DESPITE HIS ROUGH CLOTHING, REEVE MCKENNA TOOK, A cabin in the first-class section of the ship. His station in life entitled him to the best and, besides, he felt an odd need to separate himself from that willful Yankee snippet with tangled moonfire hair and eyes the color of a brooding Queensland sky.

Tired and none too clean after a day spent burning off the sugar fields at Seven Sisters, his plantation upriver, Reeve sank down on the edge of the spacious bed bolted to the floor of his cabin and flung his hat away. He kicked off his boots and then stretched out on the fussy satin quilt that covered his berth, smiling to himself.

Loretta. He would think of Loretta. Thoughts of his mistress would surely keep one untidy little Yankee out of his mind.

One by one he assembled Loretta’s features in his imagination: dark, glossy hair, wide and impudent brown eyes, ivory complexion, lips as tartly sweet as the fruit of a pomegranate, breasts that could be described only as succulent….

Restlessly, Reeve sighed and cupped strong, callused hands behind his head. Loretta’s image faded from his mind like smoke, instantly replaced by the vision of that saucy little chit from America.

What was her name? What was she doing here in Australia, some seventeen thousand miles from her home? Had she given herself to that bastard Briggs, or had some benign fate spared her?

Once again Reeve sighed. What could she have seen in that sniveling waster anyway?

Interested by a rap at the cabin door, Reeve sat bolt upright, as embarrassed as if his thoughts had been shouted in the passageways for all to hear. What the devil did he care whether or not Philip Briggs had had his way with the girl? It was none of his business, and besides, he had Loretta.

The knock sounded again and a tentative masculine voice called, “It’s about your bath, Mr. McKenna—”

“The door’s open,” Reeve responded irritably, swinging his legs over the side of the bed and sitting up.

A steward entered, lugging a glistening copper bathtub and followed by two minions carrying enormous steaming buckets of water. Reeve knew he could find soap and towels in the cabinets affixed to the cabin wall. He gave the men a few coins for their trouble and muttered a dismissal, already peeling off his clothes as the door closed behind them. His smoke-scented shirt and trousers landed in a heap at the foot of his bed.

He fetched a large bar of lard soap from the cabinet as well as a washcloth and several towels, then stepped into the tub. The water was so hot that it made him draw in a sharp breath, but he sank into it without further hesitation, grateful for the ease it gave his aching muscles. If only the dratted thing had been large enough for a man to stretch out in.