Cullen changed the subject to try to keep the image of his wife’s lips closing around the bit of raisin bun they’d shared, and the look of pleasure in her eyes when she’d swallowed the warm pastry. “How soon will your ship and the lads be ready to return to the squadron?”
Arnaud’s teasing grin disappeared. “We’ve finally coaxed most of our old crew back, and added some new recruits. Capt. Neville and Lt. Bourne have been scouring the coastal villages for marines.” He stopped for a moment and stared out over the forest of masts in the harbor. “They say the good Baltic wood is cured enough to raise the mainmast next week. We’ll be leaving soon.”
“What does the Admiralty say?”
“They say, ‘Good riddance.’ Time for us to get back to the squadron. Too many slavers slipping out of the estuaries, and not enough of our ships to intercept them.”
“When you were last in London, did you hear anything about some passengers we’re awaiting?” The look on Arnaud’s face was not what Cullen wanted to see. His old captain knew something, and it wasn’t good.
Arnaud continued to stare down at the harbor for long minutes as if waiting for some sort of sign or arrival before turning back suddenly toward him. “I don’t know what their mission is, or their final destination, but one of them is Ariadne. She’s one of theArethusapassengers bound for Gibraltar.”
Christ. Ariadne.First, he’d been ripped from his squadron, then forced into marrying an unwilling woman. Now he’d have to face an old lover turned enemy in close quarters in the midst of trying to court his own wife. And Ariadne would not make it easy. No. He’d have to tell Willa as soon as possible. And he’d have to tell her everything. A nasty blow was headed their way.
Madame Ariadne de Santis arrived aboard theArethusain a great flurry of boxes and chests…and a great deal of bowing and scraping by the men and officers of the ship, including Captain Still. Willa knew this, because she witnessed the mounds of luggage, officers, and sailors surrounding the woman when she hurried topside after hearing the incessant thumps overhead.
Clouds of a heavy, expensive scent of lilies heralded a woman full of self-importance, and mystery. Willa’s husband, the ship’s surgeon, was suspiciously absent from the gawking throngs. He’d tried to explain Madame de Santis the night before during their nightly talk in the dark across the thick blanket hanging between them.
Cullen had shared a past with this woman, he’d said. He’d even had the audacity to warn Willa not to be offended by the other woman’s possible lies or unwarranted piques of jealousy. His final warning, however, had seemed odd in the extreme. He’d made Willa promise never to be alone with the woman.
From Madame de Santis’s delicate silk slippers to the strands of pearls tucked within her high-piled curls, the new passenger reminded Willa of an exotic fish out of its element. Once, off the coast of Spain, a sailor on theArethusahad caught a huge, rainbow-scaled specimen that had flopped mightily and snapped razor-like teeth. One of the carpenter’s mates had clubbed it to death before the Poppy’s mates had made fast work of cleaning and filleting the monster.
However innocent the woman’s presence on the ship might be, Willa suspected there was much more to the story of her past with Dr. MacCloud than he’d revealed. She told herself she didn’t really care. Some things simply had to spool out, regardless of consequences, like a play at Covent Garden.
She sensed, rather than felt, Cullen behind her, close behind. His breath warmed her skin beneath the soft tendrils of hair at her neck that had escaped from the tight bun she’d twisted in with pins that morning. Willa ignored the shiver down her spine, smoothed her plain gray muslin work dress and moved briskly toward the main mast for morning call of ailments amongst the crew.
She assumed Cullen would follow, but then heard Captain Still call out. “Dr. MacCloud, Mrs. MacCloud—please come meet our passengers.” The man stumbled over her title, clearly still adjusting to her new identity aboard theArethusa.
Willa longed for the years when she’d answered to just plain “Wills.”
Cullen turned toward the new passengers, dread welling up in his throat like a leaden ball of hard tack. Four years had not changed Ariadne. She was the same iron-willed termagant who’d left him for dead after shooting him in Algiers. He could see past the artfully rouged cheeks and the pouty soft lips to the black-hearted bitch he knew her to be.
He sucked in a tight breath and moved toward them, steeling himself for whatever might come.
“Mrs. MacCloud?” Ariadne turned her face toward him, for once a hint of shock in her deep violet eyes. “Why did I not know you’d become leg-shackled, Cullen?”
Willa, who had glided up behind him in silence, answered in his stead. “We did not have time to publish notices,” she interjected smoothly. “Dr. MacCloud insisted we marry before theArethusasails for St. Helena.”
Ariadne seemed momentarily nonplussed that Willa had dared speak to her. Her head snapped toward the source. “Have we been introduced?”
Cullen felt as though his tongue had deserted him. He knew he had to speak, but the words stuck like claws in his throat.
The tall, dark-haired man next to Ariadne came to his rescue. “I amMonsieurHenri Duvall, and this isMadameAriadne de Santis. The captain told us you assist your husband in the surgery, but he did not warn me of your great beauty. Mrs. MacCloud, I would be grateful if you could, ah, prescribe some sort of balm for themal de mer.” He bowed slightly and made as though to take her hand.
Willa jerked back out of his reach. “I formed a new supply of ginger powder pills last week. Come to the surgery later today, and I’ll put together a few in a paper.” Willa brushed back a curl nudged loose by the freshening breeze on deck and favored the damned frog with one of her rare, faint smiles.
Cullen shoved past Ariadne to stand between his wife and the newcomer. “I must warn you,Monsieur. Ginger pills don’t always work. You might be better served by staying above deck…and keeping a bucket handy.”
He turned to his wife, deliberately giving the man the cut direct. The sharp intake of breath from Ariadne was telling. She was not accustomed to being ignored.
With a gentle hand against the small of Willa’s back, he urged her toward the main mast where a line of men already waited. The combination of the men’s boredom and access to harbor front amusements while in port always took its toll.
Willa gave him a look over her shoulder and teased in a low voice. “Are you jealous?”
“Mrs. MacCloud, ye’ve not yet seen me jealous. If I were jealous, I would have planted a facer on that glib Frenchie.”
“But he didn’t even touch me.” Her mouth opened in a small ‘O’ that Cullen yearned to trace with his finger.
“If he had, he’d be dead, and I’d be in gaol.”
