My Lord Beaumont Read online

  As the moment of shocked surprise passed, however, she quickly covered herself, scowling at him defensively to hide her confusion and the dreadful sense of vulnerability she felt. If he thought her so repulsive, she thought indignantly, why was he staring at her like that? Was it because he thought she was so distasteful that he stared at her?

  On the other hand, he might think it was presumptuous of her to help herself to his fancy towel. She would've dropped it like a thief at that thought, but she bloody well wasn't going to stand before him bare arsed just so the sod could study her like some kind of freak. "I didn't have anything else to use," she said defensively, and his gaze traveled up her length and paused for several moments as he studied her face.

  There was a promise of budding beauty in her elfin features, he decided with a start of unwelcome surprise. And an equal budding allure in her slender curves that he surmised would take no more than adequate food to fulfill. He frowned, not at all pleased with the turn of his thoughts or the prick of interest that had suffused him as he surveyed her lithe form.

  It wasn't that he regretted the impulse that had prompted him to take her under his protection . . . precisely. It now occurred to him forcefully, however, that he'd placed himself in a very awkward position in doing so. He doubted that the charming bride who awaited him in Charles Town would be any too happy when he arrived with her in tow.

  He rose without replying and moved to the large chest at the foot of the narrow bunk that protruded from the bulkhead. Lifting the lid, he rummaged through it for several moments, extracted a plain white shirt, and tossed it to her. Without thinking, Danielle dropped the towel and caught it. Blushing profusely, she quickly snatched it about her shoulders, but Adrian had turned away from her after only a fleeting glance and moved back towards the desk where he resumed his perusal of the papers of indenture with apparent absorption.

  After glancing at him curiously for several moments, trying to decide whether she was relieved or insulted by his complete indifference to her femininity, she finally decided that she was relieved. With a slight shrug, she turned and glanced around the cabin for a place to sit since the earlier chase and the lack of substantial food for quite some time had combined to make her feel rather rubbery legged.

  She had a dim suspicion that it wasn't at all the thing for a servant to sit in their master's presence for all that. And she was reasonably certain that he would object to her making herself at home in his personal chair. Nor did she care for the idea of sitting on his bunk, even if he didn't object. But finally she decided, with a touch of rebellion, that she would sit, whether he approved or not, and stalked to the far side of the cabin, taking a seat on the floor with her back to the bulkhead as she fastened the shirt and began to roll up the sleeves that fell past her fingertips. That done, she raked her fingers through her hair to remove what tangles she could and finally settled back to watch the man who sat with his back to her, drawing her knees up beneath the shirt and propping her chin on them.

  "Danny."

  Her head jerked up, and she surged guiltily to her feet, although she glared at the back of his dark head for his peremptory command. "Bleedin' sod. Expects me to be at his beck an' call like a bleedin' lackey," she muttered under her breath.

  He swiveled around in his chair, one dark brow raised in hauteur. "You spoke?" he asked coolly.

  She blushed then paled, glancing warily from him to the tub of water, and finally shook her head, chewing at her lower lip.

  He gestured with the quill pen he held in his hand for her to approach. She did so with lagging steps and an uncomfortable feeling of foreboding. "You'll need to put your mark on here also. Come. I'll show you where."

  "You mean to keep me then?" she asked in surprise.

  Chapter Four

  "For the time being at any rate . . . ."

  The words still seemed to echo in her ears . . . . the time being. "Nodcock!" she spat at the rolling breakers, glaring down at them as if they offended. They didn't. The truth of the matter was that the gray swells that reflected the ashen heavens above so exactly suited her mood she found a precarious peace in studying them. There was little peace in contemplating her thoughts.

  "How could you be such a nodcock?" she asked her bobbing reflection in the silvery waters below. The answer eluded her still, though she'd pondered it at length and berated herself roundly about it over and over since that first day when she'd behaved like a complete lackwit.

  The lord alone knew what she'd given away. But she didn't doubt that it was more even than she was aware of, and that was bad enough in itself.

  So she'd been slightly disappointed at his answer. It wasn't as if she really cared that the bleedin' sod didn't want her, after all. Because she didn't. She really didn't. She'd gotten along just fine by herself. She didn't need anyone. And she didn't want anyone making her business theirs.

  It wasn't that that was bothering her about the incident anyway. It was the fact that she had spilled her guts when she wasn't in the habit of trusting anyone. Told him everything. Even things she'd never told Jimmy. Though of course Jimmy had known all about old Thornsby. After all, it had been him that had suggested it wouldn't be none too healthy to stick around the foundling home after the attack. If she'd killed the old buzzard when she bashed him . . . . And if she hadn't . . . . Well, he'd made one attempt on her. It wasn't very likely he'd be put off by the fact that she wasn't happy with the idea.

  But when it came right down to it, she thought the thing that was really eating at her was the fact that she'd tried to impress the man when a complete ninny would've known it couldn't be done. Not with a man like Lord Beaumont. It had been just plain stupid to try to show off the fine education the vicar had given her. As if he would be overwhelmed with admiration. Even if she could've written her name on that piece of paper with as fine a hand as any princess, which she hadn't. And how humiliating it was to recall the shameful mess she'd made of it when compared to his neat scrawl!

  "Is this a private conversation, petite?"

  Danny felt her face heat. She hadn't realized she was muttering aloud. But then she'd thought she had this particular spot on the deck to herself. She barely threw the little french maid a glance. Caution aside, she wanted nothing to do with the Widow Johnson or her maid. "Bugger off," she snapped ungraciously.

  "You are very rude," Yvette observed petulantly, planting her dimpled arms firmly on the taffrail beside Danielle with the air of one who has settled for a spell.

  "Well, it don't seem to discourage you none," Danny shot back, giving her a disgruntled look before pointedly ignoring her.

  Yvette chuckled. "Non. I've grown quite accustomed. Madame is very rude as well."

  Danny sent her a slightly more interested glance that time, admitting to herself that she had just a tad of curiosity about the other party aboard. Not much, but a little. After all, it was always best to know the enemy. And she had a real strong feeling that she and the Widow Johnson weren't going to be bosom buddies. "You indentured too?" she asked with a touch of sympathy.

  Yvette gave her a puzzled stare, but then a look of comprehension crossed her face, followed almost immediately by pity. Danny didn't care much for the pity. She was tempted to knock the silly widget on her arse. "Non . . . ."

  She had Danny's full attention at that. "Then why do you stay with the old sow?" she demanded, outraged at the maid's apparent stupidity.

  Yvette burst out laughing. It took her several moments to regain control of her merriment, during which time Danny wrestled once more with an urge to knock her silly. She was beginning to think the maid the silliest creature she'd ever laid eyes upon. "How can you call Madame sow? She is fine like porcelain doll!" she giggled. "She will tell you so if you care to ask. And as to the other . . . ." Yvette paused and issued a gallic shrug, sobering. "One grows accustomed to eating..."

  "Oh, but you ain't indentured. You could go where you like," Danny argued.

&
nbsp; Again Yvette shrugged. "It isn't as easy, petite, as you seem to think. One must have references. And Madame doesn't wish to let me go. She wouldn't give one. And there seems little point. One is much like another. One accepts life as one finds it, n'est-ce pas?"

  Danny gave her a sour look. "Only if one's such a nodcock as to look for no better!" she snapped and stalked off, leaving the maid to stare after her in indignant surprise.

  "Did you have a pleasant chat with Mrs. Johnson's maid?"

  Danielle straightened from her task of putting Lord Beaumont's trunk in order and turned a startled look upon him. It wasn't his curiosity so much as the gist of the question that surprised her.

  She'd discovered fairly quickly that she was a font of infinite curiosity to Lord Beaumont, for one of her chief functions seemed to be to chase away his boredom.

  On the one hand, she couldn't help but be flattered at his interest. On the other, she frequently had the unpleasant suspicion that he viewed her rather in the light of a performing animal.

  But as familiar as she was becoming with his uncanny omnipotence - for he always seemed to know where she was and what she was doing - it hadn't yet failed to startle her.

  She shrugged.

  Adrian eyed her narrowly for a moment and finally gave up the pretense of reading and laid his book aside. Leaning back in his chair, he stretched his long legs out before him, studying the toe of his boots. Since this also brought into his line of vision Danny's bare feet and ankles, which were only inches from the toe of his boots, and he found the sight both disturbing and distracting, he lifted his eyes to her face almost at once. "I think it unwise to cultivate that particular friendship. Your charade isn't exactly impenetrable."

  Danielle ground her teeth. No one, save Lord Beaumont, ever had penetrated it. Probably because she'd never let anyone else close enough to do so. But she wouldn't have admitted that under torture. "Been doin' it a while. I figure it's safe enough."

  "You're very certain you won't make a misstep," Adrian observed dryly. "Just how long have you managed this masquerade?"

  Again Danielle shrugged, off-handedly, though she was beginning to feel more than a little uneasy at the direction of the conversation. "It wasn't long after I got the curse, so I figure it must be goin' on three years now."

  Adrian glanced at her with a touch of exasperation, his expression pained. "You're nothing if not candid, I must say."

  She cocked her head to one side questioningly.

  "My dear child, surely you must know that it isn't the thing to be discussing such intimate details about your person with a gentleman," he said and, thinking back to an earlier conversation between them, added with a touch of amusement, "nor your virtue either, for that matter."

  She gazed up at him doubtfully. "Well. I ain't exactly used to talkin' to gentlemen. Don't they know about things like that?"

  "Any man," he corrected dryly. "And yes, they know, but that does not mean they discuss it. And certainly not with the opposite sex."

  "Well. You did ask," she said stiffly.

  "Not," he returned with a touch of asperity, "about that."

  "Well, it ain't as if I could sashay up to my boudoir and glance at my calendar," she snapped indignantly to cover her embarrassment. "I have to figure things by things that happen to me. And as for discussin' my virtue, I ain't in the habit of discussin' it, seein' as how there's an awful lot of blokes out there that'd be right cheerful about releavin' me of it, even if I was objectin' up a storm. But you was insultin' me about it!"

  He sighed with a mixture of exasperation and acknowledgement, dropping his forearms across his thighs as he leaned forward, gazing pensively at his hands. "Touche`. As for the other. I suggest you keep your distance from everyone else aboard if you mean to maintain this charade. And I'd very much prefer that you do so. The consequences, for yourself, would be most unpleasant, I assure you, should the crew discover your gender," he said finally.

  Danielle cocked her head to one side, studying him. He'd made a similar observation the day he discovered her gender himself, which was one of the reasons she was still masquerading as a boy. The other being that she agreed with him whole-heartedly. He might not find her particularly appealing, but the other men aboard weren't likely to be nearly as discerning, and she had no desire to fend off a shipload of randy sailors. Now she began to wonder, however, if he had a personal reason for keeping her gender secret. She didn't believe for a moment that he was particularly concerned for her safety. "I expect your intended wouldn't be none too pleased if she got wind of it, huh?"

  Adrian's eyes narrowed, and he sat back, hooking one arm over the back of the chair and propping the other on the chair arm as he studied her. "You seem to be uncommonly well versed with my affairs."

  Try though she might, Danielle couldn't control the blush that suffused her cheeks but forced an off-handed shrug. "A body hears all sorts of things on the streets.” She paused, frowning. "Ain't it true then?" She shook her head in disgust at her gullibility. "I might have known it wasn't. I never figured you for the sort what would let anybody push you where you didn't want to go. I should have known soon as I heard Old Nick Beaumont was fixed to be leg shackled to a female of the old Duke's choice that there wasn't nothin' to it."

  "Oh?" Adrian asked coldly.

  Danielle felt a touch of dismay. "Well, you needn't go all cold an' stiff on me! I told you I didn't believe it none of the time, didn't I?"

  "How is it, I wonder, that you know me so well?" Adrian remarked with more coolness than curiosity, his eyes narrowed with anger.

  Danielle gaped at him, feeling heat flood her cheeks again. "I didn't say as how I knew you!" she snapped indignantly. "I only said as how I'd heard this an' that. Folks do talk, you know. Especially about swells what . . . ," she broke off abruptly. He was awfully touchy about his affairs, she'd already discovered, and why she'd brought it up she couldn't figure.

  "Yes?" he prompted.

  Danielle squirmed uncomfortably but managed a credibly off-handed shrug. "Oh, nothin'."

  His brows rose in mock astonishment. "Nothing? But I was certain you had something to say. Pray continue. You were about to tell me some of the more interesting rumors circulating about 'Nick Beaumont'?"

  "Well, I wasn't!" Danielle retorted indignantly, though she conscientiously inched a little further away. "Only you asked me how I knew you in that haughty way you have about you, an' I told you. That's all."

  Adrian studied her angrily, so furious that for several moments he didn't trust himself to speak. He'd never concerned himself overmuch with discretion, even in the days before his father had purchased his colors. He'd used less, if possible since he'd resigned his commission and returned to civilian life, allowing his restless frustration to lead him from one scrape to another. Until his father, tiring of it, had “suggested” that he could put his energies to better use in the colonies. But it infuriated him to think of himself being discussed, his every move being monitored and snickered about.

  He sat back again, forcing himself to assume a relaxed stance again as he considered it. Try as he might, he simply couldn't envision the common folk waiting with baited breath to see what he would do next. Perhaps Danielle had some particular interest in him?

  He examined the thought, wondering if it had come to him because, perversely, he found himself intrigued by the idea. On the other hand, he'd thought from the first that there was something familiar about Danielle. He just hadn't been able to figure out what and had dismissed it as imagination - until now.

  Now he examined her again, and still the familiarity pricked him - and eluded him. "You seem to have a particular interest in my affairs," he observed finally, slowly. "Did that, by any chance, have to do with your stowing away?"

  Danielle gaped at him for several moments before her brows descended in an indignant frown. "Don't be a nodcock."

  He grasped her forearms and jerked her to him so quickly that sh
e had landed on her knees between his spread thighs before she quite knew what was happening. She gaped up at him in stunned surprise, feeling a start of fear as she quite suddenly recalled that it was Beaumont's 'devilish' temper that had earned him the nickname 'Old Nick Beaumont'.

  "You try my patience, Danny," Adrian said through gritted teeth. "You really do. Answer the question, if you please. And restrain yourself from personal comments if you have a care for your hide. I don't give a damn what your personal opinion of me is, you see, but I do not suffer insults from a living soul."

  Frightened or not, Danielle had no intention of allowing him to intimidate her. She sniffed. "Don't have a very high opinion of yerself, do you?"

  His hands tightened on her arms, and he gave her a little shake. "Danny," he said warningly.

  She hunched a shoulder. "Well, if you think anything I've heard about you 'as give me a burnin' desire to know you better, you're . . . ." She broke off, swallowing hard at the sudden fury in his eyes. "Any how, I didn't stow away. Leastways, not on purpose."

  "It was a curious sort of accident, I gather," he said dryly.

  Danielle glared at him. "I hid in the long boat, right enough. Only I wasn't tryin' to get on board. Didn't want to. I was just tryin' to lay low until they stopped lookin' for me. Only I fell asleep, and I didn't wake up till they was half way across the Thames an' it was too late to get out."

  "Who was looking for you, the watch?" Adrian asked, releasing her arms and sitting back once more to study. He didn't believe her farfetched tale for a moment, though he was curious to know how far she was willing to go to convince him that her presence aboard ship was no more than happenstance.