“In the first place, I am not your boy,” she said evenly. “And what I said was, your invaluable guns did not appear to be all that effective against the Spaniards who found you.”
If it was possible for him to become any angrier, he did, and Beau would have reason later to remember the chilling fury that turned his eyes from silvery gray to a clear, crystalline blue. For the moment, however, all she could see were exploding starbursts. His hand had come up with the speed of a striking cobra, grabbing her under the chin and lifting, squeezing so tightly, the air was instantly and painfully cut off from her lungs. Only the tips of her toes touched the decking as he brought his face near enough to hers, she could feel the heat of his breath scorching her cheeks.
“For your information, boy, it was six ships, not one, that found us. We sank four on the spot and sent the other two limping off to perdition, more than likely”—he gave her two violent shakes to emphasize his words—“to sink before the night was out.”
Beau’s hands clawed at the vise clamped around her throat, but it was like trying to pry away bars of steel. She could barely see through the blackness clouding her eyes, could not think for the pain. She tried reaching for one of the guns at her waist, but the attempt was knocked aside. She tried kicking and scuffing him with her bootheels, but he parried her efforts with ridiculous ease.
Some of the crewmen from the Egret saw her predicament and started to surge forward, but they, too, were stopped cold when a large black shadow hurled itself over the forecastle rail and landed with a thunderous roar between Dante and the advancing threat. The polished steel of the Cimaroon’s two scimitars flashed in the sunlight, causing Spence to throw up his hands with a roar.
“Aye, that’s enough!” he shouted. “Leave go o’ her, ye blackhearted bastard. Leave go o’ her, do ye hear me!”
Geoffrey Pitt reacted first. He whirled and looked closely at Beau’s red and swollen face, then at the front of her doublet where the strain of her frantic efforts to free herself had resulted in the prominent outline of breasts.
“Simon! Simon, for Christ’s sakes—it’s a woman!”
Dante’s eyes screwed down to slits. The veins in his temples and throat were throbbing, the ones in the back of his hand and forearm stood out like blue snakes. He blinked to clear the sweat from his eyes and found himself looking down into a face that was too smooth and flawless to ever know the need for a barber’s skills, into hot amber eyes that were blazing with outrage and indignation, but were, beneath the feathery lashes, a woman’s eyes.
“What the hell—”
His fingers sprang open and he dropped Beau heavily onto the deck. Gasping, choking for air, she crumpled to her knees and doubled over enough for De Tourville to see the thick auburn braid that hung halfway down her back. If he needed more proof, it came in the form of the shrill, distinctly female voice that began to curse him through coughs and splutters of air.
“Beau! Beau, are ye all right, lass?” Spence shoved past the Cimaroon and crouched awkwardly on one knee. “Slow an’ deep. Breathe slow an’ deep.”
Beau clutched his arm for support and dragged at gulps of air.
The curses were getting stronger, the words more decipherable, and after a minute she glared up and found Dante de Tourville.
“You … son of a … bitch,” she gasped. “You … sonofabitch!”
“Aye,” Spence grunted. “Ye’re all right.”
He pushed to his feet again and glowered at the Frenchman. “It might be she has a sharp tongue in her head at times an’ ought not have questioned yer courage so … bluntly. But ye had no call to choke her either.”
“The captain isn’t quite himself—” Pitt began.
“I need no one to make excuses for me,” Dante snapped, rounding on his own man. “Nor does the situation warrant one. She spoke out of turn. Maybe she will think twice before doing so again—to me, anyway. In the meantime, Mr. Pitt, we don’t have much time. I want as many guns transferred to the Egret as we can manage.”
“Hold up there,” Spence snarled. “She’s still my ship an’ I’ve not agreed to take any o’ yer bloody guns on board yet.”
“You don’t have a choice, Captain Spence. And I don’t have the time to argue.”
“Ye’ll damn well make time, by God, or ye’ll be arguin’ with this!” Spence stepped back and drew his cutlass, but quicker than he could curse, a slash of curved steel sliced across his intentions, the point of the scimitar hooking the hilt of Spence’s blade, sending it cartwheeling off into space. The Cimaroon’s blade then slid upward, shearing off a thick chunk of wiry red beard as it came to rest across Spence’s jugular. At almost the same time the rest of Dante’s men drew swords and pistols, effectively halting any move by Spence’s group to reach for their weapons.
“I had hoped it would not come to this, Captain,” Dante said grimly. “I had hoped you would not force me to take command of your ship.”
“Command o’ my ship?” A thin red trickle of blood ran down Spence’s throat and began soaking into his collar, but the sheer audacity of De Tourville’s statement caused the leathery face to break out in a wide, disbelieving grin. “There are near a hundred fully armed men on board the Egret Are ye plannin’ to force them as well?”
“I won’t have to if they see their captain cooperating.”
“Faugh!” Spence snorted disdainfully. “That’ll be a cold bloody day in hell! Ye can slit my throat three ways to Sunday an’ I’ll not give the order to hoist a single sail.”
While every man within earshot held his breath and waited, Dante stared at Spence, at the wide slick of blood that streaked his throat and spread across his collar. Something in the fierce, burning topaz of the captain’s eyes made Dante look down to where Beau was still crouched on the deck. He took a casual step toward her and used the barrel of his musket to lift her chin, and there was no mistaking the similarity in the bright, hot sparks of amber that flared up at him. His own gaze narrowed in speculation as he glanced back at Spence.
“Such rare coloring,” he mused. “Unlikely there should be such an exact match within a thousand miles … unless the two were related somehow. She appears to be too young and fresh for a sister. A daughter, perhaps? One with a long, shapely throat more than suitable for slitting in order to ease you of some of your stubbornness.”
Spence stiffened perceptibly. But instead of bowing to the implied threat, he allowed a wide, somewhat contemptuous grin to settle across his face as he folded his arms across his barrel chest.
“A clever deduction, Cap’n Dante. And, aye, Beau’s my daughter. The sweet fruit o’ my loins. Mayhap that’s why she doesn’t take any kinder to threats than I do.”
Dante felt a sudden, sharp intrusion of steel next to his skin and his body froze even as his gaze was drawn slowly downward again. Beau’s golden eyes were still staring up at him, but it was her hand that won his full attention, and more specifically, the stiletto clutched in her fist. The point had already pierced through his hose and was resting like a cold sliver of ice across the impressive bulge of his manhood. A flick of a slender wrist would reduce that impression considerably.
“We seem to have reached an impasse, Cap’n Dante.” Spence chuckled wryly. “Unless, o’ course, ye’ve no objection to pissin’ out a hole in yer belly. She’s a fair hand at carvin’, an’ blow me dry, but look at them eyes ye were so admirin’ of a minute ago—I’d say she were in a ripe fair mood to prove it, would ye not agree?”
Dante saw no reason to disagree. Her eyes were large and wide with an eagerness that sent the point of the blade nudging deeper into the soft sacs of his flesh.
Geoffrey Pitt held up his hands in a placating gesture. “Captains—I’m sure we can arrive at some amicable arrangement here, can we not?”
“Not with a blade at my throat,” Spence declared flatly. “Does this ugly black bastard understand English?”
“He does,” Pitt replied with a nervous glance at Lucifer. “Rathe
r well, too, I should warn you.”
“Well, then, ye’d best warn him if he does not lower his steel, I’ll be breakin’ off both his hands an’ stuffin’ them down his throat.”
The Cimaroon’s agate eyes stared at Spence without blinking. His nostrils flared so wide, the tension produced a thin purple line around the rims. In the bright sunlight it could be seen that his face and torso were tattooed with patterns of lines and dots. The lobes of both ears had holes in them and the flesh had been stretched to form long, hanging loops. He was the same height as Spence, roughly the same weight, though proportioned differently, and probably could have snapped the one-legged captain in half without raising a bead of sweat.
The only thing he raised now was his lip, curling it back in a bright pink snarl that revealed an enormous rack of shockingly large teeth, all of which had been filed and sharpened into glistening points.
“Lucifer,” Pitt urged. “Not now.” He glanced worriedly at the stone-faced Dante de Tourville. “Simon—?”
He was still staring down at Beau Spence. Her arm had remained as steady as her gaze and both were causing a visible tightness throughout his body.
“Quite the ferocious little corsair, aren’t you, mam’selle?” he asked quietly.
“I have had no cause for complaint.”
“You will,” he promised softly, and turned to the Cimaroon. “Lucifer, put the blade down.”
The Cimaroon obeyed, but not without a final, terse flexing of the huge muscles in his arm. It caused the edge of his scimitar to widen the split in Spence’s skin—not enough to threaten the jugular, but sufficiently bloody to leave a warning.
Spence clapped a hand to his neck and glared at the wetness that came away on his glove. “Do ye always treat the men this way who rescue ye, Cap’n Dante?”
“Only if they stand in my way.”
Spence frowned uneasily over the flecks of cobalt-blue that had turned the Frenchman’s gaze as brittle as glass. “Beau, give the captain some breathin’ space.”
“Must I, Father?” she murmured.
“Aye, ye must show a little faith sometimes, girl. Sheath yer knife like a good lass. A man can’t think clear when he’s standin’ on his toes.”
“Or when he’s holding a musket,” she added pointedly.
Dante met the long-lashed amber eyes again and almost smiled with the rush of promisory menace that flowed through his veins. Carefully, he set the arquebus aside, and carefully, he curled his hands into fists by his sides.
Beau, having seen what the Cimaroon did to leave her father a reminder, dragged the point of the knife across tender flesh as she removed it and was gratified to see a thin ribbon of blood color the Frenchman’s hose. She tucked the knife back into the cuff of her boot and stood, her eyes still fastened on Dante as she massaged the tenderness in her throat.
Spence cleared his.
“The way I see it, Cap’n, ye’ve another six, maybe eight hours, topmost, before yer ship goes belly down. If I were you, I’d start talkin’ fast. Ye talk bold enough, there’s a certainty, but if ye want our help, ye’ll have to convince me there’s a fine enough reason for givin’ it.”
Simon Dante searched the captain’s weathered features with eyes that had lost none of their cold intensity. “I’m genuinely sorry, Captain. If I had an hour to spare, I might be able to convince you we aren’t demented fools, but as you already determined, time is of the essence. You say you want a fine enough reason to order your men to help us?” He reached around to the small of his back and, quicker than she could react to avoid it, held a pistol out at arm’s length, pressing the nose flush against Beau’s temple. “Will this do?”
Chapter 3
Dante exerted just enough force to depress the skin at Beau’s temple. His finger was curled around the pistol’s serpentine trigger and the look in his eye was the same one Beau had had while she held the knife at his crotch.
“I don’t have time for explanations, Captain Spence. When we have transferred the guns safely, I promise you all the explanations will come. For now, I need my guns on board your ship and will do it with or without your help. Your daughter, I am sure, would like to keep the top of her head, so if we have no more little impasses to conquer, I would suggest we reach some kind of an arrangement now.”
Beau started to slip her hand down for her dagger but a warm strong grip clamped around her wrist, stopping her.
“Sorry,” said Geoffrey Pitt. He had anticipated the move and had come up with surprising stealth behind her. “Not this time.”
He removed the dagger from her belt along with her pistols and cutlass, then leaned over to extract the stiletto from her boot. Dante watched, his brow arched in a cynical curve as a third small knife was noticed and taken from the collar at the back of her doublet.
“Any more?”
“You’ll find out if you turn your back.”
“I’ll find out sooner if I have you stripped and searched.”
Beau set her teeth and lifted the lower edge of her doublet to remove the blade strapped to her hip.
“A trusting soul, indeed,” Dante murmured.
“With good reason, as it turns out,” she countered evenly.
He offered a twist of a smile in rebuttal and turned to Spence. “Well, Captain? Do we have your cooperation or not?”
“Ye have my daughter’s head under a gun, what choice do I have?”
“None,” Dante agreed coldly. “Mr. Pitt will return to the Egret with you while you make ready with the winch and cables. Since there is no need for any of the rest of your crew to know our special terms, Lucifer and a few of my men will go along as well, just to make certain everyone works with a smile on his face. Your men can remain here, of course, to help prepare at this end.”
Spence glared at him a moment, then looked at Beau.
“She will stay with me, naturally.”
“Ye touch a hair on her head—” Spence warned softly.
“I’ll not touch anything,” Dante insisted. “So long as she behaves.”
“Father—do I have your permission to slice out his liver if I get the chance?” Beau asked with casual disregard for the pistol denting her temple.
“That probably would not qualify as behaving,” Pitt muttered at the back of her neck. She ignored his sarcasm—ignored him completely, in fact—and waited expectantly for her father’s reply.
It was Dante who gave her the answer.
“Lucifer will be keeping your father as close company as I will be keeping you. My liver goes, his liver goes; simple as that. Mr. Pitt—?”
“Aye, on my way.” He tucked Beau’s pistols into his own belt as he passed. “Without a wind, we’ll have to tow the ships close enough together to hook on grappling lines.”
Dante nodded. “In the meantime, I’ll set the men to work dismantling the guns and carriages. You”—he nodded in Spit McCutcheon’s direction—“do you know your way around cannon?”
“Enough to blow ye off the edge o’ the earth if I had ye in my sights.”
“Good. You’re in charge of the dismantling.”
Spit thrust his tongue into his cheek and folded his arms across his chest.
De Tourville sighed. “Captain Spence?”
“Do it, Spit,” Spence ordered, his eyes narrowed. “He’s right—there’s no harm in takin’ on valuable cargo.”
McCutcheon glared for as long as it took him to lean forward and project a wad of phlegm onto the deck, missing Dante’s boot by the width of a nose hair.
“There is shot and powder—if the saltwater hasn’t ruined it—below in the magazines. It will have to be transferred as well. And did you say you had a cask of fresh water on the jolly boat?”
“I did,” Spence said through a snarl.
“I’m sure it will be much appreciated for the hot work ahead. Mistress Spence, if you would care to come with me, I will see about clearing my cabin of logs and charts.”
The invitation was perempto
ry. Beau was given little choice but to accompany the pirate wolf as he wrapped his fingers around her upper arm and guided her to the after hatchway. While they were still in sunlight, she glanced back over her shoulder, catching her father’s eye a step before he disappeared through the gangway hatch. He was flanked by Pitt and the Cimaroon, neither one allowing him the opportunity to convey a strategy to her, if indeed he had devised one yet.
“You won’t get away with this,” she declared savagely. “My father has friends in England. He has friends in Court who will not tolerate an act of blatant piracy against one of their own kind.”
“Well, the next time I am supping with Bess, I shall be sure to inquire who they are. Watch your head, the ceiling has caved in in places.”
She was shoved through the hatchway and found herself smothered almost immediately by the dark, musty haze. No light penetrated the gloom save for the few slivers that showed through cracks in the splintered timbers. Half the steps on the ladderway were broken or missing altogether and she would have stumbled on the unfamiliar footing if the iron fingers had not remained around her arm.
The stench of old smoke was cloying in the narrow passageway. Dante ordered her straight, then to the left through an arched doorway and she was as relieved to leave the gloom behind as she was the smell of decay and death.
The captain’s great cabin was as cluttered and strewn with wreckage as the rest of the ship, yet there was evidence to suggest it had once been grandly appointed. There were carved oak panels on the walls with brass fittings and candle sconces. One entire wall had once been lined with wire-fronted bookcases, the shelves filled with books bound in leather and embossed in gold. Most of the volumes lay scattered across the floor; some were stacked in piles where a path had been cleared around the massive gumwood desk.
Spanning the full width of the cabin, canted inward to follow the shape of the ship’s stern, were the gallery windows. Most of the hundreds of small diamond-shaped panes had been shattered, and over everything—floor, chairs, shelves, walls—there lay a fine white coat of glistening glass dust. Only on the desk had there appeared to be any effort made to keep the surface clean, and then only because the top was littered with charts, maps, navigational instruments, and writing materials. A solid gold replica of a galleon in full sail was being used as a paperweight to hold down a sheaf of documents badly stained by smoke and saltwater.
Across a Moonlit Sea Page 4
