Page 5 of Gabriela and His Grace (The Luna Sisters #3)
Threads of gold, pink, and violet were just weaving across the horizon when Gabby stepped out of the interior passage and onto the promenade deck. Wrapping a shawl tightly around her shoulders, she shivered in the early morning air, white halos of steam puffing from her lips.
It wasn’t like her to awaken before dawn, but she’d not yet adjusted to the pitch and roll of the ship, which had jerked her awake more times than she could count.
Gabby had stared at the ceiling of her cabin for long minutes, listening to Lucia’s even breaths, feeling as if the room were shrinking in around her.
She’d always despised confined spaces, and with her head pounding, she escaped for the welcoming expanse of the ship deck.
Tipping her head back, Gabby sucked salty sea air into her lungs and then expelled it, and her discomfort, in a long whoosh.
And then she heard it. Coughing, followed by a gagging noise that made Gabby’s nose crinkle.
Apparently someone was struggling with motion sickness, and she pivoted to see if she could offer assistance…
only to draw up short. For, leaning against the railing, a sickly tinge to his pallor, was Whitfield.
He dragged a handkerchief from his coat pocket and wiped it across his brow, his shoulders heaving with his labored breaths.
Had Gabby ever seen him so discomposed? She couldn’t recall, and sympathy swelled in her chest…
which she resented. The duke didn’t deserve her sympathy.
Still, Gabby wasn’t heartless, and with a sigh she quietly made her way to him. “You don’t strike me as a man to be felled by seasickness.”
Not exactly kind, but she reasoned it was the best she could do.
Whitfield’s frame instantly stiffened, before his shoulders drooped. Turning his chin, he glanced back at her and offered a brief smile. “Well, you are in good company, for I didn’t expect it, either.”
Gabby hummed in the back of her throat as she took a step closer. “I must say—”
“Must you?”
“—that I almost believed you incapable of human afflictions,” she continued, as if he hadn’t spoken. Gabby didn’t let any man speak over her. “You being a duke and all.”
He opened his mouth to respond, but the ship dipped sharply then, and Whitfield turned to grip the railing with both hands. His head dropped forward, and it took him a moment to say, “I don’t know what I did to offend Poseidon.”
A laugh bubbled up her throat, but she quickly swallowed it. Gabby wrapped her shawl tighter about herself even as she inched closer. “Isa had horrible seasickness on our voyage to England. I had never seen her so listless.”
“Listless. That’s an appropriate word to describe how I’m feeling.” Whitfield’s chest rose and fell with a sigh. “First your warm welcome, and now this stingy greeting from the sea. This trip across the Atlantic seems determined to humble me.”
Heat rushed up her cheeks. “Yes, well, that was not well done of me. I was surprised…” She dropped her head. “And I acted rudely. I apologize.”
She glanced up to find Whitfield looking at her, his brows now high on his forehead.
“Don’t look so shocked,” she snapped…and then bit her tongue. After a pause, Gabby licked her lips and tried again. “I know when I’m in the wrong.”
“So you know when you’re in the wrong, yet choose to not always confess it.” His eyes narrowed. “Is that it?”
Gabby considered this for a moment, and eventually nodded. “I have a healthy dose of self-awareness…although I’m often lacking in empathy. And patience.”
“Hmm,” the duke said, turning to stare back out on the ocean. “I wouldn’t say you’re uncaring.”
“You wouldn’t?” Gabby’s brow furrowed.
“I’m well aware you have no care for me, Miss Luna,” he said on a snort, “but I’m not ignorant of how you give it to others.”
“What do you mean?”
The corner of Whitfield’s mouth kicked up. “I know of the charitable ventures you engage in.”
“Oh,” she murmured, dropping her gaze to study the planks beneath her feet.
Gabby should have known the duke was aware of the work she had done with her women’s group.
Although they had fundraised to provide aid to widows and young mothers within Whitechapel and beyond, they had begun to organize an official effort to petition Parliament to take up the right of women to vote.
Gabby had worked alongside several friends to gather signatures for the petition, and she felt terrible that she had left before all the signatures had been acquired.
Another thought that plagued her was how she would fill her time once she arrived in Mexico.
Ideally, Gabby would like to aid the resistance in some way.
Perhaps she could assist Isabel in her work for Senora Maza de Juárez or even act as a diplomat, earning the regard of imperialists, who would be keen to form alliances now that the French empire was crumbling.
But such plans would matter only if her father didn’t immediately send her back to England for not asking to return—
“What charitable or political causes will you commit yourself to once you return to your life in Mexico?”
Gabby blinked. Of course Whitfield would ask her such a thing. But Gabby was done considering her future in Mexico when so much about it seemed uncertain. So Gabby rushed to divert the attention from herself.
“I didn’t know you were invested in the Camino Rojo mine,” she blurted out, containing a cringe over how forceful her voice sounded.
If Whitfield thought it strange, he didn’t show it. Instead, he raised a shoulder as he carefully folded his handkerchief and put it in the pocket of his coat. “My letter to you announcing the news must have been lost in the post.”
Gabby’s mouth wobbled as she bit back a laugh. “How terribly rude,” she finally managed.
The duke’s eyes darted to her for a moment, and he promptly looked away again.
Silence enveloped them but it was not uncomfortable. Gabby was usually on edge when she was around Whitfield, always ready to return his pointed jests with barbs of her own.
But there was no bite in Whitfield’s jests now, and Gabby didn’t have the energy to reignite their war of words. Not when the ocean breeze sifted through her hair and cooled the fire of her temper.
“Are you excited to be returning home?”
Gabby blinked as she glanced at him. “ Excited is a strong word.”
The duke pivoted to perch on the railing, his arms crossing over his chest. Once again it appeared his coat seams were fighting a tense battle. “Relieved, maybe?”
She considered this for a moment. “Relieved, yes. Eager, definitely.”
“Eager to see your parents?” Whitfield asked.
“My mother,” Gabby said succinctly.
“Aah,” he said, and nothing more. But it contained a depth of understanding she had not expected.
Gabby rested her hip against the rail. “I assume Gideon has told you of my father.”
Whitfield nodded. “He has. So has Dawson.”
Now it was her turn to say Aah . Gabby had no desire to speak about her father or even to bring thoughts of him into this peaceful moment.
He waited for her on the other side of the ocean, whether he knew it or not, and the thought of his reception made her stomach turn.
Gabby was thankful that Whitfield did not push the topic.
He could have used whatever he knew of Elías Luna and his relationship, or lack thereof, with his youngest daughter to humiliate her, but he didn’t.
Perhaps it was an olive branch. Perhaps they could call a ceasefire to their contentious interactions while away from London.
Perhaps Gabby could return his circumspection with discretion of her own.
Perhaps.
Neither of them said anything more, and the only sounds were the cresting waves and the gulls squawking overhead. Gabby found herself staring at the horizon as the sun prepared to peek over the ocean, a sense of purpose, of hope, swelling in her chest.
Movement in the waters below caught her eye, and she gasped.
“Look, Whitfield, do you see there?” Gabby exclaimed, gesturing to the figures streaking in the water next to the ship.
The duke took a step closer to her, his gaze following the direction she pointed. “Wh-what are they?”
“They’re dolphins!” Gabby laughed as she clapped her hands, looking up at him with a smile. “I was told they like to swim in ship wakes. They’re considered good luck, you know.”
A hint of a smile softened his face, even as he continued to stare down at her and not at the beasts that zipped along in the blue waters below. “I didn’t know.”
“Well, you do now.” Turning back to watch, Gabby laughed again when a dolphin leapt out of the water, its grayish body graceful and carefree. “Aren’t they wonderful?” she cried into the wind.
“Indeed,” he murmured before pivoting to face the ocean again. “I could use a little luck right now.”
So could she. Gabby closed her eyes, soaking in the moment and all the positive energy it presented. She never would have imagined the Duke of Whitfield would be by her side in such a moment of hopefulness. Gabby decided she could afford to share this moment with him…for a spell, at least.
· · ·
Sebastian didn’t quite know how he had found himself the recipient of one of Gabriela Luna’s smiles, but he would not complain. It overtook her whole face and blazed in her greenish-brown eyes.
Not that she was miserly with her smiles, but the offerings she flashed at social events were different.
They were polite, friendly, and usually without depth.
Gabriela knew how to navigate a social situation with a kind word and an attentive gaze.
She deployed her laughs and smiles with a military precision, a talent Sebastian recognized because didn’t he do the same?
But in this moment, with the salty breeze in her hair, and her gaze sparkling with unfettered delight, Sebastian was afraid to move or say anything to pop this idyllic bubble he had found himself in with her.