Julia London (17 page)

The apologies died on her tongue. Dear God, it was her cousin Galen standing before her, looking more shocked than she. Abbey dropped the packages she had so carefully caught only moments before and threw her arms around his neck. “
Galen!
You didn’t tell me you had come!” she cried.

Galen hugged her fiercely but briefly, and quickly set her away from him.

“I intended to surprise you, but it would seem you have surprised me.” He smiled, glanced surreptitiously toward the main thoroughfare, then up the alley in the opposite direction. “Come, let me help you with those things,” he said, and bent to gather her things as Abbey happily plied him with questions. When they had gathered the packages, Galen paused to look at a beaming Abbey. A smile slowly spread his lips.

“My God, little one, what a beauty you’ve become,” he said appreciatively as he gazed at her for the first time in many years.

Abbey laughed and glanced demurely at her toes. “Galen, really. I’m the same as the last time we met.”

“Indeed you are not! That was a full five years ago, I am quite certain, and though you were beginning to show signs of natural beauty …” He trailed off and lifted his hand, brushing his knuckles lightly across her cheek. “I could not have guessed how truly breathtaking you would be,” he said softly.

Abbey, blushing furiously now, gazed shyly into his dark-brown eyes. He was one to talk with his dark-blond locks and dancing brown eyes. He had sent her into a bout of severe adolescent devotion many years ago, as he undoubtedly was still doing to unsuspecting maids. He was as tall as she remembered,
his face tanned from years at sea, and his eyes still twinkled just as mischievously.

She grinned as a flood of warm memories invaded her. “I am so thankful you have come! I have so longed to see you, you could not imagine!”

Galen grinned charmingly. “I’ve missed you, too, little one. Have you time? There is a place I know where we might take tea. There is much we have to discuss.”

“Of course! I have so much to tell you,” Abbey agreed, and began to walk toward the main thoroughfare.

“Not that way!” Galen called sharply. Abbey glanced curiously over her shoulder; Galen smiled sheepishly and motioned toward the far end of the alley. “It’s just here, a small, quaint little place I am sure you will like,” he said, walking slowly away from the main street until Abbey caught up with him.

The place he took her could hardly be called a tearoom, but there was a scarred table, and a woman did bring them a pot of tea and some stale biscuits. Abbey sipped her tea, listening attentively as Galen told her of his many adventures since leaving the
Dancing Maiden
.

So many, in fact, she had to wonder if there was more than he might have possibly been able to squeeze into his twenty-five years. He talked of fighting in strange wars Abbey had never heard of, and having captained his own ship that unfortunately went down around Cape Horn. Then there was the time he spent apprenticing in the offices of the East India Trading Company in Amsterdam, which naturally led to his joining a small but independent shipping firm in Copenhagen sometime later.

As she listened to his thrilling stories, she felt as if she were listening to her aunt read from one of her adventure novels. In all honesty, she was not terribly sure she had not heard some of the stories Galen told in those books. But she did not care. Her adored cousin had come to visit her, and if he wanted to embellish a bit, that was perfectly all right with her.

“And what of you?” Galen finally asked after eating the last biscuit and helping himself to the last cup of tea. “When I
last saw you, the captain was sending you to a Geneva finishing school.”

Abbey laughed. “Geneva, dear God, how long ago that was! I should be ashamed to confess I lasted only a month in that school. I was much too old for it, I think, and I had a particular dislike for the headmistress, and she for me. She was quite appalled that I had been sailing about with a bunch of scalawags, as she called them. Anyway, it wasn’t very long afterward that Papa’s condition worsened, and he sent me to live with Aunt Nan.”

Galen looked aggrieved at the mention of her father’s consumption. “I can’t tell you how terribly sorry I was to hear of your father’s death. He was like a father to me, you know, but I never had the opportunity to tell him just how fond of him I was. I was just about to depart for the West Indies when I heard the news,” he said sadly.

“I thought you were preparing to depart for America,” Abbey remarked, recalling his letters.

Galen colored slightly. “Well, I was, in a manner of speaking. To the West Indies first, then to America. I had planned to do a grand tour of sorts and see the entire family in one long trip,” he said with a dismissive smile. “But the news of his death came, and right on the heels of that, the company I was working for collapsed with debt. An amazing thing, really. I had thought it completely solvent, but apparently it was just making ends meet. One ship was lost, and the whole enterprise crumbled like a house of cards.”

“Oh, no!” Abbey exclaimed, completely unaware that he had artfully turned the subject. “What did you do?”

“Fortunately, I had put a small amount aside in savings. It was enough to see me through for a time, and I had actually planned to join another vessel when I heard you were in England.” He turned a charming grin on her. “I simply had to come and see my little cousin,” he said, and covering her hand with his, squeezed gently.

“Oh, Galen, you shouldn’t have used your savings to visit me!”

“And why the hell not? I’ve missed you terribly, little one,
and I didn’t know when I might have the opportunity again. Family is too important to ignore, don’t you think? Don’t look so surprised—the seas will wait!”

Abbey was not immune to the struggle of most seafaring men to make ends meet, and immediately worried. Galen was trying very hard, at the moment, to make light of it. He had always been so carefree; she could remember her papa complaining he was too carefree, too eager to shirk responsibility. But Papa would have been proud of the man he had become. “Have you sufficient funds? I mean, while you are here?” she asked boldly.

Galen shrugged and looked at the scarred tabletop, his face clouding a moment with what Abbey thought was regret.

“You haven’t, I can see it plainly in your face!” she cried, alarmed.

Galen smiled sheepishly. “You shouldn’t worry about me, little one. I’ve enough to get by. Granted, I won’t be staying in the finest inns, and I won’t be hiring a curricle for your fancy, either.” He laughed.

Abbey shook her head and reached for her reticule.

“I have no desire to go about in a curricle, Galen. I cannot bear the thought of you sleeping in some barn! You’ll come to Blessing Park with me—”

“No, no. I am quite fine in Pemberheath for the moment. I shall be all right,” he assured her weakly. “And in fact, I am off on the morrow for a few days. I’ve some business in Portsmouth.” Unthinking, Abbey reached inside her reticule and withdrew the cash she had put aside for her passage home. “Take this,” she said, and as Galen started to shake his head, she grabbed his hand. “Please, Galen, I want you to have it! I would feel so much better if I knew you had a decent roof over your head!”

Galen laughed nervously as his fingers closed around the money she held in her hand. “It’s not nearly as bad as all that, little one. We shall consider this a loan. And for a very short time, I assure you. I am expecting some important news very soon that I think will alter my situation completely.”

“Really? What?”

Galen shook his head and grinned enigmatically. “In due course I shall tell you everything. I shouldn’t be surprised if this very important news affects my little cousin, too. In the meantime, however, I should very much like to spend some time with you, as circumstances permit.”

Time
. Abbey was about to ask how his news could affect her, but her eyes flew to a clock across the room. She was a good quarter of an hour late for her coach. “Oh, dear God! I told the driver to call for me at precisely four o’clock!” she exclaimed, and started reaching for her packages. “I shouldn’t want them to worry something has happened.”

Galen looked oddly distracted by her remark for a moment. “No, we would not want them to worry,” he muttered, and taking the things from her hand, escorted her outside and began to lead her toward the main thoroughfare.

“So, you’ve been in America all this time, have you?” he asked as they strolled down the alley.

Abbey nodded. “Until a little more than a month ago, when I came here.”

They came to the point where the alley intersected the thoroughfare. Just down the street, the Darfield coach was waiting for her, and Abbey waved until she got the driver’s attention.

Galen thoughtfully eyed the ornate coach over her head. “We hardly had time to talk about you! So, my little cousin is to marry the Marquis of Darfield. I suspect the happy event will occur sometime this spring?” he asked as the coach swung out onto the road and moved toward them.

Abbey hesitated. She was not prepared to tell Galen that her marriage had ended the moment it had begun, or that she was returning to America very soon. She was not quite ready to face her humiliation, not yet. She turned as the coach pulled to a halt and smiled at the driver, blithely ignoring the suspicious look he gave Galen. A coachman leapt down from his post on the back runners and with a definite, challenging glare for Galen, took Abbey’s packages. Galen surrendered them easily, watching both men with a look of amusement.

“You should engage these two to drive you to the church,
little one,” he teasingly muttered. “I am quite certain they won’t allow anyone to stand in your way!”

“Actually, I have already married the marquis,” Abbey said as matter-of-factly as she could.

Galen jerked a startled gaze to her. “You did
what
?”

Nonplussed by his reaction, she asked, “What is wrong?” Next to her, the coachman made a great show of opening the coach door.

Galen quickly recovered with a deeply charming smile. “You caught me by surprise. I had thought there would be a period of engagement, that’s all.”

“There
was
a period of engagement—of about thirteen years!” Abbey giggled nervously. “I assure you, it was all quite proper!”

Galen smiled down at her. “I should like to meet your marquis, little one. Perhaps I shall call in a few days. There is so much more we shall have to discuss.” He took a step forward, his arms outstretched. “An embrace for a long-lost cousin?” Abbey happily obliged, hugging him tightly to her. Galen kissed her on the cheek, slowly released her, and, with a wink, took a step back as the coachman crowded between to separate them.

“Then you will come to Blessing Park? Very soon?” Abbey asked as she let the coachman help her inside.

“I shall, just as soon as I return form Portsmouth,” he assured her as the coachman slammed the door shut.

Abbey smiled and waved at him through the window of the barouche as the coach lurched forward, watching him until she could not see him any longer. Only then did she wonder how she would return to America after giving all the money she had to Galen.

Facing the mirror, Michael finished tying his neckcloth, ignoring Rebecca’s continuing tirade about broken promises. It had been a mistake to come here, a colossal mistake. A figurine went flying past him, crashing into the wall, and Michael impassively looked down at the broken pieces. With a final
inspection of the knot he had just made, he turned and glanced at the pretty blonde, his eyes drifting over her filmy negligee and the curvaceous figure underneath.

“I never promised you a damn thing, Rebecca,” he said impassively. “You and I had an arrangement that suited us for a time, but it no longer suits me.”

“You heartless cretin! How
dare
you waltz in here and take me like some rutting stud, then announce this is the end!” she shrieked.

“No, it was not particularly satisfying, was it?” He sighed and shoved his hands in his pockets. Michael had not thought himself as heartless as she accused him of being, but at the moment, he felt … nothing. It was the end of another series of assignations, an event almost as routine as his business deals. Granted, his liaison with Rebecca had lasted a little longer than most, but in the end, they all ended. Always. He was mildly surprised she could evoke any emotion in him. From the moment he had arrived, he had realized he could not summon a true desire for her anymore. It was simply over. Irretrievably over. He suspected she had realized it, too, as they had gone through the motions rather mechanically.

“Rebecca, darling—”

“Don’t call me that!” she spat, her eyes welling again.

“Stop acting like a child, love. You know there has been little to bind us to one another, except, perhaps, a shared physical attraction.”

“That’s not true!” She sobbed.

Michael frowned disapprovingly. “Isn’t it? You do not like the country, or have you forgotten? I do not like town. You do not like that I engage in shipping—the Merchant of Darfield, I believe you called me. And I do not like lolling about tearooms, feeding on the latest
on dits
you so rabidly follow. Come now, love, you knew there would be an end.”

Rebecca sank wearily to the bed, grabbed a satin pillow, and clutched it woefully to her breast in genuine sorrow. “I knew there would be an end for you,” she murmured. “But not for me.”

Michael felt a small twinge of pity. He walked slowly to the
bed and placed his hand on her smooth shoulder. “Rebecca. We always knew it would end. It was only a matter of which of us would end it first,” he said softly.

“No,” she insisted, shaking her head. “I didn’t. I never—”

“I am sorry, love,” he interjected before she could finish. “Apparently it is better it ended sooner rather than later.”

Pain glanced Rebecca’s features at that remark, and she reached up and covered his hand with hers before he removed it from her skin forever. “Do you … 
love
her?” she whispered. Michael did not immediately answer. He had told Rebecca he had married, but nothing more. He certainly had not suggested his marriage was the reason for ending their affair. Because it wasn’t. He simply did not desire her anymore.