And then he was done. The crystalline pool seemed suddenly chilly. He turned and swam away from her. He didn’t tell her to turn away as he walked back through the shallows to the shore, his back to her, heedless of whether she did or didn’t watch. He picked up the towel he had brought, dried himself quickly, then stepped into clean breeches. Only then did he notice the soap, which he had tossed down by his clean clothing.
He turned back to her and saw that she was still floating far from shore. “Hey!”
“What?”
“Soap,” he said, and held it up to show her.
She wanted it. She definitely wanted it.
But she didn’t swim any closer.
“Hey, I can only it throw so far.”
She came closer at last.
He tossed the soap to her.
It landed closer still to the shore, where it floated on the surface.
She cast him an evil glare. “Thank you.”
“It’s nothing.”
“Perhaps you should go back and work on finding breakfast,” she suggested.
“Aye, Captain, I’ll do that.”
But he remained right where he was.
She stared back at him and swore beneath her breath, then apparently decided to call his bluff and swam for the soap.
Still looking at him. Still cursing him. And she could indeed curse like a pirate.
Ah, well. He took another long look and wondered how such a woman had ever managed to pass herself off to anyone as a man.
Then he turned, grinning, and headed back for the beach.
“BRENDAN?”
Brendan barely turned as Silent Sam walked up to him at the helm; his eyes were on the horizon.
“Aye?”
“Let me take the wheel.”
“I’m fine.”
“No, you’re not. Everyone must sleep at some point.”
“They’re out there. Somewhere,” Brendan said vehemently.
Silent Sam was silent.
“They’re out there,” Brendan insisted.
“They might be. And if they are, we’ll find them. Have faith in the man in the crow’s nest. We’ll sail to every island off the coast, sail until we drop dead of old age. But you’ll be worthless if you don’t get some rest.”
It was the longest speech Brendan had ever heard Silent Sam give. He looked at the man, and saw that his devotion to the cause—to Red—was real. At last he nodded wearily and stepped away from the wheel so Silent Sam could take his place.
“Who’s in the crow’s nest?” he asked.
“Hagar.”
Brendan nodded. “I’ll be in her cabin,” he said.
Silent Sam nodded.
In the cabin, Brendan realized that he and Red weren’t just cousins, or even the brother and sister they more often felt like, after everything they’d been through together. They were survivors. Her quest was his quest. And he couldn’t believe, with all that life had already dealt them, that he could lose her, too.
He wouldn’t believe it.
He had to believe she was alive. Logan had gone after her, and he was a survivor, too. Logan would have kept her safe.
If he had been able to find her in the churning dark waters.
If they had found a way to shore.
If…
They were out there somewhere together. They had to be. And they had to be…
Alive.
And he was going to find them. Or, as Silent Sam had said, die in the trying.
Be steadfast. Hold to the wind. It was the motto she survived by.
SHE HAD BEEN STILL for so long that the water felt cool, even chilly. She had watched him go, but even now, long minutes later, she was still staring at the shore.
Really, what does any of it matter? she asked herself mockingly. They could rot here for years. They could die here.
Another thought trickled through her mind.
Would it matter so much?
Most of her life had offered little but misery. She had learned about swords and pistols and sailing not for the pure joy of the thing but because it had been a welcome diversion from scrubbing floors and had offered her a better life, even if not an ideal one. She had stood up to a man and killed him because life had been preferable to death.
No way out of it. All roads led back to a slaughtered family, a massacre in a village and the end of the promise of a decent life. She knew that sorrow, even terror, visited every life. Death was no stranger to the rich, but it was harder on the poor, and often came on the order of the wealthy and the royal. Because kings could send soulless men to achieve their goals, with no thought to how it was done, commanding them only to leave no survivors, so there would be none left to tell the tale.
But Blair Colm was greedy as well as cruel. A healthy child who could work in the colonies would fetch a nice price. He had made one mistake, though. Blair Colm had never realized just how long hatred could simmer in the human heart.
That day on the pirate ship…
It had been her salvation. It had given her life, where she might have had none. And knowing he was out on the seas had given her a reason to go on. She had won her own freedom, and with it a chance to fulfill her burning desire to live, to avenge all the vicious brutality he had done to others.
And then…
Like a fool, she had taken a prisoner.
A man of reason. And charm. Intelligence and courage.
And he was beautiful.
Built rock-solid, smooth and sleek. She had thought herself immune. But as he had walked away, his muscles rippling, his skin gleaming with the droplets of water touched by the sun, he’d been enticing. Captivating. Seductive.
What she knew about sex wasn’t particularly appealing; she’d seen enough rutting right in the taverns she frequented to consider it all a rather nasty and grunting affair. What she’d seen of most men had not been attractive. Hairy, ugly…
But Logan…
She closed her eyes. The water seemed cold, but she was glad of it, because she felt flushed, burning from within.
She forced her thoughts onto a different path, remembering that awful moment when she’d seen the body and thought it was Brendan. It had been worse than death itself to think he might have died….
What of that poor fellow’s life? Had it been good? Had he been married? If his wife had been on the ship with him, had she survived the tempest? Were they good people, or had they been wealthy and titled and cruel? She found herself praying that he had lived a good life, that he had known pleasure, that he had been kind and decent.
It was no use.
No matter how hard she tried to think of something else, her thoughts kept returning to Logan. She despised herself for caring about him, for being so fascinated by him, his glorious body as well as his mind. He could tease, he could taunt, and he could challenge her, but he was never cruel. She wondered not so much about sex, to what she had seen in taverns and dark alleys, but about what it would be like to feel a gentle touch. To be held by him. To have him there to defend her, as he had done when she was set upon by the men in the alley.
She wondered what it would be like to feel the palm of his hand on her face, the soft pressure of his lips on hers, to hear his whisper, gentle and sweet…to let go of everything else, if only for a brief moment in time, even though it would not be…
Proper.
She wasn’t at all proper. She was the child of an Irishman slain at the command of William of Orange. She had grown up upon her hands and knees, scrubbing. And when she had turned out to be presentable, she had suddenly become the possession of a woman who had eventually seen fit to sell her once again. And then…she had become a pirate.
No, not a proper life at all.
She didn’t think she would ever be invited into any of the fashionable parlors in Charleston or Savannah.
But what did that matter, if she was seeking only a moment?
But there was more.
There was Cassandra.
<
br /> Another mystery. If she was as beautiful and sweet and intelligent as he said, what was his hesitation? Why were they not affianced? He obviously knew her well and cared about her, as she did him. So why…?
She would be a frozen prune in another minute, despite the fact that the sun was rising high enough to heat the air. She scrubbed herself thoroughly with the soap she had been holding for too long, then hurried to the shore, wincing slightly as she stepped on a jagged outcrop of rock. On shore, she hurried for the towel and the clothing she had chosen, cursing the fact that she hadn’t noticed Logan had done the same before her.
She dressed quickly in a man’s breeches and shirt, then happily slipped into a pair of hose and shoes.
She paused then, her thoughts inevitably returning to Logan.
He was a decent man.
Another man in such a situation might have raped her already. After all, she had captained a pirate ship. She was one of the brethren. She would have been seen as fair game.
Not by Logan.
In his way…
In his way, he seemed to know her. To understand her. Maybe, perhaps, admire her.
She had met men—even some, such as Teach, who were reputed to be animals—who were decent. Many who were kind. Who had standards and ethics.
But she had never met anyone who made her pause, who had given her a glimmer of an idea that she might like to truly live rather than merely live for vengeance. Not until she met Logan.
And that was both ridiculous and dangerous. She did not dare care for him. She could bear no more pain in her life.
But what if Brendan and all her crew were…lost?
They couldn’t be. The Eagle needed cleaning, but she was a beautiful, well-built ship. She would have made it through the storm.
And her men would come for her. She had to believe it, she thought as she started walking again.
She would believe it.
She stopped.
Her heart was beating too hard. She was trembling. She had to pray that they came soon…very soon.
THE SECOND BODY washed up on the shore while Red was still at the spring.
Grimly, Logan pulled the corpse ashore and dragged him to the place where they had begun their graveyard. He didn’t know how Red was going to react to a second dead man.
Well, he thought grimly, she wanted to be such a tough pirate. She must have dealt with dead men before. Yesterday’s reaction had been due to her fear that the ship that had broken up was her own and that the dead man was her cousin.
Still…
There was a vulnerable core beneath her facade, one he might never have discovered had they not landed upon this isle.
He walked down the beach, hoping to find something better to dig with than yesterday’s soup tureen. As he walked, he discovered a broken timber that had been painted with the ship’s name. D-E-S-T-I was what he read. Destiny? Probably. An ironic—indeed, sad—name, given its end. She must have been a merchantman, and she seemed to have been carrying personal belongings as well as cargo. Perhaps she had been bringing a bride to meet her groom in the colonies. Or perhaps the owner had been taking his wife on an extended stay to visit relatives in the new country. Or the old country, he thought. There was…no way to know in which direction the ship had been traveling. The man they had buried yesterday had appeared to be a gentleman, in any case.
Destiny.
It found them all.
A long box, partially battered in, offered him what he was looking for.
A shovel.
A most useful tool, since he was very afraid the day would bring more inhabitants for the graveyard.
He was on his way back to the cemetery when he saw Red walking toward him and stopped. She was dressed simply in men’s breeches and a shirt again. He had wondered if she might choose something from the costly feminine apparel they had found, but apparently she felt the facade must be maintained even here, in isolation.
Whatever helps her survive, he decided. But he wondered if she knew that, minus the coat and other accessories, the clothing she had chosen hugged her tightly and only enhanced the curves of her form rather than hiding them.
Not that it really mattered, given that he could picture her as she had been in the pool, minus any clothes whatsoever.
He gave himself a mental shake; they had a dead man to deal with, and then there was going to be the business of finding more food.
“My dear Laird Prisoner Haggerty,” she greeted him, her tone light, as if they had never met at the spring that morning. “I had thought breakfast would be prepared by now.”
He held still, wishing he could speak lightly in return, that he could challenge her to be the one to create their breakfast.
She saw his face and paused, concern rather than a frown coming to her features.
“Has…it’s not…?”
“I’m afraid another poor fellow has arrived, but not a man from your ship, Captain,” he reassured her quickly.
Still, she paled. “My God,” she murmured. “I wonder how many were lost.”
Not at all a real pirate, he thought. The salvage would have been uppermost in a real pirate’s mind.
“The sea can be a cruel mistress to any who risk her waves,” he replied. “Why don’t you look and see if we’ve anything other than biscuit? I shall tend to the man.”
She straightened her shoulders, stiffened her spine. “No,” she said softly.
He gazed at her quizzically.
“Someone must mourn the dead,” she said.
“As you wish,” he told her. “But I found only one shovel.”
She swallowed. “One is enough.”
He dug, and when she offered to take over, he shook his head and told her he could manage, so she stood by his side and watched.
She didn’t look at the dead man’s face, for which Logan was glad. This fellow was in even worse shape from the fish and the bloating than the first man had been.
Logan dug deep, then piled the soil high.
Once again, Red fashioned a cross, and they said the same prayers as they had before.
Logan realized he was drenched and winded, and his arms ached from digging through the hard-packed sandy soil. He leaned on the shovel, looking down.
When he looked up again, she had moved down the beach.
He put his shovel in the shelter, safe from the rain that was sure to come, and thought about building some shelves, and raising their beds above the ground, away from whatever rodents and crabs might wander in.
He heard her cry out with a note of triumph in her voice just as his stomach rumbled, and he hoped she had found food.
Leaving the shelter, he ran down the beach toward her. “What?”
“Fishing poles,” she said.
He stared at her.
“Fishing poles. We can catch fresh fish,” she told him.
“I see.”
She smiled slowly. “You’ve never fished?”
“Of course I’ve fished,” he assured her. Then he blushed and admitted, “Um, no, not really.”
“Never?”
“I was the captain of my ship,” he told her.
“And I was the captain of mine,” she reminded him, then gazed at him curiously. “What of your life…off the sea, Laird Haggerty?”
“Let us just say that fishing was not among my duties. However, I do believe I shall figure out the basics.”
She was still smiling. He let out a groan of aggravation and stepped forward to take a fishing pole. It seemed a simple enough device.
He took the pole from her and started toward the beach. Behind him, she cleared her throat.
“What?” he returned, more sharply than he had intended.
It only increased her smile. Perhaps he should be glad he could afford her such amusement.
“We should find some mangroves…that way. The fish will be there. And…a dead crab will make good bait. Or a live crab, if we can catch one.”
They walked on t
ogether, and he saw a crab shell on the beach, but on examination, the body within had long ago been nibbled away to nothing by other creatures.
“We could eat these guys, but they’re not the tastiest. If we can catch a red snapper in the mangroves…that will be very good.”
Logan managed to snare a live crab quickly, when it scurried up onto one of the trunks. He managed to keep away from the snapping claws, and then, irritated that she found his lack of expertise so amusing, he made quick work of sectioning the crab. If crabs suffered, that one did not do so for long.
She kept walking, then turned inland, where the ocean washed between the trees.
The area was sheltered and cool, and he could see that she had chosen well; the fish were actually visible in the shallows. Perhaps because he was once again determined to prove himself, he snared the first fish. And it was a snapper. A big one.
She watched him silently as he brought it in.
“Well?”
“Good prisoner,” she commended.
He swore and, turning with his catch, headed back for the shelter.
She followed, but paused on the way by their cache of treasures, searching until she found something that gave her pleasure. He tried not to watch as he started building a fire, but when she returned, she seemed so pleased that he had to ask, “Well? What did you find?”
“Tea. And that’s a lovely fire,” she said.
They set about their tasks; he prepared the fish, while she brewed the tea.
It was almost domestic.
The fresh fish was delicious, and the hot tea, mixed with sugar, made the perfect complement. They both relished their food in silence, but as he savored his last bite, he realized she was looking at him.
“Have I failed you in some way, Captain?” he asked her.
She shook her head. “Just how and where did you grow up?” she asked him.
“I think your past is the greater mystery.”
“Not a mystery. Just drudgery. But you…?”
“Your drudgery being a mystery, it seems my story should be the same.”
She shook her head, watching him still. “But it isn’t the same. I mean, it’s evident that you are loved and highly esteemed by many.”
“As are you.”
She waved a hand in the air. “I know of no one willing to pay a fortune on my behalf.”
The Pirate Bride Page 13