Perhaps his plan needed refinement.
Chapter 8
Harriet awoke with a start, disoriented. The last thing she remembered was trying to understand longitudinal shifts the farther one ventured from the equator, seated at the table. Now she was stretched out in an unfamiliar bed.
She squinted. Familiar cabin, though. Just the scent was unfamiliar.
On second thought, she knew this scent … sandalwood soap, underlain with just a hint of salty hemp, masculine sweat, and something indefinable.
Sheffield.
She twisted to see behind her, but she was alone in the bunk. Alone in the cabin.
The hammock was hanging from a different hook, though.
He must have risen from his nap and gone topside for the midnight fix of their position, then come back down and slept in the hammock.
How did she get from sitting at the table to lying in the bunk? She racked her brain but only remembered putting her head down on her crossed forearms on the table, since Sheffield was softly snoring in the bunk when she grew too fatigued to prop her eyelids open. Or perhaps it was just that instruction on navigation was a fabulous cure for insomnia.
Sometime during the night, Sheffield must have lifted her, carried her to bed.
And she slept through it? She covered her face with her palms.
BOOM!
Harriet fell out of the bunk.
She jumped to her feet, then climbed up on the bunk to look out the window. Why was the ship’s cannon firing? Were pirates attacking? She craned her neck this way and that but saw no ship, no sails on the horizon. Her field of vision was limited, even after she stuck her head through the small opening. The gentle breeze felt good with just a hint of autumn nip, brushing away any last vestiges of sleep, the sun warm on her cheeks—a summer-like day, a gift after the storm before the dreary winter settled in.
BOOM!
She cracked her head on the upper window frame. Rubbing the back of her sore head, she jumped down, headed for the door, and stubbed her toe on a chair leg.
Bare toe. Her feet were bare. Sheffield had taken her shoes from her feet when he put her to bed last night? Of course he had.
Like viewing a diorama through a filmy curtain, images from a barely remembered dream flooded her senses. Strong arms about her, a warm chest and steady heartbeat beneath her cheek. Callused hands stroking her ankles, one after the other, exposing her toes to the cool air as her shoes were slipped off. The soft, warm weight of a blanket settling over her like a caress. A ghost of a touch to her cheek.
Not a dream.
She fell onto the chair, her every heartbeat almost as loud as the cannon blasts.
She glanced down and assured herself with shaking hands that she was still fully clothed. Even the strings on her shirt were snugly tied.
Surely a man bent on seduction would have taken advantage of the situation? Taken some liberty? Sheffield had put her to bed like … like …
Like a brother putting a sibling to bed. He had five sisters, after all.
She felt relieved. And yet strangely disappointed.
But then, what about last night, when he had played with the string tie on her shirt? It was almost obscene the way his thumb and fingers had held the soft cotton, like a lover’s caress, the back of his hand nearly brushing her breast. His words had seemed so innocent, yet he had stared at her with such intensity she could almost feel it as a touch, his eyes dark, the blue irises almost obscured by black pupils.
BOOM!
She shoved her feet into her shoes and bolted for the door, then up the ladder until she peeked out of the hatch.
No cannonballs were flying. Jonesy paced on the lee side of the quarterdeck. “Again! Faster! They’d have shot our mainmast to kindling by now!”
“Again, aye!”
