Surrender of a Siren (The Wanton Dairymaid Trilogy #2)

“I’ve one last piece of business, then. Stay here.”


With that imperious command, he crossed the tavern. Bains sat at a table, hunkered over a fresh tankard of ale. Gray clapped a hand on his shoulder and leaned over to speak in his unwashed ear. A few more stern words, a few coins, and there was one more quandary resolved to his profit.

“Now then, Miss Turner. We can be on our way.” Grasping her firmly by the elbow, he whisked her out the tavern door.

“You gave him money?” Struggling under his grip, she twisted to look back toward Bains. “After what he did to me, what you did to him … You paid him?”

Ignoring her question, he caught the porter’s eye. “The lady’s belongings,” he commanded briskly.

The porter wrapped beefy forearms around the larger of her two trunks.

Gray reached for the smaller one, hefting it onto his shoulder and holding it balanced there with one hand. He took three paces before he realized she wasn’t following.

He paused long enough to toss a comment over his shoulder. “Come along, then. I’ll take you out to the Aphrodite. You’ll be wanting to meet the captain.”

CHAPTER TWO

The captain?

Sophia stood staring numbly after him. Had he just said he’d introduce her to the captain? If someone else was the captain, then who on earth was this man?

One thing was clear. Whoever he was, he had her trunks.

And he was walking away.

Cursing under her breath, Sophia picked up her skirts and trotted after him, dodging boatmen and barrels and coils of tarred rope as she pursued him down the quay. A forest of tall masts loomed overhead, striping the dock with shadow.

Breathless, she regained his side just as he neared the dock’s edge. “But… aren’t you Captain Grayson?”

“I,” he said, pitching her smaller trunk into a waiting rowboat, “am Mr. Grayson, owner of the Aphrodite and principal investor in her cargo.”

The owner. Well, that was some relief. The tavern-keeper must have been confused.

The porter deposited her larger trunk alongside the first, and Mr. Grayson dismissed him with a word and a coin. He plunked one polished Hessian on the rowboat’s seat and shifted his weight to it, straddling the gap between boat and dock. Hand outstretched, he beckoned her with an impatient twitch of his fingers. “Miss Turner?”

Sophia inched closer to the dock’s edge and reached one gloved hand toward his, considering how best to board the bobbing craft without losing her dignity overboard.

The moment her fingers grazed his palm, his grip tightened over her hand. He pulled swiftly, wrenching her feet from the dock and a gasp from her throat. A moment of weightlessness—and then she was aboard. Somehow his arm had whipped around her waist, binding her to his solid chest. He released her just as quickly, but a lilt of the rowboat pitched Sophia back into his arms.

“Steady there,” he murmured through a small smile. “I have you.”

A sudden gust of wind absconded with his hat. He took no notice, but Sophia did. She noticed everything. Never in her life had she felt so acutely aware. Her nerves were drawn taut as harp strings, and her senses hummed.

The man radiated heat. From exertion, most likely. Or perhaps from a sheer surplus of simmering male vigor. The air around them was cold, but he was hot. And as he held her tight against his chest, Sophia felt that delicious, enticing heat burn through every layer of her clothing—cloak, gown, stays, chemise, petticoat, stockings, drawers—igniting desire in her belly.

And sparking a flare of alarm. This was a precarious position indeed. The further her torso melted into his, the more certainly he would detect her secret: the cold, hard bundle of notes and coin lashed beneath her stays. She pushed away from him, dropping onto the seat and crossing her arms over her chest. Behind him, the breeze dropped his hat into a foamy eddy. He still hadn’t noticed its loss.

What he noticed was her gesture of modesty, and he gave her a patronizing smile. “Don’t concern yourself, Miss Turner. You’ve nothing in there I haven’t seen before.”

Just for that, she would not tell him. Farewell, hat.

To a point, he was correct. She likely had nothing in there he had not seen before. He’d certainly seen a sovereign in his life, and a banknote or two. He may have even seen almost six hundred pounds’ worth of them, all lined up in a tidy row. But he likely hadn’t seen them in the possession of a governess, because no woman with that sort of money would ever seek employment.

That scuffle with Bains in the tavern had only underscored her peril. She needed to focus on the tasks at hand. Escaping England and marriage. Guarding her secrets and her purse. Surviving until her twenty-first birthday, when she could return to claim the remainder of her trust. And in aid of it all, keeping men out of her stays.