“Why didn’t ye?”
“Tell her I shot Dervish to keep him from killing her? It wouldn’t change anything. Doesn’t change who I am.”
“Doesn’t make ye a bastard either.”
Luke snorted, and Joe was shocked to see the other man’s shoulders bow.
“Nothing can change the fact that I am exactly that.”
Now Joe was getting the whole picture. “And ye think yer not good enough for her. Didn’t stop ye from beddin’ her.”
Luke tensed, clearly anticipating the beating Joe had always threatened. “You’ll likely kill me, but so you know, I can hurt you some before you do.”
Joe laughed, not believing he was actually warming to this scalawag. “I don’t doubt it. But I’ll kill ye only if ye don’t tell Samantha the truth about what really happened on Santa Placidia.”
Luke frowned. “Why in blazes would you want me to do that?”
“She deserves to know the truth. She needs to know it all before she makes her mind up fer good.”
“She hates me. And come to think of it, so do you,” Luke said.
“She hates that ye lied to her. And in case yer too bloody blind to see it, she loves ye. After all she’s been through, if ye can make her happy, then that’s what I want fer her. As fer what I think”—he scratched at his grizzly beard—“yer not the same man who boarded in Port Royal. Ye’ve changed, Luke.”
They both turned their faces to the sky, to God’s lights that twinkled in the heavens.
“I can’t give her what she needs.”
Joe smiled at the hurt in Luke’s words. There were some things he didn’t like about Luke, but he knew as surely as he was breathing that Luke would never let harm come to her. “I’m not sure she even knows right now. Me question, Luke, is do ye want to find out what that is?”
Sam waited in the parlor while Pritchard fetched Aidan. Jacqueline, thankfully, was out this evening, so Sam would be spared a lengthy explanation and a sister’s subtle push to pair her and Luke. Since Jacqueline had already proved to be a savvy woman, she’d no doubt realized Sam and Luke were lovers. And that, Sam thought with a twinge in her heart, was a matter she couldn’t talk about after such an emotional day. She trailed a finger along the dustless mantel of the cold hearth. It was much better that Jacqueline wasn’t home. Even if that did make Sam a coward.
Besides, Jacqueline would have felt it necessary to extol Luke’s virtues. Sam knew Luke’s good side, didn’t need his sister to point it out. But she also knew what lay at Luke’s core. Piracy. He’d proven such on Santa Placidia.
No, she shook her head, she had to forget about Luke and any silly dreams she’d begun to spin about the two of them being together. Despite her attraction to Luke, she needed to stand alone, to find Samantha. She heard sullen footsteps tramping down the stairs. This was what she needed, to provide for Aidan.
Aidan dragged his heels into the room and Pritchard silently closed the door behind him. The boy’s shoulders were hunched nearly to his ears. His hands were fisted at his sides. An angry flush colored the tops of his cheeks and the tips of his ears that poked out of clean hair. Despite his anger, he looked good. He was clean; his clothes had been washed. He looked as he should, an ordinary boy living in a nice house and leading a common life. She was prepared to fight to see that he continued to live as one. And judging by the battle that brewed in his eyes, it was going to be a hard one.
“I said I won’t sail with you again.”
“That’s fine. I won’t be sailing anymore myself.”
He crossed his arms over his pressed shirt. “What about the Revenge?”
“I have her for two more days, then she’s Luke’s.”
She didn’t miss the sweep of sorrow that went through his eyes. Because she understood it, she moved toward him.
“That don’t mean I’ll live with you. You treated me like a damn baby.”
His chin angled up, all but daring her to reprimand him for cussing. Instead, she nodded. “You’re right, I did. Now let’s sit, and I’ll tell you why.”
She sat on the couch, very aware it was where she’d spent the best moments of her life, here with Luke. But since she could manage only one hardheaded male at a time, she concentrated on the one who watched her warily from just inside the closed door. The one who didn’t trust her to tell him the truth.
“Aidan, you know about my family. About how they were killed.”
He nodded. She took that for encouragement and forged ahead. She had a hazy notion of what she wanted to tell him, combined with what a boy his age needed to hear. She’d made mistakes as Steele, and Aidan was one of them. So often she’d held herself back, not going to him as she’d have liked to, not reading him stories more often. All because she thought it best that way. Best not to mother him too much, not to embarrass him. Not to let herself care too much. Now she could see it hadn’t been the best thing for either one of them. This time she intended to make things right, no matter the cost to her heart.
“Do you know why I always kept you with me, on board? Why I never let you go ashore with Joe or Willy?”
“Because you think I’m too young. You’d lie and say you needed protection, but you didn’t. You just wanted to keep your eye on me.”
Oh, dear boy, you’re not so very young, are you?
“You’re right. And I’m sorry.”
He moved to the couch opposite her.
“Why’d you do it?” he asked.
“Because when I first saw you on that plantation, when I saw you hurt and bleeding, I saw my sister.” Aidan faded with the tears that swam into her eyes, but this time she let them flow. He needed to know it all, see it all. She’d shielded him enough.
He sat, and she drew a deep breath before plunging into dark, unfamiliar waters.
“My sister was younger than I was, and it was up to me to look out for her, to care for her. If my parents were busy, I was the one who taught her, guided her. I was to look out for her.” For a moment, she saw her sister in her mind and smiled through tears at the perfect memory. “I didn’t that night. I never even saw her. I was supposed to look after her, and I failed.”
Her voice cracked. Aidan, she noticed, had uncrossed his arms. His eyes were bright and focused on her. It helped steady her.
“When I saw you, when I knew I was going to escape Mr. Grant, I promised myself I’d take you with me. That I would do for you what I failed to do for my sister.” She wiped tears with her hand, then dried it on her gown.
“I didn’t want you in Tortuga, especially Tortuga, because it’s such a vile place. Yes, I think you’re too young, but it wasn’t because I didn’t trust you. I was thinking about me, Aidan. Only me.”
He sniffed. Sam followed her heart and moved to sit by him. She took his growing hands into her own and held on for life. “What if you got hurt in Tortuga? What if you needed me and I couldn’t be there? I don’t think I could live with myself for not being there when you needed me most. Can you understand that, Aidan? Can you understand that it was only because I love you so much and that I wanted to keep you safe?”
They were both crying now, and Sam knew he understood. She hadn’t pushed him so far away that she’d lost him.
“Why didn’t you say so?” he asked, wiping his nose on his sleeve.
Jacqueline might have cleaned his clothes, but it would take some doing to work on his manners. Thankfully, she had the time.
“Because I was afraid. Afraid you’d push me away, afraid you didn’t want a big sister watching over you.” Too much emotion was pushing inside her to hold it back. She squeezed his hands. “You’re the brother I never had, Aidan. I love you.”
His face crumpled. “I was scared you’d hate me after those things I said.”
His eyes met hers, so full of need it broke her heart.
“I could never hate you, Aidan. Never.”
His lips trembled. “Promise? Promise you won’t ever hate me so much you give me up? Promise
I can stay with you? Forever?”
Her voice hitched. “God, I promise. As long as you want, Aidan, we’ll be together. We’re family now.”
His face shone through his tears.
“I’d like that.”
She crushed him to her, smelled the soap he’d used to wash his hair. He smelled of sunshine, youth, and hope.
“Me, too, Aidan,” Sam muttered as they clung to each other. “Me, too.”
Eighteen
She was beautiful. Perfect. And in two days she’d be nothing but a memory. Losing the Revenge hurt more than Sam had figured it would. More than losing the Destiny. She’d never mourned that ship, only the people who had been on it.
Sam caressed the sides of the lifeboat with her palm as she strolled the deck. The moon watched her quietly, its soft glow the only light Sam needed. She’d worked, walked, and loved every corner of this ship. A lantern wouldn’t show her anything she could easily see with her eyes closed.
Her fingers wrapped around a coarse rope, and she remembered the times they’d been caught in storms, the calluses that had burned from the effort of tugging it. She jerked it to ensure it was secure. Then she stepped over the windlass and leaned against the bowsprit. The water was still as glass, so the ship hardly moved. The ships anchored nearby were motionless and quiet.
The silence allowed her to think.
Aidan was asleep below, in a berth they’d made together so he wouldn’t have to sleep on the floor. She was pleased with their new understanding of each other. Pleased a part of her was finally at peace. She had family again. She smiled up at the stars and imagined their twinkling was a smile in return.
She breathed the humidity into her lungs, held it, and slowly let it out. She had a brother. Now she needed to find a way to provide for both of them.
“Wish I could keep you,” she whispered to her ship.
Pushing away from the bow, she wandered back to the helm, around the guns she’d polished until they shone like black jewels, then on to the tiller. The wood was smooth from hours of being held. How many nights, she wondered, had she stood there, gazing out at sea? She’d felt the sea rise up, slap the ship, and spray her face. She’d tasted the salt along with the freedom. There was nowhere she couldn’t go, nothing she couldn’t see if she so chose.
Dolphins had played alongside the Revenge, lean muscles working to ride the crest they made. Wind had both assaulted and caressed her, whispered and raged. Her ship had glided, rocked, and pitched, depending on the wrath of the wind. She’d been soaking wet, shivering, and so cold she’d thought she’d never feel warmth again. There had been wilting heat that had flattened her hair to her head, caused every pore in her body to sweat, and left her throat dry as a desert wind.
There had been times she’d feared for her life, for those of her crew. Times she’d hated herself, and moments she’d been bursting with pride. Those moments, she’d escaped to her cabin, and the triumph had turned bitter with nobody she could run to, nobody so close to her they could feel her joy. She could have turned to Joe, but it hadn’t been an uncle figure she’d ached for.
She took the tiller, clasped it as she would the hands of a long-lost friend. Yes, there had been sorrow and pain on board. Loneliness and frustration. But Sam knew that was part of life. And not one of those emotions could shadow the love she felt for this ship. Luke was right. It was her home.
“I’m going to miss it all,” she said.
Just then a feeling, nothing more substantial than a chill across the nape of her neck, turned her attention to shore. At first glance nothing was there. There was no movement, no sound. But as her eyes took a second pass across the stretch of beach, she saw a person sitting on the sand. Sam squinted. Yes, definitely a person. A man. With his knees drawn up.
As she watched, he extended an arm and took a bottle from the sand. He lifted it up and out, hesitated, then drew it to his lips.
“Luke,” Sam said, and everything inside her curled, then ached.
Though he was likely watching the ship, ensuring its safety, she chose to pretend he was watching her. For tonight, she would allow herself the silliness of pretending he was watching her, that he had nothing on his mind but Samantha Fine. It was ridiculous, but she couldn’t help herself. She’d been a captain for four years, men turning to her for leadership. Prior to that, she’d been a naive young girl. Tonight, thinking Luke was there only for her made her feel like a woman loved.
Tomorrow was soon enough to return to her troubles and the stark truth of Luke’s feelings toward her. She’d think of a way to look after herself and Aidan, a place for them to live. But it would all wait until morning.
“Good night, Luke.”
As if he heard and decided to ignore her, he lay back in the sand and pretended to sleep.
Oliver Grant could taste victory as surely as the fine brandy that swirled in his glass. He’d known this day would come.
“Enjoy your evening,” Oliver said, toasting with his brandy as he watched Samantha stroll the deck of his ship. “Enjoy it while you can.”
Cannon fire rocked the ship and jarred Sam awake. Terror clawed at her stomach, stealing her breath. It couldn’t be happening, not again! She dashed from her berth, feet scraping the stairs. She slammed her shoulder against the hatch when it wouldn’t open. Needle-sharp pain blasted down her arm.
The hatch finally gave way, and Sam pushed her way up. Pirates—hundreds, it seemed—glowed eerily in the moonlight. Their faces swam before her, each one more mocking and more vile than the last. Rotting teeth flashed in cadaverous faces that laughed, the sound a mixture of a screeching cat and an animal dying from a mortal wound.
Despite her terror, Sam knew she needed to act. Her eyes darted, hunting for what she needed most. Panicked, she shoved at the pirates and raced between them. A laugh, high-pitched and taunting, seeped into her bones, drawing her strength. Her legs lost all feeling. She dropped to the deck, unable to stand, no matter how much she struggled.
“Help me,” she begged.
Then silence. It was such a sharp contrast that her ears rang with the lack of noise. The pirates shifted, allowed her to see across to the other side of her ship.
“Luke!” she yelled.
He turned to her, blood oozing from where his right eye had been. The patch still covered the other.
“No!” she wailed. Then, drawing everything she had within her, she braced upon her elbows and dragged herself toward him.
“I’m coming, Luke, I’m coming.”
Around her the pirates sneered. Then, just when she was mere inches from Luke, pistol fire shattered the silence.
Luke jolted like a puppet being pulled by a dozen different strings from as many directions.
“No!” Sam yelled, feeling the pain to the depths of her soul. But it was too late.
Luke fell, dead, at her side.
She jerked awake, dripping wet. Grief pressed heavily upon her. Her uneven breathing echoed off the cabin walls. Pictures from the dream floated around her head, tormenting her. Luke had lost both eyes. Luke had been killed. She’d failed. She’d lost him.
Sobbing, she scrambled from her berth, ran past a slightly snoring Carracks and up the stairs. Night dampness collided with sticky sweat. Sam shivered. Against the gunwale she craned through the darkness to find Luke. It was a dream. He’d still be lying on the beach. He was alive; he had to be.
Her gaze found the area where he’d been. She blinked. He was gone! How could he be gone? She ran to the bow, her nightgown catching on the corner of the lifeboat. The rip roared in the silence, but didn’t slow Sam down. It was silly, unreasonable. But she knew she wouldn’t breathe normally again until she saw Luke.
At the front of her ship, she took a deep, if shaky, breath and began her search from one corner of the beach to the other. Her hands dug into the ship.
“Please, Luke, please be there.”
Under the moonlight, the sand was dark where the waves rolled in to play. But
it was empty. She leaned forward, reaching her torso over the edge of the ship. Praying.
And when she found him, standing on the pier, leaning casually against a post, his attention drawn out to sea, Sam knew glorious relief. It washed like a soft tropical rain down her throat and melted away the last of her fear. Luke was safe.
“Thank God,” Sam whispered.
Then, before he could sense her watching, before the energy that had propelled her from her bed to the gunwale evaporated in the night, Sam dropped to the deck.
“Yer lookin’ tired, lass,” Joe said the following morning.
“I feel it,” Sam answered, and tried again to blink away the grit that had embedded itself in her eyes. She hadn’t slept a wink after her nightmare, so she wasn’t surprised that she looked as exhausted as she felt. “I thought we agreed you’d come back tomorrow. I don’t have any answers for you yet.”
Joe pressed his girth against the bowsprit. He watched a few dolphins break the surface of the sea, arc, then slip back into the water. When he looked at her, when she could see past the glare of the sun into his eyes, she saw the fatigue in his face.
“I didn’t sleep much meself, lass. But ’tisn’t why I came. I thought I’d take the boy off yer hands for the day, give ye time to think in peace.”
“Aidan?”
“Me?”
Over her shoulder she watched Aidan close the main hatch carefully before stepping to her side. He looked refreshed and exuded enough boyish energy to make Sam, with her weighty limbs and foggy brain, feel a hundred years old. Still, the initial thought of letting him go ashore created a fist of fear in her belly.
“I don’t know, Joe . . .”
He held up a palm that had a yellow callous at the base of each finger. “Now, let me speak. Ye need to think, and by the looks of ye, a little sleep wouldn’t hurt any. And as it happens, I saw for meself some waterfalls and pools a young lad such as this one”—he ruffled the boy’s hair—“might enjoy.”
The sun was out and cheery, the sky was as endless as the sea. The temperature was already pressing heat through her gown.
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