The Devil's Necklace

“Stop! You…you must stop this instant!” She was trembling. She crossed her arms over her breasts, embarrassed by her unexpected reaction, angry at him for taking advantage. “That wasn’t part of the bargain. I didn’t give you permission to take liberties.”

He shrugged. “I only wished to be useful.” But a faint smile curved his lips and his pale eyes were darker than she had ever seen them. As she studied him from the tub, her gaze lit on the heavy bulge in the crotch of his breeches. It happened when a man was aroused, she knew, and fear began to rise inside her.

“Please, I beg you. Let me finish my bath in peace.”

A long finger skimmed along her cheek. “Are you certain that’s what you want?”

Grace moistened her trembling lips. “Yes, very certain.”

For several long moments, he didn’t move, just stayed where he knelt next to the tub. Then with a sigh, he rose to his feet.

“I’ll make sure you aren’t disturbed.”

She managed to force out the words. “Thank you.”

She watched him stride across the cabin. Relief came with a rush when the door closed behind him. Beneath the water, her nipples were still diamond-hard. Her stomach still quivered. It was frightening, what his brief caress had done.

The water was turning cold before she roused herself from her troubled thoughts, managed to finish bathing and wash her hair. All the while she kept asking herself how she could have allowed such a thing to happen.

But the answer did not come.

He couldn’t figure her out. In the past, Ethan had prided himself on his understanding of women. His older brother, Charles, had explained the facts of life when he was just a boy, and having a sister gave him insight into the workings of the female mind. As a youth, he had often spent time with his sister, Sarah, and her friends and he had grown to feel comfortable in the company of women. Over the years, he’d had a number of mistresses.

But Grace Chastain confused him. He believed her to be a whore, yet she played the innocent. Her bravado rose in contrast to the vulnerable expressions that sometimes appeared on her face, the glimmer of tears she fought to hide. She kept him constantly off balance and Ethan didn’t like it. Not one little bit.

Last night after the episode with Grace in the tub, he had shared his first mate’s cabin instead of retiring to his own. Angus knew better than to ask questions. Even if he had, Ethan wouldn’t have known the answers.

Perhaps he was afraid if he had slept beside Grace Chastain as he had the past few nights, the temptation to have her would have been too great. He knew now what lay beneath her borrowed night rail, knew the exact smoothness of her skin, exactly how full her breasts were. He knew the shape of each one and the weight, the rosy color of her nipples.

It had taken sheer force of will not to lift her out of the tub and take one of those heavy breasts into his mouth. He had wanted to run his hands over her belly, her hips, her thighs, wanted to spread those long, shapely legs and bury himself inside her.

Ethan took a steadying breath. The kiss he had stolen that first day had been torture enough. Now, just thinking about her slender, luscious curves made him hard, and that was the last thing he wanted.

Standing on the quarterdeck behind the big teakwood wheel, he looked out over the water. If he slept beside her, he might not be able to resist the temptation to take her. He might not be able to control his lust and it angered him to think she held that kind of power over him. It was never what he had intended.

And he was determined to take back control.

Tomorrow they would reach Odds Landing, the tiny seaport village south and east of Dover. He would buy the lady some clothes and use them to strike the bargain he had intended to make from the start—one he hoped would ease his disturbing need.

He almost smiled. By tomorrow night, Grace Chastain would be sharing her luscious body as well as his bed. “Capt’n?”

He looked up to see his second mate, Willard Cox, topping the ladder to the quarterdeck. Cox was a man in his forties, a big, beefy seaman, heavily muscled through the chest and shoulders. Apparently, the man had acquired a bit of schooling and the surprising ability to read, write and cipher. Cox had a scar across his cheek and one on the back of his hand, but otherwise he wasn’t a bad-looking man. Ethan had never sailed with Cox before and though he had done a good job so far, Ethan wasn’t ready to rush to judgment.

“We received the signal, sir. You can see the lantern, there, off the starboard bow.”

They were close enough to shore to see the glow of yellow light. He’d been expecting the signal. Tomorrow in Odds Landing he had a meeting with a man named Max Bradley. Bradley worked for the British War Office. Along with Ethan’s cousin, Cord Easton, earl of Brant, and another of his best friends, the duke of Sheffield, Bradley had been responsible for Ethan’s narrow escape, after nearly a year, from a filthy French prison.

“Return the signal, Mr. Cox. Tell them the meeting will take place as scheduled.”

“Aye, sir.” Cox made his way back down the ladder and Ethan thought about tomorrow’s rendezvous.

He had agreed to a final mission for the British government. For years, there had been concern about the strength of Napoleon’s naval forces, but lately that concern had in creased. The military believed the Little Corporal was amassing an even larger armada and that once the ships were completed, the fleet would be used to invade English shores.

It was Ethan’s job to prowl the coast, to search for information until he could discover the truth of the matter, one way or another.

He glanced toward the coastline, saw tiny lights flickering in the windows of the distant town of Odds Landing, and thought of Grace Chastain. For the second night in a row, he would sleep in his first mate’s cabin. He imagined the purchases he would make on the morrow and the con cession he intended to receive in return for them, and vowed it would be the last night he spent in a bed other than his own.

“I want to go with you.” Grace faced the captain as he collected his things and prepared to leave the ship. “I can’t stand another day confined to this cabin.”

He glanced her way. “You would prefer a prison cell, perhaps?”

She blanched but pulled herself together and held her ground. “I need some sort of exercise. I am unused to this kind of confinement.”

“I thought most women preferred to stay in out of the sun.”

“Yes, well, I am not most women.”

One of his black eyebrows went up. “That is more than clear.”

Grace ignored the note of sarcasm. “If I promise not to try to escape, will you let me go with you?”

He scoffed. “How much is the promise of a traitor worth?”

Her heart started pounding. “A traitor? That is what you think? That I am a traitor?” Dear God, she had never considered her crime would result in such a charge! For God’s sake, they hung traitors! As Grace knew only too well.

The captain frowned. “Your face has gone pale. You did not realize that helping a traitor escape might lead you, yourself, to be viewed as a traitor?”

She swallowed, shook her head. “No, I… He was…” She couldn’t tell him that Harmon Jeffries was her father, the man who had sired her, but not the one who had raised her. The viscount, her biological father, had a wife and children, and there was her mother and her husband to consider. The scandal would be unbearable for all of them. She had vowed to keep the secret to her grave and she intended to abide by her word.

“He was a friend,” she said. “I couldn’t stand by and let him hang.”

She couldn’t miss the hint of disdain. “He must have been a close friend, indeed, for you to take such a risk.”

For the first time it occurred to her that she had just admitted her crime. Dear God, what had she been thinking? Ethan Sharpe was hardly a man to trust.

She walked toward the row of windows above the bed, trying to calm her fears. The ship was anchored some distance offshore. She could see the tiny village on the hillside above the cove. “I should still like to come along. I am desperate for a little fresh air and a chance to stretch my legs.”

“I can’t take the risk. But I’ll tell you what I’ll do. From now on, at least once a day, I’ll take you up on deck. Will that make you happy?”

She hadn’t really expected him to let her go ashore, not after the trouble he had gone to in order to get her aboard in the first place. She should be happy for the concession. “I suppose that is better than nothing.”

He finished loading his gear and left the cabin, and Grace looked back out the window. A handful of crewmen settled aboard a pair of wooden dinghies and began to row for shore, undoubtedly to refill the ship’s larders. The captain sat in the stern of one of the boats and Grace wished again that she could have gone with them.

Still, the fact that the ship was stopping gave her hope. Sea Devil had anchored in the cove to restock supplies. The vessel would certainly make other stops along the way to wherever it was headed. Eventually, the captain might agree to take her ashore. If he did, she might find some means of escape.

It was obvious she couldn’t go back to London, but Lady Humphrey knew her circumstances and had agreed to help her. Perhaps the baroness could arrange a way for Grace to leave the country.

Grace’s mother had explained that Lady Humphrey, Harmon Jeffries’s widowed aunt, had raised her father after his own mother and father had died. She loved him like a son, and though the viscount had never claimed Grace as his daughter, he had told his aunt about her. Grace wondered what the baroness would say when she discovered Grace had been taken from the Lady Anne.

She sank back down on the captain’s berth. Whatever happened, she had survived thus far and she refused to give up hope.

It simply wasn’t her nature.

A damp, chill wind blew across the water as the small boats drew up beside the dock at the end of High Street. A cloudy, gray, overcast sky hung over the tiny village that morning, keeping people indoors, out of the in clement weather.

With the collar of his woolen coat turned up against the wind, Ethan stepped out of the boat and left the men to complete their assigned duties. His first priority was his scheduled meeting with Max Bradley and he started walking up the hill toward their rendezvous spot, a tavern near the end of the main road called the Pig and Slipper.

As he shoved through the tavern door, entering the smoke-blackened, low-ceilinged taproom, he spotted Bradley sitting at a battered wooden table in a corner near the hearth, finishing the last of his breakfast.

Ethan crossed the room, pulled off his jacket and tossed it over the back of a chair next to one he pulled out for himself.

“Good to see you, Max.”

“You, as well, my friend. I see you have finally put some meat on your bones. Have you had breakfast? The steak-and-kidney pie is excellent.” Max was as tall as Ethan, with the same black hair, though Bradley’s was straight, not wavy, and grew well over his collar. He was perhaps ten years older, somewhere near forty, his face weathered, his features harsh and gaunt. All in all, he had the look of a man other men avoided.

“No, thanks, I ate before I left the ship. What news do you bring?”

“Not much. No word of Jeffries, if that is what you are asking.” Max worked mostly on the Continent. His French was flawless and he moved like a wraith through the taverns, gaming halls and brothels of the French underworld, collecting information useful against Napoleon’s army.

“The man’s a clever bastard,” Ethan said. “Probably tucked away, leading the good life in some château somewhere.” He considered mentioning Jeffries’s mistress, a prisoner aboard his ship, but Bradley was a government man, and the matter of Grace Chastain was personal, and not yet resolved to Ethan’s satisfaction.

“What about you?” Max asked. “Have you run across anything new in regard to the growing French fleet?”

“Nothing so far. I’m heading toward Brest. Rumor has it there is some shipbuilding going on down there.”

“Word also has it there are ships moving toward the south, possibly as far as Cadiz.”

“I’ll see what I can find out.”

“Be careful, Ethan. Jeffries may no longer be a threat, but that doesn’t mean the French are uninformed. They have their spies, just as we have ours. You’ve enemies in France. Your escape made them look like fools. If they catch you again, they won’t let you live till sunrise.”

“Sea Devil is the fastest ship I’ve ever sailed. She’s light and incredibly maneuverable. Still, I’ll not ignore your warning.”

Max rose from his chair and clapped Ethan on the shoulder. “If you need me, leave word here. The owner is a friend and completely trustworthy. I check for messages as often as I can.”

Ethan just nodded. He watched Max Bradley slip quietly out the door and disappear into the street as if he had never been there. Though Ethan would heed his friend’s warning, he needed to discover how many ships were being built and where they were headed.

Once his mission was complete, he would return to London to take up his duties as marquess of Belford, and Grace Chastain would face judgment for what she had done. In the meantime, he had his own personal score to settle with Grace, one that required a different sort of mission than the one he was currently involved in with Max.

Walking down High Street, he surveyed the row of shops along the lane, Dalton’s Meat Market, Emory’s Bakery, a hatmaker’s shop with the sign, Blue Bonnet, on the other side of the street. At last he spotted the dressmaker’s abode, The Apparel Shop. Ethan strode in that direction.

The bell rang above the door as he stepped up to the counter in the tiny receiving room and a buxom woman with too much rouge on her cheeks waddled out to greet him.

“Good morning, sir. How might I be of service?”

“I’m looking to outfit a lady. Her trunk was lost and she has only the dress she was wearing. I was hoping you might be able to help me.”

“Well, of course. If you bring the lady in, we can have her outfitted in no time. In a couple of weeks—”

“I’m afraid that won’t do. We’re sailing this afternoon. I need the dresses by then.”

The pink circles in her cheeks turned a bright rose. “Why, that’s impossible! I couldn’t possibly fashion even a single gown in such a short time.”

“I realize it’s a good deal to ask, but I’m willing to pay for the inconvenience. I’ll give you double what you usually charge.”

“It isn’t a matter of money, Mr…?”

“Captain Sharpe. My ship, Sea Devil, is anchored just offshore.” He still wasn’t used to using his title, marquess of Belford, though it occurred to him it might come in handy right now.

“Well, Captain Sharpe, such a sum would certainly be useful…” She cast a glance toward the curtained room be hind her. “I’m sure the lady must be frantic, without even a change of clothes.”

“She is quite unhappy about it, as you have rightly guessed.” He held his hand up to demonstrate Grace’s height. “The lady is fairly tall, about this high, and slender—except for her breasts.”

The dressmaker blushed, making the pink circles brighten again. She smiled knowingly. “I see. Well, I sup pose any sort of clothing would be better than doing with out.” She leaned over the counter, shoving her pendulous bosom nearly out of the top of her gown.

“I sew for an assortment of different patrons,” she said confidentially. “There is a lady of the evening who purchased a number of items several months back, but ran short of the funds necessary to pay for them.”

A lady of the evening. A hard smile curved his lips. Grace was Jeffries’s mistress. It seemed perfectly fitting.

“The gowns won’t be exactly her size, but with a little alteration, she might make do.”

“I’ll take them.”

He sat down on a damask-covered settee to wait until his purchases could be readied, and a few minutes later, the dressmaker pushed back through the curtains and walked in carrying a stack of boxes. Ethan paid the bill, noting the double amount as he stacked the boxes against his chest.

“It’s been a pleasure,” she beamed at him. “Do come back any time, Captain.”

“I’ll do that.” Though he doubted he would ever again have use for the clothes of a whore.

It was late afternoon by the time the crew had finished transporting fresh kegs of water, salted herring, ale and myriad other foodstuffs back aboard the ship. Ethan was tired but eager to get there. Eager to see what Grace’s reaction would be to the clothes he had brought her.

Thinking of the red satin gown trimmed with black lace he had glimpsed in one of the boxes, somehow he didn’t think the bargain he’d had in mind was going to be as easy to strike as he had hoped.

Five

Grace paced the cabin. Twice she had left the room and climbed the ladder to the deck, only to find the weathered old Scot, the captain’s first mate, Angus McShane, standing at the rail. Each time he had looked at her and simply shook his head.

“Sorry, lass. Capt’n says yer ta stay below in his cabin.”

“And no one dares to disobey the captain’s commands, is that right?”

“Aye, lass. No’ unless he wants ta wear a set o’ strips across his back.”

Grace turned around and marched back down to the cabin, slammed the door, and sat there silently seething. This constant confinement was driving her mad. If she didn’t get out of the cabin soon, she couldn’t be held accountable for her actions.

It was another hour later, the afternoon fading, when the cabin door swung open and the captain strode in. She tried to ignore the way his presence filled the room, the way her heart started to clatter the moment she saw him. He set the stack of boxes he carried down on top of the bed.

“This was the best I could do. They’ll probably take a little alteration, but I imagine you can manage.”

“You brought me some clothes?” she asked excitedly. “Oh, thank God.”

“I’ve a couple of things to see to. I’ll be back a little later.” He left her with the clothes and she hurried over to lift off the lids.

The first box held several white lawn chemises. The woman who wore them must have been taller for when she held them up, they barely covered her breasts. But she could shorten the straps without a problem. Odd though, once she did, they would barely cover her behind. There were long black gloves in the box and a red feather boa, along with several pairs of lacy garters. One set was black, the other red. She frowned. She had never seen garters those colors before.

She took the lid off the box underneath. A swatch of scarlet satin glowed up at her. She caught a handful of fabric and lifted it out of the box, saw that it was a gown fashioned of red satin with small black satin sleeves and black piping.

It was the ugliest, gaudiest gown she had ever seen.

Grace tossed it onto the bed and opened the next box. There were two gowns inside, one of sapphire silk edged with black lace, the other of orange crepe also edged in black. There were hideous little orange puffed sleeves and when she held it up, she saw that the scalloped bodice was so low it would expose the edge of her nipples.

Grace shrieked in outrage. How dare he! She tossed the orange gown on the floor and stomped on it, twisted it beneath her feet. She picked it up and started tearing out the silly looking sleeves, her satisfaction growing at the sound of the ripping fabric.

He had bought her the clothes of a whore!

She would die before she would wear them!

“What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing?”

She marched toward him, shoved the orange dress under his nose. “These might be the fashion for the other women of your acquaintance, but they do not suit me!” Reaching for the opposite sleeve, she brutally ripped it out of the arm hole and tossed it in his face. When she reached for the neckline, the captain caught her arm.

“I told you these were the best I could do. It cost me a bloody fortune to get them for you.”

“These are the clothes of a whore. Find someone else to wear them.” She caught the neckline between her fingers and started ripping the bodice of the dress in two.

“Put it down.”

“I’ll be happy to put it down.” She tossed it onto the floor, stomped on it several times, then marched over and grabbed the red-and-black satin.

“You rip that dress and I swear you will wish you hadn’t.”

She gave him a vicious smile. “Oh, I think not. I think I will be extremely glad to be rid of it!” She held up the sleeve, taunting him with it, ready to rip out the offending puff of black satin.

“Don’t do it,” he warned softly.

She thrust out her chin and took a firmer hold. The fabric ripped loudly and a ragged hole appeared where the sleeve of the gown had been.

“Damn you!” The captain charged forward. Grace shrieked as he gripped her arm and started dragging her to ward the bed. She pulled free of his hold, drew back and slapped him across the face as hard as she could. Instead of fear, she felt a glorious rush of satisfaction.

The captain looked stunned. For several seconds he just stood there with his mouth agape. Then his jaw clenched and his eyes turned the color of a frozen sea. “You’re going to be very sorry you did that, Grace.”

Eyes widening at the fury in his face, Grace bolted for the door. He was on her in an instant, dragging her back across the room and over to the bed. He sat down on the edge and hauled her over his lap. She was tall and fairly strong but he controlled her easily. Grace shrieked at the sting of his palm, coming down hard on her bottom, the sharp blow penetrating the thin fabric of her aqua silk gown.

“Let me go!” White-hot fury engulfed her. Another stinging swat landed before she regained her wits enough to grab hold of his leg and bite down hard on his calf.

“Bloody hell, woman!” Surging to his feet, he jerked her up beside him. He was breathing hard, his eyes full of fire.

Grace faced him squarely, her breath coming fast, every bit as angry as he. She had been itching for a fight since the night he had dragged her off the Lady Anne. She wasn’t about to back down now.

“I vow you are the damndest woman I have ever met! I am twice your size and you are my prisoner! God’s breath, woman—don’t you know enough to be afraid?”

“I am afraid! I am also sick and tired of your high-handedness. And I am sick unto death of being trapped in your bloody cabin! I think I am going mad!”

Ethan stared at Grace in disbelief. His cheek still stung where she had slapped him. He could feel the imprint of her teeth on his leg. There wasn’t a man on board this ship who would have the courage to fight him as she had.

His mouth twitched with unexpected amusement. He took in her dishevel, the slightly wild, utterly determined look in her eyes, and thought he had never seen a more beautiful creature. He could still remember the shape of her lush curves as he had dragged her over his lap, the warmth of her bottom beneath his hand. He was hard and aching for her. He couldn’t remember wanting a woman so badly.

“I can’t decide if you are the bravest woman I have ever met, or the most foolish. Do what you will with the clothes. Perhaps you can salvage enough to come up with at least something to provide yourself a change. I’ll see you have needle and thread, if you are interested.”

In their struggle, her hair had come unbound and now hung in thick curls around her face. Her gown was wrinkled and stained and yet she faced him regally, her head held high, looking more like a duchess than the criminal she was.

He cleared his throat, trying to regain some semblance of authority. “Perhaps later on, if you wish, I’ll come and get you, escort you round the deck.”