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

“Oh, Gray. You did this to yourself?”


He blew out a sigh. “Never underestimate the power of liquor and maudlin sentiment on an adolescent boy. I was so stupid. Botched the whole business. It had to be my chest, since I couldn’t very well reach my own shoulder. Didn’t heat the iron long enough, and of course my hand shook like a palm frond in a hurricane.” He pushed her hand aside and traced the blurred, irregular pattern with his own fingertips. “God, did it hurt. Hurt all the way to England. It reminded me, all right. Reminded me that I should never have left. I felt so damned guilty for leaving him behind, I couldn’t even bring myself to go to Oxford when we arrived. Stayed on that ship for more than a year.

“When I did finally go to England, it only made matters worse. I saw the life my father’s family should have had. Society, wealth, rank, privilege. Not some nigh-on-biblical exile in a land of slavery and pestilence. I wanted—needed—to rebuild the fortune our father squandered. I hadn’t a clue how to atone for his moral failings, much less correct my own. But I knew how to make a profit, and that’s what I did. I wanted to give my brother and sister all the comforts and security they’d been denied.”

His hand curled into a fist over his heart. “And how did I go about it? By breaking every promise I’d ever made. By denying my brother, taking his inheritance, selling his family’s home out from under them, and dragging Joss out on the sea with me.”

“To become privateers.”

“We did have an unholy good time.” Gray’s lips curved in a cold smile.

“We were like boys again, only armed with men’s weapons: cannons, cynicism, anger at the world. France and England and America could blow one another to bits. We were there to collect the spoils. Toward the end of the war, we started planning Grayson Brothers Shipping. We’d set up offices in England, build more ships—bring Bel to London for her schooling and debut. We were supposed to be equal partners.”

“So what happened?”

“Love, inconvenient thing that it is. Joss married Mara, got her with child. They didn’t want to travel, so I went ahead to England and started building the business, gathering investors. Came back just in time to witness Jacob’s birth, then Mara’s death. Suddenly, Joss wanted nothing to do with the shipping business. Demanded his share of the prize to buy land on Tortola, of all places, and then just give it away.”

Sophia frowned. “Give it away?”

“It was Bel’s idea, a sugar cooperative. This is what happens when a girl’s only friends are missionaries. The Quakers and Methodists have been buying up plantations and dividing them into smaller farms, for freedmen to make their own livelihood. The cooperative bit was Joss’s notion—by sharing the cost and labor of refining the sugar, they might be able to eke out a profit.”

“Well, that doesn’t sound like a bad idea.”

“No, it doesn’t. It sounds like a bloody saintly idea. But in practice … it’s a tremendous risk. And the farming life—it’s hard, it’s poor. It’s less than they deserve.” Gray swore into the night. “After all that time, all that work and sacrifice—to end right back where we’d started? I couldn’t let Joss do it. I left.”

“And took the money with you.”

“He’ll thank me eventually. Mara’s death made my brother too cautious, that’s all. Once he’s been out on the sea long enough, he’ll come around.”

He sat up in bed. “And I don’t care if my sister claims she’s happy dressing in rags and playing ministering Quaker. She is going to London for the most extravagant debut the ton has ever seen, and she will wear silk in every damned color of the rainbow. I didn’t spend the past ten years lying, cheating, and stealing just so my brother and sister could continue on in the same miserable exile our father gave us. Damn it, I sold my soul for this.”

“Shhh.” She sat up behind him, draping her arms around his shoulders. “It

’s all right.”

“It’s not. Nothing’s right. I’ve never done a right thing in my life, it seems.”

“That makes a pair of us then.” Her lips pressed against the spot under his ear. “But I believe we are right together, don’t you? People like us … we have no talent for following rules. We can only follow our hearts. I’ve wronged people as well, but is it horribly wicked that I can’t bring myself to regret it? It brought me to you.”