She only had the briefest warning, the soft whoosh of the belt cutting through the air before it landed smartly across the centre of both cheeks. The fierce pain and heat seared along the strip, and her intention not to make a sound went flying out the window.
“You miserable cur!” she yelped.
The belt made contact again, and she jumped at the sound of snapping leather, the huge root in her back passage pouring out more fire. She balled her hands into fists, a breath wheezed out from between her gritted teeth, and she willed her muscles to go slack.
“Now you see, that wasn’t so bad?” Jack had the temerity of stating.
“Take it out!” she demanded, stamping her foot. “Take it out, right now!”
The leather snapped against her punished flesh, and she howled as she instinctively clenched her bottom and the ginger released its fiery juices.
“Not until I’m sure I will never have to repeat this lesson again, little wife.”
Jack was slow, methodical, and thorough. It was these traits that made him a good captain, but how she hated them when faced with this humiliating position, the leather methodically striping from the crest of her trembling globes to the tops of her thighs. And then he started all over again, effectively stripping her of her anger and pride.
“Please, Jack,” she croaked, her voice aching from keeping the tears at bay, the first one now rolling down her cheek. “I’ll never strike you again,” she sobbed, the tears flowing freely.
Jack stilled his arm. “You will admit to how foolish and dangerous it was?”
Marie bobbed her head, crying too hard to answer him. The leaden knot of anger that had been sitting on her chest since the day they’d parted dissolved. She cried for the fear she’d felt at finding herself homeless. She cried for their angry separation. She cried for all the days they might have had together and all the time she had missed him.
Jack released a sigh of relief and secured the belt back around his waist. It was over, done with. Gazing at her prostrate over the desk, sobbing unconsolably, Jack massaged the left side of his chest. It pained him to see Marie this way; she was a strong woman, wasn’t one for hysterics or tears. She didn’t seem to be aware of him releasing the knots, of gathering her up in his arms to sit her on his lap, mindful of her scolded bottom. It was a deep, angry red, and though he’d taken considerable care not to mark his wife’s skin, the odd welt was edged with purple.
“Cry it out, sweeting,” he whispered, nuzzling her thick hair. He hated being that harsh, but the danger to them both if he left it unaddressed was high, and a woman on a pirate ship… He shuddered, unable to force his mind down that sinister path, what they would inflict upon his Marie. “Hush, hush,” he murmured into her ear. “It’s over, sweeting, all over.”
Marie cleaved to him, and he took heart in the action. Her arms wrapped tight around his neck, she almost choked him. She buried her face into his shirt and inhaled, appearing to absorb the comfort that had for so long been denied her.
At length, her breathing steadied, and Jack curled his knuckle under her chin and tilted her face up to him and swallowed hard. Tears clung to her long dark lashes, eyes red-rimmed and the muscles in her face slack with exhaustion. Her eyes drooped at the corners, indicating that sleep wasn’t far away.
“You are hiding something from me, Marie.” Jack reached around and grasped the root lewdly protruding from her scarlet cheeks, drawing it free from her body with her high-pitched squeal of protest. He rubbed careful circles over her blazing bottom, the heat radiating off her skin.
It had been a tedious day for both of them.
“But now that I have found you again, I will never let you go. I will not allow your secrets to part us; I will find them out one at a time.”
He received no reply, other than her soft and even breathing, informing him that sleep had claimed her. Jack shifted her ever so slightly against his shoulder, then settled her on the bed, and she immediately rolled onto her belly. He grimaced; it had been necessary, he reminded himself. He’d needed to break through the angry wall she had wrapped herself in, and she was a stubborn lassie when she wanted to be. Settling for draping a thin sheet over her, he left the cabin. The task was done, completed with enough noise to reaffirm to his men that he was without doubt master of this ship.
Chapter 4
Marie was awoken by the sensation of falling; the unforgiving floor caught her and knocked the breath from her body.
Ow.
She scrubbed the sleep from her eyes and, twisted into a sitting position. Her eyes all but popped out of her head and, spewing curses, she scrambled onto her knees, quick to relieve the pressure on her backside. Climbing to her feet, she gently cupped her tender cheeks, her lips curled in a rueful grimace. When Jack did a job, he did it properly. Her bottom was still highly sensitive and tender to the touch; she would be feeling the aftereffects for some days yet. She didn’t know how she felt about what he had done and caught her bottom lip between her teeth. Had she pushed him? Tried to get a reaction from him? A tell-tale heat painted her cheeks and neck. Well, she had got one. Jack had turned her into a writhing, willing mass driven by her basest needs. She didn’t know how he had managed it while she was so angry.
The floor tilted wildly, and Marie seized the edge of the bed, only just managing to keep on her feet. Fuck! What the hell was going on? She shucked into her trousers, hissing a breath through clenched teeth as the rough material scraped over her tenderised rump. Her gait stiff, she stalked out of the cabin, surprised but pleased to find the door unlocked. She stepped through the portal, and the wind tore the breath from her lungs, rain pelting her face and almost forcing her back under the onslaught. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the gloom. The thunder boom rivalled the blast of a cannon, and lightning split the sky, illuminating the colossal waves and black churning clouds in a perfect instant before darkness swallowed the horizon whole. Her forearm raised over her brow, she tried to shield her eyes from the rain, searching for a familiar face. Someone grabbed her shoulder, and she blinked into the tanned, weathered face of Grayling.
“Marie, what are you doing?” Grayling shouted, trying be heard above the storm. “Get below where you’ll be safe.” His words half ripped away by the relentless winds buffering her body, he turned her back in the direction of the cabin.
“Tighten the sail!”
They both froze. Jack’s ungodly roar cut through the storm. Her eyes were drawn to the rigging in the main mast, and the blurred pinpricks fighting against the wind to roll up the canvas for the main sail. Grayling broke off, striding away from her and barking orders to the men. A towering wave rose, and she watched in slow motion, rooted to the spot. It smashed upon the lower deck. The rush of water swept her feet out from under her, dragging her to the edge like Hell’s demons had latched on to her ankles, determined to sacrifice her to tempest’s fury. With a strength born of fear, Marie clawed her way to her feet. The ship gave a harsh buck, almost succeeding in taking her down again. Others were not so lucky. Two murky outlines, barely perceivable through the sheets of rain, lost their grip on the yardarm and crashed back on to the deck, their bodies limp and broken. Another wave hit and swept the two bodies overboard, just like they had never been. Marie’s stomach threatened to rebel.
“Get more men to secure that fucking sail!” Jack bellowed again and snapped Marie into action.
If they didn’t get the sail in, the storm would continue to steer them and they could run aground, forced upon an unseen reef. Gritting her teeth, Marie, fought her way through the wind assaulting her body, which ripped the very breath from her lungs, and, with a desperation born of mind-numbing fear, she began the perilous climb. Faster and faster, her legs pushed her upwards. She curled her fingers into tight claws, the high winds trying to snatch her off the rigging. The rain stabbed at her skin, the penetrating icy needles numbing her flesh. She moved stiffly but willed herself to keep reaching up to grasp the next fistful of rigging.
With sure feet and hands that spoke of years of practice, she never put a foot wrong.
She’d reached the arm of the mainsail and sucked in a breath. There was no time to relax, the job was only a third of the way done. Marie jerked her chin up and began the walk of faith on to the precariously swaying footropes, so called for one wrong move, and the unfortunate sailor would plunge to his death. Her eyes stung, and wind whipped at her shirt, threatening to wrench her off her unstable perch. She couldn’t help it, she glanced down, and her gut twisted. A fall that high would certainly kill her.
Arriving at the end of the arm, she sat and straddled it, locking her thighs tight at a particularly vicious buck, her hands slipping against the slick wood. She looked left and right—only the vaguest outlines of the other men were visible through the sheets of rain. Marie compelled her frozen hands to grasp that sail, discomfort knifing through her knuckles. The wind caught the canvas and yanked on it, dragging it from her struggling fingers. She swore a constant litany of the vilest words she knew, and having been raised by a seaman, she knew a lot.
Their battle with the sail continued. It was exhausting work, but little by little they drew it in, and it was at last secured and the ship steadied. She almost sagged with relief, but she wasn’t out of the woods yet. Her body was stiff, her limbs difficult to move, and she had to navigate both the footropes and the shrouds before her feet safely touched the deck again. Her teeth gritted, she willed herself into action and at a snail’s pace, crawled towards the rigging. It was like trying to move lead—God, she was so tired and cold. She swore she would never get warm again. She had worked herself halfway down when she became dizzy. Her senses swamped, the world spun and her head floated, unable to discern up from down. Marie’s foot slipped! Her stomach flipped, and she curled her fingers to keep her handhold. Her weight wrenched down on her shoulders, and she cried out. Her eyes slammed shut, bracing for impact. It never came. It took a long, drawn-out moment for Marie to conceive she could still breathe, that her brain wasn’t dashed upon the decks. She un-scrunched her eyes that she didn’t remember closing. That had been a close call, and she tried to right herself, but her body didn’t move.
Oh God, she was stuck. She curved her neck up, muscles screaming in protest and popping out in stark relief, and saw her foot had gone through a gap in the rigging. The ropes now had a stranglehold on her the top of her thigh.
Fuck! Her panic mounted—she was caught, trapped. After everything she’d been through, all the risks she had taken, she was not going to die just because she’d lost her bloody footing! She couldn’t let go of the ropes to pull herself free, so she wiggled and thrashed, to no avail. Blood rushing to her head and pounding in her ears, she collapsed back down, exhausted and fighting back tears of frustration, fear, and anger. Marie gathered her strength to try again, the rain pouring into her mouth and nose and choking her. The rigging rippled, and she gritted her teeth as her body bobbed—battling to keep her handhold made it bearable, or all her weight would be on her trapped leg. There was tension on the line—someone was coming to get her. Oh, thank God, she was losing feeling in the trapped limb.
A large body blanketed Marie, shielding her from the flaying wind, hands and feet holding on from either side of her.
Jack.
Instinctively, she knew it would be all right now, he wouldn’t let her fall. He’d come to get her and was in the process of bracing her back and shoulders, taking her weight.
“Now, Marie! Now!” He grunted.
Marie lunged upwards and grasped a higher handhold and, taking her weight and pulling up with a strength born of desperation, tugged her leg free.
Together they began their slow descent, Jack keeping at her pace, and he shielded her all the way down. Her feet touched the deck, and her vision wavered again. Her legs would have buckled, if not for Jack wrapping a strong arm about her waist and planting her on his hip. She sagged against him, only catching snippets of the conversation.
“Gilham! Take the ship, set course for St George. Come and get me if anything changes.”
He half walked, half carried her back to the cabin—the effort to keep her head up was enormous, when had it become a dead weight? They were both soaked to the skin, water dripping off the end of their noses and their clothes waterlogged.
Jack kicked the door shut behind him. “What were you thinking, you little fool?” he bit out, his heart still hammering.
“That you needed your fucking sail shortening.” The weak voice held a glimmer of humour, and he wanted to wring her reckless neck.
He tried to form a coherent sentence and…nothing. His lips moved, but nothing came out—Jack was beyond words. When he had seen her up there… He closed his eyes and released a steadying breath. She was safe, he had her. His eyes snapped open, and he focused on the slight woman who had him so twisted he couldn’t think straight. “Are you out of your ever-loving mind?” Jack demanded, regaining the power of speech.
He reached for the near see-through shirt that was plastered to her skin, and Marie made a half-hearted attempt to bat away his shaking hands. He peeled it off over her head, stripping her of the sopping garment and throwing it on the floor where it landed with a squelch. What was this? Jack’s brows winged upwards. He eyed the bindings hiding her mouth-watering breasts, large enough to fill his hands. Jack shot the roll of fabric wrapped around her chest a dirty look, before it, too, was disposed of, revealing barely an ounce of fat on her delicate frame. Christ, hadn’t they been feeding her aboard the Swallow? Taking out a rough blanket, he sat at the end of bed, Marie standing between his legs, and froze. There on her left side, standing out in sharp relief against her soft skin, was a large ugly scar from a musket ball, the distressed skin whitened and slightly raised. The ball had entered through the back, and with no exit wound at the front must have become lodged above her right hip, missing anything vital. Jack’s mouth tightened. He lifted a shaking hand and traced it, Marie’s flesh jumping at the initial touch. The scar was old, perhaps—he swallowed hard—perhaps by about two years. Dear God, what had happened to her? He hadn’t been there to protect her. He had failed her. He looked at her face to find her fathomless, mercurial eyes staring back at him, watching him and gauging his reaction. She shivered, her skin roughening with goosepimples, and it jerked him out of his reverie. He renewed his efforts to get her dry, chafing the numb flesh until it pinkened and she squirmed, showing a flicker of life. The fear that had been a noose around his throat eased by the smallest degree, he was not going to lose her. “I swear, Marie, I should whip you every day for a month for risking your life.”
“Yes, Jack,” she murmured, resting her forehead on his shoulder.
He bit out a curse—she was more tired than he thought, near drooping with exhaustion.
Another thought came to him. “When was the last time you ate?”
“The morning aboard the Swallow.”
He stilled his hands. That was nearing two days ago. No wonder her damn foot had slipped.
He should be horsewhipped; he had been so wrapped up in his own anger he hadn’t seen that she was fed. It hadn’t occurred to him to order even a basic ration to be brought to her.
He tucked her into the bed and piled the blankets atop her while she squirmed to find a comfy position, settling for resting her weight on her hip.
“Stay here,” Jack barked.
Marie rolled her eyes. “And there I was thinking of prancing about on deck naked.”
Jack snorted, her sharp wit warming him like nothing else would, and stalked out of the cabin.
He returned, a wood trencher clenched in his hand with the offering of ships biscuits, cheese, and dried meat—pork if he remembered correctly, bought from the Buccaneers on Hispaniola.
He scowled upon reentering. Marie had somehow managed to kick all but a single blanket off.
“Eat,” he said shortly, placing the verifiable feast in front of her.
She wrinkled her nose, a sign that she w
as about to argue, and Jack headed it off.
“That was an order, Marie, not a suggestion.”
Marie snorted. “Aye, Captain.”
Sarcasm dripped from her words, and Jack’s lips twitched. She used to do that when he was ordering her about at home, letting him know when he was on the edge of getting too bossy and her temper was rising.
She bit off a piece of the jerky and chewed. Satisfied that Marie’s immediate needs were being met, Jack set about stripping out of his sodden clothes, hanging his coat on the back of the chair, water dripping from the edge and forming a puddle on to the floor.
“What happened? Why did you run into the storm in full sail?” Marie asked, regarding him with a critical eye, breaking off a piece of biscuit and popping it into her mouth.
Jack knew exactly what she was thinking: why the hell hadn’t he shortened sail sooner? Her father had taught her well, and she would have made a formidable captain. Jack rolled his head back, the muscles shifting in his neck, and he froze when they clicked into place, the tension of the last day leaving his shoulders.
“A Navy man o’war was sighted and was set on chasing us down,” Jack said, drawing his shirt over his head and peeling away the wet fabric.
Marie paled, pushing herself into a more upright position, appearing to know exactly what that meant: a man o’war was a king of the sea, with three gun decks, and it had double the cannons of the Sirène. They wouldn’t have stood a chance in a fight.
Jack ran a hand through his dark hair, combing back the locks plastered to his forehead and leaving furrows where his fingers had indented in the wet hair. “It draws more water and—”
“—you decided to take your chances on the reefs,” Marie finished for him.
Jack nodded, his mouth flattening. “The bastard was still chasing us with a storm on the horizon, and I didn’t dare shorten sail.”
Her curiosity seemingly satisfied, she returned to her meal, the blanket falling away from her left shoulder and revealing her high, firm breast. Jack’s mouth dried, and he slowed the action of towelling himself. She had absolutely no idea what a little temptation she was to him.
Pirates, Passion and Plunder Page 90
