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PART III

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MAY, 1780
MÉLISANDE GABLES
LONDON, ENGLAND

“MOTHER,” ELLIOTT chirped as he strode through the hall, past the morning room where she was holding court, the ten o’clock sun streaming bright through the front window and bathing her in a serene glow. “A word in the library, if you please.”

His stride never broke, nor did his character—at least, not in front of some of the ton’s most ragged quidnuncs. He hated having people in his house, obliging him to carry his charade where he should not have to.

He entered his library and came to a standstill at the window. He looked out onto the minute patch of grass between the ivy that clung to his house and the ivy that clung to his neighbor’s house three feet away. Two, three more weeks of this masquerade, perhaps longer—however many evenings at the Dovecote it would require to get Celia strong enough to do what he needed done.

“Come,” he said at the knock on the door, listening to Lynch wheel the dowager countess in, after which he closed the doors softly behind her.

“Yes, Tavendish?” she drawled mordantly.

“Did you dismiss your guests?”

“Of course I did.”

“Excellent,” he began immediately. “I’ve been thinking about the conversation we had after which you ceased to speak to me.”

“Do you mean the one wherein you threw up a white flag?”

He turned to see her scowling at him with a goodly mixture of anger and hurt. “Mother,” Elliott said stiffly, now utterly furious, “I had been intending to have a courteous and respectful discussion, but since you are determined to be contentious, I will follow suit.

“As I said, I have thought about our disagreement, but clearly you haven’t even though I politely requested you do so. Thus, I shall end this interview now and we can both continue to believe the other is too proud to admit the other might have a point. So. Never mind. Go on, now, and retrieve your guests before their coaches depart. Apologies for having bothered you.”

She didn’t move. “After all that argument, you now think I’m right?” she said warily.

“No,” he said flatly. “I don’t. But I did begin to think more seriously about diverse schemes I had flirted with during rare bouts of self-pity. Then your last lecture on choice prompted me to attempt to construct one. Thus, you will be happy to know I have made a choice wherein I can have Fury and keep the earldom safe and free and positioned to carry on the next generation.”

A smile grew on her face.

“Of course, it comes with a price.”

Her smile dimmed. “What price?”

“The death of your second son.”

Her gasp was loud. “Elliott, no!” she cried. “Do not do this thing, I beg of you! How can you have Fury if you intend to—”

Confused, Elliott watched her crumble from a petite virago into a tiny old woman who sat hunched over in her chair, sobbing, with her face in her hands.

Then he understood and if he had not already been furious, he would now be. “If you think,” he snarled, “that after all these years and all I’ve endured, I would kill myself now when the worst thing I will have to face is forced elbow-rubbing with politicians, speechifying in the House, and some nebulous fear of discovery and execution, then you know me less well than I thought you did.”

Her head snapped up, her face red and blotchy, wet from tears that still spilled.

“Since I’ve arrived home,” he went on, “I have been accused of no less than cowardice and stupidity—by my family—seasoned with a good dose of mockery for my little macaroni masquerade designed for the express purpose of keeping my neck out of a noose. Which makes it all the more reason I would seek to leave and never come back.”

“I’ve never thought you a coward,” she whispered, horrified. Elliott waited, his eyebrow raised. “Or … stupid.”

“Goddammit!” he roared, picking up a vase and pitching it at the hearth, where it shattered. Not even her flinch could dampen his rage. “I will be so goddamned happy to see the back of this family when I leave.”

“Son,” she whispered, horrified. “Eli!”

“Twenty goddamned years I have spent in service to this family! The things I have done and seen and suffered. The promotions and commendations and letters to the Admiralty, from men I commanded requesting to serve under me again. Stupid men don’t live as long as I have at sea and sometimes even brilliant men don’t. But I would be stupid to continue to sacrifice my happiness for a family that lovingly tolerates my cowardice and stupidity because I brought them ships full of contraband and gold—that they have no idea what I had to do to get—to finance this goddamned title. And the only reason they believe me to be stupid is because I only ever wanted to be a goddamned farmer and everyone knows farmers are a stupid lot. Begone, Mother. I have paid my debt—a debt I did not incur—to you, to Father, and to this goddamned king!”

“Elliott … If not—that—then, what are you going to do?”

“I’m going to Algiers,” he hissed, “to assist my lover to fulfill a debt of honor. And then I will take her and make a life with her … somewhere. Ohio if the Americans win. Buenos Aires if they don’t.”

“What if she won’t go?” she cried desperately.

“Then I will be heartbroken whilst I plow my beautiful virgin, because land is the only thing that is sure.”

“But … you’re the earl,” she whispered, her face ashen. “You would ask Niall to sacrifice his career—”

Elliott cackled. “Oh, what is this now? Are you going to cite duty at me?”

Her jaw tightened.

“I see it now! It was perfectly acceptable, nay convenient—perfect, in fact—for me to sacrifice my ambition because it was beneath us, an embarrassment even, but not Niall, oh no, because he had an acceptable—nay, prestigious—ambition.” His muscles were so tight with anger for which he had no outlet, he grabbed the nearest thing—a crystal decanter of whisky—and hurled it into the fireplace, too.

It didn’t help.

“Niall will be the earl after I … die … so aye. I am choosing to sacrifice Niall’s career on the altar of my selfishness. And you can sleep safe in the knowledge that I took control of my own life whilst securing this family’s future, thereby abating my sorrow with a clear conscience. I hope you apprehend how much control Niall has over his own life right at this moment, when I am planning to walk out that door and never return. We’ll see how he manages his fate once he’s obliged to argue policy in Parliament instead of cases before the court. Which, of course, will also affect Sandy and his career because he will have to find a new barrister with whom he communicates so well.”

Her face was a study in fear and anger, but Elliott simply did not care—nor would he drop her gaze as if he were to be ashamed of his … low … and unaristocratic … ambitions.

“Have you spoken with him?” she whispered.

“Aye, and he is as furious with me as I am with my life.”

They both started when the door flew open, bounced off the wall, then slammed closed again.

“Camille Mélisande!” the dowager countess barked. “What do you think you are doing, intruding upon a private interview, you shameless girl!”

“Mother,” Elliott drawled harshly.

But Camille never flinched and her attention never wavered from Elliott. Her expression was odd, as if—

“Take me with you,” she breathed, wide-eyed. “Please, Elliott, take me with you!”

“Camille!” their mother whispered, aghast.

“I don’t want to wed,” she said desperately. “Right now, at any rate.”

“What about your list?” Elliott asked with sudden bemusement. “I thought you were happy with your plan. You and Viscount Merrill appear to be getting along famously. In fact, he intends to offer for you this very afternoon.”

She flushed. “No, I— I realized how foolish it was. He’s a perfectly wonderful boy and the best of the lot, but I can’t imagine living with him, much less his interminably idiotic mother. I cannot—will not—marry for obligation or even to get out from under Mama’s thumb—”

The dowager countess gasped, but Camille paid her no mind.

“I just— I want to— Elliott, you’re the only person in the world who understands me. I couldn’t bear it if you left me here alone. Please take me with you!”

“Milly, I—”

“You gave Sophie what she wanted!” the girl cried desperately. “Phillip did whatever he pleased without censure. Lucille is like a fat hog in mud, doing what she loves and once you leave, she will no longer fear you will dismiss her. Niall does exactly what he wants. Your lover is possibly the most free woman in the world—a, a, a privateer captain every woman in thetonwishes she could be, and one even Marquess Rathbone respects. Would you leave me alone to the same fate you are escaping?”

Elliott took a deep breath and clapped a hand to his mouth to rub at it whilst he thought. Indeed, she had proven herself quick-witted and smart enough to become a trusted ally—which was why she had been able to pin him on all points. Giving Sophie what she wanted was simple enough, and aye, Lucille would be over the moon with delight.

Why shouldn’t he make all his sisters happy if he could?

“Aye,” he finally said, to his sister’s squeals of joy and his mother’s cries of horror. “You will sail with Fury, should she agree.” Milly’s face lit up like the dawn. “But know this: She is still an agent of the enemy and the Thunderstorm is a vessel of war. She does not suffer idlers on her ship, so you will be expected to stand watch as any able seaman and assist during battle—”

“Battle?!” the countess screeched, then burst into tears. “Elliott, no, I beg you!”

But Elliott ignored her. “Georgina Mocksling has managed to acquit herself to near perfection, and I expect you to do as well or better.”

Camille was bouncing and clapping, twirling and laughing. He regretted the decision even as he made it because his frilly and pampered sister was not Fury, nor any of her women, nor even a hoyden like Lucy, Sophie, and Georgina. But what logical argument could he present that would not leave him and her with a lifetime of regret? It was true: He was the only one in the family who understood her. And … he found himself all too happy not to have to abandon his entire family.

“Ultimately, whether you land on the Thunderstorm or the Silver Shilling, you’ll be aboard a pirate ship for months, deep in Ottoman waters—”

“Elliott!” his mother wailed.

“We will be raiding a sultan’s harem whilst fending off every enemy Fury has made in her long career.” Camille’s eyes grew big, but in terror or excitement, he couldn’t tell. “Hopefully, her father will be with us and we will all leave the Mediterranean alive. Then we’ll head to the Americas. We’ll be taking prizes and killing everyone who either has something I want or gets in my way. You will be expected to work to that end, filthy, backbreaking work along with the rest of us. And then we will be traveling hundreds of miles into wilderness to make our home. This decision is permanent, Milly. Are you sure?”

“Yes, Elliott— I mean, aye, Cap’n!”

By now the countess’s sobs had deadened to helpless weeping. “Elliott. Camille. Please don’t do this.”

His head snapped to look at his mother. He spread his arms wide and leaned toward her. “I am out of words. This is how a man controls his life without regard to any needs but his own: by hurting those he loves. This is the cost I have determined you will bear, Mother, and mayhap you’ll reconsider your philosophies every time you remember that I chose to oblige you to bear it. This is not even the worst I could have done, as I have made adequate and unassailable provisions for you.”

She turned a grievous expression upon Camille. “Have I been such a horrible mother?”

“You want me to be someone I’m not,” she said angrily. “You and Lucy. You think I’m stupid, wanting Lord Covarrubias to marry me because he is so sensible and I am not.”

“No,” the countess whispered, “Camille, I never meant— I— What can I do to convince you to stay? I will do it. Anything, so that you will not leave me and go off to sea.”

Elliott half expected Milly to buckle in the face of this sincere plea, but her mouth only tightened further. “Nothing,” she said low. “’Tis too late, and I’ve no reason to believe your habit will change once my cooperation is assured.”

The look of sheer torment on the countess’s face when she turned back to him was real. “Son— Elliott— I understand. Truly, I do. Please … ”

“Aye, I know you do, somewhere in there. Your pride simply will not allow you to admit it.”

She sat in her chair, bowed, broken, her shoulders shaking with her sobs. Elliott could not find it within him to pity her because, he now realized, it would have come to this anyway. Some day. Some way.

“The King has granted me my symbolic pardon and unarticulated apology, so I will be making the arrangements for my and Camille’s … deaths … whilst he and I continue to negotiate for indemnity. I am choosing my own Fate insofar as I can. I have fields to plow and grain to sow.”

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Pirates!