Moonlight Surrender (Moonlight Book 3) (23 page)

Beth looked at Duncan, her brow raised in question. He had not mentioned anything about Jacob to her. “He is coming with us?”

Duncan nodded as he took up his horse’s reins. “We
will have need of an extra sword beside us. And another
pistol as well. And though I have your word for it, I have not seen how well you shoot.”

She had not oversold her abilities, but harbored no desire to point the weapon at a man. “Perhaps there will be no need,” she whispered.

Jacob was tying down his saddlebags but looked up to stare at her as he recognized the voice. “Mistress?
Mistress Beth?” His face looked as if he had seen an ap
parition.

“Aye.”

It was Duncan who answered and Beth who laughed at the surprise on the young man’s face. His bewilderment was due to the clothing she had donned. Skirts were far too cumbersome for a long journey on horse
back. She had borrowed a shirt and pair of britches from
Tommy, making his heart glad by trading him a gold coin for the worn clothes. He had run off, crowing, to show his mother his booty.

“ ’Tis I, Jacob.”

Jacob circled her slowly in wonder, as if to convince
himself that it was truly her. “Why are you garbed like Tommy?”

She saw the amusement in Duncan’s eyes. He had said nothing when she had entered the stable, as if he could expect nothing less from her than the unexpected. She wondered what he thought of it. She had received severe criticism for dressing this way before.

To her it made perfect sense. “Skirts are made for sitting in parlors and long strolls on moonlit nights. They are not made for riding quickly, for stealth and a long journey atop a horse.”

As she spoke, Duncan’s eyes swept over her form. The britches adhered to her posterior in a very pleasing
way. “There is much to be said for this new fashion you
have taken.”

His gaze made her warm and she looked elsewhere, afraid that Jacob would see more than he should.

They brought their horses out into the courtyard and found that many people had come to see them off.

Sylvia tearfully kissed Beth goodbye, then fell back into the protective shelter of Samuel’s arm.

“I charge you with her safety,” Beth told Samuel, and he but laughed, pleased.

“It is my first concern, I swear it,” he vowed, looking down into the older woman’s face.

As she turned to mount her horse, Beth found that

John had come to see them off as well. “How are Enid and the baby?” she asked.

“Well, both well, thanks to you.” He pressed something small and wooden into her hand. “Here.”

“What’s this?” Beth looked down and genuine awe took her features. In her hand she held a small, delicately carved cross. It hung upon a long, thin gold chain. Beth raised her eyes to the farmer’s. “I cannot accept it.”

She tried to return it to him, but he would not accept it. He pushed her hand away.

“Please, ’tis but a small token for what you have done. May He protect you on the journey you undertake, mistress.” John crossed himself piously. “Your name is sainted in our home.”

Beth hung the chain solemnly about her neck. “Thank
you.”

“”Tis I who should be eternally thanking you.” He bowed as he backed away.

It was time to go, if they were to make good time before evening. “Beth?” Duncan asked.

“Ready.”

She swung into the saddle with such grace, it filled
Duncan with pride just to watch her. She was a magnif
icent figure of a woman, he thought, and woe to the man who tried to tame her.

Duncan gave the signal. “Let’s be off.”

Chapter Twenty-three

If there were any doubts that still existed in Duncan’s mind about Beth’s ability to keep up, they were quickly dispelled when he saw her ride.

Holding the reins tightly in her hands, Beth leaned into the big bay. She and the horse were as one as they galloped across the lush British countryside. The wind was hot as it whipped through her long hair. It flew behind her like golden brown streamers.

Duncan urged his horse closer to hers and raised his voice. “You seem to the saddle born.”

Though they were moving swiftly, she heard the note of awe in his voice. Beth smiled.

“It always caused my mother much grief to see me ride thus.” She sighed as she thought of it. “Everything
I did caused my mother much grief.” Though they loved
one another, mother and daughter had no common
ground upon which to meet. Dorothy Beaulieu could not
begin to understand her daughter’s strange ways. And her mother’s wishes to remain hiding in the shadows of life often mystified and annoyed Beth. “She is far happier with my sisters.”

He had not thought of her as having more of a family than just her father. Since he was his mother’s only child, he had given the attribute to Beth. “Are there many like you at home?”

She guided her horse away from a low-hanging branch that would surely have tangled in her hair.

“None.” She flashed Duncan a smile when she saw the confusion on his face. “But I have three sisters, if that is your question.” Beth looked forward and continued, as if reciting, “All comely, obedient, and well versed in womanly arts.”

And hopelessly boring and dull, she added silently.

And very all different from Beth, Duncan thought. He
laughed and the sound echoed from the trees that surrounded them like green, shaggy sentries as they made way.

“I’d wager that the entire lot of them is not worth one of you.”

If she meant to suppress the pleased smile that rose to her lips at the sound of his pronouncement, she failed
miserably. Her mouth curved deeply. “You would be the
first of that opinion.”

He looked at her. If that were true, then he was not only the first to make love to her body, but the first to
kiss her lips as well. The idea pleased Duncan beyond
measure.

He nodded. “Good.” With a kick of his heels, he urged his horse ahead of hers.

Beth pressed her heels harder into the bay’s flanks, refusing to be passed. She did not ask what he meant by his comment. It undoubtedly had something to do with his manly pride. She knew that men enjoyed being the first to have a woman, and Duncan had been her first.

And, she thought, though Beth locked the secret away
deep in her heart, he would be the last. She did not have to look over an entire field to know when she had seen
a rare flower that had no match. So it was with Duncan.
She did not need to look upon the faces of all men to know that there were none like Duncan.

Beth had never been one to accept second best if there was something better in the offing. Rather nothing at all than settling.

And that, she thought, as she slanted a look at his face as they rode, would be what she would have in end. Nothing. For Duncan was not one to be shackled to
a single woman. Like a bee that was meant to go from
flower to flower, to gather honey where he might, Dun
can would always remain free. This was something she knew in her heart to be true just as plainly as she knew
herself.

The weather smiled upon them and the journey went swifter than Duncan could have hoped for. He knew the countryside well, knew the shortest paths to take. They
stopped only to rest the horses. Beth would not allow them to stop on her account. After so much delay, she was anxious to reach journey’s end. Beth feared that the weather would turn foul once more and prevent their crossing the Channel.

Far from worrying that Beth could not keep up with them, Duncan found that he and Jacob had to press hard so that they could keep up with her.

Though she seemed tired, there was an unmistakable
urgency that pushed her onward.

She was a complete puzzlement to him. She looked like a dove and behaved like a falcon. He spurred his horse closer to hers again, the way he had done a dozen times since they had set out. “You ride as if the very devil is at your back.”

Her breath was being stolen by the wind, and she had to husband it in order to be heard. “No, up ahead, from what I have heard.”

So she knew more than he had told her, he thought. “And what have you heard?”

She tried to separate the words from her thoughts
about her father, from her fears about her father’s safety.
She pretended that she was reciting something that she had seen printed in the Virginia Gazette back home.

“That there have been killings and lootings. That there are bands of self-righteous people reclaiming things that never belonged to them to begin with, that they had never had a right to, under King nor God.”

Jacob, who had ridden silently by them for the better part of two days, suddenly turned toward Beth, a question shining in his eyes. “Why did your father go to a place like that?”

She was surprised that Jacob had been listening. He had been so quiet, she had all but forgotten that he was with them. She turned slightly in her saddle and the wind whipped her words to him.

“Because he is a good man.” And good men do things
that get them killed. “Because his mother, my grandmother, and his maiden aunt are still in Paris, and he was worried for their safety.”

Beth looked ahead, unseeing. Before her eyes was the
last time she had seen her father and the conversation they had, the one in which she entreated him not to leave, all the while knowing that for her father there could be no other way.

“And because he thought he might be able to help.
Whenever people take up the sword, he thinks himself needed.” Beth turned toward Duncan. Her voice softened and perhaps there was even a hint of an apology there, because he had chosen to help her. “He fought against you in the Revolution.”

Duncan shook his head. She was still not clear about that, he thought.

“I did not fight in the Revolution, Beth.” He saw her open her mouth in protest. He was quick to clarify the
difference as he saw it. “I plundered American ships for English advantage which was clearly in my family’s in
terest.”

Her brows drew together as she tried to understand the words. Had she misheard him? He had said his father was dead, as was his mother.

“Your family?”

Duncan nodded. There was no other way to think of the people who populated his life. “The people you saw on the manor and at the house. Samuel, John, Amy. Tommy.” He laughed as he caught Jacob’s eye. “Even that one.”

It was an unusual sentiment, and a charitable one. “You think of them as your family?”

Since the moment he had found his way to the London streets and been rescued by Samuel. “ ’Tis the only one I have now.”

She thought back to the story he had told her about his father. “You mentioned half-brothers.”

His face hardened, as different from a moment ago as day was from night. “They are strangers.” He turned his
eyes toward Beth. “Blood does not always make family,
Beth. Feelings do.”

She believed he meant that, and it made her heart glad. She had been right in her estimation that he was a rare man. “Then you would get on well with my father, for those are his sentiments as well.”

Duncan laughed shortly as he saw Dover emerge on the horizon. Beyond that, the harbor waters shimmered, beckoning to him as the sea always did. “I do not know how well I would get on with him. I do not think he would take it lightly that I have brought his eldest daughter into danger.”

Because they were almost there, she spurred her tired bay on.

“I think that he would not smile,” she agreed readily,
“but he would understand that you had no choice in the
matter.” Beth raised her eyes to his, a pleased smile lifting her lips. “I am my father’s daughter, not my mother’s.”

Duncan could only nod. “I am truly looking forward to meeting the man.”

With all her heart, Beth prayed that he would be able to.

Duncan dispatched Jacob to discover which ship was leaving across the Channel for France at the earliest
scheduled departure. In the time it took to secure that
information, Duncan ushered Beth to an inn, though Beth protested that she was neither hungry nor thirsty.

‘Then you are even rarer a woman than I thought. But I am only a mortal man, and I require both if I am to continue on this journey.”

So saying, he chose the closest inn that did not look
as if it contained the dregs of seafaring society within it. Dressed as a young boy or not, even with her hair now
fastened and tucked beneath a cap, Beth was most assuredly womanly in form, and he wanted no more battles upon his hands than were absolutely necessary.

He nodded at the man behind the bar as he entered the Boar and Cock and quickly ushered Beth to a table. When the barmaid drifted to their table, he ordered three full meals, keeping Jacob in mind.

“Hungry, are you?” the young woman asked knowingly.

The dirtied blouse she wore barely clung to the swell
of her more than ample bosom. Her face was worn, her
smile eager; and her eyes were swift to measure the length and breadth of Duncan. She found him well worth her trouble.

“I’ve ways of satisfying men with large—“ her full mouth curved more, “appetites.”

“Then you’d best be on your way, doing it,” Beth said evenly. The woman turned to look at her haughtily. “Because his appetite will be satisfied by what he can find at this table.” The look in Beth’s eyes challenged the woman to say anything further.

Though she was clearly angered, the woman retreated. “Very well, I’ll bring your supper.”

She turned on her heel and stalked away.

Duncan lifted his tankard of ale to toast her. “Fighting to defend my honor, Beth?” Duncan asked, amused.

She pretended not to take note of his smug manner. “Merely assuring myself that I will leave with exactly what I entered with.” She leaned closer, her voice lowered. “If your head can be turned by something like that, you’re of no service to me.”