Miller knocked on Jess’s cabin door shortly after one o’clock with a request for her to join Alistair on the deck.
Trying to pay no mind to the nervousness brought on by uncertainty, she followed Miller up the companionway stairs and into the open air. Her last discussion with Alistair under moonlight had been fraught with tension. His invitation to visit his cabin had lingered in her mind for hours after they parted. It was not an offer she could act upon, and she believed he knew that, but it hung between them now like a gauntlet thrown at her feet. There was a part of her—the part he incited into mischief—urging her to indulge, but her greater nature overrode such abandon.
What did he wish to say to her? In a relatively short acquaintance, a multitude of searing intimacies had passed between them. She was now completely preoccupied by thoughts of him, in a way she’d never been with anything or anyone else. Jess had difficulty understanding how he could so thoroughly engage her physically and then capture her mental faculties as well, but he had. Alistair had left it to her to decide what to do about it, while making it clear he would not desist. She doubted there was anything Alistair Caulfield wanted that he didn’t eventually attain.
As they turned toward the stern, the salt air hit her back in a rush, awakening all her senses. Invigorated and anticipatory, she slowed at the sight of a large blanket spread across the deck, anchored at each corner by crates of cannonballs. It was covered with several pillows and a shallow basket brimming with food.
A picnic. At sea.
Alistair stood on the other side of the counterpane, waiting. He was perfectly dressed in buff slacks tucked into polished Hessians, tan-striped waistcoat, and brown tailcoat. His hair had been styled by the wind in a fashion resembling the way he looked after she ran her fingers through it.
As many women did, Jess thought him the handsomest man she’d ever seen. Exotically so. Blatantly seductive. More than slightly dangerous.
Delicious. She wanted to strip him to the skin, to appreciate the full impact of his powerful form without the impediment of clothing. She couldn’t resist such thoughts now, with their desire for one another bared so openly between them.
It was impressive to see him on the deck of such a fine ship, surrounded by men who worked for him. She could scarcely recall the scapegrace who’d accepted every wager and lived on the fine edge of a hazardous margin. But she knew he was there beneath the flawless surface. Tempting her with wicked promises she knew he’d keep.
“My lady,” he greeted her, bowing.
“Mr. Caulfield.” She looked around the deck, noting how the dozen or more men about them kept their gazes carefully averted.
He gestured for her to sit, and she sank to her knees. He joined her, then dug into the basket, withdrawing a loaf of bread he tore in half. That was followed by a hunk of dry cheese and a quartered pear. He collected her portion in a large napkin and passed it over.
She accepted with a smile. “An impressive offering for ship’s fare.”
“Soon enough, you will pine for variety.”
“Some might consider a picnic on a ship’s deck to be a form of courtship,” she pointed out, deliberately using a teasing tone. “It could certainly be considered romantic.”
“My aim is to please.” He flashed his infamous smile, and a tingle moved through her. How easily he charmed women when he wanted to, while keeping his tone so light as to take any intensity from his words. She couldn’t decide if the practiced, noncommittal discourse was meant to soothe her nerves, or make her long for his usual fervency.
He ripped off a bite of bread with his perfect white teeth and somehow made the act of chewing arousing, too. And he seemed not to do it on purpose, which was in keeping with her belief that sensuality was simply innate to him.
Taking a small bite of the cheese, she looked out at the endless expanse of ocean. The sun sparkled off the water, and although the day was a cool one, she thought it quite lovely. All the anxiousness she’d previously felt around Alistair had altered into a different sort of awareness, one she savored for how alive it made her feel.
She’d been raised to maintain a certain distance between herself and others. That space had been easily established through her speech and deportment, and most men were swiftly discouraged by lack of progress. Alistair, however, was challenged by her demeanor. He would not allow her to withdraw, which forced her to acknowledge that she didn’t really wish to. She wanted to be right where she was—on an adventure with an infamously wicked man.
And then there were the memories of what he’d done to her body. She’d shared similar intimacies with Tarley, and had had no difficulty facing him over a breakfast table in the morning. With Alistair, she found herself flushing often and without warning, her body heating and softening in welcome just from his proximity. Somehow, his touch seemed more intimate to her than even her own husband’s. How was that possible?
“Did you sleep well last night?” he asked, drawing her attention back to him.
She shook her head.
“That makes two of us.” He stretched out along his side with his head propped in the palm of his hand. He watched her with those brilliant blue eyes that saw too much. Those windows to the soul aged him, revealing a darkness that shouldn’t be there in one still young. “Tell me what happened the other day when you fled from the helm. What were you running from? Me?”
Jess shrugged awkwardly. “There was so much noise and activity. I felt … off balance.”
“Does the lack of hearing in your left ear contribute to that sensation?”
She looked at him with raised brows. In hindsight, she realized he always whispered in her right ear. “You noticed.”
“Michael told me.” His eyes were kind.
It was a topic she would never discuss. She was so violently opposed to even the notion of such a discussion that she resorted to speaking about other topics she wouldn’t have otherwise. “I was not running from you.”
“No?”
“Tarley has been gone only a year.”
The arch of his brow mocked her. “And you honor his memory with chastity? For how long?”
“Exactly twelve months, apparently,” she said dryly.
“You are ashamed of your desire for me. That won’t sway me.”
Ashamed. Was that the right word? It wasn’t shame she felt. Confusion was more apt. She had been raised to live in a particular world under particular rules. An affair with Alistair moved her into an entirely new realm. Remembering his dance analogy, she would say she didn’t know the proper steps and so was stumbling around. She’d been rigorously trained against stumbles and missteps, and found it extraordinarily difficult to forsake those hard-taught lessons.
“An affair isn’t necessary,” she began, “to enjoy sex. It’s certainly possible and respectable—albeit unfashionable—to find pleasure in the marital bed.”
“Are you suggesting we marry?” His tone was dangerously low and sharply edged.
“No!” She winced at the rushed manner with which she’d replied. “I shan’t be marrying again. To anyone.”
“Why not? You enjoyed your first marriage.” Alistair reached for a pear.
“Tarley and I had a rare affinity. He knew what I needed, and I knew what he expected. We were able to blend the two into a harmonious arrangement. It’s highly doubtful I’d be as fortunate again.”
“Meeting expectations is important to you.”
Jess met his gaze. As always, there was something in the way he looked at her that challenged her to be more than who she knew herself to be. Challenged her to speak aloud the thoughts she rarely contemplated even in private. “When expectations are met, there is harmony.”
Alistair’s head tilted, considering. “To value harmony, one has to know disharmony.”
“Can we speak of something else?”
There was a long pause, then, “Whatever you like.” She nibbled at her bread for a few moments, gathering her thoughts. Why did it always seem as if he could see into her? It was unfair when he was a mystery. “Was it your choice to pursue the path of enterprise you follow?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
“You said your father acquired the plantation and ship for you. I wondered if you requested those things, or if you simply made do with the avenue Masterson provided.”
He looked down at his hand. “I wanted nothing from Masterson, but accepting his largesse meant a great deal to my mother. I suggested sugarcane because I knew it would be profitable and that the distance inherent in the cultivation would be appealing to Masterson. I’ve been a source of displeasure for many years.”
Jess remembered saying something similar to Hester long ago, and felt remorse for the cruel thought. She’d prejudged him by assuming he had no ambition or mind for business. She had dismissed him because of the order of his birth. Also, because she’d bristled at Hester’s admiration. She could admit that now. Although Hester’s praise had been offhand and merely conversational, it had roused envy in Jess and territorial feelings.
“Some fathers mean well when they express affection in harsh ways,” she offered. “Their methods may leave much to be desired, but the intent is laudable.” She didn’t credit such lofty ambitions to her own pater, but that did not signify.
“By what basis would you know?” he challenged softly. “You have always been perfect. I have always been far from it.”
“Perfection, if that’s what you choose to call it, isn’t effortless.”
“You make it seem so.” He held up a hand when she would have demurred. “Masterson’s affection is for my mother. She is the sole reason he showed any generosity. I am grateful for that and even for the least of what he did for me on her behalf. For all the ill will between us, his love for her earns my appreciation.”
“Why is there ill will?”
“When you share your secrets, I will share mine.” Alistair’s smile was devastating and soothed the sting of his refusal. “You are a very mysterious woman, Jessica. I would be best served by keeping you equally intrigued with me.”
Jess chewed thoughtfully. His belief in her extraordinariness made her wish she was as remarkable as he saw her to be. Her tutelage had been so strict, and any deviation so strenuously punished, that she’d been certain anything noteworthy about herself had withered and died.
But Alistair made her wonder if she was wrong. He made her wonder what it would be like to be the sort of woman who was equal to a man as fascinating as he was to her. A man who was so darkly sensual and flamboyantly handsome that women paid for the privilege of possessing him, if only briefly.
Her imagination ran away with the idea, inventing a past interesting enough to make her notable.
“I suppose I could tell you about my time in captivity with the maharaja …” she began.
“Oh?” A very wicked gleam brightened his gaze. “Please do.”