Chapter Nine

Sleep with Me

"So it was over then?" asked Lily, a note of reluctance in her voice. Nigel could tell a spell-binding story and she wasn't so sure he had missed his calling in life. Nigel was a criminalist, but he could easily have been a romance novelist.

"Yeah… I mean, they've caught the bad guy and Jordan and her boat are safe…" Lu finished, squirming uncomfortably at the thought of her nemesis being the heroine of this story.

"It's done? You all can come back inside and join the rest of us?" Brandeau asked. He had eventually wandered outside to find Lily and instead found himself as caught up as everyone else was in the tale Nigel was spinning.

Nigel shook his head. "No. Not exactly. Remember we still have one helpless victim locked in a crypt and the good detective still has a reward to claim…"

"Reward?" Woody stammered. He had been trying to keep his eyes above Jordan's chin-level all night. But that low-cut bodice was making that and other things damn hard.

"Yes…" Nigel's voice took on a silky tone. "A night with the boat's owner…doing whatever the detective wanted…"

"Come on," Bug rejoined. "He's the hero. Surely not…"

"He won it…" Nigel replied.

"But not fair and square," Bug countered.

"He still won it," Nigel continued, stubbornly. "He risked his neck to keep her and the boat safe."

From the corner, Garret sighed. "Okay, Nige. Get on with the story. Just…keep the details at a PG rating..."

"No..." Nigel answered, his voice still silky. "This is my story…."


Everything else happened too quickly for Jordan to process. JD had tipped the table over to try to throw Woody off balance, so that he could make a run for it, but it didn't work. Bug had pressed the end of the rifle to JD's back and forced him to his knees.

After that it didn't take long for a little persuasive questioning from the Pinkerton detective to get the rest of the information from JD. The man sang like a New England Bufflehead. The Delta Marker chugged ahead to the next stop where a search party organized by Woody, Matt Seely, Nigel, and Bug found Lu and freed her from the crypt.

Then Woody headed back to town to wake the sheriff and get Garret out of jail.

By midnight, the invited gamblers were off her boat and life as Jordan knew it, was returning to normal. Garret was back, Matt and Lu were safely ensconced in the honeymoon suite, and Nigel and Bug had retired. Only she was left awake, walking the decks, unable to sleep. Woody hadn't come back to the boat with Garret. Jordan imagined he may have stayed to talk to the sheriff a little longer and to make sure charges were properly drawn up against JD.

Or he may have left the boat for good.

That thought bothered her and her heart fell a little with the notion. Pushing a lock of her hair back with a shaky hand, she headed back to her cabin, hoping to gain a little rest with what was left of the night when a shadow fell over her shoulder and onto her door. It didn't take a Pinkerton to identify the broad physique.

"Woody…" She turned to face him.

This time his dimpled grin was sincere. "Hey. I just came by for a card game…" he joked. "The kind like you and Nigel have…" There was a point to the last comment.

Silently she opened the door to her stateroom and let him enter before she glided in after him and shut and locked the door. "It's over?" she asked quietly, her leaning back against the wall.

"Yeah. It's over. Completely. JD and his nefarious partner admitted to the murders. No doubt in a week or two New Orleans' justice will do its civic duty and both men will find themselves at the short end of a long rope, twisting in the Bayou breeze."

Jordan felt a shudder run through her. Death was not something she wished on anyone. Even JD. She had seen too much of it in her short life. She took a deep breath and fought to compose herself.

"It's okay, Jordan." He was at her side then, gently tucking an errant curl back behind her ear. "It's okay…it's over. You don't have to stay and watch anything…Garret's back and he's been completely cleared…Everything should get back to normal…"

But she was still struggling andWoody saw that. Miss Cavanaugh may be many things…most of which people saw her as wasn't true…but the fact that she did try to do the right thing and make sure justice was rendered didn't go unnoticed by him.

However, a one-time-time-lover-turned-murderer…who could have easily come after you… it was no wonder she was having a hard time processing everything. He needed to snap her out of this before she ended up in puddle at his feet. "It is over now," he repeated. "And now that I am as good as 'co-owner' of this boat, you better stay out of trouble…."

"Co-owner…."

"Remember, I won the game…"

"Ah… yes…now I remember…."

Woody chuckled. His tactic had worked. She was snapping out of the dark reflections she had been dealing with. "So you'd better be good or I'll come back and take over the boat…" He grinned through his words to let her know he was teasing.

"You will?" Jordan still blinking back into reality, looking at him with puzzled eyes.

"Not really…" he replied softly. "It was a joke, Jordan. To get you to laugh. To make you realize this whole thing is over." Somehow his fingers had never got untangled from her hair.

She sucked in a breath. "Well, like you said, you won the game. I guess the boat is partially yours….as well as me. For a night."

Woody's fingers froze. "No…Jordan…I was joking. I don't own one square inch of this boat…or one square inch of you…not for a night, an hour, or a minute."

"You mean you find me unattractive." She pushed away from him and the wall, walking across the room to stand in front of the bed.

"What? No..."

"Then you want me for a night…"

Woody struggled for a moment. Want was blending with need and it was all getting tossed around with reality. "No…."

"You don't want me for a night, then. Why? Am I not good enough for you?" She sat down on the edge of the feather tick with grace, spreading her skirts out around her. "I mean, I know what everyone says about me…I'm a lady with a reputation…so you can't soil your hands…and other parts of you with me?"

"It's not that…and yes, I know your reputation. I also know that's just a front. I'm not going to make you my mistress for a night just because I won a thrown card game."

"It was a gambling debt, Mr. Hoyt. Made with my full knowledge and consent. And I expect you to pick up your winnings."

"Jordan…"

"I will not be in debt to anyone, Mr. Hoyt. And I am up to ears in my debt to you. I owe you my boat and ….my body."

"It was a thrown game. And you risked your boat and your well-being to help us catch a killer."

"Who was ultimately after me. If it wasn't for me…none of this ever would have happened…" Her voice caught, broke, and trailed off.

"No…" He was at her side on the bed in half a heartbeat. "It's not your fault. You had nothing to do with JD and what he did."

"But if I hadn't let him sweet talk me all those years ago…" She looked up in his face for some kind of response. Resolution? Retribution? Absolution? She wasn't sure.

"You were young."

"But I should have known better….especially after….I have always known I should never trust gamblers…not real gamblers, anyway." Her fingers went back to tying themselves in knots like they did during the card game. Woody gently put his hands over hers. She had slipped up. Now he was going to get at the crux of the matter.

"After what, Jordan?"

Another shudder. "After Jim…after…"

"Jim?" he gently prodded, encouraging her to go on.

"Gentleman Jim. My guardian."

A sick thought flickered through Woody's mind. "Your guardian…" Surely this man didn't…

He heard her suck in a breath. "Jim…Gentleman Jim….was a riverboat gambler. A very good one. I was ten…when my parents…After…after my parents died, there wasn't any family to take me in. No one wanted me…."

Woody felt his heart break a little as he began to put her nearly incoherent sentences together. He could see a parentless, ten year-old Jordan…dark brown braids hanging down her back…with no one to turn to. "Go on," he prompted.

"Jim was a good friend of my father's. He took me in…raised me on this boat. He was a good man…a kind man…until…." Jordan shut her eyes at the memory. But this game tonight with her as a potential marker had dredged up all the feelings of an abused sixteen year-old girl. "Until there was a high stakes invitation-only poker game on this boat. Jim had nothing left to wager but the boat or me. So…" her voice caught and she struggled to regain her emotional footing.

"He wagered you." Woody's voice was flat, although he struggled to keep it that way. The bile was rising in his throat. Whoever and wherever this Jim was, Woody vowed to get retribution for her.

"And he lost….I lost…" She pulled her hands out from under Woody's and hid her face in them. "It was awful… At the end…when it was over…the man threw me out of his room…said I was about as common as they come….and called me a whore."

"Jordan.." Woody was torn between shaking her until she didn't believe those cutting comments or just taking her in his arms and holding her. The lady in this room was very different than the lady that made her daily appearances on the boat. Vulnerable. Needing someone to hold her and just tell her everything was fine…she was fine…wonderful, even.

"It's okay…" the hands came down from her eyes and sought Woody's again. "That was a long time ago. A long time ago." She shook her head. "But that's how I met up with Nigel, actually. He found me…after….took me back to his stateroom, gave me some brandy, and helped me calm down. Then he simply….stayed on the Marker. He's been my protector ever since."

"Jim?" He had to ask. He needed to know. Did the gambler simply hand over the boat to Jordan as an act of penitence?

"Dead. He died shortly afterwards from Yellow Fever."

Woody was quiet for a moment as the weight of her story settled in on him. A young girl, her innocence ripped from her in a most brutal way…and then the shame she obviously endured afterwards…and maybe still did.

Tonight dredged it all back up again for her. She had been made a gambling marker once more, and in her mind, it was still a debt she had to pay. For all the bravado she was now putting on, Woody knew she was torn. In Jordan's mind, she had been made fodder for man's crudeness once again by JD, someone she had at one time trusted…just like she had Jim.

But she also felt she had a debt to repay. And Woody knew in Jordan's mind, she wasn't sure which was worse. He would have to proceed very carefully.

"So like I said, I should have known better, but I didn't…which brings me back to where we are now, Mr. Hoyt." She stood, and put her fingers to the laces on the back of her dress. "I am yours. For one night. Anyway you chose. As many times as you chose." She untied the bow and began to wrestle with the bodice of her dress with nearly numb fingers.

And felt herself jump when Woody's fingers covered hers and gently pulled them away as he began to free her from the laces himself, finally pushing the bodice to her waist before turning her around to face him. She was beautiful and the chemise she had on underneath her burgundy beaded dress did nothing to hide the curve of her breasts or the pinkness of her taunt nipples. He swallowed hard. "Anyway I want?"

Jordan nodded, finding herself searching his blue eyes for answers to that question. But they were hooded and dark and told her nothing.

"Take your hair down."

The command was curt and gruff. Hesitantly she reached for the pins that held her hair, and pulled them and the ostrich feathers out of her chestnut curls, shaking her head so that her hair spread around her shoulders.

"Your dress. Take it off."

Jordan's fingers found the last two hooks on the skirt of the dress and popped them open, letting the beaded, burgundy creation fall to the floor, leaving her in only her chemise, which fell to the tops of her thighs, and her stockings that were held up by two lacy garters.

"Get in the bed."

She took a deep breath and obediently began to pull down the coverlet, all the while hearing him undress behind her. She crawled in the bed and lay down, waiting for the inevitable. At least she knew he could kiss…from his exploits in front of JD…when she wished it had been just him and her in that room…she knew he could kiss.

Woody turned down the kerosene lights. The room went pitch black. She felt the covers shift and slide and the feather tick give as he got in beside her.

And nearly jumped out of her skin when his arm slid across her middle, turning her on her side, her back to his chest. He pulled her up close next to him and his lips found her ear. "Good night, Jordan."

She stiffened. "Good night?"

"Yeah. Good night."

"But…"she fairly stuttered the word. "You…won…I….anything…"

"I know. Anything I chose. And this is I what I chose. One night…with you…snuggled up beside me while I sleep."

"But…"

"It's what I chose. I'm tired. You're tired. It's been a hell of a day…let's get some rest."

"But…."

"Shh….good night."