Dunham

Chapter 10

10

Elliott's smile deepened when Fury blushed, arose abruptly, strode across the cabin, and threw the door open.

"GEORGE!" she bellowed. "FOOD!"

He watched as she went about the cabin tidying things that were already tidy until they had achieved some perfection only she could discern. Her hair swirled about her hips with every move she made. Instead of the pink braid that had originally caught his eye, when loose and in the harsh spring dawn, her hair was a lovely Venetian blonde.

Aye, he should be incensed that she had ferreted him out so quickly, but he should have expected that. She was no fool. Any experienced sailor and sharp observer could draw the conclusions she had were they afforded the opportunity to observe, which was precisely why he had never let anyone else that close.

Yet now he knew that the minute he told her of his betrothal to a twenty-three-year-old American girl he had never met, whose name he could not remember, his time with Fury would be over—irrevocably.

He wasn't surprised, but he was rather seasick at the lost opportunity. The only thing he could do was enjoy this time with her in order to have one good memory to take with him into his interminable future, the one in which he was forever trapped, bound by duty.

She returned to him, scooping her cat up in her arms along the way, and once again sat on the edge of the bunk, her arse against his hip. He drew a finger down her arm, and then up again, caressing her until she shivered and sighed with obvious delight.

"What did you study at Oxford?"

"Law," he answered before he realized what she had said. "Hell's bells," he muttered when she began to laugh. "How did you know that?"

"I can hear it in your voice." He stared at her and her smile deepened. "'Tis not obvious, so do not fret that someone else will find you out. I have an ear for accents and languages."

Languages. That was a safe topic. "Oh? Your accent is barely American."

"'Twould be no wonder," she said matter-of-factly. "I speak six languages more or less fluently and have spent most of my life on the deck of a ship with men who spoke ten more and every variety of English I know of."

"I confess I am fluent only in English and French. Whatever Latin I learned has long since vanished."

"I know no Latin, so you have my advantage there."

"And the other four?"

"Arabic, Portuguese, Spanish, and Dutch. French is my second language, as 'tis the lingua franca of the Barbary Coast. Portuguese was my most difficult language to acquire."

"Ah, yes," he drawled. "You attended University of Coimbra, so your Portuguese is academic, no? And you studied astronomy and mathematics with Doctor Covarrubias."

She reached out and tweaked his nose. "That is no great secret, Sir."

"Nor that he was lover number one."

Her palm landed softly on his chest and she leaned forward, her smile mischievous. "He still is," she whispered. Elliott wished he'd killed the bastard in Virginia, but she shrugged when his eyes narrowed. "Do you care to tell me your name, or for me to examine your inability to wed for love, we may then discuss Rafael. Men who marry for duty must choose an appropriate woman and by anyone's defining, I am as far from appropriate as the sun."

She had him there—and he despised the fact of it. He struggled to find another topic. "I heard a rumor you are a musician."

"I sing," she answered airily. "Soprano. Also not a secret."