Pirates of Britannia Boxed Set Volume One: A Collection of Pirate Romance Tales

by Barbara Devlin

  He gazed down into the fathomless depths of her violet eyes, which were swirling with ribbons of desire and uncertainty and…want. Those same eyes flicked down to his mouth, and he knew she wanted his kiss as much as he wanted to kiss her.

  But she surprised him. Glynnis turned from him and quickly made her way to a cottage, set apart from the others in the vast sea cave. He followed her, entering the building just after her. He closed the door behind him, effectively sealing off her escape.

  She was his…

  Spinning to face him, she balled her hands into fists and advanced on him, stopping just shy of barreling over him. “You speak so plainly, Robbie. I find I cannot think when you do so,” her voice was a bare whisper, but each word blew air over the fire in his gut.

  He reached out, placed his hands on her hips, and she shuddered. Empowered by her reaction, he pulled her into him, until the hardness of his erection pressed against the softness of her belly. It was his turn to shudder. This…was right.

  Glynnis pressed her hand against his chest, and leaned back, her gaze roving over his face. What did she see there? Could she see the raw and unfiltered yearning for her? As Ravishing Robbie, he’d become an expert at hiding his true feelings and intentions behind a mask of indifference or feigned interest. As one bawd or barmaid blurred into the next, he’d learned to take the pleasure and leave the emotion outside. It was easier to forget the fact that he was nothing more than a thieving debaucher of women, known throughout Leeds and Liverpool as a highwayman who stole more than gold—he also stole virtue and kisses.

  This woman, though, he would never forget the emotions on her face, the sound of his name on her lips, the hitch in her breath when he touched her…

  Bending low, he brushed his lips over hers before finally responding. “I find that I can only speak so plainly with you, dear Glynnis.” He remembered standing, naked as the day he was born, before her in her little cottage. He could easily recall the way her eyes widened and her chest rose and fell with excited breaths. She’d liked what she saw, though she hadn’t said as much. Even then, he’d wanted that reaction from her, he’d wanted to see the appreciation and open desire in her eyes. “I do not know how it happened, but…the moment I awoke in your little cottage, I knew something had changed.”

  “I would say so—you had just survived a shipwreck,” she huffed, trying to pull away. He held her fast, raising one hand to take hold of her chin.

  “Aye, but it was not the shipwreck that beat against my mind…it was you, standing over me, thundering and storming and looking magnificent.”

  She sucked in a breath and arched a brow in confusion. “But why?”

  He smirked. “Why what?”

  “Why me? Why say these things to me? I am just a lonely widow; whose own husband saw nothing in her that was enticing enough to convince him to stay.”

  Robbie gripped her chin tighter, hissing. “If he were alive, I would cut him from bollocks to brain for even touching another woman while you were waiting for him.” She gasped, her eyes widening with something like admiration shining through. “You are the most beautiful woman I have ever met…and though I have only known you these mere days… I cannot help but think…I am supposed to do this…”

  He exhaled and pressed his lips to hers.

  Glynnis stiffened at first contact but then quickly melted against him. He took that as a good sign, pulling her closer until her bountiful breasts were crushed against him. He could feel the points of her nipples through her bodice, and it made every sense clamor in his skull. He deepened the kiss, swiping his tongue over her silken lips, silently begging her to give him access to her heaven.

  She moaned, opening for him, and he thrust in, his tongue meeting hers. Sparks ignited the cold coal around his heart, combusting, sending a blaze of scorching pleasure through his blood. Something within him burst open—not like an agonizing rending or shattering. It was as if a part of him had finally broken free. And the sensation was glorious, heady…breathtaking.

  Discordant shouts from outside the cottage made Robbie halt, his breath hitching, his heart pounding. He pulled away, groaning with ache in his chest and his manhood, and stared down at Glynnis, who peered up at him, her eyes wide, her lips kiss swollen. More than anything, he wanted to continue kissing the enchantress before him but…he knew the sounds of alarm in another man’s voice.

  “What is that?” she asked, breathless.

  Dragging his gaze from her flushed face, he answered, “I do not know. Let us find out.” Cautiously, lest an enemy come barreling toward them, he opened the cottage door and peered out.

  Saban was dragging someone beside him. Saban was drenched, his clothing bloody, his face pale.

  From behind him, peering over his shoulder, Glynnis gasped.

  “Saban! What happened?” She rushed from the cottage, unmindful of her passion-rumpled appearance.

  Saban wheezed, bending to lay his burden on the rocky floor.

  “Ambush…” he rasped, just before he collapsed beside the body of another man, the one he’d dragged into the cavern. “It was….an ambush…”

  Glynnis knelt beside him, pressing her hand to his face. Her gaze flicked from one part of him to another. Robbie bit back the growl of jealousy. “Where are you injured?” Glynnis asked, distracting him and unwittingly saving Saban from being gutted.

  Saban wheezed again, then coughed. “Not…my blood.”

  Robbie knelt beside the other man. He was pale, too, but Robbie didn’t recognize him.

  Glynnis moved to examine the other man. “His wounds…he was shot with a crossbow?”

  “Aye,” Saban rasped, trying to roll over onto his back. “A long-range shot…probably from a tree.”

  “There is blood everywhere…” Glynnis had lost some of her own color, her eyes wide. She’d faced bloated corpses to drag him from the shipwreck, she’d seen to his bruises, and had faced down a sword-wielding Saban—all without flinching. She was stronger than she knew…but this… Robbie wanted to take the fear from her eyes, to kiss the gasps from her lips, to comfort her.

  He knelt beside her. “I will help them, you go find one of the others.”

  She looked at him, gratefulness written into the beauty of her face. “I will not be long,” she murmured before rising and disappearing around the large boulder separating the main chamber from the cottages.

  “Come on, then,” Robbie intoned, bending to grasp Saban by his armpits. “Let’s get you up… Best you be awake to tell them what happened once they get here.”

  IT WAS A short time later, once Saban was cleaned up and the nearly dead man had been secured in a bed where he could rest while Lucia—healer to pirates and smugglers—looked after him. The crossbow bolt hit him in the shoulder; he’d lost a lot of blood but it wasn’t a vital wound.

  “He should survive, though I cannot say the same for Rickets and Bends—those two were picked off like snipe in a meadow. God damn Spaniards!” Saban bellowed, turning to pace back in the direction from which he’d first paced, only to turn and do the same thing once again. He was carving a line into the gravelly floor of the sea cave, but no one could blame him.

  Robbie sat next to Glynnis, who was staring at Saban who wasn’t looking at anyone, only pacing and muttering to himself. He’d only known his supposed cousin for less than a day, but he could tell that this was out of character for him—if the concerned looks on Brendan and Lucian’s faces were any indication.

  “How do you know it was Los Demonios de Mar?” Rose asked, slinking in from the shadows, having come from wherever it was she went to. She sat down on the ground, crossed her legs, and planted her elbows on her knees, giving the appearance of a child gazing up at her parent, enraptured. She was a study in the unusual and the intriguing. Beautiful yet happy to hide her beauty behind men’s loose-fitting clothing and smudges of dirt. She was intelligent yet she hid her cleverness behind petulant and off-hand remarks. “It could have just been an ambush—there h
ave been more than a handful of those over the last five years.”

  Saban stopped pacing and glared at Rose who didn’t seem affected by it.

  “I know it was them because I spotted their ship off the coast just as the storm made landfall. It was as though they were escorting it to shore and using it to cover their advancement.”

  “Which ship?” Brendan asked, standing.

  “The Santa Maria,” Saban provided.

  “Santiago’s ship,” Rose sneered. “Damn blood-hungry dog.”

  “But how did they know where to strike? No one knows where our hidden cove is,” Lucian inquired, a dagger in his hand. He was flipping it easily, and twirling it, first in one hand then the other. Robbie could tell Lucian would be deadly with that dagger.

  For the first time, Robbie counted his supposed connection to the Rees as a boon. He would hate to be the enemy of a Rees.

  “They hit us as we left the clearing where we stash the horses. It is easy enough to wait there for us, they wouldn’t have to know where the entrance is, just where we go to get our horses,” Saban replied, beginning to pace again.

  “Someone in the village must have told them,” Lucian reasoned.

  “It could have been him,” Rose said and pointed at Robbie.

  Anger flashed through him like a blaze. He shot to his feet, ready to fight for his life if he had to. “Like hell it was me. I didn’t even know about you or this place until Saban broke down Glynnis’s door—where I was recovering from a shipwreck, mind you—and dragged us here. I haven’t left since; who was I to tell?”

  “How did you even know to find us? We pay a lot of people a lot of money to keep their mouths shut about us—and we threaten the rest. Who told you about Saban? About the Ganwyd o’r Mor?” Brendan asked, squaring his shoulders to better peer at Robbie.

  Sighing, he returned to his seat. “A letter.”

  “What letter?” Glynnis asked, her husky voice like a balm to his increasingly wary mind.

  “Before I was a shipwreck survivor I was a highwayman. I robbed the nobles and wealthy merchants who travelled along the River Aire. I’ve never been caught and I make more in one robbery then any farmer or tanner could make in his lifetime.” He didn’t know why he needed Glynnis to hear it, but he was glad she did.

  Rose chuckled. “You got Rees blood, alright. Whether land or sea, we plunder.”

  Robbie gave her a quick grimace before continuing. “It was one such successful robbery where I stole a box with a letter inside. The letter was from some Royal Navy man to a duke named…Revel.”

  “What about them?” Saban asked, his arms crossed, his gaze trained on Robbie.

  “Have you heard of them?”

  “Nay.”

  “The letter was an order for Revel to find twelve men—of exceptional skill—to take a ship across the Irish Sea,” Robbie continued, silent prayers rising that he wouldn’t die as the bearer of such news.

  You should have told him sooner… Ignoring the sharp tone of his inward thoughts he rolled his shoulders to rid them of the tension. It didn’t work.

  “What were the men supposed to do once they crossed the sea?” Lucian asked.

  “They were to capture one Saban “the Sabre” Rees, any of his family members, or any member of the Ganwyd o’r Mor.” Once Robbie finished speaking, it was as though God had sucked the sound from the world.

  “Damn and hellfire,” Saban spat, but then something dark and hard crossed his features. “We will deal with them when they come, but before that we will mete out our revenge on the Demonios.”

  Rose hopped up onto her feet, a glittering light in her emerald eyes. “I know just what to do.” She disappeared as she had appeared, slipping into the shadows.

  “Get some rest, Rees, we will plan on the morrow. I have to think…” Saban stopped pacing and instead headed toward the back of the cavern where Robbie supposed his cottage was located.

  Soon, Brendan and Lucian found their own beds, leaving Glynnis and Robbie alone.

  And God…he needed her.

  Before he could speak even a word of what he felt, Glynnis stood and cocked her head, studying him. She’d said very little during the interchange between the Rees, but he could tell that she’d heard every word, internalized the information…understood the magnitude of what the others were saying.

  Aye, but do you? Aye, he understood what the others were planning, and it probably meant he would end up on another ship, praying to survive the journey.

  Not having said a word, Glynnis simply picked up her skirts and turned, practically running to her cottage. The urge to chase her was too strong, and so he did, catching her just as she stepped across the threshold into the small building.

  A single bed, a wash basin, a fire pit, and a chest were all the room held, but his eyes were on Glynnis. He couldn’t look away even if someone threatened to slice him into pieces.

  He’d taken her hand, halting her, but it was she who held him in place…with her wide gaze, her shuddering breaths, and her gently parted lips. She exuded a heat, a vibrating yearning that he could feel right down to his bones.

  “Glynnis…I need to…” He swallowed the growing urgency and pressed his forehead against hers, inhaling her scent, feeling the warmth of her flow into him, drowning him. “I want to…” How could he tell this woman the depths of what he felt? He couldn’t even understand it himself. It was absolutely wild, unbelievable—how did a man fall so quickly in such a short time? It went beyond wanting to pleasure her, though, that was something he absolutely wanted to do. It was about her, being with her, even if he could never touch her…just seeing her, knowing she was there…was enough.

  Nay! Not enough. Never enough. Not with Glynnis.

  “Robbie,” Glynnis whispered, her voice heavy, husky, alluring. She gazed up into his face, pulling away just enough to brush her lips against his.

  He trembled, brought low by the wee widow in his arms. “Aye?”

  “Make love to me.”

  Chapter Ten

  GLYNNIS TOOK A bowl of boiled oats from Lucia and smiled at her friend, who smiled back, knowingly. It might be a large cavern, but it was impossible to keep what she and Robbie had done a secret for long. Not that she wanted to keep it a secret…but she didn’t want the guilt that would come if anyone mentioned her late husband.

  Robbie had woken before her, leaving the bed warm and smelling of him. It was a striking and wholly addicting way to wake up. She’d dressed quickly, because she wanted to know how Saban and his crewman fared, and…well…because she wanted to see Robbie.

  That was, until she stepped from the cottage and found several pairs of eyes staring at her. She couldn’t stop the flush that blasted heat into her cheeks, so, she’d ignored it and she’d ignore them.

  Avoiding Robbie’s possessive, hungry gaze, she settled on a stool beside Rose who was sitting with her head between her hands, moaning. She must’ve imbibed more than was good for her the night before.

  What is becoming of you, old friend? Years ago, before William’s betrayal, she’d spent many hours with Rose, getting to know her betrothed’s family before the wedding. She’d been level-headed, quick-witted, and even-tempered. She never imbibed in wine or ale and spent much of her time tending to her garden.

  Something had changed…and Glynnis couldn’t begin to guess what.

  “Why are the Demonios even here? What could they possibly want this far from their usual haunts? Have they run out of ships to plunder in the mid-Atlantic?” Brendan intoned while securing a belt and sheath around his waist.

  “Might it have something to do with the English and their hunt for you, Saban?” Lucian asked, tightening his own belt and sliding his feet into his boots. The men were preparing for something…but why was Robbie still just sitting there, leaning back against the boulder, his muscular arms folded over a chest she’d attempted to memorize the night before as she pressed her cheek against it.

  Robbie was a Rees, why was
n’t he as agitated as the other men?

  “Possibly,” Saban intoned, his gaze locked on the dancing flames in the small cooking fire. “It is even more possible that they just want to stir up trouble.”

  “That would be my guess,” Rose croaked, not bothering to raise her head. “My eyes and ears in Nantes who hear from my ears in Bilbao, who speak to my ears in Lisbon say that the Portuguese are exploring further south, into the dark continent.”

  “What of it?” Saban asked, his tone telling of his impatience.

  Rose lifted her head then, sneering at Saban. “It means that with so many Portuguese ships roaming their waters, the Spaniards are probably looking for new places to plunder, ones that won’t bring them face to face with warships and cannon fire.”

  Saban ignored Rose’s sneer. “It seems that we have yet another enemy hungry for a taste of our blood.”

  Saban lifted his chin, apparently signaling to Brendan and Lucian to follow him. The three men rose and made their way to a corner where they squatted in a circle, their heads nearly touching as they spoke in murmurs.

  Glynnis could feel the tension rise around her, and she finally met Robbie’s gaze. He was seething, silently, his big, taut frame twitching with the need to move.

  Go to him… She needed to touch him, to comfort him, to help him calm his anger before he said or did something he would regret.

  Placing her uneaten bowl of oats on the ground she stood and made her way to Robbie. His eyes followed her, sliding over her as she moved…much as his hands…and his tongue had a few hours before. The ache began in her lower belly, the ache that told her she needed him, but she stopped before him and clenched her thighs, fighting back her baser urges.

  “You look troubled,” she said, tipping her head to look down at him. He threw his arm up behind his head to cradle it, and Glynnis was enraptured by the ease at which he moved, and how quickly he could go from cold and angry to hot and enticing. The devil smirked up at her, his lopsided smile too wicked…too ravishing.

  “I am troubled…by my desire to have you naked beneath me as I pleasure you…”