He smiled as she picked an unusual pink flower and placed it behind her ear. It refused to stay in place because her hair was too short to grasp it.
“When I see you again,” he said, “I expect you to have that hair of yours grown to the middle of your back. If I find out that you’ve chopped it off again, for whatever reason, I’ll flay you alive.”
Alexis laughed at the threat. Then she sobered suddenly. She took his hand firmly. “It will take years to grow my hair that long. So you mean Oi won’t see ya ’til then?” There was a slight catch in her voice but she checked it. She did not want to make a habit of crying in front of him.
“Who knows the next time I’ll be here,” he said lightly to hide his feelings. He took the delicate frangipani from her hand and twirled it in his own. “But when I do come I expect you to be waiting.”
“Will you tell yer family about me, Pauley? Maybe one of yer boys will marry me. Then you could be me dad.”
Pauley would have liked nothing better than to take her home where she would be accepted by his wife and sons and daughters, but he pushed the thought aside, knowing George and Francine were the best people for her. “You’d frighten off my boys with those penetrating eyes of yours, Alex. The only reason I stand up to your stare is that I’m three full heads taller. I don’t know what will happen when you start meeting people eye to eye. You can make a body feel tiny when you stare him down.”
“Not you, Pauley. Never you. That’s one o’ the things Oi like about you. You never back away. Me brothers an’ sisters turned from me when Oi didn’t take to their teasin’. Sometimes when Charlie would beat me Oi’d stare ’im down. Ooooh, ’e ’ated that. Jest about as much as Oi ’ated ’im fer lookin’ the other way. What do you suppose made ’em do it?”
Pauley did not answer her. He knew the reason others turned away from her. She didn’t know that in her eyes people saw her expectations mirrored and most of them avoided her because they could not meet her demands.
Alexis tightened her grip on Pauley’s hand when she felt his pace slacken. She looked up and followed the path of his gaze until her eyes rested on a house situated on a cliff overlooking the water. “Is that were Oi’m goin’ ta live?” she asked, feeling her heart beat wildly in anticipation of his answer.
“That’s it. Your new home.” He said it without hesitation, knowing that George and Francine would never turn down the gift he was about to offer them.
The breath caught in Alexis’s throat. She could not take her eyes away from the house. She had never expected so much. She blinked once, then several times in quick succession. Each time the same view greeted her. The large house, the wide portico, the thick white columns, and the red tile roof were all still there. Surrounding the house were trees so green she wondered by what right the trees in London made claim to that color. The sun touched the leaves so that they sparkled like emeralds, and the flowers here were even more beautiful than she remembered on her walk through the settlement. A coral bush, glowing like a firework display with yellows, oranges, and crimsons, demanded her attention; even as the belladonna, like a delicate yellow pinwheel, begged to be noticed. These were the colors, the sparks of light, she had seen when she’d pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes. There would be no grays in this existence. She thought she had never seen anything so clean and fresh as this place. The only thing marring it was her own grubby appearance. She held back suddenly, not certain she wanted to go on. Pauley waited patiently, sensing the reason for her hesitation. When he heard her sigh and caught sight of that determined set of her mouth, he pulled her up the hill quickly before she changed her mind.
Alexis followed him, willing her feet to take each step firmly as if she were climbing the rigging of theConstellationagain. She knew when she reached the crest of the hill it would be like being in the crow’s nest.
No one could ever harm her there.
Chapter 2
The next six years held the promise Alexis had envisioned when she first reached the crest of the hill. In the loving protection of George and Francine Quinton she found a contentment she had never known or even hoped existed. Yearning to be worthy of the love she had learned to accept and return, she challenged herself to contribute to her new family.
Under George’s strict eye and encouraging countenance she learned to read and write, and was able to laugh at the mistake she had made selecting her own name. It wasn’t important any longer. Alex Danty was gone. She was Alexis Quinton, secure in the knowledge that no one could take that away from her.
She retained all the perseverance of the child who had at one time dropped her aitches. George was never quite certain how he had been persuaded to allow Alexis to work in his offices, but after a time it ceased to matter.
He ignored the comments others made when he gave her tasks ranging from the most difficult to the most menial. She did them all with equal enthusiasm. George was quick to realize he had found a person capable of running Quinton Shipping. He never tried to conceal his pride when she handled difficult situations smoothly. Her self-confidence was labeled as arrogance by some but that mattered little to him. That quality was a sign of knowing what she was doing as far as he was concerned and he loved her for it.
During the years that Alexis was learning her trade she gradually became aware of her maturation into womanhood. She bore no resemblance to the gangly, tow-headed youth Pauley had introduced to the Quintons. At nineteen her limbs were in perfect proportion to the rest of her tall form and the awkwardness that had plagued her was replaced with a grace some women took years of conscious effort to learn. Francine had told her that her long limbs would be her best asset, but Alexis could not help wondering if asset was quite the right word to apply to the smooth line of her arms and legs. It was getting harder to be taken seriously by some of George’s associates. It had been bad enough when they had treated her as a child, but now they only seemed to see her slender waist and gently swelling hips. She never blushed when they stared at her. She merely waited until their gazes returned to her face; then she discreetly murdered them with a piercing amber glance. It was they who blushed and looked away, embarrassed for having forgotten the business at hand.
At home with Francine, Alexis practiced needlepoint and dancing. She learned how to entertain guests and her graciousness was as natural as her arrogance.
Only on one subject did she and Francine disagree.
“But Alexis,” Francine would protest, “you cannot continue to turn away every young man with a look. You frighten them.”
“I don’t intimidate George or Pauley,” Alexis would return quickly.
“They are different.”
“You mean they’re special.”
“Perhaps,” Francine would concede.
“Don’t you see, Francine? The man I want would never turn away.”
And the subject would be closed until Francine caught Alexis doing it again. She was at a loss to explain Alexis’s peculiar behavior. Her daughter was beautiful, intelligent, and certainly wealthy. It was known throughout the islands that she was George’s choice to run Quinton Shipping in the future. And it was not as if the islands were not without suitable matches. There were planters and ranchers as well as politically ambitious men vying for Alexis’s attention. She, however, seemed interested only in making friends with George’s employees, the men who worked in the offices or the men who sailed his ships.
Francine finally contented herself with tutoring Alexis in social graces. Her daughter hung on each lesson with the same degree of earnestness she exhibited when George was teaching her some aspect of the business. The intensity with which she approached every stage of her education sometimes frightened Francine. Alexis was a formidable young woman, even as she had been a formidable child. The man who would have her love would have to be special indeed, and Francine had to agree with her daughter that Alexis had not met him yet.
Alexis had too much interest in the present to allow herself to dwell on the past. But she thought of Pauley’s return and of her promise to him as her hair grew past her chin, then her shoulders, and finally reached the length he had commanded.
