by Sara Reinke
* * *
Rafe did not believe her. Not for one moment, not yet, anyway. But he had agreed to her proposition, and that was as good a place to begin as any, Kitty figured.
To his credit, he was a perfect gentleman after breakfast, summoning freshly heated water for her, and stepping out into the corridor so that she could wash her face with a modicum of privacy. He had closed the door nearly all of the way to, stopped only by the chain links between them. Bathing her face and neck, and then swatting a brush through her disheveled hair to loosen all of the knots and tangles was admittedly a challenge with only one hand, but it felt amazingly good, these simple tasks, and Kitty was grateful.
When she was finished, she sat on the edge of the bed, her arm extended, her hand dangling in midair to allow him the use of both hands as he shaved. That he tended to this task himself surprised her.
“Why?” he asked, sounding amused when she mentioned this.
She listened to the soft splash as he dipped the straight razor into water to rinse it, and then a soft, melodic ping as he tapped the blade dry against the basin. “I do not know,” she said. “I have never heard of a nobleman shaving himself before. I thought you had stewards for that sort of thing.”
Rafe laughed, and she heard a faint scraping sound as he drew the razor against the thick growth of his beard. “What?” she asked, wanting to frown, but resisting the urge lest he catch her at it.
“Nothing,” he replied, tapping the blade again. “It is just that in Spain, we are nowhere near as worldly or proud as you English seem to be. We have never felt the need for ostentatious demonstration of any noble birth. You might be surprised how much larger the world is beyond your little Isle of Wight.”
She tucked her tongue between her back teeth and bit back a sharp retort. He was goading her deliberately, still uncertain as to her motives for being so pleasant all of a sudden. He was trying to trip her up, get a rise out of her, and she refused to let him. She used the mention of the Wight to tell him a bit about her life there, and the marriage her father had hopes of arranging for her.
“Michael Urry is a pleasant boy and all,” she said, after she had spoken at quite some length. She had nearly forgotten she was talking to Rafe at all, and had chatted openly and freely, her tongue loosened and unguarded. “I mean, if you are one who favors the bookish sort. He is rather short―compared to him, I am sure I must seem positively towering. And he makes this dreadful noise when he is breathing, a sort of sodden sound, like this…” She tried her best to imitate Michael’s unfortunate snorting and burst out laughing at her own clumsy attempts. “I cannot imagine marrying him, listening to that every night in bed.”
She blushed slightly, remembering that it was Rafe to whom she was confiding, not her handmaids or a female friend. She knew about lovemaking; she had heard plenty of rumors about the messy, malodorous affair that was one of the laborious duties of a good wife. But it was hardly the topic of proper conversation. She had forgotten herself momentarily.
“Are all English women like you?” he asked.
She blinked in bewildered surprise. “I…I do not know what you mean.”
“Do they all talk so much?” he asked, and she bristled. “In my country, it is considered a virtue for a woman to be demure.”
“I am demure,” Kitty protested, her brows narrowing slightly. The crimp deepened when Rafe laughed at this. “What?”
“I think you are the most un-demure woman I have ever met,” he said. “You have what we call despejo―a decided lack of inhibition.”
“I beg your pardon!” Kitty exclaimed.
“It is not a bad thing,” Rafe said. “At least, not to me. I find it rather refreshing, in fact. Although you do talk about the same sorts of inane gossip Spanish ladies tend to drone on and on about.” The chain jingled softly as he shrugged. “Must be a woman-thing,” he remarked, tapping the razor against the wash basin again.
Kitty’s posture grew rigid as she stiffened indignantly. “Perhaps if women were allowed to enjoy the benefits of a proper education, such as the type you’ve been awarded, we might have more of interest to discuss with you.”
Rafe uttered a soft bark of decidedly humorless laughter. “I would not call my education any sort of award,” he muttered.
“And I will have you know that yes, I do know a fair measure about other things besides gossip,” Kitty said. “Man-things, I suppose you would consider them. For example, I am not so ignorant of politics as to think that any so-called privateer who claims to sail under the sanction of the Spanish crown is not lying.”
She heard Rafe’s breath draw still, and she cringed, wishing she would have just kept her damnable mouth shut. He had been deliberately baiting her, and she had finally let him. She had snapped at him out of anger, crossing the tentative lines she herself had drawn in their hesitant, fledgling truce.
“My father sailed with a writ certified by Philip the Fifth,” Rafe said, his voice low and taut, as if he spoke around a clenched jaw.
She had broached the subject; there was no way she could take it back now. She could remain silent and hope to backpedal, repairing the damage her sharp tongue had just meted out, or she could blunder onward, come what may. As per usual, her mouth moved ahead without the necessary consent of her mind. “Ferdinand the Sixth is the King of Spain now,” she said. “King Philip died two years ago. He might have been an adversary of England, but his son is not. Ferdinand denounced his father’s privateering sanctions. He stripped privateers of the crown’s protection.”
Rafe’s breath drew in sharply, and the chains between them rattled softly as he stumbled. “What are you talking about?”
He sounds surprised, like I have caught him off guard, Kitty thought, bewildered. How could he not have known this?
“For the last two years, your father sailed deliberately against the English fleet,” she said. “Against the orders of your king.”
“That is not possible,” Rafe said. “You are wrong. Philip is dead, yes, but Ferdinand honors his writs. My father was a good man. He would never have sailed otherwise.”
He did not know, Kitty realized, her eyes wide. She said no more, pressing her lips together to stifle anything else her willful tongue might have offered to add insult to this grievous injury. Oh, my God, Rafe did not know his father was a pirate!
