Page 36 of The Indigo Heiress

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The heart of man is very much like the sea, it has its storms, it has its tides and in its depths, it has its pearls, too.

Vincent van Gogh

Juliet awoke from harried dreams to the pressing need of the chamber pot. How could it be, even when the sea heaved and the cabin slanted, that such mundane functions must be attended to? She climbed out of the hammock to first check on Leith. She’d not heard him cough all night. Her hand crossed the coverlet to lay upon his chest. It rose and fell with steadiness beneath his nightshirt and kept her former panic at bay.

Slowly she began a perilous journey to the gallery, ruing the chamber pot wasn’t beneath the bed. Little, she was learning, made much sense aboard a ship, a wooden world with entirely different rules. Gripping the wall, she tried not to look toward the windows, where the usual unbroken blue ocean had become a wall of black, briny water. The roar of the wind was so loud she nearly lost her nerve to continue.

Was Loveday well and safe? Try as she might, she could not reach the corridor to check. In a breath, the ship rose then dropped so violently it seemed the floor beneath her gave way. Losing her bearings, she nearly fell against the tiled stove, her keening cry half drowned beneath the mounting scream of the storm.

The wind woke him. It cut through the fevered blur of untold days as only something as frightful as a storm could do. Leith pushed himself up on one elbow, aware of the cry that could only have come from Juliet.

Where was she?

A hanging lantern flickered, offering few clues. Though he sensed it was dawn, they seemed to be in a fierce struggle with the blackest gale he’d ever seen. Watching the Atlantic twist and foam beyond the cabin windows failed to steal his courage. He was done with being waited on. Done with dying.

Was she hurt?

Nothing else mattered. As the ship heeled leeward, he made his way none too easily to where she half lay upon the floor. Worn down as he was, his own steps were wobbly as a newborn lamb’s. Sheer stubbornness drove him forward. Ignoring the roiling in his gut, he reached for her and brought her to her feet.

Another lurch pressed them back against the stern window. She fell against him as his arms went round her. With Juliet at the forefront of his mind, Havilah was pushed to the back of it. The realization stunned him and turned the tense moment more tender. He hardly knew her, but she was his wife, and he felt a protectiveness toward the woman who’d been by his side day and night.

Somehow they made their way back to the bed as the ship creaked and groaned and seemed about to break apart. Once they lay down atop the twisted linens he held her in his arms, savoring her softness and scent and the feel of her fine linen nightgown with its lace trim against his roughness.

Had he overheard correctly that she was ... attracted to him? Or had he been imagining things in his stupor? She’d been so adamant in her initial refusal of him that he couldn’t believe she was anything but repulsed. Aye, he must have misheard ... or Loveday was teasing. What did it matter? He hardly felt whole, hardly had the wherewithal to attempt another tie after his colossal failure with Havilah.

Yet he still held his bonny bride despite the storm without and within. Tomorrow he’d return to his hammock. For now, he wanted her near.

Her back to Leith, Juliet lay curved against him, one of his arms draped over her as if safeguarding her from the ship’s fretful rolling. Through the stern windows streamed broad daylight. A spent sea with only the barest ruffle of a wave met her eyes, not the briny watery wall of before. Lord, thank You. She’d not felt such elation since she’d climbed aboard the Glasgow Lass that fractious night.

“Time for a bath and a shave.” The male voice near her ear was threaded with resolve and relief. “And breakfast.”

Was he finally on the mend? Joy sang through her and she rolled over, their faces a handsbreadth apart. “I rather like you bearded.”

His eyes sparked. “You might not if I kissed you.”

Her first kiss. For a trice she forgot to breathe. Her eyes traced his sleepy features, and she found herself wishing his razor was afloat. He was savagely handsome, his rumpled hair a different hue of ink than her own, the dark shadow along his jaw calling out the blue of his eyes and his patrician nose.

She brought a finger to her lips, all too aware of her disheveled state.

“Bethankit we’ll live to see Glasgow.” He coughed into his fist, but the sound had lost its racking depth. “If the gale didn’t blow us off course, we’re closer than we ken.”

She closed her eyes, overcome with gratitude all over again.

He rolled onto his back and looked at the ceiling. “Where’s your miniature?”

“Safely tucked away in your washstand.”

He frowned but said nothing more, leaving her to wonder. The shadow she sometimes sensed about him seemed near again. What was the gist of his thoughts?

Not wanting to dwell on it, she turned away from him, missing the warm weight of his arm about her waist. “I’ll fetch it.”

She handed it to him, then went to the gallery lavatory, giving Loveday’s closed cabin door a fretful glance. When Juliet came out, she knocked and, hearing nothing, opened her sister’s door to find the cabin empty.