Surrender of a Siren (The Wanton Dairymaid Trilogy #2)(111)

She turned a slow circle, letting her gaze linger on each of her friends one last time. “I sail for Antigua immediately, where I understand I may board an English frigate.” Her gaze settled on Gray. “So this is good-bye.”

Gray nodded. Of course, now that he understood everything—how her past would inevitably poison his family’s future—he was letting her go.

“Farewell, then. Unless …” She addressed Fitzhugh with perfect innocence. “But you didn’t really mean to charge us all with piracy?”

He blinked.

Sophia smiled. “I didn’t think so.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Whether one strolled the park or traveled the globe, the journey home invariably seemed shorter than the journey abroad. It felt only a matter of hours before the Polaris crossed the Tropic, although Sophia knew days had passed. Very little fanfare had accompanied the occasion: a bit of singing among the sailors, a collection of shillings in a tarred cap, to which she contributed from her dwindling purse.

Perhaps the subdued celebration could be credited to the scarcity of passengers aboard the frigate. She was accompanied only by the ship’s supercargo, and the widow and two grown sons of an Antiguan planter. However, Sophia thought it more likely that the character of the captain, the perpetually dour Captain Herring, was to blame. As herrings went, he seemed to be of the kippered variety.

No, the Polaris was not the Aphrodite, nor even the Kestrel. And for this, perhaps Sophia ought to have been grateful. In an atmosphere of camaraderie and merriment, her melancholy might have drawn notice. But if anyone took note of her remote behavior or persistently moist eyes, it was only to suggest a remedy for cold.

If only there were a cure for heartache.

On fine afternoons like these, she spent long hours staring out over the sea. She had no more paper or canvas; even her little trunk of paint and brushes had been left behind. But it soothed her, blending pigments in her mind to capture the ever-shifting colors of the waves: today, a base of Prussian blue, tinted with cobalt green. The same shade would be reflected in his eyes, if Gray were there with her. She could almost imagine he was. Almost.

Sophia shook her head, dismayed. It would seem she’d finally discovered the limits of her vivid imagination.

Still, whenever a sail appeared on the horizon, a ridiculous hope bloomed in her heart. She peered out over the waves, anxious to glimpse the profile of the ship, the style of its rigging. Any square-rigged ship spurred an irrational acceleration of her pulse. When a closer view—or the ship’s disappearance over the curve of the earth—proved it was not the Aphrodite, she would chide herself for her foolish tears.

He knows the truth now, she told herself. He understands everything.And he has let you go.

When a sail appeared this afternoon, her ordeal was mercifully brief. The ship sighted at their stern quickly revealed itself to be a schooner, its large, triangular sails jutting up from the sea like a row of shark’s teeth. As the ship drew closer, unease spread through the crew like a contagion.

“Don’t like it,” the first mate said. “The way she’s bearing down on us, as if she were in pursuit. If they want to speak, why don’t they fire a signal?”

“What colors is she flying?” the captain asked. “That’s a Baltimore-built ship, to be sure. Could be privateers, though, sailing under a Venezuelan flag.”

“Not flying any colors that I can see,” the officer reported, squinting into his spyglass. “She’s heavily armed, riding high on the waves. Can’t be much cargo to speak of in that hold.”

“Pirates.” The captain let out a string of oaths. Not particularly imaginative ones, but uttered with conviction nonetheless. Sophia drifted toward the stern, drawn by the sight of the jagged sails slicing toward them.

“She has the advantage of the wind, Captain. Gaining fast. Still no colors, but I can almost make out the name of the craft. Hold there … she’s tacking to the wind. Ah.” He lowered the spyglass. “Named the Sophia.”

Her heart gave a queer flip. No. It couldn’t be. Surely it was merely oneof life’s cruel coincidences.

“Shall I send up the alarm, Captain? Ready the cannon?”

“No!” Sophia cried.

The captain and officer turned on their heels to face her.

“I … I believe I may know this ship, sir.” She looked to the first mate.

“Might I borrow your spyglass?”

She took it from his hand without waiting for permission, then fitted it to her eye and looked sharp toward the horizon. There it was, the schooner. Through the narrow lens, she stared down the ship’s prow. Scanning the sails, the rigging, the deck. The jib blocked her view, drat it. There, they tacked the sails and the ship pivoted slightly. She could almost make out the figure of a man on the quarterdeck.

Beside her, the first mate shifted his weight. “Beg pardon, miss, but—”

“Levi!” A towering figure came into focus. It had to be Levi, so impossibly large. She directed the spyglass up to the rigging, searching … searching… Quinn. There was no doubt in her mind. The man had hams where his fists should be.

A shot boomed across the waters, and Sophia jumped. “No,” she cried.

“You mustn’t fire! They’re not pirates.” She swiveled to face the first mate.