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

Enough. She’d been reliving those events for days now, ruminating over the implications and castigating herself—and, when regrets became tiresome, savoring the memory of his wavy hair caught in the webs of her fingers, or the sensation of his strong hands encircling her waist …


Enough. It was time to go back to work. Once she put charcoal to paper, a bubble of concentration formed around her, blocking out all distractions. She drew a kitten, of all things. A kitten, with wide eyes and sharp little claws, wiggling back on its hindlegs as if preparing to pounce. Pounce on what, she had not yet decided.

A shadow fell over her paper, and a low whistle sounded from some feet above. Sophia froze, afraid to look up.

“Would ye look at that. Got his sights on a wee mousie, has he?”

It was O’Shea. Sophia sighed with relief. She didn’t know all the crew by name yet, but O’Shea’s thick brogue—and mammoth size—distinguished him from the crowd. “I hadn’t yet decided,” she answered him, tilting her head to the side. “I was thinking, perhaps a cricket. Or maybe a snake.”

“Brave puss.”

Sophia shielded her eyes with her hand and peered up at the Irishman’s face. His hard eyes wandered from her hand, to her face, to the sketch in her lap. He made a gruff noise in his throat—the sort of noise men make when they’re working up to saying something and don’t quite know how to get it out, but want to keep up the aura of brute masculinity in the midst of their indecision.

He was making Sophia nervous. He meant to ask her something, and she was afraid to learn just what.

“Yes?” she prompted.

“The crew … We had it out between ourselves, Miss Turner. There were a bit o’ scuffling, but I came out on top.” He suddenly crouched before her, transforming his silhouette from tree-trunk to boulder in an instant. His craggy face split in a devilish grin. “I get to be first.”

“We drew lots, Miss Turner. It’s my turn next.” Sophia looked up from her drawing board. Quinn stood before her, wringing his tarred sailor’s cap in massive, knob-knuckled hands, wearing an expression more fit for a funeral than a portrait-sitting. “Do take a seat, Mr. Quinn.”

The man lowered his weight onto the crate opposite, bracing his arms on his knees. “What am I to do?”

With her fingernail, Sophia sharpened the stub of charcoal. “You needn’t do anything but sit there.” She gave him a small smile, then quickly looked down again, as it clearly made him uncomfortable. “Why don’t you tell me about yourself?” She directed her question to the paper as she began to rough in the oval of his face.

He scratched his chin. “Not much to tell. Born in Yorkshire, I was. My father moved us to London when I was a lad. Got pressed into the Navy when I was sixteen, and I’ve not called dry land home since.”

“You don’t have a wife then? No family of your own?” Sophia kept her tone light, stealing furtive glances at Quinn’s hawk’s-beak nose and heavy brow between questions.

“Not as yet, miss.”

“But surely you’ve a sweetheart for Saturdays?”

Quinn gave a rough laugh. “Oh, I’ve one for every day of the week, Miss Turner.”

Sophia stilled her charcoal and lifted an eyebrow. “What a relief to learn that your calendar is full, Mr. Quinn. For I warn you, I shan’t be tempted to stray from Gervais.”

He laughed then, and his posture relaxed. Sophia was relieved, too. In the week since that night, her drunken toast had become just another shipboard joke. Mr. Grayson had returned abovedecks quickly enough to prevent the crew from suspecting an affair. Neither had the men taken Gervais seriously, thank Heaven, and she was coming to understand why. Most of their toasts weren’t based in reality, either. Life at sea was a dangerous business. The men flirted with death on a daily basis, and they laughed off their close calls. But even if they could escape death, they could not escape loneliness. It was an ever-present shadow that they worked to shrug off—through song, drink, embroidered tales. Sophia could wholeheartedly relate to that sentiment. She knew loneliness, all too well. And having a fantasy lover—well, for the first time in her life, it didn’t make her feel isolated. Here, she was just like everyone else.