Wherever You Are

by Sharon Cullen

  They reached the outside of The Scabbard without incident. The sweet smell of relatively fresh air hit them full in the face. Each of them drew in a deep breath, including Morgan.

  That place gave her the creeps. The sailors on the Adam had been unkept and dirty, but they never made her fear for her safety the way the men in the bar did.

  Morgan shook Patrick and Reed off, throwing them a dangerous scowl before falling in an ungracious heap on the cobblestone ground.

  Morgan awoke to a dry mouth and a head pounding in rhythm to his heart. He rolled over and his stomach followed a moment later as he pulled the pillow over his head. The weight of the feathers felt like a brick wall pressing against him and he heaved the pillow away.

  He cracked open an eye, then quickly slammed it shut. Some dumb idiot turned the sun on too bright. He ached all over, and what was that God-awful smell?

  He sniffed and grimaced. He was that God-awful smell. Where in the hell had he been last night? He vaguely remembered a wobbly corner table and a woman glued to his knee. Lots of ale. But after that things got a bit foggy. He examined various body parts, trying to decide if he was in one piece.

  Yup, everything there.

  He gently probed his throbbing mind, trying to recall what day it was. Then it hit him. Slowly, he opened his eye again. Pain washed through him. A different kind of pain. A soul-ripping pain. Last night he’d devised a plan to marry Juliana off so she was safely tucked away. And so he could return to his life and pursue Barun.

  For some reason thoughts of his revenge didn’t hold the appeal they would have a month ago. He gingerly rolled over and eased up the headboard, groaning when his aching muscles and head protested.

  How had he managed to make it home in one piece?

  Patrick probably. He would have to thank the little man as soon as he found him. But finding him would require getting out of bed and at the moment that task seemed Herculean.

  Morgan leaned his head back and closed his eyes. He tried to pick apart his plan, to find something wrong with it. It was still a good plan, even in the light of day. Sure he’d like to have Juliana at his side but that was impossible. He wasn’t worthy of someone like her. Not with his past and not with the things he’d done weighing heavily on his soul. Besides, he needed to be free to find Barun.

  There would be no more lying on the bottom of a tender on his ship, staring up at the stars and discussing life. No more standing on the quarterdeck and watching her stroll the forecastle with the wind in her blonde hair. No more seeing her dressed in his pants, imagining pulling those pants off and driving deep inside her.

  He couldn’t even think of making love to another woman. Not after Juliana's return.

  With an impatient yank, he pulled the covers off and swung his legs over the side of the bed. He leaned his elbows on his knees and buried his hands in his hair. God, even his hair hurt. He rubbed his face before standing. It took a moment for his equilibrium to return but when it did he felt much better, more able to take on the world.

  He turned and froze.

  Juliana sat in a chair in the corner of the room fingering his cutlass, looking mighty, mighty angry.

  “Feeling better?”

  He tried to swallow but his mouth was too dry. “Somewhat.”

  Why was she in his bedchamber?

  And then it hit him like a cannonball to the gut. Her yelling out his name at The Scabbard. Not Morgan, but Zachary. The furious look on her face, the anger and the hurt and disappointment clouding her beautiful blue eyes.

  “I take it you’d like to get cleaned up before we talk?”

  Oh, shit, damn, hell. She wanted to talk. He ran a hand through his hair and sighed. “Juliana—”

  “Not now. Personally I can’t stand the smell of you any longer.”

  She stood, wiped shaking hands on her pants and left the room, her back straight, her shoulders tense.

  Rich and full of vegetation and beautiful flowers, Morgan’s garden was an unexpected surprise. Drops of dew on the grass made it seem as if someone scattered diamonds across the ground and the sweet fragrance of roses and lavender filled the air. Juliana touched a velvety petal and for the umpteenth time since last night fought her tears, humiliation, anger and the host of other emotions threatening to pull her under.

  Zach was alive. Zach was Morgan.

  Her anger knew no bounds and she was fighting to control it. It didn’t help that he’d been passed out and she had to watch him sleep all the while wondering what she was going to say to him when he awoke.

  While he’d been spread eagle in his bed, she took the opportunity to compare the man to the boy she used to know. He wasn’t much taller than he’d been at seventeen but he was broader across the shoulders and chest. Zach had been fit, but Morgan was built. His hair was also lighter and longer, yet it was the eyes she kept remembering. They were the same deep brown but held a wealth of knowledge no seventeen-year-old would possess. She kept asking herself why she hadn’t figured it out before and felt like a fool for not seeing it. Yet, another part of her argued that the man and the boy were so different, and the circumstances beyond bizarre, that there was no way she would have known.

  A cloud passed over the sun and a breeze blew in. She crossed her arms, turned and paused. He was standing at the edge of the garden, the sudden wind teasing the ends of his newly washed hair. He’d put on clean clothes and smelled of mint soap.

  His stance was belligerent, arms at his sides, hands clenched into fists, face unreadable, eyes hooded. He’d put up a wall between them and she knew she’d have to fight for her answers. That’s all right. She wanted a good fight.

  “I thought it safest if you didn’t know.”

  Her heart thumped a little harder at the stab of pain that went through her. He’d known. All this time he’d known who she was.

  “You thought it safest,” she repeated. “What exactly were you protecting me from, Morgan? Or were you protecting yourself?”

  “It was best you didn’t know.”

  She laughed. The sound was harsh but she didn’t care. “You’ve been in the eighteenth century way too long if you think that explanation is going to fly. Now tell me the truth. Tell me why you’ve lied to me all these weeks. Tell me how the hell you’ve lived with yourself knowing how damn scared I was running around two hundred years in the past feeling like I was all alone. But I wasn’t alone, was I? Oh, no. I had big bad Morgan the pirate to save me, didn’t I? Except you’re not the man I thought you were.”

  She stepped back, out of breath, so angry she could barely see straight. “You’re a bastard,” she whispered.

  His face was unreadable, a mask. She wanted to slap his indifference away even as she realized he was protecting himself. There was no protection for her, however. Her wounds were open and raw. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “Because I’m not that boy anymore. I kill people. I steal. I do everything I have to in order to survive this life I stepped into. I knew you’d look at me and see the boy I used to be and not the man I’ve become. I’m not a naïve child anymore. I don’t believe in honesty. I don’t believe in truth. I don’t believe any of that shit I believed as a boy.”

  The venom in his words made her want to step back but she held her ground. He was right. He was different. Just as she was different from the girl he’d known. Their lives had taken different paths—admittedly his was more bizarre than hers—and they came out on the other side different people. But this need inside him to convince her he was evil and undeserving confused her.

  “You think this is the place for kindness?” He waved his arm, indicating the garden and beyond. “Look what happened to you—flogged, kidnapped.” His voice broke on the last word and he cleared his throat. “This is a different world, Juliana.”

  “You don’t have to tell me that.” She would bear the scars for the rest of her life.

  His jaw muscles tensed. The silence seemed to stretch for an eternity.

 
“For what it’s worth, I tried to go back,” he said. “I searched for the mirror everywhere I went. I asked but no one seemed to know anything about it. Eventually I stopped.” He looked away. “What was I supposed to do? I’m thirty-two years old with no high school diploma. I can sail a ship rigged for the eighteenth century and I can kill people. Even if I could go back, what am I supposed to do with those qualifications?”

  She heard his words but her mind only wrapped around one thought. “So there’s no hope? I’ll never go back?”

  The hard lines of his face softened. “I’m sorry.”

  She looked at the back of Morgan’s home. Zach’s home. But he wasn’t Zach. Not anymore. Here stood before her a man who’d done all the things he kept telling her he did and probably more. A man from a different time. A time she was now stuck in.

  “So what now?” she asked.

  He took a deep breath. “Now I find someone to take care of you.”

  “Take care of me?” She took a step back, stunned.

  “I thought I’d enlist Isabelle’s Aunt Sylvia to help find you a husband. I can put up a dowry.”

  “Wait a minute.” She held up her hand to stop his words. “You’re going to sell me to the highest bidder?”

  His gaze finally met hers but slid away. “It’s how things work here.”

  “I know how things work here.” Sophia had gone into excruciating detail about how marriage worked in this time. “Let me get this straight.” She hurt more than she’d ever hurt before. Possibly worse than when she discovered Zach was gone. “You’re giving some man money to marry me.”

  “Juliana—”

  “Just answer the question.”

  He sighed. “If you want to put it that way—”

  “You are such a bastard. You’re right, you know.” She had to swallow because the knot in her throat was choking her. “You’re not the boy I once knew. You’re nothing like him. He was kind. He cared about other people. He wouldn’t sell the woman he once loved like she was cattle.” She lifted her chin even though the act of defiance was ruined by the tears slipping down her cheeks. “Thanks, but no thanks, Morgan. I don’t need your help.” She turned and walked away even though her legs felt like rubber and she prayed her knees wouldn’t give out. She felt like the world had been ripped out from beneath her. Even more than when she discovered herself on a burning ship in the middle of the eighteenth century.

  “Juliana, wait.”

  She whirled around. “No, Morgan. I’ve had enough of waiting for you.”

  Morgan watched Juliana slip through the garden gate. He felt hallowed out, empty. A shell of himself. He was doing the right thing, damn it. She had to understand that in this day marriages were arranged and he could find her a nice, kind man. If she harbored thoughts of marrying him then it was best he shattered those right away.

  “Cap’n!” Patrick pushed his way out the back door, running toward Morgan in his bow-legged sway. Morgan took one last look at the gate and turned to Patrick. “Diego picked up a rumor at The Scabbard. There be a ship anchored in a cove off the coast of Dover. He thinks it could be Barun.”

  Morgan glanced at the garden gate again. He needed to find Barun but couldn’t end things this way with Juliana. The image of her standing before him—proud and shocked he was marrying her off—would probably haunt him the rest of his life. A stabbing pain ripped through his gut as if someone thrust a dagger inside him. He couldn’t leave things like this but finding Barun was more important. Keeping Juliana safe was most important of all. “Get someone to follow Juliana. Make sure she gets safely back to the Parkers’.”

  In resignation he headed to the house, mentally preparing for his trip to Dover.

  Chapter Nineteen

  When Penworth opened the door, he was still pulling on his dressing robe. His hair stood on end and one cheek held the imprint of a pillow crease.

  “I need to speak to Juliana,” Morgan said before the shock wore off the butler’s face.

  “Master Morgan, it is too early to come calling.”

  “I don’t give a damn what time it is.” Morgan shoved his way past. His boot heels echoed on the parquet floor in the quiet of the dawn.

  “Sir!” Penworth shut the door, sealing the entrance off from the weak sun just beginning to rise.

  “Juliana!” Morgan’s voice bounced off the walls and echoed along the corridors. He didn’t care. For the past four days he’d ridden with a ball of dread in his stomach that grew unbearable once he reached Dover.

  Something wasn’t right. His sixth sense never failed him and it was screaming at him that something wasn’t right. Where the hell was Juliana?

  “What the hell’s going on?” Reed came pounding down the stairs, shirtless, breeches half-fastened, pistol in hand. He stopped short and cursed. “Morgan.”

  “Where’s Juliana?”

  Reed grabbed him by the arm and shoved him into the library. “Are you drunk again?”

  “No, I’m not drunk again.” Morgan yanked his arm free. “Tell me she’s here. Tell me she’s safe.”

  Reed gave Morgan a confused look. “Of course she’s here and of course she’s safe.”

  Morgan ran a hand down his face his relief so enormous it almost buckled his knees. What the hell was wrong with him? Why was he acting this way? Of course Reed and Isabelle would protect Juliana. She was safer here than anywhere else, even at his side. He blew out a breath, suddenly feeling ridiculous.

  “It’s too early for social visits. If you were hoping to make a good impression on Juliana after all you’ve already done to her, you probably failed.”

  Reed was right. Barging into the Parkers’ home and demanding to see Juliana wasn’t the best way to go about this, but damn he needed to see her. All the way to Dover he thought of nothing but their conversation. And to make matters worse, when he arrived in Dover, there’d been no ship.

  After questioning the residents of the small town closest to the shore, he learned there indeed had been a ship anchored there named Bhaya and it sailed away the day before. Obviously Barun knew Morgan and his men were coming after him and if he knew that, he also knew Juliana was vulnerable.

  Convinced Juliana was in danger, Morgan raced to the Parkers’, not even stopping to bathe away the dust and grime of four days of travel before arriving at their door. No wonder Reed thought he was drunk.

  “I need to see for myself that she’s safe and unharmed.” Maybe then the hollow feeling in his stomach would go away. But even he couldn’t fool himself. That feeling wouldn’t go away and he knew why. He’d hurt her four days ago. Probably in a way beyond repair and he’d barely been able to live with himself since.

  “She’s fine,” Reed said. “Angry as hell, but fine.”

  “I need to see her. I need to see she’s okay.” It was as close to pleading as he’d ever come and he’d do more if he had to.

  Reed studied him, arms crossed over his bare chest. “I never thought I’d see the day the great Morgan fell to his knees for a woman.”

  “Bugger off, you bilge rat.”

  Reed merely raised an eyebrow. “I don’t know what happened between you two, but she doesn’t want to see you.”

  Hell, Morgan figured that much out by the look on her face when she stood in his garden, her emotions clear as day. The naked pain that flashed in her eyes had been nearly as painful as receiving the brand on his arm. He hadn’t known what to say to her. Instead, he did what he always did when someone asked about his past; he pushed it behind a veneer of cold indifference. It’d been a mistake but years of habit were hard to break, even with Juliana. He knew now he could never hand her over to a stranger and he’d been a fool to mention it to her. Unfortunately the damage had been done and it was up to him to mend it. He just wished he knew how.

  Reed uncrossed his arms. “I take it you didn’t find Barun.”

  “His ship pulled anchor the day before. Someone tipped him off we were on our way.”

  “That m
eans you have a spy in your crew.”

  Morgan paced. “Hell, I’ve known that. I can’t figure out who though.” He faced his friend. “I need to see her.”

  “Mate, I don’t know what to tell you. If it were up to me, I’d stay out of the whole mess, but Isabelle… Let’s just say you’re not her favorite person right now.”

  “Get the hell out.” Isabelle stood in the open doorway, tying a wrap around her nightdress. Reed placed himself between her and Morgan and Morgan half wondered if it was to protect him from Isabelle rather than the other way around. He’d never seen her quite this angry.

  “How dare you barge into my home in this manner.”

  “I came to see Juliana.”

  “You can just turn around and go home, Morgan. Come back at a more civilized hour.” She wrinkled her nose. “And after you’ve bathed.”

  “It’s all right, Isabelle.”

  Juliana appeared next to Isabelle. The sight of her stopped his breath. She was here. She was safe. He checked the urge to hustle her out of the house, to lock her away where Barun would never find her. However, he wouldn’t put it past Isabelle to have a pistol on her person or a cutlass hidden nearby and he sure as hell wasn’t getting himself shot or sliced before he talked to Juliana.

  Reed propelled Isabelle toward the door with a look of sympathy thrown Morgan’s way. “I told you not to get involved in this,” he said to his wife over her sputtered protests.

  Juliana stood alone in the doorway. The dress she wore was too large. The shoulders kept slipping and the color washed her out. She crossed her arms. The dress slipped off her shoulder and she shrugged it back up. “What do you want?” She glared at a spot above his shoulder and he wanted to shift into her line of sight so she’d look at him.

  “To talk.” What he wanted was to take her in his arms and kiss her senseless. To hold her tight to make sure she was all right. To never let her go. If he learned one thing on his trip to Dover, it was that life without Juliana was dismal and he’d been a fool to think he could ship her off to a stranger and brush his hands of her.