by Lisa Cooke
Chapter Five
Dyer’s eyes flew open in the darkness of his cabin. It took a moment before he realized the scream that awakened him had come from his own throat. Sitting up on the side of his bunk, he felt around in the darkness for his trousers. He had to get out of the stifling heat and away from his empty bed and its nightmares.
He could still smell the acrid smoke and hear their cries for help. Ironic he’d never heard those cries until the dreams began, and now they wouldn’t stop. Maybe if he had heard them when they’d actually occurred, he could’ve done something.
He pulled on his pants, barely fastening them around his hips before he stumbled out of his cabin to suck in the night air outside on the deck. The air moved very little in the warm summer night, but it was cooler than his bunk, and the reflection of the moonlight on the water helped to calm his jagged nerves.
It was peaceful out here, and the sounds of the night animals and flickering lights of fireflies appealed more to him than the terror of his cabin. For four years now he had fought that terror. Four years he had searched for the bastard responsible, and he felt no closer to him now than he had when he’d begun.
He walked barefooted to sit in the wooden chair he kept outside his room specifically for this purpose. The slats felt cool on the heated skin of his back as he leaned his head against the side of his cabin to wait for dawn.
There would be no more sleep to night, but maybe when the sun chased away the shadows, he would be able to catch a few hours before the rising heat would run him out of his bed once again. Then he would go into Baton Rouge to ask anyone he had missed earlier if they knew where he could find the murdering son of a bitch.
Lottie stayed hidden in the shadows until Dyer tipped back his head and closed his eyes. She never would’ve guessed in a million years anyone else would come onto the deck at this hour of the night. Thankfully, she had grabbed her shawl to cover her chemise just in case. Though based on the look on Dyer’s face when he’d stumbled from his cabin, he wouldn’t have seen her even if she were naked as a jaybird. She watched for a few minutes, pleased to see his face finally relax.
She had come to escape the heat.
He appeared to be escaping something else entirely.
Were they both properly dressed, were it a more appropriate time of day and if he liked her just a little more, she would have gone to see if he was all right. But none of those things was the case, which helped to alleviate the small amount of guilt she felt for doing nothing except stare at him through the darkness.
Of course, there was also the guilt she felt for staring at a half-naked man without his knowledge, despite the fact it truly wasn’t her fault. He was simply the most magnificent man she had ever seen, and sometimes even a proper lady could be curious. There didn’t appear to be an ounce of fat on him anywhere, and evidently the broad shoulders that filled his suit jacket weren’t from a tailor’s padding.
She tried to keep her eyes from drifting down to his belly where his trousers weren’t fastened completely, but they seemed to have a mind of their own, and at the moment, they didn’t mind looking. A thin line of hair ran from his navel to disappear beneath his waistband, and her face heated when she realized her thoughts had traveled lower still.
She was going to give the man her virginity in exchange for the lessons she needed to save her father. If anyone had told her a week ago she’d do such a thing, she would have laughed at the audacity. But to night there was no laughter, only surprise. Surprise that he’d demanded her body as payment and more surprise that she’d agreed.
What had she been thinking? She’d been thinking she had nothing else to offer, and her father’s life was more important than her maidenhead.
Maybe when all was said and done, he’d be a gentleman and not take his payment. Maybe he’d be chivalrous and congratulate her on her win with a chaste kiss on her hand.
And maybe she was the queen of France, she thought as she returned to her bunk.
The next morning, she heard from Sally that Dyer had left the boat just after dawn. After what Lottie had seen in the middle of the night, she couldn’t help worrying.
Though having Newt catch her watching for Dyer’s return was a little embarrassing. “Gone all morning again?” he asked.
She started to deny searching the dock for Dyer but knew it would be a wasted effort. “Do you know where he goes?”
“Anywhere. Everywhere,” Newt answered cryptically. “But you needn’t worry about Dyer. He’s a big boy.”
“I wasn’t worried, just curious.”
Newt grinned one of those knowing grins and offered Lottie his arm for a stroll down the deck. “How is it going with him now? Any closer to your lessons?”
Lottie smiled. “Actually, he’s finally agreed to teach me. We start this morning.”
“Hmmm.”
Lottie was beginning to hate it when Newt ‘hmmm’ed. It usually meant he was about to say something she didn’t particularly want to hear.
“I’ve known Dyer a while now, and I can’t imagine him doing that for free, especially considering how much he fought it.” He left his statement hanging with an unasked question she really didn’t want to answer.
“Well,” she hesitated. “I’m going to pay him when I win the tournament in St. Louis.”
“Ahh,” he said. “So if you don’t win, you don’t pay?”
“Exactly.”
Newt stopped walking and turned to look at her. “Be careful, Lottie. There are some things in life more important than money.”
“Most things in life are more important than money. Unfortunately, you usually need money to secure those things.”
Newt chuckled. “I guess I never thought of it that way.” He glanced over Lottie’s shoulder toward the gangplank. “Here comes Dyer now. I think it’s time for your lessons—just be sure the only lessons he gives you have to do with poker.”
“What do you mean?”
Newt raised his brow, and suddenly she understood.
“You don’t think he would . . .” She couldn’t make herself say it, but Newt’s expression left no doubt. Her face heated at the implication.
He lifted her hand to brush a kiss across the back. “Be careful.” He walked away.
She took a deep breath and pasted on a smile she hoped was friendly without being too forward. Even though she had coerced Dyer into giving her the lessons, now that he had agreed, she was nervous to actually begin.
She turned around with a smile. He returned it with a scowl.
Civil might be out of the question; perhaps she should settle for non combative. “Are you ready for my poker lessons?”
“Are you still intent on that nonsense?”
Raising her eyebrow, she said, “What do you think?”
He sighed. “I think I should have someone shoot me now and get it over with.”
“Really, Mr. Straights, such melodrama over a few simple card lessons.”
He shook his head and walked away from her. There was no way she would let him renege on their agreement. She’d opened her mouth to give him a piece of her mind, when he yelled back over his shoulder, “Come, Miss Mace! Don’t dawdle, I haven’t all day.”
“Well, I never,” she muttered, hurrying to catch up with him. No mean feat considering the length of that man’s legs.
They hurried down the deck, past the lounge and restaurant, and up the stairs to the passenger cabins.
“Where—where are we going?” she asked, gasping for air as she struggled to keep up.
“To my cabin.” He still had not turned to speak to her directly.
His cabin? “Why?”
He stopped and turned so abruptly she collided with his chest. He grabbed her arms to steady her and smiled wickedly, his voice dropping to a dangerously low rumble. “For your lessons, of course.”
Surely he wasn’t thinking . . . She blinked twice and swallowed. “Wh—what lessons?”
“Why, Miss Mace.” Slowly,
he traced his finger down the side of her face, then drew it lightly across her lips. “Don’t tell me you’ve already forgotten.” He leaned toward her until his mouth was just a few inches from her own. “Poker,” he whispered, then turned quickly away from her and headed down the deck.
It took a few seconds before she was able to get her legs moving again, and by the time she caught up with him, he was opening the door to his cabin.
“Wouldn’t it be more proper if we did this in the lounge?” she said to his jacket, thinking she’d had quite a few conversations with this man’s back.
He entered his cabin, pitching his hat on the bed before he finally turned to face her. “I believe it is in the best interest of both our reputations if our little lessons are done in private.”
She stood just outside his door, unsure of what to do next. She wanted the lessons, but . . . “I don’t see how going into a gentleman’s cabin alone could possibly be good for my reputation.”
“That’s why it’s important that no one see you, but if you’re going to stand out on the deck. . . .” He shrugged.
She looked quickly about and, seeing no one, hurried into his cabin and closed the door. She’d never been in a gentleman’s chamber other than her father’s, and the very thought of it had her nervous as a cat. She glanced around his room, surprised to see it was tidy but devoid of any personal items such as pictures or books. There was a faint smell of tobacco and bay rum lingering in the air and, much to her amazement, a lack of perfume.
She darted her attention away from his bed, her face heating at the memory of the disheveled lady she had seen in the blankets the first morning she’d met him. Dyer, on the other hand, seemed perfectly comfortable with the situation. He removed his jacket, added it to the hat on his bed and pulled a deck of cards out of a drawer in his bureau.
“Shall we?” He motioned to a small table under his window, where he sat down without pulling out her chair and began shuffling the deck.
“Tell me what you know about cards,” he said.
She pursed her mouth, sat down in the chair opposite him and pointed to his hand. “Those are cards.”
Surprisingly, his lips twitched with a quick smile. “That’s a start, I reckon.”
He laid one of each of the four patterns of cards on the table. She had seen them before as she’d served drinks to the men, and once, after the gamblers had gone, she’d studied one of the decks left on a table. But as a lady, she was raised to never play with cards, and she didn’t know what they were called or which was more valuable.
He pointed to a card with three little red hearts. “Those are hearts. The number of hearts on the card tells you the value of the card. This one, for instance, is referred to as the ‘three of hearts’ and is more valuable than a two of hearts, but less than a four.”
So far this was quite simple. No wonder men enjoyed it so much.
“This suit is called the diamonds.” He pointed to a card with five diamonds on its face. “What would be its value?”
“Five?”
He nodded and laid two more cards on the table. “This is a club and this is a spade. Each suit has a ‘two’ through ‘ten’ card as well as a queen, king, jack and ace.” He laid those four cards on the table as he talked.
She pointed to the ace of the suit he called clubs. “Is this the one card?”
He shook his head. “The ace is the most powerful card in a suit.”
“Then why does is have only one clover on it? Shouldn’t it have twenty or thirty?”
“Because it doesn’t,” he answered with a frown.
“Well that’s just plain silly. If the number of clovers tells what the card is worth, then the most powerful card in the suit should have more than one clover.”
“Perhaps, but that’s not the way it’s done.”
“Then where is the one card?”
“There isn’t a one card.” His voice sounded a little edgy.
“Why?”
“I—I don’t know.” He loosened his cravat and laid the suit of hearts on the table in a line, starting with the two card and ending with the ace. He took a deep breath and started again. “The ace is higher than the king, which is higher than the queen, which is higher than the jack.”
“What is a jack?” she asked.
He raised his brows and pointed to the card.
“No, that’s not what I mean. I know which card is the jack card, but I don’t know what a jack is in real life.”
He rubbed his hand down his face and sighed. “Real life, Miss Mace?”
“Why, yes.” Perhaps she needed to explain things a little more slowly. He seemed to be having trouble keeping up. “You see, a king and a queen rule a country, so it makes sense they would be powerful cards, but there’s no such thing as a jack, is there? Shouldn’t that card be a duke card?”
“What would the ace be?” He looked quite perplexed.
“That’s a good question.” She paused to think. “Who has more power than a king?”
“God?”
“Perhaps they should have a God card, but that might be sacrilegious, don’t you think?”
Mr. Straights was at a loss for words. Evidently, he had never stopped to question the logic of his cards.
“And wouldn’t it be easier if they put numbers on them so you wouldn’t have to count the little hearts and clovers every time they give you a card?” she asked.
He sighed again. “I don’t know, Miss Mace. I didn’t invent the cards, I just play with them.”
“It seems to me whoever invented them could’ve done a much better job of it, like making each suit have its own color instead of everything being red and black.”
He squeezed his eyes shut and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Perhaps you should invent a new deck with numbered pink butterflies and God cards.”
She smiled. “That would be delightful and would make more sense than black clovers that are called clubs and aces with only one heart on them.”
There he went, grimacing again.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Straights. Do you have a headache?”
“Occasionally.”
“Oh.” She leaned back from the table and folded her hands on her lap. He didn’t seem to be enjoying their first lesson at all. Maybe she shouldn’t have asked him so many questions he couldn’t answer. Men didn’t like that.
“I think that’s enough for today, Miss Mace,” he said, sounding far more tired than a man should at that hour of the morning.
She stood and smoothed down the front of her skirts. “I suppose it is. I need to go to the restaurant for lunch anyway.” She walked to his door and peeked out to see if the deck was clear. “Until tomorrow, then?” she said back over her shoulder.
“I shall count the minutes.”
Dyer watched her slip out the door of his cabin, convinced his sanity had just been put to the ultimate test. He wasn’t sure whether he’d passed or failed.
“God cards,” he muttered with a shake of his head as he scooped the deck off his table. He glanced down at the seven of spades he held in his hand and had to admit, albeit reluctantly, that having numbers on the cards would make the game a little easier. “But it’ll be a cold day in Hell before I play with a deck that has pink butterflies . . .”
He sighed.
Now the woman had him talking to himself.
The Magnolia Belle left Baton Rouge promptly at dawn, though Lottie had to take Captain Woodruff’s word on that since she was asleep at the time. A few hours after sunup, the deck was mostly deserted, except for the few passengers who took the opportunity to enjoy the scenery as the Belle’s paddle wheel pushed the boat through the current of the mighty Mississippi. The thump, thump of the wheel hitting the water sounded like a heartbeat, giving an odd sense of life to the large wooden vessel.
Lottie closed her eyes to enjoy the breeze and the rich fragrances of the river and the vegetation on its shores. The huge smokestacks carried the thick black wood smoke of the B
elle’s boilers high above the heads of those on deck, so none of the pungent odors interfered with the pleasures of their journey.
It was so peaceful at times like this she could almost forget the burden she carried. Almost.
“Beautiful morning, isn’t it, Lottie?” Newt’s voice brought her back to earth and its ugly realities.
She opened her eyes and smiled. “Yes, it’s quite lovely.”
He took a place beside her at the rail. “How did your lessons go with Dyer?”
“Oh, well . . .” She hesitated. “I found them enlightening.”
Newt chuckled. “Why do I get the feeling that if I asked Dyer the same question, I’d get a different answer?”
She knitted her brow. Newt had a rather uncanny way of getting to the heart of a matter. “He seemed a bit tired.”
“Before or after the lesson?” His teasing grin brought a smile to her lips.
“It’s not very gentlemanly of you to ask such a thing.”
“My apologies, fair lady.” He turned to look out at the river, then added as an afterthought, “You’re good for him.”
“I doubt he would agree with you.” She wasn’t sure where Newt came up with such a notion. Most of the time Dyer acted as though she was a curse.
“Only because he doesn’t know you’re good for him yet.” He glanced at Lottie out of the corner of his eye. “Be patient with him, Lottie. Don’t give up.”
“I think you’re giving that advice to the wrong person.”
Something over Lottie’s shoulder caught Newt’s attention. “Speak of the devil.” He nodded once in a greeting to someone behind her. “We won’t be in Natchez for a few more hours. Now might be a good time to continue with those lessons.”
She turned around to see Dyer walking toward them on the deck. His suit was immaculate, and his white shirt was starched and crisp against the tanned skin of his neck. He wore no vest, perhaps in deference to the heat of the day, but the lack of the extra garment allowed the outline of his chest to show against the thin fabric of his shirt. She pulled her eyes, and mind, away from his chest and glanced over to Newt, silently willing him to say something.
