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Hannah appeared around the corner, making it apparent that she’d been eavesdropping. “Well, then, the widow Hobbs and I will be looking forward to seeing you,” she said.
Mr. Hunt grinned widely and bowed his head to Hannah. “Thank you, Mrs. Breton. For everything.”
“My pleasure,” Hannah said. She turned to Daphne and said, “Timmy is in back with your gig, Daphne. I’ll tell him you’ll only be a minute.”
The heat of a blush crept into her cheeks. She’d scold Hannah later, but the damage was done. And she marveled that Mr. Hunt had remembered Hannah’s name from this morning, though he did not look like the sort of man who would miss much.
He raised an eyebrow and said, “You’re young to be a widow, Mrs. Hobbs. I am sorry for your loss.”
He didn’t look sorry as he glanced down at her wedding ring. “Thank you,” she told him after a moment’s hesitation.
He cleared his throat and stepped back. “Good evening, Mrs. Hobbs.”
She stood there for a long minute, staring at Mr. Hunt’s back as he left the shop and mounted his horse. Oh, such strong calves, long legs and wide shoulders. There was something very…compelling about the man. Something that piqued her interest and caused a yearning she hadn’t felt before. She would have to be very careful around Mr. Hunt. Any careless involvement would have her at the end of a hangman’s noose in short order.
Even near midnight, the air was balmy and humid. The soft breeze was a sultry caress on his skin and the scent of exotic flowers overlay the tang of sea air. In the past ten years, Hunt had forgotten the night heat, warmer than a summer day in England. Even the tavern door stood open to catch an errant breeze. He took a deep breath and entered.
Like taverns everywhere, the Blue Fin was dimly lit and smelled of stale ale. The square barroom had a long counter at one side and two dozen tables scattered throughout. Hunt sat in one corner facing the door with his back to the wall, a habit he’d acquired after being knifed in the back by a French agent in a Marseille public house. He ordered a tankard of ale and placed it on the small wooden table in front of him. Half past eleven. Right on time.
A man of average height entered and glanced around. He was dressed in rough brown trousers and a stained blue work shirt. His long sandy hair was pulled back and tied with a black string at his nape. He was the very picture of a longshoreman. When his gaze met Hunt’s, he nodded. Hunt nodded back.
The man went to the bar and bought a tankard of ale. After exchanging pleasantries with the barkeeper, the man slammed his tankard down on the counter and headed for the back door with an excuse that he had to use the privy.
Hunt did a slow count to ten, finished his ale and stood. He dropped a small coin on the table, exited to the street and then rounded the building to the rear courtyard of the tavern. And there, waiting for him in the shadow of an ancient oak, stood Oliver Layton, clandestine operations, Foreign Office.
Layton glanced at the rear door to the tavern. “We’ve got about five minutes, Lockwood.”
“Good to see you, too, Layton. Have you found a more private meeting place for us?”
The man nodded. “West of town, just before your plantation, there’s a brick mile-marker. Off the road about one hundred yards you’ll find an abandoned hut. The track is overgrown, but there’s still a trace of it. Behind the center stone above the lintel is a pocket. Leave messages there. I will check for them and leave my own every midnight. If you need to talk to me, meet me there.”
Hunt nodded. “Bring me up-to-date.”
“Not much to tell. I’ve been in place a month. The locals are just beginning to trust me. I’ve hinted that I’d like to make more money and don’t care how. We’ll see if someone takes the bait. Do you have a plan?”
“Nothing firm beyond a reception to be given tomorrow night by Governor Bascombe and his chargé d’affaires, Gavin Doyle. I met with them this evening. They don’t know why I’m here. I gather Eastman fears the problem may have reached the highest levels. In the morning I’ll go to New Albion. I haven’t been to my plantation for ten years.” Hunt closed his eyes to remember. “Then…if I recall correctly, there is a mountain range that runs down the south end of the island. The mountains come down to the sea, and since it is the windward side of the island, the currents are fairly treacherous. Not much land over there.”
“What has that to do with us?”
“There’s a small town built on the cliffs. Blackpool. I hear they don’t like strangers. Something is wrong there. The captain of the ship I sailed on pretended ignorance of the town. I find that interesting,” Hunt told him. “Most shippers want to make the most of a port. If Blackpool has any goods to trade or any need of supplies, it would be a logical stop. That it isn’t on anyone’s itinerary is suspicious. I intend to pay them a little visit. Have you heard any gossip regarding the village?”
“The townspeople are strangely silent about the other side. It’s almost as if it doesn’t exist. I asked the harbormaster about ships from Blackpool, and he told me they don’t come here, and that our ships don’t go there. Then he made a cryptic remark about ill fortune to those who tried.”
Hunt laughed. “Good God, what an opening! And you haven’t gone to the other side after that tempting remark?”
Layton rubbed the stubble on his chin and shook his head. “The pack of sea rats we’re looking for are bloodthirsty barbarians. I’m just a poor longshoreman. I don’t go looking for trouble and I don’t make any.”
“Or so they believe.”
Layton gave him a lopsided grin. “So far, at least on St. Claire, that’s the truth. My orders are to collect intelligence and stay out of trouble.”
Hunt nodded. Those were Layton’s orders, not his. The Foreign Office expected him to “handle” any problem on St. Claire. “Any word, any mention at all, of Captains Sieyes or Rodrigo?”
“None. It is as if no one in San Marco has ever heard of pirates.”
“They cannot be blind, deaf and dumb.”
Chapter Three
T he next morning, Hunt threw his coat across his saddle and left for New Albion, his plantation just west. Lush growth crowded the sides of the road while overhanging trees canopied the track, blocking the sun but not the early morning heat. The road ran parallel to the ocean and he could hear the soft hiss of waves through the heavy growth of mangrove and cypress. Distant screeches reminded him of the brightly colored birds in cages on the wharves destined for London drawing rooms.
That thought brought him back to the most exotic creature he’d seen yet: the tempting Widow Hobbs. Widow. Not married. Fair game. She’d have no illusions of a future together. She was self-sufficient and did not need him—a good thing, since he had nothing to give. They’d be free to enjoy whatever comfort the other could offer without impossible expectations.
When Governor Bascombe had insisted upon holding a reception for Lockwood, Hunt had requested that an invitation be sent to Mrs. Daphne Hobbs. The governor had merely smiled and warned that she never attended public affairs.
Too bad. She had made her own way in the world instead of catching another husband—which would have been an easy task for a woman of her looks and manner. She had a backbone. He liked that in a woman. But if she could not be enticed to attend soirées, he would just have to become Pâtisserie’s best customer.
A pair of wrought-iron gates, open to the road, bore the words New Albion. He turned his recently acquired gelding through the gate and proceeded down the track a quarter of a mile.
His first sight of the house surprised him anew. He hadn’t remembered it looking so typically like a British manor. Two stories, with tall windows open to the breeze, it was constructed of stone and covered with a verdant growth of flowering tropical vines. A row of small well-kept cottages formed a semicircle behind the house, and off to one side across a clearing were the barn and stables. The drive made a loop in front and he dismounted at the wide steps.
A short man with dark, slicked-back hair and a luxuriant mustache came down the steps to greet him. “Lord Lockwood? Good to meet you. I’m Jack Prichard, your factor. You had a pleasant voyage, I hope?”
He nodded and shook the man’s hand. “Uneventful, which I hear is a good thing.”
Prichard laughed. “Never know when you’ll encounter a hurricane this time of year.”
Hunt looked toward the cottages. “The staff?”
“And the workers. They are out on the plantation this time of day. Your trunks arrived and I’ve left them in the foyer until you decide where you want to stay. There is a room upstairs with a crossbreeze or, if you prefer privacy, the guesthouse.”
He would prefer privacy. In fact, he would require it. “Where is the guesthouse?”
Prichard pointed to a trail through the garden toward the sound of waves breaking on a beach. “Not far down the path.”
The factor signaled a waiting servant who entered the front hall, hoisted Hunt’s trunk to his shoulder and followed them. The path took them several hundred yards toward the ocean, but the destination was well worth the walk. Single story, long and low, the guesthouse was built on stilts with a porch surrounding the entire structure. When he opened the door, he was enchanted. Though the house was beneath the tree canopy, the ocean was visible through a wall of windows lining the front.
Prichard slid one window to the side, and then another, and fresh sea air swept through the house, making it feel almost a part of the outdoors. Polished native mahogany floors were interrupted only by rich Persian carpets and low rattan chairs with deep cushions that faced the water.
Hunt dropped his jacket over one chair and went to the other room. A wide bed made up in crisp linen sheets was partially shrouded by transparent netting draped from the ceiling. More floor-to-ceiling windows were open to the breeze. The only concession to cooler months was a fireplace in the wall between the outer room and the bedroom, open on both sides. The privacy would suit him well.
“Shall I assign you a personal servant, Lord Lockwood?”
“No servants,” Hunt said. No interference, and no witnesses to his comings and goings.
Daphne smoothed the rich plum silk in her lap. After trying the gown on, she’d only had to take in the seams a fraction beneath her bosom. She’d had the gown remade in Charleston, along with a few others, when she’d gone to visit William at school last year.
And now, with Governor Bascombe’s invitation to a reception honoring a Lord Lockwood tomorrow night sitting on her foyer table, she’d have the perfect opportunity to repay Captain Gilbert for all his thoughtfulness. She’d steal a private moment with the governor, request a patent for the captain to carry official documents and then count her debt to him paid.
The errant notion that she might encounter Mr. Hunt passed through her mind and sped her heartbeat. The mere thought of him was like an opiate—seductive, promising unknown delight, addictive. Dangerous. Every sensible thing in her warned her to stay away from the man. That anything else could bring disaster. That, should he have the faintest suspicion of who she was and what she’d done, all she had worked to build and all she loved would be forfeited.
No, the risk was too great to give in to the temptation that was Mr. Hunt. Nevertheless, and illogically, she twisted the wedding band off her finger, dropped it in her sewing basket and returned to her task.
Taking one final stitch and knotting the thread, Daphne put the gown aside. She arched her back and rolled her head as she stood. Her life since leaving London had been anything but sedentary and now she could not sit for long periods of time. She’d found forgetfulness and peace in hard labor. It was only in the quiet moments that the reality of what she’d become caught up with her.
The faint click of the kitchen door opening drew her attention. Olivia must have come back for something. The housekeeper was always leaving her supper or her mending before going back to the cottage by the gate to her property.
“Olivia?” she called. “What did you forget?”
When there was no answer, an uneasy shiver shot up her spine. “Olivia?” She snatched the scissors from her sewing box and whirled to the back hallway as soft footsteps approached. “I… I have a pistol,” she warned.
“Si, an’ you will use it, too.” A tall Spanish beauty appeared in the doorway. Her long dark hair hung loose to the small of her back and she had the confident look of a woman who knew her own worth. She gave Daphne a saucy grin. “I think you will have to be more ferocious than that if you want to stop someone, querida. If I had been the thief, you would be much the poorer now, eh?”
Daphne exhaled and dropped her scissors. “Why did you not answer me?”
Olivia shrugged. “I wished to see what you would do. I worry about you when I am not here.”
Daphne turned away from her to hide her annoyance. Olivia meant well, but she could often be trying. “I got on quite well before you came along,” she snapped.
“Si?” Olivia laughed and shook her head. “And that is why you are here on St. Claire? Because you ‘got on’ well?”
Daphne had learned almost the same day she arrived on the island that Olivia was a conscienceless busybody. Thank heavens she was discreet. And thank heavens Daphne had been careful to bury her secrets deeply beneath the rain tree behind her house.
“I suspect I am here for the same reason you are, Olivia,” she answered.
Olivia gave a weary shrug. “Men,” she said. “They are the reason for everything, eh? But I came back tonight because I forgot to put the little William’s letter where you could see it. It is in your desk.”
William? She went to the escritoire in one corner of the room. Her spirits lifted and she smiled as she opened the thin little letter and saw the child’s bold writing. “Do you mind if I read it now, Olivia?”
“I will go, querida. Tomorrow, eh?”
“Yes, tomorrow.” Daphane sighed, settling into her chair again. She read the words quickly, then went back to savor them a second time.
Her son was doing well. His letter was filled with news about his friends and classes. He’d finished his exams and had been promoted a level. He had grown two inches since last Christmas. The headmaster and his wife had invited him to stay with them over the Christmas holiday again, but he begged to be allowed to come home. He was homesick for her and St. Claire, he wrote, and promised he would be no trouble.
Trouble? That he could even think such a thing cut like a dagger to her heart. Of course he was no trouble, and she would give anything to have him with her every single day. It tore at her very soul to spend so much time apart from him, but the danger of having him where he could be found if she was discovered was too great. Oh, but surely she could risk having him for the Christmas season? A month? Two?
She withdrew a sheet of paper from the escritoire drawer and scribbled a few lines. Words of encouragement and love, and the promise that she would send for him soon. She folded her letter, sealed it and placed it on the foyer table to take with her to town tomorrow. She would post it by packet to a neighboring island, where it would be routed to Charleston—the only way she could be certain her letters wouldn’t be traced.
Music floated on the sultry island breeze. Chandeliers cast a gentle glow through the grand ballroom. Were it not for the smell of salt air stirring the draperies and the humidity, Hunt could well imagine himself at a state dinner at Whitehall. On his left, Governor Bascombe introduced him to yet another island notable while, on his right, the chargé d’affaires, Mr. Doyle, kept the line moving.
Hunt shook the newest arrival’s hand. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Goode,” he said. “I believe we are neighbors, are we not?”
“Aye, Lord Lockwood. Our lands adjoin to the east. Glad you’ve come. Now you can straighten out that factor of yours.”
“Prichard?” Hunt asked in surprise. “Has he encroached on your land or business?”
“In a manner of speaking. I can’t keep workers. Prichard pays yours too much, so mine keep wandering off to New Albion.”
“Have you tried paying yours more, Mr. Goode?”
The man gave him an incredulous look. “Profits, Lord Lockwood. That would cut my profits.”
“Ah, yes,” Doyle interrupted smoothly. “A man must make a living, mustn’t he? Have you tried the hors d’oeuvres, Mr. Goode? They’re delicious. You’ll find them in the drawing room.”
“Nicely done, Doyle,” Hunt said when Mr. Goode had shuffled off to the drawing room. The chargé was the type of man who had always been popular at school—charming, good-looking and the sort one wanted on one’s cricket team.
The tall, fair, solidly built chargé grinned. “Mr. Goode has a tendency toward confrontation. Easy enough to manage when you see it coming.”
Hunt was about to reply when he caught a flash of shimmering plum from the corner of his eye. He refocused on the captivating creature. Mrs. Hobbs. Bascombe had been wrong. She’d come. Dare he hope she’d come alone? He gave a polite half bow and excused himself.
She had her back to him and he took a moment to admire the curve of her swanlike neck and the set of her shoulders. Her sun-streaked hair, done in an interesting twist at her nape, glowed in the candlelight. He could smell her scent—not vanilla and sugar, as it had been in her shop, but something more tropical. Oleander? No, gardenia. He inhaled deeply before speaking.
“Mrs. Hobbs. I am delighted to find you here.”
She spun and left him bemused. The cut of her gown was both innocent and bold, revealing the valley between her breasts and suggesting a hidden lushness. And was that a hint of black lace beneath the plum silk? Lord! Was she wearing a black chemise? His mind ran riot with the fantasy and his body responded shamelessly.
“Mr. Hunt,” she said in a low, throaty voice, obviously unaware of what she was doing to his pulse. “I wondered if you might be here tonight.” She offered her hand, as gracious as any duchess.
Mr. Hunt? Then she still didn’t know who he was? He bowed over her hand and held it fast. “Have you come alone, Mrs. Hobbs? Might I importune you for a waltz?”
She glanced around and took note of Governor Bascombe, still in conversation with Mr. Goode near the punch bowl.
“You can pay your respects to our host afterward,” he said. “In fact, I will be pleased to take you to him myself.”
A shadow of indecision passed over her features and he thought she might refuse. Then she looked up at him and when her uncertain green eyes met his, he could see her surrender. Whatever internal battle she had been waging had just been lost. And he’d won. Still holding her hand in his, he led her to the dance floor.
She tilted her chin to look up at him and an enigmatic smile curved her full lips. She looked so exactly like a woman who’d just tempted fate that he grinned back.
“It’s just a dance, Mrs. Hobbs. I’m not going to devour you,” he said, not entirely certain that was the truth.
She laughed and moistened her lips as he led her into the dance. “It’s just that…it has been a while, Mr. Hunt.”
“Really? How long?”
She shook her head. “So long I cannot remember. Six, seven years?”
“Ah, since your husband died.”
“Long before that. I…we did not mix in society much. My husband did not like to dance, and he did not like me to dance with others.”
And yet, as they danced, he’d have sworn dancing had been second nature to her. “Where was that? London?”
“Yes. It seems like another lifetime ago.”
He found it hard to believe that he could have missed her, even in the height of the seasonal crush. He had no doubt she was a part of the ton, even if only on the periphery. Could she have come to town when he was away on business?
“You have not forgotten a single step,” he said, and led her into a quick turn.
