LAVENDER BLUE (historical romance)

by Parris Afton Bonds

  He blinked his surprise. “This is my cabin. Surely you aren’t going to be unreasonable at this time of night?”

  “Get out!” she yelled shrilly, all self-control gone. It was going to be another of their confrontations. But this time, in contrast to all their childhood clashes, she meant to get the upper hand. “I demand the privacy accorded a lady,” she said primly.

  He hooted. “A lady!” He crossed to her and grabbed her upper arms, pulling her from the bed. “Look!” he said, positioning her before the small, tarnished shaving mirror that hung above the built-in chest. “Look at yourself, Jen! Is that dirt-streaked face and wild-tumbled hair the mark of a lady? Would a lady be caught dead in boy’s pants that blatantly reveal her curves? Or those hands?” He grabbed up one. “Callused palms and broken nails?” He spun her around to face him and caught her face between his large hands. “But, Jen, I wouldn’t have you any other way. You’re real—vital—alive!”

  She shook free. She didn’t want to hear his tender words. They confused her, diverted her from her purpose in life. Oh, why couldn’t she think clearly! It was the confinement of the small cabin. “I don’t recall having asked you to have me in any other way—other than in name only. Yet you used me abominably, Cristobal!”

  He began to strip off his pants, and she whirled to face the window. Never had she seen a naked man. Even she and Armand had undressed in the dark and performed the ritual of lovemaking beneath the concealment of blankets.

  “I knew I would take you any way I could have you,” he said lightly, as if that taking were of no consequence.

  “Rape,” she said bitterly. “Oh, you might call it refined rape, Cristobal, since I did have a choice of sorts. But it makes you nonetheless despicable in my eyes. I could never come to love you as I—”

  “I know—I know. As you did Armand.” His boots were plunked down on the floor. “But I’ll settle right now for your arms.”

  She heard the soft squish of the mattress, and yanked about. “Oh, no, you don’t, Cristobal Cavazos. I told you that was my bed.”

  He crooked a lopsided grin. “Want to wrestle me for it?”

  She snorted in disgust. “No! I should have realized long ago you obviously were no gentleman.” She discarded her boots, first one, then the other, and came to the edge of the bed in her stockinged feet. “But you stay on your side. Our marriage conditions still hold.”

  When she had settled herself on the mattress with her back to him, he leaned over her shoulder and whispered teasingly in her ear, “I’m a patient and persistent man, Jen. Eventually you’ll see the error of your ways.”

  “Ohh!” she gritted. “Your conceit knows no limits.”

  He feigned a wistful sigh. “My one failing. But I’m trying to learn to be humble, dear. It’s awfully hard when I have a wife who secretly worships my body.”

  She squinched her eyes shut and prayed for sleep.

  But just as she would begin to drift off, Cristobal’s warm breath would tickle her ear or his arm would pull her close and awaken her. When his hand continued to snake around her waist to palm one full breast, she snapped, “Apparently it’s my body that is being worshiped!”

  “Let me pay your lovely body the full homage due it,” he coaxed.

  The way his thumb and finger cajoled her nipples into pert little peaks, the way her lower abdomen ached for the same attention—she was so badly tempted to yield. “You said you were my friend,” she reminded him. “Why don’t you leave me alone?”

  “I try, Jen,” he chuckled in the dark. “Really I do. But all my good intentions vanish when I get near you, and the lusty beast in me takes over.”

  The proof of his own desire nudged her impudently in the small of her back. Oh, she did worship his body—that was the agony of it all. Never had she and Armand performed the intimate acts of lovemaking she had initiated with Cristobal.

  When Cristobal’s hand slipped under the waistband of her britches to satisfy the yearning of her woman’s secret parts, she twisted around to face him. Her hand over his, halting its progress. “Cristobal, can’t you see?” she rasped. “Can’t you understand that if I yield now, I yield everything? My honor, my self-respect—that I dishonor the love I bear Armand? ’ ’

  He jerked his hand from hers. “Dammit, Jen. That’s just it. Bear! Present tense. Armand’s dead! When will you get that through your stubborn head? I can’t compete with a dead man!”

  “You’re not trying to be reasonable!” she charged. “There’s nothing reasonable or logical about love. By God, I wish there were. Then I could just reason you out of my mind.”

  He pushed her imploring hands from him and crawled over her and out of the bunk. As he slid into his britches, the soft moonlight that dappled the walls and floor illuminated his massive body. It gleamed with the movement of well-honed tendons and ligaments undulating beneath brown velvet skin. She stared. She drank in his masculine beauty. Her lips opened to call him back to her side, to tell him of their baby. But she changed her mind.

  Her want of him was overshadowing logic. She must not let herself forget that Cristobal Cavazos, for whatever reason, had become a coldly calculating rogue. When he couldn’t take her body in payment, he had taken her money. When he was bedding her, he was also making love to Rubia.

  The child. She knew she would never tell him. The child would be hers—with no ties to bind her to Cristobal. Once she returned to Texas, she would immediately divorce him. It was too late to wish she had never set eyes on Cristobal Cavazos. But at least now she had a child to love; someone to care for. Now she could understand why the Aunt Hermiones of the world would suffer dependence on relatives. At least they had someone to care for.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  The monstrous, forbidding Morro Castle, a fortress built by the Spaniards in the early 1500s, guarded the bottleneck harbor of Havana, Cuba. In its shadow stevedores worked feverishly on the docks, loading and unloading the contraband bound for both Mexico and the Confederacy. Even the Alameda de Paula, the promenade along the shore of the bay, was backed up with speculators, hucksters, merchants, agents for Mexico, France, the United States, and the Confederacy—all anxious to capitalize on the wars being waged by those nations.

  “I’ve spent almost three days in this cage of a cabin,” Jeanette protested. “At least let me go ashore with you.” He turned from the mirror, his face lathered with shaving foam, and coolly surveyed her—from her tousled hair down past the boy’s shirt that stopped short of a pair of well-turned knees.

  It was times like this when she felt she did not know her childhood friend at all. That feeling of comfort, of superiority even, that she knew with the dandy Cristobal vanished in the presence of the Frenchman Kitt. The way he arched a sardonic brow or smiled a lazy, infuriating grin made her light-headed. He might love her, as he professed, but she suspected she could not control him through that love.

  “Haven’t you heard of pirates, Jen? They abduct white women and sell them along the Spanish Main for enormous profits.”

  “You look like a pirate!” she said with a grimace that curled her mouth in disgust.

  He threw back his head and laughed at her candor. But he did look like one, she thought, resenting the amusement she seemed to inspire in him. Swarthy, with flashing dark eyes and a brace of pistols at his waist; his hair longer now, curling at his nape. All he lacked was an eye patch and an earring.

  “How about a gentleman adventurer or a cotton privateer?” he asked rhetorically. “Oh, Jen, most women would be cowering in the corner and weeping at their predicament. But not you. You were always anxious to taste of life. Come along then—but, por Dios, put on your britches and keep that wild mass of hair tucked in your hat. And, oh, keep those lovely lips closed—until later tonight.”

  She would not let his vile humor provoke her that morning. She was too excited about going ashore. Obedient as a manservant, she followed Cristobal, who was dressed in a finely cut, camel-colored frock coat, from
the longboat along the dock. The wharves were crowded with Negroes and Hispanics working shoulder to shoulder. She had to almost skip in order to keep up with Cristobal’s long strides as he made his way through the narrow streets lined with stone houses with tiled roofs.

  He turned into a small, narrow building bearing the box-lettered placard, W.E. CROWEL & CO., SHIPPING AGENTS. A small bell rang when they entered the office. A fair-complected man with wheat-colored hair entered through a side door to greet Cristobal, who presented his carte de visite.

  “You have managed to bring us another consignment, Don Cavazos?” he asked, smiling and shaking his head, as if the feat were incredible.

  “Cotton—salt—Mexican beef,” Cristobal replied laconically and seated himself in the chair the agent pulled out.

  Fuming at Cristobal’s rudeness, Jeanette was left to stand at his side. He seemed not to notice her presence and smoothly continued his conversation. “You, of course, have the order filled?”

  The tall, reed-thin man removed a sheath of papers and placed them at the corner of the desk before Cristobal. “Percussion caps. Rum. Molasses. And the Enfields. The last of them for a while. It’s almost impossible to get them out of England right now with such an increase in demand for them.”

  Cristobal nodded, glanced over the papers, and picked up the pen. “The supplies are being unloaded now for transfer to your dockside warehouse.” He scrawled his name, looked up, and said, as if it were an afterthought, “By the way, is there still a traffic in white slavery?”

  The agent frowned his disapproval. “Why . . . yes, though at the moment, as you must know, the profits are a good deal better in contraband running.”

  Cristobal inclined his dark head toward Jeanette. “I have a cabin boy here that I think would prove of interest to certain people in the market.”

  Jeanette gasped. “You wouldn’t!”

  The agent looked dismayed at the feminine pitch of her voice. “That kind of boy? I see.” The color that flooded the man’s fair skin indicated his discomfort with the entire conversation.

  “Actually not.” Cristobal cast an acquisitive eye at her, saying, “I have kidnaped a young virgin that I thought would bring a good price.”

  “Cristobal! Stop this immediately!” She didn’t really believe he was serious; she suspected he enjoyed taunting her. Still, one never knew about Cristobal. Had she ever really known him?

  A look of distaste passed over the agent’s now-red face. “We really prefer to deal in goods other than human flesh, Don Cavazos.”

  Cristobal sighed. “I was afraid of that. Besides, the girl has proved to be recalcitrant. I doubt if she would bring a good price.”

  While he concluded the transaction, she fumed in silence. After they left the agent’s office, she caught up Cristobal and jerked on his sleeve. He looked down at her stormy expression with mild surprise. “Don’t expect me to be amused by that performance back there!” she said. “It was disgusting—utterly disgusting!”

  “Oh, but Jen, I was so tempted. Think! I wouldn’t have to worry about you blowing my ruse to the French. No one, not even my own sailors would question me about your disappearance. And think about the money I would stand to inherit—and Columbia. Yes, I admit it crossed my mind. But, alas, good conscience forbade me.”

  “Bah, what do you know of good conscience!”

  He resumed walking and she fell into step alongside him. “Let’s say, then, that I would find it extremely difficult sleeping at night knowing some other man might be indulging in your—uh, delectable attributes.”

  She wrinkled her nose at his mocking grin. “That you will have to worry about the rest of your life, Cristobal Cavazos, because you certainly will never again enjoy my favors.”

  “Don’t count on that, Jen, dear.”

  She glanced up at him quickly, but his expression was bland.

  Before she could retort, he halted to purchase two mangoes from a raggedy Negro vendor pushing a cart loaded with an assortment of tropical fruits. He passed her one of the mangoes and sank his teeth into his own before he resumed walking along the crowded street. “Have you ever stopped to think, Jen, that perhaps you could be misjudging me”—he swallowed a bite—“and others?”

  The delicious juice coursed down her throat. “I doubt it.” She wiped the back of her sleeve across her mouth. “I think I know you very well. Too well.”

  “And Armand?”

  She fixed him with a freezing look. “I prefer not to discuss him with you.”

  He tossed the mango core into a pile of refuse on the cobblestones and said lightly, “I’m tiring of always hearing about what you prefer.”

  Caught off guard by the statement, she slid a glance up at her husband. He was gazing distractedly down at the shimmering turquoise bay that was studded with more ships than Bagdad’s. Yet the forbidding set to his lips warned her she should be careful not to take his words as lightly as he stated them.

  While he supervised the reloading of the cargo, she spent the rest of the day with Alejandro and Solis. Sitting on a crate, she helped the two tally the bill of lading. The mestizo treated her with the utmost respect despite her disreputable garb. And Alejandro seemed to regard her with a certain awe. He took the cigarette butt from his mouth and flipped it into the trash-littered water below the wharf before asking, “Is it true that you ride a horse astride—like a man?”

  She chuckled. Giving in to the urge that had been pestering her ever since she set eyes on the boy, she pushed back the shaggy black hair that hung into his eyes. “Yes, it’s true.”

  His bird-bright eyes widened. “And it’s true that you shoot like a man—that you really did shoot el capitán?”

  She sobered. It startled her to realize that being compared to a man was not all that flattering for a woman. “Yes. But it was an accident. I was angry. But people who can’t control their anger—their emotions—they lose in the end.” She sighed. “I don’t suspect I’m making much sense.”

  From behind her Solis said, “What you say makes sense, señora.”

  She colored, abashed at being overheard, and bent her head low over the column of figures she had been totaling.

  Toward evening, an affable Cristobal invited her and Solis to dine at the Louvre, a large café outside the city walls. Her reluctance even to speak to her husband warred with her desire to escape the confines of the ship. “Like this?” she asked, and indicated the soil-blackened buckskins.

  He grinned. “It’s the only way I’d trust you among all those lecherous men.”

  Solis bowed out, muttering he had other things to do.

  Whether he’d planned a night of drinking at the local grogshop or was merely making a polite gesture in deference to her and Cristobal, she was not sure. But Cristobal certainly made no effort to dissuade his friend.

  With its bull’s-eye windows and mahogany booths, the Louvre closely resembled an old English pub. A dark-skinned young woman with short, wiry hair placed tankards of stout and meat pies before Cristobal and Jeanette. The inn had a warm ambiance, and for a while the two of them ate in silence while all around them men joked and laughed and talked.

  As if to break the silence that grew ever more tense, Jeanette asked, “What did you do all those years you lived away, Cristobal?”

  “I survived.”

  She glanced up from the thick, crusty bread she was breaking. He counted on the dim seclusion of the booth to hide his expression, which was dark and guarded. “Yes?” she prompted.

  He set down the tankard of ale. “The thousand acres my father owned—they were seized by the United States courts. After they were distributed among a hundred and fifty or so lawyers, we were left with nothing. We were poor. As poor or poorer than Alejandro.”

  “I didn’t know,” she breathed. “I was just a child. No one ever bothered to explain—”

  “We emigrated to France where my mother had cousins,” he continued tersely. “Life was not much better. My father died wo
rking as a machinist in a shipyard at Nantes. My mother had to support my sister and me. I applied for my father’s job and was hired. And I grew up. Quickly.”

  Did she espy the tightness in his features? “Why did you come back to Texas?”

  He hesitated. The truth? For her? He thought of the thousand and one nights he had lain awake in hovels—on ships, even on the hard earth—dreaming of the saucy minx who had stolen his boy’s heart. To achieve that it had been worth the deception. He answered truthfully. “Partly for revenge.”

  “Ah, yes. That explains your ship’s name. And for what other reason?”

  ‘‘For my mother country. For Mexico. She needed— and still does—the help of her sons.”

  Perhaps Cristobal was right; perhaps she had misjudged him. Perhaps her love for Armand had colored all else. In light of what Cristobal had told her, could she blame him for some of the things he had done? His deceptions—had she not practiced her own? Something in her softened toward the boy she had known. But the man—she still could not deal with him. Not this new man. Yet had not both the boy and the man been recklessly daring and ingeniously resourceful?

  “But the United States is an ally of Juarez,” she said, wanting to get away from the personal direction the conversation was taking. “Why, then, would you even indirectly aid the Confederacy?”

  He tossed off the last of the ale. His mouth twisted in a semblance of a smile. “Juarez berates me with the same question. The truth is that feelings I have for a childhood friend overrode all rationality.”

  Uneasily aware of Cristobal’s brooding eyes on her, she disregarded the statement and attacked her food. Like an ostrich burying its head in the sand, she hoped that by ignoring him she could ignore the sexual tension that licked at her nerve endings.

  The barmaid refilled Cristobal’s tankard. He ignored the open invitation in the buxom young woman’s dark eyes and crimson lips, and proceeded to down the ale. Jeanette forced her attention on her food. But a little later she looked up from her plate to find his gaze playing on her lips before dropping down to the faint shadow of a cleavage in the open neck of her buckskin shirt. His pupils were glazed with obvious desire. Watching the way his lips touched the rim of his tankard, she knew exactly what he was thirsty for.