Page 21 of Dangerous

“That does not shock you?”

“You will not find me easily shocked, my lady.”

Mia didn’t tell him she viewed such a statement as a personal challenge. She would save that for later. “Part of the story I told you was true. The ship was harried by corsairs, but they captured our vessel not far from Gibraltar.”

“You were on the Persephone?”

Mia blinked. “How—”

“Such things are reported in the papers, my lady. I don’t recall there being a passenger roster, but I do remember reading about it at the time. Please continue.”

The fine hairs on her neck prickled; this man made it his business to know things. She swallowed her concern. Luckily for her, she’d made it hers to hide things.

“There were only a handful of English passengers aboard the ship, among them Hugh Redvers, Baron Ramsay—the same man who would eventually become the privateer One-Eyed Standish.”

“Ah.” Exley’s chilly features thawed a little. “So that is your connection to him. I knew he was the one who brought you back to England. You have known Ramsay for many years, then.”

“I wouldn’t say I knew him. We were together for only a few days on the ship, until the corsairs docked at Oran to sell their captives.” Mia realized her jaw had clenched and moved it from side to side. She would have believed this story was too old for her to feel such tension. Apparently, she had been wrong. “The corsairs raped and then decapitated my nurse the day they took the ship.”

His body tensed beside her at the brutal words and she looked up. Their eyes locked, but he did not rush to offer pointless words of condolence.

“The corsairs never touched me. It did not fit with their plan, which was to give me to the sultan.”

His brow furrowed. “But you are a duke’s daughter. Why not ransom you? Surely they could have done so?”

“Ramsay argued the same thing with them, over and over, until they tied him to the mast and whipped him bloody.” She could still see the big man if she closed her eyes. His broad back naked and streaming blood as an even bigger man delivered the twenty strokes the corsair captain, Faisal Barbarossa, had decreed.

“One whipping was not enough to stop Ramsay. He fought them again when we reached Oran, when the men put me into the carriage that would take me to the sultan. The last I saw of him—until I returned to England—he was being kicked and beaten by a dozen men.”

Mia stared at the seams on her mint-green kid gloves but saw something else entirely. “I never forgot the big Englishman who took such risks on my behalf. I didn’t learn that Ramsay survived the horrible beating until much later, when I heard of his escape from the sultan’s prison.”

Mia remembered the day clearly. Babba Hassan’s fury at the escape had resulted in widespread beheadings. The sultan had been livid enough to offer a reward of gold equal to the weight of Ramsay’s head.

“So, Ramsay escaped many years ago but only returned to England recently.” There was more than a little curiosity in his cool voice.

“Yes, that is correct. I have no idea why Ramsay didn’t return to England until now.” She shrugged. “In any case, he and a dozen other slaves seized control of the very same ship that had captured us a few years earlier. He beheaded Faisal Barbarossa, rechristened the ship, and became One-Eyed Standish, the most feared British privateer in the Mediterranean. Even tucked away in the harem we heard of his exploits.” She shook her head. “But my story has run ahead of itself. You asked why I was not ransomed?”

He nodded.

“The corsairs knew of the sultan’s insatiable hunger for young girls.”

The grooves that bracketed the marquess’s mouth deepened and his hands tightened on the reins.

“They guessed he would find my red hair and green eyes an irresistible novelty. Some things were more valuable to them than money, and pleasing the sultan was one of them.” She looked at the man who would soon be her husband. “The sultan was my only lover, my lord. I have never lain with another.”

“There were no children from this union?” The words were clipped and his expression had become dogged. Was he regretting his desire for openness?

“There was a child—a son.” Mia gritted her teeth and told the most difficult lie she’d yet spoken. “He died.” She did not need to fake the pain that seized her as she ended her son’s life, even if it was only in the mind of the man beside her.

Exley cut her a brief glance but said nothing.

“The sultan fathered no children during the last ten years of his life. He was unwell much of that time and could not participate in the act of conception without considerable effort.” She was amused to see Exley’s pale skin tint across the bridge of his fine nose.

Ah, even a jaded aristocrat could blush at such plain speaking.

“In any event, he showed little interest in taking me to his bed once I was beyond a certain age. He had many wives who were younger.”

“What caused you to leave Oran?” he asked tightly.