The Ugly Duchess

Page 61

James laughed suddenly. “So neither of us made our money entirely on the side of the law.”
“Ryburn Weavers are far from being pirates,” Theo said loftily.
“What about the ceramics company? How on earth did you get that off the ground? Did you steal someone from Wedgwood, the way Reede suggested?”
“Oh no. There was no need for theft.”
James leaned forward, loving the combative look in her eyes and the smugness in her voice. “Tell me.”
“I offered them a proper wage,” Theo said with a grin. “They came to me with no need for stealing or bribes. I’m afraid that some people at Wedgwood were dreadfully upset, but really, I had nothing to do with it. It was a decision made entirely by the men in question. I didn’t contact a single soul at Wedgwood. But if their workers discovered what I was paying, and shared that information with their friends, it was hardly something to blame me for.”
James burst into laughter.
“From the very beginning, I had the best craftsmen working on our kilns,” she said, finishing her tart. “I decided that we should specialize in ceramics with Greek and Roman patterns, and luckily those pieces have proved very popular in London.”
“It’s not far from your idea for the weavers,” James said, fascinated. “Renaissance fabrics, Greek ceramics . . .”
Theo hopped out of bed and ran across the room. James instantly forgot the subject of conversation. Theo from the back was a revelation: long graceful legs, a sweet, tight rear, shoulders that were as elegant as the rest of her.
Lust swept up his body as if he were nothing more than a bundle of twigs hit by a forest fire. He could feel his eyes glazing as she climbed back onto the bed, clutching a large leather folio.
She curled her slender legs to the side, twitching the sheet over herself, and opened the book. “Here are the fabric samples from Ryburn Weavers this year,” she said. “See this?” She pointed to a fabric and he made an effort to pay attention. It was a black cloth. Just beyond the edge of the book the sheet had slipped and he could see her thigh and a patch of skin so sweet and delicate that he longed to lick it.
“It’s a pattern of birds in flight,” Theo told him. “You can’t see the repeat unless you look very, very closely.”
“Lovely,” James managed.
“One of my weavers lost her baby,” Theo said softly. “She designed this because she wanted to think that her daughter flew to a better place.”
“Truly lovely,” James said. And this time he meant it.
“We sold thirteen bolts in one week after the Prime Minister was shot,” Theo said, her voice reverting to brisk practicality.
“He was?” James raised an eyebrow. “What was his name? When?”
“Spencer Perceval,” Theo replied, looking surprised. “He was assassinated in ’13. Didn’t you get any news while abroad, James?”
“Very little. I’m looking forward to reading the newspapers every day.”
“It shows a grim side of owning a business concern,” Theo said, “but the truth is that the poor man had thirteen children, and his widow loved this design. Suddenly everyone was wearing our fabric. I felt sad and triumphant, all at the same time.” She hesitated. “You must have felt the same at times, James.”
He nodded. “The slave ships were heartrending, not because of the fight, but because of what we’d find on the ships once we’d overtaken them.”
“I’ve read about it. Filthy stinking holds crowded with humans, dead and alive, none of them fed properly or given light or even ventilation. Despicable!”
Her voice shook, and he loved her more in that moment than he had realized possible. His Daisy may be rigid, but she was ethical to the very core of her being.
The same second, it came to him that he might take advantage of that decency. “We would dispatch the slaver dealers during battle and then give the men and women on board the choice to sail their ship back where they came from—along with a good amount of gold coin—or continue with us, and we’d drop them at our next harbor, again with all the treasure we’d found on board the pirate ship.” He gave her a pious look and then held his breath, hoping.
Sure enough, Theo leaned over and put her lips to his, in a little girl’s version of a kiss. In response, James carefully rolled onto his back and, equally carefully, pulled her on top.
She looked down at him in surprise, but he opened his mouth and welcomed her in. Her velvet tongue tangled shyly with his. Though James felt as if his body was blazing, he managed to keep the kiss relaxed and easy.
“I like kissing you,” she whispered, some time later. Her lips had turned ruby red.
“Not as much as I love kissing you,” he said honestly.
She ran a finger along his eyebrow. “If that were true, you would never have stayed away for seven years.”
“I was on the verge of coming back after two or three years. I had a heap of fabric for you in my cabin that I’d confiscated from pirates. I couldn’t stop dreaming about you. I kept rethinking what I should have said after you overheard that conversation with my father. Most of my solutions involved locking the bedchamber and making love to you until we were both senseless.”
A smile trembled on the curl of her lips. “That wouldn’t have worked at the time.”
“But would it have worked if I had returned two or three years later?”
She was silent a moment, the brush of her finger unbearably tender as she traced the shape of his tattoo. “It might have. Why didn’t you return?”
“Father died, and I wasn’t with him.”
“Oh, I see.” She dropped a kiss where her finger had touched.
“I fell off some sort of cliff,” James said with a grimace. “I know my father was a fool and a swindler. I spent my boyhood dodging flying objects he’d launched at me, and trying to ignore his outlandish schemes. When I left England, I thought it would be blissful never to see him again. He had traded my happiness for stolen money, as I saw it.”
“But?”
“I would guess that he died grieving, because he didn’t know whether I was dead or alive. In his own way, he loved me.”
Her eyes fell.
“Did he die asking for me?” His voice scraped like iron on iron.
Theo ran a hand down his cheek. “He was confused. He did ask for you, so I told him that you had stepped out for a moment but you would be there when he woke. He fell asleep with a smile on his face. And he didn’t wake up.”
At this, James waited a second until he had control of himself again. “Father was a criminal, and a fool, and all the rest of it. But he loved me. I was his only child, and his only tie to my mother. He loved her too, for all he said it was merely a prudent marriage.”
Theo nodded, then bent her head and dropped another kiss very precisely onto his tattoo.
“I don’t know what happened to me,” James said. His hands instinctively rounded her bottom, settling her more snugly into the cradle of his legs. “I think I lost my mind. I shaved my head. I took a mistress, and then two more, because to my mind, I was such a worthless person that it was better to betray you than return to England.”