Passion's Tide (46 page)

“You must have known this would be the consequence of being caught in a compromising situation, didn’t you
?” He crossed to the window and pulled it closed, locking it against the impending storm
.
He returned to the bed and sat beside her
.
“When we spoke about marriage on the
Shadow
you were just as appalled by the idea as you are now
.
Are you against the institution it
self, or is it just me you disagree with? Would I really make such a terrible husband?”

“The only thing wrong with marriage is that you expect me to marry a stranger.”

“A stranger?” Logan reeled back, looking shocked
.
“Amber, it’s me.”

She shrugged off the hand he tried to put on her shoulder and stood
.
“I don’t even know who you are! I let you into my heart, and you couldn’t even trust me enough to confide in me the most important thing about yourself: your identity
.
How can I ever trust you now?
You have a family, Logan, a wonderful, caring family, and you let me believe that you were a pirate…” she froze
.
“Hold on, is that even what you are?  How does your family feel about you murdering and plundering?

He shifted his weight uncomfortably
.
“If
we’re getting technical about titles, then no, I’m not a real pirate
.
I’m a privateer.”

“A what?”

“A privateer
.
Essentially, I’m a legal pirate for hire, under the employment of England.”

She threw up her hands
.
“Perfect! So you rape and pillage for
Queen and Country, is that correct?”

“Amber,” he growled, “I am not a bloody Viking, and I’ve never raped anyone
.
Now will you keep your voice down?  You’re going to wake up the entire house, and the last thing we need is to be caught
in flagrante delicto
twice in one evening
.
Now listen,” he said, cutting her off, “my methods may have been unorthodox but I did what I thought was best to protect my country, both physically and economically.”

She crossed her arms
.
“So you admit you’re British now? Do you
have an accent?”

He sighed, and abandoned his accent for an English one
.
“Would you prefer if I did?”

“No.”

“Then what do you want me to do? How can I make this right?”

“Just tell me why.”

He ran a hand through his hair in exasperation
.
Outsi
de, rain had begun to fall
.
“Why what?”

“Why do you do it? Why would you leave your stable life, your loving family and just sail away? You are the eldest son of an earl
,
and with that comes responsibilities
.
How could you abandon them?”

“
Damn it, b
ecause I’m not the oldest son!” Logan cried. “Or, at least I wasn’t supposed to be.”

Astounded by his sudden outburst, and starving to learn anything about his life before her, Amber sat beside him and took his hand, waiting for him to continue
.
“It was a long tim
e ago
.
His name was
Ma
rcus
, and he was three years older than me
.
He was so serious, so righteous and so damn perfect
—
and so very unlike me
.
I was a devilish child, always looking for trouble and always finding it tenfold.

“
Ma
rcus
and I were never close, but I did love him. I also secretly admired him
.
I envied the way he got on with my father, and how easy it was for him to be the impeccable son
.
He died when I was eighteen.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be
.
It was no one’s fault really, save
his own
.
He was walking down the street one night, most likely having given up his cab to a poor, destitute family, when he came across a woman in the alley being accosted by three men.”

“And he tried to save her? Perhaps you aren’t so different after all,” she said, remembering the way he had protected her in Tortuga
.

“Yes, but I would have just killed the bastards up front and gotten it over with
.
Ma
rcus
,” he asserted, rolling his eyes, “tried to reas
on with them
.
He found himself with a bullet in his stomach
.
According to the girl, he drew his sword and gutted one of the men and scared the other two away before he bled out
.
She stayed with him until he died, and then she confessed the entire story
to the police, who alerted my father.

She squeezed his hand. “What happened then?”

“While my family grieved I hunted down the two men who had escaped and killed them
.
My father has never mentioned it, but when their bodies were found in the Thames I coul
d swear he looked
at
me approvingly
.
To this day, he is the only person
who
know
s
it was I who avenged
my brother’s death
.
But it changed nothing
.
Ma
rcus
was gone, and I was suddenly the eldest son
.
I was young and I was reckless
.
I had just
turned eighteen; I had discovered women, alcohol and gambling, and I found the shoes I was supposed to be filling were too big for me
.
My parents never expressed their disappointment, but I knew that if I stayed at home I would do something to embarrass my family
.
S
o I left and joined the Navy.”

“How did you become a pirate?” He raised an eyebrow
.
“Sorry, how did you become a privateer?”

“I fought in the Nav
y for several years and, despite my insubordinate attitude, quickly climbed the ranks until I was Captain of my own ship. I suppose my wild approach was gaining attention, for after seven months I was called before the Queen and offered a new position.”

“You met the Queen? What was she like?”

“Would you like to hear about the Queen, or would you like me to continue with this damn story I know you’re so eager to hear?” When she expressed her desire for him to continue, he laughed and pulled her across his lap
.
“That’s what I thought
.
Now, I had to appear to be a real pirate for the plan to w
ork, so for a while, I was
.
I joined a crew and began stirring discontent about their own Captain until they mutinied and put me in charge
.
It was a small ship but it was powerful, and I used it to commandeer a larger Spanish ship, and then I used that o
ne to take down an even more powerful one, and so on until I had the
Imperial Shadow
, a crew I could trust, and a reputation.”

“And the name
el Tigre
?”

“One of my first marks was a corrupt Navy ship that was smuggling goods to Spain
.
As we pulled alongsid
e her, I recognized several of the men, including the Captain
.
Not wanting to be recognized myself, I did the only thing I could think of at the time to disguise myself: I stuck my fingers into a barrel of sealing tar and streaked it across my face
.
Not
only did it keep my identity hidden, but it also worked effectively as a scare tactic
.
I used it for several months until I grew tired of scrubbing the damn stuff off, but by then the name had caught on and I found I no longer needed it.”

“How would you k
now which ships to take?”

“I would meet with agents of the crown who would give me a list
.
Your ship was on my most recent one.”

Amber peered up into his face
.
“
The
Queen Charlotte
? What could poor Captain Watson have done to upset the British Governme
nt?”

“Your beloved Captain Watson was smuggling documents back and forth between the colonies and Great Britain, conspiring against the Queen.”

“Oh, I had no idea
!
”

“Of course you didn’t
.
I’m not sure
even
his men
knew what his true purpose was
.
In any case, he’s finished now and we can put the whole event behind us and move on.” Amber shifted restlessly on his lap
.
He gave her a quizzical look
.
“Or are we not moving on?”

“Since you were finally honest with me, I have a secret of my own to confess.”

He shifted her off of his lap and onto the bed beside him
.
“Amber, are you…” Following his gaze down to her belly, covered by the folds of her nightgown, she laughed.

“Pregnant? No, it’s not that, don’t worry.”  She ignored what appeared to be disappointment cross his face, and continued
.
“That first time you asked me to marry you, back on the ship, it took everything I had to say no. I wanted to say yes, I truly did. But because of who I was and who I thought you were I had to turn you down, a
nd it was excruciatingly difficult.”

“I remember that day well
.
You wanted me to believe you detested me and tried your hardest to convince me it was true
.
Why?”

“Because I was afraid that if you knew how much I truly cared you would force the wedding, a
nd then my uncle would find out about the will and I would lose everything.”

“Sweetheart, what will are you talking about?”

“My father wrote a second will before he died, and concealed it
.
My mother kept it a secret from me until she was on her own deathb
ed, probably because she never thought she would die before seeing me married.
” She took a deep breath
.
“
The will stated
that should my mother die before I was wed, the total control of the Townsend family estates would be turned over to my guardian.” She looked up at him, and saw that he was listening intently
.
“I assume my father intended for his own family to look after me in that situation, but because my mother moved to the colonies, guardianship was granted to her brot
her Neil, my uncle
.
He…he’s an awful man
.
He’s addicted to alcohol and gambling, and more than once we caught him stealing from our house to pay off his debts
.
If he discovered that my mother’s estate now belonged to him, he would dismiss the help and t
ear apart the house, piece by piece until there was nothing left
.
I couldn’t let that happen to everything my mother worked so hard for and took so much pride in
.
So I left right away without telling Neil about the will, and boarded a ship sailing for En
gland to find a husband.”

“What stopped you from searching for one in Boston, or marrying me when I asked?”

“Because the will also stated that my future husband must be in possession of a title equal
to or
greater t
han
my own.”

He took her hand in his
.
“Why didn’t you tell me
this before?”

“For the same reason you neglected to tell me you were the son of an Earl
.
We both wanted to forget who we were, and what responsibilities waited for us at the other end of our journey.”

He was silent as he
thought about this
.
Then he asked, “
D
o you have the will with you?”

She nodded
and
stood, wrapping a dressing gown around herself
as she walked
over to the writing desk
.
She took
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
down, opened it to the front cover and freed the will from behind the lining.
She
handed it to Logan and rejoined him on the bed.