Romney Marsh Trilogy: A Gentleman by Any Other Name / The Dangerous Debutante / Beware of Virtuous Women. Kasey Michaels
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Probably thirteen, as old as she was now.
Courtland had been holding Cassandra that day when the Black Ghost limped home to the island. Standing on the beach, up to his knees in the clear blue water. Not a tear in his eyes or a word passing his lips. Holding the infant…
Chance shook off the memory. Too many memories. He shouldn’t have come back. “For a boy of few words, you make a nattering man. Are we going to talk or are we going to ride?” he asked, daring Courtland to take the next step.
“Listen up,” Court said, turning his mount, a coal-black stallion with only a small white blaze on its face. He stood in the stirrups as he addressed the company, and Chance noticed that his brother was wearing a black silken cape tied at the neck. A flair for the dramatic, his brother. “They may have shifted most of the haul by now, but we don’t know that. What they haven’t carried inland, they’ll be guarding. Our land party awaits word at the usual place but won’t move until we’ve had ourselves a look. And maybe a fight. Are you ready for a fight, boys? Are you ready to take back what’s ours and maybe send a few thieving bastards to hell?”
Dozens of fists and as many shouts shot into the air and Chance cursed under his breath, his heart sinking. Boys, Court had called them. He knew these men. He’d sailed with these men. But that was thirteen long years ago, and some of them hadn’t been young then. A ghastly crew.
He wished Ainsley would be riding with them but hadn’t expected him to. Did Ainsley know that Spence was riding with them? That Rian was riding with them? That all of his “sons” were riding out while he sat in his study, so turned away from life even the thought of a fine fight couldn’t rouse him?
They had all lost so much when Isabella died.
Chance used his heels to turn Jacmel and ride out of the stable yard with the others, bringing his mount beside Court’s as they rode along shoulder to shoulder in the moonlight and ground mist.
“The silk cape is possibly overdone, if you want my opinion,” he said.
“Everyone needs to know who leads, Chance. And the cape adds to the mystery. Dramatic, yes, I agree. But it serves its purpose. If something were to happen to me, Spence could take over, with no one outside of Becket Hall the wiser.”
Chance moved on to another subject. “How long have you been putting Spence and Rian in danger, Court? I asked last night, but you didn’t answer.”
Court kept his eyes looking straight ahead. “They’re grown now. They make their own choices.”
“Really. And Morgan? What about her? She told me she’s ridden with you. Not, she says, that you noticed.”
“That’s a lie. Morgan has never—hell’s teeth, Chance, she hasn’t! Damn her!”
“Damn somebody. Ainsley had better think about marrying her off before she does something even more reckless,” Chance said tightly as they came to a worn track and turned to follow it, two abreast. More horsemen were joining them, appearing one by one out of the mist from the direction of the village, falling into line. There had to be sixty of them now. It would have been easy for Morgan to slip unnoticed into such a group. “We were too busy figuring logistics last night to go into it, but tell me, how did this all start? Better yet—why?”
They rode on in silence for a while, until Courtland said, “You remember Pike, don’t you?”
“Pike? Of course I do. Ship’s carpenter. He worked for months making Cassandra’s cradle. What of him?”
“He’s dead, that’s what of him. Not quite a year ago. It turned out his wife’s brothers were part of a small gang of smugglers from Lydd, and Pike went on a run with them, thinking it would be a lark, I suppose.”
“That sounds like Pike. Go on.”
“There’s not much to say that you haven’t already guessed. They crossed the Channel—rowed the whole way—but when they landed with their haul someone was waiting for them. Four of the crew and one of the brothers were sent back to Lydd with two messages.”
“What were the messages?”
“The first was that no goods would be moved unless both the men and the goods were under the protection of the Red Men—they move about the villages quite openly, too, with their red sashes for all to see. Bloody arrogant, but not so arrogant that they travel in groups of less than a score or so.”
Chance patted Jacmel’s sleek neck, as the horse clearly wanted to run. “Not yet, Jacmel. Not yet.” He turned to Court. “And the second message?”
“Heads. Heads in a box. Two of the brothers. And Pike’s. You take any message from that you want to take.”
Chance said nothing. There was nothing to say. Courtland and the rest of them had dug up the Black Ghost and set him riding, uniting together to protect the many small independent groups of smugglers in the area. And all the time hoping to hell for a fight—and some revenge.
At last, as the horses moved carefully through chill standing water, he said, “Why the Black Ghost?”
And at last Courtland smiled, ruefully, obviously at his own expense. “Idiocy. A touch of madness. It was stupid of me, Chance, I know that. But there’s nobody to make the connection, trace it back to Ainsley. We’ve been safe here for thirteen long years. Safe and bored.”
Chance looked toward the horizon, which was a good distance away on this flat, treeless land. “We’ll soon remedy that, brother,” he said, pointing toward the long, winding trail of lit torches moving inland. He pulled the thin black scarf Billy had left on the bed for him up and over his nose, just as Court did, just as they all did.
“Yes. Everyone’s seen them and knows what to do. The majority are land movers and will drop their loads and run when they see us, but their guards will fight. We’ll get some revenge on the Red Men Gang tonight,” Courtland told him. “And with any luck, we’ll get back most of the haul, too.”
Chance turned in his saddle to see that the riders were fanning out now, making the party into one long line of darker shadows in the mist. Saddle horses, dray horses, horses more used to pulling a plow. Old men, young men. Boys. All fighting for their own. He felt his own heartbeat increase as the itch to be moving, riding headfirst into the danger, came up to greet him like an old friend, long forgotten but definitely welcome.
There was always the planning, the hunt. But land or sea, nothing surpassed a good fight.
Romney Marsh might physically be a part of England, but those who lived there believed mostly in Romney Marsh, just as the family and crews had believed in the island. Their land, their lives, their fight, and the devil with anyone who got in their way.
Tales of this night’s work would reach London and not be well received. England was already at war with France and soon to be at war with America, if the rumors could be believed. No one wanted a third war on their own English shores, between their own English citizens.
Chance pulled down his mask to grin at Courtland. God, but he felt alive. Alive in a way he hadn’t felt in a long, long time. “Well, shall we, brother? It’s been a while since I’ve broken the king’s law.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
JULIA STOOD IN FRONT of the long mirror in her bedchamber, surprised to find that she looked the same this morning as she had last night. She should have been able to see some difference, for she most certainly felt different.
She raised her hands to her breasts, covered once more in her simple cotton shift, and for the first time in her life thought of her body as anything more than that—her body.
That Chance could show such delight in that body, that he could bring such delight to that body?
“We’re all God’s creatures, Julia,” her father had told her the day she’d come running to him, sobbing, telling him that she was bleeding, she was going to die. “Today, my sweet girl,