“Then—”
“Certain of my men are married, milady. Though their wives’ finery might not be to your standards, still, certain …” He paused, his eyes meeting hers with a devilish light. “Certain intimate apparel will be clean and neat and surely acceptable.”
Even his silver eyes seemed to touch and stroke her, she thought. She should be far away from him. Far, far away.
She stared across to the shore. “Tell me, Captain, do you intend to let me wear this clean and neat clothing on my own?”
“Milady?”
“Are you—” Her lips were dry, and she was breathless, and they merely stood together and spoke. If only she could forget the past. If only the slightest brush of his arm against hers did not evoke memories of tempest.
“Are you going to leave me in peace, Captain? Your cabin, sir, have you given me that as my own?”
He took a long time answering. When she looked to him at last, he was studying her very seriously. “Until it is time to do otherwise.”
“What do you mean?”
“When we’ve found and taken your father, milady. Then I will return. It will be most difficult for you to keep your promise to me if I am bedded elsewhere.”
She did not reply but tore her eyes from his to survey the shore. “With my father on board?” she queried softly.
“You’re worried about your father—and not your husband?”
“My husband is not aboard,” she murmured miserably.
“Ah … so that makes it all right to be an adulteress?”
“Stop it!” she hissed desperately. “Nothing makes it all right!”
“No, it doesn’t, does it?” he murmured. He turned her around by the shoulders. She tried to jerk free from his touch, but he would not allow her to go. She stared up at him, her eyes glazing with tears.
“I need your help!” she insisted bitterly. “I had no choice. My father—”
“Aye, your father,” he muttered darkly. “And still I tell you, milady, that your husband would have gladly fought and died rather than let you pay this price.”
“His blood cannot be payment for my request.”
“Aye, milady, for his blood has become your blood, as surely as yours is his. God alone knows how he will feel this time!”
“What do you mean?” she cried, wrenching away from him at last.
“Well, milady, I assume you must have admitted something.” The sweep of his eyes told her clearly and boldly that he spoke of her lack of innocence when she entered into her marital bed. “What did you say? That it was fear? Loneliness? Desperation, a bid to save your very life! This time … perhaps you need not tell him that you bartered with what was his, that you offered yourself in payment. You can tell him that I am a pirate, a cutthroat, a ravaging rapist, and that I dragged you down before you had a chance to think.” He reached out for her again so suddenly that she nearly screamed. His fingers threaded cruelly into the hair at her nape, and he dragged her close. “Maybe he’ll be so enraged he’ll beat you to within an inch of your life. I wonder what I would do, milady, if you were my wife, under such circumstances. I’d kill the man, that is for certain.”
She kicked him savagely, taking him by surprise. He howled with outrage as her foot came in wild contact with his shin, then he jerked harder upon her hair, pulling her flush against him. He gritted his teeth. “Pirates, milady. We are allowed to be savages, remember? But I do wonder just how savage your fine aristocrat of a husband might turn out to be when he hears of this latest maneuver on your part! But then, you told me that you loved him, didn’t you?”
“Let me go!” she cried frantically. “He is my concern.” Aye, Roc was her concern, just as the Hawk was her concern. And at the moment, he was the man to fill her heart and her thoughts, for she was so completely his prisoner. From head to toe she was flush with the man, achingly aware of the heat of his muscles, the strength of his hands and arms, the fire in his groin. It occurred to her fleetingly then that she knew him more thoroughly still than she did Petroc Cameron, for this one she had seen boldly in the nude, while her husband had seduced her and been seduced in return while never quite shedding his clothing.
Warmth blazed through her as she struggled to be free.
“Captain!”
“Aye!” He released her instantly, striding the deck to come back upon the platform by the helm. It was Jacko calling to him from atop the crow’s nest.
“I see ships ahead, far right into the inlet.”
“Pirates?”
“Aye, sir! I see Teach’s flag atop the one. They’re drawing it in, I believe.”
“Safe harbor on the islands!” Robert Arrowsmith seemed to growl.
Skye hurried after the Hawk to the platform. “Where are we?” she demanded.
“My glass!” the Hawk demanded. He leaped for the mast and began to shimmy up the length of it. Skye watched his dexterity with perplexity and annoyance, then turned to Robert. “Robert! Where are we? What is going on, here?”
“A party, milady.”
“A party!”
“A pirate fete upon a North Carolina island. A number of men have gathered here. Teach just took some incredible prize and enhanced his reputation a thousand times over. We believe he has a certain immunity here, in this area of North Carolina. So do some of the others.”
Skye gasped. “So Eden of Carolina has been bribed by the pirates!”
“So goes the rumor.”
“But why have we come …?” she began, but even at the last, her voice trailed away. “Logan! The Hawk thinks that Logan has come here with my father!”
“Precisely, Lady Cameron.”
Skye fell silent and hurried back to the railing, looking starboard side. She realized that the Hawk was calling down orders to Robert Arrowsmith, and that Robert was then calling out commands to the crew. The sails were drawn in tighter and the ship began to shift. Skye thought that the Hawk meant to sail straight into the land, and she nearly turned to scream that they were insane. But just when she would have done so, she saw the narrow channel leading inland. It was a fair space ahead of the other pirate ships.
They were going to hide, she thought. Hide, until the Hawk could get a fair layout on the land—and its inhabitants.
She was right in her assumptions.
Turning about again, she saw that the order had been given to bring down the longboats.
Then a moment later, in the midst of all the activity, the Hawk was striding back toward her. He was fully armed now,she saw, with his cutlass in his scabbard, a knife in a sheath at his boot, and a brace of pistols shoved into his waistband.
“Go back to the cabin,” he told her curtly. “Stay out of sight.”
He started to turn away. “Wait!” she cried to him, catching hold of his arm. “Please, don’t leave me here—”
“Damn you, stay out of sight!” he told her, his eyes narrowing. “You little witch! Don’t you remember the last time, girl? If you hadn’t been so determined to escape, Logan might well never have known that you existed!”
And he might not have kidnapped her father. The words went unsaid. Skye stepped back as if she had been stung, but she did not cease her argument, for it was the same as his.
“Please, don’t leave me here! It is because—” she hesitated, then continued, “it is because of my very foolish determination at that time that I beg you to bring me along.”
He hesitated, and she knew that he recalled how Logan had come to the ship when it had been weak and unguarded.
“Damn it!” he swore. “Damn it! Aye, come along, then! But you heed my words and warnings at all times, and so help me, if you prove to be trouble, I will lash you to a tree! Robert! Get the lady’s cloak.”
“Robert! And my sword, please!” Skye added.
The Hawk stared at her. He did not refuse her request. “Come, lady,” he said at last, as Robert brought her things. “We’ll take the first boat.”
His touch was far from gentl
e as he handed her down the ladder to the longboat from the deck. He was not leaving the ship as unguarded as he had in New Providence, but at least twenty-five of his men were accompanying them.
He did not row, but balanced forward, looking ahead. Jacko and Robert and two others were in their boat, rowing steadily. Skye sat tense and silent, watching as they came to land.
When they did, the Hawk asked no by-your-leave, but plucked her up in his arms and thrashed through the water with her in his arms. She smiled suddenly as he carried her, taut and distant, over the sand to the secrecy and shadows of the brush. He glanced down, startled by her gaze.
“Once,” she whispered, “you said that I wasn’t even worth a fair price in gold. But you are risking your life for one night in my arms. Should I be flattered, Captain Hawk?”
“Perhaps I value my life less than gold. Perhaps that is a pirate’s way.”
“I, sir, do not value your life as less!”
She thought that he would be pleased. He stiffened like cold steel and fell to his knees to dump her angrily upon the sand. His men milled behind them but he spoke in a heated whisper anyway.
“What of your life, lady—and all that is of value to your husband?”
She straightened herself, longing to slap him. He knew her intent, for he quickly caught her wrist, and together they rolled across the sand. Breathlessly she shoved against him.
He paused at last. They had come beneath the shadow of spidery trees, on a bed of pines. He rose over her. He cupped her chin in his hands and bent down to kiss her. She tried to twist away. Her resistance was to no avail. His lips found hers. His tongue ravaged them, demanding that they part to him. He was merciless, savage, demanding. She could scarce breathe. She twisted and kicked.
But she could not move, nor could she deny the wild abandon that snaked traitorously into her veins. He brought her alive with fire, with liquid heat. She could fight no more. She tasted his lips and tongue and the deep recesses of his mouth, tears coming to her eyes. She felt his hands upon her, sweeping along her thigh, cupping her breast.
Then at last he broke away. He started to swear at her furiously, incoherently, but then his words broke away. He gently smoothed the tear from her cheek with his forefinger, then he drew her to her feet.
“You will wait here with Robert, do you understand me? I am looking today, nothing more. I may, perhaps, leave you ashore tonight, and enter into the festivities with you safely out of sight and far, far from harm’s way. Stay with Robert and my men, and take care. Do you understand me?”
She nodded. He turned and, shouting orders, left her. She waited until he was long gone, then she came over and joined Robert, who sat idly by the shore. Others of the men had stayed behind, too. Five of them. To protect her, Skye thought.
By Robert’s side, she suddenly burst into tears. He set his arm around her like a brother, drawing her close. Miserably, awkwardly, he tried to comfort her. “I’ve tried to tell him. Ah, Skye, I’ve tried, I’m so sorry.…”
“What?” she managed to gasp out. “Tell him what?”
“To leave you be,” he whispered. “You don’t understand. You can’t possibly understand. He … never mind. It will be all right. Trust me, milady, trust me, please.”
She fell silent and stayed by his side.
Later he rose, looking upward with agitation. “What is it?” Skye demanded.
“Clouds. Storm clouds. I don’t like them.”
Skye looked up herself. Even as she did so, it seemed that the day darkened. The breeze picked up.
“We should get back,” Robert said.
“We can’t leave him! We can’t leave the Hawk!” Skye protested.
“We won’t be leaving him. I’ll take you back, and he can come with the others in one of the longboats.”
A sudden, brilliant flash of lightning rent the sky. Thunder followed it like a clash of heavenly swords. “Come on!”
Robert dragged her to her feet. Skye whirled around as the other men rose, hurrying toward them.
The rain began to fall.
“We head to the ship in one boat!” Robert cried. He reached for Skye’s hand. A second bolt of lightning came, and thunder followed, and the very heavens seemed to open up upon them. “Come, Skye!” Robert grabbed her hand, and they started racing down the beach. Then suddenly she stopped, and she slammed hard against him. “Hawk!”
Skye pushed sodden tendrils of hair from her face to stare ahead of herself. He was indeed coming back. Running along before the main group of his men, he reached them. He spoke quickly to Robert. “They’re here all right, a full party of them. Logan, Teach, a fine baker’s dozen of others. We’ll move in tomorrow. For now, let’s hie from here. This storm promises to be fierce!”
He reached behind Robert, finding Skye’s hand and pulling her along. He lifted her and shoved her into one of the longboats. Robert and two men crawled in behind them and shoved them away from the shore.
The Hawk ignored Skye, rowing hard with the others. Lightning flashed, thunder cracked, and she flinched. At the shoreline she could see the waves swelling and the trees and bracken bending low to the strength of the wind. She shivered. In a matter of moments, it seemed, a true tempest had swirled upon them.
“Damn!” Robert swore. “I cannot hold her steady!”
“Pull together!” ordered the Hawk.
Skye turned around. She could see the ship, and it still seemed far ahead of them. The ferocity of the waves seemed to push them ever closer toward the shore.
“Take care of the rocks!” the Hawk cried, but he had barely voiced the words when a terrible rending sound was heard. Skye didn’t know what had happened at first. The sound seemed part of the horror of the storm, like the crack of thunder, like the high scream of the wind. “Signal the others!” the Hawk cried. Skye stared at him and saw the power he set to the oars, trying to hold the small boat steady. She looked to her feet. Water rushed in upon them. They had struck a rock. They were sinking, she realized.
“Fulton has seen us!” Robert cried. “He’s circling back.”
“Dive in, we’ll take less water, and I’ll stay with Skye to the last!” the Hawk shouted. “She cannot make it far in these skirts!”
“I can’t leave you—”
“You’ll drown us if you stay! It will come right, Robert, if we don’t take any more water! Tyler, Havensworth, dive now, and reach Fulton, and bring him around for us!”
Seeing the wisdom of his words, his men quickly obeyed his orders. Skye gasped, her hand coming quickly to her mouth, for it instantly seemed that the wild sea swallowed them over. Grayness prevailed.
Then she saw Robert’s head as he broke out of the waves. Then she saw the two other men, and that they could survive; they were swimming hard toward another boat.
She glanced down to her feet again. The water was rising high. She looked to the Hawk. He was staring at her.
“Ready?” he asked.
She lifted her chin with a smile of bravado. “I am afraid of the dark, not the water!” she told him. A slow smile curved into his features. He reached out to her.
“Come then, my love!”
She took his hand. The rescue boat was almost next to them, but Skye realized that they had to jump and swim—else risk the damaged boat crashing with the one that would save them. With her fingers entwined with the Hawk’s, she dove over the side.
She was instantly dragged down. The water was cold, heavy, and dark. Her lungs hurt and she tried to kick her way back to the surface. She was so very heavy.
There was a jerk upon her hand. The Hawk was dragging her up. Her face broke the surface. Still, she could scarce breathe. The rain beat against her savagely, the wind screamed and tore at her, stealing away what breath she could gasp in.
“Swim!” the Hawk commanded.
A giant wave crashed down upon her. Their hands were torn apart. Skye felt as if she were lifted by a giant icy hand and tossed about. She was heavy, so heavy! Wil
dly, desperately, she broke the pull of the sea.
Salt water stung her eyes and filled her mouth as she gasped for air. She strained to see, and horror engulfed her. The longboat seemed to be miles away. Miles and miles away.
And the Hawk was next to it, clinging to it. He could crawl right over to safety, while she …
Water rose and crashed over her head again. She started going down. Her lungs were going to burst. Searing pain swept through them. She realized that she was about to die, to drown, to sink down to the sea bed in a swirl of bone and petticoats and skirts, and lie there to be food for sharks and other fishes. Life, sweet tempest that it was, would be over. Death could not be so hard. Not so painful as the agony that came to her lungs. Not so terrifying as the sea green darkness and the cold that was enveloping her. They said that a drowning man saw his life flash before his eyes. What of a drowning woman?
A drowning woman saw her lover’s face, she thought, but her air was all but gone, and she did not know if she saw her husband or the Hawk before her.…
Pain awoke her just before she opened her mouth to breathe in gallons of the water. Fingers entwined in her hair, dragging her up and up. She broke the surface and through the darkness and gray and pelting of the rain, she saw the Hawk.
“Swim!” he commanded her furiously.
“I cannot! My petticoats—”
“Shut up!”
He was holding her against him, treading the water with a fury and coming at her with a knife. If she had had breath, she would have screamed. He meant to slay her so that she would not drown, she thought incredulously.
But he did not slay her. His knife did not cut into her flesh, but severed away her clothing. Her skirts and petticoats fell, and her legs were free, and she could tread water herself. “Get rid of your shoes!” he shouted.
She reached down and gulped in some water. He spun her around, digging into her hair again, but holding her face above water. She managed to shed her shoes. She realized that he was already swimming, his fingers dragging her along by the hair.
“I can manage!” she cried. Twisting, she began to go with the water. He wasn’t fighting the current or the waves. He was allowing the rush of the storm to cast them toward the shore.
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