It was an ache that ever strummed in the center of his chest. He woke with it in the morning and took it to bed with him at night. He’d experienced nothing like it in his life—and that was how he knew it was true.
This wasn’t about winning or losing…vanquishment or defeat.
It was about something bigger.
It was about the possibility that he might not spend his life with her.
Actually… Was his plan a good one? Didn’t plans need to be discarded sometimes? He understood that from his own work. Sometimes a plan contained a fundamental, catastrophic flaw and needed to be scrapped and tossed into the rubbish.
Oh, he was a fool.
Beatrix wanted to see Paris… He was going to Paris… Didn’t a new plan work itself out from there?
Perhaps the storm was a sign… That he return to London, bundle Beatrix into a carriage, and haul her to Paris. Except he wasn’t sure kidnapping was the most expedient way to achieve a viable future with a woman.
Yet…he couldn’t put two countries and a large body of water between them without talking to her.
A new plan came to him with sudden urgency.
He would pay the ship captain an exorbitant amount of blunt to hold anchor for a few days—and return to London.
He wouldn’t cross the sea without knowing his fate.
“Well, aren’t you a dark and stormy one?” came a throaty voice that sounded as if it had been worn out by all manner of life.
He angled back to address the lady who had replaced the sea dog at his side. She wasn’t one of the respectable ladies, but rather the other sort said the saucy smile on heavily rouged lips.
“If you will pardon me.” He made to stand.
A hand clamped around his forearm, preventing his progress. “I never did mind a storm-tossed bed,” she continued, as if her invitation hadn’t been clear. “With the right sort of chap.”
He had no time for this. He dug a crown from his pocket with his free hand and held it up in the scant space between them. “Not tonight.”
Or ever.
The coin was plucked and tucked within the considerable depths of the strumpet’s bosom before he could blink. “Your loss,” she said with a toss of the head.
Not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, he shot to his feet and zigzagged through the taproom, a majority of whose patronshad begun belting out rollicking sea shanties, before finding himself outside beneath a shockingly clear night sky. The storm had blown itself out, leaving an almost eerie stillness in its wake. The Channel crossing would be possible inside an hour.
No matter.
His mind was made up.
He was returning to London.
Beneath a fresh indigo sky glittering with rain-washed stars, he made straight for the packet, determination in every step. On his way to seek out the captain, the first mate intercepted him on the deck. “Is that Mr. Deverill?”
“Aye.” He hardly slowed. “What is it?”
“Your, erm,friendarrived.”
Dev’s eyebrows crashed together. “Friend?”
Even as the question emerged, his feet stumbled to a stop, and he knew.
Imogen.
She was another reason he’d left London.
