A Reckless Beauty (16 page)

Fanny took hold of the edge of the door as Valentine went to pull it shut. “Brede?”

Stupidly, his heart skipped a beat, as if she might just be inviting him to join her on the bed. And wouldn’t that be a mistake that could haunt him to the grave! No, he couldn’t bed her, not even if she might think she wished it. Not until he told her how he had left Rian to die.

But, once he told her, she’d never let him near her again.

“Yes, sweetings?” he asked, wishing she didn’t look so vulnerable.

“Perhaps…perhaps later we could…we could talk?”

He bowed to her slightly. “As much and for as long as you might please. May I inquire as to the subject you have in mind?”

Fanny had come a decision. The Duke of Wellington had trusted Valentine. More important to Fanny, Rian had trusted him. When Ethan had married Morgan, when Elly had wed Jack, those men had been brought into the family, told its secrets. Julia and Mariah, married to her brothers, were equally trusted.

Her papa might not be here to make his final judgment, but Fanny felt fairly certain he would agree that Valentine not be kept at arm’s length. She owed Valentine that much. She owed him the truth. About her family; about their pasts, as well as their precarious present.

And about her selfish reasons for marrying him. For, however much she might care for him, she had tricked him into marriage. For all the wrong reasons.

Besides, she’d never been a very good liar. She could tell a fib, but she always got found out by anyone who simply waited long enough for her pesky conscience to push her into a confession. If she’d been a more steadfast liar, she wouldn’t have spent so much time during her younger years peeling carrots in the kitchens, or counting the flowers in the canopy hanging over her bed.

“What shall we talk about? I don’t know, Brede. But I suppose I’ll think of something,” she said, smiling wanly, and then shut the door.

T
HE RAIN CONTINUED
as darkness fell over the water, forcing Valentine’s captain to steer the
Pegasus
by compass alone. But although the rain had been considerable for a time, the Channel remained relatively calm, allowing the steward to use the stove in the galley, presenting Valentine and Fanny with a simple but delicious meal of roasted quail and small, browned potatoes, turnips and carrots in a fine sauce.

Fanny ate as if she’d been starved for a week, and Valentine delighted in this return of her appetite. He sat back in his chair, his glass of wine aloft, and admired the way she daintily yet efficiently laid waste to the meal. She had changed into the gown she’d worn the night of Lady Richmond’s ball, and the candlelight glowed almost golden against the creamy skin of her chest and arms, that same flattering light turning her hair nearly silver.

Had she any idea how unusual she was, how very beautiful she was? That wide, lush mouth. Those devastating tip-tilted green eyes? Her tall, slim, body; yet rounded in all the right places. She’d believed it possible to pass as a soldier? With that graceful carriage, that proud tilt to her cleanly sculpted chin? He’d known her for a female in a heartbeat, and with the next heartbeat he’d felt himself begin to fall victim to her unaffected charms.

Then she’d shown him her daring, her backbone, her utter fearlessness, and he’d passed beyond merely wanting her. He admired her courage. And she stood in absolutely no awe of his supposed consequence. She’d stood toe-to-toe with him, dared to taunt him, dared to disobey him. Dared to laugh at him…make
him
laugh.

He took a sip of his wine. Yes, she was young. Centuries younger than himself, as he’d felt old for almost all of his life. Carrying the burden of his father’s unreasonable expectations, his constant criticisms, and then escaping to the Peninsula, only realizing too late that his father’s carelessly inflicted wounds meant nothing once he was put up against the brutal realities of war.

When Bonaparte had escaped Elba, Valentine had been reluctant to join Wellington once more. After so many years, he was tired of fighting. Tired of the once exhilarating risks he’d taken to gather information for the Duke, tired of battlefields, weary unto death of the carnage that never seemed to stop.

And then there was Fanny, exploding into his world and turning all his preconceived notions about his capacity to feel normal human emotions on their heads. Completely unexpected, wonderfully unique, extraordinarily challenging. He’d felt instantly younger, revived and most definitely interested.

He wanted that eager young woman back. Biting, spitting, impulsive, even mocking. He wanted to see her fire again, needed to feel its warmth.

Her brother was dead, and she was in mourning. That was understandable, allowable. But it was more than Rian’s death, Valentine believed. Sorrow he expected to see in her eyes…but not fear. Not fear of him, her new husband, he felt sure of that. Fear of going home, fear of her family? Yes, that seemed to be the problem.

But why? Why?

Fanny at last laid down her fork, patted at her mouth with her serviette and then smiled at Valentine. “I’m sorry. I hadn’t realized I was so hungry.” She shot a quick look to the silver domes covering a pair of plates still residing on the tray that had been carried into the room. “What do you suppose is under those covers?”

“I don’t know. I’ll ring for the steward to clear these plates and serve us, shall I?”

She rolled her eyes, a bit of the old Fanny back again. “Oh, nonsense, Brede. We’re not more than five feet away from the tray.” She got to her feet, picking up his empty plate, as well as her own and carried both over to the tray as he watched in amusement, returning with the uncovered plates where sliced peaches in burnt-sugar sauce lay carefully displayed. “Do you know that Lucie rings the bell for Frances when she wants her pillows rearranged behind her? I find that ridiculous.”

Valentine watched her work, amused. “And told her so, I’m sure.”

Fanny sat down, lifted her spoon after pushing a slice of peach onto it with her finger. She popped the slice into her mouth, and then licked at her sugary fingertip. “She thinks I’m a barbarian. She also explained that she is doing good works, employing people otherwise left to starve in gutters. I just think she’s indulged, and lazy.”

“And you told her that, as well.”

Fanny grinned, her first real smile in too long. “I think so, yes. And now she’s my sister-in-law, and she’s probably hoping we’re rarely in company. But I really do like her.”

“Most people do. I’m the Ogre, remember?”

She looked across the table at him, sitting there looking so formal in his evening clothes, his hair combed back straight from his brow. She realized that she missed the hideous gray greatcoat, the opened collar at his neck, how he clamped a cheroot in the corner of his mouth between his teeth, the way his hair seemed to naturally part at the center, allowing the long straight locks to tumble down around his face. Like a small boy at play, and delighted to be dirty.

“You’re not an ogre. Most times,” she amended. “You’re just rather…formidable, that’s all. Look at you now—all starch and arrogance. Why, I should be trembling in my shoes, just being here alone with you. But I’ve seen you otherwise, remember?”

Valentine shifted uncomfortably in his chair. It was a strange feeling, being uncomfortable in his own skin. But he was; Fanny had that power over him. “You’ve seen me other than arrogant? And when was that?”

Fanny held up one finger as she chewed on the last slice of peach. “The day you took me to Lucie’s. I had no bonnet, so you didn’t wear your hat. You were being kind.”

“Kindness, my dear, had nothing to do with it,” he said, relaxing somewhat. “I was daring the world to point to you and your obvious fashion faux pas, and snigger—for to insult you would be to insult me, as well. There are not many who would choose to do that. In point of fact, not that I remained in town to satisfy my curiosity, I imagine that there were at least a half dozen young sprigs of fashion daring the sidewalks of Brussels sans bonnets and curly brimmed beavers after our appearance. Now, how is that for arrogance?”

Fanny giggled. “I stand corrected. Morgan said that London Society is silly, and if meeting Lucie didn’t wholly convince me, you have just now proved her point. Are you going to eat your peaches? Because if you aren’t—”

Valentine slid the plate across the table. “Here you go. Indulge yourself, even as I step outside into the rain to smoke my cheroot.”

“You don’t have to do that, Brede. I like the smell of a cheroot. I even puffed on one the once, but I have to tell you, the aroma is one thing and the effect is another. I had to lie very still on my bed for hours, until the room stopped spinning. Rian kept threatening to jump up and down on the mattress so that I’d be sick, and I—
Oh.
”

So much for lighthearted banter. Rian’s ghost, mercifully absent during dinner, was now back in residence. “Fanny? Are you all right?”

She put down her spoon, took a deep breath. “I…I suppose it’s going to be like this, isn’t it? I can forget, even for an hour or more, but then I remember again. I don’t know which is worse. Forgetting for a few moments, or remembering again.” She looked up at Valentine, who had gotten to his feet. “How do people live like this? It hurts so much.”

“The pain has to begin to fade at some point, Fanny. Otherwise, how could anyone go on? Let me ring to have this table taken away, and then I’ll leave you alone for a while as I check on the horses and smoke my cheroot, as I make it a point to never smoke in here. The threat of fire, you understand.”

“No,” Fanny said quickly, jumping to her feet, suddenly loathe to be alone, even for a moment. “Wait, please, and I’ll go outside with you. I…I’d like some air.”

“Fanny, it’s still raining.”

“I know,” she said, heading for the other room to fetch her hooded cloak. “I don’t melt.”

She returned to the main saloon, the cloak around her shoulders, and Valentine stepped forward to lift the hood up and over her head. “We can’t let that bandage get wet.”

“I suppose not, although I’d rather be rid of it, if you must know. Odette always says that soap and water and good clean air are the world’s best physicians.”

“Odette? And who would that be?”

Fanny tied the strings of her cloak before answering. She’d thought of several ways to broach the subject of Becket Hall, but she hadn’t considered Odette as an avenue with which to begin her explanations. Still, the door had seemingly been opened, so she might as well barge in any way she could.

“Odette is a Voodoo priestess Papa brought with us when we came to live at Becket Hall. A
real
Voodoo priestess. Cross her, Brede, and learn to live the remainder of your life croaking like a toad.”

“Then I’m forewarned,” Valentine said in genuine amusement as he donned his old gray greatcoat, pulling a black knitted seaman’s cap from one of the pockets and pulling it down over his head. “And you brought this Odette with you, you said. Then you haven’t always lived in England?”

Fanny was still thinking about Odette, and wondered yet again what that woman would say if she knew about Fanny’s fears. Perhaps she’d say Fanny had been given the gift of seeing the future and her fear was a true premonition of disaster. Or she might say that her nightmares were a sign that bad
loa
were bedeviling her. Or perhaps she’d just call her a silly, selfish girl….

“Pardon me? Oh, no, we haven’t always lived at Becket Hall. And I must say, Brede, you’ll start no new London fashions looking like that,” Fanny added cheekily as he opened the door to the short hall and half-dozen steps leading to the deck. She brushed past him, pleasantly surprised by the clean smell of warm, rain-washed sea air that greeted her.

The rain was little more than a drizzling mist now, and she lifted her face to it for a moment, as she’d always liked to walk at the shoreline when it rained. She and Rian would come back to the hall, soaked, and Papa would say they looked like drowned rats, and Rian would—No. She wouldn’t allow herself to think about that right now. She’d begun a much-needed explanation, a confession, and she had to finish it. That her face, and Valentine’s, would be in shadow, hiding their expressions, could only be a blessing.

She walked first to the temporary wooden enclosure to look in at Molly, and Valentine stood close behind her.

“The slight roll of the yacht soothes them somewhat,” he told her as he put a match to his cheroot, “but they’ll be happy when we dock at Hastings.”

“We’ll ride them to Brede Manor?” Fanny asked him as they walked over to the rail.

“If you wish, certainly.”

Fanny frowned, her unpredictable, mercurial mood plunging yet again. “No, I can’t do that. I’d have to wear the uniform again—and I can’t do that, either. Never again.”

Valentine spoke quickly, to reassure her. “We’ll find you a proper sidesaddle in Hastings. I’ve a coach waiting there for me these past months, at a stable near the docks. But it will do Shadow good to have a gallop rather than to be tied behind the coach all the way home.”

“Thank you, Brede. I’d like a gallop, myself.” She turned around, pressed her hips against the rail, to see that she’d been right—the tip of his cheroot glowed red, but she could barely make out his features in the darkness. “Brede, there’s something I need to tell you.”

“Yes, I rather thought there might be,” he told her, taking his cue from her and standing beside her, his back also to the rail. “It’s about your family, isn’t it?”

She nodded, began again with Odette. “Papa brought Odette with us from the islands. From our own island, actually, very near to Haiti…”

Valentine remained silent for the next quarter hour, smoking his cheroot as Fanny recounted life on the island, life as Geoffrey Baskin and his family and those of his crews and their families had known it. She spoke quickly, but she left nothing out of the telling.

She told him how, over the years, she and five others had come to live on the island as Geoffrey’s adopted children.

She told him that Geoffrey had married his Isabella, who had borne him his only natural child.

How Geoffrey Baskin and his partner, Edmund Beales, had sailed so successfully as privateers, Geoffrey on the Black Ghost, her brother Chance and their friend Jacko eventually captaining the
Silver Ghost,
and Edmund and his crews on their own ships.

How Edmund had so cruelly betrayed Geoffrey when Geoffrey had announced he was leaving the islands, leaving “the life.”

How the eighth and last Baskin child had been added to the family on the same day that Edmund had landed his own crew on the island and killed Isabella and every other man, woman and child who hadn’t been quick enough to escape the terror he’d brought with him.

How Geoffrey had survived a terrible betrayal at sea, his ships limping back to the island, to be met with the devastation Beales left behind him.

How Geoffrey had gathered up any survivors and taken them all across the Atlantic, to the mansion he had earlier ordered built for his wife, turning all their backs to the sea and the life they’d led, longing only to hide, to be safe. To nurse their wounds of both body and heart.

She told him how they’d all taken the name of Becket, and how they might have wanted to live quietly, but years later had been drawn into helping the local inhabitants when their smuggling runs were put in danger by the appearance of a violent group of men called the Red Men Gang.

How her brother Courtland and the others had taken turns riding out as the
Black Ghost
in order to protect the local smugglers, and ended with Valentine’s friend Jack playing a large part in unmasking the Red Men Gang’s leaders…only to discover that the man those leaders had worked for was none other than Edmund Beales, long considered dead.

How they had just last year learned that Edmund Beales was much more than a smuggler, that his ambitions ran to controlling the destinies of entire countries, and that he had seemingly thrown in his lot with Napoleon Bonaparte…