by Angel Payne
As if her reflections made it so, that distinctive timbre called out from the quarter deck, “Very well, Rico. Thank you. Now everyone, let’s get to work. Cover every inch of your assigned area. Those bastards may have gotten luckier than we thought. I want first reports and supply orders turned over to Dink as soon as possible.”
A hearty round of “ayes” answered, not that Golden noticed over the drums taking over her heart. Somehow she willed her feet up the last two steps—
Just as Mast tilted his gaze her way.
He turned hesitantly at first, as if his ear had caught something and he wasn’t sure what. Then his head lifted and his stare embraced her completely.
Her heart soared. Even from the distance between them, she could see his dark blues gain a new light, and watched sensual twitches claim the corners of his full mouth.
She softly smiled back.
He stretched an arm out toward her. Then commanded her to his side with one bold tap of a finger. If a fire burst on the deck between them, she would have walked through it to obey.
As she got within steps of him and Dinky, the rugged first man let out a chortle.
“What?” Mast groused at him.
“You just nearly choked on that coffee.”
“The hell I did.”
“Boar’s snot you didn’t.” Dinky turned and greeted her with an appreciative whistle. “But damn, I’d croak, too, kid. Yer a more resplendent sight each day, spitfire.”
Golden giggled as Dink lifted her hand for a courtly kiss.
Mast was clearly not as amused. Especially as more of the crew began to notice her, calling and waving.
Without a word, he pulled her hand from Dinky’s grip. With another collection of silent strides, he hauled her across the deck and into the shelter of the galley.
Her heart sank as deep as the shadows into which he’d hauled her. Not even her journey up to the crow’s nest last week had antagonized him so quickly. Oh, hell! She should have stayed in the higher-necked gown that had been her first choice this morning. Or maybe…it wasn’t her clothes at all. Maybe last night simply wasn’t the precious keepsake to Mast as it was to her.
She tried composing herself as he turned to fully face her. If only he didn’t still loom over her, all unkempt masculinity, smelling of spice and sea spray and their lovemaking. “I—I can see I’ve disrupted your schedule, Captain. I promise I won’t be a nuisance again. If you’ll just excuse me—”
Exploding white stars blasted the rest of it from her. They came with the crush of his lips, hard and passionate and needing. At first, her eyes flew open with the surprise of it. They fluttered shut, lost to the languid, lovely heat he uncorked inside her.
Mast released his hold long enough to push her against the galley chopping block. With her hands now free, she slid her fingers up his torso, through the V of dark hair on his chest, then around his neck and up through his windblown waves.
“Nuisance?” came his husky murmur. “Oh, aye, hellion. Feel just how much of a nuisance you are…”
He caught one of her hands and pushed it down, making her feel the jutting ridge between his legs. He groaned. Golden gasped. Her knees and thighs became liquid fire. The blaze beckoned stronger, crying with primal intensity until she could resist no more. She hitched herself up onto the block so she could brace her legs around his body.
“Jesus, Mary and fucking Joseph.” He choked on the last syllable. His head fell forward; his eyes and mouth clamped shut. Golden never thought pain and ecstasy could mold together on one face before. He was a breathtaking sight.
He held her like that for a long moment, his hands clutching her thighs through the layers of the dress, fingering the slick blue fabric as if fighting a war with himself. Golden waged a contest of her own with each shift his hands made, shivering with the delight he gave her skin, fighting the memories of what he’d done to the rest of her body just hours ago.
“Hell,” he finally muttered. His hands trembled as he disengaged her legs and began smoothing her dress. He extended a hand as if to help her stand, but pulled her back into his arms, instead. “We’re in port, sweeting.” He gave her a kiss of gentle apology. “They’ll need me above soon. Repairs. Supplies. Peeling terrified Spaniards from the hull. We’ve got a sea witch aboard, you know.”
She feigned wide eyes of female shock. “How horrible for you, Captain.”
The side of his mouth twitched again but was vanquished by a stare of dark concern. “New Providence isn’t Milan, Golden. Not even Basseterre. It’s a viper’s nest—and nothing your curiosity can’t live without. I’m not ordering you, but I want your topside time limited today.”
“Not even to slush the masts?”
He sighed, battling back the smile again. “Especially not for that. How about a nice afternoon chat with Maya?”
Golden scrunched her face in disgust.
“All right, then. How about Ben teaching you how to ram a truck gun properly?”
She gave him a fast and approving kiss for that. As she pulled away, Mast caught her again, cupping her chin with his whole hand. His hold was firm now.
“One more thing,” he growled. “This time, it is an order.”
“Oh?” She tried to sift the huskiness out of her voice, but it was impossible with the heat that started to crackle again between their bodies, the mesmeric way his night-blue eyes pulled at her.
“Change your clothes,” he stated. “Immediately. You and this dress go together too damn perfectly.”
He drove his point home by taking her lips again. And again. When he finally, reluctantly stepped back, he squeezed her hands, his expression full of desire, yet something else Golden couldn’t pinpoint. It didn’t strike her as all-out longing or pain, though she couldn’t cross either off the list of conjecture either. It made her heart clutch with bittersweet confusion.
But he pivoted and left before she could grill him.
She didn’t follow him for a few long minutes, choosing to linger in the shadows as her mind recounted every second of the moments which had just transpired. “Perfect,” she whispered, hardly daring to believe she’d just heard the word on Mast’s lips—and the joy that filled her heart in response.
Even three hours later, beneath a light but thorough coat of gunpowder and dust, the glow inside her burned like a three-tiered chandelier. By the oddly amused smiles Maya and Ben flashed her in the dim light of the gun deck, she judged her newfound bliss wasn’t just an inner revelation.
“Mister Gunner’s Mate.” She addressed Ben while stepping back from the muzzle of the truck gun. “I believe the work is ready for inspection.”
The adorable codger shuffled forward, scratching the few gray hairs he had. “Blimey. Nearly perfect. Nice work, even for a wom—errr, for a greenhead. Cartridge and wad good ‘n’ tight, shot rammed right well.”
“Of course it’s perfect,” Golden interceded. “It has to be. Captain Stafford depends on these guns in times of trouble.”
“Aye, milady, he does.”
The wizened seaman lifted one eye and its brow to her. Golden met the unspoken question with a direct gaze that made Ben’s stare widen even further. Surprisingly, the old sea dog cocked a warm smile at her.
“You’re a good friend and a loyal crewman, Ben.” Without a thought, she grasped his hand.
“Now don’t be startin’ that kind o’ mush.” He looked away with a bashful smile. But the expression didn’t reach his eyes. There was a sweet sadness in Ben, a longing she knew every drop of the seven seas wouldn’t fill. It was much like the loneliness she’d wondered at in his captain’s eyes, that day the cannons had boomed across Saint Kitts—the day Mast Stafford had stomped into her life. The most unforgettable day of her existence.
The mist of intense emotion clouded her vision a moment. Finally, she told Ben, “Thank you, my friend. Thank you for everything.”
“Nay, milady, thank ye. From all of us—even the captain, whether ye believe it or not
.”
“Oh, I believe it!” She laughed. “I do. Maya?” She whirled to her sister. “Come to the cabin and help me clean up?”
They’d gotten no more than three steps into the companionway when Maya pulled her to a stop.
“And just when were you makin’ to tell me, sister?”
The guilt-imposing twist to the question didn’t go lost on her. Neither did the implied answer. But a funny new sensation flooded Golden. Blast. Could it be a case of shyness?
“Tell you what?” she coyly quipped.
“‘Tell you what?’” Maya mocked. Nevertheless, a smile broke across the native’s face. “You and the captain?” she whispered. “Tell me it be true?”
Golden only hugged her sister in answer. Maya squealed and crushed her in return. “Well now,” came a friendly and familiar accent. “Why the hell wasn’t I invited to this soiree?”
Dinky had appeared, his handsome face cocked and a smug grin at his lips. With a wonderful new perception, Golden observed the brightening of Maya’s eyes, the quiver of her sister’s hand at her breast.
“Maya,” she said quickly into the resulting pause, “I believe that lesson at the gun wearied me more I thought. I’ve a need to lie down for a while. Would you mind if we talk later?”
“Oh no, sister!” Maya’s response carried the subtlety of a battering ram. Her eyes were already glued on Dinky. “I don’t mind at all!”
A satisfied smile remained on her face as she continued to the cabin to clean herself up. She washed her face and sponged her body thoroughly, all the while remembering what it felt like when Mast’s hands stroked her breasts and belly and thighs, instead. The memories were so entrancing, she closed her eyes to see them better: the skin-tingling touches, the silken caresses, the wet kisses, the consuming touches…
She ached for this day to end. Yearned for darkness to fall so, like the night beams to the ocean, her dark-eyed captain would join with her again.
She forced her eyes back open. Her gaze fell to where her sky-blue dress was draped over the velvet reading chair. The dress she went “too damn perfectly with.”
She grinned devilishly, and slipped back into the gown.
She tried to make good on her words to Maya and lay down for a while after that, all the while praying she wouldn’t get too much rest tonight, but her senses danced with so many new feelings, the task was impossible. It was like her body had thrown a surprise party, and her soul was the gift she’d gotten to unwrap.
With a big sigh, she got up from the bunk. She meandered about the cabin, lightly touching the wood and brass, trying to absorb the beauty of the textures, thinking about the strength of their owner. She opened the wardrobe and breathed in the clean cedar scent there. She hummed the little tune Rico had taught her as she straightened up the wash stand, refolding the already-straight towels, polishing the already-shining razor and comb.
She was going insane with restlessness.
She carefully listened to the rest of the ship. Many of the crew had gone into New Providence with Mast. Those who remained were absorbed with a myriad of duties and repairs.
Surely nobody would fault her for a short walk about deck.
She was right. Everyone topside was busy, rechecking each line and shroud and backstay for a nastier-than-expected bite from El Culebra. If she kept her plain overcloak pulled around the bright gown and stayed along the far side of the ship, they’d never know she was there.
She had no idea how impossible that feat would be. She emitted an amazed breath at her first real view of New Providence. The mosaic of sights and sounds beyond the Athena’s rails filled her senses to the brim. She thought she’d retained accurate memories of the London docks Mummy and Daddy and she had departed from for the Caribbean, but now she realized how dim those images had grown, at least in comparison to the spectacle before her.
Shouts and screams, loud laughter, even a piercing gunshot assaulted her ears. Horses, dogs, cows, and chickens roamed among the odd-shaped buildings that seemed to have been thrown together out of anything from driftwood to palm fronds. And the humans comprised more color and texture than that. There were big-bosomed wenches with skin white as a beach or as black as lava rocks. Spanish rogues strutted like peacocks in their red and gold satin coats. Tattoo-covered ruffians appeared like they’d rather cut a man’s throat before looking him in the eye. It was loud, dirty, chaotic—and fascinating!
Something stirred inside her. She recognized the sensation immediately, though the deep, wild curiosity was usually only awakened in the rainforest.
That same sense told her that Mast could appear in that crowd any moment.
Return to the cabin. Return to the cabin. She chanted the rebuke over and over at herself. But her excitement and energy were now flowing rampant, and she dragged her feet more and more as she neared the impending hatchway.
Suddenly, she stopped. Oh, a hatchway still filled her gaze, all right: the door to the side hold, fifteen feet across the deck. From what she could gather, it was a barely-used space; Golden hadn’t seen anyone use the hold since she’d been aboard the ship. Mast hadn’t even found the time to show it to her yet. The hold was probably just stuffed full of ship’s records and tossed-aside trinkets. Old things filled with memories and forgotten stories.
If hatchways could move, the crosshatched square would have grabbed her curiosity in a chokehold.
“Hmmm,” she murmured, tilting a smug grin. “You wanted me below deck, Captain?”
She took just enough time to grab a lantern from a peg on the mizzenmast before pushing the wood slat aside and slipping beneath.
Questions blanketed her more fully than the darkness. What would she find? Mast had finally told her he was transporting valuables from Saint Kitts for a customer. Would they be down here? Did he keep anything else down here? Personal things? Trunks of treasured possessions? Something that would bring her even closer to him? But she didn’t think she’d ever be close enough.
She hummed Rico’s tune again as she pulled off her cloak, laid it in a corner then lit the lantern. The pool of warm amber light first enveloped several kegs and crates. The kegs were marked Water and the crates, Gunpowder. Golden carefully sidestepped them.
Ropes, ropes, and more ropes…patches of extra canvas…
Wait.
There was a flash of something pink and green.
She peered closer. The colors were that of old paint, curling off the features of a carved woman. A large chunk was missing from her left shoulder, contoured in the distinctive roundness of a cannon ball. Golden suspected she was the former “Athena,” downed in the line of duty for her captain.
She affectionately touched the goddess’s nose. So Mast was sentimental.
She turned toward the other corner. A variety of unmarked crates and chests met her gaze. She interrupted her humming to murmur openly and admire the elaborate carvings on some of the chests. A few were inlaid with designs of gold and mother-of-pearl. The craftsmanship was excellent. Papa had taught her how to detect that sort of thing when he’d taken her to the attic of the mansion once, using his prized collection from his travels as examples.
To her dismay, all the containers seemed to be locked. Golden tugged on all the bolts anyhow, praying she’d get lucky.
The last chest gave up her lucky strike. Anticipation thrummed as she lifted the lid with a slow creak and reached in for the first of her booty. It was a small, muslin-wrapped item. Her breath caught as she unraveled the material to reveal an ornate ruby pendant. Inscribed faintly on the back were the initials W.G.
“W.G.?”
Someone Mast knew? A friend who’d rewarded him for some act of bravery? A long-ago love, before that countess had mercilessly broken his heart?
Maybe the next treasure would give her more clues. It was also swathed in muslin, yet heavier and flatter. A picture? She loosened the ribbons eagerly. One, two, three layers and then—
“A plate? Well, that tells me nothing.
”
Her throat froze shut as recognition stabbed her mind.
At first, she’d ignored the garbled lettering on the elaborate shield decorating the middle of the plate. Papa had tried, mostly unsuccessfully, to further what little formal learning she’d had after she came to live with him, so it seemed of no consequence.
But the words were the single Latin phrase he’d demanded she master.
Ut et Deum et Regem, fidem usque in aeternum.
“To God and King, loyalty until eternity,” she translated in a shaking whisper.
She fingered the pendant again. W.G.…Wayland Gaverly.
“These aren’t Mast’s things,” she choked. “They’re Papa’s.”
But what were they doing here?
There was a logical, reasonable answer to that. Golden was sure of it. She just had to find Mast, and he’d explain. Yes, find him—
Now.
She struggled to her feet, clutching the plate to her breast as if it were armor against the million darts of apprehension aimed at her heart. She’d just go find Mast, she didn’t care where she had to go or what she had to do, and everything would be fine again. Wonderful and magical again.
She let out a weak laugh. He’d probably frown a thunderstorm at her for ignoring his wishes, not to mention sneaking into the hold. He’d likely heave her over his shoulder and throw her into his bunk again. Oh hell, there would undoubtedly be more spankings. But she’d count each one off with joy, having a feasible explanation for this ensconced in her heart.
She had to get to him!
She hastened to pick up the lantern and her cloak.
She froze again.
The light in her hand now illuminated the corner where she’d laid the cloak. A concisely folded triangle of crimson was tucked neatly there. A flag.
A red flag.
“I just want to look at the flag a moment, Mummy. It’s beautiful, don’t you think? What a lovely red flag….”
She tossed aside the cloak without faltering her gaze. She moved a hand out, stretching it across the tidy red bundle. Nerve-numbing instinct poured over her with the action. Don’t do it. Don’t look.