Oak to anyone. It is my curse and I bear it alone.”
“But I can—” She tried to say something but nothing came out.
“You can what? If you think to make something of this place, you are a greater fool than I thought.”
“But the contract? It states our son, if we have one, would inherit Liberty Oak, oui?”
Jordan drew a deep breath, wishing he could be honest, but he couldn’t tell her the only reason they were married was because her father had blackmailed him. Knowing they’d never consummate the marriage, he had conceded, but the lie hung in the back of his throat with the bitter taste of bile. “Of course, I…I…meant I will keep Liberty Oak.”
“Jourdain? What do you want from me? You have gained how from my father’s shipping?”
“A percentage,” he lied, rather than admit it was to stay out of the Calaboose jail.
“To a rich man, that must be coins for your pocket, for my father is not as wealthy.”
He shifted his weight to the other foot, sensing another trap. Aurèlie was not only not pliable, but also very shrewd, like her father. How would he respond to that statement without revealing her father’s master skill at blackmail and that all of this was to protect his business interests. To his relief, she continued to speak, not expecting an answer.
“You paid my father to marry me and…my father paid you to marry me, oui?”
Amusing but true and he liked the honesty of the statement, since honesty had not been an element of this arrangement from the start. “I believe it went something like that.”
“You use me, and I use you.”
Her observation, no matter how true, carried a slight sting. He winced before he answered her. “It’s done all the time, Aurèlie. For centuries, fathers have bartered their daughters for either political or financial gain. But discrimination laws hurt everyone. However, the courts support left-handed marriages, or plaçage contracts, so life goes on.”
“For life to go on, it must first start, n’est pas?” Those dark eyes floated up to his face. He watched as she unbuttoned her robe, one button, then two, then three, until she had undone the robe and pulled it apart. Beneath she wore a light white gown, thin enough to see the dark shade of her nipples and the shape of her breasts, ripened and swollen.
His heart pushed ahead a beat or two as a fire, way too hot for Louisiana, sank into his groin and struck a match.
She exposed little with her daring moves, but the pure suggestion of sliding his hands over her naked breasts, kneading their soft flesh, knowing nothing would stop him, made that burn roll upward and put his muscles on high alert. Suddenly his deceptive life became unpalatable as he watched life—real life—before him in the form of a beautiful woman.
His mind reeled, feeling caught between reality and fantasy. What did she expect of him? He knew the answer and knew he could not deliver. He almost hoped she would choose to leave, instead of offering herself to him when he had every legal right to take her but a moral obligation not to. The marriage was a fraud. He was a fraud.
He swallowed hard, hearing the chatter of his men coming closer to the house. He ran his fingers down the side of her long slender neck, her skin like silk beneath his sea-roughened hand. He tried to sort out his mind, assign the confusing feelings swirling within his body to reason. His balance felt off-kilter, as his past collided without mercy into the present. He had to escape, escape her before he wanted more of her. He had been wrong to think she was a part of her father’s planning. She was warm of heart, unjaded, and looked to a future when he could see nothing but the past.
He stepped away. “Think about all of this, Aurèlie. I will await your answer in the morning.”
Chapter Ten
Maisie was doing her usual chattering at the small morning table, vying for attention, when Aurèlie approached. Though Jordan appeared to lo
ve his daughter, he failed to see her struggling to grow up in a place where time stood still, where she seemed not to matter. He had distanced himself from his household by retreating to the smallest room to the back of the house. Some day it would cost him dearly, for in the wake of his withdrawal, Maisie floundered.
Jordan rose immediately when Aurèlie entered. She was pleased to see that perhaps his lack of manners yesterday was an aberration but sensed they were more for her benefit. He motioned for her to join them, folded the paper in his hand, and gave her his complete attention. “Good morning, Miss Aurèlie.”
Relieved to hear his pleasant greeting, she released the breath that she had bottled within her chest. She had appreciated his honesty last night when they talked about the plaçage and what it meant both politically and financially to the two of them. She had never thought about how the laws that discriminated against her would hurt him, a white man, as well. He couldn’t marry a woman of his choice, unless she was white. But, she assumed, white would eventually be his choice. “Bonjour, Jourdain.”
He looked pleased by her response. Though she was sure it was not her use of French that brought that slight smile to his face, but the fact that she was pleasant.
“Did you sleep well?”
“Oui, most good.”
She had seen much from her window last night. Flashes of men skulking about the grounds came to her mind, but somehow she suspected he knew all about it.
He finished off the cup he was drinking. “Aurèlie, please join me in the library when you have finished.”
She looked up, and for a moment her gaze hung entangled with his. Her heart quivered against her chest as the appeal from those dark eyes rolled over her shoulders and curved down her spine. Feeling betrayed by her response to the mere reference of yesterday’s interlude, she tried for casual.
“I do that, but Jourdain? Let us define a time when the morning meal is put on the table? We all eat together. As would a family, oui?”
Maisie blinked a couple of times and slowly looked up at her father.
Surprise raised his eyebrows slightly.
