Her Passionate Pirate. Neesa Hart
just about everything, don’t you.”
Becky looked at Cora. “This is the perfect solution, Cora. You know it is.”
She visibly wavered, then looked at Rafael. “This is exactly why I said no to your first letter,” she told him. “I didn’t want this kind of disruption.”
“It’ll work out, Cora. You’ll see,” Becky assured her. “In the long run, if he’s handling the media, you’ll have more time for the diaries. Everyone wins.”
He saw her indecision and realized he was holding his breath. Finally she sighed, a weary sigh of surrender. “Since there’s no reasonable way to stop this now,” she told him, “then I at least want your promise on one thing.” She paused. “I haven’t had the chance to fully examine the diaries, but they’re…intensely personal. I’d prefer not to see Abigail’s private thoughts printed for public consumption without my consent.”
Rafael felt a surge of satisfaction. She had a strong desire, he realized, to protect Abigail’s privacy. Dared he hope that she felt a connection to Abigail and del Flores similar to his own? “Fine,” he agreed.
She held his gaze a moment longer, then dropped her head into her hands. “Oh, God,” she groaned. “What have I done?”
Chapter Three
She always charms me, this passionate, consummate lady of mine. How they misread her, I’ll never know. The lot of fools sees only what they look for. I’m grateful, really. The world may see her proper outward appearance, but I, alone, have seen the fire beneath the ice.
Juan Rodriguez del Flores
Captain’s Log, 10 April 1861
“Dr. Prescott,” the wiry-looking man in the front row of the university auditorium clutched his notepad with journalistic fervor, “why the change in policy? Sources say you’ve turned down over a dozen other joint projects on the Conrad diaries.”
Cora could practically feel Jerry gloating as she faced the roomful of inquisitors the following morning. He sat behind her on the dais, flanked by Henry Willers and the chairman of the Rawlings College board of trustees. Rafael and Becky had left her home at two o’clock that morning. After too little sleep, Jerry’s phone call had awakened her. He’d informed her of the press conference in a gratingly cheerful voice that had Cora wanting to spit nails. By the time she’d gotten the girls ready—amid Kaitlin’s complaining, Molly’s incessant questions and Liza’s insistence that Benedict Bunny come along—Cora’s mood had disintegrated from bad to rotten. She had a pounding headache and a serious inclination to tear Jerry’s head off.
Summoning her dignity, she glanced at her nieces where they sat in the front row with Becky. They’d seen enough episodes, she reminded herself, of their mother, sans dignity, to last them a lifetime. They didn’t need to see it from her.
The only person conspicuously absent from this circus was Rafael. He was late, and when she got the chance, she’d kill him for it.
Cora gripped the edge of the podium and forced herself to concentrate on the question. “My priority,” she told the young reporter, “has always been to conduct my study of the Conrad diaries in a manner that will glean the most information in the most responsible manner. On consideration of Dr. Adriano’s proposal, I decided—”
“—that she can’t live without me,” came his low drawl from the wings of the stage. He flashed her a bright smile as he strode toward the podium.
Predictably his arrival caused a flurry of interest. Cameras popped. Reporters began hurling questions at the stage. A microphone, suddenly adjusted too high, squealed feedback into the house. Rafael seemed oblivious to the commotion as he walked toward Cora in long, ground-eating strides. He stopped when he reached her.
“You’re late,” she said in a taut whisper.
He gave her a heated look “Miss me?”
Cora clenched her teeth. “You’re creating a spectacle.” From the corner of her eye, she saw Liza smile broadly at him and give him a slight wave. The innocent act left Cora feeling oddly betrayed.
He bent his head closer. “The better to dazzle you with,” he retorted with infuriating cheer. “Watch and learn.”
Cora glared at him. He gave her a cocky grin, then faced his audience with aplomb. For the next several minutes he volleyed their questions, expounded on his research goals, gave eloquent testimony to her work with Abigail’s diaries and generally charmed the audience’s collective socks off.
He flirted, flaunted and flashed his million-dollar smile until he had them eating out of his hand. Cora watched, torn between amusement and irritation. Even her three nieces sat uncharacteristically still during the discourse. Several times Becky sent her telling looks. No wonder, she thought, that she’d had to work so hard to dig beneath the charismatic mantle he wore to glimpse the passionate man she’d seen last night. His armor was so thick he seemed undaunted by the occasionally blatant accusations that came his way from the handful of reporters who seemed determined to resist his charm. When one asked if he deliberately courted wealthy history buffs and thrill seekers for access to their money, he smiled and said with disarming nonchalance, “Whom would you suggest I court?”
And the crowd laughed appreciatively. Even Henry Willers, whose notoriously sour expression was the constant fodder of cartoons in the student paper, chuckled.
Another reporter captured his attention by asking, “Coming off the Argo find, isn’t Cape Marr going to be anticlimactic?”
Rafael nodded. “I certainly hope so. You can understand how an expedition of that sort can be exhausting.”
“Of course,” the man persisted. “But your career is peaking, and our readers would like to know why you’d choose to invest your time on something as seemingly innocuous as the Conrad diaries.”
“The del Flores story has been a career-long interest of mine. I’m eager to work with Dr. Prescott and learn more.”
“Any reason you can give us,” yelled a woman from the back, “for why you haven’t been able to find del Flores’s ship yet?
From the corner of her eye, Cora saw Rafael tense. He seemed to carefully consider the question, but she sensed a fine tremor of energy in him. In a deceptively casual move, he propped one arm on the podium and leaned forward. “Sometimes,” he said softly, “the sea is a tantalizing adversary.”
An unnatural hush seemed to fall on the room as they waited for him to continue. “In some ways,” he went on, “exploring the ocean’s mysteries is like courting a woman. It can be elusive and mysterious. It’s mercurial and unpredictable.”
Cora could almost feel the audience falling under his spell. And who could blame them? He was weaving a delicate wave of evocative images designed to entice and fascinate. She resisted the urge to wipe her suddenly damp palms on her skirt.
Rafael seemed lost in thought now. He absently stroked the outer edge of his eye patch as he continued, “The ocean is the source of life for the world. The mother of the earth, if you will. In her womb, she still carries the remnants of the earliest forms of life.”
Cora swallowed so hard it was audible. If he noticed, he didn’t look at her. “It’s full of secrets that it hides beneath a calm surface. Like a woman, the ocean can be as warm as a tropical breeze or as cold as an Arctic current.” A suspiciously strangled cough escaped her.
“Something about that fascinates me,” he said. “I especially like to find warm currents of water where the weather pattern demands frigid temperatures. The sea is a paradox. Always changing, always moving. You can never predict what the ocean will do. She can be calm as a breezeless day one minute, and catch you in a violent storm the next. She’s fathoms deep. Passionate. Alluring.” He rolled the last word off the tip of his tongue. “I love the mystery, and I love the challenge.”