Pleasure of His Bed

by Melissa MacNeal, Donna Grant, Annalise Russell

  “Aye, sir!” came the redhead’s reply.

  “And, Gandolf, you and Tripplehorn and Reilly are to post the lookout and mind the mainsails.”

  The three lithe crew members sprang to the rope ladders, clambering to the crow’s nest and the yardarms while the rest of the men gathered around the foredeck. “Who’s on trial, cap’n?” one of them called out.

  “An excellent question!” Thomas barked. “Judging from who’s been confined, we’re finally to bring Miss Martine to her reckoning! High time, I say! We’ve seen what havoc’s been wreaked by the presence of a stowaway—a woman who’s up to no good!”

  Sophia’s cheeks flared, but she held her tongue. She still stood inside the tiny pen on a level slightly higher than the sailors, with the captain and the quartermaster on either side of her. Tension bristled between the two men until she nearly suggested they square off to settle their differences—and leave her out of it.

  “Beggin’ yer pardon, sir, but we likes Miss Martine!” someone called out.

  “Aye! She ain’t been no trouble a-tall!”

  A chorus of agreement buzzed around the deck, and someone else said, “Sure, an’ it’d suit me fine if she did all the cookin’! Yer a good fella, Comstock, but me guts’re rumblin’ from that odd brew you served up this mornin’!”

  “Hear! Hear!”

  “Order! Order, I say!” Thomas called out. He paced around the pen, his arms raised in a ceremonial gesture for silence.

  It was then Sofia realized the quartermaster resembled a peacock: his bright blue frock coat and deep green breeches set off his aristocratic bearing—at least among this crowd—yet he was all for show. This little drama was affording him the attention he craved, wasn’t it?

  “Because Captain Delacroix has requested this hearing, we shall let him speak,” Quentin announced with a condescending smirk. “Our verdict rests upon your consensus and opinions, my friends, but we cannot proceed if you all express them at once! Is that clear?”

  The men nodded, focusing eager eyes upon Delacroix, Thomas—and her. Sofia stood stock-still inside the pen, careful not to let her gaze linger on any one of them. She clasped her hands, hoping to appear demure and above reproach. It was best to let Damon command their attention so no one could blame her for influencing the trial’s outcome with flirtatious gestures.

  “I commend you sailors for respecting my orders about not talking to our captive and for respecting Miss Martine as the fine woman she is,” Damon began with quiet fervor. “And while Jonas Comstock has worked miracles with precious few provisions on earlier voyages, we’ve savored the finer fare Miss Martine has prepared for us—”

  “Aye, sir!”

  “Fine woman, that one!” came their murmured replies.

  “Shall we get to the point, captain?” Thomas stopped pacing to plant a fist on one hip. “Our duties await us—while it remains a fact that the woman you extol is aboard this ship illegally and that you intend to sell her in New Providence! Why are we wasting our time—”

  “My point,” Damon countered, aiming his finger toward the far horizon, “is that while the Odalisque and the Lady Constance have made good progress this morning, the Courtesan has fallen dangerously behind.”

  The captain stood in front of Quentin Thomas then, speaking loudly enough that all the men could hear him. “When I awoke this morning, the ship was spinning as though caught in a storm, when in fact no one was steering her! And the decks were deserted!” he exclaimed. “Why is that, Mr. Thomas? We were hired to escort Lord Havisham’s ship, yet we’ve nearly lost sight of her!”

  The crowd around them grew deathly silent. Sofia shifted from one foot to the other, wondering how the quartermaster would respond.

  Quentin’s expression curdled. “And why did you not correct this situation, captain? Perhaps because you’d been chained to your bed with your own manacles? By Miss Martine?”

  The crew drew a collective gasp, and someone snickered.

  “Some blokes gots all the luck,” one sailor muttered, and those around him chuckled.

  “I won’t deny that story, because you’ve told it,” Delacroix said darkly. “But my behavior put no one else at risk, did it? You, sir, bribed the men to clear the decks—to take advantage of Sofia’s walking alone this morning. By the time I showed up, you’d not only made improper advances, but you were holding her captive between yourself and the hot cookstove!”

  “You have no proof—”

  “I saw you myself! And I have heard Sofia’s story about—”

  Quentin sneered. “So you’ll believe the tales of a tart yet discount my testimony—”

  “What say you?” the captain queried his crew. He gazed fiercely around the crowded deck until every one of them focused on him. “Did Mr. Thomas pay you to make yourselves scarce? And because he’s your quartermaster, you followed orders?”

  Silence. A lot of nervous swallowing.

  “See there?” Quentin crowed. “To a man, they deny your outrageous claims—”

  “Aye, sir, that’s the way it happened!” came a voice from the rear. “We was followin’ orders—”

  “And God’s own truth, had we knowed he was lettin’ the ship go astray—”

  “And makin’ unseemly advances!” another crewman sang out. “Shame on you, Mr. Thomas, sir!”

  “She was talkin’ to ’er mother, too!” the outcry continued. “Lord love ’er, she was seein’ after her own dear mum!”

  Pandemonium broke loose then, and while Sofia’s heart swelled with the way these ragtag sailors had taken her side, the real conflict was just beginning. What would happen if the man responsible for steering the ship—and the ship’s business—got voted out while they were still at sea?

  And what would happen if Quentin Thomas sought retribution? His stormy expression bespoke trouble on several fronts…on hers, yes, but it was Captain Delacroix the quartermaster wished to depose. Thomas’s nostrils flared, and his face became a mask forged by hatred and traitorous intent.

  “And where is all this ill-advised sentiment getting us?” Thomas demanded. “The fact remains that Miss Martine’s presence has been the catalyst for—”

  “I say we puts the quartermaster in the pen!” someone piped up.

  “Aye, that’ll do! In plain sight, here on the deck,” another man joined in. A chorus of vigorous nods followed.

  “Is it true that he defiled ya, Miss Martine?” somebody demanded. “’Cause if he did, we’ll beat on ’im ’afore he’s in that pen—”

  “Captain, sir! We’s got trouble ahead!” Gandolf hollered from the crow’s nest. “Another ship’s just fired on the Lady Constance! And she’s flyin’ the Jolly Roger, sir!”

  14

  P irates! Far sooner than he’d planned for. Damon’s pulse galloped, and he set aside his aversion to the man who swore he’d done no wrong to Sofia nor neglected his duties. “Can you see the flag?” he called up to the lookout.

  “Black, with a white devil thrustin’ a spear into a red heart, sir.”

  “Blackbeard,” Damon muttered, glaring at Quentin. “Were we flanking Havisham’s ship, he’d have recognized the Courtesan’s colors and not fired! As you know, this has always been our arrangement, but you…Delacroix reigned in his fury, for too many lives were at stake in a game gone wrong. “Man the cannons!” he called out. “Prepare your weapons, men! Take up rowing and speed us toward our sister ships!”

  “Aye, sir!” came the unanimous answer.

  “Musicians! Set the tempo! Prepare us to fight!”

  “Aye, sir!”

  All around them the crew scrambled to follow orders—except here, where Sofia stood in the sheep pen with Thomas beside her. Damon had wanted their dilemma solved, but personal politics mattered little when the brides’ lives—and his men’s livelihoods—were at stake.

  “Man your post, Mr. Thomas,” Delacroix commanded. “And by God, if your negligence has endangered anyone, you’ll answer to me and to Lord H
avisham! Dismissed!”

  The quartermaster stalked across to the quarterdeck, oblivious to the sailors who rushed below to prepare the Courtesan’s cannons. And while meeting up with the notorious Edward Teach would ordinarily stir Damon’s blood and make pirating an incomparable adventure, he wished things were going according to plan, dammit! The Lady Constance would have to defend herself until O’Roark’s ship could turn around and come to her aide.

  Meanwhile, Damon had left his partner in the lurch. While he and Morgan had devised a safe, simple plan for Blackbeard to plunder the goods aboard Havisham’s ship—and to excite the girls a little—Teach didn’t know this! They’d had no chance to get word to him, so the New World’s most bloodthirsty brigand assumed this was business as usual. The Lady Constance would be easy prey unless he and O’Roark arrived in time!

  “Damon, what can I do?”

  He blinked. Behind them, two pipers and a drummer tuned up while, below, men’s voices echoed in the hold as they prepared the cannons for battle. Yet here stood Sofia, her eyes alight and her dark hair whipping in the wind.

  “Do?” he demanded. “Get yourself down to my quarters to—”

  “Don’t be ridiculous! If you think I’ll hide myself away while—”

  He grabbed her arms, astounded that her pulse raced and she looked so damn ready to fight alongside his men. Fearless, she was! Feisty and fetching and all those other things that made his blood pound for another reason entirely. She’d probably enjoy the pirate’s life, and her beauty would convince authorities to look the other way rather than convict her for her crimes.

  “That’s my mother aboard Havisham’s ship!” she reminded him. “I can’t sit idly by, knowing Mama must take charge of Daphne and Beatrix in my place!” She raised her skirts to step nimbly over the iron pen, her expression defiant.

  “Where do you think you’re going?”

  One eyebrow arched, and Sofia looked wickedly resolute. “To the kitchen. It’s my place, you know.”

  “Excellent idea!” he cried over the trilling of the pipes. “If you can prepare us something edible before we douse the stove’s fire to go into battle, that would be—”

  “I’ll see what I can do, sir.”

  Off she hurried, her hips swaying to the beat the drummer had set for the oarsmen below. He smiled at her spirit, yet Damon suspected she’d do as she damn pleased.

  Just as Blackbeard would.

  Sofia marched down the stairs to the galley, muttering. Wasn’t it just like a couple of overgrown boys to quarrel and challenge each other—and then presume she’d hide when things went awry? The dim, low-ceilinged galley still reeked of the salmagundi that remained in the cooking pots and in many of the men’s unwashed bowls. Comstock had chided her for being wasteful, yet he’d tossed so many eggs and pounds of pickled fish—and bottles of wine!—into this rank concoction that…well, it looked like it had been eaten before.

  Ignoring that nauseating thought, she searched the shelves and bins. Her foot tapped to the patriotic tune the pipers played while the drum drove her heartbeat. Here was a bin of hard-tack biscuits, made the first week of their voyage and now showing signs of weevils and certainly deserving of the name hard tack. While conditions undoubtedly deteriorated when supplies ran low, Sofia shuddered to think that men were expected to eat such unappetizing, paste-colored lumps and soup made from what passed for garbage in the Havisham home.

  Yet surely this salmagundi could serve a purpose…and who would miss these vile old biscuits?

  Sofia smiled slyly. As she took pitchers and pans from the galley shelves, she pictured herself confronting the infamous Blackbeard—who, by God, would be sorry if he harmed a hair on her mother’s head! She would prove herself so fierce and resourceful and indispensable Captain Delacroix couldn’t possibly sell her when they reached New Providence.

  If they made it. As the Courtesan surged across the sea, she heard the distant thunder of cannons. Wondered how Mama was faring with the Havisham girls.

  But this was no time for guilt. Holding her breath, Sofia ladled the rank salmagundi into her pots, determined that her fight with pirates would bring about a resounding victory…to show what she was made of, but also who she was made for.

  “Hoist the Jolly Roger!” Damon cried.

  The Havisham banner of blue dropped down the pole. As the crimson flag with a crossed saber and dagger fluttered up in its place, Damon allowed himself a moment of sheer joy. Was there anything so grand as commanding a ship in defiance of the Crown? For most privateers and pirates, the booty meant little compared to the sweetness of setting one’s own destiny at sea.

  As they raced toward the Lady Constance, Damon gazed through his spyglass. Even from a distance, he heard Blackbeard’s crew and musicians making a racket to frighten Havisham’s men into surrender—which wouldn’t take much, considering that Captain Ned Cavendish and his sailors were long retired from the Royal Navy. The Odalisque was now positioned to sacrifice herself if the battle raged for real; Damon surmised that the wily Blackbeard had fired his ship’s weapons only as a scare tactic, for Damon saw no damage to his fleet.

  “Full speed!” he called out above his musicians’ accelerating tempo. “Row like your lives depend on it!”

  His loyal oarsmen responded with an increased speed that made his heart swell. Moments like these made him damn glad he’d quit the Royal Navy to be his own man—and to allow his crew their freedom, too. When all went as planned, pirating ranked as a rewarding life. Well worth the dangers of confronting unpredictable outlaws like Edward Teach.

  He saw the infamous pirate now, standing at the bow of his Queen Anne’s Revenge. There was no mistaking Blackbeard: broad and tall he stood, festooned in bright sashes of silk that hung from his shoulders like holsters to keep his three pairs of flintlocks at the ready. Cutlasses and daggers encircled his waist, but his dark, bushy beard had become his trademark weapon; black braids tied in colored ribbons hung to his chest and waved in disarray around his wild eyes. Fuses of hemp, soaked in saltpeter and lime water, dangled from his hat, and he was now lighting the damned things to scare the bejesus out of those aboard the Lady Constance.

  With a tight wave, Damon silenced the pipers. “Easy now,” he cautioned his crewmen below. “Let her drift but be at the ready!”

  “Aye, sir!”

  Damon gulped air, hoping this unrehearsed maneuver went well, hoping Morgan realized what he was trying to do. “Teach!” Damon cried out. “Hold your fire! We’ll deal!”

  The behemoth aboard the other ship lit his match and put it to the end of a hemp fuse as though he hadn’t heard Delacroix’s offer—or didn’t care. The Courtesan had come close enough that he had to know she was within firing range and ready to fire back.

  The rows of cannons protruding from the Queen Anne’s Revenge convinced Damon to try again. While most pirates didn’t fire on a prize, preferring to keep a ship intact and convert it into their flotilla, Blackbeard’s disposition was as unpredictable as those Havisham girls Damon heard squealing in abject fear.

  Teach heard them, too. He tossed his spent match aside and took up his spyglass to peruse the passengers aboard the Lady Constance.

  “Teach! Edward Teach, you bully mongrel, answer me!”

  This time Blackbeard turned, glancing up at the crimson flag with its cross of sword and dagger. “Delacroix? Go find your own prize!” he roared. “I smell virgin flesh!”

  The hair on Damon’s neck bristled. Teach was a notorious womanizer with a wife and child in London—which didn’t stop him from snatching and wedding any other woman he wanted. “We’ve sailed here to make you a sweet deal!” he called out. “Come aboard the Courtesan and pick your prize!”

  The Queen Anne’s Revenge now floated close enough Damon could see puffs of smoke that appeared to be coming from the pirate’s ears. Blackbeard seemed to be considering his motive for offering a deal.

  “We’d hoped to meet you near New Providence.” Damon calle
d out in a more jovial voice. “And the fine English goods in our holds will prove to your liking. Extremely profitable, my friend!”

  This time the brigand took the bait. Lithely wrapping a rope around one leg, the bearded pirate swung the brief distance between their ships and landed on the Courtesan’s deck with a solid whump.

  “Delacroix,” he grunted, glancing around the decks at the wary sailors. “Up to a little skulduggery, are we? I’m not keen on your intrusion of my—” Blackbeard’s manic eyes focused on something behind Damon’s back. His smile waxed diabolical. “If the wench is part of the prize, I’m all ears, man. Two ears with a cock on the rise between them!”

  15

  S ofia clung to her pot of salmagundi, holding the legendary pirate’s gaze. He spoke as though she were part of a bargain with the Devil himself and with him! Lord, but he looked like a shaggy beast from hell with those dark braids waving around his face and smoke pouring from beneath his black hat. She hadn’t expected such a villain to display his pistols in colorful silk sashes worn over flamboyant, fashionable clothing.

  But, then, every man had a weakness for something, didn’t he?

  Damon’s expression warned her to keep silent! To let him do the dealing!

  But she had a weakness for speaking her mind, didn’t she? “Blackbeard, is it?” she challenged. “What an honor it is to meet you, sir!”

  The pirate shook with laughter. “Let’s leave honor out of it, for I certainly have none!” he crowed. “How about you? Are you concerned for your honor around the likes of me, missy?”

  “Why should I fear a man who sets his hair afire?” she shot back. “You’re all for show, I’m thinking!”

  “Sofia, that’s enough!” Damon snapped. “We’ve three ships hanging in the balance—”

  “You think I’m mad, then? More lunatic than legend?” Blackbeard advanced toward her, sizing up her attributes. “Methinks the minx had better mind her wayward tongue—and I’ve got places to put that tongue, too!”