Chapter 20

She'd always thought, as had everyone else, he was just a dirt-poor farm boy from Savannah, whose ma set about bettering herself in a whore house. Because that was as much as he let them think.

"You never said "

With difficulty he bared his teeth. It wasn't that he was ashamed. It wasn't that nothing he'd done had ever been enough to outrun the humbleness of his birth and his childhood. It wasn't even that he'd somehow parted with this miserable fact. It was that her eyes studied him as if she felt his pain with a sick certainty. Her brows knitted, her lips parted.

It was vital her lips didn't part his defences, that he re-erect the barrier, close the tiny rift that had somehow opened in his chest. The one that seemed to point the way to him not running out on her when, if he could feel anything with a passion, it was that he should go now.

"So? You could say she knew her stuff. And I just hope it's something you've thought about. But maybe you've not."

"Thought about what?"

"Married woman who doesn't know about lying down and things? Probably not."

"What are you talking about?"

He didn't know. But he didn't want her to know he didn't know. He'd only spoken to mask his discomfort. And now, now he needed to come up with something.

"Thought about if it's a girl. I mean, anything's possible in this crackpot scheme you got here."

"I didn't notice you thinking so last night, when you blackmailed me into it. But for your information, Lady Margaret did not make the old lord specify, as such."

"What? Doesn't she care?"

"A girl could not succeed to the actual title. But, so long as I provide a child from a confirmed pregnancy, there is nothing the old toad can do about the inheritance. Beggars cannot be choosers."

"You mean yourself, there, or the old toad?"

"A boy would, of course, guarantee things." She paused. "You know about such things, do you?"

The glance she slanted him from beneath her sooty lashes said as much as he needed to know about her thoughts.

He rose to his feet. "What things, sweetheart?"

"You know. How to conceive a boy."

He shrugged, helping himself to a piece of bread. "Maybe. Maybe not." He paused. His boat wasn't even a speck on the horizon. He didn't have a thread in his pocket. Never mind a lire. If he was going to stay, maybe it wasn't so bad revealing what he just had. "I'm sure Ma told me a thing or two. Provided I can remember it all."

A strange sound emanated from her throat. He considered he'd risen a notch. Now she might elevate him to the Blue Chamber. Or maybe even a renegotiation of that ball-breaking contract of hers.

As he wiped crumbs off his mouth, he swore he could even hear her mind whirring.

"Can I trust you?"

"Trust me?" What a stupid question. Of course she couldn't. He stuffed the remains of the hunk of bread in his mouth.

"Not to run away."

"Me?" He tried to sound surprised. Despite all the surprises he'd had since he'd pried the lid off that box in her cellar, it was actually far harder than he imagined. "And leave you?"

If he didn't know any better, he'd swear she'd made up that contract on the spot without the least thought about the realities of its execution. Simple things like where he was going to go between their sessions. His gaze skirted her face.

She had, hadn't she?

He hadn't imagined that business of her staring at the nymphs frolicking on the ceiling half the night, after all.

"Hmm. I do, of course, want to be fair to you when you are doing so much to oblige me." Her soft red lips, which he found he couldn't take his eyes off, parted before he could even start protesting. "But I don't want you making off with the candlesticks. Because Signor Santa-Rosa would be most displeased."

"That would make two of us." If she explained Captain Flint had stolen them, certainly. "What kind of person do you think I am?"

"A pirate."

He sloshed a mouthful of stone-cold coffee from the cup by the bed. He'd passed himself off as the cabin boy when he had been captured. A trifle fanciful for a man of thirty, but there it was. To save his skin he'd have passed himself off as the Queen of Sheba. Or one of the women in those fancy wall hangings there. Anything.

But now, if it came out he wasn't a cabin boy, he'd hang.

And despite finding life impossible and degrading in the months since his capture, he wasn't ready to leave it yet.

"If I can trust you, and it is very much an if " She took on that refined voice she'd somehow cultivated. "Then you may have the Blue Chamber."

"I may? The Blue Chamber?"

"It's a nice room, as you will have seen. You may use it freely."

Rules thirteen and fourteen, no doubt. Amazing what the assumption of a little knowledge did for people. He swallowed another mouthful of coffee.

"That's mighty nice of you."

"Yes. Susan will serve you your meals."

"I look forward to it. I'm specially fond of Callaloo and goat."

"Goat?"

"Plenty of them running about the hillsides. You just get Susan or some of your men up there to catch them."

"Susan? Or " She tightened her dropping jaw. "If you want a goat, you must catch it and kill it yourself."

Right.

"Any steak will do. I'm not fussy. Chicken too. Oh, and rum. Heaps of it. Tell you what, why don't I give her a list?"

Why the hell had her jaw dropped like that? So far, a bread roll and a handful of grapes was a starvation diet for a man being asked to do what she expected of him. Twice a day was nothing. But to order? When she didn't even want him?

He'd thought Ma's knowledge would guarantee more than the Blue Chamber.

"It's up to you. Chicken and rum are good for a man, an awful lot better than bread and coffee when he's well, you know got to get with his lady twice a day, to become a daddy."

Her face turned green, as though she were in the throes of morning sickness already.

A daddy. His heart gave a thump. He supposed he hadn't thought about it himself. But if ths worked out, he would be. And she she would be the mother. God help the Sheltons.

"Yes. Yes, of course. I will speak to Susan about that. Although rum, in Genoa, might prove a little difficult to come by."

He stared, his gaze impassive. The more he thought about this, it was a battle he would win. She was rich, right? "Seaport, isn't it?"

"Of course."

"Let me speak to her. Save you getting up."

"I "

What? Did she think he wasn't to be trusted with Susan? Or was it the candlesticks, the silver, all the other articles of finery she'd got stashed around here?

"No, no, Fury. You lie here. You're going to be the mother of the heir. I can't have you running around after me."

"Fine." She clenched her fists.

Giving into him nearly killed her. But that was all right. Because she had given in. Although, for such an intelligent woman, he wondered at her believing him. Especially the stuff about the chicken and the rum.

"When do you want me back here?"

"This evening will do. I'll send Susan."