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He gazed into his mug, and all he saw was themoment when she’d pressed up against him and he’d nearly lost his damned mind with longing.
“Something happened. I can tell.” Griff sipped his beer. “You’ve a guilty, tortured look on your face.”
Ford swallowed half his ale in one long swig.
“Out with it,” said Griff.
“We kissed.”
“Oh ho! Gave her a good tongue lashing, did you, lad?”
“She kissed me first. I know.” He hung his head. “That’s no excuse. She’s the duke’s sister. I have to talk to him about the embezzlement on his estate—I don’t want my father being blamed for timber going missing or profits disappearing. The last thing I need is for the duke to catch drift of me kissing his pampered sister. I’m an idiot.”
“A blithering bilge-drinking lug-headed idiot. Next you’ll be falling in love with the lass. Ahoy, Peg! Bring my friend another one to set his head on straight.”
The buxom barmaid poured another for Ford, giving him a flirtatious smile along with the ale.
“I’m not falling in love with her.” Ford pounded the ale and slammed his glass on the bar top. “Love is a choice, not an uncontrollable slide. There’s no falling happening here. I’m standing firm and heading back out to sea.”
“Sure you are.”
Ford gave him a sidelong glance. “My parents talk about love that way.” He stared at the scarred wood of the bar. “‘We tumbled madly in love at first sight. My eyes met hers and I knew she was the one.’”
“Now isn’t that sweet? My parents hated each other, far as I could tell.”
“If my father had made a different choice, he would have continued as a respected builder in London, made a decent living, married a woman of his own class. My mother would have married well, someone of her higher station in life. Perhaps she wouldn’t have loved the man, but she would have had all the comforts and luxuries she was entitled to from birth.”
“Ah... but opposites attract, Ford my boy.” Griff wiped his beard with his sleeve. “Tale as old as time. You’re a workingman and she’s a highborn lady. She swans around Mayfair, you sleep in a hammock on a ship. It’s the forbidden fruit we want to pluck the most.”
“Love is out of the question. Do you hear me? It’s not going to happen. It can’t happen. I won’t let it.”
His friend smirked. “Keep telling yourself that, mate, if it makes you feel more in control. Keep deluding yourself.”
Ford didn’t have the heart to voice any more denials, but he couldn’t admit that there was even a sliver of truth in Griff’s words. “She’s at the opera tonight with some foppish Earl of Maypole.”
“Maypole?” Griff snorted. “Sounds like a right tosser.”
“No, it was Mayhew.”
Griff’s hand closed around Ford’s forearm. “Mayhew. You certain that’s the name?”
“That’s the one—why, do you know him?”
“I do.” He spat on the floor. “And he’s not the sort you want near her if you care about her at all.”
“Why?”
“’ere, Peg. Tell my friend about the Earl of Mayhew.”
Peg approached, a look of contempt on her face. “Mayhew, that scum sucker. If he ever comes in here again, I ’ave ten good men will give him a thrashing he won’t soon forget.”
“What did he do?” Ford asked.
“Left my sister for dead, that’s what he did. Threw her out like she was so much refuse. Him and his wealthy friends come to the public houses looking for sport. About a month ago, he took a liking to my sister. Nelly was a good girl, all sunshine and birdsong, she was. Until Mayhew forced himself on her. He set her up in a house, after that, promised to keep her, then threw her into the gutter.” Peg wiped her nose with her sleeve. “Poor broken bird. She’s gone back to Sussex, back to the farm.”
“I’m sorry,” said Ford. “He deserves more than a thrashing.”
“His kind take what they want and never suffer the consequences,” Griff said.
