Leslie Lafoy (22 page)

“When is she expected into port?”

“
Maggie
doesn’t sail the open seas. She’s too small. She runs the island routes and then meets the other two to transfer whatever she’s collected along the way.”

“So I’ll never get to see the
Maggie
?” she asked, sounding genuinely disappointed.

“Not unless you sail out on one of the other two to meet her.”

Rolling her eyes and chuckling softly, she countered, “I can’t imagine Drayton being willing to give me
that
much free rein.”

Since she’d brought up the matter … “Our affair is over, Simone.” He bit his tongue, but it was too late to call the words back.

Her smile faltered, but she took a deep breath and bravely retrieved it. “Well, that certainly qualifies as an abrupt statement.”

“And tactless, too,” he admitted. “I’m sorry. I should have framed it better, more kindly.”

“What about the plan to draw out Lucinda?”

God, his chest felt as though someone had plunged a knife into it and was twisting the hilt. “In the clear light of day and hindsight,” he explained, “I can see that involving you wasn’t a wise or caring thing to do. Lucinda is dangerous and if you were to come to even the least little bit of harm I’d never forgive myself.” He shook his head. “I’ll deal with her on my own.”

“Alone,” she said quietly.

“Yes.”

“Of course. It’s how you prefer to live your life.”

“You make it sound as though it’s a sad thing. It’s not.”

“I know. I remember. There is something to be said for going through life alone. It’s certainly safer in some ways.”

It was also cold and empty, but sharing that observation with her wasn’t in the interest of being noble about ending their relationship. “Noland was waiting for me at the town house this morning,” he said instead, moving matters forward. “He says Lucinda followed us last night.”

“Well,” she said, her gaze going to the dock below, “since no engagement is being announced, I doubt she considers her time limited. Brief and meaningless affairs being just that.”

The pain in his chest deepened, catching his breath and weakening his knees. “It wasn’t meaningless,” he assured her. “And if I could manage a callous disregard for your safety, it wouldn’t be brief.”

The smile she gave him was soft and nothing more than polite. “Spoken like a true gentleman,” she said with a tiny nod.

“Simone—”

“I think you have a lovely ship, Tristan. Thank you for letting me come aboard.”

He watched her walk away, willing his lips sealed and his feet rooted to the deck. God, he couldn’t remember when doing the right thing had ever been so hard, so soul-deep painful. If she had been just a bit unpleasant about it, he would feel better. But that stoic smile she’d summoned for him … Her quiet, dignified acceptance of having been cast aside … Tristan deliberately turned away so that he couldn’t watch her make her way down the gangplank, knowing even as he did that it wasn’t going to make the consequences any different; of all the women whom he’d left in his life, Simone was going to be the only one whose memory haunted him.

*   *   *

Don’t look back. Pretend that nothing’s happened. Keep moving. Keep smiling. If you run him through, you’ll go to prison.

“Warehouse Three!”

Simone looked up from the ground and through the haze of her anger and humiliation. Emmy and Mr. Gregory stood side by side on the dock, he with a spyglass to his eye and she with a sheaf of papers in hand. As Simone drew nearer, Mr. Gregory trained the glass on a crate being lifted from the hold and called out a number. Emmy checked the papers and then looked over at the knot of waiting carters. “Warehouse One!”

“Enjoying yourself?” Simone asked needlessly, noting Emmy’s wide smile and sparkling eyes.

“Yes! Do you know how nice it is to be able to do something that actually makes a difference to people?”

“Not really,” she had to admit.

“Please don’t tell me that you’re ready to go.”

Just because she was miserable didn’t mean she had the right to ask others to share in it. “I can wait for as long as you can stand being useful,” she replied. Looking around, she nodded toward a stack of barrels off to the side and added, “I’ll just have a seat over there and watch.”

“Is everything all right, Lady Simone?”

“Fine, Mr. Gregory,” she lied, flashing him a smile as she eased away from the pair.

And fine she would be, she assured herself as she settled onto the stout wooden barrel. In time. Once she’d overcome the shock of having been used and tossed away like yesterday’s newspaper. Actually, though, in their house, newspapers had a two-day life span; Fiona used them in her birdcages on the second day. It wasn’t until the morning of the third that they were sent to the rubbish bin for burning.

One night. That’s all Tristan had considered her worth his bother. Yes, he’d been kind in ending the relationship—although calling what had been between them a relationship implied that it was considerably more than it had turned out to be.

That he had looked distressed over declaring them done didn’t mean much, she knew. She’d heard stories all of her life, had lost count of the number of discarded mistresses who had ended up in the streets or the brothels of her childhood. Men like Tristan Townsend were very skilled at getting shed of unwanted lovers. And part of their repertoire was making themselves look noble and genuinely regretful in the process.

Well, if nothing else, she’d certainly learned a valuable lesson about picking lovers of her own. Handsome, interesting, experienced, and wealthy men were off her list in the future. Simone frowned, realizing that that left her to choose among unattractive, boring, monkish, and poor men. Not that there was any scarcity of them. And not that she intended to ever again waste so much as a single moment of her life entertaining the attention of any man regardless of his attributes.

She sighed, stared blankly at her feet, and struggled against an unexpected surge of sorrow. She’d always known that she and Tristan weren’t destined to be together for all eternity; she’d admitted that to him right at the start. But she had envisioned their affair lasting a bit longer than a single night. And, truth be told, she’d seen it ending on her terms, not Tristan’s. She’d rather pictured him begging—in a dignified but heartfelt way—for her to change her mind, to give him just a few more weeks of heaven to remember for the rest of his wretchedly lonely days.

Now she was the one feeling lonely. Maybe just a bit wretched, too. Not because she missed Tristan all that much, of course. She hadn’t known him all that long, barely three days. He’d hardly become an integral part of her life in that short of a time. And while there was no denying that she’d thoroughly enjoyed the time she’d spent in his bed, it wasn’t as though she had a long list of lovers against whom she could compare him. He could have been a truly miserable lover for all she knew.

No, wretchedness was in the fact that everyone in the family knew she’d allowed herself to be seduced and then to have him promise Drayton that the affair was over after one night.… God, everyone knew she’d been found lacking and thrown over. There wasn’t a hole deep enough to hide in.

“Yoo-hoo! Gregory!”

Yoo-hoo?
Simone looked up. Gregory was blinking furiously, apparently unaware that his jaw was sagging and that the spyglass was going to fall out of his hands at any moment. Simone followed his stunned gaze. If ever there was a woman who wouldn’t think twice about the idiocy of cooing
yoo-hoo
on the docks, it was the big-busted, big-bustled blonde advancing on him like a dog on a ham bone.

“Miss Sheraton?”

The woman tittered.
Tittered!
“Of course it’s me, Gregory. You silly man.” She paused to look around and then smiled coyly. “Where is Tristan? I want to surprise him, too.”

Tristan? Of course she’s looking for Tristan. The frigging rat. He probably met her on his way home this morning. Out with the old, in with the new. And an American at that.

“On board, ma’am,” Gregory supplied, looking as though he desperately needed to cough up a fur ball. He tried to clear it, twice, but still sounded choked when he looked past her and said, “If I might be so bold as to ask … Where is your husband?”

“As it happens,” the woman chirped, “I don’t have one of those.”

Gregory rocked back on his heels, went pale, and fumbled with the spyglass. He caught it just in time and then said on something of a last gasp, “The wedding has been delayed?”

“Permanently,” she declared, sashaying past him with a sweep of her skirts and a rustle of her bustle. Simone watched her walk up the gangplank, fervently hoping she’d catch a heel and topple off into the Thames.

Emmy cleared her throat softly. “Is there a problem, Mr. Gregory?”

“Not one that I can do anything about,” he said morosely. Then he sighed heavily, shook his head, and lifted the spyglass to his eye. “Crate Two-fifty-six. Which warehouse?”

“One!”

Simone sat where she was, battling the impulse to stomp off for home. The last thing in the world she wanted to witness was Tristan courting his new lover, but if she ran away she’d give the impression that she was disturbed by the notion that she’d been so quickly and easily replaced. Better to brace up, continue the farce of not caring, and preserve what she could of her remaining dignity. While she did that and waited for Emmy to tire of being useful, she’d entertain herself with all the ways she could get even with Tristan Townsend, Lord of the Louses. Having decided her course, she turned her back to the ship and began to sort through some delightful possibilities.

*   *   *

Tristan lifted his head and listened. Yes, heels. Feminine heels on deck steel. He had no idea what he was going to say to her, but he’d start with an apology and go from there. If she let him. If she didn’t … He turned, saying, “I need to say that I’m—”

Had he not had the gunnel at his back, he’d have fallen over. As it was, his stomach dropped to the vicinity of his knees and turned to ice.

“Hello, Tris. Are you surprised to see me?”

Surprised? Dear God, that didn’t even begin to describe what he was feeling. “Sarah,” he said numbly. “What are you doing here?”

“Throwing myself into your arms,” she announced, stepping squarely into his chest.

He dragged a breath into his lungs, took her upper arms firmly in hand, and set her back a respectable distance, declaring, “We’re in public.”

“Does anyone here know us or care?” Sarah countered, laughing.

“Yes and yes.”

“Who? Gregory and his mousy little assistant?”

He glanced down to the dock. Gregory and Em were still at their crate sorting. “His assistant is my sister, Lady Emmaline.”

His heart lurched. Simone was still there. She sat on a barrel, watching the wagons and hacks come and go. Maybe she didn’t know Sarah was here. If she did, it would be insult added to injury. Neither of which she deserved in the least. God, if they gave a prize to the man who could most severely mangle a relationship in the shortest amount of time, he was the winner, hands down.

“Oh, Tris,” his former lover cooed, laying her hand on his arm and bringing his attention to her with a painful jolt. “That put us off on the wrong foot, didn’t it? My apologies. I’m sure your sister has a sweet disposition and that we’ll eventually be the best of friends.”

His heart rolled over and sank to the bottom of his feet. “You’re planning to stay for a while?”

“Of course I am, you silly man.”

Silly man?
God, he’d always detested that expression. His blood heated with irritation, buoying his stomach and centering his mind. “And what does your esteemed George think of living in London?”

“I wouldn’t know. He’s in Seattle.”

“Obviously you had a change of heart about him,” Tristan observed, his mind racing along the tracks of cause and consequence. “What happened?”

She batted her lashes at him and smiled. “It occurred to me that we didn’t make a very good couple. That you and I are far better suited.”

Oh yes. Of course.
“When did you do all of this reflection? For poor George’s sake, I hope it wasn’t as you stood at the altar.”

She laughed and waved her hand dismissively. “No, that would have been most unkind. It was ten days before.”

Ten days, huh?
“Was that before or after word had spread through town that I’d inherited the family title?”

She drew herself up, trying—and failing—to look wounded. “Do you think I threw George over for a title?”

“Yes.”

More fluttering of eyelashes. “The title doesn’t matter, Tris. It’s you.”

And I own the Crown Jewels.
“I didn’t matter enough to keep you from an engagement to poor George.”

She took a half step back to consider him before saying, “You keep calling him poor George. He’s really quite wealthy.”

“He would have to be to have caught your eye. I mean poor as in suffering.”

Her smile evaporated. “Being a British lord has changed you.”

“And not for the good. You’d be far better off going back to Seattle and—”

“Nonsense!” she declared, obviously retrieving her confidence. “What we had in San Francisco we can have again. But it will be even better because you won’t be sailing off for months and months at a time. We can be together day in and day out forever.”

Dear God. He’d have to slit his wrists. “Sarah, I know you’ve come a long way on hope and—”

Anger momentarily flashed in the depths of her blue eyes. “Is there someone else? Are you expected to marry some pasty-faced English girl because you’re a peer?”

“Yes,” he supplied.

She blinked at him for a few moments and then slowly, regally, lifted her chin. “I’ve always heard that the British are more easily appalled by scandal than we Americans are. Is that true?”

Why wasn’t he surprised that she’d stoop that low? “Don’t,” he said, his anger surging.

“Ah, Tristan,” she purred. “Thank you for being reasonable. I promise to reward you well for it. Right now, if you’d like. Would you care to sweep me up into your arms and carry me off to your cabin?” She reached out to smooth his coat lapels and to smile in what he’d once considered an attractive, inviting way. “I’ll do the ravaging once we get there.”