Texas Viscount (23 page)

      
“Surely the better classes don't do that in America,” the marquess said, horrified.

      
Josh shrugged. “I couldn't speak for folks born rich, but I earned my first cash money cleaning out stables.”

      
“How unspeakably vulgar,” Eunice said, wrinkling her perfect little nose as if she could smell a pile of fresh horse manure.

      
Just then Sabrina and Drucilla passed by below, engaged in laughing conversation. “I do hope the governess can do something with that girl. At least she's managed to hold down her breakfast,” the marquess said with a sigh.

      
“If she does, it will be her only accomplishment,” Eunice interjected snidely. “Drucilla is quite beyond help, I'm afraid. She can't dance or even dress properly.”

      
“All the girl needs is time to grow up. She's only a tadpole,” Josh responded.

      
Lady Eunice's expression was positively malicious as she looked at her sister. “She'll be as tall as a man before she's grown. Papa will have a terrible time finding her a husband.”

      
“That's why I'm hiring that glorified maid to tutor her,” he replied, aggravated.

      
Josh bristled at the dismissive insult to Sabrina. “Miss Edgewater is a highly educated lady who's fixing to start her own school.”

      
“How dreadful to have to work for one's living...and to be a spinster in the bargain. At least Cilla won't have to worry about working,” Eunice said.

      
Josh was beginning to dislike both father and daughter more by the moment. His most devout wish was to get this weekend over with and return to London. Then he and Uncle Ab would have a serious talk about any further selection of matrimonial candidates.

      
As the sun reached its zenith, the marquess instructed the cook to serve luncheon below deck in the dining area. The old martinet even deigned to allow one of the crew to take the wheel while he played host at table. While they were making their way below, the wind began to pick up once more. Josh had been doing decently until then, above deck and distracted by conversation, even if some of it had aggravated him.

      
But once he stepped into the low-ceilinged dining area with its small portholes, that old queasy feeling began to creep up on him again. The horizon rocking from side to side through a round window was altogether more difficult for him to deal with than bouncing up and down on a bucking horse. At least when you fell off, it was on solid ground. Nothing aboard a boat was ever stationary.

      
The marquess took his seat at the head of the cramped table and the others sat in their assigned places. Josh was at the opposite end of the table with Eunice at his right and Drucilla at his left. Sabrina was seated next to Chiffington, who began to discuss what she could teach his daughter. The cook served the first course, a lobster bisque, and everyone began to eat with relish.

      
Except Josh.

      
The aroma of sherry and heavy cream blended with lobster was definitely not a culinary delight when one was beginning to turn the color of the second course—assorted summer greens in vinaigrette. Shoving the soup away barely tasted, Josh manfully attempted a few forkfuls of the greens, but the pungent dressing made him immediately abandon that.
Oh, for those crackers I turned down earlier!

      
“Whatever is wrong, Lord Wesley?” Lady Eunice asked. “You've scarcely touched a thing, just like Cilla. But then, we all know why she won't eat,” she added with a smirk. “Do you not approve of our cook?”

      
“The cook is doing his job just fine,” Josh managed, as he and Drucilla exchanged sympathetic glances. “Being raised in Texas, I reckon I'm just naturally more of a meat-and-potatoes sort of fellow.”

      
“Ah, then the saddle roast of venison coming up should suit you perfectly,” the marquess said as a huge chunk of beautifully browned meat was presented for him to carve. “Here, pass me your plate.”

      
Josh looked down at the juicy rare slices of meat and felt the sweat beading on his forehead. He took a swallow of water. Then another. Somehow he had to get through this. Even poor Drucilla was managing to eat tiny bits from each course and hold them down. He cut a bite of venison and commenced to chew. All right. Another. He could do this. He
would
do this.

      
Josh smiled at Drucilla, and that was when he noticed her stash of crackers.

      
She returned his smile and passed him the bag around the corner of the table. He nodded his thanks and tried to extract a cracker without alerting Lady Eunice. But, dense as the mean-spirited little filly could be, she saw what they were doing and smirked. She was ready to make some snide comment when the ship took a sudden lurch and her wineglass filled with claret splashed onto the white linen tablecloth. Instantly she scooted her chair back to avoid soiling her fancy outfit. All the china and crystal slid gently across the table, tumbling several more of the glasses.

      
That's it.
Josh's stomach went with them. He could feel it coming on and knew he had to do something immediately, but he was trapped opposite the stairway to the deck. To reach it, he'd have to climb over Eunice, the cook and a footman. He'd never make it in time.

      
Sabrina watched the tableau unfold with growing horror. Josh was green and perspiring awfully. Being below decks and surrounded by all the rich food smells must have triggered another bout of
mal de mer
. She started to slide back her chair and go to him, her napkin clutched determinedly in one hand; but before she could stand up, he reached over to Lady Eunice and yanked the wide-brimmed straw hat from her head. She let out a shriek and leaped up. Josh ignored her angry remonstrance as he leaned over, employing her hat in lieu of a bucket.

      
Sabrina thought it worked quite serviceably.
A resourceful lot, Texans. Now, if he would only clap it back on Her Ladyship's head!

Chapter Eleven

      
The moon hung low and full like a pale golden ball hovering over the blackness of the ocean at night. The sound of the waves lapping onto the beach below kept Josh tossing and turning in bed until he threw back the covers and sat up, resting his head in his hands. What a damnable humiliation the day had been. He'd spent the duration of the trip hanging over the aft railing, doubled up, dry heaving. At least he'd walked off the accursed boat under his own power, refusing Sabrina's suspiciously solicitous offer of assistance.

      
Just thinking of what he was going to do when he confronted his uncle had been motivation enough for him to storm up the beach. When he reached the house, the old man sat on the veranda, placidly sipping a glass of port and chatting with Lady Chiffington. One look at Josh's grayish complexion and disheveled appearance led the earl to chuckle and nod in full understanding. The viscount had considered getting his Colt and turning the old buzzard into a sieve. If not for ladies present, he would have done it, too.

      
Hambleton had remained utterly nonchalant, but Sabrina must have seen the murderous look in his eyes, for she quickly placed herself between the earl and his bloodthirsty nephew until he reined in his Texas temper.

      
Sabrina. What an utterly unpredictable female she was proving to be. She, not the debacle on the boat, was the true reason he could not sleep. He cared nothing for Chiffington and his wretched elder daughter. And he'd made clear to the earl in no uncertain terms that any faint hope he might cherish of a marriage between the Lady Eunice and his nephew was dead as a steer in a slaughterhouse. Odd that the old man had taken the news with utter indifference.

      
Why the devil was his uncle not upset? He'd arranged this whole shebang. But then again, he'd known the marquess would insist on sailing and Josh would humiliate himself. It just didn't make sense. Josh stood up and paced across the softly creaking floorboards on bare feet, refusing even to look at the waves beating against the sand dunes. But that, too, bothered him. He'd never backed down from anything in his life.

      
“ Damned if I'll let that water scare me,” he muttered to himself and forced himself to open the French doors leading out onto the upper veranda. At once, the salt-laden wind ruffled his hair. As long as he was standing on dry land, it wasn't so bad, he thought.

      
Unable to sleep, he considered a walk along the beach. Maybe that was the first step in conquering his fear. Hell, he'd crossed rivers swollen to torrential tidal waves in spring storms back in Texas. He'd always been a strong swimmer. Maybe if he took a dip in the salt water, it might help him get a feel for the ocean.

      
That was when he saw her. Sabrina walked along the beach, a lone figure aglow in the golden moonlight. Her hair was down and blowing behind her as she faced into the wind, which molded her skirt and blouse against the curves of her body. Here was beauty without artifice. After Eunice's staged performance that morning, he found Sabrina's solitary walk far more appealing...and arousing.

      
Seizing a pair of jeans and a shirt, he began to dress quickly. In moments he was wading through the soft sand, closing the distance between them. Over the sounds of the ocean, she did not hear his approach until he called out to her.

      
Sabrina gasped, whirling around in utter surprise. “You're the last person on earth I ever thought I'd see here,” she said, gesturing to the breakers slapping against the sand.

      
Josh shrugged as he fell into step beside her. “A fellow's gotta face his fears.”

      
“Is that a Texas truism?” she asked with a smile. Somehow it felt natural to be strolling along together, even though she knew it was utterly improper for them to be alone this way.

      
“True anywhere, I reckon.” She was dressed in the same simple white skirt and blouse she'd worn that morning, softened by many washings. Recalling the fixed-up older clothes she'd worn at the ballet, he didn't imagine she had much in the way of fancy dresses. But a woman who looked like Sabrina didn't need a lot of fancy duds to catch a man's eye. “I thought a lady never went out with her hair down,” he teased.

      
“It was pinned up until the wind saw fit to undo my hasty work. Besides, I did not intend for anyone to see me,” she answered carefully.

      
“Why are you out here alone, after midnight?”

      
It was her turn to shrug. “I couldn't sleep.”

      
He grinned. “Me neither. Guess we'll just have to find something else to do.”

      
She looked up at him sharply. “I have already found it—
walking
.” She stressed the word.

      
“I was thinking more along the lines of talking,” he offered. “Lookee, there's a seat for us, carved by the hand of nature just so we can get out of the wind.”

      
Indeed, the sand dunes had been swept against a stand of tall brushy grasses, making a niche where two people could sit in seclusion, hidden from the house as well as protected from the brisk air. As if to induce her cooperation, the wind picked up, snapping her hair around her face and drawing goose bumps on her arms through the sheer fabric of her blouse.

      
When Josh took her hand and guided her to sit in the grassy enclave, she followed without protest.
This is most unwise
, an inner voice chided. Sabrina ignored it. The warmth and callused hardness of his large hand enveloping hers felt like magic. He took a seat on the soft sand and left a semi-decorous space between them as he urged her to sit beside him.

      
Once before, she'd gone out alone with a man on a moonlit night...with disastrous consequences. But somehow this seemed different. After all, she was older and wiser now. She had a career and would soon realize her life's dream—or at least what had become her life's dream after the girlish fancies of youth had passed her by.

      
She sat down.

      
As if reading her mind, he asked, “Why'd you never marry?”

      
“That is a highly personal and improper question for a gentleman to ask a lady,” she responded reflexively.

      
“You're no old maid, Sabrina. But you are past the age when most females fix on getting hitched. And I know it wasn't because you never had offers. You're beautiful in all the ways that count. Inside as well as outside. You're smart, you care about people, and you can laugh at yourself, just like you told Drucilla.”

      
Sabrina felt her heart warm at his words, which she intuited were genuine. “You were wonderful with that child today. She's been made to feel inferior and unloved by her own family. It's unconscionable.”