The Pirate's Duty (Regent's Revenge #3)(25)
Covered with a faded quilt, the simple bedstead looked clean and well maintained. It was apparent that Miss Thorpe took great pride in all that she did.
Chloe’s role as a marchioness—prestige and property at her disposal—allowed her to open the Underwood estate to orphans in honor of slain sailors aboard the Mohegan, the ship she’d sailed on to Penzance. Miss Thorpe, on the other hand, had no title to aid her endeavors. Against all odds, she used her God-given talents and operated an inn to fund supplies that could very well save orphans’ lives.
His chest constricted. Only someone dedicated to making life better for others could suffer deprivation the likes of which Miss Thorpe had experienced and not end up in Bedlam. Her selfless acts continued to endear him to her. So much so that he wanted to give the innkeeper much more of himself than he’d ever wanted to give a woman. But what could he propose? They’d just met. He was a wanted man. In light of the danger her brother posed to her body and soul, all he could offer now was protection. Though, in truth, he just wanted to kiss Miss Thorpe’s cares away. He wanted to hold her, taste her untried passions, and awaken her body to a man’s touch. Not just any man’s, but his.
Nevertheless, acting on impulse stripped away what little tranquility Girard and O’Malley had managed to give the innkeeper.
He couldn’t waver. Not now. Not when Carnage was almost in his hands. He wasn’t blind and he suffered no delusions. Based on his duty to king and country, he had to put everything else above Miss Thorpe. It was truly a crime as he believed no one had ever put Miss Thorpe’s needs first.
Was she doomed to hate him for eternity when she discovered the truth about him?
Seven
LADY O will be pleased to discover SHERBORNE MERCURY does not support TREWMAN’S EXETER FLYING POST! The events at LAND’S END heighten the DANGER to our SHORES and can only be the work of CAPTAIN CARNAGE, not the BLACK REGENT. Cornwall does NOT support KING GEORGE’S edict that the FREE TRADER has gone ROGUE.
~ Sherborne Mercury, 29 September 1809
Oriana collapsed against her bedroom door and breathed a sigh of relief. How in the devil was she going to get any rest with John Hunt sleeping down the hall? Everything about the tall, handsome fisherman set her heart racing. Especially the moments they’d spent alone in the tavern. Heat rose to her face at the memory of when he’d almost kissed her. She placed a hand over her quivering heart, trying to steady her breath, and then touched her lips as she pushed away from the door.
Plenty of men had tried to kiss her before, but she’d refused them. She’d sworn that when she gave herself to a man, he would have principles, be trustworthy and truthful—the complete opposite of her father. Sadly, few men were like that.
Was John Hunt such a man? Oh, she suspected a kiss from him would change her life forever. If only her brother didn’t wage war against her. Maybe then she wouldn’t have to spend her entire life looking over her shoulder, not knowing what tomorrow would bring.
She walked to the nightstand near the small bed in the corner, lowered the candlestick to the ash table, and then retrieved the velvet coin purse from her apron. She set it down, then turned in a circle, gazing about her chamber. After the deaths of her brothers and her parents, she’d had her choice of rooms in the inn. She’d kept her own, however, preparing the others for guests and choosing not to change her life any more than her family had already forced her to. This room, which was much smaller than the others, had been the only thing she could call her own, and the window seat proved preferable by far, allowing her access to the stars. There, she’d spent many nights curled up, a book in her hands, dreaming of ordinary people and exotic places.
Fortunately, the room was situated at the tail end of the inn, giving her a vivid view of the sea and the horizon. Unfortunately, such a perspective also proved beneficial for signaling ships. Once her father had discovered her penchant for sitting there at night, he’d forced her to use signal lamps to warn him and her brothers of impending danger when they approached the tunnels with stolen merchandise.
Now her perch would serve to warn her of Charles’s impending return.
Oriana picked up a shawl, which had been knitted by one of the widows she employed to make clothing for the orphans in Talland Bay, and wrapped it around her shoulders. Brushing aside the heavy tapestry curtain, she took her place on the window seat, drew her knees up to her chin, and gazed out to sea.
There, blissfully cocooned by the drapes and her shawl, she touched her lips again.
The moon was perched high on the horizon, illuminating the sea’s glossy breadth—a smuggler’s night, it was. Streams of light widened, then narrowed to the shoreline below the Roost. The wind was roaring across the Channel like an angry beast fighting to reach her through the windowpane, sending a chill down her body.
She pulled the shawl tighter about her and shivered. She’d been her father’s and brothers’ pawn all her life. But she’d broken the chain with Charles. When he realized she’d used some of his gold to help the widows nearby, he’d kill her.
Unless the Black Regent got to him first.
Several hours later, Walsingham paced his room, mulling over the night’s events, when a knock sounded on his door. He moved slowly, quietly, to keep from raising suspicion and cracked open the door.
Jarvis stood in the hallway.