At Bella's insistence, a barrel still reeking of rum was filled with heated fresh water. Bella and Molly took turns bathing and washing their hair while Dante and Young Pitt—who had availed himself of Molly's argument well enough to justify accompanying his captain—scrubbed themselves with cold sea water.
The problem of concealing Dante's fiery red hair was solved when Molly fashioned a turban out of a length of pale blue silk. A steeped mixture of crushed cacao shells and lampblack produced a dark stain that could be applied to his skin, transforming the brash privateer into an unassuming blackamoor. As long as he kept his head lowered and his eyes humbly downcast, he would pass as invisibly as any other manservant.
"You will have to shave off your beard," Bella said, casting a critical eye over the thick auburn stubble. "As for your hands…" she shook her head and clucked her tongue.
"What is wrong with my hands?" he asked, holding them up.
"Nothing at all—for a man who lives and works aboard a ship twelve months of the year. But for a lady's manservant? A eunuch?"
Jonas glanced up sharply. "Eunuch?"
"A blackamoor would not be employed in a respectable household unless he was in no way a threat to the lady's peace of mind."
"Bullcock!"
"Truth. Though I doubt we shall have to go that far to add veracity to the masquerade. Gloves will have to suffice." She looked at Molly, who was trying to hide a giggle, "Assuming we can find a pair that fits."
"I will search through the sea chests."
When she was gone, Bella took up a dagger and tested the sharpness of the steel edge against her thumb. "Will you do the deed or shall I?"
"You know how to shave a man?"
"How hard can it be?"
Jonas grimaced and plucked the knife out of her hands. A dozen soapy strokes later, his jaw was free of stubble and he was seated in a chair while Bella applied the dark stain to his face and neck.
"You don't have to go through with this, you know."
"If you will recall, it was my idea, Captain. And I did not hear you objecting at the time."
"I thought my initial silence was enough of a deterrent."
"Your scowling silences no longer frighten me, sirrah."
His eyes narrowed. "Is that so?"
"They irritate," she said, swabbing his chin with the stain. "They frustrate and they aggravate, but they do not frighten. They are simply part of who you are. And in this instance, your silence was taken as assent because you know damned well if I could seduce you, I could seduce anyone."
An eyebrow arched. "You seduced me?"
"Were you not the one who claimed repeatedly that you had no interest in what I had to offer, that your lack thereof would prevail over any baser desires?"
Jonas made a sound in his throat. Her hair was still damp from the bath, her skin was glowing and soft, the shape of her body merely hinted at by shadings through the long, loose dressing gown Molly had found in the bottomless sea chest. He knew damned well she was capable of seducing the teeth out of a blind man. At the moment, however, he was the one suffering a lack of confidence in the scheme… a feeling with which he was not the least bit familiar or comfortable.
It took a full minute for him to realize Bella had stopped swabbing and was watching him.
"You are looking straight at me," she said quietly, "yet your thoughts are a thousand miles away."
"As well they should be," he said, frowning. "I am beginning to think it is, indeed, madness to send you into the spider's web."
"You are the one who fears big hairy spiders, not I." She smiled and lifted the hem of her dressing gown so that she might straddle his lap. "Do you recall the night we met?"
"Of course I do."
"Do you recall what I was doing when you so rudely intruded upon my evening?"
"Bella—"
"I was in the process of stealing a very fine diamond stick pin from the collar of a man who was so busy looking down the front of my bodice, I could have plucked the rings off his fat fingers and he would not have noticed."
"I am not denying the fact you are an extraordinary distraction."
She shifted slightly closer on his lap. "But…?"
"But… you were working your vast charms on an English lord who was easy to flirt with, easy to distract."
"And you do not think I could distract a Spaniard?"
"Varian made a valid point. You don't even speak the language."
"I have picked up a few words." She leaned forward and brushed her lips across his ear with a whisper that set his eyebrow twitching.
"I doubt you would have much call to use that particular phrase."
"Then I shall use this one." She smiled and undid the row of tiny silk bows down the front of the dressing gown. When she had loosened it enough, she slipped the flimsy fabric off her shoulders and let it puddle around her waist. Her breasts were lush and full, the roseate peaks already gathered into tight little buds.
"You had best not have any call to use this particular language either," he said as his hands rose from her waist to cradle the plumpness of her breasts.
Bella looked down as his thumbs brushed back and forth across her nipples. "The only thing that frightens me, captain, is the possibility of you losing your temper and drawing your sword prematurely."
"I do not lose my temper so easily," he objected. "As for my sword, it has never been premature yet."
She sighed and bent her head forward, touching her brow to his chin. "I need you to trust me, to believe in me. And I need to trust you."
The words were whispered so softly Dante almost missed them. Trust, he knew, was something neither parted with freely.
He raised his hands and buried his fingers in her hair, forcing her to tilt her head up and look at him. "I think that Jerome Quero will be as boneless and witless as soft clay in your hands. He will be as helpless to resist your charms as I am right now."
Bella's dark eyes searched his face, looking for the lie, but she found only genuine honesty. He believed in her. He trusted her.
She felt a rush of confidence course through her body, and a corresponding hardness stir in his.
One of Dante's hands slid to his waist a moment.
"Lift yourself up," he growled. "Lift yourself up and guide me where you want me to go."
With his probing fingers once again muddling her thoughts, she raised herself up and felt the solid shaft just there, beneath her. She pushed his hand aside and grasped him, then lowered herself over him, her mouth falling open, her eyes growing rounder and darker as she sank down inch by exquisite inch. When she was fully impaled, she sat completely motionless, every muscle in her body drawn tight as a bowstring.
"Now, what was that phrase you learned in Spanish?"
Bella shivered and repeated it.
He growled again, deeper this time, and grasped fistfuls of the crumpled dressing gown, pulling it up and over her head so that she was naked on his lap.
It felt more than slightly wicked to look down and see where his red nest of coarse hairs tangled with her own fine, black curls, and how his flesh glistened with wetness as she pulled up and eased back down again.
He was thick and hard inside her, but unmoving. She quickly grasped the notion that it was up to her to rise and fall, to press and stroke.
This was not simple pleasure. It was not a simple act of lust nor a casual arrangement between two dispassionate people. She could feel tremors in his hands where they gripped her waist and the beating of his heart where her palms rested on his chest. And his eyes! Good gracious God, his eyes! They were burning into her very soul, stripping away any pretence, ridiculing any effort she made to deny the hunger, the desire, the need to belong.
This was an act of possessing and being possessed by him and only him.
With a broken cry, she started to roll her hips faster, to grind down harder, sliding herself along his flesh until she saw him clench his jaw through a hoarse warning. Faster still and his h
ands descended to her hips, bracing himself, bracing her…
Dante roared and surged up beneath her. His spine arched as the pressure flooded out of him in long, throbbing bursts. The orgasm streaked through his body and into hers, rippling through her arms and legs, sucking the air from her lungs. He arched up a second time, filling her with another hot rush of bright, bursting ecstasy, the pleasure so intense it was almost pain.
While she made broken, incoherent sounds in her throat, he drew her down into a crushing kiss and a different kind of shudder swept through her body. She melted over him and his arms went instantly around her, his calloused hands gently stroking her back until the quivering stopped and her breathing returned to normal.
Bella mewled softly.
"You purr like a kitten."
"And you growl like a pirate."
He huffed out a deep breath and chuckled. "Possibly because that is what I am."
She sighed and nuzzled into the crook of his neck. "Do you think it's possible for a person to die of pleasure?"
"I am not sure about death, but I think it's entirely possible you might have made a eunuch of me after all."
Bella lifted her head. His face was flushed, his brow was covered in a sheen of sweat. His eyes had lost their killer-pirate confident gleam and were looking back at her with genuine consternation. For the length of two heartbeats she thought he was serious, but then she saw him grin and she batted her fist lightly against his chest. When she slid off him, a glance told her everything appeared to be intact. She reached down to offer a soothing touch, but he captured her wrist and brought her fingers to his lips instead.
"There are times when nimble fingers are not always a welcome thing. Times when a man can be… a tad sensitive to the touch."
"You have never complained before."
"You have never ridden me like a madwoman before."
Bella's lips quivered, but she could not hold back the laugh. "All of the times you have ridden me… you have never complained of such sensitivity."
"You have never shown a desire to offer a soothing touch before. Or any touch, for that matter."
"True enough," she admitted. "Probably because I've always thought it to be a rather peculiar-looking appendage. How you manage to stuff it all comfortably in a pair of breeches, let alone walk or sit astride a horse is beyond me."
Dante stared. The laughter bubbled up his throat and he threw his head back, filling the cabin with a great, lusty sound that carried all the way up through the boards and along the deck until every man on board stopped what they were doing and stared.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Jerome Fiorello Quero, Governor of Havana, fidgeted in his seat and tried not to surrender to the urge to throttle the next bastardo who insisted on hearing the whole story of the raid on Pigeon Cay… again.
It had been a long day and an even longer evening that was not promising to end too soon. He, along with his closest friends and advisors, sat at a long table on a raised dais overlooking the grand reception chamber of the Castillo de la Real Fuerza. During the day the chamber had been crowded with peons seeking favors, merchants protesting the taxes, privateers brandishing their Letters of Marque seeking permission to conduct their trade in port.
They had all carried the stench of fish or cattle dung or sweat and it had been necessary for Quero to bathe and change his clothes before the evening brought forth another assault on his senses. At least the wealthier hidalgos smelled better with their perfumes and pomades. But they still came to suck his cellars dry of wine and eat his kitchens to the bare walls.
Seated beside him for most of the endless afternoon, occupying the place of honor was Capitán Juan Pedro Recalde, the conquering hero who had succeeded where a hundred others had failed. He had executed a stunning attack on the island stronghold of the infamous Pirate Wolf. He had cleaned out the nest of vipers, destroyed the settlement, and returned like a triumphant Roman general bearing ships and captives as prizes.
It was an astonishing feat. Undeniably astonishing. And in truth, deserving of every honor, and accolade that was possible to bestow. But after ten solid days and nights of the man's arrogance and belligerence, of hearing the story told and retold and retold, each time painted with broader strokes and given even more hair-raising embellishments, Quero found himself wishing the Capitán-General of the treasure fleet would send word to his squadron commanders that it was time to sail for Spain.
Quero resented the attention Recalde's presence in Havana was drawing. He had accepted the temporary position of governor in order to facilitate his highly lucrative dealings with foreigners who were willing to pay ten times what he could earn selling his crops through the Casa de Contratacion. Greedy tax bastards! After only three months sitting as interim governor, his profits were up two thousand percent! All of that could change any day if a new governor arrived from Spain, leaving Quero with three warehouses full of recently acquired prime tobacco he would sooner not have come under scrutiny.
In the meantime, all of this pomp and ceremony must be endured. Recalde was a hero and Havana was revelling in the celebrations. The harbor was full of ships. The taverns were full of sailors drinking their pockets empty, the merchants were gorging on profits. Even the whores were making a small fortune. It had been necessary to send urgent messages to nearby vineyards to send what stock they had in order to avert a shortage of wine!
The spring flota was not due to sail for another five days—taking Recalde with it, thank the Holy Mother above—but Quero was not entirely certain his city, let alone his patience, could endure the delay. When the fleet departed, the city would empty of the thousands of sailors and soldiers idling away their time, the whores would have time to bathe between customers, the rains would come and wash the gutters clean of all the buckets of shit emptied into them each morning. As it was now, every street smelled like a cesspool and every evening saw brawling and looting and the crackle of gunfire.
The raucous destruction of his city was not what kept Quero awake at night, however. What made him double his guards and bolt his doors was the knowledge that Recalde had left the most dangerous of the hellish spawns out there somewhere. Each little noise and creak of a shutter or a floor board had Quero jerking upright in his bed, his body drenched in sweat and shaking with visions of Jonas Dante standing over him, his eyes glowing red, a bloodied sword raised to strike.
Of all the siblings to have avoided capture, Jonas Dante was the wildest, the most unpredictable and by far the most dangerous. Recalde's gravest error had been not waiting to spring the trap until all of the wolves were in the lair. Second only to that was bringing captives to Havana instead of killing the lot of them. Severed heads would have served as proof enough of his victory!
Thankfully Recalde was not resent in the reception hall this night. He had been invited to dine privately with Capitan-General Villanueva aboard the flagship, the San Jacinta .It was likely too much to hope he would remain on board until the fleet was ready to sail, but one could always dream.
Quero lifted his cup and found it to be empty. He signalled his aide for a refill... and that was when he saw her.
She was standing inside the entryway, the embodiment of a dream come to life in shimmering blue silk.
His cock actually sprang to attention and he had to shift his position to ease the pressure.
Being on a tropical island where the majority of the population was comprised of dark-skinned natives, there were not many white women who were unknown to him. There was the usual phalanx of unmarried virgins, their faces shielded with white lace mantillas and wildly fluttering fans. They were the sisters and daughters of the hidalgos and were well- guarded by hawk-faced duennas ready to swoop for the kill should any man stray too close. Most of the other females in the room were wives or widows or spinsters and Quero knew every one…and some in more ways than one.
But this… this raven-haired beauty was completely unknown to him. For certain, she was no pauper come to
beg for favors. She wore a king's ransom worth of jewels around her neck and was accompanied by a young lady's maid and a pair of dark-skinned manservants.
He reached back and snatched at a fistful of his aide's doublet. "Diego! That woman. By the entryway. Who is she?"
"Ah. The Englishwoman, Excellency. Lady Bellanna Harper. She arrived in port today. Her ship was attacked by pirates and she has come here seeking sanctuary."
"Sanctuary? Why am I only hearing of this now?"
"Alas, she sought audience earlier in the day but I thought it might be more appropriate should she not be subjected to pleading her case amongst the common rabble."
Quero nodded. "A wise decision. Bring her here at once. No! Wait." He glanced at a snaggle-toothed harpy who had been winking at him all evening and would soon become bold enough to approach the dais. "I need to stretch my legs. I shall take a turn around the room."
Diego stepped to the side as Quero rose. "As you wish, Excellency."
Quero stood and tugged on the bottom of his doublet to straighten it. He knew he cut a fine figure in rich gold brocade. He was not unhandsome, with the olive complexion and dark hair of a Castilian. His imperial was trimmed to a meticulous point on his chin, his goffered ruff was narrow but starched to a perfect crispness. The half-cape he wore on a diagonal across one shoulder was trimmed in thick gold braid and gleamed almost as brightly as the dress sword at his hip. He made a point of riding every day to keep from falling into the trap of most wealthy men, that of growing a rotund girth. His face was clear of pocks—a curse of many who had endured tropical fevers. His eyes were a seductive dark brown and he knew how to use them to good advantage.
He strolled with casual nonchalance around the perimeter of the chamber, pausing here and there to exchange greetings with important hidalgos. Despite seeming to have no purpose in his meandering, he was as focussed as a knife-point on the English woman who had yet to venture far from the entryway. Her maid was young with dark hair and a plain face. A moth in the presence of a butterfly. One of the blackamoors was easily over six feet tall, his broad chest encased in a silk tunic the same shade of blue as his turban. Both he and the younger boy had their heads diffidently lowered and their eyes downcast, barely earning a passing glance.
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