An Improper Proposal Read Online Free Page A

it.”
    “And why not?” Payton tapped a daintily slippered foot. ‘I’ll be nineteen next month. Both Hudson and Raleigh got their own ships on their nineteenth birthdays. Why should I be treated any differently?”
    Once again, Drake’s cool blue gaze dipped below her neck.
    “Well,” he said. “Perhaps because you’re a—”
    “Don’t say it.” Payton held up a single hand, palm out. “Don’t you dare say it.”
    “Why?” Drake looked genuinely puzzled. “There’s nothing wrong with it, you know, Payton. It has its advantages, you know.”
    “Oh? Name one. And if you mention the word ‘motherhood’, I swear I’ll start screaming.”
    Drake hesitated. He either could not think of anything advantageous to being born female, or did not feel that what he had thought up was appropriate to mention in Payton’s presence, since he abruptly changed the subject. “Perhaps your brother feels he’s already given you your birthday gift. Isn’t that one of the new gowns Ross has been complaining about? It’s quite lovely.”
    Payton’s jaw dropped incredulously. “What? A gown? A bloody gown? You must be joking. I’m supposed to be satisfied with a new gown when I could have command of a clipper?”
    “Well,” Drake said. “I don’t suppose that seems fair to you. But to be honest, Payton, I’m not sure I disagree with Ross about your commanding your own ship. It’s one thing when you go to sea with your brothers. After all, then they’re there to protect you. But for a young lady to go to sea all by herself, with a crew of men she doesn’t know—”
    “Protect me?” Payton’s voice dripped with disgust. “Since when has any of my brothers ever protected me? You saw them back there. Protecting me was hardly foremost in Raleigh’s mind. Killing me was more like it. No—” Here she laid her hand upon his arm once more, hoping he wouldn’t notice that this very mild gesture was enough to cause the pulse in her throat to leap spasmodically. Still, she didn’t feel she had any choice. This might well be her last chance. “Promise you’ll help me to convince Ross to give me the
Constant
. Please, Drake. Ross listens to you, you know. Please will you promise to try?”
    Determined that this one time, she was going to look him in the eye and not blink or turn away until he did, Payton raised her gaze to meet his. It never failed to unnerve her, the unnatural blueness of his irises, so like the color of the water off the shoals of the Bahamas. The only difference was that there the water was so clear she was able to see all the way to the ocean floor. She could not—had never been able to—read what lay behind Drake’s clear blue eyes. They might as well have been black as pitch, for all she could see through them.
    How he might have answered her, she had no idea, for she could not read his expression, and they were interrupted before he could reply.
    “Connor?” The musical voice drifted from the open doorway, quite startling them both. Jerking her hand from Drake’s arm, Payton turned, and saw in the hallway a pretty redheaded woman in a pale blue dress trimmed with pink rosettes. Matching rosettes adorned her slippers and hair.
    “I thought I heard your voice, Connor,” the woman said sweetly. “Good evening, Miss Dixon. I just had the loveliest chat with your father. He showed me the latest addition to his musket-ball collection. He’s such a dear man. I quite adore him.”
    Payton managed a tepid smile. “Oh,” she said. “I’m so glad.”
    To Captain Drake, Miss Whitby said, “Are you coming down, dearest? I understand your grandmother has just arrived, and has been asking for you.”
    Captain Drake’s smile, which he’d seemed to have so much trouble controlling a moment before, had entirely disappeared. Now, instead of bringing out the golden highlights in his hair, the fading sunlight brought into extreme relief the lines in his face, of which, Payton noted, there were a