The Tiger's Bride. Merline Lovelace

Navy frigates guarding the—

      At the sound of footsteps halting just outside the chamber, Jamie sat up abruptly. No! Surely she wouldn’t dare!

      The bamboo partition started to slide open.

      This time he’d take her, Jamie swore. Spinster or no spinster. Virgin or not. If she was so damned idiotic as to return to his chamber, he’d damn well take what the woman offered. He scowled at the door, thoroughly disgruntled by the sudden heat that surged into his groin at the thought of bedding the curvaceous Miss Abernathy.

      A tiny, dark-haired beauty stopped just over the threshold. Her timorous black eyes widened at his fierce scowl.

      “Cap-i-tan no wanchee Mei-Lin?” she asked hesitantly.

      To his profound disgust, Jamie realized that he did not, in fact, wanchee Mei-Lin. He was no longer in the mood for slow, languorous love play, even the incredibly skilled love play that this delicate blossom so excelled at. His pulses thrummed at too fast a pace and his mind churned with matters that took precedence even over the delights of the Fluttering Butterfly.

      With a rueful shake of his head, Jamie rose. What he needed now was a cold bath in one of Mong Ha’s tiled bathhouses and a boat girl to take him back to his ship. He had much to do before he sailed tomorrow. One way or another, Jamie swore, he was going to sail tomorrow!

      He left Mei-Lin counting out a pile of silver coins and strolled out of the House of the Dancing Blossoms with a confident swagger.

      Eighteen hours later he pounded on the door of the Presbyterian Mission House, his jaws tight with fury.

       Chapter Three

      Jamie lifted a fist to pound again. Suddenly, the door to the Mission House pulled open. He glanced down to meet the curious gaze of a boy in sturdy brown knickers and a white shirt decorated with several streaks of mud and a yellowish, unidentified substance. Since the lad carried a scimitar fashioned of wood and twine thrust through his belt, Jamie assumed he’d been indulging in that age old occupation of boys everywhere…waging fierce battle with imaginary dragons and foes.

      The boy looked the visitor up and down. “Yes, sir?”

      “I’m Kerrick, captain of the Phoenix. I wish to speak to your sister.”

      To his surprise, the boy’s chin jutted out in a decidedly belligerent manner. “You’re the man who was so rude to Sarah last night.”

      Jamie frowned. “She told you about last night, did she?”

      “She told me you wouldn’t help find Papa, and you weren’t very nice to her.” A grubby hand dropped to the hilt of the make-believe sword. “I should chop off the top of your head and feed your brains to the fishes!”

      After a frustrating day spreading bribes and threats with equal futility, Jamie was in no mood for more delays, much less childish threats. He still hadn’t procured the services of a pilot…but he had received instructions from the mandarin in charge to prepare to weigh anchor. Lord Wu Ping-chien had decreed that the Phoenix would proceed upriver on the morning tide and off-load its cargo in Canton under the watchful eye of the Emperor’s inspectors. The fact that this decree had been issued while Lord Blair, Chief Factor of the East India Company, looked smugly on only made Jamie more determined to flout it.

      He intended to weigh anchor, all right. Tonight He also intended to sail straight up the China coast. He was damned if he’d forfeit half his profits to corrupt Chinese customs officials and another tenth to the East India Company.

      First, though, he had to get past this bristling, bloodthirsty imp and speak to his sister. Jamie had dealt with enough boys during his years before the mast to know exactly how to handle this one. Summoning a suitably grave expression, he nodded.

      “If someone was rude to my sister, I’d want to feed his brains to the fishes, too,” he admitted. “I hope you’ll spare me, though, since I’ve come to apologize.”

      Still scowling, the boy weighed Jamie’s words for a few moments. “Are you going to help Sarah find Papa?”

      “Aye, lad.”

      The youngster’s belligerence vanished like a cloud blown before the wind. He spun on one heel and dashed into the house, shouting for Sarah to come at once.

      Jamie followed more slowly. He hadn’t lied, exactly. He’d help the Abernathy woman locate her father. But he’d do it on his terms, not hers.

      He stepped into a sitting room filled with furniture gathered from the four corners of the world and grown shabby with years of use. A heavy English settee with well-worn green velvet cushions was drawn up before an embroidered fire screen. An assortment of chairs flanked the settee, some done in bamboo, some in cane, and one, Jamie noted, in a dark mahogany carved in the exquisitely intricate style of the Upper Ganges. A gatelegged table that might once have graced an English manor house stood against one wall. Atop it sat a Blue Willow porcelain tea set so prized in the Western world and so cheaply procured here, in the land that produced it. Framed watercolors done by an obviously amateur hand hung on the walls. Scattered books, several women’s shawls, and a cricket bat carelessly tossed in one corner added to the cheerful jumble.

      Some might have found the room homelike. Having spent seventeen of his twenty-nine years aboard ship, where every wooden pin and twist of rope had its assigned place, Jamie found the room far too cluttered for his taste.

      The sound of hurrying footsteps brought him around. A moment later, Sarah Abernathy rushed into the sitting room. Breathless, she disdained polite amenities and got right to the matter at hand.

      “Charlie informs me you’ve changed your mind about helping me find my father. When do we sail?”

      Jamie took his time replying. As much as any man, he disliked being backed into a corner. The irritation that had built all through this long, frustrating day found focus in the woman before him. Folding his arms across his chest, he surveyed her coolly.

      The late afternoon sun slanting through the open windows painted her in no kinder a light than the red lanterns of the House of the Dancing Blossoms had last night. Attired in an unadorned dress of serviceable brown cambric and a long white apron, she looked far more like a maid than the mistress of her father’s house. Heat or strenuous activity or Jamie’s unexpected visit had put a high flush in her cheeks. Tendrils of reddish hair escaped the loose coil atop her head to curl in the afternoon damp.

      “Are those chicken feathers in your hair, Miss Abernathy?” he inquired casually, letting her have a taste of the delays and inconsequential inanities the Chinese officials had dished out to him all day. He took a small measure of satisfaction in the impatience that leapt into her golden-brown eyes.

      “Very likely,” she returned with a quick shake of her head. Several downy feathers came free and floated on the air. “I was helping Cook scald hens for dinner. When do we sail, Lord Straithe?”

      “We do not, Miss Abernathy.”

      “We do not? Do you mean you intend to comply with Lord Wu Ping-chien’s order and head upriver for Canton?”

      Jamie dropped his arms. “How the devil do you know about the order?” he demanded. “I was just informed of it myself an hour ago.”

      She waved a dismissive hand, as though the source of her intelligence was a matter of little consequence. “One of Cook’s friend’s uncles works in the Customs House. He sent word that you’d been given notice to proceed to Canton immediately.” Pinning Jamie with a level stare from her remarkable eyes, she demanded an answer. “Do you head for Canton, Lord Straithe?”

      “No, Miss Abernathy, I do not.”

      “I thought not.”

      The slight downward curl of her upper lip gave Jamie evidence