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She half opened her eyes. ‘My legs are near run off. The captain keeps me at his side while he sleeps, and when he stops dozing, he sends me to sleep. When I begin to dream, he calls for me again. He’s unkind.’
Warrington shook his head. ‘No. He’s not. Gid’s keeping Ben’s mind in a fog so the pain will not get to him. The medicine has addled him a bit, and the injury, and he’s used to a life with men around him.’
‘And bad women.’
‘He’s not called Saint Benjamin, but Captain Benjamin.’ Warrington braced himself again against the empty bunk, still devoid of any mattress. ‘He’s keeping you from me.’
Warrington rocked back with the movement of the ship, and sat, tugging his boots from his feet, taking stockings with the footwear. He slipped his scuffed boots under the bottom railing. He wished for a bed. A real bed. With bed coverings and pillows that didn’t smell as if a horse had used them first.
‘I know.’ Melina shut her eyes as she spoke. ‘Neither of you wish me to sleep.’
Warrington knelt, taking her face in his hands, and her eyes quickly opened. ‘I hope for you to savour being awake with me.’ He saw the tightness of her lips. ‘This time will be better. I’ll show you what it can truly be like between a man and a woman who—’
He stopped. How would he know what it was like to be with someone who loved him? After Jacob was born, Cass had once taunted him by calling him by someone else’s name when he bedded her.
But he hadn’t given up on Cassandra—at least not then. She glowed at soirées, entertained society with the charm of royalty. Everyone wanted to be within the beam of Cassandra’s smile. When she desired, she would sit and converse with him in such a way he could feel the love in his heart and believe so easily she loved him.
Then one day, during the flash of her smile, he caught the smugness behind in her face and he knew that the sweeter she talked, the deeper her machinations were. And he looked pleasantly back at her and continued laughing with her while his world crashed.
She was Jacob’s mother. The woman he truly loved. And she was flawed. No matter that she had no true love in her, she went through the motions on occasion. She did want the appearance of perfection. And without a doubt, she wanted to be a countess and enjoy the luxuries he could provide. He’d purchased a wife, just as he’d acquired the carriage she rode in. Only he’d not realised it at first.
He looked at Melina. ‘It’s all for pleasure.’ He took her hand, but the memory of holding Cass’s fingers when he asked her to marry him flashed in his mind and his vision blackened. He couldn’t keep thinking of Cass.
He pulled his hand back and undid his shirt and slipped it over his head. Then he gazed at Melina. She looked so different than Cassandra. The darkness fled his thoughts and he cradled Melina in his arms. He could not sense artifice in her. She didn’t use her body to turn his desire against him and to her own advantage. She felt pure.
‘Melina.’ He bent, pulling her so her head tilted back and he could let his lips and face take in the soft skin of her neck and nuzzle the warmth of her. He kissed her pulse. ‘You remind me that there’s a harbour, dry land and real floors. And I want to see you lying in the middle of my bed, waiting for me.’
‘You should not think of such things. I have to be on my way once we reach land,’ she said. ‘I will see to the stone’s sale and return to my sisters.’
He reminded himself to take care. In all of his life he’d never bought a woman’s body, until Melina. And she’d not been willing to settle for one of the men from the island. Captain, she’d said. You’re not the captain? Now she knew he was an earl. As always, he was the highest bidder. Only because of the small size of the island had she kept her innocence. If she’d lived in London, she would have realised the real treasure she had was in her face and her body.
‘It won’t be easy to remove a stone from the island if this man you dislike controls the land,’ he said. ‘He will be angry at you because you left.’
‘Stephanos does not own the land of the stone. Yorgos does. Yorgos said the stone was only rocks to him and that I have sand in my head if I think it is worth coin. He will help me slip it by Stephanos, or convince Stephanos to let it go. I am near the same age as his children and he calls me kori, daughter. The museum will have to pay the Turks because they will hear of her leaving and have to be given money. It is better to be done while she is still seen as rocks.’
