In a particularly rough dive, she grasped his hand in one of hers and tucked them both against her chest. Moments later, her head fell against his shoulder and rested there. How long they stayed like this, he didn't know. But when her breathing grew soft and steady in sleep, he lowered her and drew a cover over her, then went to battle the storm, muttering to himself about promises to keep.
Tori rose, altered from the night before. Yet another storm had failed to harm her. And last night, the captain had shown that, at heart, he was a good man. She'd felt, for the first time in so long and in the middle of a tempest, safe. He was so big and strong and utterly confident in his ability to protect her that even she had begun to believe it.
Attacks, falls, storms--these calamities continued to happen to her, and she kept walking away with her life, lending proof to her suspicion that she was invincible. This time she walked away with a fresh resolve. She sank down before her new sea trunk and pulled the string from her neck. She kissed the ring, saying good-bye once more, then folded it in linen and tucked it deep into a corner, treating it like the treasure it was. Though her mother had wanted her to have the ring, it wasn't Tori's to wear.
She was about to rise when her teary gaze caught on the journal Sutherland had brought aboard and put with her things. It looked heavy--laden with memories.
When something weighed you down, it was best to cast it aside.
She plucked one of the prettier dresses out of the trunk, washed and dressed hurriedly, then set out to find the captain, journal under her arm. Though she was uneasy with the ship, she refused to be afraid. She climbed up to the bridge, and found Sutherland speaking with Traywick. "Captain," she said to his back.
He turned, obviously surprised to see her. "I didn't think you'd be up, much less out on deck."
"I wanted to thank you for last night."
He opened his mouth, then closed it. "You're...I..."
"That's all I wanted to say," she interrupted. "Just thank you."
She left them, with Traywick making some dig and the captain telling him to go to hell.
Her next stop was the side rail, where she stared at the white foam churning beside them, thinking about the incredible turn her life had taken. She'd been given a clean slate, to fill as she chose. When she returned to England, she could be anyone. She could be a terrified girl, cowed by the tragedies of her past, or she could be a dauntless woman, who'd taken everything thrown at her and was taunting Fate. Her lips curled up. Decision rendered.
With a lift of her chin, she scanned farther out. Last night, the ocean had boiled to fury. Today, smooth water stretched unbroken. And she stood unharmed. She smirked at the flaccid sea. "Was that all you could muster?" In one motion, she flung the journal to it.
Cammy's cabin was next. Her unsure walk became a march down the boards. Tori daringly skimmed her finger down the rail. At the cabin, she knocked, swung the door wide for air, and used one of her new, pinching shoes to wedge it there. "Good morning."
Cammy cracked open bleary eyes. She frowned and craned her neck to see behind Tori.
"You came alone?" At Tori's nod, she asked, "You walked here by yourself?"
Tori stood on the opposite bunk and opened a ceiling vent. "Uh-huh."
Cammy gaped. "So now you're roaming about the ship? I take it you feel better about things?"
Tori shrugged and sat. "I trust Sutherland to get us back. And I figure if I was meant to die in a shipwreck, the first one surely would've been it." She surveyed Cammy and found her looking less...green. "How're you feeling this morning?"
"I drank some tea and had some crackers. I feel better." With effort, she sat up in bed. "So you're not still angry at the captain for putting me aboard? You seemed to bridle around him."
She flushed, remembering how he'd held her hand the night before. He had such calloused and rough hands, but he'd touched her tenderly. "I thought it heartless at the time, but he had his reasons." She knew what it was like to see something you wanted and use every means at your disposal to get it. "I understand him better now."
"I want you to know he was very polite to me." Cammy's brow furrowed. "Well, except for yesterday, when he wouldn't cease coming by here. I've never seen a man more worried."
"Of course he's worried. If something happened to me, he wouldn't get paid."
"That's not it. Traywick's told me he's a very decent man." Cammy lowered her voice and said, "Sutherland has feelings for you."
"For me?" Tori asked warily. "What do you mean?"
Cammy smiled. "I saw him react to your faint on the deck. He's smitten." Over Tori's protests, she asked, "You haven't seen it yourself?"
He'd kissed her on the island. Kissed her with a desperation she'd never imagined, and touched her...as though reveling in her. She suppressed a shiver. "Most of the time, he's cold and distant to me."
"Traywick thinks the two of you would suit."
Changing the subject, Tori said, "You and Traywick seem to have gotten quite chummy." She gave Cammy a piqued eyebrow. "Quite chummy."
"We are friends. Yes, he is glorious to look at and utterly charming, but he's young." In a conspiratorial tone, she added, "I've always had a tendre for the older ones, truth be told." She smoothed the cover over her lap. "Besides, his heart's taken. Completely."
Tori leaned back against the paneled wall. "So, when can I return and stay here?"
Cammy eyed her as if she had to reveal a hard truth. "Well, this cabin is so very small. Small for two people, much less two women." She added in a rush, "And Traywick sits on your bunk when he reads to me."
Unbelievable. "I'm ousted by the tea peddler?"
As though they'd conjured him, Traywick appeared at the doorway. He smiled at Tori and kindly let the comment pass. "You certainly look better than yesterday."
"Tori adapts," Cammy said proudly. "It's her gift." She glanced at the book he held. "Were you going to read?"
When he nodded, Tori stood to leave, but Traywick said, "I wouldn't hear of it, Victoria. Please stay."
She shuffled her feet, then perched on the far edge of the bunk. As though sensing she was skittish, he sat at the foot. "So what were you two talking about?"
"Before we talked about you, we discussed Captain Sutherland's infatuation with Tori."
It was Tori's turn to gape. Cammy shrugged.
He leaned back and plopped his feet on Cammy's bunk. "A favorite subject of mine as well." He smiled at Tori. "You've got him not knowing up from down anymore."
"Why are you discussing him with us? He's your relative," Tori said in a disapproving tone, then added, "You should have more loyalty."
"Perhaps I'm not just idly gossiping," he said. "What if I had a purpose?"
"And what would that be?"
He hesitated, then said, "When Grant chased you--that was the first impulsive thing I've seen him do since he was a boy. It made no sense, it wasn't logical, yet I don't think anything could have stopped him." He boldly looked her over. "You would be good for him."
Embarrassed, she rushed to ask, "Why are you so concerned with this?"
His expression of casual indifference slipped. "Grant, my dear, is dying inside. He's already a cold man, and unless something changes, he's either going to snuff out whatever fire is left in him or he's going to snap." His eyes bored into hers. "I don't want to be shipbound with him for either."
He opened the book and cleared his throat to read, as if he hadn't just told her something that shook her to her very bones. Against their protests, she absently excused herself, her mind focused on Sutherland. Tori believed Traywick was exactly right. Simmering--that's what Sutherland was, like a volcano.
She thought about the night he'd kissed her, remembering the way his lips had seared hers, the way he'd clutched her shoulders, the savage promise in his eyes when she'd broken away. What did they promise?
She allowed herself to imagine what would have happened if she hadn't pulled away then, or if Traywick hadn't interrupted
them that morning in the hut. She'd lied when she'd said she half slept through touching him then. She'd been wide-awake, heart fluttering with each new touch, stifling gasps at each new texture, his kisses making her body ache....
Back in his cabin, Tori snooped through his belongings, craving more knowledge about him. Her nosiness was his fault, she reasoned. If he'd ever volunteered the tiniest detail about himself, she wouldn't be forced to take this action. Plus, he'd read her journal--turnabout was fair play.
For hours, she leisurely searched through his desk, scanning boring shipping documents, and reading from a cache of old letters stowed haphazardly in one drawer. One from his mother expressed her utter confidence in Grant on this voyage: "If they are alive, you above all men will find them and bring them safely back." Another one from his brother, Derek, provided an overview of the Keveral, detailing every quirk and distinct trait of the ship, with a closing that again conveyed a perfect confidence in his brother.
Did the man ever make mistakes? His family didn't think so.
She found notes and notes of indecipherable mathematical calculations, and turned them sideways, trying to read them. Each outcome was fixed with a pound symbol. Money. He was probably in dire straits to think about it so much. Wonder if his mother knows that?
She picked up his obligatory copy of Robinson Crusoe, and read through Crusoe's first days, when he lived like a parasite off that wrecked ship, hauling tool after tool, goods, and seeds for days. Would've been nice.
She set it back on the shelf, and the next book caught her attention. The Physical Geography of the Sea, by Matthew Fontaine Maury. Inside was a dedication: Godspeed, Grant. Love, Nicole.
Love? Who was this woman?
And why was Tori bristling? Because he had some woman at home, yet he'd kissed her and...touched her, that's why! Her stomach tightened. What if he was engaged?
Traywick would know. She heard him laughing with a sailor on deck. On deck among the sailors. Swallowing her disquiet, she marched across the sea-swept boards to where he sat and dumped the book on his bolted-down table. "Who is this?" She stabbed the name with her nail.
"You'll have to move your finger. Oh, that's just..." He trailed off and instead asked, "Why do you want to know?"
"I just find the idea that he has someone waiting at home surprising."