He watched her face pale, her expression tightening. He refused to break eye contact, desperate for her to understand the enormity of her brother’s idiotic wrongs.
“What do you think will happen once Santiago gets his hands on your brother? Do you think he will sit down with him and sup with him and forgive him his transgressions simply because his sister asks him to? You think men like Santiago Fernandez take lightly the use and abuse of a reputation he has taken decades to hone into one of utmost terror and respect?” Essa stared at him, her mouth ajar, her breathing shallow. “The moment your brother decided to deceive and steal in the name of the Demonios de Mar was the moment he called down death on his own head. You will be lucky if Santiago does not demand you as payment for your brother’s sins.”
She gasped, her hand flying to her throat. “He would not.”
Grimly, he nodded. “Aye. He would. And save for declaring all-out war against them, there is little I could do to stop him from taking his revenge on your brother.”
She gazed up at him, fear and hurt shining in her eyes.
Protect. Cherish. The need to roar into the sky, to tear apart every Demonios ship, and to kill every last one of the men who threatened his Essa was so strong, he could feel the wave of rage pulse through his blood. He felt more beast than man. A beast who would save his mate no matter the cost to life or limb.
Mine. My torture. My treasure. My love.
“I will fight for you.” His voice came out in a rumbling growl. “To the death, if I have to. No one—no one—will take you from me.”
The Santa Maria was truly an impressive ship—from what she’d seen of it before being ushered below deck by Lucia, who’d returned to the helm.
It looked too much like La Corona for her to deny the truth…her brother had played a most dangerous game. One he would lose. And his life would be forfeit.
Ernesto, mi hermano. Why? She couldn’t understand, doubted that she ever would. Why would a man take such risk? For money? For power? Her brother was the heir to a fortune, he had an estate that spanned miles. What need did he have for piracy or fraudulence?
You should have asked these questions long ago. Si. She should have realized that there was more to her brother’s actions than simply seeking the means to provide for his people. A people she could not see from her tower chambers. Not once in all her years at the castillo had she been permitted to leave the castillo grounds. There were days when Ernesto allowed her to escort him to the docks, but the docks abutted the castillo. The village was several miles to the south. Why had she never demanded to go there?
Now that she was on the outside, there were too many inconsistencies, too many signs that she had ignored while wrapped in fine clothes and whining about going to sea.
Sucking in a breath, she stood up from the chair that was situated before a small writing desk in Lucia’s chambers. As the only other woman, she’d shared Lucia’s quarters, lying beside the woman in the narrow bed built into the very floor of the ship. On her journey to Wales, she had slept in the crew quarters, dangling from two posts in a hammock. She hadn’t slept well; she was unused to sleeping in something that moved freely.
Her pallet in Saban’s cottage hadn’t been any more comfortable, but…she hadn’t minded so much. Especially not after he’d moved to share her pallet with her, lying beside her, touching her, sliding his large hands over her sensitive body, making her moan into the deep reaches of the night.
Shuddering, Essa began pacing. Lucia had left a mere ten minutes ago, saying she had to check on the crew and keep watch at the helm. As co-captain, it wasn’t her job to keep watch over Essa. She had a ship to protect. A crew to command. So, Essa would remain in the captain’s quarters, pacing, wondering, worrying, and biding her time until Saban and Lucian returned.
If they return.
Madre di Dios! She couldn’t think like that. Not only had they taken men with them, Saban and Lucian were trained warriors, men who lived by the sword and by their wits. One did not become a name in smuggling by failing. No. Saban and Lucian would return, and Saban would make good on his promise to protect her. And she would repeat what she’d said to him in a moment of weakness.
Mi amo. My love.
She loved him. She hadn’t meant to fall in love with her captor. She hadn’t meant to be captured at all. But it seemed that fate and the Ganwyd o’r Mor Brenin had other plans for her.
Before climbing down the rope ladder to the waiting skiff, Saban had taken her into his arms and planted a kiss upon her lips. It was a kiss of promise. And when he’d met her gaze, one last time before turning to leave her, she could see determination in his eyes. She only hoped her eyes said the same. By the time Saban and Lucian were halfway to the Santa Maria, Essa’s heart was burrowed deep into the pit of her belly, surrounded and buffeted by crashing waves of fear, anxiety, and helplessness.
Closing her eyes, Essa offered a prayer to a God she had not cared to know until now. Now, when she so desperately needed there to be a God who could hear her, and answer that prayer. A God who would protect what she held most dear.
Saban Rees…you better not die.
Opening her eyes, she began pacing again, her feet moving without thought across the floor in the moderately-sized cabin. The Seren Mor, like the Torriwr, was larger than the average sloop, with a larger hull to accommodate for goods and a large cabin. She walked to the door, then turned and walked to the porthole, then turned and walked back to the door. Over and over and over again until her frustrations and fears bled into the very air around her, suffocating her.
Dragging air into her lungs, she willed herself to calm down, to think only of returning to Port Eynon, the cottage by the Marches, and the pallet she shared with Saban.
The sounds of scuffling on the other side of the closed door brought her to a halt mid-stride. From what she’d heard before being escorted downstairs to wait out of sight, the two remaining men were supposed to remain above deck to offer support if the need arose.
So who was out in the narrow corridor?
She didn’t have long to wonder—the door burst open and a man dressed in black boots, brown breeches, a dirty shirt, and a lopsided hat plunged into the room. There was a sword in his hand and a strip of cloth over the lower portion of his face.
She gasped, her gaze darting about looking for her sword. She’d removed it when she’d entered Lucia’s quarters, not thinking she’d need to protect herself down here in the bowels of the ship.
Fool!
“What are you doing in here?” she demanded, standing her ground despite the wave of threatening menace slamming into her.
The man chuckled, the sound causing the blood in her veins to clog with ice.
“Is that any way to greet your brother, Hermana?”
Chapter Seventeen
Saban couldn’t make sense of what he was hearing, his mind as tossed and turned as a gull in a hurricane.
“Gabon?” Lucian repeated. “Not Fernandez?”
Apparently, Lucian was having the same trouble with comprehending what the man before them was saying.
“Si. It seems that the man has not restricted his deceit to his enemies,” Santiago Fernandez drawled, his lip curling upward in disgust. “One wonders how he has not already been struck down by the hand of God.”
Saban leaned back in his seat, one of four around a table someone set up on the deck of the ship. Around him, the Demonios de Mar watched their small group, their eyes sharp and their swords the same. Lucian leaned back as well, crossing his ankle over his knee and crossing his arms over his chest. Saban knew Lucian was putting on the air of nonchalance, but the man was more than capable of slicing through four to five men on his own.
Saban could handle twice that on his own with his wicked twin sabres.
“I cannot understand Gabon’s intentions.” Lucian’s voice was heavy with both confusion and disbelief. “He is mad.”
“Aye,” Saban agreed, biting back a curse.
Santiago let loose a deep, dark chuckle, the sound grating Saban’s already tightly-strung nerves.
“My men have done an excellent job of looking deeper than the surface. I had heard tales of what happened in Pozoblanco, but I had not considered they could be true. It was not until I read the letter from a baron that I realized the depths of Gabon’s sins.” He paused for a moment before continuing, “Also…I might have scuttled a ship crewed by very dissatisfied Demonios pretenders. They did not last longer than it took to wring the truth from them.”
His heart thudding painfully, Saban rubbed the bridge of his nose, his head suddenly aching terribly.
“And those sins would be?” Saban finally asked, ignoring the bit about killing the pretenders, meeting Santiago’s gaze once more. The man’s eyes were twin daggers, piercing him. Not cowed by any man, Saban held his gaze, daring him to break contact first. Santiago’s face darkened before a slow, purposeful grin spread from cheek to cheek.
“What are your sins, Rees? He who is without sin throw the first stone. I find that I am not as generous with information as I once was.”
Saban growled, his hands fisting in his lap. “What do you want?”
Lucian opened his mouth to speak but Saban held up his hand, silencing his cousin before he could break the already fragile peace of their tense parley.
Santiago’s grin grew, and Saban’s wariness did the same. “I believe you have a certain…someone.”
The muscles in Saban’s neck threatened to snap with the tension strumming his body. The bastard.
“I wish to speak with her. She may have information I find valuable—a fair trade, I believe,” Santiago drawled, his accent thickening.
Saban sneered, shooting to his feet. The men around him drew their swords, brandishing them with swiftness and skill.
Santiago moved not a muscle but the men seemed to sense their commander’s hesitation.
“She is not a prize for negotiation,” Saban intoned, his body thrumming.
“A prize? No. Not a prize. But she may have value beyond this parley.”
“I have already told you all she has shared with me. She has no other knowledge of Gabon’s activities. Hell, she did not even know the truth of who Gabon really is. What value does she have to you?”
To him, she was precious. To a man like Santiago Fernandez, she was only worth what he could get from her, be it information or pleasure, and he would cut off the man’s bollocks before he ever let him touch Essa.
His dark eyes glittering, Santiago remained silent, the sounds of the water lapping against the sides of the ship were almost deafening.
“I do not suppose you will change your mind?” He finally broke the silence.
Saban shook his head once then met the other man’s gaze, peering into Santiago’s eyes without blinking. “Nay. Never.”
Santiago shrugged then pushed away from the table. “Then I cannot give you what you seek.”
Lucian moved to stand so they could leave; no sense in remaining when their talks had come to an impasse.
“However—” Santiago blurted, his calm demeanor disintegrating into an expression of disappointed arrogance. As if it were Saban’s fault he had asked for something impossible.
Lifting his chin, he waited for Santiago to continue. From the corner of his eye, he noticed Lucian’s body tensing, his hand moving to his cutlass.
“There is something you have that may be of interest to me.”
Holding his breath, he turned to Lucian who arched an eyebrow, giving him a silent “You decide, Brenin” with a jerk of his head.
With a grunt, Saban lowered himself into his seat once more and Lucian followed suit.
“I am listening.”
Santiago Fernandez smiled then, the grin turning his face into a macabre mask of wicked joy.
“Listen well, mi amigo…”
Ernesto slowly closed the cabin door behind him, his gaze never leaving the sight before him.
His treasure. She was alive and well and his once more.
Esperanza. He glanced down at her feet, to the black boots. Then at her leather-clad legs. Then at the loose shirt hiding her bounteous breasts from his hunger.
“Esperanza…” he murmured, his voice heavy with emotion—relief and desire and excitement.
“Ernesto, you cannot be here,” she hissed, taking a large step back. The back of her thighs hit the edge of a built-in bunk.
“But I came to rescue you, dear sister,” he said, taking a step closer, the hand wrapped around the hilt of his sword sweating. He readjusted his grip and didn’t miss the way her eyes dropped to his sword then flicked back up.
“Rescue me? I do not need rescue, Ernesto. I am perfectly safe.” She lifted her lovely little chin and he strangled the desire to slap her for her insolence. He had allowed her far too much freedom and this was the result; her capture by his greatest, most hated enemy.
“Come, mi amo, we will go while the crew is distracted by the fool Rees and his ill-advised parley with Santiago.”
At the sound of that name, Essa seemed to snap, her body hardening right before his eyes.
“You are speaking of the true leader of the Demonios, are you not?”
Surprise ruffled him, but he didn’t care if she thought she knew the truth. There was so much more she would never guess, never understand. But that didn’t matter. She didn’t need to understand to know that she belonged to him. And soon, she would be his in every way.
His cock thickened, pressing against the front of his breeches. It had been too long since he’d spilled between a woman’s thighs. But that would be remedied within the next seven days.
Clearing the heavy desire from his throat, he demanded, “I said come, Essa. We will speak of this once we are back on La Corona. We cannot tarry here. I would hate to have to kill the pretty female captain.”
“What have you done with Lucia?” she demanded.
He shrugged. “Pedro has taken her in hand, and she will remain safe…unless you disobey me.”
Her face paled, her trembling hand moving to her throat.
She was afraid. Good.
“How did you get here, Ernesto?” she asked him, refusing his command without actually saying “no”. Growling, he lunged at her, snatching her long braid in his fist and pulling. She whimpered and he grinned, the sound of her pain lighting a fire in his belly. “Leave me be!”
He growled again, pulling her braid harder until her face was just before his, her expression twisted into one of sharp agony.
“I cannot leave you, my treasure. You belong with me. I have done much for you, for us, and I refuse to lose now.”
She sucked in a breath. “You mean you lied about being the leader of the Demonios de Mar for me? What do I gain from your deceit?”
He chuckled low in his throat, but the sound held no humor. “No, my love, that was for me. I wanted to exact my revenge against the Welshmen, and so I took on the name of an even greater faction to inflict as much damage as possible.”
“But why? What did the Welsh do to you?” she asked, her eyes wide. She was holding herself stiffly, trying not to move her head but also nervously moving her limbs. His poor, darling Essa. She would know what true pain was if she didn’t do as commanded.
“That is none of your concern,” he snapped.
“And what of the Demonios de Mar? Do you not fear their retribution?”
He laughed a husky laugh and she jerked in response.
“Why should I fear them? They are pirates. Once I have my revenge, you and I will retire to the south of Spain, never to look upon the sea again.”
She looked utterly horrified, and he couldn’t help the thrill that raced through him at her expression.
“Why do I need to explain any of this to you? All you need to know is that we will be free of this soon enough, and then we will marry.”
She tensed, her eyes flying ever wider and her mouth dropping open. The urge to sink his tongue bet
ween her lips almost sucked the breath from his body.
In time, my treasure.
“We cannot marry! You are my brother!” she cried.
A sickening crack sounded and the door behind them was kicked open, the force of it driving Ernesto back, loosening his grip on Essa’s hair.
“No, he is not,” came a voice he hated almost as much as he hated the Welsh. “Let go of her, Gabon.”
Essa struggled against his hold, her hands clawing at his wrist. He hissed, the pain nothing compared to the victory that would come if he just held on.
“So you know my secret, Rees?” he taunted in English. His gaze caught on a small group of men in the corridor behind the Welshman.
I am caught. No! He merely had more obstacles to destroy on his way to victory against all those who ever dared to deny him what was rightfully his; power, position, wealth.
“I know much more than that, Ernesto Gabon, son of Eduardo Gabon and Miranda Feliz. I know that you have been planning this for fifteen years, and that you think you have won.” The bastard dared to sneer at him. “But you have lost.”
White hot rage engulfed him, making him sputter before gritting out, “No. I have not, you fool!” He lifted his sword, placing the edge against the underside of his treasure’s chin. It was a sharp blade and would easily slice through her flesh if he only pressed a little harder.
Rees’ expression tightened, his lips peeling back to show his teeth.
“I said, let her go,” he demanded, taking a step closer.
In response, Ernesto pressed the sword edge against Essa’s neck just enough to make her cry out. The Welshman stopped immediately, his eyes widening then narrowing. Ernesto didn’t miss the flash of fear and concern in the man’s gaze.
“You think I do not know that you have touched her—my Esperanza! I have seen you with your arms around her, and watching her, silently plotting to take her from me,” he hissed.
Essa whimpered. “You have been watching us? How is that possible?”
“You came on board with the men from the port,” Rees remarked. “My man saw you come to shore, but you must have slipped into town while he was reporting to me.”
The Savage Sabre Page 15
