Lost Lady (James River Trilogy 2)

Bewildered, Travis smiled at her. “I didn’t say you were rubbish, only that someone had treated you as such. What I can’t understand is why you seem to want to return to someone who treats you like that.”

“I…I…no one….” she sputtered, tears beginning again. He had such a crude way of stating everything.

“It’s not so bad being an orphan,” he continued. “I’ve been one a long time. Maybe we belong together.”

Regan looked up at him, thinking that she couldn’t imagine this man belonging to anyone. No doubt, in spite of what he had said, he often kidnapped young girls and held them prisoner.

“I don’t think I like what you’re thinking,” he warned. “If you’re getting any ideas, let me warn you that I take care of what belongs to me.”

“Belongs to you!” she exclaimed. “I hardly know you!”

He smiled just before he brought his lips down on hers and kissed her with such tenderness, such longing, that Regan found her arms going about his neck. “You know me well enough,” he said huskily. “And get it through your head that you are mine.”

“I’m not yours! I’m….” she trailed off as he began to kiss her neck with little nibbling bites, and Regan sighed as she bent her head to one side.

“You are a temptress,” he laughed, “and you’re playing havoc with my work schedule.” Firmly, he pushed her out of his lap. “As much as I’d like to stay with you, I have business to attend to, and I’m afraid it will take me most of the night. Did you know we sail day after tomorrow?”

Head lowered, she didn’t answer him. She felt like such a fool because she’d reacted to him so quickly and so totally. Day after tomorrow! she thought. If she was ever to escape his hold over her, she must do it very soon.

“No goodbye kiss?” Travis joked, standing by the door. ‘Nothing to keep me warm out there all alone?”

Grabbing her other shoe, she threw it at him, but this time he ducked before it hit him. He was laughing as he locked the door behind him and went down the stairs.

At least tonight she was too tired to stay awake, but the bed did seem to get larger each night.

She woke to the quiet thunder of what could only be Travis attempting to tiptoe about the room. Keeping her eyes closed, she pretended to be asleep, even when he leaned over her and kissed her cheek. When he seemed to have left the room, she drowsily listened for the now familiar turn of the lock, and when it didn’t come she sat bolt upright in bed. After rubbing her eyes twice, she was sure that what she saw was real—the door was wide open.

Not another second was lost as she jumped out of bed, slid the velvet dress over her head, and grabbed her shoes. Ever so quietly, she hugged the door with her back as she left the room and went onto the stair landing. Never having seen the inn except for the inside of one room, she was startled to see how isolated the room was—alone at the head of narrow, steep stairs, and, from the smells, at the bottom seemed to be the kitchen. Craning her neck until it threatened to break, she saw what was unmistakably Travis’s leg and high boot near the foot of the stairs. But even as she began to lose hope, a clatter of horses and carriages sounded outside, and a man’s voice cried for help. With great happiness, she saw Travis run for the door.

Within an instant she was down the stairs, through the nearly empty kitchen, where the few employees were intent on the activity outside, and finally out into the bright sunlight of the street.

There was no time to spend on the fact that her feet were bare, because she knew Travis would discover her escape very soon. For now she had to put time and distance between them if she was ever to manage her escape.

In spite of her good intentions, her feet began to hurt too badly to ignore them much longer, and people were beginning to notice her. Slowing down for a moment, she saw a dark alleyway between two buildings, and she made her way there, crouching down between several horrible-smelling wooden fish crates. I must think! she commanded herself, because she knew that without a plan she could never gain her freedom.

Sitting on one of the crates, she slipped on her shoes, tying the laces about her ankles. As she did so, she calmed her racing heart and began to consider her alternatives. She needed somewhere to go, a place to hide until she could get a job, and especially a place to hide until that insane American left the country.

Lost in thought, she wasn’t aware of the shouts in the street until she was practically looking at Travis, his legs spread wide, hands on hips, his profile to her. It was minutes before she realized that he didn’t see her, that he was only shouting orders to the people in the streets. The idea that he’d give orders to strangers renewed her determination to escape this man. Making herself as small as possible, she crouched down among the boxes, praying he wouldn’t see her.

Even when he turned and ran down the street, she didn’t relax or move, because she felt he wasn’t one to give up. No, Travis Stanford was too sure he was right to ever give a thought to anyone else’s opinions. If he’d hold someone prisoner, he’d certainly not let that prisoner escape without a fight.

Remaining in her stiff, uncomfortable position, she tried to come up with a plan. First she’d have to get away from the docks, and the way to do that was always to keep the sea at her back. Smiling, she thought that shouldn’t be difficult to do and was sure she had half her problem solved. The other problem was where to go when she was away from the dock

s. If she could find her way back to Weston Manor, maybe Matta, her old maid, would know of some place Regan could go.

Hours and hours seemed to pass, yet the sun was still bright, the noise of the docks still loud. Using all her powers of concentration, she tried to ignore the cramps in her legs, and the ache in her back. Twice she saw Travis go by, and the second time she was close to calling out to him. Perhaps it was the pain in her aching body, but she seemed to remember all too clearly the last time she’d been alone on the docks. Of course, then she’d been wearing only her nightgown, and how could she expect to be treated as a lady when she was dressed as a woman of low morals? Now, wearing the elegant velvet dress, everyone would recognize her as a lady, and they wouldn’t dare touch her.

Smiling, her confidence somewhat restored, she tried to twist her hair into some semblance of order. Yesterday the French dressmaker and her assistants had worn their hair short, à la greque, and Regan wondered if possibly she should cut hers. Maybe it would give her an added air of sophistication in her new life—whatever that was to be.

Her musings made the time pass, and when she saw that the sun was setting she felt as if she were about to embark on a great adventure. She had escaped the awful American, and she was free to go wherever she wanted.

Slowly, painfully, she left her crouch, shaking her tired legs, and letting the blood return to them as she put her weight on them. As she stood erect, she realized that her feet were cut and the sores inside her shoes were covered with dried blood, which broke apart when she took her first step.

Pulling her courage together, she stepped toward the darkening street. A lady, she reminded herself. She must carry herself like a lady and not let a little thing like lacerated, swollen feet make her limp. If she kept her shoulders back, her spine straight, her chin high, no one would bother her—no one would dare molest a lady.

Chapter 5

NEWS OF A PRETTY YOUNG BIT OF FLUFF WALKING ABOUT the docks unescorted spread like fire through a dry forest. Men who were too drunk to walk somehow managed to drag themselves out of a stupor and stagger in the direction of the young woman. An entire shipload of sailors just in from a three-year voyage grabbed bottles of rum and ran toward where someone said there was a whole passel of women just waiting for them.