“Not mine!” Jessica said. “Not mine at all! I merely happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Eleanor opened her mouth to speak, but a knock on the door stopped her. It took her a moment to make her way through the children who’d run to the door, but she opened it to see Alexander standing there, resplendent in pink twilled silk. His wig of powdered curls was tied loosely at the nape of his neck with a pink satin bow. In his hands was a carved wooden chest. He patted a child’s head while he greeted Eleanor, then looked at his hand that had touched the child.
Eleanor handed him a damp cloth. “Good evening, Alexander. What brings you out on this fine evening?”
“I wonder if I might talk to Jessica?” he said rather shyly. “Outside. I mean, I thought we might walk down to the mill.”
“Sam! Stop that. I don’t know, I need to work on these ledgers,” Jess said. “Is it important?”
“She’ll be right there,” Eleanor said, pushing Alex out the door and taking the wet cloth from him. “Jessica,” she said sternly, “take my cloak and go with him.”
“There’s too much danger for me to leave the house, but a Montgomery arrives and suddenly I’m safe. Who’ll protect me from the hummingbirds that attack that coat of his?”
“Jessica…” Eleanor warned. “Go! He’s been courting young women all week.”
Jess’s eyes widened. “And you think I’m next? Oh heavens, Nathaniel, go get me a bucket of war paint, Master Alex is on the hunt.”
Eleanor just stood there, glaring at her sister.
“All right, I’ll go. Nate, if you hear me call, come get me.”
“And the hummingbirds?” Molly said.
Eleanor pushed Jess, wearing her sailing garb, out the door without a cloak. “Be nice to him,” she whispered before closing the door.
“Hello, Alexander, been working?” Jess asked, smiling at him as they began to walk. She would have been glad to see him—anything for a diversion—if she hadn’t been so anxious to get Clymer’s accounts done.
“I hear you’ve been seeing Mr. Clymer this week,” Alex said, clutching a wooden chest that was propped on his protruding belly.
“More than I wanted to. He says he hurt his hand and can’t do his accounts. Four times a day he finds a reason to visit me.”
“Has he asked you to marry him yet?” Alex asked.
“I’d put it at every twelve minutes. The last time he did, Sam wet on his leg. Ol’ fish-face Clymer didn’t move a muscle, just stood there and waited for my answer.”
“Which was?”
“ ‘No thank you, Mr. Clymer, but it was very kind of you to ask.’ Same as it has been for years.”
“Why don’t you marry him? He’s rich and he could give you and Eleanor and the kids a nice place to live, nice clothes, all the things women want.”
“Not all women. Eleanor and I made a vow after our parents died that we’d only marry if we wanted to, and we’d wait for the right men. We won’t settle for second-best.”
“And Clymer is second?”
She stopped walking and looked at him. “Alex, what is this all about? And what have you got in that box? Eleanor says you’ve been courting this week. Has something gone wrong?”
“Could we sit down? These shoes pinch my feet,” he said honestly. He sat on a flat rock just off the road. “Truthfully, Jess, I came to you for advice. My father wants me to get married.” He was watching her face intently for expressions of emotion.
“And?” Jess asked. She sat on the grass near him, a weed in her teeth. “There are lots of women around here. None of them to your liking?”
“A few. Cynthia Coffin is awfully pretty.”
“She sure is, and she bakes great bread. Your father would like her. So, did you ask her?” She didn’t see the look of disgust on Alex’s face.
“I haven’t asked anyone yet. I’m just searching. The Coffins loved the idea of me for a son-in-law.”
“Mr. Coffin would love to get his hands on your father’s wharf space. He probably thinks you’re incompetent as well as…” She stopped and gave him a quick look up and down. “New coat?”
His face brightened around a steely look in his eyes. “Like it?”
“Alex, why don’t you—”
“And Ellen Makepeace invited me to supper,” Alex said, cutting her off.
“Ellen is a sneak. I wouldn’t marry her if I were you.”
Alex’s jaw clenched. “Cathryn Wheatbury didn’t seem interested in me at all.”
Jess yawned. “That’s because she’s in love with Ethan Ledbetter. But then so are a lot of women. Ethan’s going to give you some trouble. You have the money and the Montgomery name, but then Ethan has…” She smiled.
“Ethan has what?”
“Looks, charm, intelligence. He’s very much a gentleman. The last time he was on the Mary Catherine we—”
“On the Mary Catherine! What were you doing alone with him?” Alex demanded.
Jessica sat up and looked at him in surprise. “Now don’t you go ordering me around, too. I’ve had more than my share from both your father and my sister. It so happens that Ethan came to buy some haddock—and he came with his mother. Ethan had to carry the fish for her.”
Alex relaxed his body. “It’s a wonder he could lift them.”
“With those arms?” Jess said, smiling dreamily in memory. “That man could carry the hindquarters of a whale home. You know, Alex,” she said, sitting up straight, “a couple of times it’s crossed my mind that maybe Ethan is the Raider. They’re built alike, both tall, strong, both very good-looking, and I doubt that Ethan’s afraid of anything. Only last year he—”
Alex was sitting upright on the rock, his back as rigid as a sword blade. “How do you know what the Raider looks like? The last time I saw you, you were saying you hated him.”
“I do, but that doesn’t make me blind. Ethan has the strength to swing on a rope like the Raider did.”
“So do half the sailors on the dock. Maybe any one of them could be this Raider you seem to think so highly of.”
“That I…” She looked at him in the fading light. “Alex, are you jealous?”
“Of the Raider?” he gasped.
“No, of Ethan. A lot of young women in town watch Ethan wherever he goes. You have to understand that when you court a woman, you may be competing with Ethan and, well, Ethan doesn’t…I mean he’s…” She was trying to be tactful but it was difficult. She looked pointedly at Alex’s belly and hair.
For a moment Alex glared at her, then he lowered his eyes. “I want to tell you something, Jessica, something I’ve told no one else in Warbrooke, not even my father…Only my body servant, Nicholas, knows this. You see, after the ship I was on went down off the coast of Italy, I had a fever, a very high fever. I nearly died.”
He looked at her through his lashes. “As a result of my illness, some of the muscles of my body were affected.” He put his hand on his stomach. “You see, because of the fever, I can’t lose weight. I can’t control the muscles, they were too weakened.”
Jess couldn’t speak for a moment. Waves of guilt washed over her as she remembered all the times she’d laughed at him. “And your hair?” she asked.
“My hair? Oh yes, I lost that, too. The wigs cover my bald scalp.”
“Alex,” she whispered, “I’m really sorry. I had no idea. I guess your illness made you weak, too. That’s why you can’t ride or work or even walk very well.”
“Yes,” he said.
“But your clothes,” she said. “Perhaps if you wore—”
“It’s the only thing I have left,” he said. “Take away my silk clothes and all you have is a fat, bald, weak-muscled former sailor.”
“I…I guess so. Alex, I’m so sorry. If only those idiot women knew.”
“Women?”
“The ones you’re trying to get to marry you. If they knew, surely one of them wouldn’t mind being a nurse rather than a wife. Have you tried N
elba Mason?”
“Nelba Mason!” he gasped. “She makes toads look pretty. Does she have a mouth under that nose of hers?”
“Yes, a small one, but no lips. Alex, her father has two hundred acres of good farmland. All right, forget Nelba. Surely one of the girls must like your money.”
“Not compared to Ethan’s arms,” Alex muttered.
“That’s a good point. But surely, there is someone who’ll have you.”
“Here,” Alex said abruptly. “This is for you.”
Jess took the wooden chest from him, then opened it to see a blue cotton dress inside.
“It was my mother’s,” Alex said. “Hardly worn at all.”
“But, Alex, I can’t accept this.”
“My sister married Pitman and gave him power in the town and Pitman’s the reason the Raider appeared and the Raider tore your dress—Eleanor told me—so I owe you a dress.”
“But Alex—”
He put his hand on hers. “Please take it, Jess. And I brought oranges for the children. They’re there in the chest under the dress.”
“Oranges?” Jess whispered and she remembered something that had happened when she was a little girl. She’d always thought Adam Montgomery was the most fascinating of men. Even when he was just a tall, long-legged boy, she used to follow him. Once, when she’d been hurrying after him across the wharf, she’d fallen and scraped her knee. She had had no idea Adam even knew her name, much less that he knew she was toddling after him. But he’d turned, picked her up, set her on a post, examined her knee, then smiled at her and said, “I’ll walk slower.” That night he’d sent Alex over to deliver a precious pineapple just for her.
“Jess?” Alex asked. “Are you all right?”
She looked up at him and smiled. “You might make a Montgomery after all.”
“Might?” he asked, his eyes widening. “I see, as compared to one of my illustrious brothers.”
“Now, Alex…” she began, seeing that she’d managed to make him angry again. “I’ll accept the dress and the oranges. Thank you for them.”
“Shall we return?” he said stiffly.
Jessica hadn’t meant to hurt his feelings and, as compensation, she took his arm while they walked.
He turned to smile at her and put his hand over hers for just a moment.
“Don’t worry, Alex, you’ll get someone. You’ll see. I’ll talk to Eleanor and we’ll see who we can find. I’m sure that between your father’s wharf space and that big house of his we’ll find a pretty young woman who doesn’t mind fat, bald men. Of course we may have to search in the south, since we don’t have a chance with the women who’ve met Adam and Kit. But we’ll find someone. Don’t you worry.” She smiled up at him in the darkness, but he had his head turned away and he didn’t say another word all the way back to the house. He handed Jess the wooden chest and politely, and rather coolly, Jess thought, took his leave.
The next day, Eleanor insisted Jessica remain at home again. The talk of the Raider was still strong and there was much speculation as to who he was. Jessica’s name was mentioned frequently. Eleanor didn’t tell her sister that Jessica’s name was always accompanied by laughter. The pretty girl had become a source of amusement.
By nightfall, Jessica was anxious to get out of the house. She kept imagining the bottom rotting off her boat or English soldiers being ordered to seize it. Eleanor said she was flattering the boat, that only the rats seemed to want the vessel.
Jessica left the house to empty a trough of dirty water and for a moment stood on the edge of the forest and breathed the cool night air.
Suddenly, an arm went around her waist and a hand covered her mouth.
“Don’t move, don’t make any noise.”
She’d have known that accented voice anywhere. She shook her head and tried to get rid of his hand.
“I’ll take my hand away if you’ll not scream. You could bring the English down on both of us if you scream.”
Jessica didn’t like to agree to his blackmail, but his big hand was cutting off her breath. She nodded.
He removed his hand, she took a deep breath and, in one motion, he turned her around so that her back was hard against a tree, one of his legs wrapped securely around hers and one arm pinning her head and hair against the tree. His other hand was free to roam.
“What do you want?” she gasped, looking into his eyes behind the mask. “Why are you here? What have the English done now?”
“I came only to see you,” the Raider said, moving his body so that it touched hers. His free hand was on her waist, his fingers and thumb caressing her ribs. “I watch you, Jessie. I think about you.”
“I don’t think about you,” she said and tried to move away from him, but she was pinned too securely.
He leaned forward and kissed her neck just below her ear. “You never think of me? You don’t remember the time we were in the blackberry patch?”
“No,” she lied, feeling herself sinking into the tree as his warm lips roamed all over her neck.
His hand encircled her neck, his thumb touching just under her chin, then his long, sensitive fingers traveled downward, his fingertips moving under the scarf that filled the low, square neck of the dress.
“Is this a dress to replace the one I tore?” he asked, his fingers lightly caressing the round, soft tops of her breasts.
“Yes.” Her voice was hoarse and shallow as she felt his hand beginning to massage the back of her head.
“Where did you get it?”
“Alexander,” she whispered. His lips were traveling downward.
The Raider lifted his head to look at her. “I saw you two together in the dark. What is he to you?”
“My friend.”
“Put your arms around my neck, Jessica,” he commanded in a low voice.
Jessica was too weak to disobey him. She lifted her arms and put them about his neck as he drew her closer to him, no longer needing to pin her to the tree. She could feel his body against hers, so warm and hard. Her breath was coming more quickly.
“You are mine, Jessica,” the Raider whispered. “You are mine.”
She could feel the silk of his mask as it caressed her skin just above her lips. She wanted him to kiss her, wanted his lips on hers, but he was denying her that touch.
“I belong to no man,” she managed to say.
He caught her hair again, pulled her head back, and then took her mouth with his.
Jessica responded in spite of her intentions. This man had no right to touch her, no right to say that she was his, but as his lips touched hers, she didn’t give another thought to right and wrong. Her arms were strong around his neck and when he pulled her to him, she responded in kind, wanting her body closer and closer to his.
“Jessie,” he whispered, pulling her head into his shoulder until she couldn’t breathe. “I can’t bear to see you with other men.”
“Who are you?” she whispered. “Tell me that. I’ll keep your secret.”
“No, my darling, I’ll not risk your life.”
She tried to push him away but he didn’t budge. “You can’t keep appearing in my life, ridiculing me, holding me against trees, mauling me in blackberry patches and expecting me to…to…I don’t know what you expect from me. I don’t know who you are, nor do I want to know. I wish you’d go away and never come back. The English are going to catch you and they’ll hang you on the spot.”
“Would you care?”
Her hands tightened on him, her cheek buried in the silk of his shirt, feeling his heart beat in her ear. “Why should I care?” she lied. “I don’t even know who you are. Choose some other woman for your attentions.”
He put his finger under her chin and lifted her face. “Do you really mean that? I came tonight only to see you. I know you’re being hidden because you helped me and I wanted to thank you for it.”
“You humiliated me before everyone, making all of them laugh at me.”
That mouth of his, with
lips of finely sculptured flesh, slid into a smile, a slow, secret, knowing smile. “A kiss is a humiliation?” He briefly, sweetly, touched his lips to hers. “A kiss isn’t a reward?” His teeth playfully caught her lower lip, the tip of his tongue running over the fullness of it. “I couldn’t resist kissing you that day, in spite of the danger. If I hadn’t stopped to kiss you, I wouldn’t have needed your help.”
“Then you were a fool. To risk hanging merely to kiss a girl…”
He kissed her four times. These short, quick kisses were somehow more intimate than a longer one. “It depends on the girl.”
“Jessica!” they heard Eleanor call.
Involuntarily, Jess clutched at the Raider, and since she was looking toward the house, she didn’t see him smile. “You must go.”
He put his hands on both sides of her face. “Promise me you’ll stay out of what I do. I can’t bear to see you taken again. Don’t risk your pretty neck for me. If I hang, I mean to hang alone.”
Her hands slipped down to touch his neck. She could feel the wariness in him and she guessed that he was alert to the possibility of her trying to remove his mask, but she was only interested in touching his neck, so warm and alive. She truly hated the idea of a rope about that neck.
“Jessica,” Eleanor called again, this time closer.
“Go,” Jess whispered. “Go before someone sees you.”
He smiled at her again, quickly kissed her and then was gone. Jessica stood there for a moment, missing his warmth. Her mind told her she should be glad he was gone, but her body wanted more of him. She straightened the scarf tucked in her dress and was refastening her hair as Eleanor appeared.
“Where have you been?” Eleanor demanded.
“Right here,” Jess said dreamily. “Not far.”
All evening Jessica was only half with her family. How could a man she didn’t even know mean anything to her? How could she mean anything to him? But the Raider talked as if he cared about her.
She didn’t, of course, care about him. Just because he was more courageous than a hundred men together, because he risked his life to help others, because he kissed her until she couldn’t breathe, because he’d chosen her out of all the women in Warbrooke—no, that was no reason to give him a second thought.
The Raider Page 9
