Read Online Columbine by MIRANDA JARRETT - Free Book Online Page B

the strain on the edge of his smile, and he realized just how much pain Jonathan’s bravura entrance on horseback had cost him. He swung his arm around Jonathan’s shoulder, offering support, and was both surprised and concerned by how readily his brother leaned into him.
    “Come along, Jon,” he said gruffly.
    “We’ve much to say, you and I, and there’s far warmer places to say it.”
    But first Jonathan looked back to the ship, and, with a grand flourish, doffed his hat to the two girls.
    “Ten guineas,” he said slyly to Kit, “and she’s all yours. Call her my gift to you.”
    Eunice giggled into her hand at the attention, but Dianna wished it had been Kit, not his brother, who had turned back. With Jonathan Sparhawk now here to oversee the Prosperity, there would be no need for Kit to remain. This, then, could be the last she ever saw of him …. “Dianna Grey!” Captain Welles’s voice was sharp, and Dianna guiltily wondered how many times he’d called her before she noticed.
    “Come, girl, I haven’t all day.”
    There was a stranger beside the captain, and the frank appraisal the man gave Dianna made her blush.
    He wore a large-brimmed hat with a beaded band, a long black coat like a parson’s and greasy leather leggings. He was not tall, but stocky, his legs bowed outward, and although his hair was wispy and white, Dianna could not guess his age. The bones of his face seemed to almost jut through his leathery skin, and Dianna feared the man himself would be equally sharp, with no softness or gentleness, no humor in him anywhere.
    “Stop gawking like a lackwit, girl,” growled Captain Welles impatiently.
    “You won’t favor yourself keeping your new master awaiting.,”

Chapter Six
    Dianna sat on the deck of the sloop Tiger, her back braced against the hatch cover and sheltered from the wind. She had been there since they had left Saybrook that morning, preferring the open air to the small, stuffy cabin below and the seemingly endless dice game her new master had begun with the two other passengers. Every so often she heard Asa Wing’s voice rise above the others, and she wondered if he had won or lost.
    The only thing she now knew of the man was that he liked gaming; he had volunteered nothing else about himself or their destination. She didn’t even know why he had bought her indenture in the first place. He was clearly not accustomed to servants, nor did he seem interested in her in the lustful way her uncle had been. In fact, he really didn’t seem interested in her at all.
    She rested her head on her arms. She hated the feeling of helplessness, the way a total stranger now controlled her life for the next seven years. Seven years! She would be thirty then, an ancient crone, too old by far for any husband. When her father had lived, he had been family enough, but after two months with the Penhallows, she imagined herself more and more with a home of her own and babies and a husband that, to her dismay, always looked like Kit Sparhawk.
    She sighed and brushed her haft back from her face. She had never been in love, but she realized how close she’d come to it with Kit. She tried hard to forget his unpredictable kindness and his smile and the way his kiss had left her breathless and eager, and tried to remember instead how he always believed the worst of her, how he’d played along with her uncle, and how he’d tried to starve them all on the Prosperity. And, too, she couldn’t forget the auburn-haired girl who’d met him at Saybrook.
    No, it was better like this, better to never see Kit again. There were other men as handsome in the world, and others who might come to love and cherish her in a way Kit Sparhawk never would.
    She stared out over the water. The river had grown narrower, and shallower, too. The rippled surface had changed from green to silver, and the tang of the ocean faded as salt water gave way to fresh. The landscape was changing as well. First the town had been