DD-Michaels-END.rtf (30 page)

"You do know that Papa will be sending outriders from Becket Hall to Headcorn, to escort us the rest of the way tomorrow. What if they've already arrived?"

"Why then, I imagine I shall have to be very, very careful later this evening."

The smile Morgan shot him was, he believed, her first real one of th
e
day....

CHAPTER TWENTY

Jacob couldn't stay in the common room of the inn, not with Saul trying to goad him into drinking a mug of ale, telling him he wasn't really a man grown until he'd been drunk as a lord for three days running, and Jacob was two days short.

Everyone in the common room, strangers to him, had laughed, had joined in the teasing. One of his lordship's outriders had even offered to buy the barmaid for him for an hou
r
— 'Take ye at least that long get your courage up, let alone raisin' up anythin' else," he'd said, and everyone had laughed again.

Everyone treated him like a puling infant. A dumb, stupid baby. He was a man grown, all of twenty years old, and nobody saw that, nobody cared.

Morgie cared, or used to. She'd never laughed at him. She was his friend. And
now he'd ruined that, too.

He tried so hard, and still he could do nothing right. He should go to war, that's what he should do. Come back with scars and one of Napoleon's golden eagles.
Then
he'd be a man. Or he could die, be a hero. But he couldn't go back to Becket Hall. Not now, not after what had happened. He just couldn't. Not with Morgie lost to him...

His hands stuck deep in his pockets, Jacob walked with his head down in the dark, toeing a stone ahead of him as he slowly made his way toward the stables, where he could be alone, maybe get kicked in the head by one of the horses, and put out of his misery.

So intent was he on his misery that he nearly jumped when the scrape of a stick match against stone was followed by a small, yellow flare of fire.

He peered into the darkness just at the corner of the stables, ready to curse whoever was hiding in the shadows, scaring him like that...
a
nd saw a pair of hands cupped around the flame, the first hint of smoke as the person lit a cheroot.

But when the man lifted his head, and looked at him from beneath the brim of his hat, Jacob's words stuck in his throat.

"Hello, Jacob," Ethan said quietly, pushing himself away from the wall, the lit cheroot between his teeth. "Feeling more the thing tonight, are you?"

"I...
I
..." Jacob nodded furiously, bringing the fading remnants of his daylong headache back for another airing. "Something I can do for you, milord?"

"Oh, yes, Jacob, I believe there is something you can do for me. Or, rather, something you can tell me. Is there something you want to tell me, Jacob?"

It had been a guess, no more, but Ethan had put together Morgan's unhappiness and Jacob's descent into a bottle, and come up with the idea that something had happened between the two of them. Something decidedly unwonderful.

Now, looking at the boy, at the guilt and pain so evident in his eyes, Ethan drew deep on the cheroot, blew out a stream of blue smoke, then asked, "You and Miss Becket argued?"

"I..
.
that is..
.
she told you?"

"No, Jacob, she didn't. Your Morgie would never say a bad word about you. But she's unhappy, Jacob. Miserably unhappy, and you're about to tell me why."

Jacob pushed his hands through his hair, his chest heaving as his breathing turned rapid and painful. "It's my fault. Everything's my fault. I saw you. I saw you kissing her. Touching her."

"Did you now," Ethan said smoothly, remembering his moments alone with Morgan last night, in the drawing room. It would appear that Jacob had found at least one very good hidey-ho
l
e there. "And you didn't like what you saw?"

Jacob looked at the earl, his expression tortured, tears on his cheeks. "Why? Why you?
I'm
the one knows her,
I'm
the one she should be... Is she all right? Is Morgie all right?"

Ethan was liking this less and less. "What did you do, Jacob? Once I was gone, and your Morgie was alon
e
—
w
hat did you do? Did you go to her? Did you go to her bedchamber, Jacob?
Did you?"

"She had to tell me," Jacob tried to explain, wiping at his wet cheeks, rubbing his hand beneath his dripping nose. "She said to watch you. She
told
me! Watch him like a hawk, Jacob. Can't let anybody know, you know. Nobody's business, and dangerous. Nothing about the island, nothing about the Ghost. Can't let strangers in, can't let them see.
Watch him,
Jacob. That's what she said. And then she let you
touch
her. I saw you touch her. But what about
me?"

Ethan remained very still, and the boy rewarded him by rambling on in his agony, speaking to himself, his eyes tightly closed, his head down.

'Tells
me,
and then she says no, I was wrong, Jacob, don't worry, Jacob. Because he kissed her. She'd forget all of us, just to kiss him. She'll tell him. She'll tell him
everything.
Females do that. And we'll hang. Don't do it
,
Morgie. Stay with me, Morgie. Don't let him
in.
Why can't it be me?"

Ethan stored away everything Jacob had said about islands, and ghosts, and even hangings, concentrating on the one thing that mattered. The only thing that mattered. "Did you touch her, Jacob? Jacob, answer me. Did you touch her?
Did
you hurt her?

Jacob looked up at Ethan, his hands clapped hard to the sides of his head, his face a mask of pain and self-loathing. "Oh God. Oh God, oh sweet Christ. I didn't mean to hurt her...
I
didn't mean to...."

Ethan wanted to kill the lad where he stood, his anger was so hot, so wild.

But Morgan loved this boy, this sad, confused boy. Even now, she was protecting him, probably even blaming herself, if Ethan knew her at all, and he believed he was beginning to know her very well. Jacob's sin, with Morgan taking on the blame for that sin.

One question. He had one more question. And, depending on his answer, the boy would live or die.

"Did you rape her, Jacob?"

"No!"
He shook his head violently. "No, no. Not that. I stopped, I stopped! It was wrong, I knew it was wrong. And she just
stood there!
She didn't yell, didn't try to stop me. She just stood there! And..
.
and then she told me she loved me. She said she was sorry.
She
was
s
orry. What did
she
do? It was
me!"

Ethan cursed under his breath. Yes, he knew Morgan well.

Jacob wiped at his face again, and looked to Ethan as if he had answers. "I don't know what to do now. What do I do now?"

"You find a way to live with your mistakes, that's what you do. That's what we all do," Ethan told him. "And, if you're lucky, someday you may even get to make up for them. You're a fortunate man, Jacob. Miss Becket cares for you, cares for you deeply. Give her reason to continue caring for you. That's all you can do."

Ethan took one last pull on the cheroot, then ground it beneath his boot. "And I wouldn't worry overmuch about Miss Becket giving away secrets, when they roll off your tongue so easily. Get yourself back to Becket Hall, you and your mouth, and stay there until you learn to control both it and yourself. Oh, and not another word about any of this to Miss Becket
,
understand? You've said and done more than enough."

Jacob sniffed. "You should kill me," he said, putting a hand on Ethan's sleeve. "I need to be killed. Morgie shouldn't be the only one hurt."

"Is that a request, Jacob?" Ethan asked as the younger man dropped his hand. "You feel the need to suffer?"

Jacob nodded, lifting his chin. "It isn't right that I shouldn't."

Ethan rubbed at the bridge of his nose for a moment, thinking about this, then smiled. "You know something, Jacob? You're right. Boys are scolded. Men are knocked down."

And then he hit him flush on the jaw, and Jacob flew back onto his backside in the dirt. He lay there for a few moments before he sat up, shook his head, then reached into his mouth, taking out a bloody bottom tooth the punch had knocked loose.

And then the boy smiled. He actually smiled. "Thank you, milord."

Ethan rubbed his right fist, felt the scrape on his knuckle where it had come into contact with Jacob's teeth.
"
No, thank you, Jacob. I think we
both feel better now. Now make yourself scarce, before I want to feel better again."

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Louise snored with an enthusiasm that made Morgan smile as she slid out of the high tester bed, her feet searching on the carpet for her slippers.

She stood up, pulling her dressing gown with her, and slowly pushed her arms into the sleeves, tied the ribbon at
her neck.

It was dark in the bedchamber she'd been assigned, but the moonlight shining through the threadbare drapes revealed the few bits of furniture that lined the walls of this room beneath the eaves. There were only two guest chambers on this floor, hers and Ethan's.

Which should work out well.

Louise's pallet bed had been placed in front of the doo
r
—
o
n Chance's orders, Louise had told her as she'd apologized profusely. But that didn't matter. Chance should have realized that it didn't matter. And he probably did, Morgan thought now, smiling.

She tiptoed to the casement window she'd unlocked earlier. She had also rubbed its hinges with bacon fat she'd taken from the kitchens in Upper Brook Street and hidden in her bandbox, among other things she thought she might need: two sheets she'd cut into long strips and knotted together, a tinderbox, candles and a heavy pewter holder, and
one
of Chance's dueling pistols. Just i
n c
ase.

Chance had been wrong about who had taken his dueling pistol all those years ago and shot out Papa's study window, but he would know who had
borrowed
his pistol this time.

Still, if she had to use sheets to escape her bedchamber, a woman should not be traipsing about in the dark of night in her dressing gown without some sort of protection, now should she?

Ethan had said he'd come to her tonight. They'd both been waiting for this night since the moment they'd first met. But if he had decided it would be too dangerous, if he had decided to be a gentleman...? Well, she'd just have to convince him otherwise, wouldn't she?

And he had not come to her chamber. She'd waited until the moon was high in the sky, and he had not come.

So she would go to him.

Taking one last look at the sleeping maid, who probably wouldn't wake if the French invaded and began firing cannon at the inn, Morgan climbed onto the chair she'd earlier placed in front of the window, then held her breath as she pushed open the casement and looked out over the fairly flat roof.

And smelled smoke.

She poked her head out of the window and looked to her right, to see Ethan lying back against the shingles in his breeches and shirtsleeves, his knees bent, his arms behind his head.

He turned to her and spoke around the slim cheroot-lamped between his teeth. "Hello, imp. Lovely evening, isn't it? I was sure you'd figure some way
a
round the inestimable Louise."

Morgan rolled her eyes. "Why are you out there?"
sh
e whispered fiercely. "Why didn't you
knock
on the window, or something?"

"I trusted your judgment as to the timing," he said, tossing the cheroot high into the air, so that it landed
i
n the dirt inn yard, clear of the building. "Care to join
-
me? It's a beautiful night."

"I must be insane," Morgan muttered, hiking up the skirts of her nightrail and dressing gown, then levering one bared leg and her upper body out the window at the same
time, which wasn't exactly graceful, but was hands-down better, she'd decided
,
than crawling out
onher belly.

Ethan sat up and reached for her, helping her fully onto the gently sloping roof, and then they both were lying on their backs, side by side, looking up at the stars. "Comfortable?"

"Not really, no," Morgan said, turning her head to look past him. "That's your window?"

Ethan grinned at her. "It is. I've just been contemplating what would happen if a stiff breeze were to come from nowhere, slamming it shut with me still out here."

"You didn't remove the lock?" Morgan asked
,
incredulous. "I removed the
lock
from
my window hours ago."

Ethan believed he might one day be unsurprised by Morgan, but he was fairly certain it wouldn't be any day soon. "And how did you achieve that, may I ask?"