The Price of Indiscretion Read online

  Alex wrapped his arms around her. A part of him was awed by her loyalty…and yet he was unwilling to let himself fully believe. This was too new, too fragile. And he’d learned the dangers of trusting before.

  He should go out and check on his ship. Oliver was capable of handling everything, but Alex usually kept a watchful eye. But he wasn’t ready to leave Miranda’s side. Not just yet. He wanted to savor this moment a bit longer. Spent, he fell asleep and didn’t wake until late in the day.

  Miranda still slept as if exhausted. Alex was hard. He would have made love to her again, except she looked so tired. She’d been through quite a bit.

  Carefully rising from the bed so as not to wake her, Alex pulled the sheet up over her shoulders and dressed in clean clothes and boots. He carried the bucket of water he’d used to wash her outside. Holding his head over the side of the ship, he poured the fresh water over his hair to get the salt water out of it.

  Miranda might like a full bath later. He would let her use all the fresh water she needed. He’d even help her bathe.

  The thought almost brought him to his knees.

  He shook his hair out and straightened, thinking he just might have to go wake her up. But when he turned, he realized that thirty very curious pairs of eyes were watching his every movement.

  A scowl sent them back to work. Everyone, that was, save Oliver. The Scot was at the helm.

  Alex set the bucket down and walked over to him. “Do you want me to take the helm?”

  “If you wish, Cap’n.”

  “I do.” Oliver stepped back, and Alex put his hands on the wheel. There was a strong current, and the sails were full. Fair skies and fair wind. At this speed, they could be sailing down the Thames in five days.

  “So,” Oliver said, lighting his pipe, “now that you have her, what are you going to do with her?”

  “Keep her,” Alex answered, knowing this was the question the men in his crew wondered about. Yes, he would keep her.

  A new sense of purpose filled Alex. He had responsibilities. He meant what he’d said about taking care of her sisters. Her family would be his family.

  Places in his soul that he had not known were empty suddenly overflowed with anticipation of the future.

  She could even be carrying his son right now.

  “Well,” Oliver said. “Well, well, well.”

  Alex frowned at him. “Well what?”

  “You’ve been caught.”

  “I’ll not deny it,” Alex answered, a hint of challenge in his voice. “She’s my wife.” The words sounded good on his tongue.

  “Your wife?” Oliver asked. He caught his pipe before it dropped out of his mouth. “I always thought you a bachelor, Cap’n. Just as rowdy as the other lads.”

  “No, I’ve been married,” Alex answered. “It was a Shawnee ceremony. There was just a small disagreement between the two of us.”

  “And now what?” Oliver dared to ask.

  Alex loosened his hold on the wheel and then tightened it again, thinking. “Now we’ll go to London,” he answered, his words measured. “We’ll do it right this time. I’ll buy a special license and hire a priest.” Then no one could say they weren’t married.

  There was a beat of silence. “She’s a lucky woman,” the older man said at last. “Does she know how wealthy you are?”

  “No,” Alex answered.

  Oliver raised one doubting bushy eyebrow.

  “She doesn’t,” Alex insisted. “I’ve not told her. She accepts me for myself. I’d not have her any other way.”

  “Oh, it’s not the acceptance part that worries me. Women are funny,” Oliver observed, sticking his pipe back in his mouth. “You never know which way they will jump with that logic of theirs.”

  He was right. Alex had already learned that the hard way.

  Oliver checked the wind in the sails before saying in a low voice that seemed to emphasize his brogue all the more, “You’re the finest man I’ve ever known, Cap’n. You deserve a woman who will be loyal.”

  “She’s the only woman I’ve ever wanted,” Alex answered.

  “I can see that…but you had to throw a bag over her head to get her to come with you.”

  Alex dismissed his reservations with a shake of his head. “You don’t understand.”

  “Aye.”

  The dryness in the Scot’s answer annoyed Alex, but then he was very sensitive on the topic of Miranda. That’s what happened when a man explained himself; he got irritated. “Here, take the wheel,” Alex said. He went down the stairs to the main deck and his cabin.

  He checked on Miranda. She still slept, her golden hair spread across his pillow. His sextant was still on the floor where it had fallen the night before. He retrieved it. He understood Oliver’s doubts, but they were unnecessary. This time, Miranda truly was his.

  Shutting the door, he knew he had to keep himself busy or else he would be checking on her every ten minutes, and he didn’t want to appear that much of a puppy in front of his crew.

  First he walked the perimeter of his ship and then walked it again. Oliver had gone down to his quarters for some sleep, but the other men watched him, their curiosity over their shipboard guest clear in their faces, but Alex had already said enough. He climbed the rigging and tested the knots. Twice. Everything was as it should be.

  He checked on Miranda again. She slept on.

  Evening was coming upon them.

  Alex went to the galley and had Cook prepare a plate with only the freshest meat and vegetables. Here was a good reason not only to open the cabin door but to wake her.

  Carrying the tray himself, he went up to his cabin. Miranda didn’t notice his entrance. He set the tray on the table and walked over to the bunk.

  She’d tossed and turned in her sleep, and the sheet was down low enough to expose one breast. His palm itched to cover it. He sat on the edge of the bunk. He’d kiss her into wakefulness. Bending down, he pressed his lips against her cheek and stopped—

  She was burning hot. The heat radiated from her body.

  Alex placed his hand on her head. She frowned and tried to turn away from him. “Miranda,” he said sharply. “Wake up.”

  She ignored him. He lifted her by the shoulders. Her head lolled to one side and then the other.

  Alarmed, he laid her back on the pillow and lifted one eyelid. With a frown, she pushed him away and peered out at him through half-open eyes.

  “How do you feel?” he demanded.

  “Not good,” she answered, her voice barely a whisper.

  “Not good?” he repeated inanely, trying to understand what was happening.

  She made herself very clear by rolling over to the edge of the bunk and throwing up all over his boots.

  Miranda’s eyes were glued shut. She’d try to open them but it was much easier to sink back into sleep.

  She knew she had to rise. Her mother wanted her to watch baby Ben and hoe the garden. Mama said she did the job better than Charlotte, even though Miranda resented having to always watch the baby.

  This was a dream Miranda always had. It had haunted her since her mother’s death.

  However, this time, just as Miranda would start toward the door, Mama would try and ladle something foul-tasting into her mouth. She pushed it away and yet Mama kept coming at her with the spoon until finally Miranda had no choice. She had to swallow it, and then Mother would leave her alone.

  Time changed. She was no longer in her cabin but on a barge. It skated along a sea made of moonbeams and Alex was there, tickling her nose and pulling her arm. She swatted at him to stop but he kept trying to make her follow him.

  She looked toward shore and saw her sisters standing there. They called to her but she couldn’t answer. She wouldn’t.

  She’d failed them.

  She’d failed all of them.

  They didn’t know how much…but her dreams did.

  Her dreams never let her forget that it was her fault her mother and Ben had died. She’d
not watched the baby. The Shawnee had come, and Mother and the baby were struck dead in the morning sun.

  Miranda had run to find her sisters. Everyone had thought she was brave but she’d run because she was scared. She’d seen them take her mother’s scalp. The brave had waved it in the air, and she’d run.

  Sir William appeared and began hitting her with his gloves. His white gloves. Lady Overstreet warned him he was going to get them dirty and then what would he do when he married Miranda? He’d have dirty gloves to wear. They should be white, pure white. White, white, white!

  Miranda shouted she didn’t want to marry. No one listened to her. Charlotte kept insisting on a duke. Always a duke—

  Everything went black.

  Her father was there.

  Her skin grew so cold her teeth chattered. He slapped her. He slapped again and again but she could not stop shaking. Ever since Alex, he hadn’t hesitated to use his fists. But it was Charlotte who bore the brunt of it. Charlotte who often came between them and ended up being slapped around herself, their father three times angrier than he was before.

  She had to marry a duke for Charlotte.

  She wanted Charlotte to be happy.

  Her skin grew hot. She felt as if she was boiling inside. Someone had blankets on her. She kicked them off. It was hot. Too hot…and then she realized she was going to die and it would be all right.

  Charlotte would understand…

  Miranda was very sick. The fever was deep in her bones, and her body seemed powerless to fight it.

  Alex cursed Esteves and his slack practices. Ports were rampant with disease. It was the harbormaster’s responsibility to see that it didn’t spread.

  As it was, he would let none of his men close to Miranda and kept himself quarantined, too. He hated fever. It had carried off his mother and Shawnee half-brothers—but it hadn’t had an impact on him. By some twist of fate, he’d always been immune to illness. The Shawnee thought his invulnerability from the diseases that could decimate a whole tribe sprang from his mixed blood. Alex now used it to nurse Miranda, sitting by her side day and night.

  When she shook from the chills, he heaped blankets on her. When her skin grew so hot, her own sweat dried immediately, he bathed her in cool water, pleading with her to stay alive.

  Alex wasn’t a praying man. He practiced the spirituality of his mother and an acceptance he had learned on his own. White theologians had only angered him.

  However, now he prayed to whatever God could save her. Miranda was very ill.

  He’d toyed with the idea of returning to the Azores and dismissed it. If her body could not heal itself, she would need the services of a good physician, the sort that could be found only in London.

  But the fever wasn’t the only demon Miranda fought. Through her restless mumblings and feverish rants, Alex learned her fears. He understood now her loyalty to her sisters and the insecurities that, in spite of her beauty, drove her.

  He also heard her speak of a marriage to a white. Over and over she would repeat the word “white,” and he knew she did not love him. Not in the way he cared for her.

  They were not to be. He had made love to her, but she would not love him. She’d never accept him…although he could no longer accuse her of selfishness. He and Miranda were victims of the violence of the American wilderness. Some chasms could not be crossed. He understood that now.

  Sitting beside her, holding her hand, and praying for her life, Alex reached a point when he could let go of the possessiveness that had gripped him over much of his relationship with Miranda. In that moment, he could truly love enough to set her free.

  She didn’t belong to him. She couldn’t. She needed to marry the duke she kept muttering about.

  If she lived, he would see that she did.

  They reached Portsmouth on the evening tide. The pilot would meet them with a doctor whose job was to inspect ships and quarantine them for disease. Alex could not let that happen. He and Flat Nose smuggled Miranda ashore in a small boat to a point where he’d arranged to be met by the fastest team and carriage his money could purchase.

  By midnight, they were racing on their way to London.

  Eleven

  Miranda awoke in stages. She could hear everything, and yet her eyelids refused to open. It was easier to let them be.

  She could distinguish voices—a man’s deep, thoughtful concerned one, a woman’s answers. In her delirium, she assumed the woman was Charlotte, and yet some part of her knew she wasn’t. She wondered where Constance was, but she was too tired to worry. It was easier to drift back in the darkness.

  The dreams disturbed her. They’d start so pleasantly…

  She was riding in a birch bark canoe down a river of golden water. It was autumn and the trees were a blaze of color. The water was clear. When she leaned over the side of her canoe she could see all the way to the pebbled bottom of the stream, only there weren’t pebbles but gold. Coins of gold. Like the ones in her father’s chest. Only here there were many, many more. They were too numerous to count and they were hers for the taking.

  Charlotte would be happy. None of them would have to marry. They could do whatever they wished.

  She looked up, aware that she wasn’t alone, assuming it was one of her sisters, and wanting to share the good news.

  But it wasn’t her sister with her in the boat. A Shawnee warrior, his face marked with red streaks of war paint, stood at the prow. In his hand, he held her mother’s scalp—

  Miranda screamed. She finally let loose all the anguish and horror that she had felt that day long ago but had suppressed to save her life. It came from deep within and forced her to regain consciousness—

  “Miss, miss,” the Indian said to her in a wee, feminine voice with a hint of Irish in it. “You must wake up, miss. Yer dreamin’. Please, miss.”

  The scalp vanished from his hand. He shook her shoulders.

  It was too confusing.

  She opened her eyes in surprise and didn’t see an Indian but an oversized mobcap on the head of a blond-haired girl. She was about fifteen, with freckles across her nose.

  Struggling to catch a breath, Miranda reached out to touch the girl and see if she was real. The tips of her fingers brushed warm skin. She looked beyond the girl to the walls and elaborate furnishings surrounding her.

  This was not her father’s cabin. There was no golden river…but what was in its place was far finer.

  Miranda discovered she lay in the middle of a huge canopied bed on a mattress as soft as down. The underside was a soft rose and the drapes and curtains a silvery hue with sky blue tassels trimming its edges. The quilt and sheets covering her were smoother than anything she had ever touched.

  The room was the size of her father’s whole trading post. A rich, deep carpet in the colors of the heavens lay on the floor. The armoire and dresser were ornately carved out of light wood. Floor-to-ceiling windows were covered with drapes the color of sweet cream. They pulled against the morning sunlight. The atmosphere was cool and relaxing, and in the air was the faintest hint of flowers. The scent came from several large, painted bowls of potpourri strategically placed around the room. There was also the slightest fragrance of beeswax, letting her know that this was a well-cared-for home.

  Bits and pieces of her memory returned. She could recall sitting in an inn in New York with Charlotte and Constance…but this wasn’t New York.

  Nor was she wearing her own nightdress. She remembered shopping for one—

  “Where am I?”

  She was speaking to herself, unaware she’d said the words aloud until the maid bobbed a curtsy and said, “The home of my mistress, Mrs. Severson. I’m Alice. Mrs. Severson instructed me to wait on you.”

  Miranda frowned. The name Severson didn’t sounded familiar. However, before she could ask any more questions, the maid said, “I must tell my mistress you are awake. Excuse me, miss. I shall go fetch her.” She left the room, going out an ornate, paneled door, her feet not making
a sound on the carpet. She closed the door behind her, and Miranda was alone.

  She sank back into the feather mattress, pulling the covers up almost to her nose and feeling very weak and insignificant. She started ticking off in her mind the things she knew, surprising herself by what she could recall.

  Charlotte had sent her to London to find a husband.

  They were paying Lady Overstreet to play matchmaker.

  She and Her Ladyship had been on a ship—

  Alex.

  She remembered his entering the party with his hair down around his shoulders and his spirit defiant. She’d gone out on the terrace alone with him.

  Memories returned with more details. The kidnapping…the kissing…the making love.

  Her mind whirled from the memories.

  No wonder her body felt alien to her. She’d made love to Alex and now found herself in this place, with people she didn’t know. He had to be close. She sensed that he was.

  Her throat felt dry. She was thirsty. There was a glass and water on a bedside table and other accouterments of the sickroom. Images of Alex’s concerned face rose in her mind. Where was he?

  Miranda wet her lips, wanting a sip of water, wanting to rise and find answers to her questions, and yet it was easier to stay as she was—

  The door opened.

  She turned, expecting to see Alex. Instead, a lovely woman of about her age entered. She had a beautiful, welcoming smile. Her hair was dark, and she wore it up without the coyness of curls. Her clothes matched the elegant surroundings of the room. An air of serenity surrounded her, and Miranda relaxed.

  “Miss Cameron, you are feeling better?” the woman asked in a well-modulated voice.

  Miranda nodded, not trusting her scratchy throat or her voice. Her own hair felt lank and dull compared to this woman’s, and she hated not knowing any of the answers to the questions rapidly forming in her mind.

  The woman didn’t seem to expect her to answer. She pulled up a small chair with needlepointed cushions and sat down beside the bed. “I’m Isabel Severson. You are a guest in my house. You’ve been very ill. We nearly thought we’d lost you.”