Chapter 28
Linnie had spent so much time hating Jeremy for deceiving her.
For making her fall madly and hopelessly in love with him, only to then reveal everything had been nothing more than a grand deception—a scheme to prevent her family from having connections with another shipping family.
But she hated herself for the all-consuming sorrow that’d gripped her when he’d simply walked away and left her for his one and only true love, the seductive mistress who’d forever hold his heart: the sea.
After almost a fortnight at sea, standing on the starboard side of the Painted Dragon, the wood railing cool and damp under her fingers, it all made sense for Linnie.
Why the sea called her husband.
The smooth, soothing sound of the ocean’s waves as they rose and fell. An air so purifying it cleared one’s head. And the skies . . .
Linnie stared out at a thousand different shades of orange, red, and pink the setting sun cast upon the sky that was God’s canvas.
“Now I understand,” she whispered.
Here, a person existed in a different world, free of society’s constraints and all the irrelevance that civilized society held up as the be-all and end-all.
Closing her eyes, Linnie breathed in the salty air and let it fill her, this same air her husband now breathed.
How she missed him.
She missed everything about him. Her short time at sea hadn’t lessened her love for Jeremy. Rather, it’d made her long to be with her husband so she could share the wonder of the ocean with him.
He’d been the first—the only—to ask what she wanted in life and challenge her to pursue it, and she’d done it. She’d just not anticipated how hollow sailing off would be when she didn’t have Jeremy to share it with.
He, on the other hand, didn’t have that same longing. As he’d bluntly but honestly told her their last day together, he desired her body and even cared about her. Jeremy just had no need for her heart, and that truth would never, ever, ever not hurt.
You should not marry me, Linnie . . .
He’d said those words because he’d meant them.
In the immediacy of her shock and anguish at Jeremy’s revelation, Linnie hadn’t been able to see anything beyond her own grief. She now stood with her eyes wide open. He’d lied by omission, and a lie was a lie, but he had told her.
The day of their wedding, he’d attempted to set her free.
All along he’d known his heart belonged to the ocean. He’d known the day they’d stood apart from one another, bride and groom, his heart would never be Linnie’s. This untamed wonder was his one true love.
He’d tried to tell her that day.
She’d seen his reservations. She’d known he wasn’t present in the moment.
She’d just not wanted to look at the reasons why because she’d wanted him more. Too much to ever suggest they speak in private about his tumult.
He didn’t love Linnie, but he cared enough about her that he’d been willing to let her go—even though in so doing, it would have potentially preserved an alliance between Arran and Lord Culross.
It wouldn’t have. There was never going to be anyone but Jeremy.
I’m not good enough for you, Linnie. I’d rather kill some other man before seeing him have you as his wife, but even more, I’d see you happy, and that means setting you free . . . Because that is what you deserve . . .
He’d wanted her to walk away from him.
Just as he’d believed every self-deprecating word he’d spoken about himself that day, and after insisting Linnie cut herself loose, she, too, with her whole heart, meant what she’d said in return:
I will never hate you. I could never. I love you . . . I love you with my whole heart, my soul, and with my entire being. I always have.
She always had and she always would.
Drawing in a shaky breath, Linnie lowered her head and rested her cheek upon the railing.
She would forever loathe the ocean for being Jeremy’s one true love, but she could not resent her husband. She couldn’t resent him because she understood what it was to be filled with a love so deep, so consuming, one held absolutely no power over that emotion—or, for that matter, oneself.
She loved him that much.
She always would.
When he’d said she was the only woman he wanted in his arms and in his bed and in his life, he’d meant it. He was capable of love and did love deeply and profoundly. But his heart? All of it belonged to the sea, so vast and infinite.
A tear squeaked out. She brushed it away. Another followed the same winding path.
Alas, it appeared the number of tears Linnie had to shed for Jeremy was as deep and wide as the ocean.
The vibrant light of the night’s sunset dimmed, and she tensed as a shadow fell over her.
Despite captaining his ship and all the responsibilities that accompanied his role of master and commander, Arran checked on Linnie throughout the day. He’d come to know sunsets were the time she wished for herself and never sought her out.
Concerned, she faced him.
No. Not just Arran.
A humming filled her ears. While she’d been composed during even the most violent sway of the ocean waves, on this calm night, her legs swayed and her stomach revolted.
“Linnie.” Arran lifted a hand. “Hear me out.”
Shaking her head, Linnie stumbled away. Befogged, she looked all around her.
Arran and Lord Culross exchanged a look.
I’m going to be ill.
“How is he here?” she asked, a buzzing in her ears.
“He boarded upon our last harbor stop.”
“Why are you here?” She swung her gaze in Arran’s direction. Her voice crept up into a shrill shriek. “Why is he here, Arran?”
“Linnie,” Lord Culross tried to say.
“Do not!” she rasped. “I am Lady Jeremy Tremaine.”
Ignoring the earl once more, Linnie whipped her head back toward her duplicitous cousin. “My God,” she whispered, and the implications of what Arran had done rolled through her horrified mind. “You deceived me, Arran.”
Color filled his cheeks. “I’m protecting you.”
“I didn’t ask to be protected by you,” she cried, her voice carried by the gusty ocean breeze. “What was your idea, exactly? For me and Lord Culross to sail off and leave us on some corner of the globe where we might live happily ever a—” Linnie caught the quick, furtive glance between the men.
She recoiled. A crazed, harsh, bitter laugh exploded from her. “Oh, my God.”
He reached for her, but she slapped his hand away.
“Who else knew?” she demanded. Because God help her, she’d never again speak to whichever kin he named. “I said who?” she railed, horror, rage, and shock lending a sharp timbre to her voice.
“Linnie, we are worried about you. We felt it was best.”
That’s what it’d always been. “What you felt was best?” She briefly closed her eyes.
“Each and every one of you—my mother, Aunt Catherine, Uncle Harold, Lord Culross—and God knows which other ones of you”—she spat, waving her palm about—“took it upon yourselves to decide who I should marry and not marry . . .”
“You made the choice to marry Tremaine, and how did that work out for you, Linnie?”
Had Arran thundered that charge in Linnie’s face, it couldn’t have been more powerful or vicious than the calm way in which he spoke.
The tears in her throat got in the way of her attempt to swallow. “How did that work out for me?” As she batted the moisture from her cheeks, a painful half laugh, half sob bubbled up. “I feel like I’m dying inside every day, slowly. Over and over.”
Arran’s features spasmed. “Linnie, I’m sorry,” he said hoarsely.
She shook her head. “But do you know what, Arran? It was my choice. I chose Jeremy, and he may have married me under the greatest pretense, but he never attempted to stifle me the way you and our family do. Even after Hyde Park, when you and Culross took it upon yourselves to see him, Jeremy allowed me to decide what I wanted. I chose him. And do you know what? I’d choose him a thousand times over. ”
Speaking in a quieted voice, Arran said something to Lord Culross.
The earl bowed and left Linnie and her cousin alone.
Scraping a derisive stare over him, Linnie returned to the starboard side of the ship. Holding the rail, she stared out.
Arran joined her. He didn’t speak for a while, which was good. There was nothing he could say to make Linnie feel anything other than disdain for him and disgust for what he’d done.
Alas, he’d not done her any favors recently, and apparently wasn’t going to do them anytime soon.
“I allow, I should have been truthful with you,” he admitted. “But with everything he’s done to you, I’ll not have you act as though there’s even the slightest good in Tremaine, just because he’s shown you some kindness over the years.”
“You won’t have me . . . ?” Linnie sputtered.
Rage briefly blinded her, and she had to take a deep breath.
“Let me see if I have this clear, Arran. You expect to just gloss over your lie of omission, but will have me leave my husband, betray the vows I made before him, God, and the family, because he wasn’t completely truthful about our relationship? ”
A dull flush filled his cheeks.
Linnie looked at him in disgust. “Get out of my sight, Arran.”
Arran lingered and then started to leave.
Linnie drew in slow, steadying breaths, filling her lungs with the pure, clean, salt-tinged air.
It didn’t help.
What had she done? Whether she’d known Culross would be boarding mattered not; the fact she’d left would be all Jeremy cared about. He’d see her actions as a betrayal and . . . they were. It wouldn’t matter to Jeremy if it’d been unknowing on Linnie’s part.
“Arran,” she called out.
He turned back quickly. Hope filled his questioning eyes.
“When my husband discovers what you and Lord Culross did, he will kill you,” she said calmly. “And you will both deserve it. May God have mercy on each of your souls.”
That is, if your husband does not see you as complicit for running off to sea with Arran—and the Earl of Culross.
A shout came from the crow’s nest.
“Bring a spring upon her!”
Arran paled. The deck crew froze.
“Arran?” she asked, her voice shaky, her fury momentarily forgotten.
“Fire in the hole!”
A split second later, an explosion thundered in the distance.
The Painted Dragon rocked and violently swayed with a force that sent water pouring over the sides and Linnie flying backward.
She screamed; her body burnt everywhere with pain as she hit the bulwark.
Just as she’d begun to tumble through the gunport and into the sea, someone wrapped an arm around and hauled her over the side.
Panting with fear, wild-eyed, Linnie grabbed at Arran and clung tight.
“All hands on deck!” he bellowed, setting Linnie down. “Culross!” he thundered.
The earl was already there, taking Linnie by the arm.
“You know your assignment. Get her to the smuggler’s compart—”
Before his captain completed the rest of that command, the earl hauled Linnie away.
They were under attack.
And as the earl scooped her up and raced her belowdecks, terror sapped the moisture from her mouth and closed off her throat.
It turned out, she didn’t have to worry about witnessing Jeremy’s fury at her betrayal.
Given the approaching ship and the crew of the Painted Dragon being caught unawares, it didn’t seem likely she’d be there to see it herself.