How to Be a Proper Lady by Katharine Ashe

Author:Katharine Ashe
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: HarperCollins US
Published: 2012-06-30T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 17

Viola grinned, stretched, flinched from the wonderful soreness all over her body, and finally opened her eyes. Sunlight peeked through the draperies, casting the bedchamber in a hazy morning glow.

She sat bolt upright.

Except for her shift draped across a chair and herself in the bed, the place was empty of everything but furniture. The man with whom she had made passionate love mere hours earlier, who had hired this chamber for himself, might never have been there at all.

Viola sat for a moment quite immobile, considering how among the various foolish things she had done in her life, to have practiced this lack of forethought was perhaps the most foolish of all. Unwisely, she had not assumed that the moment the wager ended he would leave her side, no matter the circumstances.

Now the discomforts in her body did not feel so wonderful. Instead she felt rather ill, her stomach tight and all her limbs soggy.

She swiveled, climbed from the bed, and took up her shift. It got stuck going over her hair, knotted strands tangled in the laces. She shoved it down and tied it over her breasts. Her sailor’s blood accustomed to rising with the sun told her it was still early morning, so she might not encounter others in the corridor. But her blood had also told her that Jin Seton would be present when she awoke. So it looked like her blood wasn’t as clever as she’d always thought.

Hand on the doorknob, she paused.

The wager was over. He had left. But that did not necessarily mean she had lost. It could, in fact, mean she’d won. If he fell in love with her, he was to admit to it, then to deed his new ship over to her and leave her alone forever. Even now he could be sailing to Tobago to collect his assets, which would allow him to complete the purchase of the sleek little schooner in Boston. Perhaps he had simply gone to fulfill the terms of the wager.

Or perhaps not.

She went to her chamber, dressed in breeches, shirt, and vest; slung her coat over her shoulder; and took up her bag. Depositing the key with the proprietor, she pressed a coin into the housemaid’s palm, then went out into the sunny morning.

The walk to the wharf was only fifty yards. Sam sat on the dock beside the yawl bobbing in the water, dangling a piece of straw from between his teeth. He sprang up and tugged his cap.

“Morning, Cap’n. How was that hotel? I ain’t never stayed in no hotel before.”

“Good morning, Sam. It was fine, thank you.”

She boarded the little boat and Sam rowed her to her ship, tentative nerves of triumph twisting about her belly now. Jin must be aboard or Sam wouldn’t be waiting for her at the dock.

She climbed the ladder and set her feet on her deck’s solid planking. Her home.

She called down to Sam, “You may have the day now. Take the yawl, but return by midday to bring me ashore.

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