The Pirate Lord

by Sabrina Jeffries

  Before the sun had fully risen the next morning, Sara was up. She took a few moments to perform her ablutions and throw her gown on over the shift she’d slept in, but there wasn’t much she could do for herself with neither a brush nor fresh clothes. She did what she could, finger-combing her hair and scrubbing her face with sea water from the bucket left outside her door by some conscientious pirate. Then she hurried out of her cabin and onto the deck.

  She needed to have a word with Petey. She wanted to tell him that if he found a chance to escape, he should do so even if he couldn’t take her. But she had to find him first.

  Just before they’d parted yesterday, he’d said he’d be on the early morning watch today. Maybe she could catch him alone before the rest of the ship awakened. She surveyed the deck, relieved to see that most of the pirates did seem to be still in their beds, and the few who were on watch paid her little heed. But where was Petey?

  Perhaps they’d sent him up in the rigging as Captain Rogers had often done. Shading her eyes against the rising sun, she lifted her head and scanned the masts.

  “Looking for someone?” a deep voice beside her said.

  She jumped and whirled to face the intruder. Bother it all, it was Gideon. Why wasn’t he still in bed like the rest of them?

  Apparently he’d just performed his own morning ablutions, for his hair was wet and slicked back from his forehead, with only the ends curling dry. His insolent gold hoop earring winked in the early morning sun, as if shouting his contempt for civilization. But far more shocking was the absence of his shirt. Today he was dressed like many of his men, with only a leather vest to cover his upper torso.

  She sucked in a breath. There was something so appallingly intimate about a man’s nearly bare chest. His was unfortunately quite broad and muscled, with just a sprinkling of black hair that formed a ragged line beneath the loose leather ties of his vest and trailed down to his golden belt buckle with its onyx inset. Clearly he seldom wore a shirt, for his arms were tanned right up to his shoulders, the skin so dark it almost blended in with his nut-brown vest.

  She realized she’d been staring only when he said, his voice lower and huskier, “Who are you looking for?”

  His words snapped her out of her terrible trance. “I…I…” She thought furiously and said the only thing that came to mind. “For you. I was looking for you.”

  Suspicion flashed in his sea-blue eyes. “In the rigging?”

  “Yes. Why not?”

  “Either you’re very ignorant about what a captain’s duties are, or you’re lying. Which is it?”

  Ignoring the plummeting sensation in her stomach, she forced a smile to her face. “Really, Gideon, you are so suspicious. Last night you accused me of plotting behind your back, and this morning you accuse me of lying. Who else would I be looking for but you?”

  Though his eyes bore into hers as if trying to ferret out the truth, she gave him her most innocent look.

  He tucked his thumbs in his belt, his gaze still skeptical. “And why would you be looking for me?”

  Good heavens, how was she to answer that? “Because…because I want to go below.” Yes, that was a logical excuse. “I want to look in on the women and see about beginning our classes. I assume I need your permission for that, since you’ve posted a guard—”

  “Don’t you think it’s a little early in the morning for school? Most of the women are probably still asleep.”

  It was clear from his raised eyebrows that he didn’t believe her. Her heart sank. She wasn’t proficient at lying, as Jordan had so loved to point out. Then again, she’d never before had such a desperate reason for it.

  She turned away from him before her face revealed everything. “I hadn’t thought of that. It is early. Perhaps I’ll just take a turn around the deck.” In the process, she could look for Petey and shake off Gideon.

  “That’s an excellent idea,” he said, almost as if he’d read her mind. “It’s a lovely morning, and not yet hot. You don’t mind if I walk with you, do you?”

  Bother it all. The suspicious lout was determined not to let her out of his sight. She forced herself to meet his gaze. “Do I have a choice?”

  “You always have a choice, Sara.” His rumbling voice sent little frissons of alarm up and down her spine. For the first time that morning, he gave her a dazzling smile. It threw her completely out of kilter, reminding her of the way he’d held her yesterday in his cabin and kissed her with heart-stopping passion.

  The wretch was far too handsome for words. Why did God have to give such good looks to the most abominable men? First Colonel Taylor, and now this pirate. It was damned unfair.

  She groaned. The scoundrel even had her cursing. Where would it end?

  He offered her his arm in a courtly gesture utterly at odds with his scandalous attire. She hesitated to take it. He had a tendency to bring the worst out in her, and right now she wanted to keep her wits about her.

  On the other hand, she shouldn’t provoke him when she had no reason other than her weakness to his charm; it would be better to pick her battles. There were bound to be plenty of them to pick.

  Tucking her hand in the crook of his bare elbow, she let him lead her into a stroll along the deck. Her bare fingers touched the skin of his naked arm in an intimacy she wasn’t used to. In London, whenever she’d taken a man’s arm he’d worn layers of clothing and she’d worn gloves.

  This was nothing like that. No indeed. She felt it every time he flexed a muscle, and his skin radiated a heat that warmed her fingers, then sneaked up her arm to warm the rest of her body. Oh, how she wished she hadn’t left her gloves behind on the Chastity. At the moment, she would give a king’s ransom for even the slightest protection that flimsy kid leather could provide.

  They walked in silence a while. They passed a pirate polishing the brass fittings on the capstan, but just as Sara tried to get a peek at the man’s face to see if it was Petey, Gideon tucked her hand more firmly into the crook of his elbow.

  “Tell me something, Sara. What made a lady like you agree to sail with the Chastity? Why risk such a harsh and dangerous journey?”

  “It wasn’t dangerous until you and your greedy pirates came along,” she grumbled.

  “It would’ve gotten plenty dangerous, I assure you, if you’d stayed on the Chastity much longer. Many a ship has foundered in the rough waters of the Cape, including a convict ship or two. Which makes it even more curious that a woman of your class would endanger herself for a lot of poor unfortunates.” His tone hardened. “Surely if you needed entertainment, there were plenty of balls and parties to occupy an earl’s daughter.”

  Why, the very idea! How dared he make such assumptions when he knew nothing about her!

  Releasing his arm, she stalked away to stand by the brass rail. She could feel him behind her, a large, disturbing presence. “I’ve been a reformer all my life, and so was my mother before me. Her motto was ‘It only takes one caring soul to make things right’, and I’ve lived by that motto as best I could.”

  She curled her fingers about her locket. Her earliest memories were of taking baskets of food to the prisoners and learning to sew by making patchwork quilts for the poor.

  “And your father?” Gideon asked.

  “My real father died in debtor’s prison when I was two years old.”

  There was a long, shocked silence behind her. When Gideon spoke, his voice was laced with genuine compassion. “I’m sorry.”

  She sucked in an uneven breath. “I never knew him, but my mother loved him very much. His death changed her. After that, all she wanted was to find some way to better the lives of those who suffered. Despite having little money and even less possibility for a future, she interceded for prisoners with the authorities and appealed to the House of Lords to change the unfair laws. That’s how she met and married my stepfather, Lord Blackmore.”

  He came up to stand beside her, leaning on the rail with folded arms. “I’m sure he put a stop to all her
good works.”

  She glanced at him, but he was staring across the sparkling waters of the ocean with eyes that were bitter, unforgiving.

  “Actually, he didn’t,” she said softly. “He supported her reform efforts until the day she died.” She ran her fingers idly over the shiny rail. “She took me everywhere she went and instilled in me a belief that people could rid the world of injustice if they made the effort. And I guess I just…followed in her footsteps.” She ventured a smile. “Now that she and my stepfather have passed away, I feel a responsibility to carry on the family business, so to speak.”

  “The family business? Sending a young woman of quality off with a lot of thieves and murderers?”

  Angling her body toward him, she met his dark gaze steadily. “You called them ‘poor unfortunates’ before.”

  For a moment he said nothing. Then a small smile touched his lips, muting the harsh planes of his face. “Aye, I did, didn’t I? Still, I can’t believe your stepbrother approved of such a dangerous project, even if it was for a worthy purpose.”

  “No, he didn’t.” Clouds scudded by, passing over the sun and casting a fleeting shadow along the length of the ship. “He tried to stop me from going. But it was futile, of course. I’m old enough to go where I want, with or without his permission, and he finally had to accept that I would do as I pleased.”

  Gideon’s smile vanished as quickly as the sun had vanished behind the clouds. “You make a habit of that, don’t you?” He propped one elbow on the rail and set his other hand on his hip as he faced her. “But let me warn you, Sara Willis. Your family might indulge your willfulness and your schemes, but I won’t. Your whims won’t be tolerated on my ship. Or my island.”

  “Your island? I thought it was a classless utopia that didn’t belong to anyone.”

  A cold scowl darkened his features. “It is. But someone has to make the rules and enforce them, and my men have elected me to do it. That means we follow my rules on my island.” He paused. “I know that’s hard for your kind to accept. You’re used to getting what you want as the Earl of Blackmore’s daughter. But you’ll adjust to it eventually, or learn the hard way what it means to flout authority.”

  She ignored his threat, but the way he’d said “the Earl of Blackmore’s daughter” with such contempt roused her curiosity. He seemed to have an unreasonable hatred of nobility, and she suspected it didn’t stem simply from his being an American.

  “I wonder,” she said, her tone even, “who taught you ‘what it means to flout authority.’ I wonder what terrible English nobleman taught you to hate ‘my kind’ so bitterly.”

  For a moment she thought she’d gone too far. His eyes blazed as he pushed away from the rail. Every muscle in his lean torso was tensed, like that of a beast preparing to pounce, and she stepped back from him instinctively, her hand going to her throat.

  “Trust me,” he finally said, in a low voice edged with anger, “you don’t want to know.”

  Turning on his heel, he stalked off toward the foc’sle, leaving her to stand there shaking.

  With a cursory glance at the compass, Gideon turned the wheel a quarter-turn. The rays of the afternoon sun slanted across the ship’s stern, warming his head and back. Unfortunately, he was already too warm, thanks to Sara Willis.

  He’d avoided her the whole day by giving Barnaby charge of her, but it hadn’t stopped him from thinking about her. That business about her mother had taken him by surprise. A reforming woman married to an earl. Amazing.

  Of course, it probably hadn’t been as dramatic as Sara had implied. Her mother’s reform efforts, and Sara’s, too, must have been limited to protected situations. Gideon had held enough English earls at swordpoint to know that they were a cautious, haughty lot who didn’t allow their female relatives to travel about getting their hands dirty with the concerns of the poor.

  Still, Sara had taken passage aboard the Chastity. She had argued for the convict women without concern for herself. Now that he thought about it, the only reason she’d told him that her stepbrother was the earl was to try to convince him not to take the Chastity. That wasn’t the act of a timid or fastidious woman.

  A smile touched his lips. Sara was about as timid as a warship. A very pretty warship, with sleek lines from stem to stern, but still a warship, intended for battle. When it came to the women and their well-being, she fought like any well-gunned brig. Her courage was daunting…and sobering. In his more frustrated moments, she even had him questioning his decision to take the convict ship.

  Then again, that confounded soldier in skirts would make any man question his actions. God help the man who married her. She’d hound him night and day and never give him a moment’s peace.

  Except when he was making love to her. He groaned. Why was it every time he thought of Sara he imagined her in bed, her slender arms outstretched, her eyes shrouded in mystery as she beckoned to him like a siren calling a sailor?

  No, not to him. Some other man must wreck himself on that shore, because it wasn’t going to be him.

  But then some other man would have the delightful experience of kissing her, of touching her silken hair, of stroking her naked body—He let out a low oath as his body instantly responded. If he didn’t stop thinking about her, he’d go insane. Or have to spend the rest of his life taking cold baths.

  “Gideon, you’d best go below and hear what that woman’s teaching in her school,” said a voice behind him.

  Gideon turned to find Barnaby standing at the top of the ladder to the quarterdeck, an amused look on his face. There was no need to ask who “that woman” was.

  “Nothing she says or does would surprise me.” Gideon faced the helm once more, putting his back to Barnaby. He wasn’t about to go anywhere near Sara again, not the way he was feeling now. Let Barnaby deal with her today.

  “Maybe not, but that doesn’t mean it’s nothing to worry about. You’ve got more schooling than I have, but isn’t Lysistrata the play where the women refuse to have relations with their husbands until the men agree to stop going to war?”

  With a groan, Gideon clenched the wheel. Lysistrata was among the many works of literature that his father had forced down his throat once he was old enough to read. “Yes. But don’t try to tell me she’s teaching them that. It’s Greek, for God’s sake. They wouldn’t understand a word, even if she knew it well enough to recite it.”

  “She knows it well enough to give them a free translation, I assure you. When I left her she was telling them the story with great enthusiasm.”

  Barnaby reached for the helm as Gideon swung away from it with an oath. “I should never have taken her aboard,” he grumbled as he strode for the ladder. “I should have sent her back to England gagged and bound!”

  He ignored Barnaby’s answering laugh and climbed down the ladder, then headed for the hatch to the hold. He’d put a stop to this now, before she incited the women to mutiny.

  As he descended into the darkness, he heard Sara’s animated voice speaking in slow, measured words. He halted on the steps. She was recounting the scene where the herald of Sparta tells the magistrate of Athens how desperate the men are to put an end to the women’s coldness. He couldn’t help but smile. She was reciting the passage without any reference to the many phallic puns in the original. Only Sara could transform Lysistrata, the bawdiest of Greek plays, into a chaste tale.

  Wiping the smile from his face, he finished descending the steps and turned to find Sara standing at the far end of the hold, her back to him. A group of about thirty women and children surrounded her, their faces rapt as they listened intently to every word. Despite the cloying tropical heat in the windowless hold, only the children fidgeted, and their mothers hushed them whenever they ventured to do more than whisper their complaints.

  He scowled. He’d had it right from the beginning—the blasted woman was nothing but trouble. How was it that she held an audience of hot, tired women in the palm of her hand with only a few words? These weren�
�t the sort of women who were easily led. They’d all seen the nastiest side of the world.

  Yet Sara told a tale in that rich, captivating voice of hers and they believed every word, ready to follow her into all kinds of trouble. Well, he wouldn’t let that happen. Not again. Matters were progressing well, and she wouldn’t spoil it with her continual attempts to foment unrest.

  He strode forward, heedless of the murmuring that began among the women when they saw him. Then Sara turned, and her gaze met his. Instantly a guilty blush spread over her cheeks that told him all he needed to know about her intent.

  “Good afternoon, ladies,” he said in steely tones. “Class is over for today. Why don’t you all go up on deck and get a little fresh air?”

  When the women looked at Sara, she folded her hands primly in front of her and stared at him. “You have no right to dismiss my class, Captain Horn. Besides, we aren’t yet finished. I was telling them a story—”

  “I know. You were recounting Lysistrata.”

  Surprise flickered briefly in her eyes, but then she turned smug and looked down her aristocratic little nose at him. “Yes, Lysistrata,” she said in a sweet voice that didn’t fool him for one minute. “Surely you have no objection to my educating the women on the great works of literature, Captain Horn.”

  “None at all.” He set his hands on his hips. “But I question your choice of material. Don’t you think Aristophanes is a bit beyond the abilities of your pupils?”

  He took great pleasure in the shock that passed over Sara’s face before she caught herself. Ignoring the rustle of whispers among the women, she stood a little straighter. “As if you know anything at all about Aristophanes.”

  “I don’t have to be an English lordling to know literature, Sara. I know all the blasted writers you English make so much of. Any one of them would have been a better choice for your charges than Aristophanes.”

  As she continued to glower at him unconvinced, he scoured his memory, searching through the hundreds of verse passages his English father had literally pounded into him. “You might have chosen Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew, for example—‘Fie, fie! Unknit that threatening unkind brow. / And dart not scornful glances from those eyes / To wound thy lord, thy king, thy governor.’”