“It should take two weeks,” her father said grimly, “with all of us skinning our knuckles and blistering our backs. At first light, we’ll send some hunting parties out to scout for rocks, cut down trees, fill sacks with sand for constructing defenses. I also want search parties to walk the entire perimeter of both islands to make sure there have been no unpleasant changes since our last visit.”
Pitt concurred. “It wouldn’t hurt to put a couple of pinnaces in the water, too, maybe check the outlying islands on either side.”
“If memory serves, only one of these two islands has a source of freshwater, the other”—Juliet pointed to the beach on the opposite side of the passage—“is barely three miles long.”
“We’ll need lookouts,” Simon said, noting the arrival of the next boatloads of men on the beach. Isabeau had come across on one and when he saw her, a sly smile stole across his face. “I will volunteer Beau and myself to check out Spaniard’s Cay, while you, Juliet”—he waved at one of the men coming up the beach—“take one of the lads with you and find a good vantage point above these trees.”
“Aye, Father.” She turned, expecting to see Lucifer loping up behind them, or at the very least, one of her own crewmen armed to the teeth with pistols and powder horns.
Instead, she saw Varian St. Clare striding up the beach, his dark hair blown about his face, his long legs forcing Isabeau Dante to almost run to keep apace. He wore a plain white shirt and dark breeches. His sword was strapped to his hip and he wore crossbelts that held a brace of pistols snug across his chest.
His steps slowed as he approached the small group at the water’s edge. After nodding to Simon and touching a finger to his brow to acknowledge the smile on Geoffrey Pitt’s face, he walked right up to Juliet, took her hand, and started walking toward the trees without so much as a by-your-leave.
She was so startled she actually followed him half a dozen steps before she dug her heels into the sand and stopped.
“Where the devil have you come from? You’re supposed to be on a ship bound for England!”
“Unlike his daughter, who is too proud and pigheaded to listen to reason, I was able to convince your father I would be of better use here. In fact, we got along rather famously after we started sharing some of our anecdotes about the stubborn, willful women in our lives. After hearing about the very first meeting between your mother and father, I can see you came by your threat to geld me honestly. And is it true you were such a nuisance when you were small that your brothers trussed you up like a chicken and hung you by your ankles off the end of a bowsprit?”
Juliet, open-mouthed, glanced back at her parents, neither of whom looked the least abashed.
“We saw the Gale leave,” she said, turning back.
“So you did. Lieutenant Beck was not entirely pleased to take my place, but he could see the need and recognized his duty. Beacom was only too thrilled to accompany him and offer his services on the voyage home. Not only that, but he has taken some private letters back to England explaining my delay. Now then, shall we go along? We have a fair climb ahead of us and only a couple of hours of daylight left.”
He gave her a brief smile, then started walking, the sand sounding like crushed eggshells as he strode toward the trees.
Juliet stared. After another full minute, she glanced back at her parents a second time, but they had already headed off, hand in hand, toward one of the boats. Geoffrey and Nathan were talking together, the latter grinning and scratching his chin as if he should have known something had been in the wind.
By the time she looked back at the trees, Varian had put several hundred feet distance between them and she had to walk smartly to keep him in sight. She made no overt effort to catch up to him. Her thoughts were spinning too fast to even believe that he was there, let alone that her father had spent more than an hour discussing gun deployments and defenses without giving her so much as a hint there was anything afoot.
Anger put a new snap in her stride as she began closing the gap. The island boasted one tall peak and several smaller ones that stretched out several miles in length, descending like the knuckles on the spine of some ancient creature. The path, if it could be called such, was jagged and steep in places, with terraces of long grasses and tangles of bush in between that had not seen a human foot for centuries. The vantage, as they climbed nearer the top, was as dominant as the one from Pigeon Cay, giving a sweeping view of the surrounding area. The water shone like a rippled sheet of pewter beneath the sun, stretching out across the Straits for twenty leagues before it met the coast of Florida. To the north, the next island in the chain was visible as a vaporous blue haze linked underwater by a high shelf of reef. To the south, Spaniard’s Cay rose like the hump of a dolphin’s back, the summit mostly rock surrounded by a ring of trees and pale pink sand.
Juliet had lost sight of Varian, but knew he could not be too much farther ahead. She passed through a narrow belt of long, lush grass and was about to climb the last ten feet or so to the uppermost ledge of rock when she saw him. He was leaning against a boulder off to one side, his long legs crossed at the angles, his arms folded over his chest.
“Why have you stopped? We haven’t reached the top yet.”
“I think this is high enough, don’t you?”
“High enough for what?”
“To clear up any misunderstandings that might be between us.”
She glanced around, not so much to assure herself they were alone but to save her eyes from being trapped by his. “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t you? When I came up the beach back there, do you have any idea how close you came to being thrown down in the sand and ravished there and then, before your mother, your father … before God Himself?”
“They would have killed you if you’d tried.”
He smiled. “I doubt that. In fact, it was your mother who suggested I just drag you off into the bushes and keep you there until you came to your senses. She said that was the only way your father managed to convince her she could be stronger with him than without him.”
Juliet narrowed her eyes warily. He had removed his crossbelts and pistols, she noticed. They were on the rocks beside him alongside his sword and baldric. “She said that, did she?”
“She also said you were very much like her—sometimes to her sorry regret. That you are always so damned determined to prove you don’t need anyone’s help getting through life, that you sometimes forget that other people do.”
“Are you saying you need my help?”
“Call it a character flaw. The need to comprehend the incomprehensible. Although I think need is perhaps too strong a word. Desire might be better suited. The desire to understand you and the need to understand myself.”
“What are you having trouble grasping? You came here to do your duty to the crown. You have done it. Two weeks ago you were eager to see the last of us, to get back to your England and your rolling green hills and well-ordered life.” She waved an arm, vaguely indicating the stretch of blue water. “You had your chance three days ago to leave. You didn’t take it. And now you need my help to understand why you did not?”
“Oh, I know damned well why I did not. You see, I have spent the past twenty-eight years of my life wandering around without any real purpose, without any real ability to stray off the path that was chosen for me, the one that was set out in a straight line from the day I was born. I said I became duke by default and that part is true, but ten years ago, had you stood me beside my two brothers you would have been hard-pressed to tell the three of us apart. We dressed the same, talked the same, were educated by the same tutors. I expect we even made love the same, for we were all taken to the same brothel for our initiation into the earthy delights of a woman’s flesh.
“My older brother studied politics because that was what he was expected to do. My middle brother learned finance and the law so that the family business would stay in the family. I joined the army bec
ause that’s what third sons do. We even—all of us—agreed to marry women that were chosen for us because, while you had at least seen love up close and knew it existed, we were never exposed to anything so … earthy and uncivilized. Our parents were polite the two or three times a year they attended the same balls and court functions. They never touched, never—God forbid—smiled. When Father died, Mother’s first priority was assuring we all had the proper wardrobes. I had absolutely no idea love could produce actual physical pain. Not until I watched you stand on top of Pigeon Cay with your arms outstretched, vowing you would one day sail over the horizon to see if such things as dragons truly existed. Do you have any idea how truly pitiful a moment that was for me? There I was wondering if there had ever been an instant in my life that I actually believed such a thing as love existed, while you were convinced there were mythical creatures lurking just beyond the horizon, waiting for you to discover them.
“I think that was the very first time I knew what the pounding in my chest was all about. It was the moment I fell in love with you, though there were occasions afterward that made me think, ah, that was the one. Or, no, perhaps that was it. I have had three days and three very long nights to think about it, you see, and … I guess I was hoping you had been just a tiny bit miserable about sending me away.”
She stared at him, watching his lips move, hearing the words he was saying. And she had followed them right up to the point where he said he loved her. That was where her mind had frozen, where every single thought had slammed to a halt.
“I realize you made it quite shockingly clear from the outset that all you wanted was a pleasant diversion,” he added, somewhat uncomfortable under her stare. “I just thought … I assumed …”
When she continued to stand there, saying nothing, he sighed and pushed a hand through his hair. “Of course, that would be assuming a great deal, would it not? It would assume you gave a damn one way or another. That you didn’t just send me away because you’d had your fill of me, but because you were afraid it wasn’t just a diversion anymore.”
Something hot and stinging welled along Juliet’s lashes, blurring him into a blot of white shirt and blowing dark hair. A blink sent a splash down on her cheek and a soft gasp parted her lips, for it was all there. All of it was in his eyes. How much he loved her, how much he wanted her, how desperately he needed her to want and love him in return. It was terrifying and thrilling at the same time to realize she had that kind of power over another human being, and to know that someone had that same kind of power over her. Not the kind of power won with a sword or a knife or a blustery command, but the kind that would come in quiet moments, with a look or a touch, or in the promise of a smile.
“I sent you away,” she whispered, “because I didn’t think …”
He pushed away from the boulder and moved closer. “You didn’t think … what?”
“I didn’t think … you could love someone like me.”
He raised his hand, touching a fingertip to the fat tear that rolled slowly down her cheek. “Someone like you?” he murmured. “Someone who takes my every breath away? Someone who makes me want to be more of a man because she is so much more than any other woman I have ever had the privilege, the honor, the pleasure of knowing? Someone for whom I would gladly slay dragons the rest of my life?”
Juliet felt a flush rising up into her cheeks. Her eyes met his briefly, the tears brimming with damnable persistence as if once started, they would never stop. All four of his fingertips were wet now and he tried using his thumb to stanch the flow, but they just kept coming.
“You never thought it would happen to you either?”
She shook her head. “No. I never really thought it would.”
“And? Has it?”
It was a foolish question, for of course he knew. He had known it before she had even acknowledged the possibility to herself that this wild beating in her chest, this molten heat in her limbs, the pleasure of simply have him sit with her through the night and hold her, was more than anything she had ever expected. She did not know how or when it had happened, but he had not just won his way into her body; he was inside her blood, a part of her now, flowing through her veins like life itself.
Juliet was looking studiously at the hollow at the base of his neck, unable to lift her gaze above the level of his collarbone. Even when he tipped his head, trying to make contact, she bowed hers lower, leaving him no choice but to thread his long fingers into her hair and gently turn her face up to his. He must have seen the answer to his question shimmering in her eyes, for he smiled and closed his own. She thought she heard him breathe a faint “Thank God,” but she could not be sure, for in the next heartbeat, he was kissing her cheeks, her eyes, her temples, her brow. He brushed her lips lightly two or three times before his mouth came down hard and firm over hers but by then her arms were already around his neck, and she was partly laughing, partly sobbing as he swept her up off her feet and spun her in a dizzying circle.
She heard him say her name over and over, and she shuddered violently, knowing she wanted to hear it said that way, hoarse and ragged with passion, forever. Her own lips moved, and whether the words she uttered had substance or not, she could not tell, but at least she knew without any further doubts or hesitation that she wanted to say them, and that, for the time being, was enough.
Chapter Twenty-One
Havana
September 15, 1614
The Contadora was among the thirty-two warships anchored in a protective semicircle around the harbor, and one of the larger warships that comprised the armada de la guardia. There were fifty-nine merchant ships inside the ring of galleons, their captains increasingly anxious about the coming voyage to Spain. As early as last summer, the captains, the island governors, the officers in every garrison along the Spanish Main, had been on edge, knowing that it was important for the vast armada to reach Spain safely. The king needed the ships and the treasure the flota carried. Almost more than the gold and silver, Spain needed her best soldiers and officers if the plans for the new invasion of England were to succeed.
Common sailors and officers below the rank of captain were not told in advance that the treasure fleet would be larger than usual. Seamen were notoriously loose-tongued and privateers from every nation would have descended on them like locusts. Nor were they told the Indies would be stripped of her biggest warships. Those same loose tongues would have been bragging about how they planned to exact revenge for the fleet of 1588, and Spain would not only lose any advantage of surprise back home, but there would be open war with the English privateers in the Caribbean.
Of those who did know something was in the air, there were very few entrusted with all the details, fewer still who had realized the full scope of the enterprise until their ships were approaching the rendezvous in Havana and they saw the crowded conditions of the harbor. At the same time, most reported that there had been increased attacks on the ships attempting to reach Havana. Each cluster of ships that arrived brought stories of French and Dutch marauders thick as flies on a rotting corpse. Seven ships had been sunk or captured, and another twelve had turned back to their home ports not wanting to risk their valuable cargoes.
The Contadora had sailed from Vera Cruz. She mounted forty-eight big guns, which was enough of a deterrent against the privateering vessels that plagued the smaller, unescorted merchantmen. Her captain, Luis Ortolo, had been recalled from his normal duties patrolling the coastline off Cartagena, and this would be his first trip home in five years. On board for the voyage to Spain were twenty-three important passengers, including the former governor of Nueva España and his family. Also on board was Captain Diego Flores de Aquayo and several of his officers who had themselves been victims of the marauding privateers. News of the stunning capture of the Santo Domingo had spread like wildfire through the fleet, adding to the tension that was building incrementally in the harbor with each tale of attacks and sinkings received. For a ship so large, so heavily armed to
have come under such a brazen attack, how could smaller vessels expect to defend themselves?
Earlier that evening, the obese, red-faced Aquayo had retold the story again for the benefit of the new passengers on board the Contadora. His version of the attack also built incrementally with each telling, and on this particular night, there were seven heavily armed ships involved in the Santo Domingo’s demise. Although her crew had put on a valiant defense, had nearly emptied her armory of shot and inflicted savage damage on her enemies (sinking at least one ship in the conflict!), the capitán had felt it a merciful necessity to surrender before the pirates slaughtered them to the last man.
Credit was lavishly bestowed on Don Cristóbal Nufio Espinosa y Recalde for his bravery and courage. The capitán had offered resistance to the final possible instant and bore the bloody scars to prove it! The lower halves of his ears had been shot away, leaving gnarled black scabs, the remnants of which were still visible beneath the precisely curled waves of his hair.
Recalde himself had remained rigidly silent through most of Aquayo’s recitation of the events, though there was the occasional flicker of exasperation in the ebony eyes when the embellishments grew almost too outlandish to believe. But there had been no refuting the identity of the attacking ship, and for that, the governor, Don Felipe Mendoza, could heartily agree that Capitán Aquayo had indeed been lucky to escape with his life.
“La Rosa de Hierro. The Iron Rose.” The governor had shaken his head in disbelief. “We were under the mistaken impression this was but the name of a ship. We knew, of course, there were sons who sailed under the crimson flag of the Pirata Lobo, but to think of a daughter having such boldness! She must be so mannish and ugly it is beyond the ability of a godly man to conceive of her as a woman.”
The Iron Rose Page 29
