Regency Vows: A Gentleman 'Til Midnight / The Trouble with Honour / An Improper Arrangement / A Wedding By Dawn / The Devil Takes a Bride / A Promise by Daylight

Baron, Nick had already discovered, was not the right title.

“If this business is keeping you from happiness,” she said, “it has everything to do with principle.”

Dear Honoria, loyal to a fault and impervious to shortcomings. He smiled a little, only to have the rudimentary curve shrivel on his lips. Happiness. It was a ravenous beast, insatiable, incapable of satisfaction no matter how much one fed it.

“Just use the money from the Croston estate,” she said sadly. “The title belongs to you now, and it’s what James would have wanted.”

It was out of the question. “I incurred this debt of my own doing, and I shall discharge it the same way.” Once this bill passed, it was all but certain the Dunscore estate and title would be settled on Holliswell. And once Holliswell became the Earl of Dunscore, he would forgive Nick’s debt and bless his union with Clarissa.

Or so Nick hoped.

* * *

WHATEVER JAMES MIGHT have wanted, what he’d received was a demotion of monumental proportions.

Deep in the hold, he pushed the end of a broom into the crevice between a stack of crates and raked out a wad of rats’ nests. Five days of emptying slop buckets, carrying water, cutting biscuits, swabbing decks—it should have made him furious. He tried for something like outrage when he shoved the next handful of disgusting mess into the bucket, but all he did was scrape his knuckles against the wood.

He yanked his hand away with a hiss.

That he couldn’t work up a good fury over something like this was proof he wasn’t himself. Perhaps he was ill. But then, he’d been wondering that for months now with no sign of physical manifestation. His ship’s surgeon—God rest his soul—had suggested malaise. If nothing else, all this work had him sleeping like a babe in that creaking, knotty hammock he’d been relegated to. But his joints ached like the devil.

The menial tasks, of course, were punishment for being “practically of one mind” with the supposedly ruthless Captain Warre, whose merciless brother threatened her family estate. But poor Lieutenant Barclay wasn’t being punished for Nick’s sins, that much was clear. He was being punished for Captain Warre’s.

Wouldn’t she be disappointed to know that the impassioned naval captain for whom she cherished such a special hatred had been dead for at least a year, perhaps two. The tenacious, single-minded man he used to be had gone missing as completely as the bodies of the men aboard the Henry’s Cross. All that was left was a man who, he could assure her, was much less satisfying.

But if this was Barclay’s penalty for simply knowing him, he preferred not to know what his fate would be if she knew his true identity. Incarceration, probably—and he’d be damned before he let her know he preferred menial tasks over idleness. He wanted his idleness on his own terms, preferably with a generous glass of something expensive and strong.

Briskly he swept out the crevice, shined the lantern to see the result and repeated the process until not even a mote of dust remained. He scooped the mess into a bucket and got on his hands and knees to reach around the side of the crates and into another corner. The little buggers had met their fates at the paws of some of Mr. Bogles’s relations, but before the massacre they’d turned this lower hold into a city the size of London. He breathed in a puff of nasty dust and coughed, wiping his face with his wrist.

Devil take it, this should have been enough to cool the fever she stoked in his blood. But there was no sign of relief from that. Malaise definitely did not afflict him where she was concerned.

At least the tight quarters in the sailors’ berth kept him from becoming more closely acquainted with himself than he ought to.

“I see you’re surprisingly adept with a broom, Lieutenant,” came her smug voice into the hold.

Bloody hell.

Protocol demanded that he stand. Instead, he reached farther around the crates and came up with another handful of dusty, feces-riddled nesting. “I’m adept with any number of tools, Captain.” He didn’t even try to keep the double-entendre from his voice, although there was no doubt it hurt him more than it annoyed her.

“Versatility is a useful quality in a sailor.” Her heavy boots thumped across the planks as she moved in to inspect his work. “My boatswain says your strength is increasing. I thought I would see for myself how you’re managing.”

As though she hadn’t been observing him these past five days at every task he’d put his hands to. He’d felt her eyes on him, caught her watching him countless times. “As you can see, I’m quite recovered and managing well.” He dumped the mess in the bucket and finally stood, reaching for the broom, purposely letting his chest brush her arm—and then regretting it. “You may satisfy yourself that your nemesis is turning in his watery grave to see his lieutenant doing the work of a cabin boy.”

She stood with that arrogant posture, shoulders back and chin up, as though she commanded not just her ship but the sea and everything on it. Her dark hair gleamed in the lantern’s light, falling loose over the swell of her breasts beneath layers of Turkish muslin.

“You misunderstand, Lieutenant,” she said evenly. He watched her lips move and fought an overwhelming urge to kiss that self-satisfied curve from that sensuous mouth. “Your new duties have nothing to do with my feelings toward anyone else. I’m simply operating with a skeleton crew, as you are aware, and naturally I require the assistance of all hands.”

“Naturally.”

“I apologize if the position doesn’t suit you, but I’m afraid I have all the officers I require at present.”

“I have no wish to be one of your officers, Captain.” But he could imagine several other positions that would suit him very nicely. Her power was intoxicating, wrapping around him the way her legs might do, and he drank it in. The raw need to touch her surged through his veins. “Given that I’ve not yet resigned my commission, I am obliged to continue my loyalty to the navy.” He shoved his hand in his pocket and encountered the handful of dowel discs he’d recovered off the floor beneath the carpenter’s bench.

“I am fully aware of where your loyalties lie, Lieutenant.” She looked him up and down, and a pulse jumped in his groin. “Are the men treating you well? If you have any complaints, you are as free to speak with me as any other member of my crew.” The gleam in those topaz eyes told him any complaints he had would be met with satisfaction.

“No complaints, Captain.” Except that he was on fire, and he needed her to leave.

“Excellent.” Her eyes darkened. Good God.

“Although my hammock creaks.”

“I’m sorry to hear it.”

“And this broom is worn.”

“I shall see that you get another.”

And I am James Warre. One sentence, and everything would change—though not necessarily for the better. Wisdom dictated that he wait until a more strategic moment to have the satisfaction of seeing the look on her face when he disclosed himself. Or perhaps he wouldn’t disclose himself at all. Perhaps he would wait until London and savor the moment when circumstances threw them together.

“You’re doing excellent work, Lieutenant,” she said, looking past him with a raised brow. “Very thorough. One can only imagine what you could accomplish with a fresh broom.” She smiled. “You may well earn yourself another commendation.”

On the other hand, perhaps he would prefer to savor his moment much sooner.

CHAPTER NINE

KATHERINE SENT THE fresh broom and hoped the hammock would keep him awake every night, the same way his presence on board was doing to her.

Her attention followed his movements like a compass needle, and she hated it.

By Anne’s sixth birthday nearly a week later, the Possession had made good time sailing up the coast of Spain toward France. Katherine stood at the railing after the birthday festivities with her hands fisted inside a heavy woolen coat, overlooking the lower decks where Captain Warre swabbed the main deck near the bow.

How vexing that he worked with as much vigor now as he had a week ago in the hold—never mind that he’d been assigned the midnight watch, and a moist drizzle threatened harder rain, and the breeze was chilling. The man was impervious to every hardship.

“The closer we get to England, the more insufferable India becomes,” Phil said, joining her at the railing in a billowing, hooded cape. She followed Katherine’s line of sight. “Aha. I see the view from here is excellent today.”

“The closer we get to England, the more insufferable everything becomes,” Katherine said irritably, and pulled her coat more tightly around her. He deserved to be vulnerable. To know what it was like to be powerless and expendable.

“I left Anne instructing Mr. Bogles in the basics of draughts,” Phil told her. “I have a feeling he’ll be a most inept player, but I didn’t wish to disillusion Anne on her birthday—especially since Cook put her in charge of meting out the leftover sugar cakes.”

“With India around, no one else need worry about leftover cakes.”

Phil made a noise of agreement. Below, Captain Warre ran a rag over the railings. Katherine could feel the moment Phil’s gaze shifted away from him and back to her. “The draughts board is remarkable,” Phil said. “Such meticulous detail. Who would have ever thought of embedding rope into the wood so Anne could feel the squares?” Phil’s voice dripped with the answer: Lieutenant Barclay, that was who. “I never would have expected him to be so skilled with wood,” she said. Her lips twitched with suppressed amusement. “At least—”

“Do not say it.”

“Very well.” Phil was quiet for a moment that was pregnant with her mischievous thoughts. “I suppose the third son of a baronet learns any number of diverting skills.”

Apparently so did the second son of an earl. “The draughts board was a gift from the crew,” Katherine said tersely.

“Mmm.”

’Twere all Tom’s idea, Cap’n. He was the one who had thought to adapt the game so Anne’s blindness would not prevent her from playing. It was so difficult to find things to make Anne’s life interesting, things she could do independently. Now she had one more thing to give her confidence.

It was impossible to hate Captain Warre for that.

A drop of rain fell from Katherine’s eyebrow to her cheek and slid down her face. She brushed it away and gripped the dewy railing. The familiar wood, like her sense of control, slipped beneath her grasp. The Merry Sea called to her from its resting place beneath the water, tempting her with memories of those terrifying hours when she’d known, without a doubt, that she would die.

Below, Captain Warre had exchanged the rag for the mop. They watched him drag the mop forward and back, forward and back, carefully pushing it around the railing spindles. He bent to pick up some small thing she couldn’t identify and flung it over the side.

“Anne is very fond of him,” Phil reminded her. “And she misses his stories.”

“I tell her stories.”

“And now you’ll play draughts with her, as well, I daresay. Although one’s own mother is vastly less entertaining than an intriguing naval lieutenant—no matter how many similarities you and the lieutenant share.”

“Continue, and you’ll find yourself swabbing alongside him.”

Phil laughed. “Worth the price, if I could but see you distracted from your worries by a fiery amorous liaison.”

It was past time to tell Phil the truth. “The longer you persist in this notion that I should have an affair with Lieutenant Barclay, the more severe your disappointment will be when it does not occur.”

“The only thing you will gain by such a prudish attitude is a pinched mouth and a crease above your lip.”

“I already have a crease.” Phil was going to be furious that Katherine hadn’t told her. And once she knew, there would be no peace for the rest of the voyage.

“Then you must bed him quickly to prevent more.”

“I rather think I shall continue my nightly cream instead.”

“What could it possibly hurt? A few stolen moments, a passionate embrace...”

Katherine was not going to embrace Captain Warre.

“Let me assure you, lovemaking can be very discreet. If you move him from the midnight watch—”

“Enough!”

Phil raised a brow.

“There’s something I haven’t told you.”

“You are having an affair with him.” Phil gripped her arm. “I knew it.”

“No.” Katherine dragged her gaze from Captain Warre. “I am not.”

Phil’s eyes narrowed and her grip tightened. “Tell me.”

“You must swear you won’t breathe a word to anyone but William.”

“William knows? Katherine, tell me instantly.”

Katherine did, and Phil went from deathly curious to outraged in a heartbeat. “I should run you through on the spot!” she hissed. “Isn’t that what you always say? For heaven’s sake, Katherine—how dare you keep something like this from me? It’s— It’s—” She spun on her heel, stalked a few paces away and stalked back. “Why did you not tell me? Did you not trust me?”

“Perhaps I did not wish to hear about his skill with wood,” Katherine hissed back.

“Do you honestly believe I would have said such things if I’d known?”

Katherine answered with a look. Of course Phil would have said such things—and with all the more glee.

“At least credit me with some sense,” Phil scolded. But already Katherine could see Phil putting the pieces together, realizing that mere moments ago Katherine had been watching Captain Warre—and not because she was merely surveying the crew. Katherine studied a distant ship on the horizon.

“Oh, Katherine. You mustn’t be angry with yourself.”

It was too late for that. “His identity changes nothing. My plans are the same.” Captain Warre was not going to steer her off course. Clearly she was a fool, but she was a fool in command—of both her ship and herself.

“He has no idea that you know? You haven’t spoken to him at all of the past?” Someone called to Captain Warre from overhead, and he tossed the rag over his shoulder and climbed into the rigging to put his weight on a rope.

“No. Nor do I wish to.”

“Of course not. But— Oh, you should have told me.” Agitated, Phil pulled her cloak and hood more tightly around her against the annoying drizzle. “Katherine, you’ve got the Earl of Croston swabbing your deck.”

“It’s less than he deserves.”

“Most definitely. But you must realize this changes everything. Everything! You cannot keep him with the crew. Oh, if only I’d known, I would have advised you never to have put him there. Don’t you see? We didn’t rescue just anybody—we rescued Captain Warre. You rescued Captain Warre.”

“Yes. And I intend to make sure his brother is fully aware of that fact.”

“Which is all good and well, but the possibilities are so much larger. You’ll be a heroine in your own right. This is exactly the kind of thing that will open society’s doors.” Phil looked at him once more. “You’re absolutely certain he is the captain?”

“Yes.”

Phil’s lips tightened, and she sniffed. “I always imagined him with a bulbous nose and cruel, twisted lips.” The fact that he had neither hung silently between them as they watched him carefully but efficiently wipe down the spindles. “But that’s neither here nor there. Regardless of all the reasons you have a right to dislike him, you must remove him from the crew immediately and begin cultivating his good favor.”

“His good favor!” Katherine stared at her. “He should be cultivating mine.”

“Perhaps so, but unfortunately that is an attitude you cannot afford. Your father’s friends in the Lords cannot be counted upon to approve of you, and Lord Taggart certainly won’t appreciate the news that his brother served as your cabin boy.”

“He will appreciate that his brother is alive, and that if it weren’t for me, he wouldn’t be.”

“Will he?” Phil questioned, and for the first time Katherine realized the flaw in her plan. She met Phil’s blue eyes, and Phil arched a damp brow. “The new Earl of Croston might not be pleased to lose his earldom so soon.”

“And there is Lord Deal.”

“So you keep telling me, and I agree that your father’s best friend is an excellent champion, but Lord Deal could not do in ten months what Captain Warre could do in ten minutes if he took up your cause.”

“I do not want him to take up my cause. I want him to grovel at my feet.” Even from here she could see how the drizzle had turned Captain Warre’s hair into dewy black waves. That she noticed his hair at all was galling. “I deserve my revenge, and I will have it.”

“Is not your rentrée into society more important than revenge?”

It was, but— “I shall have both.”

“Think, Katherine. With the right kind of effort, once we get to London all of society will praise you as a heroine.” Phil narrowed her eyes in his direction. “Unless you capitalize on your acquaintance with Captain Warre, what you will very likely have is nothing.”

CHAPTER TEN

WITH THE RIGHT kind of effort, Katherine decided, one could exact a very satisfying revenge.

Over the next few days, she ignored Phil’s repeated pleas and made sure that her new cabin boy had plenty to do. There was no end of unpleasant tasks aboard a ship. And conveniently, the most repugnant were those most in need of repetition.

They were also those most likely to be stoking his resentment against her.

Now she stood at the top of the stairs that led down to the hold where they kept a small hen coop and listened to him sweet-talk the hens as he cleaned their straw and collected eggs.

Lord Deal could not do in ten months what Captain Warre could do in ten minutes if he took up your cause. The same would be true if he decided to oppose her cause, as well. What if she was taking things too far?

It wasn’t as if she were abusing the man. If he had a complaint, there was little doubt he would make it known.

And he was reaping so much less than he deserved.

But they would reach London in a week, and Phil was right about one thing: she would need all the good favor she could curry.

She pushed her mouth into a curve and started down the stairs. “I see you’ve finally found a lightskirt to allow you the liberties you’ve craved,” she said, reaching the coop.

He faced her with a small bucket of eggs in his hand and a piece of straw in his hair. His gaze raked over her. “To what do I owe this pleasure, Captain?”

“Millicent reports that you’ve made a complete recovery. I wanted to see for myself.”

His eyes drove into her. “And what, pray, is your assessment?”

“You don’t seem to have come to any harm,” she said mildly, but the way he looked at her made her pulse jump. She should have left well enough alone.

“Harm? How thoughtful of you to be concerned for my welfare. Could it be that as we approach England you are regretting your decision to demote me so severely?”

She laughed. “Heavens, no. I only regret that I won’t be able to keep you after we arrive. I am convinced you would make an excellent stable boy.” He looked like a fallen god, and she clenched a fist to keep from plucking the straw from his hair. The coop suddenly felt twice as small.

“Mmm. I thought perhaps you might be worried that the punishment you’ve meted out will turn back on you in London.”

“I’ve meted no punishment.”

“A matter of opinion.” His eyes dropped to her mouth.

Every breath suddenly became a conscious effort. “Do you plan to air your complaints to London at large, Lieutenant?”

“Not at all. But the truth will out, as they say.” A hint of amusement creased the corners of his eyes. He was thinking that truth now—that he was not Lieutenant Barclay at all.

“In that case, I have nothing to fear,” she said, but Phil’s warning silently screamed at her. “Nobody will frown on a sailor doing honest sailors’ work.”

He laughed. “You’ll not be able to afford such obtuseness in London if you wish to prevent the bill of pains and penalties you mentioned. London society—not to mention the Lords—will not bend to your authority. I suspect that securing your right to Dunscore will be no easy task. What will you do if your dream of becoming a countess does not come to fruition?”

“You overstep your bounds, Lieutenant.” Damnation—that came out too sharply. And now he observed her through narrowed eyes that saw too much. “I am a countess,” she said quickly, before he could respond. “I do not have to become one.” She smiled and turned to go. “But I suppose if I’m not successful at acceding to my own title, I shall have to find a desperate earl to marry.”

The corner of his mouth curved upward. “I’ll be sure to let you know if I hear of any desperate earls in the market for a wife.”

* * *

YOUR DREAM OF becoming a countess.

Four nights later, his words still chilled her. Mere days out of London, she sat with her feet propped on a chair at the table in the great cabin as evening turned to night. At the far end of the table, Millicent trounced India at draughts.

The hope of seeing Dunscore again—and soon—clogged her throat with unwanted emotion. And now Captain Warre knew how she felt.

He pitied her. She’d seen it in his eyes.

More the fool her, for expecting something more from him. What a devil that she’d let him upset her. It would be impossible to maintain the upper hand if his slightest references to Dunscore had her succumbing to fanciful girlhood dreams.

She didn’t ache for those things anymore. She had new things. She had Anne. If Dunscore had any relevance at all now, it was only because of the future it promised Anne.

“That’s not fair,” India cried as Millicent captured four of her pieces.

“Beg your pardon?” Millicent said. “I can’t hear you behind your ‘contribution to fashion.’”

“Très amusant,” India said, with a movement that might have been a head toss, but it was hard to tell because beneath her usual tricorne India was swathed from head to waist in a length of turquoise cloth. “I think the English have much to learn from their Ottoman counterparts.”

Which may well have been true, but given that India’s interpretation of Ottoman fashion made her look more like a turquoise mummy than a modest Ottoman female, was somewhat inaccurate. “If Englishwomen were going to take a cue from their Ottoman sisters,” Katherine said, sipping her wine, “they would have done it long ago.”

“And they certainly won’t do it now from a girl whose father has locked her away in her apartment,” Phil added. And then, turning her attention squarely back to Katherine, she said, “You’re not listening.”

India noisily captured one of Millicent’s pieces in retribution. “I think it makes a woman look mysterious.” Katherine stared at the game board Captain Warre had largely crafted with his own hands. Too many things aboard this ship were being done by those hands. She could hardly grip a railing without physically sensing that his hands had been the one to clean it. She didn’t have to wait for London for her actions against him to turn back on her—she suffered from them now in the smallest details of her own ship.

“Englishmen don’t want that type of mystery,” Millicent scoffed. “They would have women go about entirely nude if they could.”

“Less than a week before our arrival,” Phil went on, “though I daresay the damage is already done.” She leaned close to Katherine, though for what purpose was a mystery. India’s persistent eavesdropping had required the truth to come out days ago. “You must move him back to André’s cabin.” That Phil ignored Millicent’s quip about nudity underscored how serious she thought this was. “He is your goose that will lay the golden eggs, and you would do well to keep him healthy and happy—not emptying slop and keeping midnight watches. You must start plumping the goose now if you wish to reap its rewards later.”

“One only plumps a goose if one plans to kill it,” Katherine said. “You’d best read the fable again.”