Free Pieces of Dreams by Jennifer Blake Page A

slender body… His hands closed into fists as he pictured it.
    It was Aunt Dora who filled the lengthening breach in the conversation. With a lifted brow in his direction, she inquired, “And just what do you know about boxes for the fine things women like to keep anyway, my lad? I thought you'd been at sea these many years, far from the company of women?”
    “Don't know a thing, Aunt Dora,” he said, giving her a bland look from under his lashes.
    “Go on with you. I'll just bet there's been a woman or two traveled a few miles on that China tea clipper of yours.”
    His amusement faded. “Not my ship.”
    “If you say so. Still, you must've consorted with them somewhere because you didn't learn your tricks in Good Hope. Not that I'm blaming you, mind. A man's a man wherever he may be, and a bear don't pass a honey tree without trying to climb it.”
    “Good Lord, Aunt Dora!” He drew back in the pretense of shock.
    “Now don't go trying that innocent stuff on me, my boy, because it won't work. I expect you'd rather not take females to sea, that's all.”
    “I might take a wife if I had one,” he said in tentative tones. “Some captains do; I know a lady who always sails with her husband. Once when he was laid up in his bunk, half out of his head with fever, his ship ran into a hurricane. His lady took charge, giving orders she claimed to be relaying from her husband. The ship sailed right through the storm when every man jack on board had thought she'd surely go down. The captain laughed himself hoarse when he heard, because he hadn't been able to give a sensible order for five solid days.”
    “Sounds like a woman with a head on her shoulders to me,” Aunt Dora commented with a notable lack of amazement.
    “A man of sense, rather, for marrying the right one in the first place.”
    The older woman pursed her lips. “Still, not every female is cut out for a life afloat.”
    “Or every man.”
    “No, but most of the ones who take to it become sea rovers who can never settled down to one woman or be satisfied with a quiet life following a plow or tending hearth and home. I think you’re one of them, my boy. What do you say to that?”
    He met the woman's wise eyes, saw the purpose there and also the anxiety that forced her to it. His gaze flickered to Melly an instant before returning to her aunt. Grimly, he said, “You may be right. Or close to it.”
    “I thought so,” the older woman said, then sighed. “You always were about half pirate.”
    Caleb, who sat listening, said, “More like three-quarters.”
    “Humph,” Aunt Dora said, giving Melly's fiancé a brief glance. “Yes, and the other quarter of you both was two-year-old brat.”
    Conrad had to laugh. At the same time, he glanced at Melly again. She was staring out over the river with her teeth set in the softness of her bottom lip. Caleb, on the other hand, showed no signs whatever of regretting his brother's future absence.
    It was a short time later that Biddy finally prevailed on Melly to go for a stroll. As he saw Melly gathering herself to rise, Conrad sprang up and pulled her to her feet. Once upright, he decided he might as well amble along with the two ladies as escort. That got Caleb moving. Then the Reverend Milken elected to join them. Next thing they knew, everyone was meandering off along the levee in the hot afternoon sun as if it made perfectly good sense.
    Everyone, that is, except Aunt Dora and Seymour Prine. Melly's aunt watched them with open-mouthed incredulity before lying back on a pile of cushions and closing her eyes. Before they had gone ten yards, she was snoring gently. Mr. Prine shifted his position so his body blocked a shaft of sunlight falling on her face. Then taking a small book from his pocket, he settled himself for guard duty.
    The group of picnickers turned downriver, talking in fits and starts, rambling with no destination. The breeze off the water was stronger than earlier, and carried humid promise in