When the accidental fire caused by a blocked chimney had consumed the hunting lodge and killed his brothers and father during the duke’s fiftieth birthday celebration, the ducal estate had fallen to Rhystan, along with the care of his remaining family: a mother who resented him, a nearly grown sister he’d never known, and a sister-in-law and two nieces he’d briefly seen at the funeral. And so, the precious mantle had fallen to him.
The pressure. The responsibility. Everything he’d run from.
You should have been there, a voice taunted.
Rhystan rubbed his temples, a surprising amount of guilt and bitterness pouring through him. He hadn’t been plagued with so many thoughts of his past in years. First, his pathetic first love, and now, his dead father and brothers. The title was cursed. He was cursed. Cursed in love, cursed in life. The only thing he hadn’t been cursed with was a lack of fortune.
He stopped in the kitchens to wolf down his ration of food before making his way to bed with a bottle of whisky in hand. A dreamless sleep, he thought. That was what he needed. Not thoughts of his freedom slipping away or of hot, fragrant nights filled with laughter and adolescent vows.
Sarani.
The beautiful, headstrong daughter of the Maharaja of Joor. His first love. His only love. He’d learned quickly from that disaster.
He hadn’t thought of her in years. Rhystan would have assumed the passage of time would have lessened the ache, but he was wrong. His chest contracted painfully. She’d been sixteen and stunning. He’d fallen head over heels for her and thought she’d felt the same, until he realized she didn’t.
Rhystan came to a halt at the entrance to his quarters as the phantom scent of jasmine assailed his nostrils. He must be tired. Jasmine had no place on a ship like this. She had smelled like it, the soft skin at her throat and wrists delicately fragrant. He’d kissed them enough to know. Buried his face in her glossy waist-length hair. Stolen her kisses and shared more. He’d been intoxicated. So much so that the scent of jasmine haunted him to this day.
Slamming the door to his cabin, he tipped the bitter whisky up and gulped it down. He would exorcise thoughts of her from his mind even if he had to drain the entire bottle.
* * *
Sarani came awake with a start, clutching her pistol with a shaking fist. That noise had sounded too much like a gunshot. Had the assassin found her? Had she been followed? Discovered?
No, no.
She was on a ship. Secure in a shoebox of a cabin with the door shut. Shaking the webs of sleep from her head, she forced herself to release her death grip on the pistol. They’d been careful. They were safe. And from the soft sway beneath her, the ship was moving, which meant they were already at sea. Thank goodness for that, then. Her eyes flicked to Asha’s motionless form. The loud bang Sarani had heard hadn’t disturbed her maid’s rest.
A tight fullness shot through her bladder when she uncurled herself from her cramped position, hunched over the chair. She glanced around the room for a chamber pot and found nothing even remotely resembling a receptacle for personal needs. Not even a bucket. Clearly, the cabin hadn’t been prepared for guests, though she had no right to complain. Tej had said as much.
The ache became more insistent when she stood, and Sarani resigned herself to trying to find a pail. Or the head, as the sailors called it in her books. Urinating at the front of a ship would be an adventure, though the mechanics of it for a woman might be a smidge more complicated than for a man. Sarani was convinced petticoats were the devil’s armor.
If only I’d been born a boy…
That old wish had been a constant during her childhood, and though she’d learned to do things as well as any boy—climb trees, shoot guns, fence, and wield a sword—she was still a woman. Living in a man’s world. On a man’s ship. Without a chamber pot.
Cracking open the door, Sarani peered down the gloomy corridor. No one was in sight. She crept out and slunk down the hallway, freezing when the murmur of voices filtered down to her but faded after a minute. Well aware she could be seen at any moment, she continued her search and almost wept with relief when she spotted a bucket and mop leaning against one wall. Snatching the former, she retraced her footsteps and came to a dismayed halt at the sight of several identical doors.
Her cabin was on the right, but she couldn’t recall which one it was. Tiptoeing to the first, she pressed her ear to it and was greeted by the sound of loud snoring. That wasn’t it, not unless her maid was impersonating a steam locomotive. The second was quiet; so was the third. There was no help for it—she would have to try both.
Sarani was deliberating cracking open the second door when more voices came from the stairs. Growing louder and heading her way! Discarding the hard-won bucket, she opened the door and closed it just as three men breached the corner.
Goodness, that was close. Her relief was short-lived, however, as her gaze adjusted to take in the shadowy details of a large cabin that was clearly not hers: the velvet drapes, the large desk covered with cartographer maps, a bookcase crammed with books, and the bed that was at least twice the size of hers…which was presently occupied by a man lying sprawled facedown upon the mattress.
Long, lean, and sculpted.
And shockingly bare.
Sarani’s pulse throbbed. For a breathless moment, she was stunned into wonder by the taut, tanned lines of those broad shoulders, the muscled planes descending into the scooped hollow of his spine and tapering to a narrow waist cinched into snug breeches that left precious little to the imagination. Unperturbed by her flagging morality, her curious eyes traced over the firm rise of his buttocks and sinewy, splayed thighs encased in black fabric, and her mouth went dry while other parts of her went mortifyingly damp.
Gracious! She hadn’t had such a visceral attraction to a member of the opposite sex in, well, ever. Not since…
No. She wouldn’t think of him.
Not that a boy from her youth could compare. This was a man. A very large, very broad, and clearly very powerful man. She couldn’t see his face, but his overlong hair was a sandy sun-streaked brown. Idly, Sarani wondered what he looked like and whether his front would match the back. Perhaps he would be old and weathered. His sun-bronzed back gave little idea of his age, but his face would.
She had a sudden, indescribable urge to see it.
A bottle rolled into view from beneath the bed as the ship rocked, amber liquid sloshing around inside of it. The bed’s occupant groaned and flung one hand up over his head. Sarani didn’t dare breathe as lucidity and understanding of her situation rushed back to her woolly brain. She should have been trying to hide instead of mooning over some half-naked—albeit put-Adonis-to-shame kind of naked—sailor.
“Cap’n, are you awake?” a voice said, footsteps stopping just outside the door, and Sarani’s heart plunged to her toes as she shot a wry glance at the dozing man. She bit back a groan. Of course this had to be the captain…a duke, no less. It couldn’t have been the cook or the surgeon or someone without the power to toss her overboard.