Free Heart's Safe Passage by Laurie Alice Eakes Page A

me, Mrs. Lee?”
    “Yes, I—” She looked down at the borrowed cloak.
    “I do not care if you wear my boat cloak. Come up if you like, Mrs. Lee. Mel, you and Tommy Jones go clean up the cabins.”
    Mel’s fine features tightened. “Not Tommy, please. He—he’s so unpleasant to be around.”
    “Is he now.” Docherty’s face hardened. “To you?”
    “He says naught to me. ’Tis what I dislike above all things. He just grumbles and mutters . . . stuff.”
    “What sort of stuff?” Docherty’s tone was so cold and hard that Phoebe took a half step backward and caught her heel in the extra length of the cloak.
    “I will go with our imp here.” His black eye now turning all sorts of colors from green to yellow, Watt leaped from the quarterdeck and rested a hand on Mel’s shoulder. “Tommy has a bee in his bonnet about doing women’s work.”
    “No work aboard a vessel is women’s work.” The chill remained in the captain’s voice. “Set him to scrubbing the lower deck if he won’t clean cabins.”
    “Rafe—er—Captain—” Watt began, then stopped, nodded, and started forward.
    “Scoot, imp,” Rafe said to Mel in a gentler tone.
    “Aye, aye, sir.” Mel gave him a salute so exaggerated it verged on insolent.
    Docherty sighed. “There’s no disciplining the lad.”
    Phoebe climbed the quarter ladder so she stood at least close to level with the captain and looked him in the face. “No lies between us, sir, please. It’s obvious to me that’s a girl.”
    “Aye, I should have known you’d work it out this quick. ’Tis too obvious.” He leaned against the rail and scrubbed his hands over his face. Beyond him a dozen feet away, the helmsman looked on with concern. “’Tis more obvious since she took the notion to cut her hair so she cannot braid it and stuff it down the back of her jacket. I do not ken how that is possible.”
    “It’s softer, perhaps.” Phoebe’s hand twitched, wanting to reach out and touch him. Wipe away a trouble he shouldn’t have if he didn’t have a child aboard a brig in constant danger. She grasped the rail with both hands behind her, for she no longer felt like giving him comfort. “This is scarcely the place to raise a child, let alone a girl.”
    “You tell Melvina that.” His lips twisted.
    “What do you mean? This is your ship.”
    “Brig.”
    Phoebe flipped one hand in the air. “What does it matter? It’s a vessel of war. You’re the captain. Put her ashore.”
    “You ken naught of it.” He turned on Phoebe. “What do you want from me other than set ashore?”
    Words of apology slipped from Phoebe’s mind. She set one hand on her hip and willed her temper to be obedient. “You are irresponsible keeping that child aboard. What if an enemy took her, harmed her? Could you live with yourself knowing you were responsible for something awful happening to—who is she? A relative, that’s obvious. Your sister? Do you want your flesh and blood—”
    “Madam,” Docherty interrupted in a voice as low as that of a growling feline, and just as hair-raising, “state your business or get off my quarterdeck.”
    “I, um, I—” Phoebe gulped. She turned her face away from him. The bracing bite of the wind steadied her, took away the last of the malaise in her middle with the clean, open air. “I’m sorry. I care about children.”
    “And you’re thinking I do not?” Though still low, his voice had gentled. “Believe me, you are wrong in that. I care about two things in this life, and Mel is one of them.” He hesitated a beat, then took a breath loud enough to hear over the wind and surf. “She’s my daughter.”

5
    In less than ten hours, Rafe had learned one thing about Phoebe Carter Lee that Williamsburg gossip hadn’t taught him—little left her speechless. His announcement of Mel’s parentage did. It left Mrs. Lee wide-eyed, gape-mouthed, and, above all, silent.
    One corner of Rafe’s mouth twitched upward. “Something surprises