The Wayward One (The De Montforte Brothers Book 5) by Danelle Harmon Page A

sailor was hauled up, a dozen hands reaching for his lifeless body as he was quickly brought aboard and laid on the deck. A stooped, gaunt man came rushing up from below; she heard Cranton say he was the surgeon. He got on his knees beside McGuire, rolled him onto his stomach, and began to work on him until he coughed, vomited seawater, and weakly began to move. A great cheer went up from his shipmates and immediately, they picked the poor fellow up and carried him below, the doctor at his side.
    A few moments later, Captain O’ Devir was back aboard the ship with the aid of a rope thrown down for him to scale, his inky black hair streaming water down his broad back, the shirt plastered wetly to the skin beneath, his angular features and prominent cheekbones defined all the more with his hair soaked and flattened to his skull. Someone pressed a towel into his hand, and he scrubbed vigorously at his face and hair for a moment before looking up; at that moment, his intense, purple-violet gaze met Nerissa’s through those absurdly long black lashes and something tingled in her belly. Lodged itself in her heart. He had said nothing, and yet with that look, he had said everything.
    He winked roguishly at her. She flushed and dropped her gaze.
    “Back the tops’ls, bring her about and continue on our previous course,” he said to Lieutenant Morgan, and tossing the towel over the quarterdeck railing, turned and walked away.
    And Nerissa found herself staring after him, looking at his broad, tapered back through the drenched transparency of his shirt, the line of his powerful thighs and calves through the soaked white breeches, as he strode to the hatch and, following the procession bearing the hapless sailor, went below.

Chapter 7

    Captain Christian Lord was just returning from an appointment at the Admiralty when, upon entering the ornate London townhouse he’d rented while awaiting his next command, he was given the news by a servant that the Duke of Blackheath was waiting for him in the parlor.
    He didn’t blink an eye. He knew, of course, why the duke was here.
    He had first met Lucien de Montforte many months before when he’d been selected by Admiralty to carry out a dangerous rescue mission to get the duke’s brother Charles, and family friend Lord Brookhampton, out of France. The mission had ended in success, a life-threatening injury to His Grace, and Christian’s vow that he would never again allow a member of the aristocracy aboard his command.
    Oh, yes, he knew what this was about.
    He gave his fancy gold laced hat to the servant and grim-faced, went to meet the duke.
    Lucien de Montforte, however, was already coming out of the parlor to meet him.
    “Captain Lord.”
    “Your Grace.”
    “You know why I’m here.”
    “I’d be a fool if I didn’t.”
    The two men returned to the parlor. Christian poured a glass of brandy for the duke, and another for himself. He was going to need it.
    Blackheath, his face lined with tension, wasted no time in getting straight to the point.
    “Tell me everything you know about your brother-in-law.”
    Christian sat down, wondering where to begin. Roddy. Brazen, reckless, proud, foolish, Roddy. Never in a million years would he think his wife’s older brother would have reason for or interest in harming Lady Nerissa. But Roddy was gone. Lady Nerissa was gone. And that brought him to only one conclusion, one that pained him to even think about because of the hurt it would bring to his wife. It couldn’t be Roddy. There was no rhyme or reason for it. But what other conclusion could any sane person reach? He had exhausted all possibilities and leads. He felt numb from trying to make sense of the senseless. It was easier to just answer the question than to keep letting his mind go round and round in an empty pursuit, to try and figure out why Lady Nerissa had disappeared from his own house—a mystery that he, Elliott and those to whom he was closest had been trying to solve