A Reckless Beauty (18 page)

F
ANNY AWOKE TO FIND
herself alone, sunlight streaming in through the small round window across from the bottom of the bed.
Porthole.
She was fairly certain it was called a porthole. She’d really never paid much attention to anything the least bit nautical, preferring to ride her mare, practice shooting and fencing with Rian. She certainly had no interest in the day-to-day running of Becket Hall, and if Valentine had to depend on her to manage his household, they’d both probably starve to death within a fortnight.

Still, she was reasonably sure the window was called a porthole.

She knew definitely that she was alone in the stateroom, which was why she’d rather consider portholes than Valentine’s absence.

Not that she was in any crushing rush to see him again, after what had happened between them last night. She’d had a vague idea of what transpired between men and women; she wasn’t a baby, she wasn’t a fool.

But she’d had no idea how
intense
an experience it could be. How unsettlingly personal. Intimate. She’d encouraged Valentine, and then first accepted his caresses before eagerly seeking them out. And then, stupidly, she’d fallen asleep.

Was he disappointed in her? They’d done what married people do on their wedding nights. Morgan had been more than happy to share that fact with her long ago, but even Morgan’s frank speech hadn’t adequately prepared Fanny for the reality.

What possibly could?

Fanny’s thoughts kept running round and round in her head, making little sense, she knew, as she washed in tepid water and quickly dressed herself in one of the three gowns she possessed.

There was a round clock tacked to the wall inside a heavy brass-and-glass case, but she didn’t really need to look at it to know that the sun had been up for a good while. Her empty belly told her that. She was sure she had slept through breakfast, and could only hope that there were more peaches onboard the
Pegasus.

There was nothing else to do, and as thinking about what she’d say, how she’d feel, when she first saw Valentine wasn’t helping her courage at all, she knew she could no longer delay the inevitable. After all, unless Valentine had jumped overboard during the night, it wasn’t as if she could avoid seeing him.

Fanny opened the door to the main saloon, then climbed up onto the deck, to see the object of her apprehension and curiosity standing at the rail, with his back turned to her.

She was still shocked to see him looking so much the London gentleman. He looked so formal in his finely tailored clothing. He was so many different men, and she didn’t really know any of them. He was nothing she’d ever seen before, nothing she’d ever imagined or experienced. And he fascinated her, in so many ways.

Difficult to believe she’d dug her fingernails into his strong, bare back. Difficult to believe he had kissed her, touched her so intimately. Not so difficult to believe that she’d never tire of looking at him, never tire of his face, his voice, his touch.

She didn’t say anything. She just stood there, drinking in the sight of him, the absolute wonder of him. The Earl of Brede.
Hers.
If she went to him, put her arms around him, would he kiss her? Or would he tell her that such things were best left for the nighttime? She didn’t know. If she followed her instincts, she’d go to him, step into his arms. There was no more wonderful place to be; held by him, safe inside his embrace.

Valentine sensed her presence. How could he not? She was in his blood now; his heart beat for her, God curse him. “Good morning, Fanny,” he said without turning around. He was so tired, weary unto death. Empty of everything save his shame. So he’d take his usual refuge in sarcasm, his cutting tongue that had always well served to keep people at a distance. He was, he knew, the worst of cowards.

“Uh…yes, good morning. I overslept, didn’t I?”

“That, I would imagine, depends on your usual habits, with which, I might point out, I am not accustomed. My sister, for instance, would believe rising from her bed before noon to be a crime bordering on sacrilege.”

Her nervousness fled, and Fanny raised her eyebrows at she stared at Valentine’s back. My, wasn’t he being starchy this morning. Maybe it was the clothes? He always seemed easier in his skin when he was dressed like a rat catcher. Or perhaps he’d waited for her to come up on deck before he broke his own fast. She ought to get him something to eat, so he didn’t feel the need to bite
her
head off!

Then Fanny felt her temper begin to rise. If he had a problem with her, why didn’t he just come right out and say so? Fanny loathed anything less than a direct approach, direct action. Then again, weren’t those just the things that had gotten her into so much trouble over the years?

Perhaps she should take a page from Valentine’s book, and be more subtle.

“You slept well?” she asked him, determinedly staying where she was, trying again to have him turn around, to
look
at her at least, for pity’s sake. For she also was unaccustomed to being ignored.

“As well as could be expected, yes.”

She waited…mentally counted
one, two, three…
“Yes, I also slept well, thank you for asking.”

Finally, he turned to face her. She nearly put her hands to her mouth in shock, seeing the expression on his face. Or, rather, the complete lack of expression on his face. He wasn’t looking at her. He was looking
through
her. Dear God, she was young, inexperienced, yes. But had she been that much of a disappointment to him?

“Brede?”

“Come here, Fanny, if you please. We’re nearing the point where your assistance is necessary.”

“My assistance? I don’t understand,” she said, but nonetheless joined him as he stood at the rail, once more looking toward the shoreline less than a mile away.

He didn’t say anything else, waiting for her to realize exactly what she was looking at, while schooling himself not to look at her. He was an idiot. He was behaving like an unmitigated ass. But, Lord help him, he couldn’t seem to stop himself.

Fanny was silent for a few minutes, leaning on the rail, and then stood up straight. “We’re close to land, aren’t we? How pretty. But shouldn’t—shouldn’t land be to the opposite side of the
Pegasus?
”

“Off our starboard side, yes, that would be correct. If we were still on route to Hastings. Which we’re not. You were still asleep when I ordered the
Pegasus
turned about some time after midnight.”

Fanny ran her tongue around the inside of her mouth, trying to manufacture enough spit in order to swallow. “Why?”

“Because I’m taking you home. To Becket Hall. We’d sailed almost as far as Dungeness, but are on our way back toward Dymchurch, hugging the coastline. Becket Hall is somewhere in between, correct? Directly on the Channel, you said, below Dymchurch, somewhere in the Marsh?”

“But I don’t want—”

He cut her off. “Please, wife. Disabuse yourself of any thought that what you
want
enters into this decision. We’re married and, thanks to my actions of last night, that can’t be changed. But I am at last doing the right thing. I’m taking you home.”

Fanny didn’t know what to do, what to say. “And…leaving me there?”

“Perhaps, at least for a while. It’s for the best.” He couldn’t look at her. Refused to look at her. “You and Rian, your constant companion. You weren’t related by blood.”

Fanny looked up at him sharply, as his words sounded like some sort of accusation. “Yes. I told you all of that. And?”

At last he did turn to her, saw and did his damndest to ignore the confusion, the hurt, in her lovely green eyes. “And, madam wife, it would seem that you also talk in your sleep.”

“I do? I did?” Fanny felt her entire body grow cold. “What…what did I say? I don’t understand, Brede. What could I have possibly said?”

He ignored the question as he looked toward the shoreline once more, lifted the spyglass to his eye. The landscape had been changing gradually. Flattening, displaying a ragged, uneven shoreline. He’d seen stunted trees, a low horizon, an expanse of what he felt sure was an offshoot of the infamous, treacherous, Romney Sands. A smattering of miniscule villages he would be hard-pressed to put names to, no more than a few rough houses and shingle beaches lined with crude longboats.

He’d been watching, searching the shoreline, since dawn.

But now there was something else visible, situated in the center of an area seemingly scooped out of the shore by a giant hand, surrounded on three sides by the low vastness of the Marsh. A large manor house, four stories high if he included the attics; sprawling, with a stone terrace that ran the length of the building. Sunlight winked back from at least three dozen large windows; several levels of steep roof were dotted with massive chimneys.

Looking more closely, he noticed that none of the windows were on the lowest level of the house, and that no trees or shrubberies offered any sort of cover to anyone who was to come within two hundred feet of that house from at least the three directions he could see. He imagined the fourth was equally bare. There were two stone stairways leading up to the terrace, but anyone coming up to the house via those steps would be exposed at all times.

It didn’t take a particularly vivid imagination to picture sturdy wooden shutters inside each of those windows, ready to be shut tight against any enemy, be it storms coming off the Channel, or assault of another sort.

An impressive sight. It wasn’t a castle. It didn’t boast a moat or a keep. But it was nonetheless a thoughtfully designed and positioned stone fortress, cleverly disguised as a country residence.

Beyond it, following a slight rise, lay a small, neat village consisting of one long street and a few alleyways. He squinted through the spyglass, amazed to see what he believed to be a carved mermaid, a wooden figurehead, probably once attached to a ship’s bow, standing at the Channel-side entrance to the village.

There were two sloops and a frigate—fine ships—anchored in the natural harbor, as well as longboats pulled up on the beach. Valentine would wager his eyeteeth that there were cannon aboard those innocent-looking sloops, even if he couldn’t see them.

At last Valentine smiled, but without amusement. “I suppose I didn’t need you at all, did I? Or, as the ancient proverb put it so well, ‘Home is home, be it never so homely,’ hmm?”

“Oh, God,” Fanny whispered, holding the rail tight with both hands, so that she wouldn’t fall to her knees.
Home.
The way she remembered it. The way she had stupidly feared seeing it again. Now all she wanted was to be off this yacht, safe inside her old bedchamber, so that she could think what to do next, how to fix whatever had been so brutally broken between Valentine and herself. “What did I say? Tell me what I said.”

“Nothing you hadn’t said before, wife. You made it clear to me often enough that you loved your brother. You followed him all the way to Brussels, didn’t you? The misunderstanding is mine, Fanny, and the blame is likewise mine. I seduced a vulnerable, grieving young woman, and should most probably be flogged, if not summarily taken out and shot. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to speak to the captain.”

Fanny put out her hand to stop him, but quickly realized it would do no good. Anything she said would be suspect, taken as a betrayal of Rian and her feelings for him. Taken as selfish lies meant to ingratiate herself with Valentine. With her husband. If he considered himself guilty of some crime or sin, that did not place her in the role of the innocent.

With a last look at his departing back, she turned once more to the railing, and didn’t move again until the
Pegasus
had dropped anchor beside the
Respite.

Her family had gathered on the terrace, standing together, watching the progress of the
Pegasus,
but Ainsley Becket was already waiting on the shore, Jack Eastwood beside him. A longboat was already in the water, being rowed out to the yacht, as even a smaller vessel like the
Pegasus
had to be anchored a good hundred yards from the shallow waters along the shore.

“They’re wearing black armbands. They know about Rian,” Fanny said as Valentine stood beside her at the rail. She didn’t care if he stood beside her, or if he simply tossed her into the longboat when it pulled aside, and then ordered the anchor lifted and disappeared back into the Channel.

Because she now felt numb. She felt nothing at all. She didn’t think she could ever feel anything again.

But Fanny was wrong. The moment she stepped onshore, the moment Ainsley Becket put his hands on her shoulders, looked into her eyes, at the bandage on her face, she felt an unbearable pain rip through her, taking her breath with its intensity. “Oh, Papa…I’m so sorry,” she managed, and then fell into his arms, sobbing.

Valentine watched as the tall, impressively handsome man with the penetrating blue gaze nodded to him as if to say
later, I’ll deal with you,
and then turned, his arm around Fanny’s shoulders as he held her close to his side, guided her across the shingle and sand toward Becket Hall.

“You brought her home,” Jack said, extending his right hand to Valentine. “How badly was she injured? And how, Valentine? How the hell did she manage to get herself shot? Have you brought Rian’s body home for burial? Your note was brief, and the Sergeant-Major didn’t have many answers for us.”

“Later, Jack.” Valentine tilted his head toward the village. “Is there a taproom anywhere close by, old friend?”

Jack frowned. “There is.
The Last Voyage.
But I think you’ll be wanted, up at the house.”

“Then they can damn well wait for me. Right now, Jack, I feel a crushing need to get myself very, very drunk.”

Jack’s frown disappeared and he smiled slightly. “Fanny can do that to a person, I suppose. She meant well, Valentine. She was the younger, but she always seemed to put herself in the role of Rian’s protector.”

“Yes, among other things,” Valentine said, starting for the village, only to have Jack take hold of his arm.