Sweet Seas

by Scarlett Finn

  “Geez,” she said. “I guess even the up-close view of the tits doesn’t prove I’m a woman. Do I need to get naked to get some respect?”

  She might think her objection was putting him in his place, but this time he bit his tongue so hard that he tasted blood. Naked sounded about fucking right to his dick.

  It took all of his effort to remember why he’d come storming down in the first place. “What do you think you’re doing? This isn’t a fucking pleasure cruise!”

  “What is your problem?” she shouted and worked hard to wrench her arm free. “Goddamnit, I made your meals. Your dinner is in the oven, I have my timer…”

  She spun around and bent over, giving him a more intimate view of that ass he’d admired this morning. Instead of jeans this time it was adorned with a skimpy white bikini brief held in place with two little strings on each of her hips that would take him seconds to loosen. There wasn’t a knot he couldn’t identify and tackle; she shouldn’t challenge a sailor with that kind of test.

  When she whipped around, it took him a second to notice that she was holding a timer an inch from his face. Right, the timer, shit. She wasn’t presenting her ass, she’d been retrieving her timer.

  “Nothing will burn, you and your men will be fed, I promise. I have the rest of the afternoon! What’s wrong with me taking a little break? I did inventory after breakfast and made three batches of cookies before lunch. I made more cookies this afternoon, and dessert, and I made cherry pie for supper. I’ve prepped the donut dough for the morning so I can fry them for you fresh! What more do you want from me, Captain? You want baklava? Soufflé? Baumkuchen from a spit? What?”

  Okay, he didn’t know what that last one was, but she’d proven that she wasn’t shy about hard work. There was nothing wrong with her taking a break. As he started to feel guilty about his attitude, the ship shifted and she stumbled sideways out of his shadow.

  The sun caught the shimmer of her skin and it made her glow. This woman was like silk, smooth and beautiful, but stronger than steel.

  His body reacted to her figure and he cursed himself for responding to a member of his crew like maybe they were an option for intimacy. Crew, shit, his men were still in the wheelhouse enjoying the view.

  Regaining his bluster, Swain sidestepped to block their view because that lurch wasn’t only caused by the water; someone was at the wheel playing games. They knew he wouldn’t move against the sway of the ship, but she wasn’t as steady on her feet.

  “We take breaks fully clothed around here,” he said and that made her look at her breasts.

  “I’m dressed,” she said, gasping in mock offense. “All the important parts are covered. Don’t tell me you and your crew are squeamish, or are you offended that I’m not covered in tattoos and scars?” When her hands went to her hair, she started to finger her scalp like she was searching for something. “The only scar I’ve got was a gift from my ex-boyfriend.”

  That’s what she was searching for in her hair? One word came to mind. “Headboard?”

  “Vodka bottle,” she said. The volcano of fury that burst in his chest made him consider diving into the drink just to get back to shore to pay the fucker a visit. “In his defense, he was aiming for my brother who’d just hit him with a chair.”

  She said it like it was nothing.

  Everything she said intrigued him. What the hell kind of men did she date? And, why was her brother hitting guys with chairs?

  This girl was an enigma unlike any other.

  Grabbing her wrists, he pulled her hands out of her hair, he didn’t need to see a scar. “Bar room brawl?” he asked, trying to figure it out.

  “Cock fight,” she said, lifting a shoulder. “My dad was unconscious… it’s a long story.”

  Now her dad was involved too? What the hell kind of family did she come from? If Swain hadn’t known it wasn’t a good idea for him and the guys to keep their hands off her before, he knew it for sure now.

  The dithering dad, violent brother, and boyfriend with a bad aim would be enough to discourage any guy.

  With that thought, he quickly let go of her wrists.

  Her smile got so wide that she showed her straight, white teeth. Bowing toward him, she lifted her chin. “Don’t worry about those guys, Captain. I can handle them… the ones who are still alive anyway.”

  Shit. The brawl ended in murder? This woman lived a dark life. No one would know it by looking at her. But, it made sense. What better way to run from the law than to escape to the sea? Many had done the same thing for centuries.

  “You killed one of them?”

  “Broke his heart,” she said, gazing over the water. “Some would say.”

  That he could believe. “The boyfriend?”

  Taking a breath, she brought her attention back to him. “This is getting deep for a first date, wouldn’t you say?” she asked. “You came down here to yell at me for getting my hoo-has out, stay focused, Captain.”

  He wouldn’t let any of the other guys talk to him that way, but part of him was grateful for the reminder. “Right,” he said. “Stay in uniform, that’s an order.”

  The breath she took was so deep that her shoulders rose and fell. “You yelled at me this morning for not wearing it right and now I’m supposed to sleep in it?”

  Yeah, okay, maybe he was being unfair.

  When they got to the salvage site he and his crew would be stripping down and changing on deck regularly. Board shorts were part of the Swain uniform when they were in and out of the water and their dive suits all day. At that time, it would be a double-standard to tell her she couldn’t wear a bathing suit.

  But, that body, fuck, it was going to get someone on the crew into trouble. The woman was a master of sugar and baked treats, but from the look of her figure she rarely indulged herself. Either that or she worked out a lot. Slender and toned, she had the perfect form for a man to play with.

  Noticing her breasts again, he took his time looking down the curve of her waist to the flare of her hips. The line of her bikini briefs was held straight between her hip bones leaving a narrow gap between fabric and skin, perfect for his hand to just… shit. He had to stop letting his mind make these sexual leaps.

  This woman was his cook and he was being a cock; a sleazy fucking asshole who shouldn’t be building sexual fantasies that involved his subordinate.

  “Flirting with the guys and walking around in skimpy bikinis is going to get you into trouble,” he said.

  “Are you telling me you hire rapists?”

  The boat lurched again, just the tiniest bit, but it was enough to make her stumble against him. The squash of her breasts on his torso made his dick salute in an instant.

  No. No. This wasn’t good.

  Usually he’d take the time to find himself a woman before they left shore. But, he’d been in such a rush to get everything ready that he hadn’t had the time to think about drinking and seduction. He hadn’t enjoyed a woman for a while and that was his excuse for his juvenile reaction to this one.

  If he’d known his cook was going to be a sexy nymph sent to test them all, he’d have found a way to make the fucking time to take the edge off.

  Wrapping his fingers over her shoulders, he eased her back, wishing that he didn’t have to touch her because she was softer than sun-melted butter.

  “I’m saying I don’t want either of us to find out,” he said.

  The sunglasses still covered her eyes, but he could feel her gaze rise to his. “No man has ever violated me before,” she said with a vehemence in her tone that made him curious. “I can’t say none have tried.”

  He wanted to know what that meant, wanted to know what kind of bastard would try to force himself on a woman, and he wanted to know what she’d done to protect herself.

  “While you work under me, you’re my responsibility, wholly my responsibility. I take that duty seriously. A captain’s value is set by his crew.”

  “Your crew value you. They respect you,”
she said. “Highly. All of them… they were talking at lunch. The loyalty around here is humbling.”

  “You’re a part of our crew now,” he said, feeling like it was important to let her share a piece of that security though he couldn’t figure out why because this woman was impenetrable.

  Instead of being gratified, she smiled. “Then it shouldn’t matter what I wear because no crewman would violate another, right?”

  Stepping away from him, she moved into the sunlight and stretched her arm above her head to wave at the wheelhouse. The woman knew exactly who was watching; she knew exactly what she was doing. When the horn blasted, he whipped around, ready to curse his crew. But, when she opened her mouth in a rapturous laugh, Swain’s knees were taken from under him.

  She didn’t just talk like she was naked in a man’s bed, she laughed like he’d just tickled her most intimate spot.

  Fuck.

  Swain was getting mad again. The horn blasted once more. He glared at the wheelhouse and signaled for them to cut it out.

  “You need to lighten up, Captain,” she said.

  She rested a hand on his forearm, but he wrenched it away and forced her backward when he bowed to swipe up her towel. “Get your fucking clothes on, Waif,” he demanded, throwing the towel at her. “Break’s over.”

  Storming away, he was going to give his crew a good dressing down for being so frivolous with their safety system, but she called out.

  “Jockey said you’d let me write an order for supplies that we could pick up in Miami.”

  He stopped.

  Damn it, he couldn’t ignore legitimate business.

  Glaring over his shoulder, he nodded for her to follow and marched on. He’d set her up with what she needed and then he’d get back to his crew and away from her.

  Sassi didn’t find it easy to keep up with the long-legged captain when he marched back inside and along the corridor past her bedroom and the mess to the end. Turning right, he ran up a flight of stairs to a square landing before turning ninety-degrees right and running up another half dozen.

  Crowding in at his back because there wasn’t much space on this top landing, she heard him grumble before he unlocked a door and moved forward.

  Reminding herself to step over the frame at the bottom of the door, she expected to go into another cold metal room.

  This was anything but.

  The first thing she noticed was the warm wood flooring and the paneling that went all the way to the ceiling. To the left were three circle windows with a messy desk facing into the room beneath. A file cabinet stood behind the desk, against the wall underneath the furthest away circle window. On top of that was a printer-scanner.

  Her casual eye moved right, past the dressers, and came to a stop on a huge bed in the back right corner.

  “Is this your bedroom?” she asked, assuming only the captain could have such a sumptuous room.

  “It’s my cabin,” he said, doing something with his keys.

  Dashing past him, Sassi crawled up on his bed and lay down in the middle to exhale. Oh, it was so soft, way softer than hers, though she’d only laid on her bed for a minute this morning to test it.

  Spreading herself out, she smelled nothing but fresh linen like the sheets had just been changed that day.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” he snapped.

  Sassi was getting used to his brusque mood and wasn’t intimidated by it. Clambering off the end of the bed, she ran through the door just beside it to find the bathroom with full bath and separate shower.

  “You have a bath tub! Can I use it?”

  “No!” he squawked like she’d just made the most ridiculous request.

  Peeking into it, she noted how clean it was and wondered if it had ever been used. “Doesn’t look like you use it much.”

  “The captain doesn’t have time for laying around.”

  Swinging around the door frame, she ran a fingertip across a rung of the ladder that was attached to the wall by the built-in closet doors.

  “Someone thought you did or they wouldn’t have put a tub in the bathroom.”

  “It’s called the head,” he said, watching her scamper around the room. “You’re not gonna have time for taking baths either.”

  Leaning on the door they’d entered by, Sassi folded her hands behind her. “I have an hour this afternoon and you’d probably have preferred me in there than out on deck.”

  His interest slithered down her, but she was wearing a bikini. Sassi couldn’t blame him for looking when she’d put on a show outside.

  Waving to the wheelhouse had been a bit of fun. Before she went outside, she hadn’t really thought about where the other men would be, just that she needed a break. Jockey had told her that Swain would be spending the day in the wheelhouse, but she hadn’t considered that she’d be putting on a performance for anyone.

  All she’d figured was that so long as the captain was on over watch, she could be confident that the other guys wouldn’t be able to hurt her. Not that she was afraid of anyone on the crew, not really. She’d actually begun to warm to them. Despite their rough exteriors, she didn’t think any of them would harm her.

  Sunbathing was Sassi’s way of enjoying what might be her last days of freedom. If she didn’t come up with the money, she’d have to marry Dario or else she’d watch Stuart and Karen suffer. But, Sassi feared she’d take her own life rather than give herself to that snake.

  “I told you to keep your clothes on,” he grumbled.

  “No one would see me in the tub,” she said, but the corner of her mouth curled. “Unless that’s your way of telling me you want to watch.” His attention snapped up like she’d just pinched him. “Hope you treat me better than you treat my underwear.”

  At first, she’d been pissed off to find her ripped bra in her cabin. It didn’t take long for that tension to sink lower into a part of her anatomy that she hadn’t thought about for a long time. Her breasts had tingled at the idea that they might have been liberated by his vicious, arousing, act.

  Okay, so her chest hadn’t been in the bra when it had been ripped. There was nothing sexual about what he’d done. He’d probably just been leaving her a message that he wasn’t happy with her and she got that.

  But, a fantasy played out in her mind, one involving an overbearing Captain with a bad attitude and a cook who couldn’t stop goading him even though she knew it wasn’t the best idea to tease him.

  “I shouldn’t have done that,” he said and retreated to behind the desk. “I’ll replace it.”

  Pushing away from the door, Sassi started toward him. “You’ll buy me underwear? How do you plan to do that out here?”

  He unlocked the file cabinet and tugged a catalog from it. Tossing it onto the desk, he grumbled. “Order anything you want.”

  Intrigued, she picked up the booklet to flick through the hundred or so pages. “Clothes… Uniforms.”

  “He can put our branding on anything. I’ll have Jockey add a note and ask him to rush the order. He’ll deliver it to the ship,” he said and cleared his throat. “There’s a printed order form in the back. Fill it out with whatever you want, your… sizes.”

  There was something incredibly sweet about the gesture, or maybe it was the shift in his stance showing that he was uncomfortable that endeared her. “I’d appreciate that, Captain.”

  Probably because he was comfortable, he frowned and got stern again. “You’re going to be with us for a month and we can’t have a repeat of this morning.”

  “Sure,” she said, hugging the catalogue to her chest.

  “Fill it in and leave it on the desk.” He tugged a blank sheet of paper from the printer. “Write down whatever you need for chow on this. When you’re done, call through the intercom in the galley, and Jockey will send it all.”

  The first-mate would know their contacts, how the machine worked, and what to write in the extra notes to make sure their orders were ready to be delivered before they left Miami.
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br />   When he figured there was nothing left to say, Swain nodded once and came around the bed to head for the door again. Sassi turned on the spot to watch him go, amazed that he was leaving her alone in the bedroom.

  “Captain,” she said when he opened the door. He turned to look at her. “You have a great bed.”

  Even though his beard was thick, she saw his jaw move forward and his frustration made her smile. “Berth, it’s my berth,” he said.

  “Then you have a great berth.”

  “Wench,” she heard him mutter as he went out leaving her to her fun.

  And as she scampered over to the desk and sat to open up the catalogue, fun was on her mind. Sassi could follow the spirit of his words without disobeying orders. If she was ordered to walk the plank for being mischievous, she’d do it.

  Out here there was no debt, no Dario, no abandonment, no grief. Something about the ocean made her feel free. Sassi had been out there less than a day and already she was dreading the day she’d have to go back to shore.

  FIVE

  Yeah, Sassi felt like a bit of an idiot.

  How many times did she have to hear that they were going to be in port that night before she realized the men wouldn’t need fed?

  It was still light when they docked. The men were quick to get to their plans of fun and debauchery on shore and disappeared the moment they were given permission.

  Of course, everyone was planning to eat in the city. It made sense. The crew was going to be stuck out at sea where there were no bars, and no willing women, for weeks. They had to take this final opportunity while they had it.

  The food that Sassi had prepared could be packed and stored, so there was no harm done. She’d got a head start on meals for the following day; that was the way she chose to look at it. But, it was a little embarrassing. She’d been so preoccupied with her own concerns that what was being repeated around her hadn’t filtered through.

  Hours after they’d arrived in port, Sassi was in the kitchen boxing up the cookies and desserts as the casserole cooled. She was considering making some mac and cheese to serve as a midnight snack, in case the men came back to the boat hungry, when Swain walked into the mess with Jockey.