Chapter Twenty-two
The Only Love, Mal Chance Bayou
Beneath their feet, the deck shifted. Luc caught Grace as she staggered.
“What was that?” she asked.
Luc grinned out at the rising flood waters. “I think we’re afloat. Come look.”
Taking her hand, he helped her find her sea legs on the way to the ship’s rail where they peered over the side. About two yards of water separated them from shore. The tangle of brush, trees and driftwood that had hidden the wreck of the Only Love was nearly submerged.
“Oh my. Can we sail out of the bayou?” Grace asked.
“Not quite yet. However, if we float far enough before the water level drops, we should be able to set some sail. I may retain some of my spectral abilities, but I’m still just one man. You’ll have to help me.”
“Aye, aye, Captain.”
Luc’s grin broadened. “We’d better go check on the cat and dogs. I locked them in the hold to keep them from wandering off.”
“Any other preparations we need to make before we can weigh anchor?” she asked.
“A few, but I think I can take care of them myself.”
“What shall we do while we wait?”
Heart turning over, he stared at the woman he’d come to love and bussed her cheek. “Get out of this rain for a start. Then I think we’ll need to dry off.”
“Oh. We’ll have to take our clothes off.” Grace’s pretty green eyes were wide, and she batted her lashes in false innocence.
“Minx. You’re just as bad as me. Come. I took time to light the braziers, so the cabin will be warm.”
She flashed a smile and squeezed his hand.
They went below. The cat and dogs ambled into the cabin after them.
“Lay down,” Grace told Mars and Mercury. “Stay here.”
They whined a bit when the cat marched right past them and through the curtain.
Luc went after her, emerging into the main cabin holding the dark puffball by the scruff in one hand a pillow in the other. “You’re not welcome, either. You can stay here with the dogs or go out in the hold.”
“Mrrow!” She swatted at him, but he held onto her.
“Fine. Here it is then.”
He set the pillow down on his desk chair and the cat atop the pillow. She turned her tail to him, kneaded the cushion then settled.
Grace giggled and hung her rain gear on the knob of the door. Their animals would be fine. She moved into the alcove, with Luc close behind. She unbuttoned her shirt, one by one, in a slow tease.
“Allow me.” He brushed her hands away. “Please.”
She smiled that breath-stealing smile, and he caught a faint echo of Grainne. His heart stuttered with fear, and his hands stilled.
“Luc, what’s wrong?” Instantly, concern tightened her dark red eyebrows.
“I don’t know what will happen next,” he whispered.
“We’re together. What else do we need to know?” she asked.
“What if I vanish? What if you do? Both of you, Grace and Grainne.”
“Oh, my love. My dear, sweet love.” Grace stroked his cheek. “I expect that one of us—Grace or Grainne—will vanish. It won’t matter, though. I will still be here.”
“You have no idea how much I pray that will be true.”
“As do I,” she agreed.
“However, we can’t know, not for certain. Especially given the requirement for a heartless woman to hold my heart. Whoever that woman might be, she never will, because I’ve given my heart to you.
“But you gave yours to Grainne long ago.” Sorrow crept into Grace’s expression.
“Aye,” he hugged Grace to him. “Yet I kept a piece back from her.”
“I remember, you kept the piece needed to say alive.”
“Aye, and was cursed for eternity because I didn’t love her enough to give everything. My own selfishness caused my curse.”
She looked at him, stroking his cheek with her palm. “I don’t think it is wrong to keep living, even when your heart is broken.”
“Perhaps. For now, live or die, I keep nothing of my heart, my soul, my life. I give it all to you.”
“Then let us not worry about the future. Come make love with me. We’ll seal our fate together.”
Luc reached for her clothing as she reached for his. They undressed each other. Every inch of skin revealed, he worshipped with his lips, his tongue, his touch, his body, his soul.
She answered each devotion with praiseful attention of her own.
He felt her heart race when he stroked her breast. His galloped in echo.
Her sighs filled his ears with melody. He groaned in counterpoint.
She was the key he needed to unlock intense rapture, and unmatched love.
He grasped her hips. They plunged together, sailing the seas of pleasure through the long stormy night.
***
The seas calmed with the dawn. Luc rose and dressed. He climbed the ladder to the deck, blinking in the brilliant sunlight.
All signs of storm and flood were gone, and the air held a distinct chill.
He ran, slower than he had in years, from port to starboard then bow to stern, ending where he started, looking out over the rail, brow furrowed.
Hands sweaty and chest tight, he gripped the amulet.
’Twas one thing he knew for certain existed.
A woman existed in his bed of that he was also certain. But which woman?
“Luc?”
He whipped around at the sound of Grace’s voice. “I…I didn’t hear you.”
He basked a moment in that glorious, stone-melting smile.
“I was very quiet.”
The dogs and the cat followed her onto the deck. The cat settled in a sunny spot. Mercury and Mars explored.
“I should have heard you, felt what you felt as you got out of bed,” he said “The curse. It doesn’t seem to be working.
” He blinked again, to make sure she was really before him.
“My hearing is normal, I can’t sense your movements or the dogs’, the cat’s.
” He closed his eyes to concentrate. “I can’t even teleport. ”
His heart began to race, full-blown hysteria a mere breath away.
“Really, that’s amazing.” Her brow wrinkled. “Why is that important?”
Calm down, he ordered himself and drew in a deep breath. He swiped his palms against his shirt.
“I just ran the length and breadth of the ship, but no faster than any other man.”
Grace smiled softly, but with an edge of confusion. “So that’s what all that pounding was. It woke me, so I came to find you.”
“Did you hear me? The curse isn’t working.” He hefted her into his arms. “You used to be light as a feather.”
“And now?”
“Now you are a wonderful, gorgeous armful of woman.” Luc set her down. “I’ll break my back if I keep that up.”
She giggled. “Not lighter than the proverbial feather, am I?”
“No.” He smiled back, calmer now that Grace was beside him. “What does all this mean?” He waved a hand at her, at the sea.
“I think that out there, means we are at sea. Although, if I’m not mistaken, those humps on the horizon are islands.”
Luc rummaged in a nearby box, withdrawing a spyglass, and aiming it at the humps. “Aye, those are islands alright, and I know them well.”
“Really?”
“We’re about five to six hours sailing from my old anchorage at the mouth of Bayou Mal Chance.”
“I am eager to get back. I want to know how bad the flood damage is at Sweet Dreams.
Luc studied the horizon in all directions. “I’m not sure you’ll be able to do that.”
“Why?” Grace asked.
He handed her the glass and pointed toward the islands. “Tell me, do you see any clouds on the horizon in that direction?”
She looked then lowered the glass slowly. “No, not a one.”
He stared at her for a very long time. She raised her head in question.
“Who are you?” he asked.
“Grace,” she confirmed, and her eyes went wide. “Grace Thibodaux, and you aren’t cursed anymore, are you?”
“Right, I no longer have spectral powers.”
“What do you think that means?” Her brow furrowed.
“I believe Grainne is gone.” The memory of what could have been saddened him, but only for a bit. He had a future with Grace to fill all the coming years. “It makes sense. After all she’s been physically dead for decades,” Grace said.
He gave that statement careful consideration. “I’m not so sure of that.”
Grace stared at him. “You can’t mean…” Her face paled, and her gaze swept the horizon. Her breathing shallowed. “We can’t have traveled back in time to…. When? 1814?”
Luc gripped her hands. “It’s alright Grace. Look at me. Don’t panic.”
She focused on his face and heaved in air until her breathing slowed to normal. “How do we know we time-traveled?”
Luc thrust his hands through his hair. “Find out the year, the date?” His head came up. “I know exactly where to find them. Come with me.”
He took her hand, and they went below to his cabin. At the bottom of the ladder, he glanced toward the bow hold.
“Look,” he pointed for Grace. “Those barrels and bales weren’t on the Only Love when you and I came to my ship after escaping DeLille.”
Grace’s gaze slid in the direction he pointed. “Oh my.” She put her fingers to her lips briefly. “You have cargo aboard.”
“Just as it was before I was cursed.”
“Do you think your log book might be here too?”
“That’s why I came down here. I kept it in my desk, let’s go check.”
In the cabin, Luc opened the desk drawer and withdrew the logbook.
“How? That was in my valise.”
“I’ll bet your valise has vanished.”
“I put it in the bedroom alcove.” She rushed through the curtains.
Luc put the log on the desktop and opened to the last entry. The date was 08 December 1814. Grace returned and clutched his arm. “You’re right. The valise is gone.”
“Look at the date in the logbook?” He pointed to the page.
“08 December, 1814.” She turned to the next page and the next and the one after that. All were blank. “Do you think today is December eighth?”
“No, I think today is the ninth, or later. I had planned to prepare for Grainne’s visit yesterday. I even dismissed the crew so we could be alone. Then the two of us sailed away for a day or two coming back on 11 December.
“The day before you were cursed.”
“Precisely,” he agreed. “If I’m right, you won’t see folk in modern clothing when we dock, and we’ll have a visit from my brother on 12 December.
“Luc, I need to know.” Worry lines formed on Grace’s brow. “What happened to Grainne after you returned from sailing with her?”
He did not want to say, and he could not meet Grace’s gaze.
She grasped his chin and forced him to look at her. “Whatever it is, I’ll understand. When you were with Grainne, you and I had not met.”
He sucked in a deep breath. “Right. I had proposed to her before we docked. After we tied up, she went to New Orleans to get the things she’d left at her hotel and promised to return within three days.”
“Did she?” Grace asked her tone gentle and solemn.
“You know she did. You dreamed about that night when Mawu found us in bed together.”
“Yes, that’s what I dreamt. It’s also what you wrote about in the logbook.”
“What if Grainne is still in New Orleans?” Given the vanishing valise, the conflicts and paradoxes of that chilled him to the bone.
“I don’t think she is,” Grace said.
“Why not?”
“Because she would be here with you aboard the Only Love, not me.”
He put his arms around his beloved. “Then what happened to her?”
Grace leaned against him. “You are kind to wonder, but then I intend to marry a kind man.”
“Not the type of man who might be relieved that a woman he once love vanished from existence.” He hugged her close.
“Definitely not. We will have to wait for more information to find out what happened to Grainne.” Grace said.
“If she lives, I don’t want to hurt her in any way.”
“Nor do I, Luc my love, but we may not be able to influence how she feels when she learns about us. If she lives, that is.”
“Agreed. One thing remains that I don’t understand,” Luc said.
“What is that?”
“Let’s go back on deck to talk. I want to watch the wind to be certain the sails are set properly.
“Okay.” She preceded him up the ladder then waited while he examined the set of the sails.
He joined her at the rail. The islands were closer now, he could actually tell they were green and the sea channels between them were more visible.
“You were about to tell me the one thing you don’t understand,” Grace prompted.
“The curse seems to be broken, but I don’t think the conditions were met.”
“You mean you didn’t earn the love of a heartless woman?”
“I earned your love, but you are far from heartless.”
“I wasn’t when we met. I was afraid all the time. I had no hope of anything good in my future. I was bitter at the losses I’d suffered and the way I’d been treated.”
“True but none of those things make you heartless. A heartless person usually shows lack of feeling and consideration for others.”
“Which is precisely what I showed you when we first met. I did not care what you told me, I wanted you gone. I think I knew you would make me feel emotions I’d rather never experience. I’d had feelings and consideration for others, but all I got in return was betrayal and pain.”
“I don’t know. Perhaps you were heartless early on in our relationship, but what about now?”
“You might have a point.” She smiled that treasured smile. “I am not heartless now, but then you gave me your heart and filled mine. By doing so, you earned my love.”
“Thus, I earned the love of a heartless woman,” he mused. “It feels like winning on a quibble.”
“Do you want me to take my love back?”
The idea near crushed him. “NO! No. I beg you, please stay, please let me keep the love you’ve given me.”
“Silly man. You hold my heart forever more.” Grace twined her arms around his neck, rose on tiptoe and kissed him.”