Patrick led his captain to join the others at a table in the far corner. The pirates who had come to fear and respect him as their leader, lifted their mugs in greeting. James returned the niceties with his own brand of insults and jeers as a brimming pint of grog was thrust into his hand.
No matter how many swigs he took of the drink, James remained as sober as a nun, unlike his crew. It didn’t take long for them to become part of the rabble, leaving the infamous captain the only coherent mind in the place.
It was a good thing he could think clearly, otherwise he might have never picked up on a strange and fascinating development on the other side of the tavern. He watched the door - mostly to make sure no officers or patrolmen entered the tavern in search of unsavory characters to arrest - when he spotted an odd figure slip in with a group.
The young sailor kept his head low, the wide brim of his hat shading his face, but James could make out a bit of red hair at the nape of his neck. The boy’s slight frame meant he was either fairly young, or fairly new to someone’s crew. His body hadn’t been broken and toned by the hard toil required on a ship.
Then, there was the way he moved. His steps weren’t lumbering or heavy, but light and graceful as he dodged the stumbling drunkards and avoided the whores who didn’t pay him a second glance. James watched the boy, his thumb stroking over the rough handle of his mug that was only half empty. The young sailor sat alone against the wall and as soon as he lifted his head, James had to force himself not to burst from his chair.
The clothes the boy wore were baggy, but not baggy enough to hide the fact that this boy wasn’t a boy at all. One deep whiff of the foul air confirmed it and James steadily rose to his feet. Careful not to cause a disturbance that would draw attention to himself, he made his way to stand next to the sailor.
James closed his eyes and breathed in her scent. How long had she been masquerading as a man? How long did she think the charade would last? Still undetected, he leaned against the empty space on the wall beside her.
“How did you manage to sneak out?” he asked, just loud enough for her ears alone.
From the corner of his eye, James saw her go rigid. He only needed to hear her speak and every suspicion would be validated. Her head tilted ever so slightly, as if she were trying to get a good look at him while still being subtle.
“What are you talking about?” she replied, her voice dropped to keep up her disguise.
That was enough for him. James reached up and tugged off her hat, allowing her bright red hair to tumble down over her shoulders. Grace made a sound of protest and stood to confront the man who had ruined her disguise. As soon as those eyes met his, brilliant and glittering like the most precious sapphires in all the world, James thanked whatever powers were at work in the heavens to produce this miracle.
“Your fellow crewmates must have been staring at the sun too long, because they’re blind as worms if they couldn’t see all your curves.”
There was a moment of hesitance in her, and James could see the war of emotions plainly written in her face. Shifting back and forth between confusion and irritation, it was clear that she didn’t recognize him right away. James wasn’t all too surprised. He shaved his face especially for her birthday, but kept to one of the oldest seafaring superstitions and refrained from taking a razor to his beard since then. His thick, dark layer of stubble was a better disguise than her little getup.
She reached out to snatch her hat back, but he held it high above his head and well out of her reach. Grace would have to climb him to get at it. Unfortunately, she didn’t try.
“Give me my hat,” she demanded.
It was then he noticed that her delicate hands were wrapped in bandages. Judging by the traces of old blood in the cotton, her captain gave her plenty of work on whatever ship she had snuck aboard. James wanted to be furious with any seadog that would make such a dear lady slave away on a ship, but they didn’t know any better.
“Not until you answer my question.”
James chuckled at her pathetic efforts to jump for her hat. When she slipped on the spilled rum on the floor and collided straight into him, his free arm encircled her waist to hold her close. This was right where he always wanted her to be, in his arms with her breasts pressed against his chest. How rousing it was to feel her body, free from the constraints of a corset and thick petticoats.
Though she might not have made the connection yet, Grace still didn’t seem to mind. She neither struggled nor fought against him as other respectable ladies would have. Instead, the heady scent of her arousal cut through the stench of tavern life and called to his own manhood like the red-headed siren that she was. If they continued to stay so close to one another, she’d come to realize exactly how she made him feel. It’d be impossible to hide.
“Did you find your heart yet?” he muttered in her ear.
Grace jerked back so she could get a good look at his face again and he gave her a wicked, mischievous grin. She gasped, and recognition donned in those pretty eyes of hers.
“You!”
James gathered a bit of her shirt and vest fabric in his hand, a precaution just in case she decided to run. He mocked her by feigning the same shock she displayed so openly.
Grace beat at his chest and he smelled a bit of fresh blood seep from the broken blisters on her palms. “You lied to me!”
James shrugged. “I do it all the time, darling. I’m sure I’m not the first man to ever deceive you, and I won’t be the last.”
That hidden temper finally flared within her and James could only laugh.
“You were the one who stole from my father, weren’t you?”
“Is that why you came all the way from Kingston?” he teased. “Just to track me down? Well, I hate to tell you this, but we’ve already sold off your –“
Grace pushed against him to try and get free. “I don’t care about what you stole!” she declared. “And what do you care of my reasons? You never cared from the beginning, did you? You were just trying to distract me and my father so we wouldn’t see what you were planning all along.”
James had to admit that she was smarter than he originally thought. Beautiful, feisty, and intelligent. Even the wolf within him admired that about her. What he didn’t like was that she was completely right. It had all been part of his plan and it worked. He just didn’t plan on everything else that happened in between. He didn’t plan on fancying her or becoming a mess in her absence. Seeing her now was like breathing fresh air, even in this squalid shithole, and he hated to admit it.
However, she was wrong about one thing. He did care about her reasons. He cared that she was a little fire bird trapped within that gilded cage. If he had the chance, if he could have set aside the plan for one moment, he would have done exactly as he promised and freed her somehow. This wasn’t what he intended for her, though. She didn’t belong in a nasty place like this, with her body disgraced by sailor garb and gentle hands tarnished by labor.
Yet, here she was, out in the wild open and free. She didn’t need his help in escaping. But now, he had to set things to right.
James slapped the hat back on her head and tucked it neatly so her feminine features were somewhat hidden again. “I’ll tell you one thing I do care about now,” he said. “Seizing an opportune moment.”
There was a glint of panic in her eyes, and though James would have taken that opportunity too, it wasn’t the one she was thinking of. In one swift movement, he threw her over his shoulder and carried her out of the tavern like he was hauling a sack of flour.
She screeched and beat at his back. The drunken sailors laughed and pointed at the spectacle, but made no move to stop James from finally claiming his prize. He would have been a fool to pass up a chance to hold the governor’s daughter for ransom. They could be back to Kingston within a few days and his crew would get another easy bounty for them to gamble and waste away at another port. It wouldn’t be easy to give her up, but James’ first duty was to his men, not
his heart. And certainly not this throbbing, aching need that might get the better of him before this new escapade was through.
Grace finally stopped struggling when they arrived to the docks. Dozens of people stared as the man, whom she now understood to be a thief, carried her over his shoulder toward a ship. She might have fought harder if she wasn’t so bone-tired and starving from the long voyage aboard The Lady Adventure. It was a fine, respectable merchant vessel and the only one in Kingston that was in search of hired sailors at the time when Grace made her escape.
What she hadn’t expected, after cutting her hair to her shoulders and donning an outfit she stole, was the amount of work involved in sailing on a ship. She hadn’t expected it to be easy, but she thought that because of her slight frame, they would give her some of the lesser jobs. Not so. If anything, they set her to some of the toughest and filthiest tasks on the ship.
So, when she glanced up and saw the man was carting her to another ship, she let out a long groan and succumbed to her fate. She didn’t know what the blackguard had in mind, but it couldn’t have been favorable. What opportune moment could he be talking about?
It wasn’t until she saw the name painted on the stern of the ship that she finally made the connection. The men she sailed with for the last two and a half weeks sometimes talked about The Burning Rose in reverent, fearful whispers like it was some malicious ghost that could be summoned out of the fog by simply uttering her name. Even the captain seemed afraid of the pirate ship that was rumored to swoop down upon unexpecting ships with unprecedented speed and brutality. The pirates aboard were just as equally dreaded, especially their captain known only as The Devil Dog.
The man who carried her up the gangplank must have been part of The Devil Dog’s notorious pirate crew, looking to gain favor with his captain by presenting him with a bartering chip. He knew she was the governor’s daughter. How he knew that she was a woman beneath her disguise was a mystery. Not even the men she bunked with below decks on The Lady Adventure suspected who she really was.
Men, their faces and clothes grimy and riddled with stains, hurried up to meet them. Grace wished she had time to tuck her hair beneath her hat.
“What’s all this, Captain?” she heard one of them ask while the others whistled and made lude comments about her bum that was in full display.
Grace’s eyes went wide and she looked around for any man who resembled the dangerous pirate captain with the glowing golden eyes that made him so infamous. She saw no one, but the man who still had his arm wrapped around her legs answered the crewman.
“Here, I have a bit of precious cargo that needs returning to Kingston.”
He affectionately patted her rump and Grace tried to angle her leg in such a way as to kick him in the jaw, but his hold on her was steadfast. In response to the man’s words, the crew gave out loud shouts of victory, as if they were already guaranteed a ransom.
“Let me down!” she cried, feeling her heart pound even harder into her throat as all the blood rushed to her head.
The man, The Devil Dog, laughed at her expense. With such deft precision that she was left slightly dizzy and disoriented, he dropped her to her feet and held her arms tight with her back pressed against him. If she wasn’t so furious for falling into the hands of a ruthless pirate, she might have enjoyed the feel of his body against hers. It was something she had dreamed about almost every night swinging in her hammock on The Lady Adventure. Never had she imagined that the man, parading as Edward Corbet, was not only a thief, but a pirate.
Once her vision cleared and she could see straight again, she found herself facing about a dozen pirates leering at her with crooked smiles. Surely the captain wouldn’t just throw her to the wolves like this? If he intended her for ransom, he couldn’t deliver tainted goods back to her father.
“It’s bad luck to bring a woman aboard, Captain,” one man contested. “Especially a redhead.”
“I say we tie her to the bowsprit all the way to Kingston!” shouted another.
“Make her sleep below decks with us!”
“What’s she doin’ all the way in St. Thomas?”
Grace ignored the obscene remarks they made about her red hair and the way her vest stretched across her chest.
The Devil Dog silenced them with just a word and said, “I’ll hang any man by his guts if he so much as touches my treasure.”
Grace wasn’t sure whether to find such protectiveness endearing or disturbing. “I’m not your treasure,” she spat viciously, letting the venom from her ardent words be heard by all the men.
The pirate spun her around until she was facing him again and forced to glare up into the eyes that had ruined her. Grace might have run away eventually, but this pirate, this cad and brigand, quickened her plans prematurely. She set out to sea in search of that freedom she longed for, but only found toil and hardship. This wasn’t the life she anticipated, but her home wasn’t in Kingston anymore. She had no place to go, no place to claim as her own. She was stuck in limbo all because he had put some silly notion in her head to go out and seek that adventure he promised.
He smiled down on her and she hated the way her core tightened with longing that was so contrary to what she should have been feeling seconds before.
“As long as you’re on my ship, you’ll be whatever I want you to be.”
The weight of her situation finally settled on her shoulders. This was The Devil Dog. She danced with him at her party, she flirted and dreamed about that face that enchanted her so irrevocably. The Devil Dog saw through her disguise, and was now holding her hostage on his ship. The Devil Dog was staring at her, right here and now. This pirate was not what she envisioned when she listened to rumors of the man who went into battle with the eyes of a demon and ferocity of a wild beast. This couldn’t be the same man who swept her off her feet in the ballroom back in Kingston. Surely this handsome face didn’t belong to a cutthroat.
But the men around her, the ones who addressed him as captain, the ones who looked to him for answers about the woman he held so close, had confirmed it. This was The Devil Dog; scourge of the seas and murderer of all who stood between him and the treasure he sought.
“Mr. Bones!” The Devil Dog shouted over her shoulder. “Tend to her hands. We don’t want to deliver damage goods back to the governor, do we?”
Abandoning his former gentleness, the captain pushed her into the crowd of pirates who were eager to get their hands on her soft skin. Another man, whose touch was light and bony, caught her and immediately directed her toward the stairs that led below decks. The pirate who had her now wasn’t like the others. Thin, older, and smelling of lard, she assumed he must have been the cook.
Once they had escaped into the cool darkness that reeked of fusty, stagnant water and manly odors, Grace glanced down to her hands. In all her struggling, she had broken open the cuts and blisters that she acquired while serving on The Lady Adventure. A lot of good that had done her. If she had known it was The Devil Dog who grabbed her in the tavern, she might not have put up much of a fight. It was pointless, which was why so many merchant vessels gave up their cargo to the pirate without firing a single shot. Once The Devil Dog had his eyes set on a bounty, he wasn’t going to let it go so easily.
Mr. Bones led her into a secluded part of the lower deck where she could smell the evidence of some meal preparation. The ship’s kitchen wasn’t impressive, but the herbs, spices, and other preserved foods were an improvement to the smell.
Without a word, he sat her down on one of the long benches, presumably where the crew took some of their meals, and went to retrieve the supplies he needed to bandage up her hands. Above her, she could hear the muffled voices of the crewmen and stomping feet as they walked around deck. If she listened close enough, she could almost make out The Devil Dog amongst them. His voice was so clear, so much more pleasing than the grisly talk of his crew.
She silently berated herself for admiring the man who was wanted by the English,
French, Spanish, and Dutch for unspeakable crimes. There was nothing admirable about a pirate, no matter how charming he was.
“He won’t hurt you, miss,” Mr. Bones said in a withered, crackling voice that gave away his age and years spent before the mast. “If I know James, which I like to think I do, he’s more interested in the money than letting anyone harm a hair on your pretty head.”
The old cook sat down beside her and Grace didn’t shrink away when he reached for her injured hands.
“James,” she mumbled. “That’s his name?”
“Aye, miss.” Mr. Bones unraveled the strips of cloth from her hands and poured something from an unmarked bottle over the gnarled skin and bloody scabs. She hissed at the pain. “Don’t tell the captain I’ve got the good stuff stowed away back here.” The old pirate took a swig for himself and set the bottle down so he could redress her hands.
A tiny tear escaped from the corner of her eye. Not because of the way her cuts and blisters stung, but because she finally knew the man’s name that had haunted her dreams.
James.
It suited him somehow. In a way, it demystified his persona just enough. Grace still had a long way to go before she came to fully understand The Devil Dog, but at least she knew that he had a mother once that gave him a proper name. He wasn’t something born of the sea or spat out from the mouth of hell like the myths said. He had a true name.
Chapter 3
Isle de Mona, Caribbean
“She hasn’t come out yet, has she?” Patrick asked as he approached the captain at the wheel.
With his grip tight over the wooden prongs, James steered The Burning Rose into their usual safe inlet around Isla de Mona. The island, remote and practically deserted by the natives and merchants of the Caribbean, served as his own secret hideaway. He knew the course by heart and could navigate to its shore from any point on the compass. Every month, James and his crew journeyed here for a single reason. Only Patrick knew that purpose.
The Pirate (The Legacy Series Book 5) Page 3
