Free His Wicked Kiss by Gaelen Foley Page B

it’s not!” She took a step toward him and seemed to force her coaxing smile. “You’re going there anyway, aren’t you?”
    Bloody hell
. “Is that why you asked me here for a visit?” he asked crisply. “To butter me up so you could get what you wanted?”
    She lowered her head at the question; Jack scowled.
    He glanced at Trahern. “Ready?”
    “Aye, sir.”
    “Oh, please don’t go—you only just got here!” Miss Farraday jumped in front of Jack, blocking his path. She seemed undaunted by his famous glower, though she only came up to his chest and had to tilt her head back to meet his irked gaze.
    Her anxious smile refused the quashing effect of his glare. “You said your ship is big—very big. There must be room on board for me!”
    “There’s not.”
    “I don’t take up much space, as you can see.”
    “T hank you for the pineapple, Miss Farraday—”
    “
Eden
,” she insisted, trying to drag him into a familiarity that he did not desire, the better to make him do her will. Aye, that was how they got their claws into a man.
    She was a most determined creature, darting left and right to block his path as he tried to step past her.
    “I’m sorry, Miss Farraday,” he said through clenched teeth, “but my ship is not equipped to take passengers. It is a merchant vessel, a cargo ship. I have no place to put a young lady—”
    “I don’t require any special accommodations. I could sling my hammock anyplace! In fact—” She gulped with an air of desperation behind her dwindling smile. “That, er, brings me to my next point.”
    Jack set his hands on his waist. “Oh, there’s more, is there?”
    “Um, yes, well, you see, I-I have no money, actually. Terribly embarrassing. I’m afraid I can’t pay for my passage. But I will work,” she added stoutly. “I could help in the sickbay or the galley. I’m a hard worker, just tell me what to do. I won’t complain. I’m quite cheerful.”
    “Yes, I can see that,” Jack said through gritted teeth.
    Trahern stifled a cough.
    Jack shot him a fierce look.
    “I’ve heard about press gangs, so I know that every ship can always use an extra pair of hands—”
    “Not yours, my dear.” A quiver of lust shot through him only to imagine where he’d like those skillful, pretty hands to work on him.
    “But why?” she asked with a sorrowful, doe-eyed blink.
    “Because I said so,” he growled. “Now will you please get out of my way?”
    “No! I don’t mean to be a pest, but it’s just that I need so badly to get back to England .”
    “Why is that?” Jack demanded, though he swore to himself he did not care and didn’t really want to know. He was not taking her to England , and that was that. There was too much at stake to risk adding a feckless young beauty underfoot.
    “Father’s patron died,” she exclaimed. “His heir has cut the funding for our research.” This instantly flared Jack’s instinct for lucrative opportunity as Eden continued: “I intend to return to England so I can speak to the new earl and convince him to reinstate our grant.”
    He raised an eyebrow. “
You’re
going to speak to the earl?”
    “Yes,” she declared with a firm nod.
    He stared at her. “Nobody’s going to listen to you, a mere slip of a girl.”
    “Oh, yes, they will.” She planted her fists on her waist. “I’ll
make
them listen.”
    He found himself fighting a wry smile, damn her. Jack eyed the redhead warily, a trifle amused in spite of himself as he realized that, indeed, the chit had made
him
listen.
    Somehow it was easy to picture the intrepid little epiphyte lady taking this earl by the ear like an errant schoolboy and making him pay attention to her scientific lecture. Jack couldn’t help but wonder how she’d set London on its ear if she had half a chance—or rather, knock it on its pompous arse.
    That thought nearly persuaded him to take her there just for the pleasure of watching it happen, but of course, he couldn’t