Savannah Heat (19 page)

Apparently feeling that same closeness, when they left the restaurant, Jordy seemed more relaxed than she had ever seen him. As they rode along in the carriage, Silver discovered that he had been orphaned so young he didn’t remember his parents at all. He worshiped Morgan Trask and Jacques Bouillard,
and he spoke repeatedly of Cookie, of the way the tough old sailor had watched after him since he was a little boy.

“Guess things’ll be a whole lot different from now on,” he finished, beginning to grow pensive. “Cap’n’s quit the sea, Cookie’s got a woman he’s been courtin’, and Jacques is takin’ a berth on a brigantine, soon as we git—get—back home. I gotta start lookin’ after myself.”

“Surely Major Trask won’t abandon you.”

“Course not. But a man’s gotta grow up sometime.”

“I suppose that’s true.” But thirteen was awfully young to start facing life alone. Silver knew more about that subject than she should have. Maybe she could talk to the major. Silver thought of the tall handsome man, and soft heat curled in her stomach. “I’ve been taking care of myself for quite a while,” she said, pulling her mind from its dangerous path. “It isn’t really so bad.”

“Didn’t you get lonely?”

“Yes, Jordy, I did.” The carriage whirred along the lane, the sound interrupted only by the clip-clop of the horses’ hooves. “Sometimes I still do.”

They returned to Bridgetown late that afternoon. “I suppose the major has plans for the evening.” Silver worked to keep her tone nonchalant.

“He and Owen Moore got a meetin’ out near Gun Hill. There’s a big cockfight tonight, back o’ one of the old plantations. Cap’n and Moore is—are—s’posed to discuss the mission.”

“A cockfight.” Silver had heard about such things, but she had never seen one. “Are you going, too?”

Jordy grinned. “Yup. Me and Jacques.”

“Can I go with you?”

Jordy looked uncertain. “I don’t think the cap’n would like it.”

“Come on, Jordy. If I went with you and Jacques, surely there wouldn’t a problem. Besides, the major might not even find out.”

“I don’t know, Silver.”

“Where’s Jacques? Why don’t we ask him?”

That idea seemed to set a little better. “All right. He’s either down on the
Savannah
or over at the Bull and Crow.”

“Let’s try the tavern first.” They’d be less likely to run into Morgan. Silver instructed the driver, who seemed a bit surprised, and a little while later they pulled up in front of the same shuttered building Jacques had been drinking in before. Jordy ran inside to look for him. Both men came back outside a few minutes later.

“So,
chérie
, you want to see the fighting chickens?” Though the Frenchman smelled pleasantly of ale, he wasn’t the least bit drunk.

“It sounds like fun.”

“I am not so sure you will think so.” He reached into the pocket of his breeches and pulled out a crumpled piece of paper with some sort of sketch and some printing on it. “There is another problem as well.”

Silver gasped as she recognized her own image on the reward poster her father had distributed throughout the islands. “Damn him. He always finds a way to make my life hell.”

“You are much prettier than this drawing,” Jacques said, “but two thousand in gold is a lot of money.”

“Pinkard has already claimed the reward. Isn’t there something we can do?”

“I can put the word out, try to let them know. But
it will take time for the truth to spread.” He glanced down at Silver, one pawlike hand coming up to her cheek. “Maybe you
should
go with us tonight. At least with Jacques Bouillard you will be safe.”

Silver grinned with excitement. “I knew we were going to be friends.”

“There will be other women there. Not many, but a few. You will not feel out of place. Jordy and I will call for you at six.”

“I’ll be ready,” Silver said. She would tell Lady Grayson that Morgan had arranged the evening. The way the woman jumped at his every command, Silver was sure she’d have no trouble leaving the house.

“Do not go out alone,” he warned.

“I won’t.”

Jacques lifted her hand to his lips. “Until tonight,
chérie
.”

Several hours later, their rented buggy pulled up in front of a huge thatched-roof shed that sat some distance from the main plantation house. The grounds teemed with horses, buggies, carriages, gigs, and phaetons—any and every conveyance that might carry passengers to the evening’s big event.

“This is so exciting,” Silver said.

“There will be much gambling,” Jacques told her. “The stakes will be high.”

Silver frowned. She hated not having her own money.

“Don’t worry, Silver,” Jordy said, reading her expression. “Jacques will wager for you.”

“That wouldn’t be right, Jordy. What if I lost?”

“You will bring
bonne chance, ma chère
—good luck. We will all be winners.”

Silver smiled at that, liking Jacques Bouillard
more all the time. She took his beefy arm and let him guide her through the throngs of people making their way into the interior. Silver had worn a turquoise silk faille gown trimmed with darker turquoise piping. It was a lovely dress, more beautiful for its simplicity. As Jacques had said, there were other women of quality there, not many, but a few, each dressed elegantly and clinging to her escort’s arm.

Of course there were just as many disreputables—sailors, gamblers, rogues of every shape and color. Men from the docks, workers from the cane fields, merchants, peasants, doxies. All were mixed up in a potpourri of sights and sounds and colors that made Silver’s head spin.

“Thank you for bringing me,” she said to Jacques as they made their way inside.

“Do not thank me yet,” he warned, but said nothing more.

Inside the open-air shed, the more elegantly dressed patrons clustered in one area while the less wealthy sat across from them. Dressed simply, in dark blue breeches and a clean white shirt, Jacques escorted her to a place somewhere in the middle. She scanned the crowd for Morgan but didn’t see him.

In front of them, taking up the center portion of the shed, sat a low-fenced arena called the cockpit. On one side, crates filled with roosters squawked and crowed as their handlers removed one or another from the cages. The shed itself was noisy and crowded; the smell of fresh-cut straw and sawdust filled the air. Dark-skinned men tipped up pottery jugs filled with kill-devil, a harsh Barbadian rum, while others drank sugarcane brandy.

Silver noticed that tonight Jacques didn’t drink.

“What’s that man doing up there?” She pointed to a beetle-browed man suspended in a basket above the center of the ring.

Jacques chuckled softly. “That blackleg is a sharper who could not pay ’is bet. ’E must remain there for the rest of the evening.”

Silver laughed. It seemed a harmless enough punishment until someone lofted an ale mug and nearly beaned the man on the head.

“Well,
ma belle
, which one shall be the winner?” Jacques pointed to the two birds being lifted into the ring. One was a white chicken speckled with black, and the other a huge red rooster called a ginger, whose light and dark feathers fairly glistened in the glow of the overhanging lanterns.

“The big red one, surely.”

“The black and white rooster is the favorite,” Jacques warned. “ ’E has won many times.”

“But he looks so bedraggled.”

Jacques chuckled, and smiled beneath his thick black mustache. “An old warrior, I think, is often the toughest. But we will bet on the red.” With that Jacques left her, eager to wager, it seemed. The instant the gamecocks were set on the ground their neck feathers puffed out, and they took up their fighting stances, each warily circling the other. For the first time Silver noticed the huge metal knives they wore strapped to their thin black legs.

“What are those metal things they’re wearing, Jordy?”

“They’re called rippons or spurs. The owners put ’em on so the cocks can fight better.”

Silver looked back into the ring. The speckled cock chose that moment to leap in the air and plant his metal knives into the feathered breast of the big red rooster. Silver gasped at the sight of the blood that
gushed from the deep ugly gouges left by the slashing blades. The big red cock flapped his wings and spun away, only to dart back several moments later. His own gleaming weapons sliced viciously into the underbelly of the white speckled bird, and more blood dripped onto the sawdust in the arena floor. Silver’s stomach rolled,

Though each had been wounded, the birds cackled and shrieked their vengeance, neither willing to stop or run away. Again and again they flew into each other, sinking in their metal claws, ripping the other’s flesh, tearing, and knifing, determined to become the victor.

Silver clutched the wooden bench and looked away. Why hadn’t somebody told her?

Across the arena, Morgan glanced up from his conversation with Owen Moore. They’d finished most of their discussion outside the shed, but Moore had insisted on going in, and Morgan had reluctantly agreed. Cockfighting wasn’t a sport that sat well with him. It was bloody and, by all good measure, unnecessarily cruel.

He watched the two birds tearing into each other’s flesh, feathers flying, blood oozing from cuts and slashes that gouged their small bodies. The red cock had a wing broken and dragging on the ground. The speckled bird hobbled on an injured leg. It was too soon to tell who would win, but Morgan had had enough.

He was just about to go outside when a woman in a turquoise gown caught the corner of his eye. She lifted her head, and the lamplight reflected off her shiny blond hair. Silver. He’d never known a woman with hair that pale and eyes so dark.

What the hell was she doing here? Then he saw Jordy sitting beside her, and his blood began to boil.
He’d trusted the boy with her care; he sure as hell hadn’t expected him to bring her to a place like this! Rising from his hard wooden bench, Morgan began to make his way toward Silver, determined to set both his charges straight. He’d give Jordy more than a good what for, and then he’d deal with Silver.

He’d gotten only halfway there when he saw her get up and begin to pick her way toward the far side of the shed. Where the hell did she think she was going? If the place wasn’t safe for a woman escorted by a boy, it was a nightmare for a beautiful woman alone.

Morgan cursed her soundly and shoved his way through the throng of people that barred his way. Once outside, he scanned the darkness but still couldn’t see her. Then he spotted her turquoise silk skirt peeping from behind the wide rough girth of an ancient palm tree.

Setting his jaw, Morgan made his way toward her. When he reached her side, he grabbed her arm and heard her gasp as he spun her to face him.

“What the devil are you doing here?” His brows drew together in a frown.

Silver looked up at him, her pretty face ashen. “Excuse me, Major.” She tried to jerk free. “I’m afraid I’m not feeling well.”

“I’ve heard
that
before.”

Silver just looked at him. “I—I didn’t know it would be so … bloody.” Clamping a hand over her mouth, Silver turned away, bent over, and retched into the bushes behind the palm tree.

“Christ.” Morgan pulled her skirts back out of the way, held her head while she threw up several more times, then instructed her to stay where she was. In minutes he returned with a damp rag and a pottery jug filled with water.

Silver rinsed her mouth and accepted Morgan’s help in washing her face and the beads of perspiration from her brow.

“Damn it, Silver, what in the world possessed you to come to a place like this alone?”

“I’m not alone.” She pressed the cool, damp rag against her cheek. “Jacques and Jordy are with me.”

“Jacques brought you here?”

“I asked him to. I thought it would be fun.”

“Obviously it wasn’t.”

“No, it wasn’t.” She let him guide her over to a wooden bench and sank down wearily. “Those poor, beautiful birds.”

Morgan sighed. “I know you find it hard to believe, Silver, but there are some things a woman just shouldn’t do.”

“Surely
you
don’t enjoy this.”

“As a matter of fact, I don’t. But—”

“Good,” she said with a lift of her dimpled chin.

Morgan fought a smile. “Why don’t I take you home?”

Silver looked at him with relief. “I should be forever grateful.”

“I’ll go tell Jacques.”

When he returned, he carried the crumpled-up poster Jacques had shown her that afternoon. “Jacques sends his apologies.” He didn’t tell her that this was probably Jacques’s idea of a test and that Silver, with her untimely display of compassion, had passed with flying colors.

Morgan unfolded the poster and scanned the big letters that offered two thousand in gold for her return. “I don’t like this, Silver. Not one little bit If one of these men were to recognize you—which isn’t too tough—he might try to force your return to Katonga.”

“It really doesn’t matter. In a few days we’ll be gone.”
Wrong
, he thought, feeling a mixture of worry and guilt. “As long as I’m careful, surely nothing will happen.”

“With you anything could happen,” Morgan grumbled, and Silver squared her shoulders. God, she looked incredible standing there in the moonlight. Her dress, cut low in front, showed the tops of her high round breasts. He could remember the smoothness of her skin, the delicate contours of her body. “We’d better go,” he said, forcing his mind in a safer direction.

Morgan had ridden a saddle horse to the cockfight. He left it with Jacques and Jordy, who would ride back with Owen Moore and return the horse to the livery, leaving Morgan the buggy.

He was silent much of the time, until he surprised Silver by stopping at a small roadside inn not far from the ocean. “Do you feel well enough to eat something … at least have some toast and tea?”

“That sounds wonderful.” They drank several cups of tea and ate hot buttered scones, licking pineapple jam off their fingers. The conversation moved easily, both of them feeling relaxed.

“Tell me about your mother,” Morgan said when they had finished and sat quietly beside the window. “I always thought a lot of Mary.”