Free The Lady and the Captain by Beverly Adam Page B

his return from service. She’d enjoyed their lovemaking, deciding waiting was unnecessary, as they’d been committed to each other. Now the handsome master and commander had reawakened all the emotions she’d kept pent-up inside her body, by accidentally pressing his body against hers.
    Heavens , it’s a good thing he cannot read my thoughts, for sure now they are not that of a proper gentlewoman’s. Indeed, as she lifted a hand to feel her heated cheeks, it was quite the opposite.
    Gathering his things, he hurriedly prepared to leave the cabin.
    “Shall I give you a couple of minutes to tidy yourself and then return to escort you to the captain’s cabin where we shall take a look at his personal log?” he inquired before leaving.
    “Yes,” she said, nodding, while adjusting the lace fichu, which had slipped off to one side of her bodice during their encounter. He turned and left, giving her the time she needed to cool the flames that burned her cheeks.
     
    *    *    *
     
    A red, uniformed marine saluted them outside the captain’s cabin.
    Robert smartly returned it and they entered. Captain Jackson had given him advanced permission to look into his personal log, a document separate from The Brunswick’s.
    He sighed deeply upon opening the door. His face was dark with troubled thoughts of what he was about to undertake as the first mate. The upcoming days would decide not just Captain Jackson’s future, but his, as well.
    “What is troubling you?” she asked, noting his expression.
    “My every action from here on in will be minutely scrutinized by the Royal Admiralty,” he confessed. “A single blameworthy error on my part could end any hopes I may have entertained of ever being promoted to the rank of captain. Indeed it may occasion something much worse.”
    He prudently closed the door behind them. There was no need for the sentry to overhear their conversation and possibly report it to the other hands.
    “If Captain Jackson should decide to find fault with what I do during this time of his convalescence, he may have me brought before a naval tribunal and court-martialed for any incompetence, real or imagined. I am now walking a fine line between safety and an open, damning abyss.”
    “You are doing right by taking command. Captain Jackson could not have done so, even if he were here right now. He could barely sit up and speak when we left him. You still would have been forced to take his place, as undoubtedly you did before. Nay, ’tis right. You’ve no other choice. You must proceed as planned.”
    “Aye, although this is not how I hoped our voyage to your mother’s island would end,” he agreed. Resolutely, he walked over to the captain’s desk.
    He opened the log.
    It was encased in a leather cover. The parchments inside were smeared by Indian ink. The tobacco Captain Jackson smoked smelled pungently from the opened pages. Reading, Robert looked them over.
    “There is little here to point us in the direction as to who may have been trying to kill him. Everything appears to have been normal. No malicious notes of discontent from any of the men, no heated arguments with the officers, just the everyday discipline of normal routine. The only evidence that points to anything out of the ordinary is this entry here . . .”
    He fingered the page before him.
    “Captain Jackson began to admit to not feeling well. It was shortly after we brought the captured French warship, La Bonne Chance, back to England.”
    ‘“When was that?”
    “One week later,” he said, looking again at the entry in which the captain began to admit to ‘not feeling quite up to scratch.’
    “We were fair proud of ourselves, almost bursting out of our britches at having captured a blockade runner. It was the second one in two years we had managed to nab. The first had been of Spanish origin, a small fifth-rated vessel. But this one, this one was particularly special. She was a French merchant’s cargo ship. Aye,