Almost a Scandal (35 page)

Willis set his lads scrambling for the royals even before they heard the mixed voices of Mr. Charlton putting the helm over once more, and Col ordering the sails hauled over hard, to fall off the wind and carry the ship’s momentum back southward. Sally was suddenly glad for the seemingly tedious hours of sail drill they had endured in the Channel as
Audacious
came about into the wind as smartly and swiftly as Col could have desired.

It was a long day of watching the enemy, and signaling all their information to the line of English frigates waiting for just such purpose to the southwest. Captain McAlden was a cool one, staying with the enemy fleet as close as could be as they made their ponderous way down the coast, swooping in close to gauge the strength and numbers of each ship, and then easily sailing closer to the wind to westward so he might relay his reports by signal to the
Euryalus,
and therefore to Admiral Nelson.

Sally didn’t think she had ever worked as hard as she did with Will Jellicoe, sending a constant stream of information as Captain McAlden thought necessary. Even knowing the codes well, she was still forced to constantly flip through the code book and work the signals out on a slate before they could find the necessary flags, set them out in order, tie them on, and haul them up. And then the reverse, hauling down and untying, and especially refurling and storing correctly so they might be found again easily. It was laborious, mind-stretching work, and it lasted until the last instant of daylight, when the dark of the coming night finally allowed them respite.

The French, and especially the Spanish, did nothing to disguise themselves through the night, though Captain McAlden took all precautions and had all the lights put out on
Audacious,
allowing him to sail well within the enemy’s range. He was not through any mischance going to let himself lose them.

In anticipation of the battle, which to them seemed entirely inevitable, but which the Spanish and French seemed to think they could avoid, the captain asked Mr. Colyear to arrange the watches so more men could have a long stretch of uninterrupted sleep in order to be well rested for the grueling day to come.

Which meant that Col and Sally were finally in the gunroom at the same time.

Yet the brief look he gave her—fierce but somehow bleak, all dark scowling brow—did not encourage her to seek him out. She went instead into her own cuddy to attend to other equally important matters.

She must finally write to her family. She must write them all and explain herself. She hardly knew where to start, except at the beginning when she had first thought of taking Richard’s place, but at this point, after so long, and with uncertainty looming, her reasons at the beginning no longer seemed important. What was important was that they know she loved them, and that she hoped she had honored them, and that they would honor her for that.

It was difficult, but once she had made an honest start, the words poured off her pen. More than anything else, she wanted them to know she had been happy aboard
Audacious
. As happy as she had ever been in her life. But she could not bring herself to tell them the chief reason why she had been so happy. Or with whom.

She could not tell them about Col, other than to say Mr. Colyear had been everything an officer ought. Everything in a friend. Everything to her.

Everything that she no longer wanted to ignore. He was too close, too important. “Col?”

“Kent.” His voice came through the dividing wall, gravelly with strain. “What are you doing?”

“Writing. I’ve finally written my father.”

“Finally?” He swore vehemently under his breath. “Damn your eyes, Kent.”

“I know.” She took a deep breath. “I’ve told him all—”

“All?” This time his voice was sharp with something closer to alarm than frustrated disbelief.

“All my reasons for joining, and coming on
Audacious
. And my hopes that my conduct will speak for itself.” She took another deep, fortifying breath. “Will you see to it he gets it?”

“Me? Why not Captain McAlden, or even Angus Pinkerton?”

“Because I know I can trust you. And it just seems right that I should ask you.”

“I can’t promise what I can’t deliver, Kent. You make a very great assumption that I will survive while you will not.”

“You will,” she stated simply. “Of course you shall survive. I cannot conceive of any other outcome. You’re … essential to this ship. To this world.”

“Your confidence in me is startling, and humbling, but I assure you I am as mortal as any other man.”

“And so am I,” she insisted. “And you must promise me one further thing. If I am hit, you must promise not to let them take me below.”

“Are you afraid?”

“I’m not afraid of doing my duty. I’m not afraid.” But she was. She was afraid of what her life might be if he were not in it. Of the loneliness that would result from their inevitable, final separation. She could only pray that she was the one to fall, and not he. “If I’m hit, you must let me die.”

“Damn your eyes, Kent.” He swore again, violently and vehemently, under his breath. “You ask too much.”

“Think of yourself, if I should be discovered. Think of my family. It would be better if I were to die with dignity and honor than to have my family shamed.”

“You should have thought of your family before you entered into this harebrained scheme.”

“I was thinking of my family. I thought of nothing else.”

“Come now, Kent.” He wouldn’t let her get away with such willful self-deception. “We both know that’s a lie. No one who takes to this life the way you did does it solely for someone else. You did this as much to please yourself as to save your family’s name.”

“I didn’t do it to
please
myself.” She could hear the distress in her voice, and feel the heat building at the back of her throat. “That seems so tepid, so insipid. I did it because this life—the navy—is the one thing in the world I’m good at. Because it’s the one thing in the world that makes me feel alive. Because it’s the thing I dreamed of, night after night, when I was made to go home to Falmouth and sit and wait. I’m no bloody good at waiting.”

She felt taut and picked apart, as if the tangled skein of her lies was unraveling her. As dizzy as if she had been spun across the deck. And somehow the tears, which through months of trial and tribulation she had not allowed herself to shed, now were coursing down her cheeks. She dashed them away with the back of her sleeve, but this was the truth at last, the truth she had not even dared to put in the letter to her father that lay sealed atop her sea chest. It felt good to finally say it, and to share it at long last with Col. “But you probably already knew that.”

“About how bad you are at waiting?”

“That, too.”

“Yes, Kent. I knew. And what I didn’t know I guessed. But I am glad. Very glad.”

It was all the declaration she could hope for. She went to her door. Mercifully, the gunroom was empty, and Col had not taken the precaution of locking his small cabin door.

She was through and standing in front of him before he could do or say anything to stop her. “I am glad as well. Even if I die, I’ve no regrets.”

“No regrets,” he affirmed. And reached for her.

Just as she was reaching for him. She went to him without hesitation. Her hands were in his hair and she was pulling his mouth to hers just as he was fanning his thumbs along her jaw and angling her head to bring her closer.

His lips were firm and his mouth met hers in quiet desperation. She dove into him, into his strength and his rightness and his fierce, fierce tenderness. He broke off the kiss, leaving her feeling empty and wanting for only a moment, to step away, drape a shirt over the keyhole, and douse the lantern before he returned.

The dark pressed into them, impelling them into each other’s arms. There was no way to see, to look at each other, so they could only feel. They made no sound at all, as their lips and hands explored the shifting boundaries between them. She pressed herself into his warmth, into the surprising softness of his hair, and the rough rasp of his face against hers. She wanted to feel him, and taste him, and know everything about him, explore every aspect of his being, discover every facet of his character as thoroughly as he had uncovered hers.

“Kent. Sally.” He eased back enough to breathe, and then, when he couldn’t stay separated even that small distance, he rested his forehead against hers. “I’m glad you came. All I could think was my only regret would be that I was going to die without having kissed you one last time.”

She didn’t want to hear any more of death and dying. She didn’t want to think of it. She wanted to think of life and love. She wanted to feel alive. In his arms.

She silenced his words with her lips. She wanted to taste the salt of his skin and navigate the byways of his muscles and tendons where they curved over the frame of his bones, and gave him breadth and substance.

His hands were streaming through her hair, pulling it from its queue, tugging it away from her scalp as he ran his fingers down its length. “Ah, Kent. You have no idea how long I’ve waited to do that.”

“How long?” The skin along the side of his neck was sensitive. She could feel the pulse of his heart under the surface, and hear the way his breathing changed when she kissed and nipped along the strong tendon than ran down to his shoulder.

“Forever,” he breathed into her hair as he reciprocated, kissing along the line of her collarbone. The heretofore unremarkable surface of her skin lit up with searing sensation and previously unknown satisfaction. Everything felt more—more important, more intense. More inevitable.

She wanted to take off his shirt so she could map the uncharted territory of his skin. Her hands were at the knot of his cravat, unraveling him, and giving her a taste for more. For more of his warm, glowing skin, more of the luminous power of his body. She unwrapped him like a present to herself, kissing down the line of his throat and across his chest until his head arched back.

He made a wordless sound of both anguish and encouragement, and she kissed it away. “Hush. Let me.”

“Kent. We can’t. We’ll be heard.”

“We can. We’ll be quiet. Silent as the gr—” No, she would not even think it. “We will be quiet. You’ll see.” She punctuated each whisper with a kiss until she reached the hollow at the base of his throat. “Please. Don’t make me beg.”

He swallowed and closed his eyes, so she decided to beg anyway, because when she moved her mouth lower across his flat brown nipple, he tipped his head back and made an appreciative sound deep in his throat.

“Please, Col. Please let me kiss you.” She suited word to action and pressed her lips to his chest. “Please let me touch you.” She ran her hands across the warm wonder that was the wall of his torso. “Please let me undress you.”

And her hand skimmed down to address the buttons on the fall of his breeches.

He made another sound that might have evolved into a protest, but she stopped it with her lips and whispered, “Hush. You have to be quiet.”

“Kent.” He was the one begging now.

“Hush,” she repeated her whisper, even as she smiled against his lips. “Why don’t you see if you can occupy your lips on something other than talking.”

“Oh, Kent. Be careful what you wish for.”

His passive acceptance of her ministrations was at an end. He backed her into the only wall that wasn’t made of board and batten, and began to divest her of her clothes. While he worked with his hands to peel away the layers of her fabric armor, he kept his lips on hers. She held him to her, urging him on with her enthusiastic compliance. She let her tongue seek out and then tangle with his, and as soon as that remarkably sinuous slide began, she was compelled to move her body as well, arching and stretching against him.

She needed to be naked. She needed the feel of her skin sliding along his with the same intimacy as her tongue danced with his. She reached down and lifted her shirt over her head, and then went straight to work on her bands, pulling them loose and pushing them down to her hips in a messy tangle, rather than wait to neatly unwind them.

His hands were at the buttons of her nankeen trousers, pulling away the loose bands now wreathing her hips. But the deep darkness itself pressed like velvet against her skin and she grew achy and unsatisfied without the reassurance and warmth of his body against hers.

“Col, kiss me,” she begged in a low voice.

“Oh, Kent.” She felt the vibration of his answer hum through her. “I do believe I will.”

But he clearly did not mean her mouth, for she could hear him drop to the floor, and she felt him put his wide, strong hands against her hips, urging her to lean against the wall as he pushed her trousers, and then her smallclothes, down to pool around her feet.

His hands circled her ankles and lifted them up, one at a time, to step her out of the pool of fabric at her feet. She toed her clumsy shoes off, and when he peeled her cotton stockings down, she was left naked before him. Her breath began to draw short—small, noisy gulps of air. She put her hand over her mouth to stifle the sound, but she felt loose, unmoored and adrift, without his anchoring weight against her.

And then he said, “I want to see you. But I can’t. So I’ll taste you instead.”

She felt a soft press of air and he blew his breath against her mons, but nothing prepared her for the gentle probe of his tongue along her most intimate flesh. She made a very small sound of shock and surprise, but not dismay. Only of discovery and subsequent delight as he explored the folds of her sex. Sensation, heat, and need blossomed under her skin, and she felt full of wonder and strength, and she wanted more.

She angled her hips to appease the breathless, hungry craving that came from deep within. And then it began, in wave after tiny wave, growing, spreading out from her center, radiating from the place where he touched her, so carefully and so precisely; she felt as if she couldn’t breathe and didn’t want to, didn’t need to. She had no need of air, she needed only him and the feeling building until she felt she would do anything to appease the want.