His mouth found hers again. She kissed him wildly in return, and when they pulled apart to breathe, she gasped, then played her fingers down his chest, following those tender strokes with a cascade of kisses and the caress of her tongue. He lowered his weight onto her, finding her mouth again, ravishing it, only to leave her gasping again while he followed her lead, lips against her breasts, her belly, below. She writhed in sweet anguish, her need for him allowing her mind little room for thought and reason. Ecstasy swept over her as she arched beneath him, caught in the moment of pure sensation, but then he was with her again, his mouth claiming hers, his body driving into her with slow and powerful conviction, and he was the most exquisite lover, teasing her with the slowest strokes, then moving like a storm at sea, raising a fire inside her that seemed to scream in silence for the ultimate release. It burst through her and took her breath away, momentarily stilled the thunder of her the heart, then burst like a million flares across a velvet sky, and finally the soft, midnight feel of wonder come sweeping down upon her as she trembled in the aftermath.
She was startled when he immediately and abruptly rose, then donned his breeches before turning back to face her.
“Listen to me. I want to live, not just survive. I want to live a life with a future and children and Christmas. I want to know that I will always sleep in the same woman’s arms. I want to be with someone who loves life and me more than any specter from her past, especially when I have been haunted by that same specter. That is what I want. You ruled the seas with a righteous hatred, but that is over now. And you are not by nature a killer or a thief. Think about it, Red. You can have me and the future, or you can spend your days still haunted by the past. So if you really want what I want,” he said, “then you have to come for me in town.”
And then, throwing on his shirt, he opened the door and left.
She lay there for long minutes in complete shock. Then, slowly, she rose and began to dress. When her clothes were on, she looked at the black wig on the desk. Her hands shaking, she started to put it on.
She couldn’t go into town without it.
But what in God’s name had he really meant? Did he want to…
Marry her?
SONYA HURRIED down the street. At the dock, she saw a boat just coming in. The man rowing it wore a hat, and his head was low. She wondered if perhaps he was ill, because he had a scarf tied around his neck.
“You there!” she cried. “Take me out to the ship anchored there—I will pay you well.”
The man hesitated, but finally he nodded. Sonya stepped down into the boat.
She had to see Red Robert. She had to know the truth, had to know if Blair Colm was really dead.
“You’re off to see the pirate?”
“Aye. Red Robert.”
“He be on his ship?”
“Aye, obviously.”
The man began to row, but she barely glanced at him. Her eyes were on the ship. Then she realized that he had rowed in a circle and taken them into the shadowy waters below the dock.
“What are you doing?” she protested in annoyance.
He looked up then.
And she knew the truth.
No, he wasn’t dead. It had been too good to believe.
She never had a chance to scream.
He struck her with an oar. She saw a burst of light.
And then…nothing.
LOGAN STILL HAD so much pent-up energy that he had waved off the crewman who offered to row him in. He was eager to put his muscles into the rowing of the little boat.
Would she come?
Would she don the wig of Red Robert one last time to come into the tavern and find him? He’d done nothing but wait for the last several days, but she’d made no attempt to find him nor even to summon him….
What had been left to do?
His thoughts so preoccupied his mind that though some part of him heard the noise while he was tethering the longboat, it didn’t seep through at first.
It had just been a mewling sound at first. Like a kitten.
Then it was a voice. Horribly weak. Hardly a whisper.
“Help.”
He looked around and saw nothing suspicious. Some workmen were busy farther down the dock; men were walking the streets. A carpenter was repairing a sign that advertised rum.
He stood still, and heard nothing. He started to walk, then thought that he heard it again.
There were other boats tethered at the dock, but they were all empty.
Then it came again. Barely a whisper, so weak. And it seemed to be coming from beneath him.
He dropped down on his stomach by the edge of the dock and looked underneath, where he saw a woman barely hanging on to one of the pilings.
He swore and, barely taking the time to doff his boots, jumped into the water. She was just keeping her head above the surface. He caught hold of her and realized that she was naked. He also realized that he knew her.
“Sonya!” He almost dropped her, he was so shocked.
Men often grew angry with whores and used them cruelly, but Sonya was the no-nonsense queen of the island. Who would have done this to her?
He hoisted her high, fiercely treading water as he found the strength to push her up on the dock. Then he crawled up beside her and threw his jacket over her. A huge gash marred the right side of her face.
“Sonya, I’ll get help for you. Just hang on,” he said, and started to move away. But she caught his arm and pulled him back with a surprising surge of strength.
Her mouth worked. He leaned low to hear her.
“He is alive.”
“Who is alive, Sonya? Let me get help for you!”
“Blair. Blair Colm.” She couldn’t open her eyes. She could barely whisper. “He is heading…”
Her words trailed away.
Logan stood, and bellowed loudly enough to be heard on the street. “Somebody help this woman! Get over here and help her!”
He waited a split second, just long enough to see that someone was heeding his call, then jumped back into the tender and started to row.
BLAIR COLM was stopped when he reached the ship and went for the ladder. He had expected as much. He pulled his scarf more tightly about his head and silently cursed the wretched skirt, which was going to make movement difficult.
“Is the captain aboard?” he called out in the highest pitched voice he could summon.
“Aye, what be the problem?” the fellow at the rail demanded.
“There’s a row in the tavern among his men. I must speak to him, and quickly.”
He was sure the sailor thought he was the ugliest whore imaginable, but he knew well enough that many a whore was not a beauty.
“I’ll tell him.”
“No, please, I must tell him what’s been said, what’s happened.”
“Come up, then, woman. Be fast. He’s in his cabin and not wantin’ to be disturbed.”
He was fast. The minute the crewman helped him aboard, he knifed him in the gullet and let him fall silently to the deck.
There were others aboard. He could hear men calling orders to one another. He had no intention of dealing with them. He strode instantly for the captain’s cabin.
DOWN IN THE TAVERN, Jimmy was bemoaning his luck with women.
Blimey, he couldn’t even propose properly to a whore.
A hand fell hard upon his shoulder. “O’Hara, you rutting little dog. I heard tell you went off and served under Red Robert. And I’m hearing that you fought a battle and didn’t go hiding beneath any sheets, neither.”
Jimmy turned. The massive pirate known as Blackbeard was standing behind him.
“Aye, it’s all true.”
“So that bastard Blair is dead, is he?”
“Must be, for the ship went down to Davy Jones’s locker,” Jimmy said cheerfully.
Teach had always treated him like scum. All right, so perhaps he had been scum. But he wasn’t anymore. He was going to be an honest man.
“So why do you look like a man drinking his woes away?” Blackbeard asked.
“I want to marry Sonya,” Jimmy said.
“Aye?” Blackbeard gave out a mighty laugh. Then, looking at Jimmy, he sobered. “She turned you down?”
“She went racing off to see Captain Red. Wanted to know if it was true that Blair was dead. She must have had a mighty hatred of the man.”
Just as he spoke, they both heard the cry in the street. “They found her down at the docks! They found Sonya!”
Jimmy actually pushed past the giant of a man to run all the way to the docks.
And then he saw her.
WHEN THE DOOR opened again, Red expected Logan.
He wasn’t making her come to him, she thought in relief. And she wanted to talk to him; she needed to admit that she was afraid—and why. Pirates weren’t supposed to be afraid, but she was terrified. Maybe she wasn’t a pirate after all, she thought with a wry grin.
Maybe she had hated too long.
Maybe…
But it wasn’t Logan. It was a woman. “What is it?” she asked.
The woman closed the door behind her, then seemed to stagger and fall. Red rushed forward to help her, but as she bent down to help, she felt steel fingers grasp her wrist. She tried to rise and free herself, started to shout out an alarm, but she was silenced and forced back, an arm like a steel pipe against her throat.
And then she saw who it was.
He eased his hold just long enough to lock both hands around her throat, still forcing her to move backward. She tried to raise her hands to fight him, but he was too strong.
And still he pushed her back.
Back to the bunk.
Where she had just lain with Logan.
She stared at him, struggling, trying to scratch and claw, but she was weakening, losing air, seeing the room grow dim. She could feel the wig slipping and expected him to squeeze harder, certain that whatever happened after, he had come to kill her, and kill her quickly.
But first he took one hand off her throat to rip the wig from her head, and then he smiled in a combination of disbelief and amusement, still keeping just enough pressure on her windpipe that she was rendered powerless.
“You are Red Robert?” he said.
She struggled fiercely. With his free hand, he was ripping at her clothing. She realized that he meant to rape her, then kill her. Debase her, take away all her pride. Hurt her.
His hands were on her. The hands that had slain her mother, her father. Little children. Hands that were covered in blood.
She had to find a way to fight. He was touching her breasts, ripping at the linen of her breeches. His hand was between her thighs.
No.
She knew he had a weak spot, and she managed to raise a hand and claw at his throat where she had cut him with the bottle.
Startled and in agony, he let out a scream but quickly rallied, bringing a knife that was wet with blood straight to her throat. She went still, but his hold on her had eased. He was relying on the blade to control her.
“Kill me now,” she told him. “Because I will never let you touch me.”
He smiled. “Dead or alive, my dear, I will debase you. I will use your dying flesh, and when I’m done, I’ll hang you out for the crows.”
It was over. Her life didn’t flash in front of her eyes.
She just waited for the blow.
It didn’t come.
He was suddenly wrenched away from her and thrown across the cabin.
And Logan was facing him with murder in his eyes.
Blair threw the knife. Logan barely ducked in time to miss the deadly missile, as Blair turned and flew out the door. Logan followed him, and Red jumped to her feet, straightening her clothing as she raced after the men…
And plowed straight into Logan’s back.
She caught her breath, looked around and saw that Blair Colm had been stopped.
They were not alone on deck.
Blackbeard was there, like a living wall of fury. There was nowhere for Blair Colm to run.
“Give me a weapon!” Blair Colm bellowed. “I demand my right to fight like a man.”
“You want a weapon, man? You think you should receive a fair fight?” Blackbeard asked.
“Aye, pirate’s honor, I demand it.”
Blackbeard hiked a bushy brow.
“Bull,” he said simply.
Then, he smiled, drew his pistol and shot Blair, point-blank.
The man stared at the huge pirate.
Slowly, he fell to his knees.
Blackbeard shot him again.
And he pitched forward.
There was silence for a moment. The air reeked with the spent powder and shot, a strange contrast to the beauty of the day.
Then Blackbeard shrugged, looking at the two of them.
“I suppose I should have allowed one of you the honor,” he said.
Red stepped around Logan and smiled at Teach.
“No, he is dead, and that is all that matters.” She walked over and put her arms around his giant girth.
“Thank you,” she said softly.
“Get this rubbish off the deck!” Blackbeard roared.
Two of the carpenters hurried forward and quickly took the body.
“Not overboard! His like rots in a gibbet, even in New Providence!” Blackbeard looked over Red’s head to Logan. “A lot of people will want to know he’s truly dead and gone.”
Logan nodded, still silent.
Red pulled away from Blackbeard. “Want another ship?” she asked.
He bellowed with laughter.
Then she turned and walked over to Logan. “I have just one question.”
“Aye?”
“Was that…a proposal?” she asked softly.
He grinned, going down on a knee. “Is this better?”
“You want me—me—to marry you?”
“Aye, that is what I want.”
It couldn’t work. He was a laird.
“Well?” he said.
“Well, lass?” Blackbeard prompted.
“I want what you want,” she told the only man she had ever loved.
THE BREEZE WAS SOFT as it drifted in off the water.
Magnolias dripped moss that gently swayed in the glory of the afternoon sunset.
“Are you nervous?”
She turned. Brendan, in a brocade vest and matching jacket, was at her side. He looked glorious. But then, he was attending the College of William and Mary up in Virginia, and he had learned a bit about attire from some of his classmates.
He grinned. “And you…You look like…a girl!”
She elbowed him.
“Truly, Red, you’re stunning.”
“Thank you.”
“But are you nervous?” he persisted.
In her own mind, Red had been married since that night in New Providence.
That was when Blackbeard had decided that, as a ship’s captain—and a pirate with a swiftly growing reputation—he needed to marry her and Logan then and there, that night. And so they were married, with a court of pirates and whores and thieves—and amazingly good friends—around them.
That had been easy.
She had a new friend in Cassandra. And it had been Cassandra then—as it was now—who stood up for her as maid of honor. Word had gone out that Red Robert had died in the fight with Blair Colm. Red Robert, being an upstanding member of the pirate community, had been buried at sea, while Blair Colm was placed in a gibbet.
Red didn’t need to see it done.
But Sonya was still at death’s door, with Jimmy O’Hara keeping watch over her, tending to her every need.
The crewman from her ship had miraculously survived, as well, though at first they had not thought he would. He had gone overboard—mostly dead, in his own words—and clung to the hull until Logan had arrived and pulled him in.
Red meant for Blackbeard to have her ship to add to his fleet.
He accepted.
/> So Roberta was married to Logan in a ceremony many didn’t understand but were still pleased to celebrate. And when it was over and they were alone, she had voiced all her fears for the future, and he had shushed her. He loved her. She loved him. And they would make it work.
It helped, of course, that once they were taken to an island near Charleston and “rescued,” they were quickly able to commission a ship and return for the treasure Logan had tossed overboard.
It had helped a great deal. In fact, Lord Bethany had merely rolled his eyes in amused surrender when Brendan and Cassandra had asked permission to marry. His time with the pirates had broadened his mind indeed.
But today…
Today she was to walk, on her cousin’s arm, down the aisle arranged in the garden of Lord Bethany’s very impressive Savannah estate. And she was nervous. For Logan’s sake, she prayed she might be accepted by society. Not that he cared. He assured her that they could go to the Highlands at any time, but she wanted to make a place in the New World, for theirs was a new life.
The music began.
“This is it, Red,” Brendan said softly.
She nodded, and they walked out. She saw so many wonderful people.
Jimmy O’Hara.
And his new wife. Sonya.
And there, unbelievably, was a happy if somewhat plain woman: Lygia. Lygia, who had made her own life bearable when she had been young.
Lygia, who appeared to be a bit tipsy, was on the arm of Silent Sam, and given how wealthy she was, society had no choice but to accept her flouting of convention.
She smiled as Red walked by her. And giggled.
Red kept moving. There was an altar in the gazebo, where a minister—a real minister, Lord Bethany had assured her—waited.
And there was Logan.
Tall, smiling, assured. And waiting for her.
She vaguely heard the minister asking who gave her hand in marriage, and she heard Brendan’s reply.
She turned and clung to him for a minute.
Then she met Logan’s eyes and took his hand.
The last mist of the past rolled away with an explosion of cannon fire from out at sea.
She saw Logan’s smile.
Blackbeard’s salute, sent from as close to the harbor as he wished to come.
The minister spoke, and she and Logan answered in turn.
The Pirate Bride Page 28