“Miss Chase, where is your maid?”
Miss Chase shuffled her feet and glanced around the cabin, then looked at him and opened her mouth.
He held up his hand, stopping her before she could speak the lie. “The truth, Miss Chase.”
She took one deep breath, which did interesting things to her décolletage, then another. Nick forced his gaze upward to her eyes.
“She went ashore with one of the bumboats at Gravesend.”
“And forgot to come back?”
Miss Chase pursed her lips. “She went to stay with her sister until I return. She was sick all the way down the river. It would only have become worse when we sailed out on the open water. I didn’t want her to suffer the entire voyage.” She tapped her finger to her bottom lip. “I wish I’d remembered that mal de mer usually gets better after the third day. She might have been able to manage after all.”
An unwed young woman, of respectable lineage, alone on his ship? In his cabin? Nick headed for the door.
“Where are you going?”
“To turn the ship around and dump your unwed arse off with the nearest chaperone.”
“No! You can’t do that!” There was an edge to her voice as she stepped forward, her progress impeded by bumping into the table.
“It’s my ship. I can do anything I damn well please with it.”
“You can’t take me back! What about the treasure? I’m the only one with the map.” She flattened her palms on the table, leaning toward him. “You can’t find the treasure without the map.”
“No treasure is worth the parson’s mousetrap.” Nick had his hand on the door handle. “I’m disappointed, Miss Chase. I didn’t take you for a liar.”
“I am not a liar. I told you I have plans to wed another. I have no interest in you, other than as a means to retrieve the treasure to which we are both entitled.”
Nick tilted his head back and looked at her through narrowed eyes. “Not trying to trap me into wedlock?”
“My, aren’t we puffed up with our own consequence.” Miss Chase sat on the edge of the bunk, her hands primly folded on her lap. “I concede that your title, lineage and form may appeal to some women, but I have other plans. I am only interested in my share of the treasure. Since other parties are also interested in retrieving the treasure, we must make haste. I’ll make do without a maid. There is no time to turn back and get another.”
Now that she’d pointed it out, Nick noticed how wrinkled her gown was, as though she’d been sleeping in it. Silly nonsense, this fashion of women wearing clothes they couldn’t get into and out of on their own. Although there had been many occasions when Nick had happily helped a woman out of her clothes.
Miss Chase coughed.
Nick looked up from her bosom, startled to realize he’d been imagining what Miss Chase looked like out of her dress. Did she know that’s what he’d been thinking?
Never mind. The chit said she had another man in mind for her matrimonial plans. Or at least that’s what she claimed now, when no one knew where she was or in whose company, and that she was alone. With him.
Or did they?
“Let me make this painfully clear, Miss Chase.” He drew himself up to his full height, folding his arms over his chest. Green sailors had been known to wet their drawers when faced with The Sheffield Stare. “I take no responsibility for your reputation. It is entirely in your hands. Should a scandal arise from you traveling alone, I will not be doing the gentlemanly thing. We will not be marrying. Am I clear?”
Her cheeks flushed bright red, but otherwise she seemed unfazed.
Damn. He was going to end up taking the chit all the way to Spain. Unaccompanied.
Harriet fought to keep her body perfectly still, to not betray her pounding heart, or blink before Sheffield’s stare. He expected her to be a milk-and-water miss, afraid of her own shadow, at least where her reputation was concerned.
Normally, she would be.
But her future was at stake here. To turn back now meant a life of certain drudgery, for Sir Percival would never marry her without a dowry. And she had Gabriel and Mama to worry about.
If word got out and there was scandal, would Sir Percival accept her then, even with a dowry?
Probably not.
