My Fair Lover (Legendary Lovers 5)

“My American countrymen needed me. It would have been cowardly to think only of my own safety.” His voice lowered an octave. “The worst part was visiting destruction on my own kin. Having to turn against my friends and colleagues like my cousin Trey and Macky and Hawk.”

Kate fell silent. She hadn’t often thought about the sacrifices Deverill had made, carrying out what he believed was his duty.

Looking down at the table before him, he became strangely introspective. “War is not glamorous or exciting. Indeed it’s often senseless and idiotic. But in this case it was necessary. Your navy was vastly in the wrong to make slaves out of our seamen.”

“They justified their actions by claiming the greater good. They needed to keep the navy strong to battle Boney.”

“It was still wrong.”

She felt his suppressed intensity. “Perhaps so,” she allowed.

“There was too much killing and blood and pain,” he added quietly.

Wanting to take his mind off his grisly memories, Kate steered the subject to his former service. “To hear Hawkhurst talk about it, serving in the British Foreign Office as you did was a noble calling. What did you do for the F.O.?”

“Many things. And I often supplied ships for our missions. There were always villains to vanquish—despots, local tyrants, Napoleon Bonaparte. We were able to make a real difference when Boney was threatening to take over the world.”

“You also aided Aunt Bella some years ago, didn’t you? She said a number of her Foreign Office friends mounted a rescue when she was abducted by a Berber sheik.”

He shook his head. “I was in America by then so I wasn’t part of the rescue.”

Kate thought back on Deverill’s reasons for leaving for America. She had to admire him for fighting and risking death for what he believed in, even if his choice had taken him away from her.

“I am very glad you weren’t injured, or worse,” she said softly.

Deverill shrugged. “I rarely talk about it. I dislike even thinking about it.” His smile was grim when he raised his gaze to hers. “See your influence? I’ve never before told anyone how I felt.”

“Not even your family?”

He gave a mirthless huff of laughter. “Especially not my family. They didn’t share my reservations, probably because they didn’t have the close ties to England that I did. My father mainly sought retaliation for the losses of our ships and crews. My mother was angry that it disrupted her social routine. My younger brother was far too eager to hear about my adventures.” Deverill smiled again, a bit sadly. “I once was adventurous. I loved the sea…until the war.”

At his confession, a deluge of thoughts and feelings swamped Kate. “I am glad you told me. It isn’t good to keep things like that bottled up inside you.”

His gaze was level. “If you care to know why I don’t let myself feel, it’s because of the war.”

It surprised her, Deverill letting her see this darker, hidden side of himself. The deeper, conflicted man inside. But she was grateful.

His confession tugged on her heartstrings and made her reconsider. She’d been wrong to pressure him to feel, Kate reflected. There were good reasons he was detached and dispassionate. She’d wondered what had shaped him into the man he was, and now she better understood. Warring against his former friends and colleagues had scarred him. And he had no loving family to confide in, as she did.

At her new awareness, something sharp pierced her chest. If Deverill couldn’t feel tender emotions such as love, it was for his own self-protection.

She ought not try so hard to change him, Kate realized. Instead she should try to help him forget his violent past. She still believed if he was to learn to love, he had to open himself to healing emotions, not grim ones of war and death. But for now, he seemed to have had enough of introspection.

“The hour is late. You should get some sleep.”

“I suppose so,” Kate said reluctantly.

He had succeeded in distracting her from her own dark thoughts, but now they returned full force. Taking up a lantern, Deverill walked her to her cabin and preceded her inside.

After showing her how to properly secure the lantern on a shelf, he accepted the return of his coat and hung it on his arm.

As he turned to leave, though, a panicky feeling gripped Kate. “Deverill?”

“Yes?”

“Would you…would you please hold me for a moment?”

He raised an eyebrow. “You are the one who set the rules about no embracing.”