15 THEY ARE LOST—LOBSTER AND LAUNDRY—LIVE ENTERTAINMENT—A SUDDEN EXIT—IF ONLY—TAKING THE LONG WAY HOME—TWO HEARTS IN THE DARK—TURNING BACK—THEY ARE FOUND The most incomprehensible thing in the world to a woman was a man who rejects her offer of directions. Charlotte might never have set foot in Clacton-on-Sea before, but as soon as she obtained a map of the town (not stealing it, since if the shopkeeper wanted money for his maps he obviously would not display them on a wall rack, but instead lock them in a cabinet behind the counter, guarded by himself, a pit bull terrier, and two alarm systems), she automatically became an expert through the simple expedient of reading. Alex, however, just seemed to go any which way he happened upon. “I’m familiar with this town, and know a shortcut,” he insisted, tugging on her hand as he attempted to lead her down entirely the wrong street. “But it’s not on the map,” she replied, tugging back. “Map,” he scoffed, as if the word itself was pure nonsense, let alone the concept. Thus went the conversation, on a looping circuit, over the two days they spent searching the town for Lady Armitage. At night they barely spoke beyond instructions like More, faster, and My God don’t you dare stop or I will smack you with my shoe, as they engaged in what Charlotte liked to think of as reasonable constitutional exercise, and Alex viewed more frankly—i.e., using other words beginning with f. But the days were full of argument. For example: “You’re eating your lobster all wrong,” he said as they picnicked on the cottage roof at twilight, looking out over the sea. (Officially, they were searching—after all, who knew when Lady Armitage might take a skiff out for an evening’s sail?) “As a vegetarian,” Charlotte retorted, “you have no right to comment. I do declare—” She paused, suddenly breathless, as a cool, whispering breeze swept up from the shore, the sky’s own incantation, making her shiver. Her derelict imagination stirred with dreams. Why had Jane Austen not advised her of how vast an expanse a woman’s wonder might encompass? Could she even return to her scrupulous existence after watching wild stars dance out from beyond the edge of the world? Of course, the question was redundant. It was her prophesized fate and her duty to remain in London and one day lead the Wicken League. But perhaps it didn’t have to be as dreary as she’d always anticipated. “When I get my amulet back,” she said, mostly to herself, “I will use it to help other people know life can be this beautiful.” Alex stiffened. She glanced at him, and found his eyes dark with wary amusement as they stared down at her. “What?” she asked anxiously. “You surprise me.” “Why, because you doubt I will beat you to the amulet?” She’d meant it as a joke, but there was no humor in him. “No, because you don’t talk like a witch would.” Charlotte laughed a little, frowned a little, considered running away to hide a little. “And how does a witch talk?” “I don’t know.” He looked away, pushing a hand through his hair. For a minute it seemed that he’d rather jump off the roof than answer. “Alex?” she prompted, rather unnerved by this sudden seriousness in a man she’d not thought capable of it. He shrugged. “Not interested in beauty. Or in helping other people.” “Oh.” It wasn’t her he thought wrong; it was all witches. She relaxed teeth she did not know she had been clenching. “It’s true: some of us care nothing for beauty or charity. My aunt does good works only to spite others. But some are caring and good—not legally good, that is, but they use the incantation whenever they can to aid others. My mother is one such.” Alex did not reply, his expression closing even further. Charlotte nudged him with her elbow. “I myself am not so good, however, that I’m going to let you win the amulet.” He laughed then, like she’d hoped he would. He removed his coat and wrapped it around her shoulders, tucking her close against him as if he feared she might fly away. “Reprehensible lout,” she murmured, leaning her head on his shoulder. “Wicked little witch,” he answered, and kissed her hair. She sighed, and the sun set like summer passion in their eyes. And later, as they prepared for bed: “You are exasperating,” Alex told her when she picked up his clothes from where he’d tossed them on the floor. “You are disorderly,” she replied, folding his shirt and placing it on a chair. “Oh?” His eyes smoldered as he turned to look at her, and Charlotte swallowed dryly. She retreated behind the chair, but it was a useless defense; within two steps the nefarious pirate caught her. When he hoisted her over his shoulder, Charlotte did all she could to not laugh as she faked a struggle. He tossed her onto his ramshackle bed and demonstrated various unanticipated benefits of disorderly behavior—after which she was willing to concede it perhaps hadn’t been the dreadful insult she’d supposed. “But you should still employ a mop or flamethrower around this house occasionally,” she said as they sat on the bed later, eating biscuits they’d stolen from Bixby’s kitchen. “Next you’re going to want me to wear perfumed pomade in my hair,” Alex grumbled; then, at the contemplative look in her eye, hastily kissed that thought out of her mind—and every other with it. And the following morning: “Stop being so bloody well aggravating, woman,” he said when she stole from him five pounds he’d stolen from a passing tourist, and gave it to a ragamuffin girl instead. “Stop being uncivilized,” she countered, handing him the gold bangle she’d stolen from that same tourist. “I like being uncivilized,” he replied, grinning. And he sold the bangle to buy her a pair of embroidered ankle boots and several darts to weaponize them.
“Besides,” he added later, as they sat with Bixby in a tavern booth, quenching their thirst after a long day’s futile searching. “I’m a pirate and smuggler. It’s my job to be uncivilized.” He had his feet on the table as he drank beer. Charlotte sat primly beside him, sipping tea. Bixby, on the other side of the booth, with his fingers propping up his chin and pressed against his mouth, was gazing at something across the room. “I believe the Wisteria Society would disagree with you,” Charlotte said. Alex grinned at her sidelong. “Are you complimenting pirates, my darling?” “Certainly not. They are uncivilized to an extreme degree. However, within that context, they have their own simplistic notion of manners. They would not put their feet up on a table.” “Only because their clothing won’t allow it.” “Bixby is a pirate and he manages to sit with appropriate decorum.” “He’s a butler, not a pirate. And his elbow is on the table.” “Your behavior is corrupting him.” Alex laughed. “Daniel, old chap, Miss Pettifer just called you corrupt.” “I did not,” Charlotte retorted, but Bixby didn’t notice in any case. He remained focused on the distance. Frowning slightly, Alex glanced over his shoulder to see what had transfixed the man. A young, brown-haired woman in a plain dress was walking quietly across the room toward the door. “Pretty,” he said, shrugging his mouth. “You should go and say hello.” “One does not just ‘go and say hello’ to a lady,” Bixby murmured reproachfully. Alex laughed again. “Of course one does! Granted, she doesn’t look your type, since she’s not a diagram in an etiquette manual, but you might get lucky. Go, say hello. I dare you.” “Oh well then, if I have been dared, I should of course immediately act in a manner contrary to all my education and character,” Bixby replied, deadpan. “Yes,” Alex said. They gave each other looks that would have involved tongues sticking out were they twenty years younger. “I was not even looking at her,” Bixby said. “Sure.” Alex hid a disbelieving smirk by drinking more beer. Charlotte leaned forward with a frown, judging this pretty woman for herself. “Good heavens!” she remarked. “That is Miss Dearlove.” “Who?” Alex asked. “Mrs. Chuke’s maid.” She looked anxiously about the room. “Mrs. Chuke is here?” “Mrs. Chuke being a witch, I presume.” Alex slipped his feet down from the table as if expecting trouble at any moment. “Well, the jig had to be up sometime, I suppose. It’s been fun, darling, and if you need a lift home—” “I beg your pardon?” Charlotte stared at him, bewildered. He shrugged, not quite meeting her eye. “I assume you will join with this Mrs. Chuke to continue chasing the amulet.” Charlotte felt suddenly as blank as the space at the end of a chapter in which the heroine has been left in exciting circumstances, but one’s visitors are due any moment now, so reading on is impossible. Both men looked at her, and she swallowed dryly. “Why would I join with Mrs. Chuke?” “Well, she is a witch; you are a witch,” Alex reasoned. “You are in league with each other, literally.” “Yes, but—” She frowned, unable to explain why her heart was pounding. After all, while the past few days had been, as Alex put it, “fun,” her goal remained to retrieve the amulet for the Wicken League. It did make sense to reunite now with her own people. “But—” “But Miss Pettifer must remain in temporary alliance with you,” Bixby supplied in the calm, reasonable voice Charlotte herself could not manage, “because a flying house may still be needed in the pursuit of Lady Armitage.” “Exactly!” Charlotte smacked her hand against the table for emphasis, causing her teacup to rattle and pain to shoot up her arm. Alex raised an eyebrow; Bixby almost smiled. Fiends, the both of them! (Her foolish heart tried to budge an r into that word, but she ignored it.) “However, I would not call this an alliance. We must never forget, gentlemen, that I have kidnapped you.” “Oh, absolutely,” Alex said cheerfully. “Pretzel?” Charlotte ignored the basket of snacks he handed her. “Furthermore, although this kidnapping has been done in the name of the League, Mrs. Chuke would not approve, since I am a reputable lady and you are—” “Rogues?” Alex suggested. “Knaves?” Bixby offered. “Deplorable pirates,” Charlotte said. “Therefore, I must hide from her—and from any and all other witches we might encounter. For the sake of the amulet, you understand.” “I understand,” Alex replied in a tone that suggested he understood only too well. Looking her in the eye finally, he tipped his smile between wickedness and sweetness. My God, Charlotte thought, how many women have drowned in that charm? And why do I envy them? Flustered, and annoyed at being flustered, she leaned forward again to scrutinize the pub’s inhabitants. “I cannot, in fact, see Mrs. Chuke anywhere.” “No,” Bixby agreed, “but I count three pirates.” Alex’s beer mug met the table’s surface with a thunk. “Details,” he ordered brusquely. Bixby did not move more than his eyes as he indicated each pirate in turn. “Mrs. Etterly is sitting three tables behind us, sharpening swizzle sticks with her dagger. And the Rotunders are playing cards over there. Mr. Rotunder just discarded his entire hand. Literally. He’s screwing on a hook instead.” Alex straightened. “Time to leave.” “I don’t think they’ve seen us,” Bixby said. “No, but it sounds like they’ve seen each other. You create a distraction and I’ll—” Smash! Alex’s instructions were rendered unnecessary by the arrival of an independent distraction: to wit, a beer mug thrown at Mrs. Etterly’s table. The glass shattered and beer splashed widely, causing an outraged “Well I never!” from Mrs. Etterly. Bixby’s eyes widened in an excess of astonishment. “Is there a fourth you didn’t count?” Alex asked. “No. The mug was thrown by Miss Dearlove.” “Huh. In any case, we’re leaving. You go out the front, and I’ll take—” “I see you! Scoundrel!” There came a shudder of furniture as Mrs. Etterly rose abruptly from her chair, the bustle of her dress shoving it back to smack against the floor. “I smelled you ten minutes ago!” Mrs. Rotunder leaped from her own chair, cards flying. Mrs. Etterly gasped. “I am wearing an eau de toilette the Duchess of Uzes gave to me in thanks for not shooting her or burning down her house.” “Eau de toilette? Smells more like water you took from the toilet.” “Well I—” Smash! Another beer mug exploded on the floor between them. The pirates looked at it in momentary bewilderment, since clearly neither had thrown it, then cast such petty considerations aside and drew their swords. “En garde!” Mrs. Etterly shouted. “Prepare to die!” Mrs. Rotunder shouted in reply. “Never!” “Um, dearest,” Mr. Rotunder said, tugging on his wife so he might whisper to her. She listened, then straightened again, her expression poised between fury and dignity. “Prepare to be wounded!” she shouted in amendment. “But not so badly that you cannot sing at my soiree next week! The prince will be there, and you know how he admires your voice!” “Never!” Mrs. Etterly repeated. “By which I mean never in this context! I of course look forward to the soiree!” And she leaped forward, sword raised. A table crashed over, blades met with a loud metallic ringing, and several patrons screamed. “Blighters!” roared the innkeeper, waving a cricket bat as he entered the fray. “Up,” Alex said, climbing on to the bench seat and hauling Charlotte with him. “Be careful not to spill the tea!” she urged as a chair went flying past to shatter against the bar. With some difficulty, due to the inconvenient volume of Charlotte’s clothing, not to mention beer mats whizzing past with a stinging speed, they clambered across the table, over the side of the booth, and dropped to the ground unnoticed by anyone (except three waitresses, the bartender, and an old lady who had just been trying to enjoy her fish and chips in peace). As Bixby headed for the front door, Alex led Charlotte out the back into a dark alleyway. He shut the door moments before a plate shattered against it. “You have destroyed my skirt, sir, with these shenanigans,” Charlotte said, brushing at a slight mark on the fabric. “I declare, you appear to have a genius for mess. If only you weren’t such a scoundrel!” “If only you weren’t so enchanting,” Alex countered. This made no sense at all, since she had not done magic, and Charlotte was on the brink of telling him so when he grabbed her, pushed her against the alleyway wall, and kissed her until she forgot every word he said or she ought to say in response.
Kissing was one thing she never disputed. Her body had an irrepressible attraction to the man and, despite the several lectures it received daily from her brain, refused to care about either ill-mannered feuds or well-mannered behavior. Alex seemed to be caught in the same dilemma. They could barely cross a street without afterward dragging each other into a passionate embrace. Indeed, by the time they traversed the two hundred yards from the pub to Alex’s cottage on the pier, disheveled, breathless, and significantly unbuttoned, Bixby had brewed a pot of tea and retired with Thomas More’s Utopia. Later that night, lying beside Alex in his bed, watching him sleep in the gauzy moonlight and trying to pretend there were no spiderwebs on the ceiling overhead, Charlotte attempted to reason through what was happening to her and just where along the way she had left a large portion of her good sense. Captain O’Riley was not a suitable obsession. He seemed just as dangerous asleep as he did awake. His long, dark eyelashes, curving against his cheeks, were akin to a sword at her throat; his dreaming smile was a lure that would draw her out of all propriety. If only he wasn’t as tempting as he was perilous. If only he lived in a boardinghouse, and worked in an office, and didn’t look at her as if he wanted to lick the bittersweet words right out of her mouth. As she surveyed him covetously, Charlotte wondered whether concern for the amulet had inspired her to hijack his house, or whether she had still been flying a bicycle somewhere inside herself, lawless, longing for freedom, and in love even then with the pirate’s sky-colored eyes. Well, not in love. In like. Intrigued. She might share his bed, but there was still no call to involve emotions. The fact her pulse rushed when he smiled at her meant nothing beyond physiology. The odd loneliness that made her ache when he left the room for even a short while was inconsequential. She’d been lonely all her life, after all. No, Charlotte concluded; their relationship was nothing more than temporary fun, and when it was over she would go back to her proper life, taking with her some interesting memories (and the amulet). She sighed. I am most certainly not in love, she told herself, reaching out through the darkness to touch the pirate’s face.
And Alex, lying quiet with his eyes safely closed, indulged in the comfort of Charlotte’s presence after years of not sharing this bed with any woman out of fear they’d also want to share his heart. (Rugs being different, and beds in other buildings, and a convenient tabletop in more than one case.) He felt the drift of her fingers and tried not to smile. She bewitched him even without incantating. It wasn’t that she stirred his nether regions at a mere glance—although she certainly did that too. It was how her rosy loveliness and her thorn-sharp wit stirred his heart, making it shove painfully against the stone wall he’d built around it more than twenty years ago. That heart wanted to share with her, yearned to share, trembled so fast with its desperation to share that Alex began to feel dizzy, even lying in bed. He could not allow it. But he could not lie still either while his blood shook and Charlotte stroked her soft, clean fingers against his skin. So he tipped her back and pushed her legs apart, and she arched to welcome him in. They moved together fiercely, wordlessly, holding on to sheets and headboards and each other for dear life. Not love. Not needing. Just exercise in the dark. But afterward she wept, and he tried to brush the tears from her beautiful, moonlit cheek. “Did I hurt you?” he asked anxiously. “No,” she said. “I’m—I’m feeling, that’s all.” “Are you cold? Hungry? Do you want a cup of tea? What is it?” She caught his hand, holding it against the calm steadiness of her heartbeat. “It’s nothing. Only feeling. Is that not acceptable?” She sounded so defensive, he kissed her damp face. “Of course it is,” he assured her, although he still did not entirely understand. But tucking her closer, he just let her be. She held on to him like a pirate holds on to the wheel through a storm. As if she needed him. As if he represented safety. He felt her smile shift across his bare skin, and he sucked in a breath as sensation trembled through him. It was nothing, he told himself—sex always left his body sensitive for a while. This woman was just another lover, another way of getting through the dark. He was not going to go feeling simply because she did. However, there was no harm in smiling too, like a soft, boyish fool, in the darkness where no one could see it.
“The map says there is no shortcut,” Charlotte reiterated as the three of them trudged through town, following the afternoon’s light toward sea-tanged shadows. This was their third day now in Clacton-on-Sea, and Charlotte was so wearied by searching that she had fallen into an uncharacteristic irritability. “I doubt Lady Armitage is even here. Bixby’s information must have been faulty.” Bixby did not reply to this; his silence, however, was scandalized. “Impossible,” Alex argued. “Don’t give up, sweetheart. Remember the jewelry store yesterday that was robbed of all its gold rings? And the burned-down church? Not to mention the man who saw an unusual red-doored townhouse on Anchor Road? Parking in that street would appeal to Armitage’s sense of humor.” “But you are walking in the wrong direction for Anchor Road.” “No, it’s just down here a bit. Trust me.” He tugged on her hand without effect. “Ha. If you will look at the map—” She turned to gesture at said map, which Bixby was carrying to assist them, and went abruptly still. Alex turned to see what had troubled her. Bixby was gone. “That’s odd,” Alex murmured. “He obviously disdained your shortcut and has taken the correct route,” Charlotte said smugly. Alex rolled his eyes. “He obviously got sick of your harping on.” He began walking back along the narrow street in search of the missing butler. Charlotte, by dint of her hand still being held in his, necessarily followed him. “I have not been harping on,” she harped. “I have been attempting to educate you.” “The last woman who tried educating me used to apply a birch rod when I gave the wrong answer,” Alex replied cheerfully. “Or when she simply didn’t like my looks. Are you going to beat me, Lottie?” He flashed a seductive smile at her, but she stared back open-mouthed. “My God. I am so sorry.” Surprise flittered across his expression for the briefest moment before he laughed. “Don’t be. Sister Andrew—and the other nuns—and Deirdre—and Dadai—were all good training for the life of a pirate. Hell, my father still tries to give me a refresher course every time I go back to Ireland. He may be retired now and living the life of Riley, ha, but let’s just say he hasn’t forgotten how to be piratic.” “Well, I am not a pirate, and I don’t want to hurt you,” Charlotte averred—although in fact a moment ago it had been her plan to score a verbal hit. But as she hastily assessed her motivation, she found only a desire for game playing. In fact, what made exchanging barbs with Alex so enjoyable was the thought no one got truly harmed by it. Never mind Darcy; he had somehow managed to become her Mr. Knightley, a witty sparring partner, and while she did not expect a happy ever after like Emma Woodhouse, at least she was having a good time staying up late, turning pages, even dog-earing a few like a real scoundrel. Now the vision of Alex as a whipped little boy shook her so deeply, she stumbled as he pulled her along. They turned a corner they had not taken earlier, but Charlotte was too distracted to notice. “Don’t reassure me in that way,” Alex said, his voice lilting more than usual. “What would I do without the thrill of your deadly footwear, or the ravishing bite of your teeth? Now just down here and around this corner—damn.” He stopped suddenly, causing Charlotte to collide with him. He steadied her automatically, but his focus was on the high stone wall that stood ahead of them. Charlotte could not help herself. “It seems like your shortcut has been cut short.” “Very funny.” Pushing a hand through his hair, he looked around, scowling. “I would have sworn this led to Rosemary Road. And where the hell is Bixby?” “Having a rather pointed conversation with my maid.” They turned to see Mrs. Chuke in front of them, smiling like a thundercloud looking down on a parade.