Page 104 of Go, Rogue

Chapter

41

The storm still pounds against the roof when McGann opens his eyes again the next morning. He lies there for hours, feeling the solid weight of Catherine next to him.

“Good morning,” he finally whispers to her. This is how he wants to wake every day for the rest of his life, with her curled up in his arms.

“Good morning,” she says, burrowing down into him. “It’s still raining.” Her voice is muffled from where she presses her face into his chest.

“Aye.”

“Good.”

“I’ve been thinking, Menace.” He has been. He’s lain awake half the morning thinking.

“About tea and toast?” she asks. “That’s what I’m thinking of.”

“That too.” His stomach rumbles, as if on cue. “But mostly of seaman’s cards. Do you know what those are, lass?”

“No.” She raises her head so she can look him in the face. “Tell me.”

“It’s a card a ship’s captain provides to the crew. It’s backed by the government, by the queen herself. It has a sailor’s name, date of birth, description—everything.”

“Alright,” she says, and he knows she doesn’t understand yet what he means.

“Whoever holds that card is a British sailor. And a British sailor, by law, is a free man. A free man protected by the British government no less. No matter where he came from.”

His mind whirls with the possibilities. He never thought he’d see the day when he’d be grateful for anything from the British government—but here it is. He can make something good come of this shite. Something that fits who he is: Scottish and Jamaican. Both, not half.

“I see,” she says, as understanding lights her face. “And if such a sailor were a Black man, even one liberated from the Southern States in America, he would still be protected by the British government?”

“They’d want to fight it, of course, but yes. As a duke…” He shakes his head, still not quite believing it. “There’d be nothing they could do against a duke, would there?”

“No,” she says, and they listen quietly for a moment while the rain finally begins to taper off and the weak rays of the sun begin to break through the clouds. “I don’t suppose there would be. If you were a duke…”

She stops and corrects herself. “As the duke, you could have a whole fleet of ships crewed by formerly enslaved men, and the government would go to the ends of the Earth to support what you wanted.”

She lays her head against his chest for a moment before she adds, “You could do a world of good, Andrew.” She grins. “Or at least a far sight better than burning down an East Indiaman ship.”

“I could,” he says, and he feels his heart swell. “Imagine it, Menace. Imagine what we could do.”

She buries her head into his chest again. “I can see it,” she says, her voice muffled against his skin once more. And then, “You’ll have a place on your ships for women too, won’t you? You won’t forget them?”

“Nay, lass. I don’t think you would let me.”

She lifts her head and smiles at him. But it’s the wrong one—he can see it is. The one with sadness at its edges and no mirth in her eyes.

“Menace?” he says. “What’s wrong?”

“I think the rain has stopped.” She disentangles their limbs and rises from the little bed of grass to listen. It has; the storm has worn itself out. “I ought to be back before they’re worried sick over me. Although,” she adds, “I did tell Elizabeth where I was headed last night.”

“Should you have done that?” he asks, but she only laughs.

“It’s a little late to begin thinking of my reputation now. There’s nothing left of it to bother over.”

She bends and places a kiss on his forehead, then dresses herself quickly while he watches. The morning feels wrong, but he doesn’t know how to fix it because he doesn’t know where it’s gone pear-shaped.

He’d always thought he was beneath her as an illegitimate sailor, but as a duke—bloody hell—he’d thought he could have her now. But watching her scurry away this morning, he thinks he was wrong about that.