An Improper Proposal (20 page)

But not Drake. He wouldn’t have been able to stand it. Sit at a desk, when he could be sailing the open seas, commanding his own ship? No, thank you. He’d take the sea, with all its perils, any day of the week.

Of course, he hadn’t expected Becky Whitby to understand that. He couldn’t have expected any woman to understand it, really. Which was why he’d put off telling Becky as long as he could, why he hadn’t mentioned it at all until that point, following Payton’s incredible announcement, that they’d been alone together in the vicar’s study. He’d thought she was going to faint again, that moment he’d told her he was putting Daring Park up for sale. She had worn an expression of shock their entire ride to Portsmouth. And no sooner had they boarded the
Constant
than she’d shut herself up in his cabin, refusing to speak to a soul.

Well, what was he supposed to have done? He wasn’t his brother, Richard, and he never would be. The sea was where he belonged. She’d known that. He’d explained that. Drake had been frank with her from the beginning. Well, not about how he intended to sell the house and install her in the villa in Nassau, but about how he would spend most of his time atsea. What difference did it make, really, whether she was mistress of his house in England or New Providence? She was still what she’d always wanted to be: a lady.

Well, not anymore. At least, not if what he suspected turned out to be true. Oh, her story back in the vicar’s chambers had been pretty enough. He was almost disposed to believe it. Part of it, anyway.

In the meantime, however, he was still a gentleman, and he would attempt to behave as such. He had a feeling he’d have better luck acting like a gentleman around Becky Whitby, who was no lady, than around Payton Dixon, who most definitely was. Well, of a sort.

He knocked first. After all, it wasn’t as if they were man and wife—yet. He couldn’t just go barging in there, for all it was his own cabin.

But the knock went unanswered. She either hadn’t heard—which was not unlikely, given the pre-battle activity on deck, and the creak of the bow as they made the turn toward the ship coming at them—or she wasn’t answering. Well, that too was understandable. She hadn’t answered but once or twice since she’d looked herself in the day before. He wasn’t certain what it was she was doing in there, besides, if his suspicions were true, vomiting. She’d have been better off battling seasickness on deck, but had ignored him when he’d insisted this. He still wasn’t even sure she’d heard him. It was difficult to shout instructions through a door, especially with half his crew snickering over the fact that the captain’s bride would not open it to him, and the other half wondering why the captain didn’t simply rush the portal and give the girl the thrashing she deserved.

“Miss Whitby,” he called. “It’s Connor Drake. Open the door, will you? There’s something I’ve got to talk to you about.”

Deep within the cabin, he heard her say, quite calmly, “Go away.”

“I can’t go away, Miss Whitby. You see, we’ve run into a bit of difficulty—”

“What kind of difficulty?”

“Well, there’s another ship—”

“Why should I care about that?”

Why, indeed. “Well, I don’t want to alarm you, but she isn’t one of ours. There may be cannon fire. I only wanted to let you know—”

So you wouldn’t be frightened, he almost said. And run out onto deck like a chicken with its head cut off, and get yourself blown to bits, since, judging from her behavior in the past.

Becky Whitby was not the type to keep her wits about her in moments of danger.

At least, not the Becky Whitby he’d thought he was marrying. This new Becky Whitby, the one who met men like Marcus Tyler in hedge mazes, he hadn’t any doubt could keep her head in just about any situation.

“I thank you, sir, for your concern,” came the voice behind the door. “Now, unless you’ve a priest with you, and a plan on finishing what you started, go away.”

“I’d be a sight more willing to find a priest if you’d just be honest with me.”

“I was honest with you!” Miss Whitby bellowed. For a girl who’d been so demure when he’d first met her, she could shout quite loudly when it suited her. “But are we wed? No! And all because that horrid Dixon girl stopped it. I can’t believe you’re willing to take her word over mine!”

Drake couldn’t help smiling. Even after nearly twenty-four hours, Drake still could not think of the calm way in which Payton had raised her hand without letting out a chuckle. Leave it to the Honorable Miss Dixon to make a shambles of the soberest of events. She seemed to have an uncanny knack for locating the closest source of trouble, then throwing herself bodily into it.

Of course, that amusing moment when she’d raised her hand had been followed by a bloodcurdling one, in which the vicar had asked her the nature of the impediment, and Drake had been convinced she was on the verge of revealing his assault on her the night before. Absurd, of course. He ought to have known that was something Payton would never reveal … at least, not in front of those brothers of hers.

Oh, they’d have raked him over the coals for laying a hand on their sister, no doubt about that. When they weren’t conveniently forgetting her existence, or treating her with the roughness with which they were accustomed to treating one another, they were fiercely protective of her. There hadn’t been any real call for this, since, up until recently, not many people had actually been aware that Payton wasn’t a boy. But now that Georgiana had finally got her into a corset, it looked as if Ross and his brothers were going to have to start fighting off their sister’s admirers in droves—and it had seemed, for a moment, as if their first victim was to be their best friend, Drake.

But even as he’d stood there by the altar, bracing himself for their attack, a part of him was exulting. Because Miss Whitby could not possibly hear about his disgraceful assault on Miss Dixon—on the night before he was to be married, no less!—and not feel compelled to call off the ceremony, leaving him free …

Free to launch similar assaults on the Honorable Miss Dixon.

But when, instead of a scathing condemnation of his having kissed her the night before, the words “Marcus Tyler” tumbled from Payton’s lips, a cold fist had gripped Drake’s heart. Because he knew that if Payton had thought she’d seen Marcus Tyler in the hedge maze, then she’d really seen him. Her eyesight was as good as a gull’s, and she was incapable, unlike most other women he knew, of telling a falsehood.

And if Payton had seen Becky Whitby with Marcus Tyler, that meant they were all in considerable peril. Because Marcus Tyler, despite what anyone might think, was not merely a shipping magnate, or even a ruthless businessman, who peddled human flesh without a qualm, something no Dixon would even dream of, despite the profits that could be had—transporting slaves—or “black gold,” as Tyler referred to them. Marcus Tyler was a villain, plain and simple, with no more morals or scruples than a great white shark, maiming and devouring anything and everything that stood between him and whatever it was he wanted this week.

And it appeared that what he wanted this week was Connor Drake.

Well, Drake was prepared to let him have what he wanted, but not before he’d removed himself a considerable distance from his friends. He was only too happy to go head-to-head with Sir Marcus—but on his own terms, and in his way. And the farther away he could move the battle, the better his chance of sparing the Dixon family worse trouble.

He glanced back toward the bow. There, he could see the ship they were fast approaching, moving inexorably through the choppy waves. “Well,” he said to Miss Whitby, “I’ve known Miss Dixon longer than I’ve known you—”

“Not long enough, apparently, to realize what a liar she is.” Becky’s voice sounded shrill, even with the wooden panel separating them. “Are you so dense you can’t see why she stopped the wedding? She wants you. She’ll stop at nothing to get you.”

Drake shook his head. Well, what had he expected her to say? Whatever else she might be, Becky Whitby wasn’t blind. She had to have noticed … Last night in the garden, she had to have guessed …

Unless—and this thought cast a cold chill over him—he was wrong about what had passed between him and Payton in the garden. That what to him had been an extraordinarily emotional, passionate exchange had been, to her, no more than an interesting test of her newly discovered ability to attract men. Was he special, or was she planning on laying her hand over the erection of every man who kissed her?

And those blasted brothers of hers were dead set on marrying her off. They were bound to be pushing her into all sorts of situations in which she might meet eligible bachelors. Who knew how many men she might be kissing in his absence? He had better, he decided, hurry up, if he intended to get back to England before that blasted girl found herself in the same sort of hot water Becky Whitby was in.

“Wait …”

For a moment, he thought Becky was going to open the door. But no, she went on, in the tones of someone to whom something brilliant had just occurred. “Wait! It’s not you she wants at all, but this boat! This stupid boat! Good God, of course! It’s all she ever talked about—”

Drake set his jaw. “I suggest,” he said coldly, through the door, “that you strap yourself down, Miss Whitby. We’re heading for choppy waters.”

Without another word, Drake turned, and headed for the wheel.

“Well,” he said, taking the spyglass from Hodges, and laying it to his own eye. “What have we got?”

“Strangest damned thing I ever did see.” Hodges spoke with his usual lack of hurriedness. ‘That’s a pirate vessel bearin’ down on us, no doubt about that, guns drawn and at the ready. But look over there to the south.”

Drake looked, and let out a low whistle at what he saw. “Well, I’ll be. A Tyler ship.”

‘That’s what I thought. Now, I ask you, sir, why would a Tyler ship be comin’ to our rescue?”

“It’s not.” Drake calmly set aside the glass. “They’re both of ’em after us, Hodges.”

Hodges’s eyes grew round as compasses. “Beggin’ your pardon, sir, but while I’d pit the
Constant
against any ship in anybody’s fleet, I don’t think she could stand an attack from two boats, sir, comin’ at ’er from two different directions!”

“You’re quite right, of course, Hodges.” Drake nodded to the wheelman. “Turn ’er around. We’re going to have to try to outrun them.”

But even as he issued the orders for retreat, he knew it was hopeless. The
Constant
was the fastest clipper in the Dixon fleet, but no ship, no matter .how fast she was, could outrun two full-riggers moving with the wind at their backs. He ought to have known, of course, that it was a trap, that Tyler, knowing him as he did, would have assumed he wouldn’t run from a fight—not a fair fight, anyway. Now he was trapped, trapped like a rat.

His only consolation was that, while the Honorable Miss Payton Dixon might be hundreds of miles away back in England, laying her hands over the erections of any man who kissed her, at least she was not here, and in any sort of danger.

For that, at least, he had to be thankful.

Payton lowered the glass and cried angrily, “Oh, the cowards! The cowards! Two ships! How is he supposed to beat two ships?”

“He’s not,” Raleigh informed her, taking the glass and applying it to his own face. “That’s the point.” He worked on focusing the lens. “They can’t risk letting him get away, which is why they’ve pitted two boats against his one. Ah! There he is.”

Payton, clutching the side rail, jumped up and down. “Oh, Raleigh, let me see!”

“No. And stop grabbing my arm.”

“Raleigh!”

“Aw, cairn down, Pay.” Raleigh peered through the glass. “The
Constant
‘s all right. They’d be fools to damage ’er. She’s worth more’n both those ships put together. It’s Drake I’m worried about.”

Payton didn’t dare snap at her brother what she wanted to, which was that she was worried about Drake, too. Damn the
Constant
. It was the man she wanted back in one piece, not the ship.

“Why, he’s got his sword out,” Raleigh reported. “I thought he lost that particular piece of steel back in that bar fight in Havana. I say, Hud!” Raleigh called back over his shoulder to his elder brother, who was stomping about the deck, preparing the
Virago
‘s cannons for firing. “Didn’t Drake lose that blade of his in Havana last year?”

“Yes.” Hudson lifted a torch, and touched the flame to the fuse of the cannon nearest by. “But he won it back in a card game. Ready?”

“Be careful where you aim that thing,” Payton urged worriedly, inserting her fingers into her ears.

“Aw, damn, Payton. I’m not goin’ to hit your damned ship, all right?”

Damn the ship, she almost shouted. Don’t hit Drake! But before she could get the words out, Hudson yelled, “Fire!”

The cannons let out a deafening roar as they catapulted thirty-two-pound iron balls at the ship to the
Constant
‘s port side. Only one of the balls hit home, smashing through the unidentified ship’s prow.

“I say,” Raleigh said, removing the glass from his eye. “Jolly good shot.”

Hudson bowed humbly. “Thank you.”

“Oh!” Payton removed her fingers from her ears and ran back to the rail, where she leaned out as far as she dared. “Oh, Raleigh, they’re boarding her! I can see they’ve boarded her from here.”

“Don’t worry, Pay.” Raleigh was refocusing the glass. “Connor Drake’ll never let ’em take the
Constant
. Leastways, not alive.”

“You ignorant boob, what do you think I’m afraid of? Give me that glass. Give it to me!”

Raleigh, keeping the glass easily out of her reach just by stretching to his full height, murmured, ‘Oh-oh.”

“What?” Payton, feeling as if she might burst if they didn’t make headway soon, leapt about her brother, bombarding him with questions. “What? Has he gone down? Has he gone down, Raleigh?”

“Not yet.” Raleigh said. “But you’d better duck.”

“Duck?” Payton stood there, staring at him stupidly. “Why?”

A cannonball whizzed past her and crashed, with a thunderous explosion, through the deck just a few feet behind her, splintering wood and creating a gaping, smoking hole. Payton, indignant, cried, “Why, those devils! They nearly blew me up!”