by Julia London
“Fader?” Drustan said nervously.
“Donna pay me any heed, lad,” her father said to Drustan. “Tell you what—go ask Gilroy if you can be of any use. Go with him, Mats. Find the lad an occupation. Lottie, go along as well, and find a way to mend your gown. ’Twas your mother’s favorite, and mine, too.”
Lottie gladly quit the cabin and the shrewd eyes of the captain. She followed her brothers to the door.
“Lottie,” her father said, stopping her before she could make her escape. “You’ll need to have the captain shined and polished as well, aye? Canna have him accompany you looking like a pauper. No’ especially if you mean to see Anders. Now there was a handsome lad if I ever I saw one. Was he no’, Morven?”
“Donna recall,” Morven muttered.
“Well I do. Bonny as a man can be, I’ll say that for him.”
Lottie opened the door and walked out, shutting it firmly behind her.
Unfortunately, she had no place to go and lick her wounds, so she settled on top of a whisky cask and watched the Mackenzie men up on the rigging changing the sails, chattering back and forth while the Livingstones guarded them from below. They all seemed rather friendly, and she couldn’t help wonder if they hadn’t hatched some sort of plan, if this wasn’t the calm before the storm of revenge they meant to launch.
“Lottie.”
She jerked around at the sound of Morven’s voice. His brown hair stood nearly on end, and his beard was beginning to look unkempt. “You best find a physician when we reach Aalborg,” he said grimly. “Bernt’s wound, it doesna look good. I’ve given him the laudanum tincture for the pain so he’ll sleep. But he needs proper attention.”
“But you—”
Morven shook his head before she could finish her thought. “I’m no’ a physician, Lottie. He needs a proper one. I’ve done all I can do, aye? I’ll make a salve for the captain’s wrists.” He moved to leave her.
“Morven!” she said. “How will I do as my father says I must? I canna take Mackenzie with me! He’ll escape, he’ll seek authorities straightaway.”
“Aye, you can,” Morven said. “These men will wait for their pay and their captain, but if they have only one of those things, they’ll no’ wait long, do you see? You need to take him with you for our sake.”
“And then what?” she asked. “If they wait patiently while we sell the whisky, and then again while we wait for someone to unload it from this ship, will they merrily make sail without us? How will we all return to Scotland?”
“You were right to offer them pay, you were. Coin is a powerful lure. I suspect they’ll go along, aye. As for us, we’ll be rich, Lottie. We can hire the best ship to return us home.”
Rich! They would have enough to pay their rents to Campbell and a wee bit more to pay this crew. No one would be rich!
“I’ll make the salve now, aye?” Morven said. He smiled kindly and patted her arm, then walked away.
Did any of them truly believe the Mackenzies would so easily forget what the Livingstones had done to them, even if they were paid? And what of the captain? She couldn’t imagine that he’d forget a single moment. She saw the way he looked at her—he would delight putting the noose around her neck himself.
She shivered in the bright sunlight at the very thought of it. Until they had sold that blasted whisky, they were stuck. Lottie had no other viable option that she could see. She got off her barrel and went in search of something to darn her gown.
CHAPTER NINE
THE RAW SKIN of Aulay’s wrists burned with the slightest movement. His discomfort had been made worse by the incessant chatter of the old man, but thankfully, he’d finally fallen asleep under the weight of his many words.
His sons had left, too, thank the saints. Between the boasts of the young one, and the fear of the giant one, and the many words of the old one, it felt as if the Livingstones had consumed all the available breath.
With the twin portholes open to allow a flow of air, Aulay could hear the men outside. He recognized the voices of more than one of his crew up on the rigging. That gave him some ease, knowing that his men were at work, trimming sails as Beaty needed, and sailing these thieves on to Aalborg.
He and Beaty had discussed it very briefly in Gaelic when Beaty had entered this room. Aulay had told him the lives of the crew were the only thing that mattered to him; Beaty assured him he’d handle things on deck and see them safely to shore. Like him, Beaty was more concerned with the ship and their men than avenging what had happened. But some of the men were obviously free to work the sails, and Aulay could hope that meant there was something underfoot that would return his ship to him.
He felt utterly useless and increasingly frustrated by his impotence, an old, familiar feeling he’d often felt at home. A burden to them all, useful to no one.
The door opened, and the lass returned carrying the tools required for sail repair—a large needle, waxed thread, a brace to stretch the fabric. She also carried a small glass jar.
She put the things down on the table and with the glass jar in hand, she turned around to him. The gun, he noticed, was tucked into the trews she wore.
“Morven made this for your wrists,” she said, holding it out. “Will you allow me to tend to you without trouble?”
“What trouble could I give you, then?” he asked irritably. “I’m hobbled like a hog.” He waved her over, grateful for any relief she could give the burning skin around his wrists.
She placed the gun on the table and approached him warily, sinking down onto her knees beside him. She opened the jar, and a pungent smell made his eyes water. “What in the devil is that?” he complained, rearing away from it. “It smells bloody awful.”
“Morven said he used a wee bit of fish entails—”
Aulay unthinkingly jerked his hands back, but she caught one and dropped a dollop onto the raw part of his wrist. He was set to protest, but she began to rub the concoction into his skin, her touch feathery light, and the relief to his skin was instantaneous.
He relaxed.
He watched her fingers move gracefully on his wrist. She kept her eyes on the task, but she was so close, he could see the translucence of her skin, the slight shadow of a vein at her temple, a gentle pulse at her neck. Her hair, though tangled and knotted haphazardly at her nape, looked like silk. He wanted to touch it, to feel it between his fingers. He leaned forward, his desire to at least smell it—
She stilled. “What are you doing, then?”
He didn’t answer her. In spite of the harsh conditions, she smelled surprisingly nice.
She slowly continued working on his wrists, smearing more of the unguent on his flesh. She turned his hand over, and Aulay caught her fingers in his. Lottie arched a brow in silent question. He answered by tugging her forward until she was close enough to kiss. He wasn’t thinking—he was wrapped in a cloud of her feminine scent, and his actions were divorced from his thoughts. He touched his lips to hers. There was stillness in her—when everything around him moved every moment of the day, he noticed stillness. She was quiet calm.
He moved his lips on hers, touched his tongue to the seam of her lips.
Her lips parted beneath his, and he felt the touch of her tongue to his. But Lottie suddenly receded from him like water. “You’ve gone off your head, you have.”
On the contrary. This was the first he’d felt himself, a healthy, living breathing man, since she’d kicked him in the chin. But he eased back and took some pleasure in the pink blush of her cheeks. “Who is our Mr. Iversen, then?”
A blush deepened. “No one.” She turned his hand over, palm up.
“Shall I guess, then?”
“No.”
He cocked his head to one side to study the way her lashes seemed almost to brush against her cheeks as she worked on his wrist. “He treated you ill, did he?”
&nbs
p; She clucked her tongue at him. “It hardly commands any thought at all to guess that, does it?”
“What happened?”
She returned one hand to his lap, dipped her fingers into the jar. “Why did you kiss me? ’Twas only yesterday that you wished to see me hang.”
“I still do,” he said. “I can admire a woman, can want her, and still believe she deserves to hang.” He smiled a little.
One corner of her mouth tipped up and she rolled her eyes, then started to attend his second wrist, her touch so damnably soft that it sent a sparkling little jolt up his arm.
“You deserve better, Lottie,” he said. “You deserve a man who will treat you well, aye?”
She suddenly stopped what she was doing and sighed heavenward. “Do you think me a fool, Captain? Do you think I donna know what you’re about?”
Surprised, he asked, “What?”
“Flattery.” She said it as if she was accusing him of violent assault. “I’ve heard quite a lot of it in my life, that I have, and I know its purpose.” She turned her attention to his wrist once more.
“For the life of me, I donna flatter you, lass, no’ now, no’ ever, aye? But I donna think you deserve to be treated ill.”
She shook her head.
He impulsively touched her face, and that stillness came over her again. “What happened?”
She moved her head from his touch. “Are you married, Captain Mackenzie?”
“Aye. To a ship.”
“Verra touching. But a ship canna keep you warm at night. Why have you no’ taken a wife?”
“I beg your pardon.”
“Ooh,” she said, her brows rising with amusement. “You must believe that as captain, you’re the only one who is allowed to ask questions of a highly intimate nature.”
He shrugged at the truth in that statement. “I believe I have a right to know who holds me captive and why.”
She puffed a thick strand of hair from her eyes and continued with her attention to his wrist. “Mr. Iversen has no bearing on why I am holding you captive, does he? Why have you no one here to keep your cabin tidy, then? Scores of captains are married and away at sea.”
“Scores,” he scoffed. “Most of the captains I know are as married to the sea as I.”
“You seem lonely, that’s all. A man as accomplished and capable as you, painting views of the sea with no one in it. Have you never longed for a wife? For children who will bear your name?” A smile shone in her eyes. “You obviously long for the sort of company only a woman can provide, aye?”
“You are bloody well brazen,” he said, a wee bit stung by her observation.
“Obviously so,” she said, and shrugged, still smiling. “I only wonder why there are no lassies about for the handsome captain.”
Why did he feel so defensive about her remarks? There was a time when he was a young man that it seemed every time he stepped off a ship, someone was inquiring about his intentions to wed. In the last few years, no one bothered to inquire at all. The only person who had thought there was even the slightest chance of it was the fragile little English flower, Avaline Kent, whom his brother Rabbie once had been engaged to wed. That lass had, inexplicably, fallen in love with Aulay while engaged to his brother, and had truly believed there was some chance he would return her affection. Ridiculous creature, she was.
He realized Lottie had finished tending to his wrists and was wiping her fingers, studying him. “You have a curious way of turning conversation around,” he said.
“Did I offend you, then? I beg your pardon. I only meant it’s odd that a man of forty years would no’ have sought the companionship—”
“Forty years! I’ve no’ reached my fortieth year,” he huffed. He had three years before that momentous occasion and planned to cling to every one of them. “And I have sought the companionship of women, but not in the prim way you undoubtedly imagine.”
She laughed, and the sound of it was like morning birds, cheerful and gay. “You might verra well be astonished by the things I imagine,” she said silkily. “Look at you, then—one moment you’re full of flattery for your captor, the next, you’re fuming over some slight. Fickle, you are.” She stood up.
Fickle? Aulay had been called many things in his life, but never fickle. “Now you must think me the fool, Lottie. Do you think I donna know that you are avoiding the subject of Mr. Iversen? Is the subject of him so verra painful, then, that you will avoid your answer by needling me?”
She lifted her head, looked him directly in the eye and said without emotion, “Aye, I suppose it is.” She shifted as if she meant to move away. But Aulay caught her wrist, his fingers sliding across her skin, then lacing his fingers with hers.
“What are you doing?”
“You’re no’ the only one who understands,” he said quietly.
She tried to yank her hand free.
“I understand you’re as brazen as a red buck. You’ve been disappointed, and you’ll no’ allow anyone close because you fear it will happen again.”
“You’re as absurd as you are lonely,” she said, and attempted to yank her hand free again. “I donna fear it—I know it will happen again. Men are, by their nature, disappointing.”
But Aulay held on. And he smiled. Her eyelids fluttered as if she’d seen something she couldn’t quite make out. Her hand relaxed in his, giving into him, and when she did, he released his grip of her. She slid her hand away, her fingers trailing over his palm and sending that alarming bit of sparkle up to his chest again. She took a step backward, tucked a bit of hair behind her braid. “Morven says I’m to let the unguent sit for an hour, then apply more,” she said to the wall. She turned around and walked back to the table, moved some things around without purpose, then dropped her hand. “I best go and...and...”
She never finished her sentence. She simply walked out the cabin door.
He heard the cask roll in front of it once again, sealing him in here with a slumbering, dying, man.
* * *
THE DAY WORE on, a host of people in and out to see after the old man who, from Aulay’s observation, was not on the mend, but on the decline. He slept quite a lot, moaned in his sleep, but when awake, he would somehow rally and begin to talk.
Diah, did he talk. He asked about pirates, if they should have fear of them sailing around the horn of Denmark. He asked what a ship like this cost a man of Aulay’s stature? How long would salted beef keep? Did he know Victor Mackenzie of Oban? He was a fine fellow but missing an eye. His right one.
Aulay was allowed on deck thrice in the course of the day. It was a gorgeous day at sea. There wasn’t another ship about, nothing but bright sunlight and a good stiff western wind to send them on. Beaty was on the quarterdeck with the Livingstone captain. It seemed, from a distance, as if some arrangement between them had been struck.
On his second foray, those Mackenzies who had been freed to work the rigging leaped down and surrounded him. His guards seemed not to mind.
“How do you fare, Cap’n?” asked Billy Botly, whose arm had been set in a splint.
“Keep your heads,” he told them in Gaelic. “We’ll be in port soon enough.”
“No’ right, Cap’n,” said Geordie Willis. “No’ right at all.”
“No,” he agreed. “We’ll sort it all out, we will. But for now, you must do everything in your power to no’ lose the ship.”
Of course, they readily agreed. It was their only livelihood.
On the third outing, someone had been offended—he walked out to quite a lot of shouting about Scottish rogues and bastards in English and in Gaelic, and fisticuffs broke out between two men. But two Mackenzies pulled a third Mackenzie sailor back and chastised him for the fight.
That seemed odd to Aulay, but it wasn’t until he’d been returned to the cabin that he realized why. His men did not like to see
him bound...but they didn’t attempt to do anything about it. They didn’t attempt to take him, they didn’t demand concessions. They didn’t even ask.
What in blazes was happening? Had she really charmed them all? She was an astoundingly beautiful woman, they were all painfully aware of that, but surely that did not rob all these men of righteousness.
Speaking of that women, Aulay had not seen her since he’d unthinkingly kissed her. The physician had come to reapply the salve, then had wrapped his wrists in what was left of Aulay’s shirt. Another man brought him food.
The sun had disappeared by the time Lottie returned to his cabin. She carried a bucket of fresh water, soap, and a soft rag. She didn’t speak to Aulay, but settled in next to her father and bathed his face.
Her father tried to push away her hand, but he was losing strength. She dabbed the water onto his forehead while the old man muttered something about a cow.
She glanced over her shoulder at Aulay only once, perhaps to assure herself she still had a captive, and didn’t look again until the physician appeared a quarter of an hour later carrying a cup, the contents of which smelled foul.
“What is it?” she asked, wrinkling her nose.
“A healing broth laced with laudanum.” He slipped his hand behind the old man’s head and held the cup to his mouth, forcing it in between his lips. The old man sputtered and tried to turn his head.
“Drink it, Fader,” Lottie said soothingly. “It will help you to feel better, aye?”
“Only a corpse would feel better after imbibing that,” he said coarsely. “Where are my sons? Bring my sons.”
“They’re needed below just now,” she said, and exchanged a look with Morven. “Please, Fader, donna speak now. Mr. Beaty says we ought to be in port by the morrow.”
“Aye, as I guessed,” the old man said, although it was impossible that he might have guessed anything in his current state. He shifted about on the bunk as if settling in for the night. “I’m lying here, useless to you all, but I can still sense how fast the wind moves us. Once a sailor, always a sailor.”
