Miranda Jarrett - Christmas Wedding Belles - The Pirate's Kiss / A Smuggler's Tale / The Sailor's Bride

He shook his head sharply. He was mad even to think of it. Lucinda hated him for his callous disregard for her feelings all those years ago, and anyway, respectability bored him. It was deadly dull.

He thrust his hands into his pockets. ‘And if I refuse?’

Kestrel raised his brows. ‘Are you going to?’

‘Yes, I think I am. I like my way of life too much to give up now.’

Kestrel grimaced. ‘Think about it before you turn us down. It’s a good offer. If you refuse, then Spencer will cut you loose and in the end you will surely hang.’

‘Despite my service to the Crown over the years?’

‘Despite that.’ Kestrel nodded towards the brandy bottle. ‘Officially you are outside the law, de Lancey.’

‘You drink my brandy,’ Daniel said. ‘You order my brandy.’ All the same, he knew Justin was right. In his dealings with spies and smugglers and criminals he had, inevitably, blurred the line. If he refused to conform now, to come into port and accept his barony, he knew the government would deny he had ever worked for them—and he could not prove it. He would be cast adrift.

‘I do drink your brandy,’ Justin Kestrel agreed. ‘I am a hypocrite. I like your brandy. I like you, de Lancey. Too much to see you hang. Think of your sister if you won’t do it for any other reason.’

That, Daniel thought, was below the belt. If anything was likely to sway him it was the thought of all that Rebecca had suffered for him in the past. But now she was settled with Lucas and their growing family. Would his return add so much to her happiness? He knew that the answer was probably that it would. He knew it, but then he thought of the stifling tedium of life on land and he shook his head. He could never go back to that now.

‘It is too late. The answer is no.’

Justin Kestrel’s expression was impassive. ‘I am sorry for it, but I am not surprised.’ He held out a hand to shake Daniel’s one last time. ‘You are on your own then, de Lancey. Goodnight.’

After he had gone, Daniel lay down in his bunk with his hands behind his head and thought about Justin Kestrel’s offer. He cared nothing for having a title, and he had thought that he would care nothing for the estates, but conscience, which had hardly troubled him these ten years past, stirred uncomfortably, reminding him of all the people whose livelihoods depended on him now. He could not simply neglect his estates and let them go to ruin, taking people’s future with them. With the title came responsibilities—responsibilities he did not want to be burdened with. Was that not what he had always done, now he came to think of it? Had he not run from those who depended on him? Run from his duty? He had preferred the reckless excitement of the hunt to facing up to his responsibilities at home.

He thought of Lucinda, waiting for him in vain all those years and telling him in no uncertain terms that very night that the love that had been between them was long gone, even if they both knew that the flame of their wild passion was scarcely extinguished. If there had been a way back from that…But there was not. There was no way back to the past. He knew that. Nor could he see himself settling to the life of village squire. But he would write to Rebecca and see if there was a way she might help the people of Allandale on his behalf.

And tomorrow he would take the Defiance out to sea and outrun his memories. He would hunt down John Norton. And he would make sure that he never saw Lucinda again. This time he would make sure that he forgot her.

‘LADIES, ladies,’ the Duchess of Kestrel said reproachfully. ‘Your concentration is wandering today.’ She closed her copy of King John and placed it on a side table. ‘I know that Shakespeare’s histories may not be the most romantically engaging of his works,’ she added, with a slight smile in Eustacia Saltire’s direction, ‘but I thought it was the type of improving book that would suit our little reading group. My dear Mrs Melville—’ here Lucinda jumped guiltily ‘—pray tell me, what do you think of the piece?’

Lucinda gulped. She had not been thinking about Shakespeare’s King John for the past ten minutes, for her thoughts had been occupied by a far more compelling character—that of Daniel de Lancey. Truth to tell, she had been thinking about him from the moment she had left him the previous night until she had fallen into a restless sleep at about three in the morning. Then she had dreamed about him: disturbing, passionate, heated dreams, full of half-remembered desire that even now caused her limbs to tingle and a burning and undeniable ache to fill her.

She realised that Sally Kestrel was still looking at her, a flicker of concern in her very green eyes.

‘You look a little too warm, Mrs Melville,’ she murmured. ‘Are you sure you are not running a temperature? Have you taken a chill, perhaps?’

‘I…no, I do not believe so.’ Lucinda struggled to push away the mental images of herself entwined in naked consummation with Daniel. She felt hot and bothered and aroused. She had prided herself on her cool common sense for years, and now she realised that she was afire with lust—and for a man she did not even like any more. It was maddening. It made her furious. And it was typical of Daniel de Lancey that he could do this to her.

‘I do find the room rather stuffy,’ she excused. ‘I think I shall take a walk down to the cove and take some fresh air.’ She turned to Eustacia. ‘Would you care to join me, Stacey?’

Miss Saltire, a lively brunette, looked glum.

‘For my part I would adore it, Mrs Melville, but Mama has forbidden me to go out whilst the weather is so inclement. She thinks that I might turn my ankle or catch an infection of the lungs or ruin my looks with frostbite.’

Lucinda caught the Duchess of Kestrel’s eye. ‘Dear Letitia is very careful,’ the Duchess observed wryly. ‘Perhaps if you took the gig, Mrs Melville, then the groom could drive and Stacey could wrap up in warm blankets?’

Stacey looked even gloomier. ‘It is a capital plan, cousin, but Mama would not approve. She fears a carriage accident in icy weather.’

Lucinda nodded. She understood Mrs Saltire’s concerns. There were so many things to be afraid of in her world, especially when Eustacia was her only defence against penurious old age. Lucinda knew that Mrs Saltire could not bear for Stacey to lose her looks or run off with an unsuitable man, or do anything that might risk their futures. But she also saw the slump of Stacey’s shoulders, and wished that Mrs Saltire might allow her daughter a little more latitude—or Stacey would rebel with the very behaviour her mother dreaded.

She went up to her room to wrap up warmly and fetch bonnet and gloves. Although it was not much past two in the afternoon, the sun was already beginning to sink in the west as she made her way along the track that led from Kestrel Court down to the cove. The path plunged deep into the pinewoods and the air was fresh with the sharp scent and loud with the song of the birds. Lucinda walked quickly, glad to feel the crisp chill of the breeze on her face. She had been active all her life, loving to walk and ride, and sometimes the determined staidness of life in the Saltire household chafed at her. Out here, in the open air, she felt a lift of spirits.

She had gone only a little way along the track when she heard the sound of hoofbeats and, turning the corner, espied Owen Chance on his bay mare, making his slow way towards her from the direction of the cove. Remembering the events of the previous night Lucinda immediately felt guilty for her part in helping Daniel evade capture. She liked Owen Chance. It was a pity that instinct and an older loyalty had set her against him.