A Lady Dares. Bronwyn Scott
our driver put you down at the next corner.’
The brother—what was his name again? She’d just said it. William? Wilson?—intervened patiently. ‘Elise, wait. I tell you he is the best. If you would just listen to me.’ Ah, so she was definitely not in the market for a little blanket hornpipe, because her brother would have absolutely no knowledge of his skills in that regard. His wind didn’t blow that way.
‘Give him a chance to explain himself, please.’ The brother waved a hand towards him, tossing him a beseeching look. Feel free to intervene at any time. Dorian opened his mouth to assist, but too late.
‘He has explained himself,’ the haughty princess fired back. ‘Just look at him! He’s unkempt, he was in a public house in the middle of the day and he was brawling. That’s just in the last fifteen minutes. Who knows what else he’s been doing?’
It was on the tip of his tongue to say ‘the captain’s mistress’. But then he thought better of it. A becoming colour was riding her cheeks. The princess had been provoked enough already.
‘You would entrust our future to that? I don’t even want to know how it is that you know him, William.’ Too bad. He was counting on her making William explain the connection. Now, he’d just have to keep guessing. But that last comment set him on edge. Pretty princess or not, no one could talk about him as if he weren’t in the room, or worse, as if he were an object in the room.
‘I hate to interrupt this lovely example of sibling quarrels, but please note, I’m still here.’ Dorian stretched out his long legs and crossed them at the ankles. ‘I think it would be best if you tell me what you really want and then I’ll tell you if I’ll do it. I find business is usually much simpler that way.’
The carriage turned on to the docks and stopped before a barred gate. His haughty princess shot him a glare as she leaned out to give a password to the guard. ‘You might as well see what I have in mind.’
First pistols, now passwords. This was growing more interesting by the moment. What was a young woman doing down on the docks, throwing around entrance codes like she belonged here? For that matter, what was she doing roaming Cold Harbour Lane in search of him? She wasn’t his usual type, that type being a bolder, brassier woman, a less-well-dressed sort. Not that she wasn’t bold. She had come armed, after all. Hmm. A girl with a gun. Maybe she was his type. By the time she led him into the shipyard his curiosity, in all its healthy male parts, was fully engaged.
‘There it is,’ she announced with a proud wave of her hand, indicating the hull of a racer. ‘That’s the yacht I need finished.’
She needed a finished yacht? It just so happened he needed one, too. That meant the shipyard was her place. Very impressive. Dorian began a slow tour around the yard, attempting to assimilate the various pieces of information. He made note of the supplies lining the perimeter: the casks of pitch, the piles of timber, the buckets of nails. He peeked under heavy tarps. Everything was new and well organised. These were not supplies that had lain in the weather so long they were rotten or rusted.
He took in, too, the silence and the absence of men. Whatever had transpired had brought work to a halt, an interesting concept of its own given the scarcity of jobs. Plenty of men were out of work these days. It made one stop and wonder.
‘There’s no one here. Why is that?’ He stopped in front of Miss Elise Sutton, his tone far more serious than it had been in the carriage. This was no longer a laughing matter. ‘I think it’s time you tell me what you really need and why.’
That got her attention. She stepped back instinctively, but her eyes were as unflinching as they had been outside the tavern. Lord, she was magnificent. ‘My father passed away recently and left this boat. I want to finish it and sell it.’ It was a succinct tale, but Dorian took nothing at face value. In his world it was best not to if one wanted to live long enough to collect payment.
‘Let me guess—the work crew left because there was no one to run the company?’ Dorian surmised immediately. Things were becoming clearer: a brother too young to assume responsibility and a woman with too much on her hands. He was starting to remember the lad, too. Sutton. William Sutton. That elusive first name of his was more familiar when paired with the last. There’d been a house party near Oxford last autumn. Perhaps they’d met there during one of his own brief forays into the fringes of society?
‘Yes, but I assure you I am more than capable, I—’
Dorian held up a hand and shook his head. ‘Enough, Miss Sutton. I am sure you are very capable, but men won’t work for you. However, they’ll work for me for the simple fact that I am male, although they’ll be glad enough to take your money. I trust you’ve thought about how to pay them?’ He’d bet his last piece of gold she wanted to sell the yacht because she needed money.
‘From the proceeds of the sale,’ she said shortly, irritated by his insights.
‘I might know some men who’d be willing to work for a future profit.’ Dorian shrugged, but his mind was racing. He’d need five men who knew what they were doing and another dozen skilled in carpentry. The promise of delayed payment meant he might have to look harder and in less-savoury places for seventeen adequate workers.
‘Would you care to see the plans before you take this any further?’ Elise offered coldly. ‘This is not just any yacht. It’s been designed with several new innovations in mind. It will be important that you understand them.’
Dorian smiled. There wasn’t a ship he couldn’t build, couldn’t sail and couldn’t steal, for that matter. ‘I can build your yacht, Princess. You can innovate all you like. The bigger question is—why should I?’
Elise put her hands on her hips and a wry smile on her lips. ‘Because you need money. The bullies at the tavern intimated as much. Who is it you owe? A Mr Halsey?’
Dorian stifled a laugh. ‘Black Jack Halsey hasn’t been called “mister” his entire life, Princess. He’s been called a lot of other things, but not that.’
‘I’ll pay you one hundred pounds from the sale to finish the yacht on time.’
‘Five hundred,’ Dorian countered. A man had to live and pay his debts. If he could make a little extra that was fine, too. It wasn’t his fault part of his last cargo had been confiscated for non-payment of port fees. He’d told Halsey they’d not pass inspection and he’d been right.
‘Five hundred! That’s highway robbery,’ Elise retorted, outraged by his exorbitant fee.
‘Have much experience with highway robbery, do you?’ Dorian chuckled.
Elise chose to ignore his question and stood her ground. ‘I’m asking for one month’s worth of work, Mr Rowland. You can’t earn that much in three years of honest labour.’
‘Honest being the key word there, Miss Sutton.’ He’d make more than that on his next cargo, but he wouldn’t attest to those goods all being legal.
‘All right, two hundred.’ The sharp point of her chin went up a fraction.
‘Let me remind you, you came looking for me.’
‘Two-fifty.’
‘Three hundred and I get three meals a day and that shed over there.’ He jabbed his thumb at a wide lean-to on the perimeter of the yard.
Her eyes narrowed. ‘What do you want with the shed?’
‘That is none of your business.’
‘I won’t tolerate anything illegal on these premises.’
‘Of course not.’
‘Or illicit.’
‘Now, you’re parsing words, Miss Sutton. Do you want me to build your ship or not?’ No doubt they could disagree on the nature of ‘illicit’ all day.
‘We still haven’t established