The Pirate and the Puritan

by Howe, Cheryl

  Passing the etching to the next eager pair of hands, she looked beyond the throng of guests to find Drew. She wondered if his subdued behavior had anything to do with fear. Perhaps he suspected he was next on El Diablo’s list, and the broadsheet confirmed his worst fears. Drew seemed too arrogant to respect an obvious threat, but she had no other explanation for his reaction.

  She found Drew and her father tucked in a dark corner away from the other guests. At her approach, they fell silent. Drew ignored her, while her father embraced her as if she might disappear.

  “Felicity, I’d like to accompany Lord Christian to the Hare and the Hound to see if we can discover more about this mysterious broadsheet. Would you like to stay here, or should I have my driver see you home?” What Drew hid expertly overflowed from every one of her father’s pores. He practically shook with fright.

  Felicity hooked her arm through his. “I wish to come with you.”

  “No.” Drew’s curt command held no hint of the polished aristocrat.

  “Lord Christian’s right. It’ll be no place for a woman.” Her father disengaged from her grasp. He held her hand, patting the back of it

  Felicity straightened, trying to appear taller than he. “I knew Master Marley since I was a child. I’m just as anxious to find the killer as you.”

  “Not this time, Felicity,” Drew said. “For once in your life, you’ll do as you’re told.” He stepped toward her, apparently forgetting to be indifferent.

  “I was speaking to my father.” She held her position at the edge of the plush carpet, despite the urge to melt back into the throng of guests still gathered around Captain McCulla and Master Linley.

  “Don’t argue with me about this.”

  Her father cut off Drew’s advance. “She’s only trying to help. I won’t have you bullying her.”

  Drew’s narrowed gaze instantly dropped. He raised his hands as if he intended to rake his fingers through his hair, but lowered his arms when he made contact with his ridiculous wig. It appeared he wasn’t used to the fancy dress of an aristocrat after all—not that Felicity was terribly surprised.

  Her father tightened his grip, gaining her full attention. “Though I disagree with his high-handed manner, I agree with Drew. I must insist that Avery see you home.”

  Her father’s obvious agitation forced her to hold her tongue—not the fact that Drew’s tight jaw warned arguing would be useless.

  “Ben, you need to take Felicity home yourself. She shouldn’t be left in the care of a driver,” Drew instructed.

  Her father shoved his hands into the pockets of his knee-length coat. “I don’t want you dealing with this alone. Now, more than ever, we need to stay together.”

  Drew glanced at Felicity as if she were an unwanted piece of baggage. “I won’t be alone. Besides, it’s more important to keep Felicity safe and away from the docks.”

  “You’re right.” Her father nodded, but the sagging of his shoulders proved he didn’t like his choice. “I must think of Felicity first.” Her father clasped her hand again. “Come along, daughter. I’m sure our hosts will understand our early departure.”

  She followed him, slightly shaken by Drew’s curt dismissal. Lord, but he was good. He could turn the charm off and on as he pleased, could become demanding and powerful in the blink of an eye. Despite knowing better, she had actually started to believe his flirtatious glances over dinner.

  In the cool marble foyer, the threesome exchanged a hasty farewell with Philip and Samantha Linley. Felicity couldn’t help but notice Samantha’s desperate attempt to pull Drew away from the group with whispered pleas. Her irritated scowl at his rebuke left Felicity with unjustified satisfaction. But it was short-lived as Mistress Linley swung around to stare at her.

  After a head-to-toe perusal, the older woman dismissed her with a smirk. Apparently, Mistress Linley found no threat to her relationship with Drew. Not that Felicity could blame her. Even the gout-ridden merchant who had sat next to her during dinner had stared past Felicity to marvel at Samantha Linley’s classic beauty.

  After her fall from grace had ensured her she’d never be any man’s wife, Felicity assumed she’d accepted the fact that the male population only gazed upon her in a sisterly fashion. It was what she’d told herself she wanted. But bluff or not, Drew’s decidedly heated attention proved how wrong she’d been.

  Without conscious thought, Felicity slipped her arm through his. He only gave her a brief curious glance before he guided her out the door. A quick glimpse over her shoulder rewarded Felicity with the droop of Mistress Linley’s smile.

  Felicity allowed herself to be meekly led to the waiting carriage, then climbed in, grateful that Drew let her action go without comment. Tactfully, she’d decided to wait for her father’s seclusion from Drew before she convinced him to take them in the direction of the Hare and the Hound. Drew’s change from fop to bully might subdue her father, but it wouldn’t stop her. Not until she found out what upset him enough to crack his gentlemanly guise.

  ***

  “Just a moment, Felicity. I’d like a word with Lord Christian.” Ben closed the carriage’s heavy door on his daughter before she could voice her obvious objections. With her out of the way, Ben began again the conversation she had interrupted. “Are you sure leaving Barbados is the right thing to do, Drew?”

  He glanced across the brick drive to assure himself the nickname had not been overheard. Torches guarded the polished stone steps to Linley Hall with silent uniformity, casting ominous shadows but revealing no curious ears.

  Motioning to Ben, Drew receded into a nook shaded by an overgrown bougainvillea whose blood-red petals fell in a dark pool at the driveway’s edge. Secluding himself with his remaining business partner might appear suspicious, but better that than to have Felicity or anyone overhear their conversation.

  “You saw the sketch. First the rumors that El Diablo killed Marley and Beatrice, and now this. I need to leave Barbados. Maybe if I’d left earlier Marley and Beatrice would still be alive.”

  Ben reached out and squeezed his shoulder. “I don’t blame you. You know that, so stop blaming yourself. Marley and I both knew the risk of selling pirated goods. We’re in this together, Drew.”

  Drew folded his arms over his chest and casually disengaged Ben’s grip. “I don’t think Marley would have agreed.”

  “Lord Christian kept Marley out of debtors’ prison. And purchased him his house on the hill and the love of a woman who wouldn’t have looked twice at him before. And Lord Christian can protect you now. Don’t leave.”

  Drew shook his head. “We always knew our charade would come to an end. It was only a matter of time before someone discovered ‘Lord Christian’ wasn’t whom he claimed. We should have quit the moment King George started his crusade against piracy.”

  Ben straightened and narrowed his gaze. “That was my decision as well as yours. And Marley’s. I don’t remember Richard complaining until pirates and the merchants who bought from them started being hanged from the docks on a regular basis.”

  “It’s not as simple as selling pirate contraband under the guise of a legitimate charter anymore. King George’s edicts aren’t all we have to contend with. Someone calling himself El Diablo is killing people associated with our venture.” He tried to make his voice deadly serious. “You might be willing to take responsibility for your part in our plan, but what about Felicity? She’s involved now. It’s clear I must leave.”

  Ben cut his gaze to the deep shadows in the foliage. Drew suspected Ben knew he was right but was too good a friend to send him out on his own—which was more than Drew deserved.

  “But what about you? You won’t be safe on the open sea. I didn’t save your life to watch you throw it away,” Ben said. But the conviction in his voice was clearly gone.

  “That’s the last thing I’m doing. Now that there’s a king’s ransom on El Diablo’s head, I’m no safer on Barbados than at sea. Besides, I want to find the bastard who is ruin
ing my life.”

  “Just send word that you’re safe.”

  “No contact. I’ll leave on the Sea Mistress tonight and you won’t see me again until I find Marley and Beatrice’s killer.”

  Drew extended his hand. Ben ignored it, opting to hug him instead. With little choice, Drew accepted the embrace, not really minding at all.

  As they walked back to the black coach perched atop red wheels, Ben hung his head and sighed. The man did a poor job of hiding his emotions. Drew never should have suggested he involve himself in this illicit profession. The irony was, at the time Drew thought he was doing Ben a favor, neatly paying off a debt.

  Drew stopped his friend before he opened the carriage door. Through the window, in the confines of the dark interior, Felicity’s pale face glowed like the moon. The way she stared straight ahead, ignoring their approach, warned she’d been straining to hear their conversation. He’d been a fool to think her taking his arm and allowing him to guide her down the Linleys’ front steps had been some sort of truce. No doubt she’d considered the fact that dew had gathered on the marble, and she’d needed something to cushion her fall if she slipped.

  Drew, leaning on the window’s edge, saw a secret smile play on the young woman’s full lips. If Ben hadn’t been hovering nearby, he might risk stealing a kiss good-bye. The resounding slap he’d no doubt earn for his efforts would surely be worth it.

  “Miss Kendall, I’ll bid you goodnight. It’s always a pleasure,” he said.

  She turned to him, her gaze smoldering with satisfaction. He’d love to see that look on her face for reasons other than his imminent departure.

  “I’m glad you’re so easily amused,” she said. “Personally, I find talk of murderous pirates anything but pleasant. But I suppose therein lies our difference.”

  Drew straightened. Lord, but her thorns were sharp. She’d surely make a man bleed before he reached her soft petals. “As always, you’re absolutely right. What would I do without your guidance?”

  “Burn in hell, which I’m sure you’ll do with or without my assistance.”

  Drew cleared his throat. His usually thick charm evaporated on his tongue. The truth of her words—something he’d always known and sometimes prided himself on—suddenly raised a chill on his hot skin. He turned away. Perhaps Felicity was a challenge he’d not be able to overcome. He hoped it wasn’t a sign that there’d soon be others.

  “Keep an eye on that daughter of yours,” he said to Ben. “You have enough to worry about with her underfoot.”

  His friend nodded, then slipped into the carriage. He settled across from Felicity, and Drew tried not to notice the grooves that marred the man’s face. Ben had aged ten years since Marley’s death. Drew feared his own demise might add another ten. But better that than Ben dying himself.

  The carriage slipped off into the night and Drew said a silent farewell. He’d keep his vow to destroy El Diablo, and he’d never see Ben or his daughter again.

  ***

  With great effort, Felicity pretended she hadn’t overheard the whispered voices carried on the heated breeze like the thick smell of tropical flowers. She studied the coach’s fleurs-de-lis-embossed walls and red leather seats, only slightly curious how her father had come by such a monstrosity. She was sure Drew arranged the purchase—as he’d no doubt hired the musket-toting driver who’d worried her on the ride to the Linleys’—but at the moment, her sole interest lay in her father’s conversation with Drew.

  An oppressive silence settled around her and her father, the only noise between them the carriage’s rattle and the rhythm of the horses’ hooves. She drew a breath with the intention of casually interrogating him, then swallowed her words. His usually plump cheeks drooped with the weight that bent his shoulders.

  “Father, are you ill?” Her concern momentarily replaced her excitement in discovering Drew planned to leave Barbados.

  “It’s nothing, daughter. Talk of the murders has upset me all over again.”

  Her father’s distress at the brutal deaths was genuine, but she sensed his grieving went deeper. Drew’s impending departure upset him. If she only had proof of the rogue’s misdeeds, her father would be grateful instead of suffering unjustified sorrow.

  She patted his knee. “It was a senseless act carried out by brutal men with no apparent conscience, so please stop blaming yourself. It isn’t good for you.”

  “I am far more responsible than I have the courage to admit.”

  Helpless to stop her father’s self-imposed guilt, she settled against the padded seat in a squeak of rich leather. He blamed himself when responsibility for the murders belonged to Drew. In the snippets of conversation she’d overheard, Drew had admitted it. If she had to guess, she’d say he had some unscrupulous dealings involving pirates. After they’d been swindled, they probably wanted their due, and Marley and his wife had paid with their lives.

  In a way, Drew had seduced her father just as he had intended to seduce her. The realization conjured a surge of anger for her own weakness as much as Drew’s actions. She couldn’t deny the unwanted desires he had spawned any more than she could deny her relief that he would soon be gone.

  With each plodding step of the horses, their slick black carriage was carried farther from the docks. Her opportunity to change her father’s mind about visiting the Hare and the Hound and finding out more about El Diablo faded with the distant lights of Bridgetown. Guilt at playing on her father’s remorse held her silent.

  Drew and his abrupt change of plans were the principal culprits in her father’s dour mood. She stared at the passing scenery. Murky green shadows tangled in a tunnel of foliage. The contradictions in Drew’s behavior disturbed her. He was leaving Barbados, but he had told her earlier that evening the seas were not safe for him. Had Drew become strange after McCulla confirmed El Diablo’s responsibility for the murders, or had he realized, during their conversation on the terrace, that Felicity knew too much?

  She sat up abruptly. Perhaps his departure would hurt her father in the end. One glance at his frowning features and she knew his troubles with that aristocratic fraud were far from over. If Drew fled to allow her father to take the blame for his misdeeds, his betrayal would compound the man’s current misery. Felicity had personal experience with abandonment. She’d not let her father be duped as she had been.

  On the long ride home, Felicity furiously devised a plan. A plan that would be carried out tonight.

  Chapter Four

  On the deck above, the pattering of rain increased to a steady roar, dashing Drew Crawford’s hope that the storm had passed. If he hadn’t discovered the lock to the hatch had been tampered with, he might have waited the storm out. That nothing was stolen worried him more than if the ship had been looted. The Sea Mistress’s ownership was common knowledge. Drew feared someone was looking for information and it was only a matter of time until they found it. With a mumbled curse, he returned his attention to the charts he’d spread out across the cherry wood dining table.

  The bloody tropical storm had blown the Sea Mistress dangerously off course. He couldn’t depend on the noonday sun to struggle through the gray, boiling sky to verify his longitude. His best guess placed them a day and a half sail to the safety of his island refuge. He consulted his compass and navigation ruler, hoping that the break in the clouds didn’t find them anywhere near the Spanish Main. The scars from his last unscheduled visit to Spanish territory had faded from his skin but not his memory.

  As the deluge pounded his ship like a kettledrum, Drew counted the one blessing in his favor. The downpour had washed his hair and face clean of the sticky white powder he wore in the persona of Lord Christian. He ran his fingers across his scalp and through his wet hair. Thanks to Marley’s murderer, he would never have to bother with the ridiculous disguise again. He might have even been grateful if the culprit’s plan had not included murdering a defenseless man and an innocent woman.

  Not that the pirate had single-handedly ru
ined his formerly carefree lifestyle. Felicity Kendall also wanted a pound of his flesh. But it was his willingness to oblige her with more than that which created the true problem. Leaving Barbados provided the only solution to both dilemmas. His strange attraction to the little Puritan left him exposed.

  He noticed the drops spreading across his map and shook his head over the overpriced carpet instead, creating a shower of water. The last thing he needed was a misguided woman clouding his thoughts with morality.

  A hard thud sounded above the drumming rain. Startled, Drew juggled the compass he’d just picked up to prevent it from tumbling to the deck. An angry lurch of the ship conspired to toss him from his chair along with the delicate instrument.

  God, but he was jumpy. Too long a time in civilization frayed his nerves, as it must have his crew. He would have thought securing the mainmast and working the pumps on the pitching deck would have drained their stores of energy. A second thud resounded against his cabin and stretched the limits of his patience.

  “Save your bloody fighting for the bastard who murdered Beatrice and Marley,” he yelled.

  Instead of being followed by immediate compliance, Drew’s command provoked a frantic onslaught of pounding. When he realized the racket came from the armoire, he shot to his feet.

  If the storm had not thrown them off course, requiring him to find a dry place to unfurl his charts, the doxy one his men had stuffed in the oversized piece of furniture would have remained undiscovered. The man responsible for spiriting away his favorite whore would rue the day he went against his captain’s orders of strict discretion. Now more than ever Drew couldn’t afford to have his true identity or the location of his island sanctuary revealed.

  Before violently yanking open the ornate door, Drew caught himself and paused with his hand tightly gripped around the brass handle. He’d not unleash his frustration on the innocent woman trapped inside.