RAKES OF THE CARIBBEAN

Sun, sand and sizzling seduction

Notorious rogues Ren Dryden and Kitt Sherard used to cut a swathe through the ton, but they were too wild to be satisfied with London seasons and prim debutantes.

Now they’ve ventured to the sultry Caribbean to seek their fortunes…and women strong enough to tame them!

Ren meets his match in spirited Emma Ward. Relish their seductive battle of wits in

PLAYING THE RAKE’S GAME

Already available

Kitt has never met a woman as unconventional as Bryn Rutherford. Enjoy their scorching chemistry in

BREAKING THE RAKE’S RULES

Available now

And look out for the Mills & Boon® Historical Undone! eBook CRAVING THE RAKE’S TOUCH Already available

You won’t want to miss this sizzling new series from Bronwyn Scott!

AUTHOR NOTE

I hope you’re enjoying the Rakes of the Caribbean mini-series, featuring my sexy new heroes Ren Dryden and Kitt Sherard. Kitt’s story is set against the riskier side of life in a British colony in the nineteenth century. Not nearly as regulated as life in England, the Caribbean offers plenty of room for adventure and rule-breaking—two things Kitt is very good at. You might have met him first in Ren’s story—PLAYING THE RAKE’S GAME.

I always like to learn a little something when I read, so let me share the historical setting for Kitt’s story. It is an economical one. Up until 1836 English pounds were not allowed for import to the Caribbean, so most debts and purchases were paid for in barter and trade (usually rum or sugar), or with Spanish and Dutch currencies. In June of 1836 a charter was granted to establish a British bank in Barbados. I’ve placed the fictional Rutherford as the envoy charged with carrying out that commission and organising a board of directors. It is true that the bank would have been a joint stock bank, which means it was an investment bank. History shows that the bank in Barbados soon led to the establishment of a network of British banks through the Eastern Caribbean.

Stay tuned at my blog or website for more Bronwyn Scott updates:

www.bronwynswriting.blogspot.com and www.bronwynnscott.com

Breaking the Rake’s Rules

Bronwyn Scott

www.millsandboon.co.uk

BRONWYN SCOTT is a communications instructor at Pierce College in the United States, and is the proud mother of three wonderful children (one boy and two girls). When she’s not teaching or writing she enjoys playing the piano, travelling—especially to Florence, Italy—and studying history and foreign languages.

Readers can stay in touch on Bronwyn’s website, www.bronwynnscott.com, or at her blog, www.bronwynswriting.blogspot.com—she loves to hear from readers.

For Flo, my awesome editor, who really massaged this book into excellence and took time to make it a meaningful story with a strong life lesson: you can’t outrun your past, so you might as well embrace it. Thanks to Flo, Kitt Sherard does it in style.

And thanks to my agent, Scott Eagan, at Greyhaus Literary Agency, who also had to put up with all my rewrites. There were lots of fits and starts and you were kind enough, patient enough to argue with me about all of them. It is much appreciated.

Contents

Cover

Introduction

Author Note

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Epilogue

Extract

Copyright

Chapter One

The Caribbean—June 1836

‘Protect the rum!’ Kitt Sherard raced forward on the beach to throw himself between the oncoming attackers and the newly unloaded cargo of precious barrels. ‘It’s a trap!’ A pistol flashed in one hand, his knife in the other as the words left his mouth, the cry carrying down the line to be taken up by his men. ‘Protect the rum! Protect the rum!’ He felt his men surge behind him, his first mate, Will Passemore, at his right, digging his bare feet into the sand, ready to take on the thick of the fighting.

Anger fuelled Kitt, pumping through his body over the betrayal. This was supposed to have been a standard trade done in the light of broad day; rum for farming supplies. The afternoon sun beating down on them was proof enough of that, but somewhere, something had gone wrong. There was no time to sort through it at present.

Cries echoed throughout the deserted cove as the first of the attackers emerged from the pack. Kitt took aim at the man’s shoulder and fired, hoping the draw of first blood would cause the bandits to retreat. He meant business when rum was on the line, especially when that rum belonged to a friend, but he never liked to take a life.

The man clutched his arm and fell back, only to be overrun by his fellow outlaws. So much for deterrence. ‘Get ready, this means war,’ Kitt muttered under his breath. ‘These bastards won’t go easily.’

‘We’ll manage them, Captain.’ Beside him, Passemore’s jaw was set with grim determination.

The horde was on them, then. With one roar, Kitt’s men met the mêlée. Kitt threw aside his pistol. This was knife work now. He stabbed wherever he could, quick, sharp jabs to shoulders, thighs, an occasional belly when there was no choice. Sweat ran in his face and he fought the urge to wipe it away with a hand. The bandits were tenacious, Kitt would give them that. At last they began to fall back—the sight of their fallen comrades was persuasion enough that whatever they were being paid wasn’t worth it. ‘Come on, boys, we’ve got them on the run!’ Kitt yelled over the fighting, leading the charge to drive the bandits from the cove.

They fled with relative speed, dragging their wounded with them. Will was ahead of him, firing a pistol into the fleeing rabble. A man went down and Will leapt on him, blade drawn. ‘No!’ Kitt swerved to Will’s side. ‘We need him alive. Get him back to the ship and get him patched up. I want to know who is behind this.’

‘Aye, aye!’ Will said with a relish that made Kitt grin. The younger man reminded him of himself six or so years ago when he’d begun this adventure. Will hefted the man over a shoulder with a grunt. ‘C’mon, you stupid bastard.’

With Will headed back to the bumboats with the wounded man and the bandits scrambling the island hills to protection, Kitt organised the beach. ‘Let’s get the barrels back on board, men! Look lively—we don’t want them thinking about organising a counter-attack.’ Kitt doubted they would. His men had given them quite a drubbing, but he knew from experience one did not take chances in this business.

Even though he’d not expected trouble this afternoon, he’d come armed, just in case. Kitt helped roll a barrel towards the bumboats, his thoughts chasing each other around in his mind. There’d been reports these last four months of bandit crews operating in the area, stealing rum and sugar from small merchant trading ships that sailed between the islands.

For the most part, Kitt hadn’t taken those reports seriously. Small merchant ships, many of them more like boats and not in the best of shape, were often unarmed and undermanned when it came to fighting. They made easy targets, unlike his ship, Queen of the Main. Small-time bandits would prefer small-time targets. Only today, they hadn’t.

Kitt ran a hand through his hair, surveying the beach. All the barrels were loaded and the men were ready to go. Kitt gave the signal to shove off and leapt into the bow of the nearest boat. It had been the worst of luck the bandits had chosen today, when he’d been hauling his friend Ren Dryden’s rum. Ren would be disappointed.

Kitt had protected the rum, which was no small thing in this part of the world where rum and sugar were still the currency of the land. But on the downside, Ren had been counting on this trade to purchase much-needed farming supplies. Now, Ren was without a sale and without the goods he and his wife needed for the upcoming harvest. He didn’t relish telling Ren he’d failed.

Ahead in the water, Kitt could see the first boat bump up against the side of the Queen. He could make out Will hauling their prisoner up to the deck in a rope sling. Kitt hoped the prisoner would provide some answers.

Aboard ship, Will had bad news. ‘I don’t think we can save him, Captain. He took the ball in the back. It’s lodged in his spine. You’d better come quick. It’s beyond O’Reilly’s skill.’ Not surprising news given that O’Reilly’s ‘skill’ was relegated to stitching knife wounds.

The man was laid out on the deck, unable to be moved any further. The pain of his injury was evident in the pallor of his skin. Fear was evident, too, Kitt thought as he knelt beside him. The man knew death was coming. Kitt saw it in his eyes. ‘Aye, man, it won’t be long now,’ Kitt said softly, motioning for his crew to give them room.

Kitt lay a hand on the man’s forehead. ‘Is there anything you want to tell me? Anyone you want me to notify?’

The man—or was he a boy?—shook his head. Up close, beneath the dirt and sweat, he didn’t look as old as Passemore. Or perhaps they all looked like boys when they died, all pretence of bravery stripped away when it came right down to it. His brother had looked very much the same way in the last hour they’d spent together, the enormity of what was about to transpire etched in every ashen line of his face.

‘All right then,’ Kitt soothed him. ‘May I ask who sent you? Who paid you?’

The man struggled to speak as the pain took him. There was urgency in his gaze. His words were halting. ‘They. Are. Waiting. For. You. If. We. Failed. Don’t. Go. Back.’ His features relaxed, his breathing rattled. ‘Am. I. Forgiven?’ The question of every dying man.

Kitt pressed a kiss to the man’s forehead and gave him the only absolution he could. ‘Your debt is paid. Rest in peace.’ The man breathed once more and was gone. Kitt rose. His crew was solemn around him. Kitt clapped a hand on O’Reilly’s shoulder, his tone sombre. ‘You know what to do, take it from here. Make sure I have anything of note that he carried.’ In case there was a message to convey after all, or a clue as to who ‘they’ were, or even the man’s name.

* * *

Shadows were falling by the time they put into port at Carlisle Bay and rowed ashore. Bridgetown was quiet for the evening, all the shops closed, people at home with their families. Out at Sugarland, Ren and Emma would be preparing to sit down to an evening meal. Kitt smiled, thinking of his friend and Ren’s newfound happiness as a husband, a landowner, a man in charge of shaping his own destiny. It was what Ren wanted out of life. It was what Kitt had once assumed would have been his, too, by right, a future he’d been raised to expect without question up until the hour it was snatched away, no longer an option. Six years in and he was still grasping just how long for ever was.

Don’t think on it, remembering can’t change anything. The dying man had made him maudlin. Tonight, such ruminations were best set aside in light of the dead man’s warning. He couldn’t afford the distraction no matter what sentiments the man had conjured.

Normally, this was a time of day Kitt enjoyed, for a while anyway. Dusk was a break between the hustle of his days and the activity of his nights. Staying busy was critical in keeping his mind focused on the present. Too much solitude, too much quiet, and he knew from experience his mind would drift to less pleasant considerations best left in the past. This evening, though, the usual peace of dusk was absent. Menace stalked the stillness.

Maybe he was paranoid. Did he believe the dying man’s warning? Or was it one last lie? If so, it was certainly a powerful one. Kitt could hardly afford to ignore it. He dipped his hand into the top of his boot and drew his knife. If there was an attack, there’d be no time to draw it later. He had rooms in a boarding house just off Bay Street past the governor’s mansion for nights when it was too late to go home or when business detained him in town, as it did this evening. He was due at the Crenshaws’ for dinner. The distance wasn’t far, although tonight it seemed like miles.

* * *

At the end of Bay Street, the shadows moved. In one stealthy motion, they were upon him, three against one. One of them leapt on his back, trying to push him down, but Kitt was ready. He smashed the body into the wall of a nearby building, stunning the first attacker. His back to the wall, Kitt whirled, knife in hand, to face the other two. They were big, swarthy men. Kitt assessed the situation instantly. They would want to make the first move, would want to crowd him against the wall so that he had no room to move. They were operating under the assumption that he would fight. Kitt grinned. He would seize the advantage and take them by surprise. Knife at the ready, head lowered like a bull, he rushed them, pushing one aside with enough of a shove to keep the man off balance, and then he kept going.

But the men were fast and willing to give chase. They were closing on him. Kitt spied a house with lights on. That would do. He tore through the little gate separating the house from the street and streaked through the garden. He needed to get up and in. Ah, a trellis! A balcony! Perfect.

Kitt planted his foot on the bottom rung of the trellis and climbed upward, feeling the trellis bend under the pressure of his weight at every step. He grabbed the railing of the balcony and hauled himself up, his foot kicking the trellis to the ground as a precaution just in case the men were fool enough to try. Kitt threw himself over the railing and drew a breath of relief. He lay on his back, looking up at the sky and exhaled. It had been one hell of a day. Maybe he was getting too old for this.

He’d just got to his feet, feeling assured the would-be assassins had given up and ready to think about what to do next, when the balcony door opened. ‘Who’s there?’ A woman in a white-satin dressing gown stepped outside, her mouth falling open at the sight of him.

Only quick thinking and quicker reflexes prevented a scream from erupting. Kitt grabbed the woman and pulled her to him, his mouth covering hers, swallowing her scream. He’d only meant to silence her, but God, those soft, full breasts of hers felt good against him. She was naked beneath the dressing robe, a fact every curve and plane of her pressed against him made evident.

Maybe it was the adrenaline of the day, but all he wanted to do was fall into her. His intrepid lady didn’t seem to mind. She’d not shut her mouth against his invasion, her body had not tried to pull away. It was all the invitation he needed. His lips started to move, his tongue caressing the inside of her mouth, running over her teeth. Ah, his lady had a sweet tooth! She tasted of peppermints and smelled of her bath, all lemon and lavender where he breathed in her skin. She was all womanly heat against him, her tongue answering him with an exploration of its own.

Kitt nipped at her lower lip, eliciting a surprised gasp. His hand moved to cup her breast, kneading it through the slippery satin, the belt of her robe coming loose. He slipped a hand inside, making contact with warm, lemon-and-lavender-scented skin, his arousal starting to peak. He had no doubt she could feel it against her thighs where their bodies met.

An ill-timed knock on her door interrupted the pleasant interlude, followed by worried masculine tones. ‘Is everything all right in there?’ Kitt knew a moment’s panic. There were only so many explanations for a voice like that. A father? A brother? A fiancé? Or worst of all, a husband?

His lady jumped away, her grey eyes wide as she mouthed the words, My father! But she was cool under pressure. Panic was already receding as she stared at him, assessing her choices and their advantages. Would she give him away? Kitt gave her a wicked smile to indicate there were definite benefits to keeping his secret. She smiled back. Apparently the decision was made.

She called into the room, loud enough to be heard through the door. ‘Everything’s fine, I heard a crash. It’s nothing, just the trellis again.’ And then, perhaps realising someone might come in anyway to be sure she was safe, she added hastily, ‘I’m, um, getting dressed. I’ll be down in a moment.’

Satisfied she would be left alone, she turned towards Kitt, hands on hips. ‘Now, for the question of the night, who are you and what are you doing in my bedroom?’

Kitt grinned, letting his eyes appreciably roam the length of her. His rescuer was strikingly attractive. Long chestnut hair hung down her back in a heavy, shiny curtain, the sharp planes of her cheek bones and cool grey eyes creating the impression of intelligence. This was no unseasoned Miss. Maybe things were starting to look up. His cock certainly thought so. He leaned back against the railing, arms crossed over his chest, making no attempt to hide his arousal. ‘My name is Kitt and what I’m doing in your bedroom is entirely up to you.’

Chapter Two

If there was a more blatant invitation to sin, Bryn Rutherford had yet to hear it. Or see it, for that matter. The blond, tanned, mass of male muscle leaning on the rail of her balcony was temptation personified. Even sweaty and wearing the dirt of the day—and from the looks of it, his day, whatever it had been, had been pretty dirty—she could tell he was delicious. He’d tasted delicious, too, like an adventure—all wind and salt as if he’d spent a day at sea.

She probably should have slapped him for his unorthodox silencing, but that would assume she hadn’t liked it, or that she hadn’t willingly participated in it. She was honest enough to admit that she had. And why not? It wasn’t every day a handsome man climbed into a girl’s bedroom. The question now was what was she going to do about it? She ought to throw him back down the trellis, but her curiosity simply wouldn’t allow it, nor would the fact that he’d apparently knocked the trellis over.

Bryn returned his stare with a frank appraisal of her own, running her gaze down the length of him in return. Two could play this game. ‘There isn’t time for what you propose, sir. I have a dinner to attend. My father is expecting me downstairs momentarily.’ As if not having a dinner engagement would have changed her decision. One look at him had told her he would not appreciate a reticent Miss who shirked from stolen kisses. He wanted the woman she’d been in his arms, all courage and fire.

‘Another time perhaps?’ Bryn dared, enjoying this moment of boldness, of not worrying about the rules. Men who climbed trellises were beyond the rules to start with. She needn’t worry about him telling anyone what they’d done. Such a confession would force him to the altar and that was the last thing he wanted. This man was not husband material, he was fantasy material, but she needed him to depart. Her maid would be up any minute to help her finish dressing. He would be rather hard to explain. ‘As lovely as the interlude has been, I do need to ask you to leave.’

He made a show of looking around, past her into the bedroom, down at the garden below and up at the sky for good measure. ‘Exactly how do you propose I do that?’

‘It would have been easier if you hadn’t kicked over the trellis.’ Easier, but far less exciting. It was rather arousing to imagine those arms of his flexing as he pulled himself over the balcony without the help of any support. Whatever he did all day, it was no doubt ‘exerting’. He fairly oozed good health from the pores of that tanned skin. Probably what he did all night was exerting, too. He wasn’t the kind to sleep alone.

Bryn looked over the railing at the ground. ‘Easier, but not impossible without it. If you lowered yourself over the balcony and extended to your full length, you could safely make the drop without any harm, I think.’

‘Or I could hide under your bed until you’ve left,’ he suggested with another sexy smile that sent a decadent trill down her spine. This was the most fun she’d had in ages: no chaperon, very nearly no clothes and this wicked man all to herself. She’d forgotten how much fun flirting was.

She trailed her hand down the open vee at the neck of her dressing gown, watching his eyes follow the motion. ‘What a most erotic suggestion, letting you watch me undress. I must decline out of fear you will rob us blind after I leave. I can’t let a stranger have unsupervised access to the house.’ She flicked her eyes towards the door in warning, a reminder that discovery was imminent if he continued to delay. ‘I really must ask that you go or this time I will scream.’

He laughed and made her a little bow before throwing a leg over the railing. She held her breath. She didn’t want him to be hurt, but she had to get rid of him and she was fairly sure the drop wouldn’t be injurious. He gave her a wink as he levered himself into position. ‘Don’t worry, I’m sure your estimations are correct.’ Then he disappeared. A moment later, she heard a quiet thud. She risked a look over the edge and saw him rise up, brush off the dirt and trot out the garden gate into the night. In the falling darkness, her conscience might have imagined the limp.

* * *

Bryn wished he’d trot out of her thoughts just as easily. He might have if the dinner had been more entertaining. Although to be fair, it would had to have been extremely diverting in order to compete with the episode on her balcony. As it was, the most exciting thing about dinner was the empty chair across from her. It most certainly wasn’t the man on her left, a Mr Orville, a successful importer, who simply wasn’t up to it with his paunchy belly and habit of excessively using the term ‘my dear’ to start most of his sentences. The man on her right was not much better, only younger. But she understood the importance of making a decent first impression, of stroking the feathers of a man’s ego. The nuances of being a lady had been drilled into her quite thoroughly by her mother, a testament to her upbringing, since she’d turned fourteen. She knew how to be a lady and how to use it to her advantage. That didn’t mean she liked it.

Quite frankly, being a lady was boring, a discovery she’d made her first Season out. She preferred to think she was far more adventurous than dancing twice with the same man at a ball. She also preferred to think she was more like the woman she’d been on the balcony. However, she was smart enough to know that woman, full of fire and passion, had no place at a dining table full of her father’s potential business partners. As much as it chafed, tonight she had to play the lady.

She and her father had only been ashore for three days and everyone was eager to make their acquaintance given her father’s mission. The men gathered at the Crenshaws’ this evening were the influential cream of Bridgetown society, the men with connections and knowledge that would be critical in carrying out the crown’s charter.

These were the men she needed to impress, not sweaty, blond rogues caught in the likely act of housebreaking. The man today was nothing more than a common criminal and she’d carried on like a common hussy with him. No matter how exciting he might have been, such behaviour was not what her father needed from her. He would be scandalised if he knew what had transpired. She supposed she should be disappointed in herself. She’d set aside the teachings of girlhood at the merest temptation. But when that temptation kissed like her balcony god, it was hard to be penitent.

Bryn sipped from her wine glass and smiled at the man on her right, a Mr Selby, very aware that he was trying to sneak a glimpse of her bosom while he talked about the island’s sights. Heaven forbid he actually talk about banking with a woman. She had the impression her unexpected visitor wouldn’t make such a distinction. He’d talk about whatever he liked, with whomever he liked. Kitt-with-no-last-name wouldn’t ‘sneak’ a peek at her bosom, he’d make no secret of appreciating it with a rather frank and forthright blue-gazed assessment.

‘What do you think, Miss Rutherford?’ Mr Selby asked, catching her unawares.

‘I’m sorry, about what?’ Bryn apologised, trying to look penitent, an emotion she was apparently having difficulty conjuring with any sincerity tonight.

He smiled patiently, too much of a gentleman to protest her inattention, but not too much of a gentleman to look down her dress. ‘About a picnic. I thought you might enjoy a tour of the parish.’

Coward. The man from the balcony would have made her accountable for her distraction. The thought of how he might do that sent a pleasant shiver down her spine. Then again, if it had been him, her attention wouldn’t have lapsed in the first place.

‘I would, although perhaps it could wait until Father and I are settled. There’s quite a lot to do at the moment with unpacking.’ She smiled and turned back to Orville, signalling the discussion was closed.

* * *

It became the pattern of the evening. Bryn listened intently, and responded appropriately, playing the dinner game adequately if not adroitly. By the time the cheese course arrived, signalling the end of dinner, she’d come to the disappointing conclusion evenings here weren’t unlike the evenings in London. She’d hoped they would be different. She’d hoped the men would be different, too.

A little smile tugged at her lips. In that regard, at least one of them was. She wondered if she’d see him again or how she could see him again. Perhaps he ran a business in town? Perhaps it was possible to arrange a chance meeting? She almost laughed aloud at that. Her logic was failing her. He’d given her no last name, very likely on purpose. Men like him didn’t want to be found. Her balcony Romeo was no businessman. Just a few minutes ago she was thinking him a criminal. Besides, businessmen looked like Mr Orville on her left, they simply didn’t look like Kitt: part-beach god, part-pirate.

Be careful where your thoughts are leading you, her conscience warned. This is a new start for your father. Your father needs you. You can’t run around risking a scandal. This is too important for him. Besides, you promised.

But it’s a new start for me, too, her heart argued in return. She could have stayed in London with relatives where life was safe and predictable. She’d had enough of that. If she was discreet, perhaps there would be a way to have both. After all, was it wrong to want a little adventure? She’d been good for so very long. Years, in fact. Surely she was due some reward.

Eleanor Crenshaw, their hostess, rose, indicating the ladies should follow her into the drawing room. Bryn gathered her skirts and cast a last glance up the table where her father was nodding and answering questions. She hoped it was going well. She still didn’t know quite how her father had managed the royal appointment. She suspected well-meaning relatives had had a hand in it. Her father’s older brother was the Earl of Creighton and well-connected politically.

It wasn’t that she doubted her father’s abilities. Even as a younger son, he’d had his own ambitions, albeit they’d always been more of a local bent. Still, she wasn’t sure it was fair to equate his experience as a country financier on the same level as the banking interests of an empire. She adored her father. She didn’t want to see him set up to fail, but this had not been a consideration when the mighty Rutherfords had lobbied for the lucrative post to Bridgetown. They’d seen only the advantages.

Her father’s success would see the Rutherfords strategically placed to take advantage of the crown’s banking monopoly in the Caribbean. It served the grand Rutherford design to send her father overseas to expand the family interests, but Bryn hoped for more than that from this appointment. She hoped the change would give him a chance to rebuild his life after the death of his wife. For over a year her father had moped about, showing interest in nothing since her mother’s death. It was time for him to move on. He was too vibrant, too intelligent of a man to simply give up on life when there was still much he could do for his family and for others.

The ladies’ conversation in the drawing room politely danced around that very issue with feminine delicacy. What could her father do for their husbands? How much authority did her father have to act on his own? Was her father going to run some of his own investments? Bryn hoped not, if for no other reason than she wanted him to start slow, follow the crown’s directive to the letter and complete his mission with success. It was simple enough if he stuck to the plan. But she also knew his brother had encouraged him to make some private investments as well.

Bryn was about to turn the conversation a different direction and ask about the empty chair at the dinner table when a footman entered. The man whispered something to her hostess, bringing a smile to the woman’s face. ‘By all means, Bradley, show him in.’ She beamed at the women seated around her. It was the smug smile of a woman who has just pulled off a social coup. Bridgetown or London, apparently the look was universal. ‘Our dear captain has arrived.’

Everyone burst into smiles and there were even a few titters behind painted fans. Good Lord, this Captain Whoever-he-was had the women acting positively swoony, even the married ones who ought to know better. To Bryn’s left, the daughter of one of the women—a Miss Caroline Bryant—blushed and looked down at her hands in an attempt at modesty. Bryn thought it only a moderate effort at subtly calling attention to herself and whatever she wished the gesture to imply about her and the captain. In London, a girl Miss Bryant’s age would have been out for a few Seasons and far better schooled in the art of dissembling.

‘Ladies,’ the footman intoned, coming back into the room, ‘Captain Christopher Sherard.’

Bryn’s gaze went to the door out of curiosity over the hubbub, her mind wrapping around the name. Captain Sherard was one of the investors on her father’s list of potential hopefuls and one of the men they had not met yet. He’d been highly recommended by the Earl of Dartmoor through a friend back in London. Her father was pinning a lot of his hopes on this particular investor who had yet to materialise.

At first glance, the man who stepped into the room was striking. At second glance, he was horrifying familiar. Kitt. Christopher. No, it couldn’t be. Her heart began to hammer as her mind connected the names with this golden god and then connected the implications. The man from the balcony was her father’s prime investor!

Unexpected didn’t begin to cover it. Bryn looked a third time, desperate to be sure, or was it to be ‘not sure’? She wasn’t certain if her heart pounded from fear of impending disaster or from the excitement of seeing him again. The way it was racing at present it might be both. Maybe she should simply wipe her sweaty palms on her skirts, ascribe it to the fact that he looked extraordinary and leave it at that.

Surely it couldn’t be the same man? Long golden hair was slicked back into a thick tail tied with black ribbon. His sweat-streaked shirt had been exchanged for immaculate linen. A subtle diamond winked in his cravat as a statement of wealth and good taste. His evening clothes were well fitted enough to have done any Bond Street tailor proud, their tight fit showing off broad shoulders, lean hips and long legs.

The physique certainly suggested he was the same man. It was the clothes that differed. They were expensive and tasteful, two traits she didn’t associate with her balcony visitor. She knew a moment’s disappointment. Perhaps it wasn’t him after all, just a strong similarity simply because she’d been thinking of him. It would be an easy enough trick for her mind to play on her. Her pulse settled back into its usual rhythm. It was for the best. Business and pleasure never mixed, at least not well, and what sort of investor climbed balconies and kissed strange women? Not one her father could trust and not one she should trust either.

But wait... She studied his face, the strong line of his jaw, the razor straightness of his nose, features she’d seen up close today. It was the eyes that gave him away. Her heart bucked in her chest. It was him! The very same man who’d climbed up to her balcony, kicked over her trellis and kissed her senseless without even knowing her name.

All the fine tailoring in the world couldn’t disguise the wildness in his blue eyes as they roamed the room, taking in the occupants one by one until they rested on her. Recognition fired in their cobalt depths ever so briefly, his mouth twitching with a secret smile.

Her breath caught as she suffered his silent scrutiny. Would he expose their little secret? She’d not worried about the man on the balcony exposing anything, it didn’t suit that man to be caught in a compromising position. She understood him. But this one in fine evening clothes who acted like a gentleman and was supposed to be a banker? This was going to be tricky. He had destroyed all her assumptions and that left her feeling far too vulnerable at the moment.

A scandal was the last thing she needed. She knew very well her behaviour reflected on her father. Rutherfords were taught from birth the actions of the individual reflected on the family. Men would be reluctant to do business with a man who couldn’t control his daughter. Besides, she’d made a promise and Bryn Rutherford never went back on her word.

His gaze left her and he moved towards Eleanor Crenshaw, making their hostess the focus of all his blue-eyed attention. Gone was the sweaty, dirty pirate prince. This new version came complete with requisite manners. He would dazzle in any ballroom, let alone Mrs Crenshaw’s provincial parlour. He took their hostess’s hand. ‘Please forgive me for being late. I hope the numbers at the table weren’t terribly upset.’

Bryn fought the urge to gape, her thoughts catching up to the implication of his statement. He was the empty chair. This grew more curious by the minute. Questions spun off into more questions. If he was supposed to have been here, why had he been scaling balconies? It was hardly standard banker behaviour.

Mrs Crenshaw was murmuring some inanity about forgiving him anything as long as he was here now to entertain them. ‘Perhaps you and Miss Caroline would play another duet for us. You are both so excellently talented at the piano.’ Her balcony intruder played the piano? The oh-so-modest Miss Caroline blushed again as Kitt acquiesced and escorted her to the piano, which stood suspiciously ready for such an occasion, further proof that his presence tonight was no accident. He’d been expected and in fact was expected regularly. This was no random occurrence. Well, Miss Caroline and her blushes were welcome to him, Bryn told herself. She hardly knew the man well enough to be jealous. A few stolen kisses hardly constituted a relationship. She really ought to feel sorry for Miss Caroline, who was clearly labouring under the assumption Kitt Sherard was somehow a respectable gentleman.

Bryn should count herself lucky. She’d seen his true colours this afternoon. She knew what he’d been doing and why he was late.

* * *

However, by the time the tea cart arrived and the men joined them, she liked Miss Caroline a little less than she had the hour before.

‘When you said another time, I didn’t think it would be so soon.’ The smooth voice at her ear made her jump. She salvaged her tea cup just barely without spilling.

‘I didn’t imagine this party to be your sort of venue—no trellises to climb,’ Bryn replied smoothly, keeping her gaze fixed forward on the other guests, but her body was aware of his closeness, the clean vanilla scent of his cologne and the sandalwood of his bath soap. He’d bathed after he’d left her, a thought that brought a flood of prurient images to mind. Hardly the sort of thing one should think about over evening tea.

‘Pity, I would have pegged you for having a rather good imagination earlier this evening.’ Laughter bubbled under the low rumble of his voice as if he had somehow followed her train of thought straight to his bath and knew exactly what she was thinking. ‘There’s plenty to climb here, just trellises of a different sort.’ She ought to be put out by his innuendo, but instead all she could do was fight back a smile. If she did smile, people would be bound to notice and wonder.

His breath feathered her ear in a seductive tickle. ‘Your failing imagination aside, I fear you have me at a disadvantage.’

She smiled down into her tea cup, unable to suppress it any longer. ‘Oh, I doubt that very much, Mr Sherard. I don’t think you ever find yourself at a disadvantage where women are concerned.’

He grinned in agreement, his teeth white against the tan of his face. ‘In this case I most definitely am. Might you do me the honour of your name? You know mine, but I don’t know yours.’

He would know soon enough. Island communities were small. ‘It’s Bryn, Bryn Rutherford.’ She felt him stiffen slightly, the pattern of his breathing hitching infinitesimally in recognition, signs that he knew her already, or perhaps knew of her. She turned to catch sight of his reaction, wanting to confirm she’d guessed right. She nearly missed it.

He hid the reaction well. Had he not been standing so close, she wouldn’t have noticed it, but she’d not been wrong in its attribution. He recognised the name. How odd that a simple fact like a name could provoke surprise between strangers. Or perhaps it wasn’t so surprising. Bridgetown was a small society and news must travel fast. Every merchant, every businessman in town would know by now her father was coming, and why. It was intriguing to count Kitt Sherard among their number since she had so quickly dismissed him on those grounds earlier that evening. Did she proceed with the fiction that she hadn’t noticed his surprise or did she confront him?

She opted for a bit of both. ‘Does the earl know what you do in your spare time?’ She was having difficulty reconciling this rogue of a man with a gentleman who’d have the ear of an earl. She was starting to think Dartmoor must have owed him an extraordinary favour to make this recommendation. Although, dressed as he was tonight, Captain Sherard might be mistaken for a lord, too.

He was studying her, hot blue eyes raking the length of her evening gown. He crooked his arm. ‘Miss Rutherford, perhaps you would accompany me out to the veranda for some fresh air?’ There was going to be a price. Bryn saw the subtle negotiation immediately. He wasn’t going to talk in here where they could be overheard, but he would be pleased to trade information for the privacy of the veranda and whatever might evolve out there.

Say yes, the adventurer in her coaxed without hesitation. If his impromptu kisses were that good on a balcony, what might they be like on a veranda with moonlight and a little premeditation behind them? The lady in her knew better and tonight the lady held sway. But only for tonight, her naughty side prompted. She wouldn’t always have to be the lady. She’d promised herself that, too, among other things.

Bryn decided to challenge him. ‘Why? So I can risk a dagger in the back from the lovely Caroline Bryant for stealing your attentions or so that you can manoeuvre your way into my father’s good graces through me? It’ll take more than a kiss and a trellis to wring a recommendation from me, Captain.’

The women had been trying to lobby her all night. As much as a starlit veranda stroll with Kitt Sherard appealed to the adventurer in her, she wasn’t naive enough to think romance was the captain’s sole motivation. Rutherford girls were taught early to detect an opportunist at fifty paces. With dowries like theirs, it was a necessity for surviving London ballrooms crawling with genteel fortune hunters.

Bryn let her eyes lock with his over her tea cup as she raised it to her lips. ‘I never mix business with pleasure. It would be best if we said goodnight, Captain, before one of us makes any faulty assumptions about the other.’ Goodness knew what he must think of her after the balcony. If it was anything akin to what she thought of him, there’d been plenty of assumptions made already. Hardly the first impression either of them would have chosen to make.

His eyes glittered with humour, giving her the impression that while she had got the last word, he still had the upper hand. He gave her a small bow like the one he’d given her on the balcony, elegant and exaggerated in a subtly mocking manner. ‘I have a meeting with your father in the afternoon. Afterwards, we could walk in the garden. You can decide then if it’s business or pleasure.’

A meeting with her father? She knew what he thought. It would be a meeting where she was relegated to some far part of the house while men did business. Who was she to correct his assumptions? Bryn smiled, hoping the wideness of her grin didn’t give her away. ‘Until tomorrow, then, Captain Sherard.’ The arrogant man might think he had the upper hand and the last word, but she had a few surprises of her own.

Chapter Three

Damn and double damn! Of all the balconies in Bridgetown, he’d climbed up Bryn Rutherford’s, the daughter of the man who’d come to induct the crown’s currency into the Caribbean and the man on whom Kitt’s future business interests depended. Kitt couldn’t believe his luck. What he couldn’t decide was if that luck was good or bad. He was still debating the issue the next afternoon when he set out for his meeting with her father.

A certain male part of him had concluded it was very good luck indeed. Bryn Rutherford was a spitfire of a goddess. She had the lips to prove it, and the tongue, and the body, and everything else, including an insightful amount of intelligence. She’d immediately seen the ramifications of going out on the veranda with him.

Her refusal made her something of a cynic, too. For all the spirit she’d shown on the balcony, she was wary of consequences or maybe it was the other way around: consequences had made her wary. Perhaps it simply made her a lady, a woman of discernment and responsible caution. Not everyone had a past chequered with regrets just because he did. Then again, this was the Caribbean, a far-flung, remote outpost of the British empire. In his experience, which was extensive, ladies didn’t sail halfway around the world without good reason. Did Bryn Rutherford have something to hide, after all?

It was an intriguing thought, one that had Kitt thinking past the interview with her father and to the walk in the garden that would follow. How did a girl with a well-bred, and very likely a sheltered, upbringing end up with the ability to kiss like seduction itself?

No, not a girl, a woman. There was no girlishness about Bryn Rutherford. She was past the first blush of debutante innocence. The green silk she’d worn last night communicated that message with clarity, even if he hadn’t already seen her in that sinfully clingy satin dressing robe, felt her uncorseted curves, or tasted her unabridged tongue in his mouth giving as good as it got. Thoughts like that had him thinking he was a very lucky man. Thoughts like that also had kept him up half the night.

The other half of the night belonged to another set of less pleasant thoughts—who wanted him dead this time? The candidates for that dubious honour were usually different, but the motives were always the same. Was this latest attacker simply one of his less savoury business associates who felt cheated or was it more complicated than that? Had someone from his past found him at last and bothered to cross the Atlantic for revenge? He’d been so careful in that regard. Discovery risked not only him, but his family. He’d cast aside all he owned including his name to keep them safe. Of course, discovery was always possible, although not probable. But he was alive today because he planned for the former. It wasn’t enough to just play the odds. Not when the people he loved and who loved him were on the line.

His mind had been a veritable hive of activity last night. He supposed he should feel fortunate he’d got any sleep, all things considered. There’d been critical business thoughts claiming his attention, too: would Bryn Rutherford hold the balcony interlude against him? If she did, how would that skew the business opportunities a bank in Barbados would provide? Those questions were still plaguing him when he knocked on the Rutherfords’ front door.

He was taken down a long hall by a stately butler who must have come with them from England. The butler, Sneed, fit the surroundings perfectly with his air of formality. In the short time they’d been in residence, the Rutherfords had already left their aristocratic mark on the house. They’d come loaded with luxuries; carpets and paintings adorned the floors and walls in testimony to the Rutherfords’ prestige to say nothing of the butler.

Kitt always made it a habit to study his surroundings. How a man lived offered all nature of insight. This house, the décor and its accessories were all designed to communicate one message: power and authority. Kitt approved of the intent. It was precisely the message a man charged with the crown’s banking interests in the new world should convey. But, did the message match the man? That remained to be seen.

The door to the study was open, revealing the same luxury and wealth that dominated the hall. The butler announced him to the room in general and Kitt was surprised to see that Rutherford was not alone. James Selby, an aspiring local importer, was already present. The weasel. He must have come early. Well, Selby’s limitations would speak for themselves sooner or later. Hopefully sooner.

The surprise didn’t end there. Selby wasn’t the only other person present. By a set of open French doors that let in the light and the breeze, her head demurely bent over an embroidery hoop, sat Bryn Rutherford. She looked up for the briefest of moments, long enough to let a coy smile slip over her lips when she met his gaze, her eyes communicating silent victory.

The minx! She’d known all along she was sitting in on the meeting. Until tomorrow, then. He could still see the wide smile on her face, the cat’s-got-the-cream look in those grey eyes. He hadn’t quite understood at the time. He understood now. She’d been laughing at him, getting a little of her own back.

‘You look well settled for a man who has just arrived,’ Kitt said affably, shaking hands with The Honourable Bailey Rutherford. Today, he would finally have a chance to take the man’s measure more closely than he’d been able to do last night during their quick introduction at the Crenshaws’. The man was in his early fifties, with faded chestnut hair starting to thin, although once it must have been the rich colour of his daughter’s. His face betrayed weariness in its lines and there was a trace of sadness in his eyes. He exuded none of his daughter’s confidence.

Bailey Rutherford waved a dismissive hand in the air, the gesture showing off a heavy gold ring on one finger, another subtle sign of wealth and power. ‘I can’t take credit for any of this. I wouldn’t know where to begin when it comes to setting up a house. My wife always handled these things. Now my daughter does.’ He smiled in Bryn’s direction. ‘Did you meet her last night? Of course you must have.’ There was pride in those last words and sorrow in the first. The sentence told Kitt volumes about Bailey Rutherford.

He was playing catch-up in that regard. Kitt would have liked to have talked to Rutherford prior to this meeting, would have preferred getting to know the man so he could assess Rutherford’s character more thoroughly. Missing dinner had been unfortunate, but there’d been nothing for it. After leaving Bryn on her balcony, he’d taken a circuitous route home to avoid another encounter with the would-be assassins and then he’d absolutely had to bathe. By the time he was presentable, it had been too late for dinner.

‘You already know Mr Selby?’ Rutherford enquired, indicating that Kitt should take the empty chair. ‘We were just talking about the geography of the islands.’ They proceeded to continue that discussion, Kitt adding a bit of advice here and there, but Selby was in full glory, espousing his latest hobby; cataloguing the island’s butterflies for a book. It would be a rather difficult book to write, Kitt thought. Barbados wasn’t known for its butterflies. Beyond Rutherford’s shoulder, Bryn rolled her eyes. Good. She found Selby as ridiculous as he did.

Thanks to Selby’s windbag tendencies, there was plenty of time to let his gaze and his thoughts drift towards Bryn, who was trying hard to look demure in her quiet day dress of baby-blue muslin and white lace, her hair done up in a braided coronet, her graceful neck arched over her hoop. She wasn’t fooling him for a minute.

Her very presence at such a meeting was provoking. Certainly, she’d planned to be here from the start, but in what capacity? She was no mere innocent attendee sitting here for her health, no matter that she’d dressed for the part. Most men wouldn’t look beyond the dress and the sewing. They’d see her embroidery hoop for what it was—a woman’s occupation.

Kitt saw it as much more—a ploy, a distraction even. He knew better. He had kissed her and a woman kissed her truth, always. Kitt had kissed enough women to know. He knew, too, that Bryn Rutherford’s truth was passion. One day it would slip its leash—passion usually did. Kitt shifted subtly in his seat, his body finding the prospect of a lady unleashed surprisingly arousing.

Rutherford finally turned the conversation towards banking and Kitt had to marshal his attentions away from the point beyond his host’s shoulder. ‘I’ve been meeting with people all day. Now that the royal charter for a bank has been granted, everything is happening quickly. By this time next year, we’ll have a bank established in Barbados and branches opening up on the other islands.’ He smiled. His eyes, grey like his daughter’s but not as lively, were faraway. ‘That seems to be the way of life. We wait and wait for years, thinking we have all the time in the world and when the end comes, it comes so fast. So much time and then not nearly enough.’

Kitt leaned forward, wanting to focus on the bank before time for the interview ran out and all they’d discussed were butterflies. ‘It’s an exciting prospect, though. A bank will change the face of business and trade here,’ he offered, hoping the opening would give Rutherford a chance to elaborate on the possibilities. At present, sugar and rum were as equally valid as the Dutch and Spanish currencies used as tender because the crown had not permitted the export of British money to its Caribbean colonies. As a result, actual money was in scarce supply. Plenty of people settled their debts in barter. Currency would make payment more portable. Casks of rum were heavy.

When all Rutherford did was nod, Kitt went on. ‘The presence of an English bank would allow British pounds in Barbados. It would create alternatives for how we pay for goods and how we can settle bills, but it will also affect who will control access to those funds.’ Kitt was not naive enough to think the crown had established the charter out of the goodness of its royal heart. The crown and those associated with it stood to make a great deal of money as a result of this decision. Kitt wanted to be associated. The charter would give the crown a monopoly not just on banking, but over the profits of the island.

‘Exactly so,’ Rutherford agreed, his eyes focused on a faceted paperweight.

It was Kitt’s understanding Mr Rutherford’s job was to make sure the charter was settled and the right players were in place. Rutherford would decide who those players would be. Although right now, Rutherford hardly seemed capable of making such weighty decisions. Then again, it might also be the effects of travel and late nights. Rutherford was not the youngest of men. Yet another interesting factor in having chosen him. Still, the bottom line was this: the interview was not going well.

It occurred to Kitt that Rutherford’s disinterest might have something to do with him personally. Maybe the man had already decided not to include him in the first tier of investors. Perhaps his daughter had told him certain things about balconies and kisses after all.

Kitt decided to be blunt. He had worked too hard for this invitation. He knew very well he’d only got his name on the list of potential investors because of his connections to Ren Dryden, Earl of Dartmoor. It had been Ren who’d put his name forward. ‘What kind of bank will it be?’ Kitt asked. He had his ideas, but clarification was important. There were savings banks and joint stock banks—quite a wide variety, really, since the banking reforms a few years ago—and when it came to money, not all banks were equal.

Rutherford showed a spark of life. ‘Joint stock, of course. There are backers in London already assembled, waiting for counterpart investors to be assembled here. It will be like the provincial bank I was on the board for in England.’

Kitt nodded his understanding. This was good. The man had some experience. He would need it. These sorts of arrangements weren’t without risk. Joint stock meant two things. First, it meant that the investors would share in the profits and in the losses. What the bank chose to invest in would be important, so would the level of risk. The less risk the better, but the less risk the fewer the profits, too. Second, it meant that shares could be traded on the exchange. They’d operate essentially like a business. This was not just a mere savings bank, it was a venture capital bank.

‘Would we be loaning money to plantations?’ Kitt asked, thinking of how that would change the current loan system. Right now, private merchants were primarily responsible for advancing the planters loans against the upcoming harvest so planters could buy supplies. It was what he’d done for Ren, or had tried to do for Ren before the bandits had upended the rum sale yesterday. A bank would reduce the opportunity for single merchants to finance planters. For those not on the board it would eliminate an avenue of income. No wonder there was competition for these spots.

Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Bryn reaching for something under her skeins of threads. No, not reaching. Writing. She was writing on a notebook. She’d been taking notes the entire time. Like Selby, he’d got so caught up in the discussion, in assessing Rutherford’s assets, he’d not taken time to notice. Her part in all this was growing more interesting by the moment.

‘It would depend,’ Rutherford explained, ‘on their collateral. Property cannot be taken as security.’

Kitt was thoughtful for a moment. Rutherford knew his banking vocabulary. That was reassuring. ‘What do we mean by property, exactly?’ Property, was a pretty wide term.

‘It means the obvious, of course; homes and farms cannot be used as security.’ Rutherford paused for a long moment and Bryn looked up, neatly inserting herself into the conversation.

‘But it also means the less obvious, too, doesn’t it, Father? That merchandise like rum or sugar can’t be used as security either?’ Kitt recognised immediately it wasn’t a question as much as a prompt.

‘It’s not really a question of collateral then, is it?’ Kitt surmised, flashing Bryn an inquisitive glance. ‘We’re to invest and hope there’s profit. If there isn’t, we’re unlucky. There’s no recouping of funds.’ There would be no collateral. The charter had just couched it in different terms.

‘Yes. Certainly, we can invest in the plantations, we just can’t expect anything in return beyond a piece of the profits,’ Rutherford said, regaining his confidence. ‘Still, there’s money to be made here.’

Kitt raised his eyebrows, encouraging the man to say more about what that money might be. Rum certainly, sugar and even tobacco in places were good cash crops. Then there was the merchandising end of things if a man acted quickly enough and knew when to get out. There was a boom going on currently, riding the wave of emancipation. Freed slaves meant more wage-earning consumers and that meant more demand for goods. Kitt knew that boom would not last, but for now it was spawning a retail layer that had originally been focused only on wholesale to large plantations.

‘There’s land, for starters,’ Rutherford offered, looking pleased with himself.

‘There’s some,’ Kitt said evenly, but he found the choice odd. It wouldn’t have been his first option. But a non-native Englishman would. A newcomer wouldn’t understand. ‘Most of the land in Barbados is already under cultivation.’ He’d been here for six years and knew first-hand there wasn’t much left to claim unless it was bought from a previous owner. It was something the freedmen were struggling with. They wanted to be their own farmers, but there wasn’t any land. This was an area where only time could teach a newcomer the realities of property ownership on an island where land was definitely a finite commodity.

Sneed entered to announce the next appointment was waiting. Rutherford nodded and turned to Kitt. ‘I will be assembling the board of directors over the next few weeks. I hope we’ll have a chance to talk further. I hear you’re a successful businessman in these parts. You come recommended. Your expertise of the area would be useful in determining the right investments for us.’

‘Quite possibly.’ Kitt rose and shook the man’s hand. The veiled invitation was progress enough for today. It confirmed he had not been ruled out. He also appreciated he wasn’t being asked to commit today. The bank was going to happen. It was already a fait accompli. That was assured. What wasn’t assured was the bank’s success. If the bank was going to do well, it would need someone knowledgeable and strong at its helm. A weaker man might easily be led astray and subsequently Rutherford, too.

Selby rose as well. ‘I was hoping I might have a private word with you before I go?’ he said to Rutherford, shooting a pointed look in Kitt’s direction. In general, Selby didn’t like him. He was too reckless for the young man’s more conservative tastes. A plainer plea for privacy could not have been made. Kitt might have been offended over the dismissal if it hadn’t suited his purposes.

Kitt glanced over at Bryn. ‘Perhaps you could show me the gardens? You mentioned them last night and I’m eager to see them.’ He turned towards Rutherford. ‘If it’s all right with you, of course?’

Rutherford beamed and nodded. ‘Absolutely. Bryn dear, show our guest the gardens. I didn’t know you were a botanist, Captain?’

Kitt gave a short nod of his head. ‘I’m a man of diverse interests, Mr Rutherford.’ He offered Bryn his arm, feeling a smug sense of satisfaction at the disapproving frown on Selby’s face. It served him right for coming early and then asking for a private audience on top of that. ‘Shall we, Miss Rutherford? I want to see the trellis you’ve told me so much about. It’s a climbing trellis, if I remember correctly?’

Chapter Four

‘You’re a wicked man to bring up the incident in such company,’ Bryn scolded him as soon as they stepped outside. She wasn’t truly upset with him, at least not about the potential for exposure anyway. She’d reasoned away those concerns last night. He had nothing to gain but an unwanted wife from telling.

Kitt merely grinned. ‘Harmless fun only, I assure you. It means nothing to anyone but us.’ Drat him, he was enjoying teasing her and that grin of his said he wasn’t done yet. ‘But you, miss, are another story entirely. You knew you would be at the meeting. I feel quite taken advantage of.’ He feigned hurt, then added with a wink, ‘I can’t let you have all the surprises.’

Bryn gave him a coy smile to indicate she understood his game. He no more liked losing the upper hand than she did. There was safety in having control. Control meant protection against the unexpected. ‘Ah, it’s to be retribution then?’ She couldn’t resist teasing him in return. His humour was infectious, even if she needed to remember it was deceiving. It would be too easy to forget that his good-natured response veiled something more, as did her own clever answers. They were both after the same thing—to take the other’s measure. What was fact and what was fiction when it came to the faces they showed society?

Bryn slanted him a sideways look as they walked. If she asked, would he give her the answer she wanted? What had he been doing in this same garden yesterday under significantly different circumstances? Twenty-four hours ago, he’d been an uninvited intruder. Today, he was received as a highly sought guest, a man whose favour her father would do well to curry. ‘It hardly seems fair for you to hold me accountable for such a small thing when you were the one who invaded my balcony. If we’re keeping a tally of surprises, you seem well ahead of me in that regard.’

Kitt stopped and turned towards her, his free hand covering hers where it rested on his sleeve. The simple gesture, something countless gentlemen had done on countless walks before, made her keenly sensitive to the intimacy of bare skin on bare skin. It was his eyes that made it different, how they followed his gesture, forcing her gaze to do the same until they rested on the point where his hand met hers. ‘Surprises or secrets, Bryn?’

His voice was a low rumble, his eyes lifting briefly to hers as he said her name. ‘I find the difference between the two to be slim indeed.’ This was how sin started, with a sharp stab of awareness igniting between them over the intimate caress of a name. Oh, he did not play fair! She’d meant to be interrogating him and here he was flirting with her, although flirting was not nearly a strong enough word for what he was doing.

‘Secrets?’ Bryn feigned ignorance of his intent.

‘Don’t play coy with me, I much prefer your bold mouth.’ Kitt’s gaze lingered on her lips. He was a master indeed at conjuring seduction out of thin air if he could turn the slightest of gestures into something more.

‘What were you doing in that meeting?’ It was said with the quality of a caress, but no less lethal for its intimacy. All seductions had their price.

‘What were you doing on my balcony?’ Bryn challenged in a breathy whisper. Now that they’d come to the crux of the conversation, the one subject they’d been dancing around, it was hard to concentrate. Most of her mind was focused on the fact they were only inches apart, inches from another kiss, from tasting the boldness of their mouths as he so bluntly put it. Her body knew it, hungered for it after only one taste.

Anticipation hummed through her, but Bryn steeled her resolve. Had he no sense of caution? Had she? Sneed could be coming out with lemonade this very minute. Maybe. The lady in her wouldn’t risk it, but the adventurer would. Sneed would be terribly busy this afternoon. The odds of getting away with a stolen kiss beneath the palms were probably in her favour...

Stop it! She had to quit thinking like this, although Kitt Sherard clearly thought like this on a very regular basis if the episode yesterday was anything to go on. Bryn took mental hold of herself: Make him accountable. Answers before kisses. Your father’s business depends on it. ‘What I was doing by the window is simple. The light is best by the window—’ Bryn began.

‘For writing? You were taking notes,’ he interrupted, his accusation implied in his tone. Kitt stopped his tracing, his hand closing over her wrist in a harsh grip. His blue eyes were harder now, their seductiveness gone. ‘You can fool Selby, but not me. I know what I saw. You were there for a purpose.’

‘It hardly matters,’ Bryn answered sharply. She did not have to stand here and validate her presence at that meeting to this man she barely knew just because he could turn her insides to mush and ruin any hopes of logical thought. All things considered, she was holding her ground well.

Kitt shrugged, his grip relaxing on her wrist. He gave her a slow smile. It was not a pleasant smile, it was a warning. Somewhere, she’d made a mistake and he was about to capitalise on it. ‘Perhaps you’re right and it hardly matters. What happened on the balcony stays on the balcony, after all.’

Bryn saw the trap too late. She’d walked right into it for all her careful play up until now. He was casting her as the hypocrite. How else could she argue the balcony mattered, but her presence at the meeting did not? There was nothing for it but to answer. She met his gaze, giving no sign of having contradicted herself. ‘My father needs reliable men in this venture.’

‘Men like James Selby?’ Kitt put in with an arch of his blond brow. ‘Selby wouldn’t know an opportunity if it jumped up and bit him in the arse.’

‘And you would?’ Bryn countered sharply, only to receive one of his disarming grins.

‘Nothing bites me in the arse, princess, opportunity or otherwise.’

His candour made her blush. Her mind had run right down that rather provocative path created by his words, just as it had last night at the the thought of his bath, as he’d likely intended. ‘I’m not worried about the balcony,’ Bryn said staunchly, keeping an eye on the bright coral hibiscus across the yard to maintain her composure. It was far less distracting than the man beside her. ‘I want to know because you will be doing business with my father. That worries me more than a few stolen kisses. If he is to trust you, he needs to know you.’ And what about her? Could she trust him?

The question was merely one of many which had plagued her last night long after she’d returned from the Crenshaws’. What sort of man climbed balconies in sweat-streaked shirts and then turned up in expensive evening clothes a few hours later at an exclusive soirée, only to sit down at the piano and entertain the ladies as if he had manners.

‘Ah, perhaps this is more about you than it is about your father,’ Kitt said shrewdly. ‘You needn’t worry, I won’t blackmail you with the balcony.’

‘Of course not,’ Bryn retorted. ‘You’d be doing nothing more than compromising yourself into a marriage if my father found out and that can hardly be what a man like you wants.’

His eyes narrowed, the air about them crackling with tension. ‘A man like me?’ He became positively lethal in those moments. She’d trodden on dangerous ground with her hot words. ‘What do you know about men like me?’

She held her ground. ‘Enough to know you’re not the marrying kind.’ This had become a perilous verbal pas de deux. What had started as a probe into the nature of his business character had rapidly become personal.

‘I assume you mean one without a moral code, who takes what he wants without thought for the consequences, someone who serves only himself?’ He was riveting like this, a sleek, predatory animal, stalking her with his eyes. No gentleman had ever behaved thusly with her. They were all too busy pandering to her, to her fortune.

His hand reached up to cup her jaw, the pad of his thumb stroking the fullness of her lower lip with a hint of roughness to match his words. ‘Your logic fails you, if you believe there’s nothing to fear from a “man like me”.’

‘You don’t frighten me.’ Far from it. He excited her. Bryn swallowed hard, more aroused than insulted at being called into account for her words.

‘Maybe I should.’ His voice was a low rumble, part-seduction, part-intimidation. She couldn’t decide which. ‘I would think my sort would be extraordinarily interested in a woman like you: beautiful, wealthy, well positioned socially, kisses like the naughtiest of angels.’ He bent close, close enough to put his mouth to her ear, for his lips to brush the shell of it. ‘Princess, I am the epitome of everything you’ve been warned about.’

All she had to do was make the smallest of movements to fall into him and whatever he was offering. She leaned towards him, into him, but too late.

Kitt stepped back, releasing her. ‘Now that’s settled, if you’ll excuse me? I have another appointment.’

A more cautious woman would retreat the field and admit defeat, but not Bryn. She was determined to not let him get away without an answer. A man who wouldn’t give one was definitely hiding something. ‘You’re really not going to tell me?’ She gave him a last chance to confess. ‘About the balcony?’

He swept her a bow, eyes full of mischief. ‘You have my permission to let your imagination run free.’

She would not let him get away with boyish charm after the rather adult heat of the previous moments. Bryn fixed him with a hard stare. ‘I can imagine quite a lot of reasons, none of them good.’ Perhaps if he thought she would imagine the worst, he’d rush to amend that image. Having a poor impression of him could hardly be what he wanted when a position on the bank board was on the line. She was not naive. She knew what sort of men came to the Caribbean: adventurers, men who were down on their luck, men who wanted to make new lives. Certainly there were a few like James Selby who was here for decent opportunities as a merchant, but he was not the norm.

Kitt gave her a sly smile. ‘Then I leave you with this: you’re a smart woman. You already know men who scale balconies are up to no good. You don’t need me to tell you that.’

The garden was quiet after he left and somehow less vibrant, as if he’d taken some of the bright, tropical colour with him. Bryn took a seat on a stone bench near the hibiscus, not wanting to go in, not wanting to encounter any of her father’s business partners. She wanted time to think first.

Kitt was right. She had known. She’d just hoped for better. Or perhaps, more accurately, she’d hoped it wouldn’t matter and it hadn’t until he’d walked into the Crenshaws’. Now, she had a dilemma. Should she stay silent and let her father discover Kitt Sherard for himself or should she warn her father off before real harm could be done? Could she even do that without exposing what had happened on the balcony?

Bryn plucked at a bright orange blossom. Current evidence suggested the latter was not possible at this point without risking the consequences. Current evidence also suggested Kitt was hiding something. Her hand stalled on the blossom. No, he wasn’t hiding anything, he was all but admitting to it, whatever ‘it’ was—further proof she needed more evidence. She was working off supposition and kisses only. She needed more than that. Too much hung in the balance. A man who compromised her, compromised her father. Likewise, if she voiced her concerns, she could ruin Kitt’s investment chances.

It all boiled down to one essential question: could Kitt Sherard be trusted? There was only one way to find out. She would have to get to know him—a prospect that was both dangerous and delicious since he’d made it abundantly clear he was not above mixing business with pleasure.

Chapter Five

‘I don’t have pleasant news.’ Kitt kept his voice low as he and Ren Dryden, the Earl of Dartmoor, his mentor in this latest banking venture, but more importantly, his friend, enjoyed an after-dinner brandy in Ren’s study at Sugarland. Night had fallen and Ren’s French doors were open to the evening breeze. The dinner with Ren and Emma had been delicious, their company delightful, both well worth the five-mile ride out to the plantation from Bridgetown. Kitt hated returning their hospitality with bad news.

‘Tell me, there’s no use holding back. I’m not the pregnant one.’ Ren pitched his voice low, too, aware of how sound carried in the dark Caribbean night. With Emma expecting, Kitt knew Ren was eager nothing upset her, yet another reason Kitt was reluctant to be the bearer of such news. Ren shared everything with his wife. Kitt didn’t think he’d be able to keep this from her.

‘It was a trap.’ Kitt still couldn’t believe it, couldn’t understand it, no matter how many times he replayed the ambush in his mind. ‘They waited until we’d unloaded the barrels and then they charged, right there, on the beach in daylight.’ Not that it made much difference if it was night or day on a deserted beach. There was no one to see either way. Things like this happened to others who were less meticulous, less prepared, less cynical. But he had a certain reputation, which made him all the more suspicious about the motives behind the attack. What had he missed? It was a simple run, the kind he made all the time. What had he missed? The words had become a restless, uncontainable mantra in his mind that obliterated other thought.

Kitt rose and began to pace the length of Ren’s French doors, some small part of him registering Ren’s eyes on him. But most of his mind was focused internally, replaying the ambush, running through potential scenarios, potential suspects responsible for the attack. What had he missed? This had been the first deal with a new client he’d contracted with a couple weeks ago. Someone, it appeared, who might not have been who he claimed to be.

Kitt stopped pacing and leaned his arm against the frame of the doors. He felt dirty, as if he’d unknowingly picked up a disease and then unwittingly spread it to a friend. Who? Who? Who? pounded relentlessly in his head, his mind was determined to solve this mystery. Kitt closed his eyes, thoughts coming hard and fast. It wouldn’t be the first time someone had given a false name to their agent. Follow that line of thought, Sherard, his mind urged. He was aware of Ren talking as if from a distance. He couldn’t concentrate on Ren’s words just now, but four managed to break through.

‘They took the rum?’ Ren asked quietly, neutrally.

Kitt’s eyes flew open in disbelief. The day second-rate bandits took a cargo from him was the day he’d quit the business. ‘Of course not! We fought like berserkers to protect your rum. You should have seen young Passemore with his knife, stabbing away like he fought the fiends of hell for his very soul.’

‘Stop!’ Ren’s interruption was terse, his eyes hard as he grasped the implications. ‘You fought to protect the rum? Are you insane?’

‘They were bandits, Ren, they had weapons,’ Kitt answered one-part exasperated, one-part incredulous. Did Ren not know him at all? Did Ren think he’d give up his friend’s cargo without a fight when he knew how much Ren and Emma were counting on it? On him? Kitt pushed a hand through his hair. He owed Ren a debt of friendship he could never truly repay.

‘We had to do something, Ren.’

‘You should have let them have it, that’s what you should have done. It’s only rum, after all,’ Ren scolded.

Only rum? Kitt almost laughed, but Ren would not have appreciated the humour. Ren had only been here a year. Island nuances, or the lack of them, were still relatively new to him. Rum was Caribbean gold. Taking a man’s rum in Barbados was like robbing the Bank of England in London. People did indeed die for it, although Kitt didn’t plan on being one of them.

Kitt looked out into the night, his mind working hard. Behind him, he heard the shift of his friend rising from his chair and crossing the room to him, determination in Ren’s footfalls. ‘Dear God, Kitt, you could have been killed and for what? For rum?’ Indignation rolled off Ren. Kitt didn’t have to see him to feel it.

‘What would you have me do? Do you think so little of me that I would give up your cargo when I know how much you and Emma were counting on it? Counting on me? I couldn’t just let them take it.’

The bandits had known that. Kitt’s mind lit on those last words. Or at least whoever had hired them had known, had guessed that he would fight. It had been what they’d wanted. He recalled now how, after he’d shot the man leading the charge, the bandits had not been deterred. He remembered muttering to Passemore, ‘This means war.’ Those bandits had been spoiling for a fight, looking for one even. He remembered being surprised by their fierceness, their determination to go up against Kitt Sherard and his men—something most were unwilling to do. The rum had been a cover to get to him, or had it?

Beside him, Ren was still bristling. ‘I’d never forgive myself if you died over one of my cargoes, neither would Emma. Promise me you won’t take such a chance again. I don’t want you dead.’

But someone did. That was the part that niggled at him. He’d had five deliveries this week. If whoever had hired the bandits had wanted him, they could have taken him any time that week and had better opportunities to do it. All right, where does that lead you? If that’s true, what does it mean? His brain prompted him to make the next connection. It meant the rum was not a cover or a coincidence. Kitt tried out his hypothesis on Ren. ‘They weren’t trying to kill me over just any rum. They were after me and your rum.’ And when that had failed, they’d been happy to settle for just him in a back alley of Bridgetown.

Ren blew out a breath and withdrew to the decanter. ‘I’m going to need more brandy for this. What aren’t you telling me?’ Kitt could hear the chink of the heavy crystal stopper being removed, the familiar splash of brandy in a glass, but he didn’t turn, didn’t move his gaze from the opaque darkness of the night, not wanting any sensory distractions to interrupt his thoughts. He was close now, so close, if he could just hold on to the ideas whirling through his head and form them into a cohesive whole.

‘There were two men waiting for me back in port,’ Kitt said.

Ren moaned and gave the decanter a slosh to judge the remainder. ‘I don’t think I have enough. Is that why you were late to the Crenshaws’? And here you had me believing it was because you were out carousing.’

Well, that and a certain woman on a certain balcony—not that Ren needed to know that part. The carousing part wasn’t entirely untrue. The fewer people who knew about Bryn’s balcony the better, especially Ren, who had done so much to get him on the list of potential bank investors. Ren had enough bad news tonight without hearing he’d been kissing Mr Rutherford’s daughter, no matter how accidental.

‘Would it be fair to conclude those men are still out there?’ Ren returned to him and handed him the glass. Kitt nodded and waited for the other conclusion to hit. It did. ‘And you travelled out here alone? They could have had you any time on the road. Dammit, Kitt, have you any sense?’

The thought had occurred to Kitt, too. Traffic on the road between Sugarland and Bridgetown was light, especially during the heat of the late afternoon. There were places where an attack would draw no attention even if anyone chanced along. ‘I was prepared for them.’ Kitt shrugged, thinking of the knife in his boot and the pistols he’d slung over his saddle. Part of him had been hoping they’d try again, hoping he could wring some answers from the bastards when they did.

They were standing close together now, Ren’s gaze on his face searching for answers he didn’t have yet. ‘Who would do such a thing? Do you have any idea who wants you dead?’ There was real concern in Ren’s tone and it touched him. Until last year, he’d been alone, cut off from all he knew, all social ties gone except the ones he’d created in this new life of his, but they would never be close, would never be allowed to replace the ones he’d given up. It was too dangerous. Closeness created curiosity and that was a commodity he could not afford. Then Ren had shown up and it was like coming back to life. Here was one of the two people left who knew him and it was gift beyond measure. ‘Who, Kitt?’ Ren asked again.

Kitt shook his head. ‘That’s not the question to be asking.’ That list was rather long, definitely distinguished and would result in a needle-in-the-haystack sort of search. ‘The real question is who would want revenge against both of us?’ That list was considerably shorter. Ren was well liked and an earl besides. There were few who would dare to be his enemy. But there was one...

Suddenly Kitt knew with the starkest of clarity who it was and why it was. It was the scenario that made the most sense, and frankly, it was the scenario he preferred to the other possibilities. The other scenarios were far worse to contemplate, like the one where his past came to the island and destroyed everything he’d built, everything he’d become. If that happened, he wasn’t sure he could protect himself.

He felt better now, back in control. There was relief in the knowing, in having a concrete enemy, although he doubted Ren would share that relief. It was all fairly simple now that all the pieces had come together. He faced Ren. ‘I know who it is. It’s Hugh Devore.’

‘No, it couldn’t be,’ Ren answered in almost vehement denial, but his face was pale. ‘Devore is gone, he promised to leave the island, to leave us alone.’

‘A man will promise any number of things when his life is on the line,’ Kitt said. ‘He’s had a year to rethink that promise and it probably didn’t mean much to him anyway.’ Last year, he and Ren had forcibly exiled three planters from the island after Arthur Gridley had assaulted Emma and attempted to burn down Sugarland. Gridley was dead now, shot by one of his own, but the others were at large, a deal he and Ren had struck with them to avoid exposing Emma to the rigours of testifying at a public trial.

‘Do you know where?’ Ren asked quietly.

Kitt shook his head. He had been the one to sail them to another island and leave them to their exile. The island had been rather remote, barely populated. They’d been free, of course, to leave that island, as long as they didn’t return to Barbados.

‘Cunningham went back to England,’ Kitt said. It wasn’t Cunningham he was worried about. Cunningham had been the one to shoot Gridley, the ringleader. He was done with the group. It was the other two, Elias Blakely, the accountant, and Gridley’s right hand, Hugh Devore, whom Kitt was worried about. ‘I have no idea where the others might have gone.’ Devore would be dangerous. Exile had cost him everything: his fortune, his home and even his wife. Devore’s wife had refused to go with him. She’d taken Cunningham’s cue and gone back to her family in England.

Ren’s face was etched with worry, as well it should be. Devore was vindictive and cruel and Ren had a family now; a wife and a new baby on the way, beautiful things to be sure, but liabilities, too. Devore would not hesitate to use those treasures against him and Ren knew it.

Kitt clapped a hand on Ren’s shoulder in comfort. ‘I’ll find them.’ He could handle trouble of this nature. He would protect Ren with every breath in his body. It had been Ren who had hidden him that long last night in the dark hours before the tide, Ren who had stood against the watch when they’d come. Kitt would never forget.

‘You don’t need to protect me,’ Ren said with quiet steel. ‘This is not England, Kitt, and I’m not your addle-pated brother. You do not need to sacrifice yourself for me.’

Kitt dropped his hand, his gaze holding Ren’s. Ren was one of the few who could make that comment, in part because it took a certain boldness to remind Kitt of his family, and in part because there were only two people outside of that family who knew the truth. Ren was one, Benedict Debreed was the other. Kitt blinked once and looked away, the only concession to emotion he would make. ‘Perhaps not sacrifice, but you’ll need me to watch your back and Emma’s.’

Ren grinned. ‘That offer I will take.’

The emotion eased between them and Kitt smiled back. The crisis, the bad news, had passed for now. ‘In the meanwhile, I’ll set up another deal for your rum and you can tell Emma everything will be fine.’

Ren’s eyes drifted to the clock on the desk at the mention of his wife. Kitt laughed. Even after a year of marriage, Ren was thinking about bed, about Emma. ‘You don’t have to stay up with me,’ Kitt assured him with a wolfish grin. ‘I can finish my brandy all by myself.’

Ren hesitated. ‘I can wait a few more minutes—you haven’t told me about the new banker in Bridgetown yet.’

‘No, you can’t wait. It’s written all over your face how much you want to be with her.’ Kitt chuckled. ‘Go, the rest of my news can keep until morning. We’ll have another good talk before I leave tomorrow.’ He shooed Ren off with a gesture of his hand.

‘Well, if you’re sure?’ Ren set down his glass, already halfway to the door.

‘I’m sure. Goodnight,’ Kitt called after him with a laugh.

Kitt took a swallow, listening to the tick of the clock. The room was quiet without Ren and he let all the dangerous thoughts come, the ones he’d struggled to suppress these last few days, the surge of envy at all Ren had and that he could never have. It wasn’t that he coveted Emma or the baby or the plantation. It was that he could never have such a family himself. Nor could he ever claim the family he’d once had.

In the last year both Ren and Benedict had married happily and against no small odds. That wasn’t the strange part. Men like them, men with titles and obligations, got married all the time. They were expected to. They were expected—required even—to stand at stud for the benefit of their great families and procure the next generation in exchange for dowries that would sustain the financial burden of expanding the family line. The strange part was, despite those expectations, Ren and Benedict had managed to marry for love, to marry beyond their obligations.

In doing so, they’d turned marriage into something otherworldly, something Kitt had not thought possible when he’d made his sacrifice. But now, seeing that it was possible, well, that changed everything. Only it was six years too late to change anything for him. He was Kitt Sherard, adventurer extraordinaire, lover nonpareil, a man who lived on the edge of decency in his occupation as a rum runner among other things. He didn’t pretend all his cargoes were legal, just some of them, enough of them, to massage Bridgetown society into tolerating him among their midst. He had only what he’d created for himself: a home, a ship, even his name. He was a self-fashioned man who came from nowhere, belonged to no one, was claimed by no one. This identity as a man from ‘nowhere’ suited him, even if it made him socially questionable. It wasn’t the sort of background mamas wanted their daughters to marry into. Nor would he allow them to. That meant he should leave Bryn Rutherford alone. There was no need, no point, in tempting them both into foolishness.

She had been right today. More right than she knew. He wasn’t the marrying kind. She’d only been talking about his flirtatious behaviour. The life he lived was dangerous and unpredictable, enemies lurking in the shadows, as illustrated by the latest turn of events. But he didn’t have a choice, not a real choice anyway. It had to be this way. He was destined to be alone. Alone kept him safe, kept others safe.

His life kept him busy, made him rich enough to buy any pleasure he wanted, any distraction he needed to keep his mind off the past, because it wasn’t just the past he remembered, it wasn’t just the sacrifice he remembered, but also the guilt—he’d run to save himself when perhaps he should have stayed and saved others first.

Kitt poured a third glass, trying hard to push away the memories. He could not imagine bringing a wife and a family into the mire of his past or the peril of his present. Indeed, they would only be liabilities and they would always be at risk. He’d not be able to concentrate on his work if he was always worried about them. What was the point of having a wife, a family, if he didn’t care enough to worry about them? He knew himself well enough to know he’d want to worry. It had been concern over another that had brought him to this state of life in the first place. His thoughts went to the man Passemore had shot. Was there a wife and children waiting for the dead man even now? Were people wondering and worrying when he didn’t come home?

He saw his own family in the sad picture such an image painted; his once-brilliant, sparkling family. Had they learned to laugh again without him? He hoped so. He didn’t want to imagine them grey and wilted—the way they’d looked the last time he’d seen them. The scandal had broken them. Did they still wait expectantly for some small piece of news about him from Benedict the same way he coveted the mail packet?

Benedict’s letters were the only connection he allowed himself, the only risk he allowed himself where his family was concerned. He cherished each scrap of news. His brother, his twin, was courting Viscount Enderly’s daughter. An engagement was in the offing.

Kitt had rejoiced over that in the last letter. It proved his choice had been worth it. The scandal had been survived, by them at least. But there was pain, too. He wouldn’t be there for the wedding, wouldn’t be there to stand beside his brother as a witness, wouldn’t be there to act as uncle to the children that would follow. Only in the dark, fortified with brandy, did Kitt ever permit himself to admit how much he missed his brother. But to see him, to contact him, would be to condemn him and Kitt loved him far too much to risk it even if it had killed him to sever that tie. To those who suspected he still lived, he was a pariah. To those in London who believed him dead, his death was considered a good riddance and a just one.

Kitt couldn’t imagine a woman who would be willing to risk stepping into his life once she truly understood it. His bed, on a temporary basis, was one thing. A woman needn’t know too much about him to enjoy his bed. He had a woman in every port and in some places, he had two. But permanently? Therein lay the risk.

* * *

A hazy, brandy-induced thought came to him. What would Bryn Rutherford do if she knew how he’d amassed his fortune? Would she run screaming to her father or would she throw caution to the wind like she had yesterday? One had to wonder if Bryn Rutherford was in the habit of living recklessly when no one was looking or if it was merely a momentary lapse in judgement? Kitt hoped for the latter.

It had been rather heady business today in the garden, sparring with her, the lightness of their banter cleverly interspersed with a more serious hunt for information. She’d been a rather tenacious opponent, shrewd enough to know he was not all he seemed. He’d actually found arguing with her a bit arousing, watching those grey eyes flash, knowing her mind was working as they stood close enough to do something other than argue. He’d thought about it—about silencing her with a kiss—she’d thought about it, too. He’d seen it in her eyes. She’d been aware of his intentions when his eyes had dropped to those full, kissable lips of hers.

Here in the dim room, the darkness encroaching, the memory had the power to pleasantly rouse him. But Kitt decided against it. Kissing her would have been the easy answer and a belittling one for such a fine opponent. If he couldn’t have her trust, he’d at least have her respect. It was a starting point at least. Ren had used his title, his English influence via Benedict back in London, to get his name on the list of potential investors. Kitt would not let the opportunity go languishing for the sake of a few kisses.

Kitt shifted in his chair to a more comfortable position, letting his mind drift. Bryn Rutherford was something of a conundrum. She’d been fire in his arms, eager to meet him on equal ground. Yet the woman he’d encountered at the dinner party had been concerned with propriety, which posed a most certain dichotomy to passion. Under usual circumstances, such juxtaposition would be worth exploring, intriguing even. But circumstances were not ‘usual’, not even for him. He had a cargo of rum to trade, new investments to consider and an assassin on his heels.

As tempting as an affaire was, it was too distracting for him and too dangerous for her. His safety and hers demanded he keep her at arm’s length. If ever there was a time to pursue a new flirtation, this was definitely not it. He needed all his wits about him.

Chapter Six

One certainly needed their wits about them to keep up with the Selbys, or even just to be up with them. Bryn had awakened to the surprise—and not the good sort of surprise either—of finding James and his mother at the breakfast table. Breakfast had become a time of day reserved just for she and her father, a time to talk plans. Having the Selbys present felt like an intrusion into intimate territory.

But there they were, with plates filled full of eggs and sausage and more than enough talk to go around. James and his mother leapt from topic to topic with lightning speed in an attempt, no doubt, to show off their conversational acuity. But it was bloody difficult to follow, with an unladylike emphasis on the ‘bloody’. It was a dizzying array of subjects, really, ranging from butterflies to weather to books and back again to butterflies. The book had been about butterflies so perhaps they’d never truly left the topic.

‘Butterflies are a rarity in Barbados, which makes studying them a challenge. It has something to do with our position in the Atlantic that I don’t pretend to understand.’ James waved a fork in the air to punctuate his point. ‘But it does make their presence here special. The Mimic is one of my favourites. It looks like a Monarch, but it’s the story behind it that makes it so extraordinary. Scholars believe it came from Africa and was brought over on the slave ships or perhaps it was blown here on the currents of a storm.’

Not unlike many of the people who’d sought the sanctuary of the island, Bryn thought. Certainly there was the literal application of the idea. The recent abolition of slavery meant that many of the freedmen had come here as slaves. There was a figurative application, too. People like she and her father, people looking for a fresh chance, blown here metaphorically on the winds of their personal storms. Men, perhaps, like Kitt Sherard.

‘I’ve just recently been able to add an Orion to my collection,’ James told the table at large. ‘An Orion is grey and blends in terrifically with things like old leaves, which makes catching one difficult.’

For an instant, the image of a butterfly garden filled Bryn’s mind. It was the first interesting thing James Selby had said. She was rather surprised he had such a garden. She wouldn’t have guessed it of him. A butterfly garden would be so bright and colourful, a perfect tropical accessory. She could imagine all the little butterflies gaily fluttering around.

Selby’s next words shattered the image. ‘I finally caught one up near Mont Michael a few weeks ago. I took it home and pinned it in the centre of my display case, I’m that proud of it.’

Pinned. Trapped. Dead. Bryn discreetly lowered her fork of eggs and opted for a sip of tea instead. Her vision had been a moment’s fancy. She silently chastised herself. James Selby didn’t have a butterfly garden, it had been silly to think so. Lepidopterists pinned things. It was what they did. It was what men like Selby did. He wasn’t a cruel man, merely young and shallow. He’d probably not even thought to consider what his actions would mean to the butterfly even though they’d impact the butterfly considerably more than they’d ever impact Selby.

She’d met men like Selby before. They were thick on the ground in London’s ballrooms. Selby would waltz through life never considering the impact he would have on others. He was an earl’s grandson. He didn’t have to. No one would expect it of him, not even his wife, who would only be a butterfly of a different sort to Selby; something to pin to his arm, to display in his home, another decoration along the same lines as his fine taste in carpets.

She must have had a distasteful look on her face. When she looked down the length of the table, her father gave her an inquisitive arch of his eyebrow. She immediately pasted on a smile and received one from him in return. In fact, his was positively beaming. Uh-oh. She didn’t like that smile. She scaled back hers to something more aloof and polite.

She had to be careful here. She didn’t want to foster false hopes and she knew exactly what was afoot: a match and one, that on paper, would be regarded as perfect in every way. Selby was young, in his mid-twenties, not unattractive in a well-kept sort of way, someone who with the right guidance could be moulded into a successful gentleman. She’d seen his file before they’d left England. She’d seen all of the investors’ files. She’d spent the voyage studying each of the recommended investors and there’d been countless letters and communications between them and her father even before that. When she’d met Selby it wasn’t as if she was meeting a stranger. In many ways she’d known him months before the actual meeting.

He was the grandson of an earl with a small inheritance of his own from his father. He was in the Caribbean managing the family’s sugar interests, cutting his teeth before taking over properties in England that would come to him upon his thirtieth birthday. His prospects were not much different than those of a second son and entirely respectable. His situation and expectations were very much akin to hers.

Oh, yes, she knew precisely where this was going and why. She wasn’t the only one who’d made promises to her mother. Her father had made them, too. But she’d also made a vow to herself, one that would inevitably collide with her father’s plans. She only hoped when it did that her father would concede. He’d always been the permissive parent, growing up. He’d been the one who allowed her to ride astride, to swim in the swimming hole, to spend the afternoons hunting with Robin Downing, the squire’s son, although he probably shouldn’t have.

Selby kept talking. It was easy to smile when she thought of those afternoons with Robin. They’d both been reckless sorts—it was what had made them such good friends. As they’d grown up, though, that recklessness had transformed from dares over climbing trees to something wilder, more dangerous. More than one kiss had been stolen on those adolescent hunting trips. Perhaps there had even been a time when she’d fancied marrying Robin, but a squire’s son wasn’t an adequate match for the Earl of Creighton’s niece and her mother knew it. Young Robin turned twenty-one and found himself off on a Grand Tour. Then her mother had taken ill and her little family was off on a tour of their own, albeit less grand, from spa to spa searching for a cure that didn’t exist.

Now she and her father were here. This was to be a new beginning for them both. Bryn was honest enough to admit she didn’t know what she wanted from that new start, but she did know what she didn’t want and that was a copy of London only with different scenery. She could not be James Selby’s latest butterfly, no matter what promises had been made.

‘I think Selby’s plantation opportunity sounds like the perfect investment.’ Her father’s words drew her back into the conversation with an alarming jolt, the words ‘Selby’ and ‘opportunity’ reminding her rather poignantly of Kitt Sherard’s comment in the garden. Selby wouldn’t know an opportunity if it jumped up and bit him in the arse. Now here were those same two words again in a different, even contradictory context. They couldn’t both be right. What had she missed while she was busy letting her thoughts wander behind a pseudo-smile?

Selby took her silence for ignorance and leapt into the breach with an explanation couched in slightly patronising terms as if she couldn’t be expected to fully understand. ‘Plantation stocks are a popular method for making money. One doesn’t have to do more than write the cheque. We invest, someone else manages and we pick up the profits at the end of the season. There are countless smaller islands that might support a single large plantation if one can stand the isolation.’ Selby gave her an indulgent smile. ‘The best part is, we might never have to set foot on the island. All the work is done by someone else.’

‘If it works out—’ her father picked up the conversation, his face more animated than it had been in a year ‘—we could have the board look into a larger investment once it’s assembled. This will be a trial run.’

We. She didn’t think for a moment her father meant her in that pronoun. By ‘we’ he meant Selby. He’d certainly taken to Selby quickly enough. She supposed it was natural. He’d exchanged letters with many of the investors months before leaving England, Selby included. Only Sherard had not written directly. All of his correspondence had come through the Earl of Dartmoor’s brother-in-law, Benedict DeBreed. Like her, her father felt that he knew many of the men before actually meeting with them in person. The two of them had spent countless hours on board ship discussing each one until the faceless investors had taken on a certain familiarity.

She might have been jealous of all the attention her father lavished on James Selby if it wasn’t for the fact that she knew her father needed her. They were partners in this venture—silent partners: the men were not the kind to tolerate the presence of a woman in finance. But she had a job to do that only she could do. She was to vet the ladies and determine what sort of wives and lives these potential investors had.

Investors had to be more than the sum of their chequebooks. Money might get one in the door, but one needed ethics and a particular quality about oneself to stay, especially when they would be putting other men’s money on the line. That’s where the mystery of Kitt Sherard came in. He had money and connections. Did he have the ethics, too? Those were the questions she’d be attempting to answer today on her shopping trip with Martha Selby, Alba Harrison and Eleanor Crenshaw.

Sneed entered the breakfast room to announce the arrival of her shopping guests and her pulse speeded up. Time to go to work and, if she was lucky, time to play a little, too. Her outing today wasn’t just about vetting the women. At the very least, she hoped to draw the women out about him and where he fit in all of this. If she had her way—and she almost always got her way—she’d ‘accidentally’ meet up with the captain. Bryn rose and smoothed the folds of her white-sprigged skirts. This was one of her favourite gowns with its tiny apple-green flowers and wide matching green sash that set off her waist. She had a certain effect on men when she wore it. She was confident Kitt Sherard would be no different. She was very good at getting what she wanted and today she wanted answers.

* * *

She needed to be careful what she wished for. Three hours into shopping, Bryn had all the answers she wanted and more. Alas, none of them were about the more interesting subject of Captain Sherard. However, she had all the impressions she needed of Eleanor Crenshaw, Alba Harrison and Martha Selby, which also meant she had got more than an earful of the merits associated with her son. She’d not quite believed someone could be bored to death, but she was a believer now.

Selby’s mother had spent a good portion of the day chattering about James’s attributes, a sure sign that whoever married him would have to answer to Martha. It was also clear that Martha was more than happy to turn the financial aspects of life over to her son. She’d mentioned more than once what a relief it was to have James manage everything for her. ‘A proper woman should never have to worry over things like money,’ she said with a flutter of her fan. Bryn could almost hear the unspoken words that followed the statement: and I am a most proper woman, thanks to James.

To that, Alba Harrison had given a soft smile and agreed. ‘Edward handles everything except my household budget.’ There was pride behind that smile, as if ignorance was anything to be proud of. Bryn’s temper started to rise. It might have been fuelled by her disbelief that wives of investors could be so blasé about their own financial ignorance or it might simply have been that she was in a peevish mood, brought on by Martha Selby’s incessant prattle.

Couldn’t they see such ignorance wasn’t in their best interest? The lessons of her childhood surged to the fore. Her mother had schooled her early in life on the subject and importance of a woman’s financial independence. That was one lesson that had taken. When men lost fortunes they could rebuild them or put a gun to their heads in a discreet room at a gambling hell, but it was the women who paid, the women who lost their homes, their security. A woman risked far more by relying on a man’s good sense. For that reason alone, a woman should be an informed and active participant in a family’s financial dealings.

Bryn knew her attitude wasn’t popular, but her temper had the better of her. Before she could rethink the wisdom of her comment, the temptation to goad their thoughts was tumbling out of her mouth. ‘Don’t you ever want to know where your money comes from and where it goes? How much it makes? Isn’t it a little bit dangerous to be so blind?’ In her opinion, it was more than a little bit dangerous. Both her parents had instilled in her the belief that a strong financial acumen showed no preference in gender. Her father had been proud of how quickly she’d grasped the concepts of investment banking.

The ladies stared at her with identical looks of confusion. ‘No, it’s a relief really, my dear. It’s one less thing to worry about,’ Mrs Harrison said softly, her tone somewhere between polite correction and gentle instruction. Mrs Selby seemed to be making a mental note, probably something to the extent of her being an unsuitable bride for James. That stung.

Bryn squared her shoulders, stood a little taller and told herself it was for the best. She had no intentions of being a suitable bride for James. But it still hurt. She was a Rutherford. As such, she was used to being found eminently suitable. That James Selby’s mother, a woman who had only a few of the barest claims to true society, would find her lacking was a bit of a blow to the ego.

They stepped into a shop on Swan Street that handled imported European furniture. The interior was dim after the brightness outdoors and it took a moment for Bryn’s eyes to adjust. Even with her wide-brimmed hat on for protection today, the sun had played havoc with her vision, something she had yet to get used to after the perpetual grey skies of London.

She was still blinking when the man at the counter finished his discussion with the proprietor and turned towards them. ‘Ladies, good day.’ He gave them a little bow she’d recognise anywhere for its slightly sardonic nature, even in the interior of a dim little furniture shop. Then he turned the full force of his attentions in her direction, so urbane, so polite, it was hard to reconcile him with the ruthless seducer-interrogator he’d been in her garden, challenging her with his words, his body. ‘Miss Rutherford, how are you besides sun-blinded?’

Kitt Sherard! Her first thought was that the fates had decided to smile on her after all. She was beginning to think they’d deserted her entirely after enduring three hours of tedious discussion and

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.