To Ruin a Rogue:

by Heather C. Myers

  "We'll figure it out," he assures me. "For now, why don't you change into more comfortable clothing? There is no way you can go gallivanting around in that"—his eyes drop to my chest and while I'm completely covered thanks to the trench coat he's lent me (at least, I think it's a trench coat, judging by the boxy cut and the fact that it reaches past my calves but before my ankles), I still feel as though he has this superpower that allows him to see through any material I use to cover myself up—"because it won't matter what I say about you. A beautiful woman has the power of persuasion, more than she probably realizes. I have some clothes I can lend you. They'll be big on you but they'll cover you up. I'll make an announcement to my crew that they are not to touch you or make you feel uncomfortable in any way. From there, we'll get you fed and figure out your place on our ship." His grin returns. "Welcome, Miss Isla Barnes of the future, to your temporary, swashbuckling home!"

  I feel my cheeks turn pink and the weirdest thing is that I actually do feel welcomed here. Maybe it won't be so bad after all. I mean, it's only temporary.

  Chapter 4

  The fact that Port Royal is a real place and not some terribly-named Hollywood-created historical plot device surprises me. However, Matt points it out to me from his position at the helm of his ship, and through the early morning fog that seems to have taken the small coastal city hostage, I can make out a huge fort protecting it—Fort Charles, from what Matt tells me.

  Even more surprising is the history the tiny city seems to be rich with. Matt Scott is a natural Wikipedia, telling me how Port Royal used to be under Spain’s control until the English invaded thirty years ago and took over the island. In fact, Port Royal used to be the capital of Jamaica, up until a devastating earthquake wiped out the majority of the town, including all but one fort—Fort Charles. Now, the city is in rebuilding mode, but I still don’t understand why people would risk their lives living here when there are so many natural disasters that threaten the place: earthquakes, tsunamis, hurricanes. Yeah, it’s great living by the beach, but not if there’s a chance the ocean is going to suck me down and never let me go.

  Which brings up another point.

  “You’re a well-known pirate,” I say to Matt, still standing next to him at the helm of the ship. I’m thankful for the clothes he’s lent me because the early morning mist is freezing. I’m also thankful I decided to wear a bra with my bachelorette dress or else I’m positive my nipples would be pressed against the material of the tunic, like flashlights in the dark. My arms are crossed loosely over my chest, and I’m still wrapped up in the jacket he lent me. He hasn’t asked for it back and I don’t intend to return it yet. It keeps me warm without overheating me and I find I’m particularly drawn to its lingering scent.

  He looks over at me with his chocolate-brown eyes, and I can see him stare at me as though he doesn’t trust the next words that will come out of my mouth. I get the feeling that he’s trying to read me, trying to figure me out, as though I’m some incomprehensible text that needs thorough analyzing. It makes me uncomfortable because I have no idea what he sees when he looks at me, and that scares me. But what scares me even more is the fact that before, I didn’t care what people thought of me. For some reason, my thoughts are temporarily consumed with what Matt thinks until I call myself a dumbass and force myself to think of something else.

  “Yes,” he finally agrees, nodding his head once and looking back at the horizon. At Port Royal.

  His shoulders are square and broad, and his eyes are sharp with determination and focus. This is a much different Matt Scott than the one whose bed I woke up in. His height still baffles me. I have to crane my head back to look at him fully, but the ache is pleasurable considering height has always been a huge turn-on for me. I don't mind it all that much. His eyes are dark, almost black, to the point where I can't tell the difference between his pupils and his irises. They have this glint of ambition in them, and that, too, is attractive to me, so I force myself to look away and continue to study him from the corner of my eye. His nostrils are flared, ready for a battle, and his lips are pressed together, clenching his teeth, popping his jaw. His posture is rigid, tense, and I can feel the determination radiating from him in waves. I force my weight evenly to my feet so I don't get swept away in him.

  “Aren’t you worried that by coming to Port Royal, you’ll be arrested for piracy and hanged?” I ask. It’s what all those pirate movies have taught me about Port Royal, and I’m worried that I’ll be hanged for even being associated with pirate captain Matt Scott.

  "Worrying about death is nonsensical," he tells me, his eyes looking at me in his periphery. Other than that, he doesn't move, still rooted to his position at the helm of the ship. "I'm going to die no matter what I do, whether it's in the arms of the woman I love or in battle with a rival crew or at the hangman's noose. It's not going to change how I live my life. My sister is someone I wouldn't hesitate in dying for. Should I get arrested trying to save her or saving her, then I've done my job. I'll die knowing she's safe."

  His words surprise me—everything from the woman he loves to dying for his sister. Suddenly, those pirate movies disappear from my mind and I blink. When I open my eyes again, I see Matt in a new light and I'm not sure how I feel about it.

  "So," I say, and my voice is tentative for some reason. All of a sudden, I have all of these questions dancing on the tip of my tongue, ready to be asked about what it means to be a pirate really, and I'm worried that I'll be bothering him with them. Yes, he knows I'm new to this time so this culture is completely different for me, but he may not be amused by my ignorance mixed with my enthusiasm for learning new things. "Woman you love. That means pirates can fall in love?"

  Now, he does face me, and I can't fault him for the exasperated look on his face. Oddly enough, the look doesn't detract from his beauty. In fact, the way his mouth is shaped emphasizes how sharp his cheekbones are, and I feel my mouth go dry when I notice this.

  I've never been around someone this beautiful and I have no idea what to do with myself; it's shameful. It's freaking embarrassing and I hate myself for it, but even though I'm aware of it, I can't figure out how to change it.

  "I'm a living, breathing human being," he points out, making sure to enunciate each word slowly so I won't mishear him. Like I'm some kind of idiot. "Therefore, I have capabilities of possessing feelings for others. Is that so difficult to believe?"

  He looks genuinely curious now, and I can't help but feel triumphant that he's the one asking me something.

  “I just didn’t expect,” I begin, but stop. For some reason, I feel my face turning red, and I’m not quite sure why that is. I have nothing to be embarrassed about. “What I mean to say is.” I pause, forcing myself to look him in the eye. “Where I’m from, pirates have a reputation where they’re committed to the sea.”

  He continues to look perplexed. “Well, yes,” he says with a nod. “That’s true.”

  “Yes,” I say. “They’re only committed to the sea.”

  He’s quiet, taking it in. “Ah,” he says, nodding his head once. “Yes, we don’t have the typical relationships one would find in storybooks.” He crosses his arms over his chest then cocks his head to the side, and there’s that look on his face, the one that really sees me, and I get goosebumps under his intensity. “But that doesn’t mean we don’t feel. Quite the contrary. Many times, we care too much and we don’t know how to show it. Loving and leaving is not something we actively pursue, but under the circumstances, it is all we know; it is all we have. Women don’t want to commit to a pirate as much as a pirate wants to commit to a stationary woman who would prefer to settle down and raise a family. However, there are women who are special. The kind worth giving it all up for.”

  “Let me guess,” I say with a knowing smirk. “They’re the kind of women who would never ask.”

  “Precisely,” he says, and he’s smiling too, which makes it all the more difficult to breathe. “But not for the reason you�
�re thinking. Women like that won’t ask because they don’t expect there to be a choice made without a discussion. Because they know how important it is to us—our life at sea—they’ll wait for us to bring it up. And trust me when I say, if she’s that type of girl, we always bring it up. Always. A discussion is had, points and opinions are noted, and a compromise is agreed upon. Sometimes it works out, sometimes it does not, but it’s always discussed. No choice is made without a discussion, without each party being heard.”

  I swallow. This whole thing doesn’t make sense to me. Matt Scott doesn’t make sense to me, because he’s nothing I could ever expect, and it’s making me feel things I can’t decipher.

  “And you?” I force myself to say, but my voice cracks. It’s raw and scratchy, like jagged edges of uncut diamonds in my throat. “You know this from personal experience?”

  He smiles—I’m not sure why—and shakes his head. I watch as his hair dances with each movement of his head, like the feathers on a bird’s wings. “No,” he says, “I cannot say I have personal experience in the matter.”

  "Ah." I nod my head and hear my heart punch my chest over and over again. I can hear each hit echo in my ears, like it's one of those terrible sound effects from the 1950s superhero television shows that's turned up full blast, and I worry that Matt can hear it. Because if he can, he'll know. He'll know that I actually care whether he has personal experience with it or not, and if he knows I care…

  I just don't like caring. It complicates things. It's why I maintained the type of meaningless relationships I did back during my time. Keeping them at an arm's length meant I would never get hurt. I know there's more out there, but that more requires a vulnerability I don't think I’m ready to give. Even so, I find myself comforted by the fact that he hasn't had personal experience with intimate relationships because I haven't had personal experience with intimate relationships, either. I don't know why it means so much to me—because I shouldn't care and a part of me worries that this newfound caring is going to bite me in the ass later down the road—but it does.

  "Have you?" he asks, and suddenly the spotlight is thrust onto me, and I'm blinded by the light, paralyzed by the scrutiny.

  I swallow to moisten my throat so my voice doesn't come out like a teenage boy's, and glance out at the water. The ocean gives me something to look at, something to focus on, and the waves gently lapping into the side of the ship has a soothing effect on me in a way I didn't expect. I feel centered, calm, like everything is going to be okay. To trust Matt with my past and hope he doesn't judge me for it.

  "No," I say, shaking my head. A couple of stray locks of hair follow my head as it moves back and forth.

  Matt pauses and tilts his head. He does this a lot, I notice, especially when he picks up new information that possibly goes against the grain, against his expectations.

  "Can I be frank with you, Isla?" he asks, catching me off guard with the question.

  I nod because I don't trust my voice to speak right now, especially considering how he speaks my name. It's said like a promise, dark and husky, filled with unspoken pleasures too inappropriate to put into words. A shudder of delight goes through me, and I realize that I would let him say or do whatever he wanted if only he said my name more often.

  "You are unlike any other girl I have ever met before," he says, and I can't be sure, but I swear there's an admiring glint in his brown eyes. "And that's saying something."

  "Perhaps that's because I'm a woman and not a girl," I point out again, proud that my wits haven't left me entirely.

  "Perhaps," he allows, keeping his eyes focused on me. My breath catches in my throat and it's hard for me to breathe—again—which drives me crazy because I hate being so out of control.

  "We need to discuss what's going to happen," he says suddenly, and I blink, broken out of my trance and brought back to present day, present time. "We briefly touched upon it a few hours ago when I gave you a change of clothes to wear, but considering you're from the future"—I appreciate the fact that he doesn't say this with any condescension. He says it like it’s a fact, like he believes me—"it seems you need a more permanent place to rest your head, a residence of sorts." He stops, waits.

  I realize that though he hasn't asked me a question, he's still waiting for an answer, so I nod. "Yeah," I tell him. "Truth be told, I have no idea how I got here or how to get back."

  "Do you want to go back?"

  The question surprises me because I think it's obvious. "Of course," I say. "Of course I do. That's my home. I have no idea where I am here. I don't know anyone. It's much more dangerous. I have few to no civil rights here. I have no money. No home. No friends or family. No clothes. No way to support myself.

  “I'm with a wanted pirate, which means if you get caught, your captors might think I'm with you, that I'm a pirate too, and hang me. They're probably not going to believe I'm from the future, and quite honestly, I can't say I blame them. I have no idea why you believe me. I don't know what's healthy to drink, what's edible. I don’t know if I ever want to get married and if I don't get married, I can't have sex. But you guys don't have condoms so even having sex is a scary thing because, you know, STDs.

  “And women are property here, you can beat up women here. I know movies have romanticized pirates and the seventeen hundreds, but I've never been the type of girl who actually wants to travel through time." I stop to catch my breath and chance a glance at Matt. His gaze is like fire and I can feel my cheeks heat up because of it. "So no, I don't want to stay in this time. I want to go home."

  Matt continues to stare at me, taking me in, taking my words in. When I feel like I'm about to explode in silence, he nods his head. "There's a lot to sort through with what you said," he says. "But I get, from the gist of it, you want to go home for all of the reasons you listed, correct?"

  I nod, breathing deeply and slowly, trying to regulate my heart.

  He presses his lips together and I can tell he's thinking of what to say next. I have no idea how I'm able to read him already, but then again, I have no idea how he's able to read me. We've barely known each other for a few hours at best and already feel as though I know him, I'm comfortable with him. I didn't even feel that way about some of my girlfriends when I first met them so it boggles my mind that I feel this way about some smelly pirate.

  "May I counter your points with my experience?" he asks, and I appreciate the patience—however strained—I can detect in his tone. When I nod, he clears his throat and places his hands behind his back. Before I know it, he begins pacing up and down the ship and starts speaking like a college professor during a lecture. "First, I'm not sure how dangerous it is where you're from. Here, as long as you keep your wits about you and you have a survivalist mentality, you'll be fine. I'll teach you all you need to know about life aboard a ship—a pirate ship. I'll train you how to keep inventory, how to cook and clean, what to eat and drink and what to avoid, what to wear and when. I'll teach you the pirate code and who it applies to and why. I'll teach you tricks on deceit, on manipulation, on getting what you want, and on avoiding detection. If you give me your attention and you soak in my words, I will teach you everything you need to know about what it's like to live here. You need not worry about that. Trust me.

  "As a member of this crew, you are afforded the same rights as anyone else regardless of your sex, regardless where you're from. You are not property. You have choices here, on my ship. Should you want to marry and have children, that is completely up to you. I can't promise you how your husband will treat you—if he'll exercise rights over you—but I guarantee you that will not happen while you are under my care.

  "Sex is fun with the right person, dangerous with the wrong one. I'm sure that's the same where you're from as well. I'm not sure what a condom is and what STDs are, but they sound intimidating and I'm not sure I'd like them anyway."

  His eyes burn through mine and he continues to hold my attention simply with the intensity of his gaze. No wonder h
e's a pirate captain.

  "I'm not going to lie to you, Isla. Life on board a pirate ship isn't easy. But if you trust me, I promise you, it's not as bad as you think. I'll be with you each step of the way." He stops, swallows. "So. What say you?"

  I pause, letting his words sink in. I have no idea what I'm doing and I have no idea what I want except my safety and to go home. But something inside is pulling me in Matt's direction and it's not something I can so easily fight.

  And then, I say something, something that surprises even me. "I trust you," I say, and I mean it.

  Chapter 5

  The Brawling Widows is a bar—tavern is what they call it here—that reminds me of every Irish pub I’ve ever been to. It has plenty of seating, the entire place is filled with lights and noises, a couple of pirates are fighting off in the corner and no one is throwing them out, and—this is something I’ve never seen before—prostitutes are sitting in laps and rubbing their breasts—enhanced by extremely tightened corsets—into said men’s faces. There are a few waitresses around, but they’re called wenches here, which doesn’t sound very complimentary, but I bite my tongue and refrain from speaking on it because the place is so loud no one can hear me anyway.

  Matt leads us to a back corner of the bar, his footing sure, as though he’s been here before and has a usual spot he likes to sit. The crew, once inside, disperses based on what they want, whether it’s women, fighting, booze, or some mixture of their options. I stay with Matt because I don’t want anything here; I don’t even want the alcohol because I don’t trust it, and from what I remember in eighth grade history, their alcohol is way stronger than it is back at home. Like, ridiculously strong. Like, black-out-can’t-remember-my-own-name kind of strong. I like my alcohol, but only when it’s so cleverly disguised by a fruity concoction that I can’t even tell it’s there. There is no way I’m going to indulge here and now with that type of alcohol.