Sea of Ruin

by Pam Godwin

  The iron shackle at his ankle connected to the wall by a heavy chain. He didn’t bother rising from his sprawl in the corner, knowing I wouldn’t step within his reach.

  “Were you tortured by someone?” I pulled an empty cask from the stores of water and used it as a stool to sit. “Or were you caught in a battle? A fire at sea?”

  His jaw flexed, and he looked away, presenting a distinguished, angular profile the likes of a man born to the upper class. But an aristocrat he was not.

  He ate with the same knife he killed with. Kissed noble ladies with the same mouth that spat on their respectability. And conquered his enemies with a brutality that would never be found among echelons of the British government. He was proud to be a commoner and wielded it well, like my father.

  Except my father hadn’t been a lying, cheating husband.

  The wound on Priest’s head looked clean. No bandages or stitches needed. Perhaps I should have hit him harder.

  His eyes shifted back to mine, and his mouth twisted, sensually, cruelly, provoking memories of its ruthlessness. I had an unnerving suspicion he was aware of the barest lift of my breasts, the slightest shift in my shoulders, every minuscule twitch I made to compensate muscle fatigue and discomfort.

  Yet he spoke with cold, unflappable indifference. “You’re still angry.”

  “You’re still an arsehole.”

  “You didn’t sleep a wink last night.”

  “I certainly—”

  “We both know my proximity prevented a moment of rest. But you’ve always had trouble sleeping. It’s the nightmares. Do you still cry out for your mother?” He gentled his voice. “Beg her not to jump?”

  Yes.

  My throat constricted. “You haven’t seen me in two years. You don’t know me.”

  “I know you better than anyone.”

  I laughed, a forced sound of disbelief.

  “I know you loathe dresses and frivolous accoutrement. You wear a boy’s shirt and trousers because it’s practical. But it also satisfies an innate need to resist your noble blood.” He inspected my clothing with a smirk. “You always wear a hat when the sun’s at its highest, claiming it’s to shade your eyes. But really, it’s to protect your skin. Because you were bred to favor a fair complexion.”

  “Lucky guess,” I grumbled. “All based on information I should have never given you.”

  “I know that pirating inspires a thrill in you like naught else. When too much time passes between raids, you chew your nails down to the quicks.” He glanced at the grown-out tips on my fingers. “You’ve been busy. Coming off a long successful stretch at sea, I wager.”

  Damn his perceptiveness. I balled my hands, hiding the evidence.

  “When silent and at ease, you’re the picture of a demure patrician beauty, and those eyes… Christ, they’re so blue and huge, like an innocent, wide-eyed child. They’re beguiling. Misleading.” He fingered the cut on his head and frowned. “The moment someone challenges you, the world is reminded that Edric Sharp sired a vicious force to be reckoned with.”

  I hadn’t thought of myself that way, but the observation pleased me.

  He gave me the full attention of his gaze, one that seemed intent on settling the debate of our intimacy. “I’m the only one who knows your upbringing.”

  “Charles Vane knew.”

  “He died four days ago. On your father’s birthday.”

  I choked on an ambivalent mass of emotions, resenting his knowledge yet grateful he remembered. “That’s enough.”

  “If you hear the words roll over during the heat of passion, you become violently ill. You don’t just relive the Marquess of Grisdale’s assault—shall he rot in hell for eternity.” He flexed his hands. “You also relive the deaths of your parents.”

  “Stop.” My voice broke, trapped against a sob. I tried to push it down, pull myself free, but it was like trying to outrun a tidal wave.

  Tears began to leak. Rampant and hot, they coursed down my cheeks and gathered at the hand I held against my mouth.

  “I know how badly you need the key to your father’s compass.” He blinked, a slow fall of lashes. “Not for the riches it would bring. You desperately hope it will lead you to a letter, words of love or affirmation, something personal he might have left for you before he died.”

  Mercy God, how did he know that? I never told anyone any of this. Yet every word was painfully, brutally accurate.

  “Where is it?” I slammed a fist against the barrel beneath me.

  He didn’t flinch, didn’t give me the satisfaction of wavering in the least.

  What did I expect? That he would cough up the compass? Agree to a divorce? Promise to leave me in peace?

  I met his stare. “How were you burned?”

  Silence. A glaring, cold, stone wall of silence.

  I shouldn’t have come down here.

  The man was locked in irons, stripped of weapons, and still managed to overpower me.

  I hugged my waist and closed my eyes, wishing with all my heart I could feel my father’s arms around me again. I missed him terribly. My mother, too.

  What was the point of anything if I didn’t have someone to fight for and fight with, to love and hate, to miss and be missed?

  The only person still alive to miss me was my husband. And despite his unforgivable betrayal, he was the one I missed the most.

  I missed the feel of him, the vibration of his voice against my cheek, the comforting, euphoric sensations only he could stir in me. I missed our conversations, his thought-provoking words in my ear while he held me tight against muscle that was molded and buffed like shining armor.

  The truth was I hadn’t come down here for the compass. What I sought had been missing for two years.

  I wasn’t usually this needy. From the moment I heard about Charles Vane’s capture, I’d been off-balance. Then came his death, Priest’s sudden appearance, the missing compass—all of it was clouding my judgment.

  “Bennett.” Silver-gray eyes commanded my attention, glinting like blades, sharp enough to shorten my breaths. They weren’t the eyes of a captive in shackles, for they showed no fear. “I’m calling a cease-fire. A temporary truce.”

  “Your games wear thin.”

  “No games. No deceit. No seduction. We’re going to yield. Just for a little while.”

  “Priest Farrell surrender? That’ll be the day.”

  “No. We’re simply going to set aside our disputes. The fighting, name-calling, resenting—it will all be waiting once you’re rested and ready to pick up where we left off. In the meantime, you’re going to walk over here, get some sleep, and I’m going to hold you while you do.”

  What he offered was too good to be true. There was a catch, a trick up his sleeve. Only there were no sleeves. No shirt on that delectable body.

  That was the trap. Half-naked Priest held the advantage, and when he looked at me, he saw my weaknesses. My vulnerabilities. He knew precisely how to hurt me.

  “Stop over-thinking it.” He stretched out his legs and opened his arms. “Be a good girl and come here. Right now.”

  I didn’t trust him. Not at all. I was the one in charge. The captain of this ship.

  But he’d always been my captain. The one I could depend on while one-hundred-and-twenty men depended on me.

  I saw myself slipping off the cask, my tired legs carrying me toward his waiting arms. I saw him guiding me onto his lap. Tucking my head into the warm, solid juncture of his bare shoulder and neck. Rocking me into a peaceful lull. Murmuring in his dulcet Welsh baritone. Stroking my hair, my arm, my face. I saw us sinking into the intimacy of our bodies, breathing into it, into that space where our heat gathered, where our scents mingled and fused, where there was no physical contact yet a full-body awareness of its existence.

  It was unreal, just imagining it. Remembering it. I craved the feeling. Yearned to collect it, bottle it, and carry it with me always. Maybe if I indulged one more time…

  No, no, I
needed to stop. My heart was too broken, my head too crowded with conflict.

  Priest had fooled me once, but I couldn’t regret that failure. How else would I learn, if not from my own mistakes?

  I blinked, drew in a breath, and forced myself to see what was really in front of me. No matter how hard we tried or how much we changed, the shattered remains of yesterday would never fit into today. Too many broken pieces.

  He gazed at me with unblinking focus, assessing my body language, studying my expressions, tracking my every breath.

  I couldn’t stand it. “You can drop that silent stare. I’m not that interesting.”

  “I disagree.” He patted his lap. “Come.”

  “Ask me.” I leaned forward and hardened my eyes. “Beg.”

  He made a fierce face, complete with a bestial snarl, flared nostrils, and bared teeth. Just when I thought he would explode, he reined it all in.

  “Will you sit with me?” His jaw worked through grinding resistance before he bit out the rest. “Please, sit with me?”

  “No.”

  “Dammit, woman!” He flew to his feet, rattling the chain and flexing his arms. “Let me hold you for one godforsaken minute!”

  “Forget it, Priest. Or better yet…” I rose from the barrel, fighting exhaustion. “Forget me.”

  “Never.”

  “Why?”

  “You know why.”

  “Remind me.”

  “Free me, and I’ll show—”

  “Now, now, my unfaithful knave. I cannot trust you aboard my ship unless I carry you as a prisoner, for we both know you’ll be caballing with my men, clapping me in those irons, and running away with my ship a-pirating.”

  “Unshackle me, and I’ll spend the rest of my life showing you—”

  “What will you show me?” My voice rose through several octaves. “Love?”

  “Yes.”

  “Love doesn’t betray.” That familiar pain announced itself in the cracks of my voice. “Why did you do it?”

  “Believe me…” He dropped his head back on his shoulders and breathed out through his nose. “It wasn’t on purpose.”

  “Oh? It was an accident, then? How does that work? Did you fall out of my bed and accidentally land in someone else’s vagina?”

  “You think I wanted this?” He leveled his gaze on mine. “I never wanted to hurt you. Hell, I didn’t even know I was capable of falling in love. God knows I never meant for it to happen twice and certainly not at the same damn time.”

  I gnashed my teeth. “A person can’t be in love with two people.”

  “Wish that were true. It’s caused me nothing but misery and loneliness.”

  “Give me her name.”

  His eyes drifted shut, a deliberate gesture of reluctance.

  “She rejected you.” My chest hurt. I didn’t deserve this. “Why are you protecting her?”

  “I protect what I love.” His gaze returned to mine, unflinching in its cruel honesty. “Simple as that.”

  “I see.” Everything inside me collapsed and burned as I moved toward the ladder. “Last chance to surrender the compass.”

  “Can’t do that, Bennett.”

  With a boot on the bottom rung, I stared up at the hatch, composing my thoughts.

  “If I overlooked your philandering… If I could be the sort of woman who shared her husband with his paramours, all our disputes would go away. You would return my compass. I would welcome you back into my bed. You would have your lovers on the side. And I would have mine.”

  I paused, letting him absorb that last part before glancing back at him.

  Fists clenched at his sides, bare feet spread in a warrior stance, mouth a hard slash, complexion red with ire—he glared in shock.

  Oh, yes. He’d heard every word.

  “Don’t look at me like that, darling.” I cocked my head. “You set the guidelines for our marriage. I’m simply following your lead.”

  “No. Hell no. By the Virgin Mother’s blood, I’m warning you.” His breathing accelerated, and his voice strained with barely controlled violence as a long menacing finger thrust in my direction. “I will not share you with another.”

  “Know this, Priest Farrell. If you don’t return my compass, sharing is exactly what you’ll do.”

  “Bennett!” His roar chased me up the ladder and through the hatchway.

  As I strode along the dark passages, climbed up a level, and walked aft to the next scuttle, I could still hear him bellowing my name.

  My threat had shaken him, just as I’d hoped. Whether I could follow through on it was another story. Right now I was determined enough to lead a crew member down to the bilge and fuck him in front of Priest. I fisted my hands, angry enough to do all manner of horrible things.

  “Captain!” Reynolds stopped me on the lower deck. “How did it go?”

  “As expected.” I held up a hand and listened. Either Priest had quieted, or the din from the nearby crew’s quarters consumed his shouting. “Did you find the compass?”

  “No.” He wiped sweat from his brow and grimaced. “Searched the jolly boat. Stripped the upper deck and every wall and barrel he passed last night to your cabin.”

  “It’s here.” I pushed by him, heading topside. “Keep looking.”

  “Jobah spotted sails off the larboard bow.” He waited until I turned around, his voice hushed. “A British slave ship.”

  My heart rate spiked. “Sailing from St. Christopher?”

  “We believe so.”

  “Can we take it?”

  “Aye.” He flashed a barracuda smile bristling with large, sharp teeth.

  I grinned with him, teetering on the verge of sudden laughter.

  With the cultivation of sugar cane on St. Christopher came the need for laborers. A gluttonous demand for strong, hard-working bodies. Hence the rampant importation of African slaves.

  My family owned slaves in Carolina. Native women had cooked my meals, prepared my baths, and styled my hair. I was ignorant of what that meant until four years ago when I met Jobah.

  The day I decided to attack his slave ship—a year before I met Priest and Reynolds—it hadn’t been out of heroism or benevolence. I had no idea what was crammed, starved, and shackled together in the cargo hold.

  That horrific discovery had earned me a sword through the belly.

  My hand fell to the scar that cut across my abdomen. Jobah had saved me that day. Not only had he escaped his chains and killed the guard who stabbed me, but he carried me off that ship and to my surgeon before I bled to death.

  Afterward, he could’ve returned to his homeland with the rest of his people. Instead, he chose to stay with me.

  Over the years, I taught him English and how to navigate a fifty-gun galleon. And he taught me the value of freedom. His firsthand accounts of his months aboard a slave ship still haunted me. He would always wear the scars of a slave, but he was no longer that man. In fact, he was the best damn pilot on the high seas.

  “Prepare the larboard batteries.” I ascended the final ladder and rose from the dark belly of Jade, shouting into the sunlight, “Jobah! Gather your charts and meet me at the helm!”

  “Your hat, Captain.” D’Arcy hopped into my path, holding out the black one I preferred that was cocked on three sides.

  “Thanks, lad.” I jammed it onto my head as excitement washed over my heart.

  Too bad Priest wouldn’t be up here to enjoy this. But he’d made his choice, and that choice wasn’t me.

  Shoving away thoughts of my failed marriage and missing compass, I stared up at the mighty double-spoked wheel, which stretched almost as tall as the formidable African man standing behind it.

  Jobah’s dark eyes blazed down at me, igniting a fire in my soul.

  I hurried up the ladder to his side to prepare our attack and rid the sea of men more evil than me.

  I balanced my boots on the jib-boom, a spyglass to my eye, and a hand clenched around the tack for support. The smoke of canno
n fire lingered, the raw scent of it clinging to the back of my throat. With it came the bitter taste of disappointment.

  The cargo ship had surrendered upon the first shot we lobbed across her bow. Had they been anything other than slave traders, I might have let them live.

  Evidence of their evil lay in the hull, which had been divided into holds with little headroom and endless chains swaying from beams and snaking across the decks. All meant to restrain hundreds of captives. And all of it empty.

  The slave ship had already delivered her cargo to St. Christopher island.

  I lowered the glass and found Jobah standing beside Reynolds near the helm. Together, they watched the sea swallow what was left of the burning ship off the larboard beam.

  We’d killed every man on board, save two.

  Two badly beaten, malnourished slaves.

  They were now on my ship, under Ipswich’s care. It wasn’t the first time my surgeon had nursed outsiders back to life. He grumbled and griped, claiming he didn’t have to obey a woman’s orders. But the cantankerous old fool secretly enjoyed it. He wouldn’t have stayed with me all these years otherwise.

  When the last spar of the slave ship sank beneath the tide with a bubbling burp, I pulled in a deep breath and shouted, “Weigh anchor! All hands prepare to make sail!”

  I jumped down to the forecastle and crossed to the rail that overlooked the expanse of Jade’s stunning upper deck. With her topsails clewed up from battle and her stalwart stem poised to smash through wind and water, I tilted my head back and let the splendor roll through me.

  Sunshine heated my face. The breeze whipped my hair, testing the grip of my hat. Sea spray misted my clothes, and I soaked it all in.

  My father had once stood in this very spot, commanding a different crew and earning their loyalty, battle after battle. How fortunate was I to follow in his footsteps.

  I would never forget that. Never take it for granted.

  Seamen clamored fore and aft, bare feet pounding across the deck. The windlass groaned, and the kelp-slimed anchor cable snapped taut, swinging out of the sea.

  “Get those jibs up.” I descended to the main deck. “When we clear the wreckage, raise the mainsail.”