The Pirate Lord

by Sabrina Jeffries

  That should have made things easier. It didn’t. At night, she lay awake in her cabin, thinking about him in his huge bed just across the saloon from her. Sometimes she closed her eyes and imagined him running his fingers over her shoulders, her breasts, her hips. Sometimes she furthered the fantasy by touching herself, and that was the worst of all…to know he could make her behave so wickedly.

  The second week was harder. By then, after much jostling and quarreling, everyone had fallen into a routine. Each had taken the jobs that best suited them, and were diligently working to put Atlantis back together. That meant less time for discussing things with Gideon and fewer excuses for seeking him out. What’s more, he sometimes didn’t stop for lunch, although he ate with her when he did.

  Yet she was aware of him no matter where she was, even when he was laying out the buildings or supervising the cutting down of trees. She found excuses to see him, then made excuses to herself for the flimsiness of her excuses. She found herself touching him casually…his arm or his shoulder or his elbow. She didn’t mean to, of course. It just happened. And whenever it did, he went very still, fixing her with a hungry gaze that always made her jerk her hand away.

  He began bringing her gifts in the evening—a scented soap, some satin for a bonnet, a sculpted shard of bright orange coral that he’d found while he and the men were spearing fish. He never once gave her anything that she might think was stolen, and that warmed her, for he must have plenty of jewels he could offer.

  Then he’d linger to walk the decks with her, speaking of his hopes for the island. Despite her determination not to let his words affect her, they did. How could she not be affected by his dreams for a society where men and women could work and live free of the cruelties of unfeeling governments? Where punishments fit the crimes, and people like Ann weren’t deprived of what they needed most?

  The worst part of the night came then—when he walked her to the door of her cabin. She always half-hoped he would kiss her and was disappointed when he didn’t. Once in bed, her imagination would take over where reality left off. Long gone were her thoughts of his hands on her body. Now she dreamed of feeling his mouth on her. It would start with her reliving their kisses, but it always progressed to fantasies of his mouth kissing her breasts and belly and even her most private place.

  It was dreadfully scandalous and made her so ashamed. Sometimes she even awakened to find herself touching her own body in wanton ways she’d never dreamed existed. She burned at night. She burned during the day. But Gideon, curse the man, seemed as determined not to touch her as ever.

  By the end of the third week, however, that had changed. Gideon began to touch her when she least expected it. He would casually reach up to smooth back her hair from her eyes or take her arm to lead her down the gangplank in the morning. When they ate together, which was now almost every meal, he seemed to delight in “accidentally” brushing her breasts as he leaned over to reach something, or taking a seat so close beside her that their legs touched whenever they moved.

  If she’d had any sense at all, she would have pointed out how he was cheating on his promise not to touch her. But she’d long ago lost all sense. She lived for those furtive touches. She took unreasonable pleasure in the gifts he brought her and the way he deferred to her judgment on certain matters.

  Even worse, her nighttime imaginings had progressed to unabashed memories of his making love to her. She no longer tried to suppress her fantasies, but gave free rein to them. And her hands—her treacherous, wicked hands—had become truly uncontrollable.

  Unfortunately, they didn’t satisfy the clawing need growing in the pit of her belly, the need to have him kiss her and stroke her and yes, make love to her again.

  It was those thoughts that engrossed her on the last morning of the third week. It was early, not even dawn yet, and she’d left everyone else sleeping on the ship. Needing a place to think, she wandered down the beach toward the stream.

  A few rules had been established for the little colony, and one of them concerned bathing. Since the water in the stream was too cold for bathing in the early morning, the women were allotted the early afternoon hours for bathing and the men the late afternoon hours, after they’d finished their dirty work for the day. The system had allowed the women the privacy they craved, especially those women who hadn’t yet decided on husbands.

  So when Sara came upon the stream, she was surprised to find Gideon standing naked in the middle of it, bathing in the chilly water. Quickly she ducked behind a tree to keep him from seeing her.

  She couldn’t believe it. Did he come here every morning? And why, when the water was so much warmer later in the day?

  She should leave him to bathe alone, she told herself sternly. But her erotic nighttime dreams were still too fresh. She couldn’t bear to leave just yet. With a furtive glance down the sloping ground to the beach to make sure no one had seen her, she peeked back around the tree at Gideon.

  The stream was so shallow that the water came only to his knees. He had his back to her as he scooped water up and sluiced it over his body. He looked magnificent…his dark hair dripping down over his broad back etched with scars, firm buttocks that flexed with his every movement, and hairy legs slightly parted to help him keep his balance on the pebbly stream bed.

  Heat spread up from her loins to her breasts to her face as she watched him. What would he do if she simply stepped out from behind the tree and into his arms? No, she couldn’t do that. She mustn’t.

  Suddenly he turned around, though he didn’t see her. She quickly suppressed a gasp. Good heavens. He was fully aroused. He was mumbling something and scowling as he scrubbed his chest with a soapy rag.

  Then, to her complete horror, he laid his hand on his member and began to stroke it. She told herself to leave at once, but her feet stayed rooted to the forest floor. She was utterly fascinated. So that was how he managed to keep himself aloof from her when she practically panted to have him in her bed.

  But if that were the case, why was he scowling? Why were his movements almost violent, as if he couldn’t stroke himself hard or fast enough? Perhaps it was the same for him as it was for her. Touching herself had been as futile as throwing water on those fiery huts had been. Not enough. Never enough.

  Suddenly, he looked up and saw her. His eyes locked with hers, full of heat and need and hunger. For a moment, she stood there transfixed, her mouth open and her feet incapable of movement.

  Then she panicked. With a cry of shame, she lifted her skirts and took off at a run, as hard and as far as her legs would carry her.

  As she stumbled down the beach, she chastised herself furiously. She should never have gone to the stream. She should certainly never have watched him bathe or…or touch himself. The minute she’d seen what he was doing, she should have sneaked away. Now that he knew she’d been watching him, he was sure to guess her dreadful secret—that she wanted him as much as he wanted her.

  With a choked cry she raced up the Satyr’s gangplank and past the drowsy, curious gazes of the pirates who slept on the deck. Glancing behind her, she half-feared she would see him following her. But thankfully he was nowhere to be seen.

  Nonetheless, it was only when she reached her cabin and latched the door closed, that she felt safe. And even then, it was several minutes before she could still her thundering heart and stop listening for the sound of his boots treading the planks outside her door.

  The rest of the day, she avoided him. She couldn’t face him after what she’d witnessed. It was unthinkable. She busied herself on the ship, helping the women drag the bedrolls up from the hold to the top deck for airing. But she couldn’t stop her thoughts…and the erotic images that plagued her.

  What was wrong with her? How was it that the man hardly ever touched her, yet she thought of him every waking moment? It wasn’t fair.

  By late afternoon, frustrated beyond endurance, she sought out Louisa, hoping that the woman’s tart tongue would lash some sense into he
r. Louisa wasn’t fond of Gideon. She would remind Sara of all his faults, and that was just what Sara needed.

  When she went in search of Louisa in the ship’s galley, however, she found Silas instead. As she walked in, he was lifting a huge mound of bread dough onto the floured surface of the table.

  “Louisa—” he began, then broke off when he looked up and saw it was her. “Ah, Sara, you’ll do, I suppose,” he said in his usual gruff manner. “Come knead this bread. I have to make sure the meat don’t burn.”

  “Where’s Louisa?”

  He shrugged. “Who knows where that woman’s gone off to? She’ll be back soon, I wager, but this dough must be kneaded now. Trust Louisa to disappear when I need her.”

  His grumbling didn’t fool Sara. The man was utterly in love with Louisa. Indeed, the two of them had become completely inseparable in the last two weeks. They’d already asked Gideon, as a ship’s captain, to perform their marriage ceremony and were as engrossed in each other as any newly married couple she’d ever seen. It made her almost envious.

  “Come now, girl, help me with this bread,” Silas repeated, waving her toward the table.

  “I don’t know how to knead bread.” At home, the servants did such things. But on Atlantis, where there were no servants, she’d learned a great many skills she’d never had use for before.

  Today, however, she wasn’t in the mood to learn anything…except how to get Gideon out of her thoughts.

  “Kneadin’ bread is simple enough,” Silas said, ignoring her protest. He pushed down on the ball of dough until it flattened, then folded it over and repeated the motion. “You see?”

  “But I’ll ruin it.”

  “Balderdash.” Grabbing her by the arm with floury fingers, he drew her to the table. “You can’t ruin it. The more you punch it, the better ’tis. The harder you handle it, the higher it’ll rise. Take me word for it. It’ll take anythin’ you give it.”

  She eyed the dough skeptically, but did as she’d seen him do, timidly at first, then with more confidence. The dough was so resilient and springy, it did seem as if she couldn’t hurt it. And he had said it would take anything she could give it.

  As she continued the kneading motion, her thoughts wandered back to Gideon. What was she to do about him? How could she get past this frustration she felt every time she was near him? This wasn’t supposed to happen to respectable ladies. Men lusted after women, of course, but only fallen women lusted after men in return. Or so she’d been taught. She was beginning to think that everything she’d been taught was suspect.

  Otherwise, how could she have found such enjoyment in the arms of a pirate? And she’d certainly done that; she couldn’t deny it.

  Now, what was she supposed to do about it? He’d said she would have to ask him to touch her. She couldn’t imagine doing so. Why, he might not even care about her anymore. Maybe he’d decided a noblewoman wasn’t worth his time. The very thought of that made her go cold with fear.

  She stabbed the dough furiously with her fists. It didn’t matter what he thought one way or the other. She’d be returning to London without him. It was inevitable.

  Silas’s voice interrupted her thoughts. “Hold up, lass. I know I said you couldn’t hurt it by punchin’ it, but I didn’t say to kill it.”

  She realized she’d been punching the bread silly, and swallowed hard. “I’m sorry…I…my mind was wandering.”

  He took the bread from her, rolled it in some lard, then placed it in a bread pan. “Aye, wanderin’ in troublesome places, I’ll wager. What has you in such a dither?”

  She cast him a wary glance. “Nothing…important.”

  He returned to ladling gravy over the meat. “It’s our good captain, ain’t it? He’s been troublin’ you again.”

  “Yes…well, no. Not the way you think.” When he cast her a searching glance, she turned her back to him and fiddled with the latch to the pantry. “He…he’s been the soul of courtesy.”

  “And that bothers you?”

  “No, of course not. It’s just that…I don’t know what to make of it. Sometimes I think he dislikes me very much. Other times…he…”

  Other times, he makes love to me with passion and caring. But she could hardly tell Silas that, could she?

  “Depend on it, the man don’t dislike you,” Silas said in a calm voice. “Gideon just finds it hard to trust any woman. Especially one of your kind.”

  There was that horrible phrase again—your kind. She whirled around to face Silas. “Why does he hate ‘my kind’ so? Which one of ‘my kind’ ever hurt him?”

  He set down the gravy ladle and stared at her a moment, stroking his beard thoughtfully. “If I tell you what I know, will you keep it to yourself?”

  Her curiosity roused, she nodded vigorously.

  He gestured to a chair. “Then you’d best sit down, lass. It’s a hard tale, and a long one. But if anyone should hear it, it’s you.”

  Taking a seat at the scarred table, she folded her hands in front of her and looked at him expectantly.

  “His mother,” he said. “That’s who hurt him.”

  She looked at him blankly. “I don’t understand.”

  “Gideon’s mother was a duke’s daughter. A very wealthy lady from a very powerful English family.”

  An awful feeling crept over her. Gideon was English? His mother had been a noblewoman? Gideon’s mother?

  “You look surprised.” Taking up his pipe, Silas filled it with tobacco from a pouch in his vest pocket. “Is’pose that’s to be expected. Pirates aren’t known for their fine bloodlines.”

  “But how? Who?”

  Silas stuck a straw in the stove fire, then used it to light his pipe. “I can tell you the how. The who ain’t so clear, least of all to him.” He tossed the straw in the fire and puffed hard on his pipe. “He told me most of the story when he was drunk one night. We’d seized a ship that day, with an old woman on it named Eustacia. Hearin’ her say her name rattled him bad enough to send him to the bottle. Mebbe you noticed as how Gideon don’t drink much. I think he fears endin’ up like his father. Anyway, that night, he said his mother’s name was Eustacia, or so his father’d said when he was drunk.”

  “Gideon told me a little about his father. The man sounded like an awful person.”

  “Aye, he was. Gideon hates him. But he hates his mother more. He blames her for leavin’ him to the care of his bastard father.”

  “I don’t understand. How does a duke’s daughter meet a man like Gideon’s father? Wasn’t his father American?”

  “Nay. His father was as English as you. Apparently, he was Eustacia’s tutor. He must’ve been a charmer, seein’ as how he got her to run off with him.” Silas’s expression grew grim. “But after she bore Gideon, she got tired of the poor life she led with Elias Horn. She asked her family to take her back, and they agreed.” He stared at her from above his pipe. “But they made her leave her son behind.”

  Sara gasped aloud. “They didn’t!” When he nodded, she said, “But why?”

  He shrugged. “I dunno. Mebbe to hush up the scandal. Mebbe they hoped that if Elias and Gideon wasn’t around, they could keep it all quiet more easy-like. Who knows how an English noble thinks?”

  She flinched. She knew he didn’t mean it as a criticism of her, but it demonstrated how suspiciously the entire crew of the Satyr regarded her countrymen. And her class. No doubt their hatred had been nurtured during the American Revolution, which had probably just ended around the time Gideon was born.

  But for Gideon, there was more to it even than that. Remembering how bitterly Gideon had spoken of his mother, she felt heartsick. No wonder he hated her “kind.” No wonder he’d been so reluctant to trust her.

  Still, his distrust wasn’t quite fair. She would never leave her own child behind, no matter what her family asked of her. She couldn’t understand how Eustacia could have done it.

  “Did he ever go looking for her, ever try to hear her side of the story?”
she asked.

  “If he did, he never told me. Would’ve been near to impossible, anyhow. His father took him off to America when he was just a wee thing. Said he wanted a new life for them. But his wife still tormented his mind, and he drowned his sorrows in drink many a night. Gideon once told me they lived in fifteen different towns when he was growin’ up. His father couldn’t keep a position as a teacher on account of his drinkin’.”

  That explained why Gideon wanted Atlantis so badly. He’d never had a home, and he was determined to make Atlantis into one. He wanted a home and someone to care for him, though he would never admit it aloud.

  “What made him run away to sea? His father’s beatings?”

  Silas shook his head. “He didn’t have no choice. His father drank himself to death when Gideon wasn’t even thirteen, so Gideon went to sea to keep from starvin’.”

  “At thirteen? He was only thirteen when he went to sea?” A crushing pain built in her chest. At thirteen, she’d been coddled by a doting mother and a kindly stepfather and given everything she wanted, while Gideon had been huddled in the cold rain on a ship’s deck, running errands and shining a man’s boots.

  Her feelings must have shown in her face, for Silas’s voice was gentle when he answered her. “It weren’t so bad as all that, lass. Bein’ a cabin boy made a man out o’ him, and that was a good thing, don’t you think?”

  Tears sprang to her eyes unbidden, and she turned her face away to hide them. All the times she’d unfairly accused Gideon of cruelty came back to haunt her. If anyone had known cruelty, it was Gideon.

  Yet he wasn’t cruel. Far from it. Yes, he’d taken them against their will, and she still thought him wrong for that. But he’d done it thinking he was doing something good. He’d done it for the sake of his precious colony, a place where he could put an end to cruelty.

  Indeed, she’d seen how well he governed. He always listened to both sides of a dispute and settled them fairly. He’d kept to his promise that the women would be treated with respect, enforcing that rule with an iron hand. When she’d wanted to begin teaching the women again, he’d shocked her by agreeing. He’d even taken to sleeping in his half-finished house, so his cabin and comfortable bed could be used by Molly, the pregnant woman whose time was nearly come, and her daughter Jane.