Day Dreamer by Jill Marie Landis Page A

the cool smile that did not reach his eyes.
    “Don’t even begin to think you know
me
, husband.”
    They were among the last passengers to board. Long-forgotten sights and sounds came back to Celine as she stepped from the gangway onto the main deck of the
Adelaide
. She was instantly reminded of the unremitting noise aboard a sailing vessel. Sailors shouted to each other from every corner and from atop every mast. The wood ship creaked and squealed, each joint and timber sounding a complaint. The clamor would grow even worse, she knew, once it was coupled with the roar of the open sea.
    All manner of livestock which would be served up at meals were housed in cages on deck. The fowl clucked, the pigs granted, the sheep bayed. At least their fate was predetermined. The passengers faced endless days of boredom and confinement, close quarters shared with strangers, and the ever-present dangers of shipwreck, disease and fire.
    “Are you all right?” Cordero stood beside her, watching her with a fair amount of grudging concern.
    How could she be “all right” when her mind was suddenly full of faded memories filled with blood and death? The last time she had been aboard a ship, her mother had caught yellow fever and died trying to take Celine to a better place. Had it not been for Persa’s agreeing to adopt her, she would have ended up in an orphanage in New Orleans.
    Now all she could think of was the stark image of her mother’s shrouded body as it slipped into the cold Atlantic waters. That and the sight of Persa lying dead on the floor. And Jean Perot in a pool of blood. No, she was not all right. She was definitely not all right.
    She longed to tell him that she might never be “all right” again. Instead she nodded slightly and turned to look back at the city.
    New Orleans lay pressed against the river like a lover. The open square called the Place d’ Armes where couples strolled, families picnicked and the condemned were hanged. The market where Marcel the vendor hawked vegetables. The maze of narrow streets and alleyways she knew so well. The courtyards, the fountains, the rumble of carts and carriages that blended with the shouts of drivers. The city pulsed with its own lifeblood, and that pulse had drummed in her veins for too long to deny it.
    Tall ships’ masts stood like a forest of leafless trees along the waterfront. Crates and barrels, trunks and carriages all vied for space on the docks. Sweat-sheened, heavily muscled men with skin of darkest ebony rolled hogsheads and hefted bales of cotton and other goods along the wooden wharf. Fat, well-dressed merchants argued with sea captains over the price of their cargoes. A tea-colored woman with a burnt orange chignon wound around her hair walked through the crowd balancing a basket tray upon her head.
    Celine could not conceive of loving any place as much as she loved New Orleans. She was tempted to leave Cordero Moreau to himself and his journey and run back to the small little house on rue de St. Ann. She wanted to know that someone had taken care of Persa. She couldn’t bear the thought of her beloved guardian lying cold, alone and abandoned in death. She almost screamed with the pain of having to bear it all in silence as she slipped away like one of the rats that hid aboard the cargo ships.
    He touched her hand in that unguarded, vulnerable moment when her mind was occupied with sights and sounds and sorrows and she had dropped her guard. Skin to skin, the connection was made, and dizziness raged through her. She felt her head begin to whirl and her hands go clammy. Darkness clouded her vision until images from Cordero’s past, as seen through his eyes, flitted through her mind.
    New Orleans long ago. The streets less crowded than now. The wharf throbs with life. The crowd ebbs and flows around him. Foster and Edward stand beside him. Waiting. Henre Moreau appears. He marches toward Cord with four ebony slaves, his expression hard and set. Grim