The Scent of Jasmine (17 page)

“Uncle, is it?”

“Yes, sir,” Cay said. “He’s my godfather.”

“Interesting,” Mr. Grady said. “I’ve known T.C. for about ten years, but I’ve never heard him mention any boys who were his godsons.”

“I guess since we lived in Scotland he forgot about us,” Cay said. She was careful not to look at Alex on the other side of Mr. Grady because Alex was giving her looks that said she was to keep her mouth shut. The lies she was concocting were piling up on one another. Cay ignored him. “So you don’t have an artist for the trip?”

“You aren’t going to tell me that you can draw, are you?”

“He can’t!” Alex said loudly. “He hardly knows how to hold a pencil, much less a paintbrush. Isn’t that true, little brother?” He was glaring at her.

“Actually, in school, I was rather good at drawing. Certainly better than some.” She looked across Grady to Alex. “You were away most of the time, so you don’t remember.”

“Well, then, boy, let’s give you a try,” Mr. Grady said. “I always carry a portable writing desk with me, so do you think you can make do with stationery and a pen?”

“I can try,” Cay said with all the modesty she could muster.

“I don’t think—” Alex began, but when both Cay and Mr. Grady turned to look at him, he stopped. “I need to talk to my brother alone.”

“Shall we meet back here when you’re ready?” Mr. Grady said. “I’ll have pen and paper waiting.”

Alex lost no time in grabbing Cay’s arm and pulling her to the side of one of the buildings. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“I want to go with you.”

“We talked about this before. This trip is too dangerous, so you can’t go, and that’s final.”

“Walking into the mouth of Hades would be better than staying here and waiting for Tally to come and make fun of me.”

Alex ran his hand over his bearded face and tried to count to ten, but he knew that if he counted to a hundred it would make no difference. “You canna go with us,” he said as calmly as he could manage. “Even your own brother told you to stay here.”

“Adam doesn’t know that there are extenuating circumstances. If he knew
who
I was traveling with, he’d tell me to go.”

Alex leaned back against the wall to the building and drew in a deep breath. “All right, out with it. Who is he?”

“Who is who?”

He narrowed his eyes at her.

“I just thought I’d add a little levity into this, but you seem to have lost your sense of humor. All right! Stop looking at me like that. Mr. Grady’s real name is James Armitage and he—”

Alex groaned.

“So you’ve heard of the family?”

“I was told of them as soon as I got off the boat from Scotland. The father wanted to buy my horses.”

“King.”

“What?”

“Jamie’s father is called ‘King’ as in ‘King Armitage.’”

“Jamie?”

“That’s what his family calls him. It’s my guess that his middle name is Grady. Maybe that was his mother’s maiden name. Do you know why Jamie’s father is called King?”

“I think he owns Georgia, doesn’t he?”

“Only a big part of it. It’s South Carolina that he owns most of. Jamie is the third son, and I can see why he’s traveling under a made-up name. It’s the only way he’s going to be treated as a regular person. And he was very nice, wasn’t he?”

Alex put his hand over his eyes for a moment. “Please tell me you’re not back to trying to find yourself a husband.”

She leaned against the wall beside Alex and said in a dreamy way, “When I was eight years old, I went with my parents to Gracewell, South Carolina, to visit the Armitage family. My father worked with Mr. Armitage during the War for Independence, and they’re friends. My father doesn’t call him King; he calls him Billy, and they spend a lot of time talking about Scotland. When we visited, Jamie was home from William and Mary. That’s—”

“I know what it is, and believe it or not, I can read and write, too.”

Cay looked at him as though to ask what he was talking about, but then went on with her story. “I was just eight years old, he was twenty-two, and he pushed me on a swing.”

Alex waited for a moment, but she said nothing else. “And what happened?”

“Nothing. That’s it. He pushed me on the swing for about half an hour, then he went back into the house, and the next morning he left before I was up. I never saw him again.”

Alex moved away from the wall to look at her. “Am I missing something here? You made this sound like it was really important.”

“It was. That night I told my mother I was going to marry Jamie Armitage, and she said I’d made a good choice.”

Alex blinked at her a few times. “Have you always been so obsessed with marriage?”

“I want to get it
right.
What’s so wrong with that? I’ve seen unhappy marriages and I don’t want to live like that.” She put her arms over her chest and turned away from him.

“Just a few days ago you were talking to me about the three men you were trying to decide about, and now you’re after this man.”

She turned back to face him. “I’m not after any man. I’m just telling you that I know
this
man. I know his family, his home, and some of the towns that his father owns.”

“And you want to travel with me so you can go after him, just as those twins are going after you?”

“You’re disgusting.”

Alex took a few deep breaths to calm himself so he could try a different approach. “Your brother Adam told you to stay here and wait, and I think that’s what you should do.”

“I think Adam would want me to spend as much time with an Armitage son as possible. Adam didn’t like—” Cutting herself off, she looked away from Alex.

“He didn’t like what?”

She didn’t want to answer, but Alex kept staring at her. “The men.”

“Are you saying that your oldest brother, who you seem to revere, didn’t like the three men you were considering marrying?”

“Yes. Are you happy now?”

Alex couldn’t resist a smile. “What did Adam say about them?”

“I’m not telling you.”

“Was it that bad? Or are you just too cowardly to repeat his words?”

“Adam said those three men weren’t good enough to kiss the soles of my shoes. There! Does knowing that make you happy?”

“Pretty much.” He was grinning. “You know, every word you’ve told me about your precious Adam has made me dislike the bas—the man, but now I’m beginning to think we might like each other.”

“No you wouldn’t. You’re too much alike.”

“Alike? Are you changing your story and saying that I
am
like your oldest brother?”

“You’re getting too much pleasure out of this, so I’m not going to say another word to you about anything, except that I’m going to go with Jamie whether you like it or not.”

“You’re not.”

“Am.”

“Not.”

“Am.”

Alex made his hands into fists. What he wanted to do was throw her over his shoulder and tie her to a tree. He’d pay someone to free her four hours after they’d sailed away—or maybe it should be six. She could move quickly.

“I don’t like the way you’re looking at me. I’m going and that’s final.”

“And do what? Dress the men’s hair? Mend their clothes? I heard that you’ve had some practice in doing laundry. I know! How about if you do the cooking?”

Cay wanted to rattle off the list of credentials of her artistic education, but she made herself keep quiet. His remark about the laundry reminded her that he knew things about her family that must have come from someone who knew them. The logical person was Uncle T.C., but she’d never known him to talk about much of anything except plants. Whatever the source, Alex knew personal, private things about her and her family. However, it was strange that Alex didn’t seem to know that Cay could draw and paint. Usually, she had a sketchbook and pencils with her. She rarely went anywhere without the means to draw what she saw, but on the night she met Alex, she’d been going to a ball, so her drawing equipment had been left at home. And since then, everything had been so new and strange that she hadn’t thought much about art.

Now, it seemed that Alex’s not knowing about her might be a very good thing. “You said that anyone could draw. If I remember correctly, you said, ‘How hard can it be?’ Can
you
draw?”

“A bit,” he said. “Believe it or not, I had a drawing master who trained in London.”

“You were meaning to take on the job of recorder for yourself, weren’t you?”

“I thought about it.” Alex was smiling.

She wanted to kick him! What else had he kept from her? “How about if we both do a few drawings and let Jamie decide which of us will record this trip for posterity?”

Alex kept smiling. “Lass, I should warn you that I was the best in my class at drawing.”

“Were you?” she asked, trying to sound impressed.

“Aye, I was. I liked going out into the heather and drawing the animals I saw. If I hadn’t been a horseman, I could have . . .” He shrugged. “What training have you had?”

“Mrs. Cooper’s Academy for Young Ladies,” she said quickly. “We used to paint china teacups.” This was true, but she didn’t tell him it had been when she was four and she’d painted her family’s portraits on the cups—which had made her mother hire the first of several private drawing masters.

“Did you now?” He was smiling so hard it was nearly a smirk. Alex was confident that he’d win any artistic competition. If his sister was good at art, Alex was sure Nate would have told him so, and since he hadn’t, Alex figured that she’d had only a little training. Teacups! She had no idea what a journey like this required. She had to be able to draw fast and accurately.

“Is it a deal?” she asked. “We’ll have a competition and we’ll let Jamie be the judge. If he says that I’m no good, then I’ll return to the boardinghouse and stay there until Tally comes for me. Is it a bargain?”

Alex frowned. She was saying all this with such confidence that he thought there was a trick. “What are you up to?”

“Nothing. I just want to go with you and I’m going to do my absolute best to outdraw you. If you’d suggested pistols at dawn I might try to do that, too.”

“All this so you can go with this man Armitage?”

“That and other things.”

“Tell me, lass, is it the man or his money you want?”

For a moment, she had to fight the urge to slap him, but she refused to sink to his level. “His money, of course, since, according to you, I want to marry men even though I have no love for them. Maybe you think I’m incapable of love. Is
that
what you think? That I’m too coldhearted to love anyone?”

Alex was blinking in confusion. “How did we go from drawing to cold hearts?”

Cay threw up her hands in disgust. “You’re an idiot, and worse, you’re a
male.
” She moved past him with a gesture that said she was sweeping aside her skirts so they wouldn’t touch scum like him.

Alex leaned his head back against the wall of the building and looked upward. He wasn’t sure, but he thought that maybe he’d just agreed to let her go on a very dangerous trip into the wilds of a jungle. And the worst of it was that he had no idea how it had happened.

Sixteen

Alex watched Cay walk toward the dock. Her head was up, her chin out, and she walked with the determination of a man about to enter into a fight. In spite of himself, he couldn’t help feeling proud of her. It was impossible to believe that this was the same girl he’d first met.

But his pride in her didn’t quash his resolve to keep her from going on the trip. He couldn’t tell her that the real reason he didn’t want her with him was because he knew that if they spent more time together, he wouldn’t be able to keep his hands off of her. He couldn’t spend more days watching her strut around in her snug little breeches and not touch her. Since they were supposed to be brothers, they’d no doubt be expected to spend the nights together in a tent. How could he do that?

When they’d first started traveling together, Alex had been so angry, so full of rage and hatred, that he could have slept next to a dozen naked women and not taken advantage of what they offered.

But Cay, with her bright outlook on life, her belief that anything could be done, had changed all that. But Charleston and what had been done to him there now seemed something that wasn’t real and had never actually happened.

He watched her smiling up at Grady and telling him that she and her brother were to have a competition to see if she would go or not. Alex didn’t like to feel smug, but he was sure he’d win. He’d always been good at capturing on paper the likeness of whatever he saw. He hadn’t told her, but his father had brought watercolors back from a trip to Edinburgh, and Alex had made many pictures of landscapes. He knew he’d be good at what Grady wanted for the trip, so winning was going to be easy.

What would be difficult was consoling Cay when she didn’t get to go with them. He imagined a sweet scene where she was crying and he’d comfort her. He’d be firm but sympathetic, and tell her it was for her own good. He was sure she’d eventually understand that he was right.

Tomorrow morning they’d part, and there’d be tears in her pretty eyes and he’d remember them throughout the perilous journey. His hope was that while he was away, Nate would find some answers, and when Alex returned, maybe he could clear his name.

When he was no longer tainted by injustice, he’d get his horses back, and he’d go north to Virginia to find Cay. If she wasn’t already married to some cold, unappreciative boy who would never find out what she was really like, he would . . . He liked to leave that thought to the future.

Cay was waving her hand toward him, wanting him to come forward. It looked like she had the competition set up to begin. Smiling, Alex went toward the dock.

“Is this all right?” Mr. Grady asked, nodding toward the two work stations he’d had Eli and Tim set up. Wide boards had been leaned against crates, large pieces of paper on them, pens and ink beside them.

“Young Cay wanted a pan of water,” Mr. Grady said to Alex. “Do you need one?”

Alex had no idea why she wanted water along with her ink, but he shrugged it off as he sat down on a crate, put the pen and ink beside him, and picked up his makeshift easel.

“Since, as you know, we’ll be traveling,” Mr. Grady said, “it’s sometimes necessary to record things quickly, therefore, this will be a timed documentation. You will have three minutes to draw what you see. Whether it’s the dock, a person, or a bird, is up to you. I just want to see what you can do in a short time.”

Cay sat down on the rough wood of the dock, her legs folded, and looked at the blank piece of paper. Everything that her teacher, Russell Johns, had yelled at her ran through her head. When he’d first arrived in America from England, just two years before, he’d been destitute. He knew no one, and her mother said he had a broken heart, but not even she could get him to tell her what had happened to make him so unhappy. Her mother had hired Mr. Johns to teach her daughter, but, truthfully, Cay didn’t think she’d ever pleased him. He wanted someone who devoted her life to art, but Cay didn’t want to do that. Now, she could hear his voice as he gave her lessons in drawing pictures of movement. “Draw faster!” he’d shout. “Do you expect your brothers to sit still and wait for you?” Cay had learned how to rapidly sketch her brothers playing at ball or riding their horses in just a few strokes. With ink, she’d had to be sure about her lines, with no hesitation, because errors couldn’t be fixed. After three months of work on these quick drawings, Mr. Johns had finally grunted. He didn’t compliment her, but he didn’t complain either. For Cay, it had been the height of praise.

Mr. Grady took out his pocket watch, looked at it, and said, “Go!”

Cay worked with both hands. In her right hand, she had the pen, which she frequently dipped in ink, while she put the fingertips of her left into the water. As she drew in quick, bold strokes, she smeared the wet ink with the water to create shadings of her scene.

When Mr. Grady called time, Cay lifted her pen and stood up. The skinny boy, Tim, smirking at her as though he was looking forward to seeing her fail, swaggered across the deck to see the picture she’d done.

Eli went first to Alex’s drawing. “By all that’s holy, but that’s good. I thought T.C. could draw, but you’re far better than he is.” He looked at Mr. Grady, who was staring at Cay’s picture in silence. “You’ll have to hire this man for the job.”

Mr. Grady said nothing, just stood beside Tim and looked at Cay’s drawing. Curious, Eli went to them.

Alex was watching Cay and trying to repress a grin. After what Eli had said, Alex was sure the contest was over. “Come on, la—” He caught himself. “Cay, don’t be disheartened. We can’t all have—”

He broke off when he saw her drawing. In just three minutes she’d captured the wharf, the river, the sky, and Eli with a fishing net on his lap. There were lines and shading, some thick, some thin, some light, some dark. In Alex’s opinion, the drawing should be framed and put in a museum.

All the men, Tim, Eli, Grady, and Alex, turned to look at Cay.

“I know it’s rough, but I’m out of practice,” she said. “I promise I’ll do better on the trip.”

Alex was the first man to recover himself and turn away. Without a word, he started down the street toward the boardinghouse.

“I think my brother’s angry at me,” she said and took off running after him.

“You have the job,” Mr. Grady called after her, his eyes still on the drawing on the board.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” Eli said.

“He missed that ugly bird on the post,” Tim said, and the other two men glared at him.

“The pelican wasn’t there a minute ago,” Eli said.

“I do believe, Tim, you’re showing a bit of the green monster.” Mr. Grady picked up the drawing and studied it. “I think I’ll send this home to my mother. She always wants to know about my forays into the dark unknown. Now I can show her.”

Cay caught up with Alex outside the boardinghouse, and she was glad to see that neither Thankfull nor her half sisters were about.

“Did you enjoy yourself?” Alex said under his breath. “Did you feel good about making fun of me?”

“You were the one bragging about your abilities, not me.” Cay was bewildered by his attitude. She never would have guessed that he’d be a sore loser. “Are you angry because I can paint better pictures than you can?”

He gave her a look that told her that was an absurd idea.

“Then what’s made you so angry?” As soon as she said it, she knew. “You’re angry because you don’t want me to go with you.”

“I haven’t made that clear?”

She was glaring at him, her hands on her hips. “You were so sure you were going to win the contest that you made a bet with me, but you had no intention of honoring your wager, did you? You’re a vain man who can’t admit he was wrong.”

“Put your arms down! No male ever stood like you are.”

Cay was so angry she could hardly speak. “Try and make me.”

Alex grabbed her arm and pulled her to the side of the building, and down a path that led through the palms and shrubs that grew along the edges. Within minutes, they were out of sight of the settlement. Halting in a clearing, he turned back to her. “You don’t seem to realize how dangerous this trip is going to be. There are creatures living in this Florida that people have never seen. You could be killed in any number of ways. You could be—”

Cay took a step away from him, her eyes wide as she came to a realization. “You’re not afraid for me to go on this journey. There’s something else. I traveled with a wanted murderer, with men chasing me, hunting me wherever we went, but you weren’t afraid for my safety then. You and I built fires, we broke into a store, and you took time to dance with me. There’s another reason you don’t want me to go with you, isn’t there?”

“No, of course not,” he said quickly, but he avoided her eyes.

She stepped closer to him and bent her head so she could look up into his eyes. Sometimes, with his heavy beard, it was difficult to see his expression. “I like to think,” she said softly, “that in these last weeks you and I have become close. We’ve been through a lot together, so aren’t we friends?”

Alex started to answer her, but they were in a quiet place, surrounded by lush greenery, with the calls of birds in the background, and the fragrance of flowers around them. He couldn’t help himself, but he pulled her into his arms and kissed her. At first, it was a gentle kiss, but Cay leaned back and looked at him in astonishment. She blinked a few times, her long lashes making shadows, and she put her arms around his neck and kissed him back.

He knew that in spite of all her talk, she was very inexperienced, so he was gentle with her, his lips on hers soft, undemanding, but she pressed her body close to his and deepened the kiss. She opened her lips under his, inviting his tongue into her mouth.

It took all his will power, but he thrust her away from him. “That was ill done!” he said, his heart pounding, his breath coming fast.

Cay’s heart was also beating hard, and she was looking at him in wide-eyed question. “The other men I’ve kissed weren’t like you.”

“Will you put me on your list of suitors?” His remark was more angry than he’d meant it to sound, but he didn’t like to think of her kissing other men.

“I’m going to put you at the top of
all
my lists.”

She said it with so much enthusiasm that he laughed. She always seemed able to make his ill humor go away.

“Now do you see why I can’t take you with me?” he asked.

“You mean because you desire me above all things in life, and because I make your blood boil?”

“More or less,” he said. “At least now you see that you and I can’t travel together, and we certainly can’t stay in the same tent.”

“You do have a problem.” She turned away for a moment, then looked back at him. “Are you in love with me?”

“I’ll be honest with you, lass, I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to love again. Maybe a person gets only one true love in his life and I married mine.”

Cay tried not to show her disappointment. She wasn’t in love with him, either, but a girl liked to think there were at least half a dozen men pining away for her. “So it’s just . . . nature that’s the hindrance to our traveling together.”

“Aye, nature.”

She held out the sides of her breeches. “That I’m wearing men’s clothes doesn’t help dampen your feelings?”

“If anything, that makes it worse. If all women start wearing men’s trousers and showing the true form of their legs, I don’t know how we men would be able to stand it.”

“That’s because you haven’t seen as many legs of women as I have,” Cay said. “I can tell you that there are more unsightly ones than there are nice ones.”

“Is that so?”

“Are you laughing at me already?”

“’Fraid so, lass. It seems to have become a habit.”

She put her hands on his chest. “What if I promise to do nothing to . . . to stir your blood?” She took a step closer to him. “What if I swear that I’ll behave myself every moment of the trip?”

Alex put his hands on her shoulders and pushed her away. “One kiss and you turn into Eve. Get over there and do not touch me.”

Cay moved away from him, but she couldn’t conceal her smile. Alex was making her feel like a female. After what seemed like weeks of being thought of as a boy, with those awful girls pushing themselves on her, it felt, well, powerful to be considered a woman. It was lovely to feel desired, to be wanted.