Goddess of the Hunt (The Wanton Dairymaid Trilogy #1)

“Miss Turner, you’ve no idea what trials you’re facing. Never mind the dangers of an ocean crossing, the tropical poverty and disease … George Waltham’s brats are a plague upon the earth. One your delicate nature and fine gloves are unlikely to survive.”


“You know the family, then?” Sophia kept her tone light, but inwardly she loosed a flurry of curses. She’d never considered the possibility that this merchant captain could claim an acquaintance with the Walthams.

“Oh, I know Waltham,” he continued. “We grew up together. Our fathers’ plantations shared a boundary. He was older by several years, but I paced him for mischief well enough.”

Sophia swallowed a groan. Captain Grayson not onlyknew Mr. Waltham—they were friends and neighbors! All her plans, all her carefully tiered lies … this bit of information shuffled them like a deck of cards.

He continued, “And you’re traveling alone, with no chaperone?”

“I can look after myself.”

“Ah, yes. And I tossed Bains across the room just now for my own amusement. It’s a little game we seamen like to play.”

“I can look after myself,” she insisted. “If you’d waited another moment, that revolting beast would be missing an ear.”

He gave her a deep, scrutinizing look that made her feel like a turned-out glove, all seams and raw edges. She breathed steadily, fighting the blush creeping up her cheeks.

“Miss Turner,” he said dryly, “I’m certain in that fertile female imagination of yours, you think sailing off to the West Indies will be some grand, romantic adventure.” He drawled the phrase in a patronizing tone, but Sophia wasn’t certain he meant to derideher . Rather, she surmised, his tone communicated a general weariness with adventure.

How sad.

“Fortunately,” he continued, “I’ve never known a girl I couldn’t disillusion, so listen close to me now. You’re wrong. You will not find adventure, nor romance. At best, you’ll meet with unspeakable boredom. At worst, you’ll meet with an early death.”

Sophia blinked. His description of Tortola gave her some pause, but she dismissed any concern quickly. After all, it wasn’t as though she meant tostay there.

The captain reached to retrieve his felt beaver from the bar.

“Please.” Sophia clutched his arm. Heavens. It was like clutching a wool-sheathed cannon. Ignoring the warm tingle in her belly, she made her eyes wide and her voice beseeching. The role of innocent, helpless miss was one she’d been playing for years. “Please, you must take me. I’ve nowhere else to go.”

“Oh, I’m certain you’d figure something out. Pretty thing like you? After all,” he said, quirking an eyebrow, “you can look after yourself.”

“Captain Grayson—”

“Miss. Jane. Turner.” His voice grew thin with impatience. “You waste your breath, appealing to my sense of honor and decency. Any gentleman in my place would send you off at once.”

“Yes, but you’re no gentleman.” She gripped his arm again and looked him square in the eye. “Are you?”

He froze. All that muscle rippling with energy, the rugged profile animated by insolence—for an instant, it all turned to stone. Sophia held her breath, knowing she’d just wagered her future on this, the last remaining card in her hand.

But this was so much more thrilling than whist.

Goddess of the Huntis a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2009 by Eve Ortega

Excerpt fromSurrender of a Siren by Tessa Dare copyright © 2009 by Eve Ortega

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

BALLANTINEand colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

eISBN: 978-0-345-51511-7

www.ballantinebooks.com

v3.0

CHAPTER TWO

Lucy Waltham’s appetite was insatiable.

Henry liked to jest that when she married, he would provide her a dowry of two cows, six pigs, and two dozen chickens—just so her husband could keep her fed. It was only a joke, of course. In all likelihood, her dowry would be worth far less.

But no one would be jesting to say Lucy downed meals that would put a farm laborer to shame. Lucy lived hungry. She devoured every day. This appetite for life required a steady supply of actual food. She nicked hot rolls from the kitchen, rang for cold chicken at midnight, and spent long afternoons grazing in the orchards. And she never missed breakfast.