A Stranger's Secret

by Laurie Alice Eakes

  “Nonsense. The sky is cloudless.”

  “It won’t stay that way. I’ll stake a month’s wages on it.”

  Morwenna laughed. “I take the warning seriously then. Come along, Mihal.” She scooped up her son, much to his protests.

  Another storm, of course, was no laughing matter. At any time, the wreckers could strike.

  Her heart a heavier burden to carry than her son, Morwenna returned to the house. She reached the top of the cliff path as a quick breeze, not yet wind, blew off the sea and tugged at her hair and flirted with her skirt. A glance behind her showed a bank of clouds roiling out on the horizon, as black as smoke from burning oil, though still hours off before reaching landfall unless the breeze turned to wind gusts.

  “Nicca was right.” She hugged Mihal to her. “He knows his storms.”

  Did his uncanny ability to predict bad weather make him valuable to the wreckers?

  For a moment, poised atop the cliffs, she wondered if she should keep watch again. But no, she needed to remain inside, remain where people could declare she never left their sight. Not that such word would hold much weight. She could direct the wreckers from afar.

  She spun from the sight of sea and clouds and increased her pace away from the cliffs, Mihal squeezed hard to her side.

  “Down.” He squirmed in her arms.

  “Another word.” She let him slide down to the ground, then bent to take his hand and allow him to toddle beside her. It slowed her pace, but she would inhibit his bid for independence as little as she could while keeping him safe. “Can you say anything else new?”

  She could have missed something.

  Mihal paused to pluck a yellow flower from the hedge along the outside of the garden wall. “Good.”

  “Very good. May I have it?” She reached out her hand for the blossom.

  He started to hand it to her, then pulled himself up straighter and broke into the shambling run of a baby not yet two years of age. “Daft.”

  “Daft?” Morwenna stared at her son. “Where did you learn that word?”

  “I am thinking he means David,” Mr. Chastain said.

  Morwenna raised her gaze to adult level. “And when would he have learned your name?”

  “When you were busy with tasks for your grandmother.” He stooped to Mihal’s level. “We’ve had a fine time together, haven’t we?”

  Mihal handed him the flower and grinned.

  Morwenna stared, torn between annoyance that this man had usurped her son’s attention and grief that Mihal was growing up without a father. She wanted to think that she had grown up without a father and been all right, but that would be a lie. She hadn’t done well just because she was now a baroness. Mihal needed a man to teach him things she could not. For that, she needed a husband, a worthy man—a man worthy of being her son’s father. She wasn’t certain she was worthy of being that sort of man’s wife whatever her grandparents said.

  “I thank you for taking the time with him.” She spoke as stiffly as she felt.

  “My pleasure. It helps.” David rose, swinging Mihal onto his shoulders, much to the boy’s delight. “He’s a fine boy.”

  “I think so.” She smiled at Mihal, who grinned down at her.

  “Up, Ma.”

  “You are up.” Her glance dropped to David’s face.

  He watched her with an intensity that heated her despite the chill of the rising wind. “There’s a storm coming.”

  “So Nicca tells me.” She glanced over her shoulder.

  At the farthest horizon, the sea was turning the same color as David’s eyes. “I plan to stay tucked up inside the house all night.”

  “Do we keep a vigil so we all can vouch for your presence?”

  Eyes wide, she looked up at him to see if he was serious. He wasn’t. At least his eyes sparkled, belying their sober coloring, and he was smiling. Oh, a man who looked like him should never smile. It was unfair to the females of the world, especially ones like her who found resisting an attractive man’s charm difficult.

  She took a step back. “I had best be going inside. It’s time for Mihal’s nap. And I’m certain you have much to do.”

  “Are you? I’ve done little more than sleep these past two weeks, these past three days especially.”

  “You are looking well for the rest.”

  There, she had admitted it. He looked better than well with the sun gleaming in his dark hair and his broad shoulders carrying her son.

  “Do you think you’re well enough to travel soon?”

  “I’m well enough to go to Falmouth soon, yes.” Holding Mihal steady with one hand, he opened the garden door with the other. “I will depart after Mama gets here.”

  Of course, with money for him, money she couldn’t lend and her grandparents hadn’t offered.

  She offered him a better reason not to leave. “And the apothecary thinks you need to have a care for those ribs. Do they still pain you?”

  “Only when I breathe.”

  “Then why are you carrying my—oh, it was a jest.”

  “A poor one.”

  “No, I’m simply not used to jesting. Conan loved his jokes, and so does my cousin Drake, but since then . . .” Her lower lip quivered and she drew it between her teeth.

  He rested his hand on her shoulder, stopping her. “I’ve never lost a spouse, my lady, and losing my father hurts like a knife to the belly, especially if all was not well when the loved one passed.”

  “Of course all was well between us.” She shook off his hand. “I adored my husband and him me.”

  “And I loved my father, but he left us—”

  “Lady Penvenan.” Jago’s too-warm voice rang out from the terrace, interrupting what David had been about to confide.

  David inclined his head. “I’ll get this lad into the house. You have callers. I forgot to mention it.”

  “I’d rather take Mihal up myself.”

  But she could not. Jago, Caswyn, Tristan, Grandmother, and Mrs. Pascoe surrounded her the instant she stepped over the threshold, cutting David out as though he were nothing more than a servant.

  “I need to get Mihal upstairs,” Morwenna protested.

  “I’ll take him, my lady.” David inclined his head to her in lieu of a bow.

  “Good man.” Jago took Morwenna’s hand. “Have you forgotten we’re going to see the mines today?”

  “I had.” She recalled no specific day being set. “But we can’t go today. There’s a storm coming.”

  “Not for hours.” Tristan took her other hand, compelling Jago to let go. “It’s the nicest day we’ve had in days, and if it does storm, who knows when we can go again.”

  Jago grinned. “Want to inspect my investment.”

  “Run along, child,” Grandmother said. “You haven’t been on an outing in weeks other than church. Wear a cloak and you’ll be warm enough.”

  “But I can’t go with three gentlemen without a chaperone.”

  “You’re a widow, not a green girl.” Jago tugged her toward the door. “But we’re collecting the Pascoes’ sister on the way.”

  “She has come to allow my nieces and nephews to drive my parents into lunacy.”

  “Tristan, that isn’t nice.” Though Mrs. Pasco protested, she was there at Bastion Point instead of her own home with her grandchildren. “But Caroline can use the outing.”

  So Morwenna found herself herded upstairs, where Rowena waited with a riding habit Morwenna recognized as her own from before her banishment from Bastion Point more than two years ago, and her own boots. The latter fit just fine. The former was snug in the fitted bodice. For some reason, that made her smile.

  Afraid if she breathed too deeply she would pop the frog closures on the jacket, she descended to the ground floor and the waiting gentlemen. Not until the butler opened the door did she wonder what she would ride.

  “I haven’t been on a horse in two years,” she admitted.

  And she wasn’t the horsewoman her cousin was.


  “Your grandfather kept your mare.” Grandmother followed the party onto the front steps. “Henry has been exercising her for you.”

  “And she’s even gentler than she was two years ago, m’lady.” Henry spoke from where he held Demelza’s bridle. “You’ll be having no trouble with her.”

  Morwenna ran her hand down the mare’s glossy black mane. “I shouldn’t have neglected you.”

  “You have those dogs,” Tristan said. “They’re nearly as big as horses.”

  “And nearly as difficult to keep in feed. Henry, will you help me mount?”

  “I will.” Jago appeared beside the mare, bent one knee, and cupped his hands atop it to make a step.

  Morwenna grasped the reins and looped up her skirt so as not to catch it beneath her. She placed her left foot on Jago’s hands and prepared to bounce off her right foot.

  He curled his fingers around the arch of her foot and the other hand around her ankle. With him stooped, their eyes were on a level, and he held her captive, off balance, his dark eyes conveying a message she didn’t want to read. “I’d rather go riding with only you.” His voice was pitched for her ears alone.

  “Jago, please don’t.” She tried to pull her foot free. “I’m not interested in marriage.”

  An image of her lips mere inches from David’s the other night flitted through her mind, and her cheeks warmed.

  Jago laughed. “You’re blushing. I think that means you’re lying.” His eyes holding triumph, he released his hold on her foot and ankle and gave her the leverage she needed to mount the dainty mare.

  For the first mile, Morwenna felt insecure atop the horse, as though the slightest breeze could knock her from her perch. Then she settled into the rhythm of the mare’s gait and began to enjoy the gentle pace. Added to the fact that away from the sea the wind bore less force, she truly enjoyed herself all the way to the Pascoes’, where Caroline Pascoe Adair greeted them at the end of the drive.

  “I had to come out here to keep the children from following me. Good afternoon, Lady Penvenan.”

  “Mrs. Adair.” Morwenna nodded a greeting.

  Caroline was ten years her senior, so they had never been friends, merely polite acquaintances when Caroline was home from school. She was a pretty woman with a slim, athletic figure despite her four children. Jago dismounted and assisted her onto her horse. Though Morwenna watched, she couldn’t see if he grasped Caroline’s ankle. Morwenna wished he would so she could mark him as a frightful flirt and not truly interested in her.

  Caroline’s creamy coloring didn’t change. She sat her mount with the ease of a born horsewoman, already chatting away with her brothers and Jago.

  “Such a pity it’s Lent and we can’t have dancing,” Caroline was saying. “I would dearly love a good village fete.”

  “Nothing would be wrong with a private house party with dancing.” Jago glanced Morwenna’s way. “My mother is willing to host one, if I can persuade Lady Penvenan to join us now that she’s back into colors.”

  “Oh, do, my lady.” Caroline’s bright-blue eyes sparkled with anticipation. “I have boring sticklers for neighbors on that remote estate of my husband’s.”

  “More remote than Cornwall?” Morwenna stared at her.

  Caroline laughed. “It’s in Ireland. That’s why I’m here so rarely. So will you please say yes? We should be able to scrape together enough lively people to join in. Do you not have a houseguest who is, according to my naughty mama, better than passable looking?”

  The idea of quiet Mrs. Pascoe being naughty made Morwenna laugh. “Your mother is correct,” she found herself saying without thinking. “He—”

  “Is hardly the sort we should be inviting to our home,” Caswyn interjected.

  “He probably can’t dance.” Jago took up the thread of condemning David in the eyes of Cornish society.

  “He was seriously injured.” Morwenna knew what Jago meant, but thought it unfair. If every miner and his lady in Cornwall could perform country dances, so could David, who surely attended parties there in Bristol.

  “I think he’s malingering,” Jago said, “so he can stay in a fine home and not work. After all, he builds boats himself.”

  A defense rose to Morwenna’s tongue, but she kept her mouth shut. They were rounding a curve in the rutted track called a road, heading back toward the sea, and a gust of wind caught at her hat. She needed all her concentration to keep her hat secure with one hand and hold the reins with the other.

  “Why are we going to visit these mines?” Caroline asked.

  “Because I am going to invest in them.” Tristan raised a hand to his eyes and scanned the horizon. “Everyone says they are merely flooded, not paid out.”

  “With what will you invest, little brother?” Caroline poked Tristan with her riding crop. “Your good looks?”

  “And charm.” He glanced at Morwenna. “Of course, Jago thinks the same thing.”

  Everyone laughed except for Morwenna. She did not care for this feeling of being a bone over which two hungry hounds fought.

  “I am not a good prospect as a bride.” Perhaps she could discourage them. “I own nothing and cannot even be guardian of my son or his lands as merely his mother. If the trustees decide to sell Penmara, I can’t stop them.”

  “But your husband could,” Jago pointed out. “At the least, he would have a good say in it.”

  “And there is Bastion Point.” Caroline slid a sidelong glance at Morwenna. “Are you not the grandchild in favor at the moment?”

  The three men looked shocked that she would be so blunt.

  Morwenna merely snorted. “I am the one here, but we will see how long I remain in favor if I refuse to marry.”

  “Rebellion runs in your veins.” Caroline spurred ahead, then wheeled her mount with a grace that defied gravity and cantered back. “I always adored your parents. They were so adventurous. Did they ever find that sapphire mine they were after?”

  Morwenna’s chest felt as though a boulder lay upon it, and she looked away. “I don’t know of any sapphire mine.”

  “I thought it was rubies,” Jago said. “Somewhere in the east.”

  “It was emeralds.” Caswyn reined in and gazed to the darkening sky in the west. “I remember Mr. Branek Trelawny talking about it at the pub in the village one night. He’d had a bit too much cider and started going on about emeralds in South America. Lost Spanish mines.”

  “How come I know nothing of this?” Tristan asked. “It sounds like something right out of a gothic novel.”

  “More like something the Minerva Press would publish.” Jago gave Morwenna an approving glance. “I’m so glad you’re practical, Morwenna, and didn’t take after your parents.”

  “I won’t abandon my son.” Morwenna blinked, shocked at how much she wanted to weep.

  She had forgotten why her parents left on that last expedition. Or perhaps she hadn’t allowed herself to think about it until it slipped from her mind. Legends of lost emerald mines were more important to her parents than she was.

  She didn’t know how she would feel about them should they appear in her life again. She wished she loved them as David loved his mother and deceased father. She feared she didn’t even like them much.

  A light hand landed on Morwenna’s arm. “And now we’ve made you sad with our talk of your parents.” Caroline sounded contrite. “How long since you’ve heard from them?”

  “Six years.” Morwenna dashed her gloved hand across her eyes. “I presume they’re dead.”

  “How perfectly beastly of me to bring them into the conversation.” Caroline bit her lower lip and cast a look toward her younger brother.

  Tristan halted his mount and held out an arm to stop the rest of them. “I think we should turn back. This storm is coming in faster than we thought.”

  Indeed, the dark clouds that had boiled on the distant horizon an hour ago now created a curtain of rain steaming across roiling waves with the speed of a frigate und
er full sale.

  Caroline sighed loudly enough to be heard over the gusting wind. “Alas, I was so hoping for this outing to last. I’ve missed Cornwall’s wildness.”

  Morwenna fixed her gaze on the storm, glad it was coming in the light of day.

  No one would try to wreck a ship in the daylight.

  Without waiting for the others, her taste for the excursion banished by talk of her parents and their fruitless seeking after riches, she wheeled her mount and headed back toward Bastion Point. The others followed, the horses’ hooves thudding on the soft earth or occasionally ringing off an errant stone. From the sea, wind gusted like air through a giant’s bellows, puffing, withdrawing, blowing harder. One gust caught beneath Morwenna’s hat. She grabbed for it. Flipping off her head, it eluded her grasping fingers, soared over the mare’s ears, and swooped past her nose.

  Demelza shied and bolted.

  CHAPTER 13

  WITH ONLY ONE HAND ON THE REINS AND OFF-BALANCE from snatching at her hat, Morwenna slipped from the mare’s back. The ground flashed beneath the mare’s hooves. In seconds, Morwenna was going to find herself beneath those hooves, trampled, dragged. Her foot wouldn’t loosen from the stirrup. She opened her mouth to scream and inhaled a mouthful of her own hair tumbling around her face.

  Hooves thundered. The storm rumbled, and a streak of lightning lanced across the heavens, sending Demelza bucking sideways. And Morwenna’s foot slipped free. Seconds before her head struck the ground, strong arms caught her and lifted her away from impact, away from hooves, and onto her feet.

  “My dear lady, are you all right?” The others swarmed around her, mounted and dismounted.

  Morwenna shook her hair away from her face and gazed into Tristan’s pretty dark-blue eyes. “I think you just saved my life.”

  “I’d say he did.” Jago leaned down from the back of his mount and laid a hand on her cheek. “The lucky fellow.”

  “Lucky indeed.” Tristan grinned. “I think I should perhaps make you an honest woman after . . . er . . . seeing you thus.”

  Head still spinning, legs wobbly, Morwenna blinked at him in confusion. Then the first drops of rain landed on her wetter and colder than they should have been.