Cloud grinned, closing his eyes. “Good. I knew I was telling the right person.”
Her hands moved across his collarbones. Her fingers brushed against his neck and through his hair. “Let’s take care of the most serious problem first.”
“And that would be?” His hands began to unfasten the buttons of her shirt. His fingers slid beneath the material to stroke her breasts.
She pulled away suddenly and addressed him sternly, laughter in her eyes. “I thought it was your exhaustion but there appears much you can still do. I will see about the other matters.” She started to move from the bunk but he caught her wrist and pulled her back. His grip was urgent, his fingers pressing firmly against the pulse in her wrist. She did not resist.
They undressed each other hurriedly, frantically, unable to prolong the inevitable joining of their bodies with tender phrases, light caresses, or gentle kisses. Somehow, they realized those things had already been done. Covert glances on deck, when amber locked on green for a fleeting moment, had accomplished the task more thoroughly than words and delicate manipulations of fingers, mouths, and tongues. It was as if their actions the entire day had been in preparation for this moment.
Their embrace was fierce and Alexis found herself straining against Cloud’s familiar contours, wanting to know the angle of his elbow with the soft inner curve of her own, wanting to feel the flat of his abdomen flush against the slightly rounded slope of her belly. She tried to get a sense of her own body through the palms of his hands as they skimmed her back, pausing briefly at the base of her spine, then causing her to shiver delightfully as the pads of his thumbs ran the length of her backbone to her neck, then over her shoulders to trace her collarbone. She wondered if he could feel her skin tingle beneath his fingers or detect heat from her flesh that rivaled his own. What did he taste when his mouth touched her lips, her shoulder, or her breast? Did he find her bittersweet or was she tangy, perhaps salty, as she found him? His nose brushed her temple when his tongue outlined her inner ear and she was curious if she had a unique fragrance he might associate with her. She breathed deeply and found Cloud to be a heady combination of briny sea air and his own special musky scent she thought very masculine and attractive. As their bodies meshed and she called his name and her need in the same breath she wondered if she warmed him with her body as he warmed her when he filled her. And he seemed to know what she was thinking because he whispered he wanted this loving to go on forever, that she was necessary for his existence, and the manner in which she opened herself to him, gave to him, humbled him even while he sought to lose himself in her. In the end they were lost in one another.
Afterward they slept deeply, unaware of any reality except the closeness of their bodies and the word that gave definition to their contact.
Alexis shivered and reached out for the warmth of the body she had grown accustomed to. She shivered again. Gradually she realized Cloud was no longer beside her. Slowly her eyes opened only to shut tightly when they met the light of the lamp. She sat up, waited until her head cleared, and opened her eyes again. Cloud was sitting at her desk, his head propped on an elbow, writing furiously. The sweep of his arm told her he was irritated and the crumpled sheets of paper scattered around him spoke of his frustration. He paused, as if to gather some thought, then the paper in front of him joined the others on the deck.
“The letters?” she asked when he made no move to get fresh paper.
“Yes. I didn’t want to wake you. I’m sorry.”
“It’s all right. Can I help?”
“Come. Sit here.” He reached for a nearby chair and pulled it close to him. “That will be help enough.” His voice was strained but his eyes were warm and inviting.
Alexis rose from the bunk, slipping on her shirt, and crossed the cabin to sit beside him. She curled comfortably into the chair, tucking her feet under her. She waited, knowing he would tell her what the problem was when he was ready. Her hand moved to his arm, easing the tense lines in his muscles with light strokes.
“I get so angry,” he sighed. “I start writing clearly; then I think of what Howe wanted to do to you…to me…to his country, and I’m so angry I end up sounding like a madman. No one will ever do anything to him on the basis of what I’ve written so far.”
His voice began to rise and he pulled away from Alexis.
“All day, Alex, I have been thinking of what I would write…of how to phrase the accusations…facts instead of adjectives. Read one. Go ahead. You’ll wonder if I have a lucid thought in my head.” He reached down to pick up one of the discarded letters but she stopped him.
“I am not interested in the attempts that were not good enough for you. Don’t insult me. Show me your best.” She released his arm and walked to the back of his chair. She put her arms around his neck and bent her head so her mouth was near his ear. “I am only interested in your best. That is all that should concern you.”
He waited until he relaxed under the full effect of her words and then he leaned forward, sliding out of her embrace, and picked up the quill. As he wrote he was conscious not of the words, but of the way they seemed to appear effortlessly before him. He made changes, scratched out paragraphs, but he did not have to discard an entire sheet.
Alexis moved away from him, sensing she had ceased to exist for the time being. She poured them each a glass of wine. His went unnoticed, untouched, while she sipped hers slowly, settling back into her chair. Occasionally, during a pause in his thoughts, his hand would reach out to touch her thigh, her shoulder, her hair. She was not certain he was aware of these movements but they’d seemed to give him the same reassurance she had sought earlier from him. She did not know when she fell asleep, only that she must have, for strong arms were enfolding her, lifting her, and when she was in her bunk they did not leave her.
During breakfast Alexis read the final work. When she finished she placed it to one side and looked at Cloud. “Are you satisfied with the letter?”
“I’d still be writing and you’d still be in that chair if I wasn’t.”
“It’s very good.”
“I know.” His fingers curled around her hand, squeezing it briefly.
Alexis accepted his silent thank you, returning it with a firm smile. “Now to get it to Charleston,” she said, sighing.
Cloud frowned. “How difficult do you think it will be?”
“Very. But not impossible. We’ve run French blockades in British ports, British blockades in French ports, Spanish blockades in any port they feel like congesting. It seems the whole world is concerned with everyone but themselves. I don’t suppose it will be too difficult slipping past the British into an American port. We have an advantage because the war is only a few months old—the British will not have their blockade well organized yet.”
“What flag will you fly?”
“Stars and Stripes.”
Cloud laughed. “You say that like an American.”
Alexis regarded him curiously. “If you mean with pride—of course. I have been an American all my life—up here.” She tapped her head. “I did not always know it. Even when I left London I didn’t know enough about the United States to realize it was the country that would hold the same truths I did. I only knew London had nothing for me.”
