Cachet (20 page)

Magic!

Her eyes flew open. Morgan lay on his side, a broad grin on his face. She flung her arms around his neck and began wildly kissing his cheeks, his chin, his mustache, his lips. "That was it, wasn't it? The magical thing."

"You tell me."

She realized she felt wonderful. As he'd said, very much alive. "If I'd known how it would feel...God, I want you to make love to me a dozen times every night!"

"I doubt even the notorious rake of Crowshaven could manage that on a regular basis," he chuckled, "But I'm willing to give it my best efforts. Now for the second part of our lesson—"

"I know this part. My turn now." She reached to stroke his engorged shaft.

His eyes closed and he sucked in his breath as her fingertip lightly circled the head of his shaft. She caressed and lightly massaged his length. Morgan groaned and clutched at the thin mattress with both hands as her fingers kneaded the root where it met his manly pouch. "I'll embarrass myself if you keep that up. Too stimulating watching you before."

He sat up suddenly on the edge of the bunk, both feet planted on the floor as he reached back toward her. "Come sit on my lap. Show me what a horsewoman you are. Take me in and then show me no mercy." She eased onto his thighs, facing him, and poised herself above his loins.

He reached for her hips as if to guide her, but she stopped him. "Oh no, you don't. Close your eyes and trust me."

She crushed her breasts against him and kissed him with all the passion in her soul. She moved back to rub her nipples over the light furring on his chest. Upward, as she trailed her tongue under his chin. Downward, as she nipped at his earlobe. "Christ! No more teasing," he panted. "Take me inside, please. Tell me you love me again. I need you and the words."

She slowly lowered herself on his pulsing shaft until she was fully impaled. Both of them moaned in ecstasy. He wrapped both arms around her waist and rocked his hips. Rachel wanted to give him sexual joy, but she felt her own arousal building again toward another shattering crest.

"You feel so damned good, woman! I don't think I can last much longer. Want it better than before, but—"

"Don't think," she panted. "Just feel it, my love, our bodies. Burn and tingle and nearly die because of me. Loving you with every inch of my body. I love you, husband."

Rachel drove him on, rocking, grinding, pushing them both toward the place of sweet fulfillment. His shout drowned out her soft cries as he erupted violently inside her. She collapsed against his shoulder then, both of them spent and quivering.

Finally she lifted her head. "I was very naughty just now, almost like one of Sheila's girls. I look like one, sitting atop you like this."

Morgan frowned. "I'm bound to regret asking, but just how would you know what the whores looked like whilst plying their trade?"

"I told you, I stayed at the brothel during the summers when I was young. I wasn't supposed to know what went on upstairs. So of course, I sneaked up and peeked through the keyholes. I definitely prefer doing to watching." The corners of her lips curved up.

He pivoted and pinned her beneath him on the mattress. His shaft was still buried inside her. He pumped lean hips in a slow gyration. "Don't smile at me that way or you'll have me believing you like rutting with your husband."

Her lips formed an even wider smile.

He grinned right back. "Now that you have a better idea what I'm asking, name your pleasure, Madam Tremayne."

"My husband, Morgan. He's the greatest pleasure of my life."

Chapter 16

Rachel's cries echoed in the darkness. She fought the powerful arms that held her. They closed around her as the somber marshal read the formal charge from his tattered arrest warrant. The deputy was huge, implacable. He wrestled her into an empty cell. The iron door clanked shut. " No, it's a mistake! Why won't you listen to me?"

Someone was calling her. A voice she knew. She whipped her head from side to side. "Jonas, is that you? You have to help me, Jonas! Please get me out of this!"

"Rachel, wake up!" Someone shook her.

She opened her eyes and found Morgan peering at her, holding the burning stub of a candle over the bunk. "You were having a nightmare."

"Yes, I must have—I'm sorry, I'm still a little unsettled." She rose onto her knees, unaware she was stark nude as she reached to wrap her arms around his neck.

"You're all right," he reassured her. "Let go long enough for me to put this damned candle out before we set fire to the bed curtains." The cabin was plunged into darkness.

Rachel took a deep breath and laid her head on his bare chest as they settled back against the pillows. She realized Morgan's heart was pounding. "I startled you out of a sound sleep, didn't I?"

He pressed a kiss to her lips. "Everyone has a frightening dream occasionally." She was wrapped tightly in his arms, warm and safe. "Good night, Madam Tremayne."

Rachel knew it was his signal that all was well. They'd been making love every night during the past weeks. Morgan spoke boldly while they engaged in exploration and love play, calling her wench or hussy. He growled out or 'Colonial' when their activity reached its highest intensity and he spilled his seed. But once they lay peacefully sated, drowsing toward sleep, he invariably said good night formally.

"You'd slipped your tongue halfway down my throat," he teased her the first time, "then called me 'Mr. Tremayne' as you showed me the door. It was bloody marvelous the way you did that."

Now his words in the darkness had become a tender ritual between them. Every night the whispered formal good night from him brought a sigh of contentment from Rachel. She snuggled close and drifted back to sleep in his arms.

But things weren't as they should be, Morgan reflected glumly. She'd called out to her old beau, the man she'd hoped to wed before Cletus ruined her life. Called out for him to help her; she was trapped; had made a terrible mistake.
After all we've become, she called another man's name and begged him to take her from me!
He edged out from beneath her and left the bunk to uncork a fresh bottle.

He gulped the brandy, greedily inviting the fire into his belly. He'd never considered that she might have left more than family in America. Maybe she'd planned to sail home to Jonas.
But you showed up at the London docks and spoiled her plans.

His hands closed into fists.
It was only a dream.
You have them yourself
. He knew he should just forget it. But he'd heard her clearly—each and every word—for he hadn't been sleeping.

He'd been going over his plan again in his mind, making certain he thought out every detail. Soon they'd reach American waters. He expected the ship would be boarded, and he knew something Rachel didn't—precisely what lay below in the holds. He'd calculated the risks back in London, but that was before he'd found himself with two new enemies aboard. Enemies who'd surely betray Rachel's presence to marauders intent on plunder.

Dark thoughts still plagued him next morning. He and Rachel shared a tray of bread and tea in their cabin, but Morgan's stomach was in a knot so tight he couldn't eat. "Is your father really the man you're going home for, Rachel, or will I be cast aside when Jonas greets you at the harbor?"

She choked on a swallow of tea. "Morgan! Jonas is just a friend. I don't even know where he is now. He and his family went to Oregon in early '52. We were neighbors there, but Jonas left when I did. He went with me—" She saw he wasn't listening. He stared out the cabin window and suddenly went rigid, cursing beneath his breath.

"What is it?"

"A vessel approaching. I doubt they've come for tea. Do exactly as I say, Rachel. There's no time. Leave the tray and pull your things out of your trunk."

She nodded quickly and set to work, more frightened than she'd ever been in her life. "No hairbrush, no ribbons, nothing feminine can be left in sight," Morgan commanded, emptying his own trunk. "Thank God you're not one for perfume. Hand me those clothes." He repacked the trunks with her garments hidden beneath a few of his and a jumble of papers in the largest trunk. The rest of his things were stored in her empty trunk. He pointed to the narrow space behind the bathtub.

"Hide under the bunk there. I'm going to cover you with the quilt."

She scrambled onto the floor and wriggled into the tight space. It was just wide enough for her body. Morgan snatched the quilt from the bunk and stuffed it over her. "With luck, they'll accept what they see and won't insist on a full search. But they'll go right to the holds and get an earful from our two friends, and come banging at our door soon enough."

"Morgan, I have horrible luck. If they know I'm aboard—"

"Just keep quiet and don't move until I say it's safe. Trust me one more time. We're about to learn how good your Bargainer truly is. But whatever happens, I won't let them harm you, Rachel. That I vow."

Shouts and thumps reached her ears. She detected the pungent reek of spilled alcohol. Morgan gave a low warning seconds before a fierce pounding came at the door. "Open up, Englishman! Mandatory inspection!"

Morgan unbolted it and the cabin door was nearly ripped from its hinges. A large man with bright red hair stood at the forefront of a throng of sailing men. "You Tremayne?"

Morgan's tone was surly. "Who wants to know? Ne'er a moment's peace on this frigging tub."

"Name's Farley. Been hired by the Confederacy to check incoming vessels for war supplies. Heard from two bilge rats down below you got yourself a right purty little wife. Like to meet her."

Morgan chuckled and seated himself on the trunk nearest the table. He took a swallow from his open bottle, spilling a little brandy on his shirt collar. "So would I! If I'd a woman in here, you suppose the place would be such a stinkin' mess?"

"It's that, all right." Farley stepped over the tray of half-eaten food on the floor. A rumpled shirt had been flung over the chair and the tabletop was awash in papers. "What's that you're drinking?," he demanded. "Some nice rye whiskey? Wouldn't have another bottle of that lyin' about the place, would you?"

Morgan guffawed. "Buffoons! A wench!
Brandy
!" He waved his bottle in the air. Rachel was awed by the slurring of Morgan's speech. If she didn't know better, she'd believe the man was a drunken ass. "Must think I've been croonin' to a lass when I sing its praises.
Brandy
, the bloody fools!"

Farley's tone was sharp. "What's in that trunk you're sitting on? Something you don't want us to find, eh? Get up."

"Aw come on, man," Morgan cajoled. "Wouldn't deprive a fellow of his sole pleasure in life, would you? I'm no arms dealer!"

"I said get up." Scuffling sounds were followed by a thump. "Well, look here, boys! Our English friend has a damned trunkload of brandy!" He clucked his tongue. "Spirits are classified as contraband. Sorry, Tremayne. Have to relieve you of that."

"At least leave me the open bottle!" Morgan whined. Then his tone became a menacing growl. "And tell your man I doubt my coat's been classified as a threat to anyone! Damn well better stop going through my pockets!"

"Marcus, put his coat down."

Morgan wove unsteadily as their vessel bumped the prow of the marauding vessel. "See here! I'm an innkeeper and merchant from Yorkshire. Got no quarrel with any of you Colonials, North or South. But I carry pistols for protection when I travel." He nodded at the guncase he'd placed near the door, well away from the bunk. " Suppose you'll relieve me of them, too."

"Right. Have to take them, but I'll let you keep your open bottle. Brandy!" Farley snorted. "Men below have been at sea too long. Captain said they broke in here and tried to rob you."

"Bloody imbeciles," Morgan slurred, hiccuping. "Got a taste of my fists for their trouble."

"One of them swore he'd had his hands on a woman in here," Marcus stated.

Morgan snorted in disgust and made a symbolic lewd gesture with his hands. "More likely on his shipmate. Trunkful of liquor wouldn't make a pair of hoary buttocks look good to me, but you know some blokes—knothole in any plank."

Farley grunted and turned to leave. "Appreciate your cooperation, Englishman." Rachel heard the cabin door bang shut. She didn't move, though her muscles were cramping and she could barely breathe.

Morgan's voice came in a hiss. "Hang on. They're pulling crates from the holds. Once they shove off, we're safe." It seemed she waited an eternity. The quilt was jerked away and Morgan pulled her out of hiding. "You need some fresh air." He cracked the cabin window to admit the sea breeze. Once the American ship was safely in the distance, he brought Rachel out on deck.

Haversham rushed up. "Got to hand it to you, Lad. Hell of a scheme! Forked over some minor incidentals, like you said, but our main cargo's intact. See your little beauty's fine." He winked at Rachel. "Damned good man you married!"

Rachel smiled at Haversham. "Any man here would say so."

The captain muttered something and hurried off. Rachel turned to Morgan, her eyes flashing. "Damned good man, eh? You brought an entire
trunkload
of brandy?" Morgan gave a rueful shrug. "And you offered them your pistols! They never would have found them if you'd just left them under the mattress."