He stood tall and utterly forbidding, his fists knotted at his side, and every muscle in his lean frame tensed and angry. “Now go, Eliza Thoroughgood. Run back to your mother and father and the safety of your little family. But don’t forget to give Haberton my message.”
He stepped away from the door and with a sharp gesture dismissed her. But Eliza could not move. Nothing about this made any sense. “You can’t send me back to him with no more message than that. What could he
possibly have done to provoke such … such
evil
from you? I don’t even know who you are.”
She caught a glimpse of stark pain in his eyes. Or she thought she did. But before she could be certain, he bent low and gave her a sweeping bow that would have done any nobleman proud, had it but been sincere.
“My, but I do forget the manners my mother drilled into me. Cyprian Dare at your service, madmoiselle.” He straightened and stared boldly at her. “Now, if you would please get the hell off my ship.”
It was positively the last straw. With a cry of pure outrage Eliza snatched up the nearest object she could find—a heavy navigational tool of some sort—and threw it straight at his head. How dare he order her off his ship so vulgarly when it was he who’d had her dragged here in the first place! She grabbed a book from the desk and threw it at him as well.
Cyprian avoided the bit of brass by ducking, and deflected the book with one arm. Then before the chit could send a heavy glass tumbler sailing at him, he launched himself at her.
All things considered, he thought he’d handled things in a fairly civilized fashion. Any other man, knowing what lay beneath that frumpy gown, would have tossed the cheeky wench on her back straightaway and taught her just who was in charge. Any other man who’d spent the last ten days frustrated just because he’d kissed some faceless woman who’d possessed a rather luscious body, would have made quick and satisfying use of that body. But rape was not his way. He’d only wanted to see her, to see if her appearance was as stimulating to his senses as the feel of her had been.
When she’d sidled into his cabin alongside Xavier and Oliver, he’d been disappointed. At least at first. But as he’d threatened her, her trembling fear had squeezed a reckless sort of bravery out of her. The prudish gown had begun to whet his appetite for the delights that lay
beneath it. Her wealth of dark brown hair had begun to beckon him to reach out and touch it. Then she’d thrown the sextant at him and his initial opinion of her had given way entirely. Eliza Thoroughgood was quite a piece of work with her huge eyes glittering in fury and her pale complexion flush with emotion.
Now, as he caught her around the waist and fell onto the chair with her on his lap, he hoped the sextant hadn’t broken. But it was not to prevent any further carnage that he’d trapped her in his arms. No, it was to have his hands on her once more. She was smaller, weaker, and scared to death of him. Yet he felt as if in her he’d met an adversary unlike any he’d ever faced before, and he felt the urge to take their battle to a new and more stimulating level.
Not to hurt her, though. Hardly. What he’d discovered, to his dismay, was that he wanted to seduce the very proper Miss Eliza Thoroughgood. To enjoy her sweet young body. And in the process she would learn a few things as well. First, the pleasures to be had between a man and woman, something a sheltered young woman such as she had undoubtedly been well-protected from. Second—and more important, he told himself—was how it felt to be at someone else’s mercy, to survive purely on the whim of someone more powerful than yourself. She was used to being part of the ruling class. Now she would have a taste of life as it was for the poor, the weak, and the helpless.
“Be still. Be still, by damn, and I won’t hurt you,” he growled as he forced her hands to her sides and held her on his lap. “I said be still.”
He couldn’t see her face beneath her tangled hair, but even so he could feel her panic. She struggled against him, kicking fruitlessly with her heels against his booted shins, and her heart beat a thunderous pace beneath his tight embrace. “You’re only hurting yourself,” he
taunted, murmuring the words somewhere in the vicinity of her right ear. “Just calm down.”
“Go to bloody hell,” she muttered back, kicking once more.
“I bloody well intend to,” he replied, smiling as her delectable bottom shifted across his lap. What would it take, he wondered, to make her more amenable to his overtures?
Only when she had exhausted herself did her struggles against him finally subside. For a moment Cyprian simply enjoyed the feel of her in his arms. Her breath came in quick, deep gasps. Her exertion had released that same lemony scent he remembered. It was in her hair, he realized, nuzzling his nose into the silky thickness of it.
She reacted as if stung, starting to struggle once again. “Let me go you … you bloody monster! You horrid child stealer! You … you—”
“You smell of lemons,” he said, paying no mind to her anger. “How do you manage that?”
She strained away from him, but it was a futile effort, for he had no intention of releasing her until he was good and ready. Yet how was he to get her to relax her guard long enough to make her willing?
“Listen to me, Eliza. You don’t mind if I call you Eliza, do you? Considering how well acquainted we became at our last meeting.”
“I hate you,” she swore.
“No doubt you do,” he mocked. “Especially since I intend to take your cousin away from you. I suppose your uncle asked you to watch over him, didn’t he? To chaperone and protect him. I’m sorry, but it will now be impossible for you to carry out those instructions.”
“If you were truly sorry you wouldn’t be stealing him this way. No, nor treating me so cruelly. Let me go!”
But he ignored her last remark. “I’m not trying to be cruel. But I can’t have you throwing my belongings
about, can I? If you’ll promise to behave I’ll release you.” He paused, waiting for her answer. “Well, will you behave?”
He could feel her heaving breaths against his arm. “What are you going to do with Aubrey?”
Aha. So the chink in her armor was her responsibility for the boy. Just as he’d suspected. Loyalty was a good quality in a person, something he highly valued. In this case, however, it was a virtue he could use against her.
“I haven’t decided what I shall do with him. Yet.”
She was still a long moment and he guessed what she would say before she phrased the first word. “If you would just return him unharmed, I … I would make a bargain with you.”
“A bargain?” Again he smiled. Yes, she was nothing if not the loyal guardian.
“I will … I will—you know—do whatever it is you wish to do.”
He nuzzled his face against her hair again, searching out the rim of her ear with his lips. When she jerked her head away he laughed. “But would you do it willingly? Somehow I don’t think so. Besides, I’m not in the mood to bargain. I have the boy and I also have you, if I want to keep you. I can do whatever I wish with either of you and there’s no one to say me nay.”
She shuddered and Cyprian felt a vague and unfamiliar regret for his words. If he was going to seduce her, scaring her was probably not the right approach.
“Then get it over with,” she muttered. “Just do it and get it over with.”
“Do it?” He laughed, but ruefully. Seducing her obviously would take more time than he had to give and raping her held no appeal at all. These ten days of frustration had all been for naught, he realized. Suppressing a frustrated oath he continued. “I’m a discriminating man, Eliza. I like my women willing. And you, it appears, are not entirely willing.”
She snorted in derision, but he also detected a slight easing of the tension in her back.
“So,” he went on. “Best to put you ashore now and get on with my plans for the boy.” He let loose her arms and gave her a little shove.
She leaped away from him as if burned and backed into a corner. But her face reflected her confusion. “Just … just what
are
your plans for Aubrey?”
He shrugged and sprawled back in the chair. But though he affected a casual air, he studied her closely, watching every flicker of emotion on her lovely face. Though she was still terrified, she was not about to back down from him. She appealed to his tastes more and more. How unfortunate for him. “I haven’t yet decided what my plans are for your young charge.”
She swallowed and he waited for the plea he was sure would come next.
“Oh, please,” she begged, wringing her hands together. “Can’t you see that Aubrey is the wrong person to wreak your revenge upon? He’s just an innocent child.”
“He gives me access to his father.”
“But what could Uncle Lloyd possibly have done to you that you would react in so heartless a fashion as this?”
Cyprian stiffened, but he bit back the angry retort that rose to his lips. That was not what this little exchange was about. He had the boy in his possession, so his revenge on Sir Lloyd Haberton was well underway. Now he could relax and concentrate on this new diversion, in the form of Haberton’s niece. Maybe he still could seduce her, if he put his mind to it. But no matter what might eventually pass between them, he had no intention of defending his plan for revenge to her.
“I’m sure you cannot imagine the man being less than the perfect uncle, Eliza. The perfect father,” he added, a trace of sarcasm creeping into his voice. “But if you
knew him as he truly is, as I know him …” He trailed off, unable to control his seething anger whenever he spoke of Haberton.
He saw her compress her lips tightly and nervously weave her fingers together. She should wear red, the unwonted thought came to him. Not a hot Chinese red, but a deep, shadowed scarlet, verging on purple. Her hair would gleam like dark, lush velvet against it; her gray eyes would glitter like diamonds.
She averted those eyes, breaking away from his avid stare. “I … I admit that he can be distant. Remote. He is a stern taskmaster to his children, and … and ever since Aubrey’s accident, well, it sometimes seems that he is angry with the child. But it’s only that Aubrey had been warned time and time again not to go riding alone. When he disobeyed and then was thrown and dragged—” She broke off, but the appeal in her huge eyes was almost enough to make Cyprian reconsider his plans. Almost.
“So, he has no pity for his crippled child.”
“No, that’s not it at all!” she cried. “And anyway, who are you to criticize him, when you are so much worse? You’re the one who has torn the boy away from his home and family. You’re the one with no conscience whatsoever. Don’t you see how wrong this is? How cruel? If it’s the father you hate, then hurt the father. But not the son. Not Aubrey.”
Cyprian stood up abruptly. In the face of her accusations he was unable to remain cool and aloof. How dare she defend Haberton to him! “It’s time you were put ashore,” he muttered in an icy tone. “You know what you’re to do. Just tell Haberton that Cyprian Dare has his son.”
He glared at her. If the wench said even one more word in defense of that bastard he’d have to shut her up. One way or another he’d have to shut her up.
But she glared right back at him, like a small wildcat
protecting her precious kit. Tears sparkled in her eyes, though they could not disguise her fury, and her petite form fairly bristled with animosity. “Send you vile communication through another messenger, Cyprian Dare, for I refuse to bear it. Uncle Lloyd asked me to watch over Aubrey, and so I shall.
I
will not leave this ship until he does too!”
The tears spilled past her lashes then, but she wiped them away with an impatient gesture. Then without waiting for a reply, she marched over to the heavy chair he’d abandoned, shoved it aside, and jerked the door open. It slammed as she stamped out into the passageway, a sharp exclamation point to her angry vow. “Xavier!” she cried in a furious tone as she hurried away from him. “Oliver!”
Cyprian’s first inclination was to charge after her and throw her off his ship himself. Who in the hell did she think she was, making such farfetched pronouncements? He was captain here and she was worse than a fool to demand to stay on a ship full of men who’d as soon tumble her as look at her.
But instead of storming after her, he just sat down, a little stunned, a little amused—more than a little aroused—and enormously pleased, if the truth be told. Brave little fool that she was, she demanded to stay, and whether it was foolish of him or not, he was going to let her. She was a strange combination of fear and fearlessness, of proper behavior and hidden lushness. Of fury and tears.
Of all those qualities, however, it was the tears that ultimately swayed him, he realized. Most women cried at the drop of a hat. It was a weapon they used to get their way. But when overused, that particular weapon lost its effectiveness. He’d seen his mother cry less than a handful of times, though she’d had reason enough to spend half her life in tears.
This Eliza Thoroughgood had impressed him, despite
all the reasons he instinctively disliked her. She was a highborn woman used to everything going her way. But she was also a brave little hellcat. Though her claws could do little enough damage—she would never win against him—she nonetheless would not give in. Despite the fact that he’d manhandled her, threatened her, and then ordered her off his ship, she’d stood up to him and demanded to stay with her cousin. You’d think the boy was her own child, so fierce was her need to protect him. Yet he was only her cousin.