“Good evening, milady,” he said, looking a trifle uncomfortable in this unfamiliar role. “We’re pleased you could join us.”
“Sit down, Smith, and dispense with the pretty speeches,” Brent growled. His rude words and the curious staring eyes all around her made Summer acutely uneasy, but Smith seemed unaffected. He escorted her to her place at the foot of the table with deliberate calm, and then seated himself on her right. Brent gave the signal for the first course to be brought in, and thus began the most memorable meal of Summer’s young life.
The seven men at the table ranged in age from thirty-three, Smith being the oldest, down to about seventeen. Talk was not confined to one’s neighbor, and, on occasion, it became rather boisterous. The men grinned sheepishly and dropped their voices to a polite level whenever the captain called them down, but minutes later they were noisily trying to make themselves heard over their tablemates once again.
Summer ate her dinner in near silence; she didn’t feel comfortable among so many strangers and she didn’t have much to contribute to the conversation. The men talked of the recent wars in the American colonies and of the continued friction at sea among England, France, and Spain. They took sides on various issues and cited facts to support their opinions. They were familiar with various methods of warfare, the most recent battles, and the individuals that figured prominently in them. And their references to politics showed that they had a grasp of the fundamental problems behind these international conflicts, and were able to discuss their effects on the participants.
Summer didn’t have the slightest idea what they were talking about half the time. She answered any remarks addressed to her as quickly as she could and then relapsed into silence. After several polite efforts to include her in the conversation, the men left her to her own thoughts.
Summer felt deprived as she listened to one youth excitedly discuss the efforts of Pitt to establish English dominance at sea. She was not stupid and she had a great deal of common sense, but her life had been bounded by her home and the plantation; no one had ever talked of anything else. Her parents had rarely entertained, and they had received news from the outside infrequently. Neither of them was interested in the turbulent forces at work in the new world or in the continuing conflicts of the old. And certainly neither had thought of developing Summer’s mind. Indeed; no one would believe that she had a mind after watching her stare at her plate all evening, ashamed to open her mouth.
“I’m afraid we don’t know how to act when there’s a lady on board,” commented Smith.
“I don’t understand much of what they’re talking about,” Summer said with a bleak smile, grateful for his thoughtfulness. “Maybe I’ll learn something if I listen.”
“It’s still unkind to exclude you.”
“But if they cater to me they won’t be able to talk about the things that interest them most, and that will ruin their evening.” She looked at Brent, who was patiently explaining a fine point to his eager listeners. “It’s bad enough they have to share their table with me. There’s no reason for them to adjust their conversation to include me.”
“They’ve already adjusted their clothing,” Smith observed dryly. “It won’t hurt them to make a few more alterations.”
“I was wondering if all pirates dressed like nobility when they came to dinner,” Summer said. She was startled to see the smile vanish from Smith’s face.
“If you would be willing to accept a word of advice, milady, I would suggest that you not refer to the men as pirates, or to the Windswept as a pirate ship.”
“But it is, isn’t it?” She faltered before his glacial stare. “I mean, you do stop ships and take their cargo.”
“That is true as far as it goes,” Smith said, without easing the severity of his tone. “We are commissioned by the Dutch government to harry the shipping of any country that attempts to establish dominance over the Atlantic. Our purpose is to keep the seas free.”
“But isn’t that what the English want, too?”
“Not in the eyes of the Dutch.”
“I’m sorry,” she apologized. “I don’t know whether you’re doing the right thing or not, but I perceive that you think you are.” She looked so perplexed that Smith relaxed. He wondered what she could be thinking about so intently; a few seconds later he found out.
“There is something I do know about, however; and that’s being taken prisoner against one’s will. You can say what you like about Pitt and the Dutch, but you had no right to take me off the Sea Otter. I don’t come under any commission, I don’t belong to the English, I’m not cargo, and I’m not an instrument of war. You’ve taken me from my family and those hired to protect me. I have no idea what you mean to do with me, nor do I have a way to prevent it.” The confidence and animation in Summer’s voice was so marked that Brent broke off his conversation.
“What are you two talking about down there? Is Smith telling you off-color stories?” he asked.
Summer choked down a burst of anger.
“We were just discussing a point of international law and its application at sea,” Smith answered calmly.
“We’re not discussing anything so elevating,” Brent said, directing a quizzical eye toward Summer’s angry face. “Maybe we’d better save our conversation for later and listen to you.” Smith felt a trifle put out by having caused attention to be focused on Summer, but she was not about to back down despite the shortcomings of her education.
“We’ve just finished, Captain,” she replied coolly. “It would be too repetitive to go through our arguments again.” The young officers stared at her, mouths open; no one spoke to the captain like that.
“If you don’t mind, I would like to retire to my cabin.” Everyone except Brent hastily scrambled to his feet as Summer stood up; he rose leisurely and deliberately walked to her side. “I can find my own way,” she said, determined to be free of him. “Mr. Smith can escort me if you’re afraid I’ll get lost.”
“I’m sure he would"—Brent smiled—"but I intend to escort you myself. He can bring the others up to date on international law while we’re gone.” He waited expectantly for her to return his verbal thrust, but instead she threw him an aggrieved look and started from the room. However, before she reached the door, she turned back to the men.
“Thank you for allowing me to join you this evening,” she said to the still-standing officers. “It has been an unlooked-for pleasure.” She then turned sharply on her heel, hoping to escape through the door before Brent could stop her, but he was standing behind her, his hand on the knob; it was impossible for her to go anywhere until he was ready.
“The pleasure has been ours,” he replied with a broad grin she didn’t think she liked. There had been a threatening undercurrent in his voice which Summer didn’t understand, but then she understood little about this disturbingly handsome, oftentimes frightening, young man. She decided she didn’t like him. She knew she didn’t trust him.
Summer walked swiftly down the passageway. The cabin door was unlocked and she stepped inside, but not so quickly that she was able to close the door on Brent.
“That was unkind,” he said with exaggerated chagrin. “I might get the impression that you don’t want me to come in.”
“I don’t,” she responded promptly.
“And after all I’ve done for you.”
“After all you’ve done for me!” she repeated, stupefied.
“I let you share my quarters. I even moved half my clothes to make room for yours.”
“If you hadn’t taken me off the Sea Otter, you wouldn’t have had to move or share anything,” she snapped.
“I admit I’m not an ideal substitute for your maid, but Smith and the boys have got to be better company than that twisted persimmon Brake-slow, or whatever you call him.”
“Brink-low,” she enunciated, trying to hide an appreciative grin.
“And without praising myself to the skies, I’ve got to be a cut above your cowardly Cap
tain Bonner. As to whether I’m an improvement on your husband, well, we’ll just have to wait and see about that, won’t we?” Summer lost some of her color and all willingness to be amused.
“I wish you’d go away. I’m tired and I want to go to bed.”
“It’s early yet.”
“Not for me. I’m used to an early bedtime and a light supper. It’s not good for you to eat so much at the end of the day.”
“I’ll remember to tell Jacques,” said Brent with a crack of laughter. “From now on we’ll have fruit, with bread and cheese for those who feel the need of something a little more sustaining.”
“You don’t have to make fun of me,” Summer said resentfully. “I know I act like a rustic; I am one. But I also know there’s no way to get fruit and cheese in the middle of the ocean, and that men who work in the riggings all day need something more than a banana for the evening meal. But people like you should watch how much they eat.”
“People like me!” Brent roared, his words so explosive Summer reeled back. “Just what in hell do you mean by that extremely ill-chosen phrase?”
Summer went weak-kneed with fright before the lightning flashes of his blazing eyes. “I don’t mean anything in particular,” she said, hoping to soothe the pride she had so unexpectedly lacerated. “I just thought that since you didn’t do as much work as the other men …”
“What makes you think that?” he demanded, his rage growing rather than subsiding.
“Well, you don’t go into the riggings,” she blurted out. “And you don’t haul the ropes or row the boats,” she added desperately. “So you can’t be getting as much exercise as the men who do the heavy work.”
Brent was shaking with such rage Summer thought he was going to strike her. He picked up a wooden chair and, with an incredibly quick wrenching motion, tore the back from the base. Then with one rapid move after another he snapped the inch-thick oak dowels that formed the back as if they were pieces of dried sugar cane.
“Before the week is out, I’ll show you the kind of exercise I get on this ship,” he said in an ominously quiet voice. “Then I’ll let you decide whether I’m an armchair leader like your Captain Bonner. Until I do, make the most of your privacy. You’re not going to have very much of it.”
Brent slammed out of the room without looking back. Word quickly spread through the ship that the young countess had made the captain so angry that he’d stormed back into the dining room, picked up a knife, and thrown it at the wall. It had come to a quivering halt between the eyes of King William V of the Netherlands. Not even Smith had ever known Brent to do anything like that. Everyone was at pains to move quietly and speak only after giving thought to each word. The last person to make the captain that mad had been pitched overboard into a boiling sea.
“I knew that girl would mean trouble,” said Smith after they’d left Brent alone with his brandy. “She hasn’t been on board half a day, and already the captain is mad enough to murder his mother.”
“What could she have done?” wondered one of the younger men.
“You can never tell with a woman,” Smith informed him. “I wouldn’t have thought she was the kind to go about causing trouble.”
“But she’s a real beauty,” pointed out another.
“That just makes it worse,” Smith said morosely. “Did you ever see a man kick up a fuss or fall into a thundering rage over an ugly female? It’s always the pretty ones that cause the trouble, and that one is pretty enough to cause a whole war.”
“I never thought of it like that.” This comment came from one of the younger men. He was digesting this novel idea.
“Ordinarily you wouldn’t have to, you being at sea all the time,” Smith said, “but now that we’ve got a female on board, we’ll be lucky if we make it back to port without some kind of upset.”
“Aw, come now,” said a third, “one little bit of a lass can’t do all that, even if she is a countess.”
“Then you don’t know anything about women,” Smith said with biting emphasis. “One little lass can do a whole lot more than that, and without being a countess. You listen to me: never underestimate any female, especially if she’s young and pretty. There’s no such thing as a little lass when she looks like our countess yonder. She’s Delilah, Jezebel, or anyone else you please all rolled into one, but whatever you call her, I call her trouble. You wait and see if I’m not right.”
As they went off to their cramped quarters to get what sleep they could, they took Smith’s words with them. He was not a talker and seldom gave unsolicited advice, but when he did speak, it paid to listen.
Chapter 6
The sound that woke Summer was slight, the whisper of stockinged feet moving across the floor, but her heart almost jumped into her throat.
“Who’s there?” she called, hoping desperately no one would answer.
“I am.” The reply was immediate. “Who did you expect?” It was Brent’s voice.
“I didn’t expect anybody,” Summer responded, too relieved to be angry. “What are you doing here?”
“Where else should I be? It’s my cabin.”
“I don’t care where you go just as long as you leave the minute you find what you’re after.”
“I know exactly where it is.” His voice was unusually tense, and his hands shook slightly as he lighted a small bedside lamp.
The tiny flame illuminated his quarters with a soft shadowy light. Pieces of furniture stood in relief like ghostly bodies casting impenetrable black shadows behind them, and the rich brown and polished-copper tones of the cabin glowed with a luminous warmth that seemed to make them pulse with life. Summer had never seen anything so eerie. She huddled down under the covers.
Brent took off his coat, folded it carefully, and put it away. He did the same with his waistcoat. The ribbon that held his hair in place was rudely cast to the floor, as was the crumpled but still-snowy white cravat. Summer watched as if hypnotized as he unbuttoned his shirt, stripped it off, and cast it into the same pile. Then he sat down to take off his shoes, and she was once more lost in admiration of the play of muscles over his chest and across his shoulders. Even in the dim light, she could easily see the rippling rhythm of his massive sinews.
Her earlier sense of excitement began to steal over her again. She wiggled in the bed, unable to be still, yet incapable of taking her eyes off the man before her. Brent tossed his shoes into a corner and pulled off his long calf-clinging hose. He then flexed his toes, glad to be freed of the confines of shoes and hose. Summer had never really looked at a man’s feet before, and she was surprised to find that such a humble member of the body could be so attractive. They were long feet, a little on the narrow side, but strong and supple.
No concrete images took shape in Summer’s brain; her mind was too untutored to be able to give shape and form to her instincts, so she let her thoughts wander along uncharted paths, carried on by a sense of anticipation and pleasurable discovery. But her daydream came to an abrupt halt when Brent stood up and began to unlace his pants.
“What are you doing?” she cried, jerked out of her pleasant fantasy with a suddenness that was physically painful. “Stop! Don’t you dare do that!”
He paid no attention, but undid the last button and stepped out of his pants. Summer dived under the covers with a muffled shriek.
“Do you hide every time Gowan undresses?” Brent asked. “It must get awfully tiring.”
Summer didn’t answer. The tumultuous sensations coursing through her body so confused her brain that her thoughts made no sense.
“Where should I undress if not in my own quarters?” Brent asked as he shed his last piece of clothing.
“You should undress where you’re going to sleep,” Summer stammered.
“I am doing that.”
Summer’s whole world began to disintegrate; nothing related to anything as it should anymore, and she felt herself being drawn into an enormous maelstrom, against her will.
“B
ut there’s only one bed,” she said, trying valiantly to keep a grasp on reality.
“That’s all we need,” Brent replied, and Summer could feel the heat in his voice.
“We?” Her voice was barely audible.
“You don’t think I’m going to sleep by myself, do you?” He sat down on the edge of the bed.
“But you can’t sleep in my bed.”
“You’ve got that wrong. You’re in my bed.”
“I’ll get out.”
“But I don’t want you to.” His fingers traced her outline through the bedclothes. “You’re too much of a temptation.”
“I don’t mind sleeping on the floor,” she said desperately.
“But I mind very much.”
Even with her head under the covers, Summer sensed his hot hunger. He lay down on the bed beside her and pulled the pillow off her head.
“Please don’t,” she begged, struggling to keep her hold on the only barrier between herself and this man who threatened to overwhelm her with his untamed animal desire. But he was much too strong, and easily pried the pillow from her grasp.
“I want to see your face,” he said. “It’s quite lovely, you know.”
His breath was hot on her cheek. “This is no time to be talking about my face,” she said, attempting to pull the sheet over her head.
“Then I’ll talk about the rest of you. It’s just as enchanting.” Passion throbbed in his voice as his arms encircled her waist; her flesh felt as if it were being burned with hot irons. She tried to push his hands away, but she couldn’t do that and still keep her hold on the sheets. She lost on both counts. His strong arms encircled her like metal bands, holding her immobile against him.
“What are you going to do?” she asked fearfully, still hoping that something would intervene to save her from what appeared to be her certain fate.
“Ten years ago the earl took what was mine,” he said, years of hate and anger cutting through flaring desire. “Now I’m going to take something of his.”
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