Patricia Potter (6 page)

“Where’s Miz Seaton?”

“Restin’,” she said, then added defensively, “She gave me permission to come up here.”

He nodded, turning away from her to look at the river. It never ceased to fascinate him, this road to freedom. Although he had not needed to take it, he continued to help others along its way.

Cam slid a sideways look at the girl. She was so small, so frightened, and so pretty. When the captain had asked him to befriend the girl, he knew it would be no hardship. She had drawn his eyes and sympathy from the moment he had seen her. Perhaps the captain and he could purchase her. But right now the captain had asked him to find out as much as possible about Meredith Seaton, although he didn’t exactly understand why the captain had requested him to do so. There seemed little unusual about her, and she certainly wasn’t the captain’s customary taste.

But if the captain asked him to fly, he would damn well do it, one way or another.

“My name’s Cam,” he said, keeping his voice soft. “What’s yours?”

“Daphne,” she whispered, her heart beating rapidly.

“Daphne,” he repeated, liking the sound of the name. He felt tenderness seep into him and creep into places it had never been before. He had lived with hate for so long, it had taken most of the last three years to even realize there could be anything else.

“How long you been with Miz Seaton?”

“Just a few days,” she answered in the same low voice.

He looked at her quizzically, his gaze so intense she felt she had no choice but to continue.

“She…bought me in New Orleans.” Daphne had trouble with the word. When she had lived at the Dunham plantation, she had never actually thought of being bought and sold. She had just always belonged there. The last weeks—the chains, the dirty slave jail, the prospect of auction—had all brought the horror of her position to her.

Cam saw the hopelessness in her eyes, and his hand reached out to her. God, he knew that feeling. Only he had fought it while she apparently did not. He had come close to dying for that rebellion.

“Is she…good to you?” It was a difficult question to ask, but Quinn needed to know. And he, Cam, needed to know.

“She seems kind enough,” Daphne said. Her mistress still puzzled her in many ways, and it made her wary.

“Where you goin’?”

“A plantation near Vicksburg. That’s all I know.” Daphne once more felt the fear of the unknown, and tears sprung to her eyes. She turned away, not wanting…Cam…to see them. She had seen his back. She knew he had gone through much more than she, and she felt terribly weak and cowardly for crying.

She felt a gentle touch, and she lurched away, afraid of it.

Cam slowly withdrew his hand and stood there, a silent still giant.

Daphne backed up even farther into the shadows. “I have to go,” she said, her face tensing.

“Daphne,” he said with a voice that once more sounded like distant thunder, muted but ominous in her suspicious ears.

“I have to go,” she repeated and ducked under an arm that pinned her to a wall. She sped away as if all the ghosts in the world were after her.

“She’s only been with Miss Seaton a few days,” Cam reported to Quinn, who lounged in a seat across from him, his boots comfortably angled on another chair.

“She didn’t say anything?”

“Only that she was ‘kind enough.’” Cam snorted. “She’s obviously too terrified to say much of anything.”

“Of Miss Seaton?”

“No,” Cam said slowly. “I don’t think so. Just of everything that’s happened to her.”

Cam’s dark eyes held a pain Quinn hadn’t seen in a long time. He reached out a hand and grasped Cam’s arm, and his lips firmed in silent sympathy.

“I have some money,” Cam said slowly. “Perhaps you can buy her, Capt’n.”

“Quinn, damn it. When we’re alone, it’s Quinn.”

Cam shook his head slowly. “Then I might make a mistake some other time.”

“You?” The word was said in disbelief.

Cam shrugged and smiled. “You will always be the capt’n to me.”

“Don’t ever forget it,” Quinn said, a slight smile belying the meanness of the words.

“The girl?”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

“I don’t care what it costs. If it’s more than I got, I’ll pay you back.”

“Don’t tell me you’ve fallen in love?”

“No…no, I…she’s just so damned frightened of everything.”

Quinn’s voice softened. “I’ll talk to Miss Seaton.” His lips curved into a grin. “She must be very pretty.”

Cam’s body went rigid. For a moment he wondered if he would ever accustom himself to Quinn’s teasing remarks. In his past experience, white men’s interest in black women had always meant violation. But this was the captain, the man who had given him his life back.

“Yes,” he said slowly. “She is.”

Quinn watched Cam’s eyes and knew what he was thinking. He felt a momentary melancholy that even after three years Cam was unable to trust him completely. But then Cam had had a lifetime to build mistrust and suspicion. He reached out his hand and put it on Cam’s shoulder. “Well, by God, we’ll get her.”

“What if she refuses to sell?”

Quinn knew he meant Meredith Seaton. But why would she turn down a good offer for a slave? “She won’t,” he said, confidently enough. He had thought about her during the day and reached the conclusion that she was nothing more than she seemed. If it had been she that morning on deck, then the mist and the rainbow and his own fatigue had made her appear to be something she was not. He would talk to her this evening and offer a price for Daphne she couldn’t refuse.

Tired of her room, Meredith ventured out on deck, sure that Devereux would probably be abed. Did the dratted man never sleep? It seemed whenever she appeared, he was there: breakfast, dinner, supper. Each time, his eyes seemed to bore into her, seeking secrets without giving any away himself. His eyes never changed, except to narrow every once in a while. His mouth changed often, but always in some maddening way: to look amused, mocking, or derisive.

She often thought of the sketches she’d made of him, of the warmth on the younger face, of none on the older one. Could a child be so deluded? She wanted to find out, to perhaps talk to him again, but there was something fearful inside her. He did things to her that no one else had ever done. He made her weak and jellylike inside, when she was usually nothing of the kind. She had never been cowardly before. She told herself it was merely caution, good judgment. He had a way of making her react in ways she knew she shouldn’t, in ways completely alien to the Meredith she had tried so hard to create.

But she would be damned before she allowed him to force her to hide. She wouldn’t hide from anyone.

The day was lovely, the sky an intense blue, the green of trees and grass the deep vivid green that comes only in late summer. The water was silver, not muddy, and the paddlewheels of the steamboat made soft music.

“Peaceful, isn’t it?”

The voice,
his
voice, bit into her consciousness, and any peace she had felt turned suddenly into violent confusion.

“It was,” she retorted, turning slowly, almost against her will, toward him.

He leaned nonchalantly against the railing, his lean body dressed in the same impeccably tailored black she was quickly learning was a trademark with him. Or an affectation, like the gloves he always seemed to wear. Or conceit. He must know how damnably handsome he was in that color, how it made his eyes so startlingly blue, and his hair so impossibly dark. The white of his shirtfront, on the other hand, contrasted with the deep bronze of his face. He looked amused at her sharp answer, and the blatant invitation to leave.

“Come now, Miss Seaton, surely appreciation shared increases the pleasure.”

“Of some ol’ trees?” she inquired disdainfully.

“I remember,” he said slowly, “one old tree you once appreciated.”

Meredith’s stomach twisted painfully, and her hand clutched the railing. So he did remember. Why was he mentioning it now? Why not before? Some kind of trap? Some secret amusement of his own?

She allowed her eyes to flutter. “Why, Captain, I don’t know whatever you mean.”

“We met once, long ago, when you were a child. A delightful child, if I remember.”

“I don’t remember,” she said. “I had a fall.” Her lips said the lie easily enough. She hoped her eyes did. “Were you delightful, too, Captain?”

He grinned, but as usual it went no further than his mouth. His eyes were even wary. She wondered why. “I hope so. I try hard.”

She couldn’t prevent a raised eyebrow of her own, and she heard him chuckle. Be careful, Meredith, she told herself. That was a stupid thing to say. It’s stupid to encourage him in any way. He’s not like the others. She had the feeling he caught every nuance, and knew it for what it was.
Be very, very careful.
He’s Brett’s brother. He’s a slave owner. He consorts with slave hunters. But his laugh was such an attractive sound, deep and resonant. Just as she remembered.

But he’s changed, she told herself.

She stiffened her back, hoping it would also stiffen her resolve against his insidious charm. “Perhaps you should try harder, Captain,” she said caustically despite her attempt to make her tone light, bantering, even flirtatious.

“You really think I should?” he said, and she knew he was laughing at her, even while his eyes probed hers.

“Most assuredly,” she said, anger at his taunting and at herself once more driving her beyond caution. She wanted to wipe that smile from his face. “A gambler’s charm…well, it’s as worthless as fool’s gold.”

“A profound statement, Miss Meredith,” he replied. “I’ll take it to heart.”

If you have one, she wanted to say, but she had gone as far as she should. Much farther, in fact. The last thing she’d intended was for him to deem her biting comment profound, even if he had done so mockingly. And there was still a glint of interest in his eyes.

She was saved by the timely arrival of Opal, who fluttered her eyelashes shamelessly at the captain. Meredith quickly excused herself.

“Weighty matters, Miss Meredith?” Quinn asked courteously.

Meredith, steeling herself against yet another barb she longed to throw at him, laughed lightly. “Of course, Captain. I must choose my dress for our arrival tomorrow, and Daphne’s going to help me with a new hairstyle.”

Daphne! Damn, Quinn thought. This was the perfect opportunity to mention the girl, but Meredith was already disappearing through the doorway, leaving him with Opal.

He turned his most charming smile on her. “I hope you and your niece will join me for dinner tonight.”

“I’d be delighted,” Opal said. “I’ll ask Meredith.”

He bowed graciously. “Eight, then.”

Cowardly or not, Meredith was not going to have dinner with the blackguard. She knew foolishness when she indulged in it, and he brought out more than a little in her. He challenged her, and she longed to respond in kind, to meet barb for barb, and mockery for mockery, but she could not afford to do so. He had the damnable ability to slice her protective layers to shreds. If it was only herself involved, she might risk more. But there was Lissa to consider. And the Underground Railroad. And the people she could help.

So she pleaded fatigue and lack of appetite, hating herself for retreating, yet knowing it was the only wise course. She was relieved they would arrive in Vicksburg tomorrow. Relieved and yet regretful too. She wished she knew why she felt a ridiculous sense of loss.

Her aunt decided to accept the invitation, despite her niece’s refusal and pointed comment about associating with gamblers. Opal’s opinion of Captain Devereux had undergone a great transformation under his not inconsiderable charisma. He came from such a good family, she declared. And he was an absolutely charming man, even if he was a gambler. Many gentlemen, she justified, gambled.

It made Meredith sick. Devereux was an unscrupulous slave owner, and charm did nothing to alter that fact, she kept telling herself.

After Aunt Opal left for dinner, she nibbled at some food she had ordered for the room. She then sent Daphne to see to Opal’s clothes since they would be disembarking the next day. But that was only an excuse. She wanted, more than anything, a few moments to go up on deck. Everyone, she knew, would be eating, and she would go to the rear of the steamboat, away from the windows and the gaiety of diners and the rapscallion smile of its captain.

Her sausage curls were still in place, her dress as frightful as the others. She smiled slightly as she thought of how carefully Daphne had implied that she looked frumpy.

“Perhaps,” Daphne had said hesitantly, “I could do your hair another way.”

Meredith’s heart reached out to the girl. Meredith the woman wanted to say yes. Meredith the pretender had to say no.

“I like it as it is,” she said testily, but her tone softened at Daphne’s crestfallen expression. She wished she could confide in the girl, but Daphne was still too new, too frightened. It would take time—perhaps months—for Daphne to trust her. And she could do nothing until the trust was there.

Meredith put on her cloak over the dress. She didn’t need it in this weather, but she felt partially invisible with it on. As she did the other morning, she slipped out the door and headed for the rear of the boat.