A Captain's Bride (Gentlemen of the Coast Book 2) Read online

  A CAPTAIN'S BRIDE

  Gentlemen of the Coast Book 2

  by

  Danielle Thorne

  First Edition

  Copyright © 2020 by Danielle Thorne

  Kindle Direct Publishing

  Publish Date: April 2020

  ASIN: B084WRLTT1

  Cover Design: Bluewater Books, Inc.

  All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced in any form or in any way including any and all electronic means, and also photocopying or recording, without the exclusive permission of the above author, Danielle Thorne.

  The pirating of e-books is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, may be investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and can be punished by up to five years in a federal prison with a fine up to $250,000.

  The names, characters and events in this book are fictitious and based on the author's imagination; or they are used in a fictional situation. Any resemblances to persons or events living or dead are coincidental.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Quote

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  EPILOGUE

  Author's Note

  More Books | by Danielle Thorne

  About the Author

  Quote

  "No city could be more beautiful than Charleston during the brief reign of azaleas, no city on earth."

  ― Pat Conroy

  The Lords of Discipline

  CHAPTER ONE

  Charleston, South Carolina

  1794

  PHOEBE'S CLOGS SANK into a layer of sandy soil cluttered with oyster shells. Glancing toward the distant wharf, she dropped her sewing basket to the ground and slipped off her shoes. The arches of her feet relaxed as soon as they touched the sand through her stockings. The shore felt bitter cold.

  She tugged the hood of her fur-trimmed pelisse around her neck, thankful she'd worn quilted petticoats under her linsey-woolsey dress for market day. The blue indigo skirt swished around her legs in a snapping breeze as she watched water lick over the narrow strip of beach.

  Charleston. It pointed at the Atlantic Ocean like a finger dotted with palmetto trees. Either side of the harbor was protected by two islands within waving distance of each other. This allowed a narrow corridor of seawater to pass into the bay where Fort Wilkin observed the comings and goings of ships laden with rice, indigo, sugar, and molasses.

  Squinting in the winter sunshine, Phoebe released a slow stream of air as a lingering headache subsided. Gulls spiraled around her with little effort, and she envied them. Life in her narrow house on Beaufain Street was not effortless, but she was thankful for it. Her embroidered handkerchiefs were growing popular and helped sustain their meager income.

  Papa had built the house and secured a land tract upriver for a plantation someday. She missed him—the smell of tobacco smoldering in his pipe, his boisterous laugh, and of course, the dry goods shop that had been an appendage to his merchant business. But the war for independence had come and after so many years, Mama, Phoebe, and her married sister, Winnifred, had to move on without him. So had Charleston.

  Resolute, she untucked her mittens from the folds of her pelisse and slipped back on her clogs. They felt heavy as she plodded back to the street. Before she crossed, she hesitated, waiting for a handsome gig to bounce by. Its horse did a jaunty dance, and amused, Phoebe watched it slow to a stop and wait for her to pass.

  She hurried across the road. A man in a heavy coat with lace at his throat and a bright jonquil-colored blanket across his lap leaned out. His English top hat looked ridiculous, nothing like the cocked hats worn by most of the men she knew these days.

  "Ah!" he called and waved a gloved hand in acknowledgment. "Miss..."

  She groaned inwardly when she realized it was the fetching but absurd son of Papa's old friend from Mount Pleasant. The one young man she had adored as a girl until she'd accepted that a planter's son would never settle for a late merchant's daughter of little means, especially one like her. "Good day, Mr. Hathaway," she replied.

  "Oh, Miss Applewaite, is it?" he cried like he hadn't recognized her. He'd only asked her to dance at her very first ball, and what a disaster that had been.

  He flashed her a brilliant grin like he knew the picture he made. His extravagant clothes were quite refined, and though she did appreciate the quality, this was just the port after dawn. Not a ball. The infatuation she'd once carried for him reared its sleepy head, but she pushed it back into the past.

  Unaffected by her lack of enthusiasm for any banter, Mr. Hathaway touched his hat, and Phoebe continued her way up the wintry street with her gaze averted. She had no interest in entertaining the village fop. As if in reply, the snap of his whip sounded in the air, and she watched the gig lurch forward on to its destination.

  Clearly, Mr. Hathaway had no interest in dallying with the unchaperoned Applewaite spinster, either.

  JAMES HATHAWAY ENJOYED a good party, and the Twelfth Night ball made a perfect excuse to have fun. He hurried to the card room patting his pockets for his new deck and what remained of his allowance. Mama insisted he receive his inheritance by allowance month by month instead of annually. That was another reason to join the games. He needed a win.

  He'd done his duty with the ladies in the drawing room. Earlier, he'd visited with Mrs. Quinton and her daughter and made them laugh, and then he promised Mama's friend, Mrs. Applewaite, that he'd dance with her daughter. But first, cards.

  The pretty but overly serious Miss Applewaite would have to wait. She had a younger sister who was married, which had gained her a brother. The brother-in-law, Mr. Daniel Cadwell, was a good sort, although not known to be as clever as the late Mr. Applewaite. Not that James could remember. He'd only been ten years old and in poor health when war broke out with England. His bed chambers in the plantation house at Sandy Bank had been a prison for most of his childhood when all he'd needed for the suspected case of rickets was a little air.

  He shook off the unpleasant memories of being confined to his bed by Mama, physicians, and the long war. What Twelfth Night revelers needed tonight was a smart game of Brag since a cockfight would not do. A smile crept across his face as he grabbed the doorknob. Cards or dice was the most leisurely way to make a little extra money, and he could amuse his friends at the same time.

  He burst into the room. "Gentlemen. Your champion has arrived." A few guffaws erupted, but Benjamin Quinton let out a hoot. His best friend pushed out a chair using his boot. "Over here, Jamie. This table, yes?"

  Pleased and since no one else offered, James ambled across the room greeting his parents' friends and associates. He was relieved to find Papa was in the library, probably smoking and avoiding the crowd, although the air in here still smelled pungent with tobacco and wax. With a quiet whistle, James dropped down into the chair beside Benjamin. Mr. Daniel Cadwell and the feisty old merchant, McClellan, completed the set.

  "What are you playing?"

  "Nothing yet," said Benjamin. "We took a break after Whitely left, so we need a new player."

  "Brag?" suggested James.

  Cadwell raised a brow. "You whipped me soundly last time. I was hoping for Piquet or Faro."

  "Any will do," offered James, "but there's
too many of us now for Piquet."

  Benjamin called for Brag much to James's delight, and the gentlemen settled into their thoughts while sharing gossip from town or complaining about the others' bluffs.

  When Cadwell tossed down a card in frustration, he mumbled, "My sister-in-law will box my ears if I lose too much tonight."

  "Don't you mean your wife?" Benjamin teased.

  "Her, too, I suppose."

  "I pity you, poor man," laughed James. "A new wife, mother, and sister. How you must miss bachelorhood and answering to your father."

  "Having Miss Applewaite over my shoulder advising my wife how to manage me is almost like having my papa here."

  Benjamin pretended to groan. "Your sister-in-law is handsome, Mr. Cadwell, but Miss Applewaite has frightened us since we were in strings."

  James caught himself before another laugh escaped. "Now, now. At least she is not silly like the new chits coming out and too old to bother us unreliable rakes. One must admire the confidence with which she takes pleasure in her own company."

  Cadwell lifted his gaze from his hand. "I do, and I appreciate even more that she's better with figures. She would probably surpass me readying for planting season if it interested her."

  Benjamin leaned back in his chair. "I would have thought you'd open a shop like her papa did what with their family's connections.

  "You know I am a cabinet maker's grandson," Cadwell admitted, "but I am eager to work this plot of land that passed to me after marrying my wife."

  "But back to your sister-in-law," said James, for Miss Applewaite lingered in the back of his mind like a shadow. This evening he'd spied her sitting across the ballroom all alone but could not bring himself to ask her for a dance. Yet.

  "Why does she esteem the gentlemen of our society so poorly? I don't recall her ever being jilted if you don't mind me saying so."

  Cadwell lifted a shoulder in a mystified shrug. "She's too bookish thanks to her doting papa and possesses these wild ambitions to be a shopkeeper."

  "I'd rather be out in the fresh air," Mr. McClellan interposed, "but I do admire the clever lass."

  "Me, too," agreed Benjamin, "but wild, yes. She's a lady. What lady belongs in business for herself?"

  McClellan quickly differed, and the game halted as the men argued like squirrels over tree nuts.

  "Come now, it is admirable in its way," said James, "and things are changing."

  "What kind of shop?" Benjamin wondered.

  "Milliner, of course," answered Cadwell. "The Applewaite women are hounds for textiles and trimmings. How they love their hats."

  "A millinery shop," mused James. "Why, there are dozens of places like that, aren't there? Though I suppose a woman's interests are more suited in that direction."

  The others made noises of agreement.

  "So she would rather be a milliner than a wife?" thought Benjamin aloud. He gave a short, barking laugh.

  James understood what it was like to want to be something different than what everyone expected. It was no secret among his friends he'd rather be a sailor than a planter's son—a captain than an heir. But who took James Hathaway seriously? No one. Not Mama. Not even Papa. Why else would he ask James to do nothing more than call on their business associates in Charleston or pass messages back and forth between Sandy Bank and the city's Exchange where business was conducted?

  "Oh, yes," muttered Cadwell over the card game, "she wants to be independent and though I don't mind, the rest of her family does. She does need to get on with it soon though—either marry or open a shop, because as much as I respect her, my hands are full."

  James understood Cadwell felt burdened. He'd married into a fatherless family and taken on a widowed mother and a spinster sister-in-law. Cadwell was not the businessman his father-in-law had been, and his new mother seemed the expectant sort. Had she not convinced James's own mama to encourage him to ask Miss Applewaite to dance?

  The last card was called, and James frowned. Benjamin took the win and most of James's money. He was about penniless, and it was only January.

  "Blast," he muttered slumping back into his chair, but then with a good-natured sigh, he laughed along with the others. The expected dancing invitation to Miss Applewaite awaited. That would get him out of this. "If you will excuse me, gentlemen, I think I will go in search of cake and try my luck at finding a pea or a bean. At least then I may be treated like a king during this revelry."

  They began to tease him about ladies lying in wait across the hall, but he pasted on a resolute grin and trotted back out into the crowd in search of cake—and Miss Applewaite.

  "Miss Applewaite? That clumsy, orange-haired thing? No one will dance with her. She'll be lucky not to end up an old maid." The girls clustered around the spinet giggled behind their hands at Alice Quinton's prediction, and Phoebe, already into her second season, fled the room she'd entered to find solace someplace else—preferably without guests.

  Phoebe blinked away the memory. Had it really been that long since cruel peers had made her abhor dancing? Nine years later, here she was among some of those very same women, and they were married and she was not. The prophecy had come true. Stunning Alice Quinton, now Mrs. Alice Leonard, had snared the wealthy Leonard widower.

  Music rang out over the Heyward's drawing room, and Phoebe pretended to be entertained as she gripped the edges of her chair. It was because of Mama's insistence that she had come out at all. Yes, her hair had been rather orange as a child, but it deepened to a shade of brown by the time she became a young woman. That wasn't why she was a spinster. She was single because she was too intelligent and reasonable to marry young or on a reckless whim. And shy. Truth be told, Phoebe didn't see the point in marrying at all. Mama had not married again, and she managed just fine with Phoebe's assistance, of course.

  Phoebe glanced down at her silk taffeta bodice. One of mama's old gowns, it was a bit light for winter, but she'd repaired it with lace to cover the worn edges. It looked as fashionable as anyone else's. She straightened to stretch her aching shoulders and squeezed the fan in her grip. Her spindly chair rested against the back wall just beside the warming stove so she wouldn't be in anyone's way.

  Mama smiled at her from across the room, and Phoebe returned it. Winnifred chatted with her friends in a corner. Daniel was nowhere to be seen. Her brother-in-law was probably in the card room where it was much quieter. She knew he didn't have the means to be gambling; not newly married to Winnifred and with his own low country household to run. For now, they had moved to the Applewaite's land upriver at Duck Point.

  With a light sigh, Phoebe watched partners dance the reel. The women gleamed like polished gems. Without examining their overskirts, she knew the very weight of the silk damask and how difficult it was to sew and clean. She also understood what colors suited which complexions best. She would. A child born with a shocking shade of orange-red hair to a fashionable and sensitive mother would have to learn what to wear to survive in elegant society.

  A pair of fitted green breeches came to a stop in front of her, blocking her view of the dancing. After impeding her view for too long, Phoebe looked up at the owner with her brows raised in chastisement. To her surprise, it was Mr. James Hathaway, and she had to steady herself to keep looking severe less he see through her act.

  "I've just left a game of cards, and here you are, Miss Applewaite, just as your brother said you would be." He gave her an exaggerated bow then straightened with a beguiling grin.

  Ignoring the square jaw that nearly touched his earlobes, Phoebe narrowed her eyes. Mr. Hathaway had a strong chin with a deep dimple that looked like someone had pressed a butter knife into it and left an impression.

  He cocked his head in inquiry, and she realized his hand hung in the air. "You won't leave me standing here like a beggar will you, Miss Applewaite? I'm happy to dance, really I am. See," he turned his head and swept his gaze around the room, "everyone else is taken."

  Phoebe swallowed down the absurd i
nvitation. "Really, Mr. Hathaway, there is no one else? You poor man."

  He realized his mistake and balled his outstretched hand onto his hip while chuckling under his breath. It was almost bashful, but not believable. "I only meant, see here you are, and I would be happy to take a turn with you around the room or stretch my legs with a hearty reel. Your brother-in-law says you hardly ever get a chance to take the floor."

  Phoebe felt her spine snap when she jerked her chin. "I don't dance because I don't wish to." This usually sent away pitying dandies.

  All but this one. Mr. Hathaway gave her a vexing pout.

  Praying she was not flushed, Phoebe added, "You haven't spoken to me in at least a year by my estimation, yet you wish to converse as if we just chatted Tuesday."

  "I'm sure I've tipped my hat." Mr. Hathaway's carefree grin tightened. "No. Wait. Did I not see you wandering around near the fort just after Christmas?"

  Phoebe remembered his jaunty ride past her favorite strip of beach between the wharves and Fort Wilkin to watch the ships come in. She didn't remind him that he'd asked her to dance once before and how that ended. It was probably the last time they'd ever spoken besides the other week. It'd been years. In the meantime, he'd made a scoundrel of himself flirting with several ladies he did not marry and was known to do more scraping and bowing than any actual labor in his family's brick and shipping businesses. They had two boats now. Or was it three?

  She looked up and found him staring with a cheap smile that looked almost roguish. The first notes of the next dance sang out over the room, and she sighed with satisfaction thinking it too late. "On the street, perhaps. I don't recall. We're hardly more than acquainted."

  "Which I was trying to repair."

  Would he not go away? Phoebe's mind raced furiously for a way to avoid having to dance with such a flirtatious and unaccountable coxcomb. "You will miss the rest of your card game, Mr. Hathaway, and we cannot allow that."