She reclined on a pillow, an arm over her head, lifting her breasts in unconscious invitation to him. The peaks were erect, pale pink, hungry for his kiss. He trailed a hand between them, along the curve underneath and even as she gave the faintest, unconscious murmur of pleasure, shame filled him at the sight of his work-stained hand against her firm, luminous flesh.
Good Lord, you cur, she’s dead to the world!
He stripped off his clothes and scrubbed in the cooling bathwater, and when ten minutes later he found himself still aroused at the sight of her, he released that tension. He rinsed, stepped out, and dried himself, then rubbed the towel against his wet curls, watching her, aroused all over again. But at least his earlier release had relaxed his exhausted body.
He realized the room had gone cold. They were into the Atlantic now, Bermuda’s warmth far behind them.
He started a fire in the stove, stoked it well, and turned, relishing the reality of this woman in his bed. Loyalist or spy, time-traveler or lunatic, mermaid or sea witch—
She was his.
Who knew how much time he had left here—or she—but he would waste no more of what he had with her.
He threw another quilt on the bed and blew out the remaining candles. He climbed in beside her, kissed her throat, rested his hand over her shoulder, and rubbed gently. She lifted her head aside with a soft moan.
He turned her over onto her stomach, straddled her hips, and rubbed her shoulders and back until he felt the tight knots loosen. His naked body’s desire to find his pleasure within her was fierce, but his greater desire was to protect her from all—including himself. With her much more safely asleep on her stomach, he lay beside her and pulled the covers up over both of them. He returned to his side, resting his palm over her back.
Moments later, she turned back on her side and wriggled backward into his embrace, as she had that first night. Then again, that night, he hadn’t been naked. He sighed, enflamed at their intimacy, her firm, womanly hips cradling him.
Again he spoke her name, but she replied naught save collapsing a hand over her shoulder. He obliged her, taking her hand and kissing her fingers lightly, then wrapping an arm around her, his hand between her breasts, over her slow, steadying heartbeat.
He dropped light kisses from her shoulder to her ear. “My name is Bronson, my darling.”
She stirred in his arms, turning her face toward him. “Hm?”
He kissed her ear lightly. And with his own heart’s other half tucked against him, once again he dropped into a perfect sleep he’d known only with her.
Hawk awakened to the sound of waves crashing against the hull, the rain pattering against his windows, and a moment later, the cry of the lookout.
“Sail ho!”
He quickly dressed, slipped on an oilskin coat, and left Marley sleeping in the room.
“All hands on deck,” Raven shouted, followed by the squeal of the pipes and the thunder of feet on deck.
Hawk rushed up the ladder. And there he found Raven staring through a spyglass. “King’s colors, as if you couldn’t guess. Two, I’m afraid.”
Hawk leapt upon the slide to a carronade, holding out his own glass to look. A schooner of good size, still some distance off, accompanied by a frigate. But they were bearing down hard.
And the Hawk and the Raven began to work in tandem the way Michael had taught them. As if they were a single organism—nature’s cooperation that Michael had first observed in them.
“Furl the mizz’nmast sails,” Hawk ordered.
Two sailors scrambled into the rigging.
The captain and his quartermaster exchanged a glance, and the captain nodded. “Close reach starboard,” Raven called, and as the riggers worked, Carter, the helmsman, turned the wheel.
The sails filled in the rainy gust and plowing surge of the sea, and almost immediately, the Adventurer began to pull away from the British ship.
The sound of cannon fire caught their attention, but the shot fell several hundred feet short. The ship continued after them.
Hawk climbed into the rigging, tacking a sail a bit more to his liking. From there he raised his glass, peering at the ship through the storm. “Don’t we know that schooner?”
Simmering rage filled him, then, and he gave a bitter, imaginative curse.
“Tell me it isn’t.” Raven had echoed his partner’s perfectionist’s leap into the riggings to tweak one of the mizzenmast sails. Now, reading his mind, he, too, looked at the other ship.
“The devil’s own, Stephen Falligan, on the devil’s Delight. Accompanied by a frigate and sailing low in the water, she’s heavy with spoils.”
“He will not let us go.”
“We still owe him for the indignity of delivering his last ship as a prize. And we’ll have this one, too.”
“Oh, captain, sir, we seem to be headed in the wrong direction for that task.”
“Too far from shore. And we don’t have the element of surprise on our side necessary to contend with that frigate. So for now, live to fight another day. You can wager he’s headed to Boston.”
For the moment, they continued to gain distance, and the rainstorm turned out to be a boon to them. The escort had to be having a tough time loading and firing in this soup.
When they were a good ways out of sight, Hawk dismissed Raven, who’d been sailing through the night.
“How’s your cabin boy?”
Hawk shot him a look. “He’s in a sad shape. Didn’t I ask you to keep an eye on him?”
“I told him to slow down. He was trying to prove something to the other men.”
“A lack of intelligence?”
“More’s the surprise, he outworked at least two of them together. And besides, you saw him as well as I did. Small miracle you didn’t fall off the rigging yourself, focused as you were on that lad’s smallest movement.”
Hawk turned away from him. “Go to bed.”
“I accept. Mind if I borrow yours?”
“Do it and die.”
Raven laughed, then exhaled with a chortle deep in his chest, loudly mocking as he headed toward the hatch. “Rescue the drowning boy. Save the drowning boy. Put the drowning boy in the captain’s cabin. What could go wrong?”
Chapter Thirteen
Marley awakened, sore but well-rested, to the faint streaks of an early morning sun shining through the windows of the captain’s cabin. The tap at the door caught her attention, and she blinked in confusion.
“You awake?”
“Yes,” she called.
The door opened, and Raven entered with a tray. He moved a table beside the bed and placed the tray there. Over one shoulder hung a pair of shoes, and he set them on the table beside the tray.
“What’s this?”
“Breakfast. Captain thought you might feel better by now.”
“How long have I been asleep?” she asked, huddling under the covers.
“Best I can tell, about 36 hours. I don’t suppose you’re …” He gestured at the covers.
She blushed and shook her head.
He hastily stepped away to the door, looking into the passageway. “Just wanted to check and see how the shoes fit.”
“Raven! Did you make these for me?” Holding the blanket around her, she sat up and reached for what turned out to be a pair of new, hand-tooled moccasins.
They were unlike similar shoes she’d seen before, with a lip of the soft leather rolled tightly into a cuff of sorts and buttoned at the ankle. Unrolled, they could convert into boots. Leather laces went through hand-punched holes. The interior of the shoe was lined with fur.
Her feet were already in comfortable stockings, though she couldn’t remember donning them. She slipped her feet into the shoes, marveling at the perfect fit.
“Not to say I couldn’t have, but no, I didn’t.”
“Well who did?”
“Prayers to God above, could you please put on something? I’m only a man, and I don’t wish to
die.”
Only then did she realize a cold draft swept in from the door.
She spotted a thick, dark shirt near the bottom of the bed and scrambled into it. It was heavenly. And when she snuggled her face into the collar, she smelled Hawk and smiled.
“All right, come in and close the door. Sit and eat with me.”
“Thank you, no. I only want to explain the shoes.”
“I can see. This part can be unbuttoned and turn it into a boot. Can you teach me how to do my hair like yours?”
“The captain might well kill me.”
“Why?”
His eyes lowered with a smile. “Ah. Well, your cap helps disguise your lovely face.”
“It falls in my face all the time. I can’t see very well. Grime gets all over me. I walked into a stovepipe the other day.”
“Oh, all right. Put your coffee down.” He sat beside her on the bed, and she turned, presenting her back. “You have the nappiest hair I’ve ever seen on a white woman.”
“I know. The captain told me. He thinks I’m black.”
Raven laughed. “He just likes black women. He wishes he were one.”
“A black woman?
“Well, no. Just black. Don’t think too badly of him. Aside from having the sad habit of being enslaved by other human beings, ’tis a fortunate lot indeed.”
He crossed to the captain’s dressing chest and yanked open a drawer, withdrawing a warm red scarf. “Don’t think he’ll miss this much.”
He smoothed his fingertips through her hair, then tied it at the nape of her neck in the scarf. Then he worked quickly, and in no time her hair was wrapped into a neat club hanging down her back.
She turned to him, beaming.
“How are your feet?”
She wiggled them. “Much better. Thank you for whatever you did, they hardly hurt at all. The other night, I could barely walk.”
“Again, ’twas not my doing. Now, I’ve duties to be about. The captain suggested you help the ladies if you felt up to it. However, no galley duties.”
“But I like Padraig. He’s my favorite part of the job.”
“Who?”
“Padraig. The gentleman who does your cooking.”
“Look. Marley, we’re simple folk. He calls himself Cook, so that’s good enough for me.”
“But I can’t visit with him anymore?”
“Visit all you like. Just don’t tote water or wood or anything to hurt yourself.” He headed toward the door and looked back at her, eyebrows raised in emphasis. “Understand?”
“Begging your pardon, Mr. Raven, but if I want to tote wood, I shall tote wood.”
“If the captain has to waste another night performing ladies’ maid duties, tweezing your pretty fingers and nursing you, your behind will be the next thing that needs tweezing.”
His words became the harmless roar of a lion cub that made her laugh. He opened a drawer, withdrew another cap, and placed it over her head. His face was grim as he gazed at her. “And Mr. Raven is my father, thank you.”
With that, he slammed the door behind him. She noticed, again elated, that he left it unlocked.
She found her clothes where someone had left them washed and dried over a chair. She quickly dressed and admired her new shoes once again. Marley had grown up the kind of girl who could spend a day in a bookstore, but who visited shoe stores only when her own were worn thin. Loving shoes was a female phenomenon she did not comprehend.
But these shoes—practical, comfortable, and clever—she loved.
She spent the morning, once more, mucking out the alleged ladies’ cabin. When she brought their lunch, she brought along a small gift.
Despite their mockery of her, she pitied them. They stayed here all day and all night, with no light except that of one small porthole high above. Were she called upon to do the same, the darkness would have driven her mad by now.
So, after much debate, she found a small dish, filled it with water, then placed a lit candle in the middle of it and placed that by the door. Kit watched her in dismay. “You know the captain doesn’t allow us to keep candles in here.”
“Aren’t you tired of all the darkness?”
Kit looked up at the low beam just above her face, then shook her head. “Dear God, I am. But the weather tells me we’ll be in Boston soon, and—” She suddenly studied Marley. “Where did you get my scarf?”
“Your what?” Unconsciously, she touched her braid.
“You thief,” she growled, crouching as if she were a wild animal preparing to pounce. Instead, she reached out to snatch the scarf away, dismayed to find it embedded in Marley’s hair. Instead, the cap came away.
“Give it back. That was my scarf, a gift to the captain. ’Tisn’t yours to wear. ’Tis a woman’s scarf, anyway. Aren’t you ashamed?”
“But I thought it was the captain’s.”
“Did he lend it to you?”
“Well, no, but—”
Kit tried again and failed again to disentangle it from Marley’s hair. Grabbing her by the thick, heavy adornment, she went into a litany of enraged squeals. “Give it back! ’Tis mine, not yours.”
“It’s the captain’s,” Marley gritted out, pulling on the top half of her hair, pecking her head away from Kit in an attempt to escape.
Good heavens, in another ten seconds she’d be dragging her around by the hair like a caveman.
“What, pray tell, is this?”
The voice behind Marley sent dread deep within her, and she looked up from the floor against which Kit was busy attempting to bang her upper body.
The captain’s rage was focused on the lit candle, which he blew out. Then he looked at the scene, and his shoulders sank in defeat. He grabbed Kit and set her aside, then pulled Marley to her feet. She spotted her cap on the floor and quickly yanked it over her head.
“What’s the meaning of this?”
Marley shrugged, trying to pluck the tightly knotted scarf out of her hair; it was impossible. “I guess I had a scarf of yours I wasn’t supposed to. I apologize.”
He looked around her at the disheveled dressing hanging down her back. His hand spread over the lower half of his face, rubbing downward, and she wondered if he was trying not to laugh. Not bloody likely.
“I thought you loved the scarf. ’Twas a gift for your birthday.” Kit was on the verge of tears. Under her dreadful cap, Marley rolled her eyes.
He looked at Kit with a calming, paternal smile.
“Isn’t it clear this is Raven’s doing? No doubt his idea of a joke. You know I love it.”
“Then why would you let this common boy wear it?”
“As I said, I didn’t know. He’ll remove it, won’t you, boy?”
Marley nodded once, her eyes downcast as she wondered what kind of relationship these two had shared.
“Now, what’s the meaning of the candle? I’ve been clear this room is to have no candles. ’Tis crowded and hot already.”
Inwardly she groaned. How had she forgotten? She’d pitied the women so, she could’ve blown them all to Kingdom Come.
Hawk’s expression was veiled as he grabbed her upper arm and jerked her out of the room. As she glanced back on her way out of the room, she noticed Kit’s scrutiny—as if Marley were a puzzle she’d grown weary of trying to figure out.
He strode toward his cabin, his stride long. She flew after him, trying to keep up.
Inside his cabin, he barred the door, sat on a chair, and yanked her across his lap, face down.
Marley blushed at the indignity, flailing to find a surface to push herself back up. His left hand held her back in place. “What are you—”
“Were you not warned about candles in that room?”
She fidgeted, uncomfortable at his focused scrutiny, at his hand firmly clutching her upper thigh, his thumb trailing innocently between them.
“Answer me.”
With his left hand, he raised the shirt that she’d left untucked, revealing the shapely curves
of her buttocks. With her legs stretched out, she felt the tightly drawn fabric of his old, worn breeches across her rear end, revealing all.
“Yes, but I’m a grown wom—”
“Aye, that I can see.”
He smoothed his hand up over the roundness of her buttocks, then suddenly smacked her there.
“Stop that! It hurts!”
His palm roved over the curve of her buttocks, one finger tracing the line between down to where it disappeared between her thighs.
She lifted her hips in invitation to his touch. She moved one leg, parting her thighs slightly.
His hand came down again in a lightly stinging rebuke to her carelessness. She noticed the difference between the first and the second.
“Do you truly want to kill us all?” His voice was low in her ear, almost strangled. She wriggled in surprised pleasure at his teasing spanking, and against her hip she felt his own hard arousal.
She shook her head as she turned her head toward the sound of his voice, but the cap had fallen over her eyes.
In a moment, the tension left him, and the exasperated sound he made was half laughter, half despair. He drew her up, across his lap, and pulled off her cap.
He held her immobile, his arms around her, his face against hers in desperate tenderness. She could taste his breath, could feel his heart racing under her hands, yet he did not kiss her. He only held her close.
“Up,” he whispered.
She came to her feet, shaky with arousal at his touch. He rose, turning away, feet planted, fists on his hips.
When he turned, his eyes were bright with emotion. He gestured toward her hair. “The scarf.”
“Oh.” Thanks to Kit’s attack, the scarf was in a knot. She fumbled with the knot that fixed the club in place, which was now a tight, tiny mess with her hair strung through it.
Hawk sighed. “Sit.”
She obeyed, sitting in the chair where he directed.
He worked at the knots, freeing strands of her hair with gentle patience. “’Tis clear this is the work of a seaman.”
“I just liked how neat his hair always is. I thought it might make it easier to—”
“Silence.”
Immortal (The Trelawneys of Williamsburg Book 2) Page 12
