afraid.
“Milord, please—” she began, but he held up a hand.
“You have a generous heart, milady,” he said. He glanced at Alsandair. “And
apparently he does as well.”
“He is a good man,” Kyle said, “and can be counted as a personal friend of my
brother Khalid al-Rashid.”
Andre smiled slightly. “You love to drop that name, don’t you?”
“I merely wish for you to know that—
The pirate cut Kyle off with a chuckle. “Aye, I know. The warrior is under al-
Rashid’s protection.” He winked. “I think you’ve made that abundantly clear so do not
belabor the point.”
“So noted,” Kyle replied.
“I’d take the boy with us but I doubt you want him to live the life of a pirate,”
Andre said.
Rylee shook her head for she was staring into Andre Corsair’s eyes—too frightened
to say anything as he regarded her. There was no indication on his handsome face to
give her a hint as to what he was thinking. His thumb was still rubbing gently along her
arm and when he drew in a long breath then exhaled slowly, releasing her arm as he
did, he looked away from her.
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“Take milady aboard the Vengeance des Raven and make her comfortable in my
quarters, Gaston,” he told one of his men, an older pirate who wore a scruffy beard.
“Show her every consideration due a lady of her breeding.”
“Aye, aye, Captain!” the man responded. The man stepped up to Rylee and
sketched her a clumsy bow before extending a hand toward the side of the ship. “This
way, milady.”
“Captain Corsair— Kyle began, a warning in his tight voice.
“I will treat her with respect,” Andre said. “Have no fear on that account.”
Kyle lifted his chin. “You intend to make her your own?”
Rylee held her breath, waiting for that answer. She had yet to move from the
pirate’s side.
Andre turned his black gaze on her. “Aye, since she has already said she will do
whatever I want.” He reached out to cup her cheek, ignoring the flinch that shook her
body. “Isn’t that what you said if I spared your husband’s life?”
Rylee was trembling beneath the pirate’s soft touch. “Aye,” she agreed in a hushed
voice. “I did.” It was all she could do not to scream as the pad of his thumb eased over
her lower lip.
“What is your name, precious?” he asked.
“R-Ree,” she replied. “Rylee Farrell.”
“Rylee,” he repeated as his eyes traveled over her thick red hair. “The given name
suits you but the surname will have to go.”
“What?” she gasped.
“On Wicklaw Cay the Privateer Brotherhood is the law. I will petition them to set
aside your Joining and then I will take you as my wife,” he told her.
“You can’t do that!” she protested.
“Oh but I can.” His smile was deadly. “Rylee Corsair has a far better ring to it than
Rylee Farrell, don’t you agree?”
Rylee’s trembling changed to quivering rage and she lifted her hand to slap the
smile from his face but he caught her wrist and brought it down and around behind her
back, pulling her to his hard chest.
“His life hangs in the balance here, precious,” he said, the smile gone from his face.
“His life as well as the lives of those on this ship. If you want me to cut his throat and
set the others adrift, I will do that.” He pulled her even closer so she could feel the jut of
his shaft on her belly. “Otherwise, go quietly with Gaston and we’ll speak no more of
it.”
There was really no choice. Rylee could not risk the chance of something happening
to Alsandair. She lowered her head—hating the man holding her with every fiber of her
being.
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“Good,” the pirate said, releasing her. “Now that’s settled, Satordi, tie the warrior
up so he will keep his ass out of mischief. Sail as close to Clare Island as you dare then
put him and the other men into the boats and set them down.”
“Aye, aye, Captain!” Satordi replied.
“Gaston, escort the lady to my ship.”
A wide plank had been laid across the distance between the pirate ship and the
Mary Constance and it was over this that Gaston took Rylee, swinging her up into his
arms as though she weighed no more than an infant, reassuring her as the plank
wobbled and she cried out in fear. As he set her down on the deck of the Vengeance des
Raven, she thought her legs would give out beneath her.
“Steady as she goes, milady,” Gaston said, making sure she didn’t stumble.
Looking back at the Mary Constance, Rylee felt her world crashing down around
her. The crew was being forced over to the two eighteen feet long jolly boats, her still
unconscious husband dangling limply from the hands of Kyle and the captain. She was
terrified he had a concussion. Ataa was being held in Briarly’s arms and the little boy
waved at her, no sign of fear on his dark face. Apparently Kyle had said something to
reassure the child for Ataa had a broad smile on his face as though he were having a
grand adventure.
With men from his crew in charge of the Mary Constance, Andre hopped up on the
plank and came over to his ship with a surefootedness Rylee couldn’t help but admire.
Remembering the somersault off the crate, she thought him perhaps an acrobat as well
as a pirate. When Gaston would have taken her arm to guide her below, she pulled
back.
“Get us under way, Mr. LeRouge,” Andre told Gaston. “I’ll escort milady.”
“Rylee!” It was a forlorn shout that drew every eye to the Mary Constance.
The last sight Rylee had of her husband was him struggling as he fought the hands
trying to restrain him, his face turned to her with another shout echoing across the
water.
“Rylee!”
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Chapter Eleven
Sitting primly on the seat edge of an oversized chair in the luxurious cabin of her
abductor, Rylee had twisted her fingers together in her lap. The man across the room
from her was pouring two goblets of wine from a decanter that sat upon a heavily
carved sideboard no doubt bolted to the cabin wall. He moved with all the confidence
of a well-heeled host, saying nothing to her but surreptitiously watching her from the
corner of his eye. When he turned and came toward her, she tensed, fearing the lethal
calmness that might otherwise have intrigued her had it been under different
circumstances.
“I don’t want that,” she said.
“Humor me,” he told her, and held the wine goblet out to her.
“Getting me drunk will not make this wretched situation any the better for me,” she
stated.
“No, but perhaps it will calm you down a bit before you jump out of your skin,” he
said. Once more he extended the wine goblet.
Looking up into his inscrutable dark gaze, she saw something that made her think
better of denying him a second time. She took the wineglass but did not take a sip of the
rosy liquid.
Andre went over to the loveseat and sat down, placing one arm along the
back as
he relaxed, crossing his right ankle over his left knee before taking a sip of his wine. He
regarded her from under lashes far too long and far too thick to belong to a man.
“I am not an ogre, precious,” he said softly.
“Please do not call me that,” she asked. “I am nothing to you. I—”
“You will be my wife and when you are, you will be the most precious thing in the
world to me,” he interrupted her.
“I refuse your suit,” she said, lifting her chin.
Andre sighed and leaned forward to put his wine goblet on the long table sitting
before the loveseat. When he straightened up, he gave her a stern look. “Milady, you
can refuse all you like. I rather like feisty women.” His gaze hardened. “Up to a point,
that is. After that, they are more nuisance than enjoyment.”
“I struck a bargain with you and I will adhere to that bargain,” she said. “My heart
will always be with my husband and—”
“And I could turn this ship around and go back for him,” he snapped. When she
flinched at his tone, he pressed his advantage. “I could bring him aboard the Vengeance
des Raven and keelhaul him. Do you know what that is?”
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Rylee’s heart was thudding painfully against her rib cage and she could do no more
than shake her head in answer.
“We keelhaul men who deserve a punishment a bit harsher than a mere flogging,”
he told her and his foot bobbed up and down with what she knew was irritation. “It is a
penalty we don’t need to use that often but there is a rope looped under the keel, the
belly of my ship. The unlucky man sentenced to keelhauling will be stripped naked,
have his wrists tied together and then he will be thrown overboard on one side of the
ship then drawn up the other, being dragged beneath the belly of the ship.” He tilted
his head. “Is he a good swimmer?”
Rylee’s face drained of its color. Although Alsandair could swim, he was very
claustrophobic and being under water for any length of time was hard for him.
“Of course there are barnacles under the keel and the hapless fellow’s skin will
come into contact with those sharp—often razor-thin—edges which tend to scrape the
hell out of flesh. Naturally his cuts and scrapes bleed and if there’s a shark lurking
about, the flow of blood will draw it as we’re pulling the man back up.”
“Stop!” she said, feeling sick to her stomach.
“Then we take him to the bow and start the procedure over,” Andre lied. “Dragging
him from bow to stern under the keel takes about three minutes. If he’s a good
swimmer he might be able to hold his breath that long.” He shrugged. “If not, he’ll
drown.”
“Don’t!” she pleaded, tears streaming down her cheeks.
“Either way, you’ll be a widow if I go after him because if he doesn’t drown
beneath my ship, I’ll gut him when they bring him back up,” he said brutally.
Defeated, Rylee slumped in the chair, drawing her legs up and tucking them
beneath her, turning her head into the chair’s winged span as she gave in to her crying.
Andre sat where he was for a long time then got up and went to her, hunkering
down before her chair. He put a tentative hand on her leg, and when she didn’t flinch or
stiffen, he lightly squeezed her calm muscle.
“I am offering you something I’ve never offered another woman, Rylee,” he said
quietly. “I will be a good husband to you. I will care for you. I will protect you. I will lay
the world at your feet.”
Her eyes red rimmed, she lifted her head and turned to look at him, tears spiking
her long lashes. “Why?” she asked, confusion and hopelessness mixed in her strained
voice. “Why me?”
He put his hand to her face and cupped it gently. “Because long ago a Romney
woman read my fortune from a deck of stained cards and told me I would take one look
at the woman the Fates meant for me. She said I would lose my heart to her for as long
as I lived and into the world beyond.” He smiled gently. “I saw you through the spy
glass and…” He shrugged again as though there were nothing else he could say. “I’ll
never hurt you, precious. I will never let anyone else hurt you.”
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“I belong to another man and I always will,” she said, trying one last time to make
him understand her heart was already taken and nothing he did could change that.
The pirate removed his hand. “No, precious. You belong to me,” he said, and got to
his feet.
Rylee watched him leave the cabin, shutting the door softly behind him. She heard
the unmistakable sound of a key thrusting into a lock and knew he had locked her in.
* * * * *
Gaston LeRouge had known his captain since Andre Corsair was but a boy in knee
pants. He had watched the man the Privateer Brotherhood called Le Livreur de Glace—
The Iceman—grow to manhood and into becoming one of the most feared pirates to ply
the seas. Only the captain’s brother Louis had a reputation nearly as formidable as
Andre Corsair’s.
“I’ll take the wheel for a while,” Andre told his helmsmen.
Sitting on a keg as he had been chewing the fat with the helmsmen, Gaston—the
first mate of the Vengeance des Raven—silently regarded his captain as Andre took over
the navigational duties.
“You’ve something you want to say, Gaston?” Andre asked, not even looking at the
older man.
Before replying, the wizened man leaned over and took up a used tin cup. “She has
the most beautiful hair I’ve ever seen,” Gaston observed. He spat tobacco juice into the
cup then set the cup down again.
“Aye, she does,” Andre agreed. His thick black hair was blowing in the breeze, his
ebony eyes squinting as he kept his ship on course.
“Anlusian, is she?”
Andre nodded. “You can tell by the brogue.” He cut his eyes across to Gaston. “A
melodic sound in a female but it sounds stupid coming from a male.”
“I’ve always thought so too,” Gaston said. “I imagine her temper is as fiery as that
pretty hair.”
Andre grunted.
The men said nothing for a few moments then Gaston took up his cup to spit his
wad of tobacco into it. He then tossed the contents of the cup overboard.
“There you go polluting the sea again,” Andre said with a sigh.
“No worse than the piss and shit from every country in the world draining into it,
I’m reckoning. As it is, I’m merely giving the sharks a little treat they can chew on
instead of some hapless fish,” Gaston said, his mustaches twitching.
“Not only polluting the sea but addicting its denizens,” Andre scoffed.
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His rheumy brown eyes locked on the younger man, Gaston said, “You know it
won’t be legal in the eyes of man or the high sheriff if you have the Brotherhood set
aside her Joining.”
“Our marriage will be legal on Wicklaw Cay and that’s all that matters,” Andre
said.
“As long as she stays on Wicklaw Cay.”
A muscle ground in Andre’s jaw. “She will.”
“And you don’t think
that boy will come after her?” Gaston asked.
“He’d best not.”
Gaston shook his head. “Andy, son, you’re deluding yourself if you think you’ll be
able to keep her without there being one helluva duel between you and him.” He
cocked a sparse brow. “If you were in his boots, would you just leave things as they are
and not try to take her back?”
Andre didn’t answer. He looked to the stern of his ship to see the captured vessel
following in his wake. It was a good catch and the cargo one that could easily be sold
and a stiff profit made. Idly he wondered if Louis had fared as well.
“Don’t answer me then,” Gaston said, getting to his feet. “I suppose you’ll do what
you’ll do.”
Watching the old man amble off—the rolling gait of his bowlegs looking almost
painful—Andre felt the tug on his heartstrings that had been there for nearly as long as
he’d known Gaston. He bore great affection for Gaston LeRouge, even if that wasn’t the
aged sailor’s real name.
Giles DuPree, the ship’s cook, came to tell his captain the noon meal was ready.
“LeFrois!” Andre called out to the helmsmen. “Come take the wheel.”
Going below to fetch the woman he had stolen—and he had to admit that was
exactly what he’d done since thieving was his stock and trade—he dug into his pocket
to extract the door key. When he swung open the portal, he grinned for the lady in
question was curled up on the loveseat, her hands tucked beneath her head, sound
asleep.
He felt a momentarily pang of guilt knowing she’d cried herself to sleep.
Easing the door shut, he walked quietly over to her and stood looking down at her
beautiful face. The salty tracks of her tears were still on her cheeks, giving evidence of
her sadness. Her coral lips were parted with just a hint of white and even teeth
showing. Her knees were drawn up and she had kicked off her slippers. The sight of
those sweet little toes peeking out from the hem of her skirt did strange things to his
lower body. He could feel the tightening of his britches and put a hand to himself to
ease the sudden ache.
“She will be the one who will bring you to your knees, Andre Corsair,” the old gypsy
woman had told him long ago.
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