The Very Daring Duchess Part 20

"Poor little creatures," crooned Francesca, reaching out to brush a wayward curl from the forehead of one of the sleeping children. "You cannot imagine how pitifully ill they both were, retching and heaving so much that all their mother could do was pray to heaven for their innocent souls. It would have broken your heart to see how they suffered, Edward."

What broke Edward's heart was seeing two recently retching little girls asleep in his cot, their golden blond heads resting on his favorite down-filled pillows, where they could very well waken and retch again.

"Surely they'd be better in their own quarters, wouldn't they?" he asked cautiously, not wishing to disturb either the children or Francesca. "With their mother and their nurse?"

"Santo cialo, but they are useless-useless!" she sniffed. "Even while she was retching herself, the marchesa was much more concerned with guarding her jewel chests from the thieving English sailors than with tending her own daughters."

Edward's expression turned black. "My men are not thieves, Francesca."

"I know that, Edward, and so I told the marchese and marchesa, not that they'd believe me," said Francesca. "But that is why I brought the girls here, where they wouldn't have to hear their dreadful parents wailing and cursing. And when I saw this clever swinging cradle you'd had contrived for them, why, I put them to bed directly, and we all fell fast asleep."

"Francesca, la.s.s," he began, unable to be quite as selfless as she. "Francesca. This is not a cleverly contrived cradle for seasick brats. This is my own personal cot, where I had hoped to rest myself."

"Oooh." Her eyes widened, and she looked at the cot with new interest. Her mistake wasn't unusual. While most landsmen had heard of common sailors' net hammocks slung from the beams between decks, few had seen the counterparts for the senior officers, tucked away in their private cabins.

Edward's cot was typical, a high-sided box frame with a featherbed that was suspended from hooks in the beams overhead, designed to swing gently with the motion of the sea. Linen curtains, brightly embroidered with swirling flowers, draped down on either side like a tent to keep out the drafts, the same as they would on a landlocked bedstead. A cot also had the extra advantage of being quickly dismantled and stowed away in the hold when the ship cleared for action, and then a gun crew would come take charge of the great black gun in the corner.

Francesca ran her fingers along the edge of the cot's polished mahogany frame, a sensuous little caress that put Edward to mind of things better left unthought, especially with the girls as innocent chaperones.

"Veramente, but it is a most curious furnishing, and a large one, too," she murmured, glancing impishly across the sleeping girls at him. Gently she gave the cot a push to set it rocking toward him. "Though you say it is for you alone, I would guess it's quite large enough for two, Edward, isn't it?"

He nearly choked at that. d.a.m.nation, this wasn't fair. How could she be as angelic as any Madonna with those two little girls one moment, then be teasing him the next as if she were the greatest coquette in the Mediterranean?

"I'm a large man, Francesca," he said as evenly as he could. "I need a large cot."

"Naturalmente." She grinned wickedly, and gave the cot another gentle push. "Back and forth, back and forth. Do you never lie here at night and consider the possibilities?"

Of course he had. He was a Ramsden; he couldn't deny that, no matter how much he resolved to the contrary. And there was nothing like an exclusively male ship to make a man think more of women, and sailors from the lowest powder monkey to the admiral himself dreamed endlessly of beautiful and accommodating females of every sort and in every position.

But now he thought only of one woman, and that woman was his wife.

"How my papa would have loved such a contrivance!" she mused. "If only he'd seen this flying bedstead of yours, I do believe there would have been a sea captain and his cot among the figures in the Oculus, whether it was proper for ancient times or not."

And with that, Edward's beleaguered patience snapped.

"Enough," he said sharply, stepping around the cot to seize her hand. "Come."

Startled, she tried to wriggle free. " 'Come'? Come? You would order me about so curtly, like a wayward pet? I am not your dog, Edward!"

"No, not my dog," he said grimly as he pulled her after him, "but d.a.m.nation, you are my wife."

He threw open the door to where Peart was standing, waiting in perfect impa.s.sive readiness with Edward's red kerseymere dressing gown in his hands, the way he must have been stationed for the last half hour.

"Watch over the two young ladies, Peart," he said as he s.n.a.t.c.hed the offered dressing gown from the servant's hands. "If they cry, send for their nursemaid directly, and G.o.d help you if they foul my cot."

Peart bowed, unfazed. "Very well, my lord. The galley fires have been relit, my lord. Would you and her ladyship be requiring a hot breakfast?"

"We shall not," said Edward, anger clipping each word with uncharacteristic precision. "What we require is to be undisturbed."

With the dressing gown fluttering behind him like a scarlet banner, Edward stormed into the great cabin with Francesca in tow. He flipped the latch closed, making sure they would be alone, and released her hand.

"You may sit wherever you please, my lady," he said as he thrust his arms into the sleeves of his dressing gown, "or you may stand, or you may dance a jig for all I care, but we will talk."

"Meaning that you will talk, and I shall listen," said Francesca defensively as he began pacing back and forth before her. "Meaning that you wish me to be as meek and obedient as that pet dog."

"If that is what you wish, my lady," said Edward with the same razor-sharp edge to his voice, "then that is how it shall be."

Francesca backed away, her arms crossed over her chest so he wouldn't be able to see how her hands shook. She didn't sit. As long as she kept standing, then somehow she felt as if she were still his equal, his friend, his wife, and not the inferior that he suddenly seemed to wish her to be. This was the first time she'd seen Edward's great cabin, the largest and most imposing s.p.a.ce on board the Centaur, designed as much to glorify all England as well as the captain who called it home.

The long sweep of windows that ran the length of the stern were covered now with the deadlights to protect the gla.s.s in the storm, but the rest was more than enough to awe her: the long mahogany table with the dozen chairs, the bra.s.s lanterns and gimbals polished to shine like gold, the bull's-eye looking gla.s.ses in gilt frames and the carved sage-green paneling that would grace the finest London gentlemen's club. She supposed by rights the great cabin now belonged to her as well-at least to Lady Edward-but instead it seemed like the purest extension of Edward Ramsden himself, a formal, chilly place with no welcome for her.

Much, it seemed, like his heart was today.

"Am I to return to addressing you as my lord captain?" she asked, her voice brittle. What had become of the warm camaraderie they'd been sharing not a quarter hour past? What had she said or done to make everything disintegrate so suddenly? "Have I become too familiar? Too common?"

She saw a tiny muscle in his jaw flicker and tense. "Familiar is not the word I would choose, though the ones that are more apt are not words I should ever say to my lady wife."

"Perhaps you should, and be done with it, and done with me as well," she said, desperation making her dare him in a way that she knew wasn't wise. She had scarcely slept in two nights, and her nerves and emotions were frayed close to breaking. "I warned you we wouldn't suit, Edward, yet you would not listen."

"You are still my wife," he insisted, pulling the front of his dressing gown together. "For better or for worse, Francesca. Because I gave my word, you are mine. I thought I'd made that abundantly clear by now."

Sadly she watched him whip the sash of the dressing gown around his waist, closing it over his bare chest. He was a handsome man, the muscles of his chest as well-defined as a Roman warrior's and a pleasure to see, but that was not the main reason she'd wished he'd left the dressing gown undone. Earlier he had felt comfortable enough with her not to bother with such niceties, to forget his English propriety and include her into a private life that did not always include a uniform.

"Do not do that on my account, caro mio," she said softly. "If you are cold, then that is one thing, but otherwise, please, do not-"

"d.a.m.nation, Francesca, this isn't supposed to be a b.l.o.o.d.y challenge!" he exploded, stopping his pacing to stand directly in front of her. "What more do you want from me? Wasn't my word enough? What devil has sent you into my life to torment me?"

"What devil?" she asked, incredulous. "Maledizione, Edward, if you believe that, then-"

"Then tell me what else I am to believe!" he demanded. "I agreed not to bed you, not to touch you, until you were ready."

"And you haven't," she said, more wistfully than she realized. "Except for that one kiss when we were wed."

"My G.o.d, that one kiss," he said with genuine anguish. "Do you know how much that one kiss has haunted me these last days? The wind howled in my ears and the rain and sea dashed in my face, yet all I could think of was that one kiss."

"Oh, Edward," she said breathlessly, reaching her hand out toward him. "How very dear and sweet-carissimo!-of you!"

But he lurched backward, away from her touch. "Not dear, not sweet, not how I've l.u.s.ted after you. And when you describe the wicked acts in those d.a.m.ned paintings of your father's-"

"The Oculus?" she asked in disbelief. "That unsettles you? The Oculus is simply a part of my livelihood, as mundane to me as a hammer and anvil would be to a blacksmith's daughter."

"They were your livelihood," he said firmly. "They're not any longer, and a good thing, too. Thank G.o.d they were left behind in your studio. Now you can look to me for support, and not that pandering rubbish."

She twisted her mouth and frowned. Better he didn't know that the Oculus had escaped Napoleon and the mob, too, and was now bound for London.

"But my father's paintings aren't all of this, caro mio, are they?" she asked gently, taking a step toward him. "There in the other cabin-I thought we were doing so well together."

"Oh, aye, too well," he said heavily, looking down at the deck and shaking his head with despair. "You tempt me, Francesca, worse than any siren. I cannot explain it any better than that. I have vowed to you to behave like a man of honor, a gentleman, yet all I want is to ravish you like the most dissolute rakeh.e.l.l in London."