Dedication
This book is dedicated to Alexe Boone. It’s my way of saying thank you for the beautiful bracelet.
Contents
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Epilogue
Author’s Note
About the Author
By Beverly Jenkins
Copyright
About the Publisher
Prologue
1874
Pacific Ocean off the coast of San Francisco
“Hold him while I teach him some obedience.”
The knife sliced through the cheek of eighteen-year-old Noah Yates, and the searing pain made him cry out as he struggled against the three men keeping him in place.
“Yer face is too pretty anyway.” Captain Alfred Simmons chuckled malevolently, holding the bloody blade in his hand.
“My mother will pay for my release!” Noah pleaded, hating that he was begging, but it was all he had.
The watching crewmen laughed and a voice rang out, “Got us a mama’s boy, do we?”
“She as pretty as you?” another yelled.
Bruised from all the fighting he’d done since being shanghaied last evening, Noah Yates was weary, and yes, afraid of what might happen next. His older brothers, Logan and Drew, were undoubtedly turning San Francisco upside down in an effort to ascertain his whereabouts, but they’d never find him—not on a ship far out at sea. His fate and that of the others unwillingly forced aboard the ship rested in the hands of the foul-breathed Captain Simmons.
“I’m going to ask you one more time: Do you want to sign on with my crew?”
“No!”
“Take him belowdecks and put him in irons! He’ll change his tune. Bring that next one over here.”
So Noah was dragged belowdecks and chained to the floor by his wrists and ankles. Earlier, the captain expressed an aversion to confiscating religious items, so he’d let Noah keep the gold cross hanging from a chain around his neck, but his boots had been taken along with his other possessions, leaving him clad in his shirt and trousers. Two other men eventually joined him in the dark, damp hold. One, who appeared to be about Noah’s age, introduced himself as Kingston Howard, a dockworker from Los Angeles. The third offered neither name nor conversation. He simply sat and wept.
Blood from the knife wound seeped into the corner of Noah’s mouth and as he used his shirted shoulder to staunch the flow, the pain burned bright. Closing his eye until the fiery wave ebbed, he tried not to think about how frantic his family must be over not knowing his fate and how terrified he was about what might lie ahead.
And what lay ahead were weeks upon weeks of darkness, rats scurrying over his body at night and being given just enough food and water to stay alive. Captain Simmons never ventured below. Noah and Kingston tried to maintain their sanity by telling each other stories of their lives. Kingston spoke of his wife and son. Noah, who’d been abducted while celebrating his eighteenth birthday, talked about his family and his love for music and books. The third man was seasick for days on end and the hold was filled with the stench of his retching . . . He was finally taken above deck but never returned.
Over time, due to the damp conditions and lack of nourishment, infection settled into Noah’s wounded cheek, bringing with it fever, and as the poison spread though his body, delusion. Kingston told him later that the ship’s doctor came down to treat him, but Noah had no recollections of the visit, only the body-wracking chills and monstrous dreams filled with the face of Captain Simmons.
Noah had no idea how many days had passed when he and Kingston were roughly awakened by members of the crew. Their chains were undone and they were prodded to their feet. Noah’s legs immediately gave way, as did Kingston’s. The crewmen laughed and forced them to crawl up to the deck. It was the first full sun Noah had been under in what seemed years and the brightness stung his eyes. The air, unlike the cool breezes of his Northern California home was thick and humid, letting him know he was somewhere far from home. He saw Kingston clearly for the first time since their capture and was shocked at his filthy clothes, full growth of beard, and how emaciated the once big man appeared. Noah looked down at his own filthy self and guessed Kingston’s condition mirrored his own.
Captain Simmons sneered, “How’d you like the hold?”
Noah’s eyes blazed hatred.
“Have to admit, you got more stones than I gave you credit for. Figured you’d be begging to be free of the chains weeks ago. You ready to sign the crew articles now?”
Noah thought how easy it would be to just surrender and give himself over to the man who’d stolen his life, but he refused. “No.”
Simmons shrugged and turned to Kingston. “How ’bout you?”
“Go to hell!” came his weary-toned reply.
Simmons chuckled. “And that’s where you’re going. Throw ’em in the longboat, boys!”
Noah did his best to resist, but in his weakened state he was easily forced into the longboat where one of the crewmen held a pistol on him and Kingston as they were lowered to the surface of the sea.
Simmons called down from above. “Be back to get you—someday. In the meantime, enjoy yerselves!”
The crew’s derisive laughter rang out as they were rowed away from the ship towards an island in the distance.
Simmons was right. It was hell. An island prison camp. Noah had no idea how the captain knew about the place but it didn’t matter. He and Kingston were turned over to uniformed soldiers and led away.
During the day, it was the job of the one hundred male prisoners to transport felled trees to the small dock, where tied up ships waited in the shark-infested waters. At night, they were herded like cattle into the confines of an old stone prison left behind by the Spanish and locked in without food, water, or protection from each other. With no guards to ensure peace, it was every man for himself against murderers, rapists, and the deranged. The first night, Noah got no sleep because of the screams—some of which were his own. As his stay lengthened and the horrors continued, he prayed the nightmare would end, but was convinced God wasn’t listening.
To feed themselves after hours, prisoners roasted rats over makeshift fires. Others ate cockroaches, lizards, and anything else unfortunate enough to cross their paths. Noah and Kingston joined them. It was either that or starve.
In the months that followed, Noah grew stronger from the forced labor and from fighting to stay alive. Both he and Kingston were challenged by those who’d carved the prison’s population into fiefdoms and were looking for more subjects to rule, provide them with food, and be their lovers when called upon, but the two men proved their mettle by being as craven and fierce as their opponents and were eventually left alone. The uniformed guards, themselves disgraced Spanish soldiers, turned a blind eye to the nocturnal mayhem. They spent their days patrolling the work sites—bayonet-fitted rifles at the ready—and their nights buying favors from the local women. Their only concern was that the work be done, and that each morning enough men were still alive to ensure
that it would be.
After six months on the island, Noah no longer identified himself with the pampered youngest son of his illustrious California family. The night before, he’d thrust a man’s face into a fire for ambushing Kingston and breaking his collarbone. He’d become as feral as the tigers that hunted in the mountains, and as deadly as the sharks circling the coasts. His humanity had been shed in order to stay alive and he had no way of knowing if he’d ever reclaim that other self again.
A week later, he and Kingston, whose arm still hung in a makeshift sling, were pulled from their work detail without explanation and driven by wagon to the docks. Waiting there stood the smug Captain Simmons. “You boys ready to sign on with me now?”
Neither man hesitated. They affixed their signatures to the articles and followed him back to his ship.
Chapter 1
Summer 1887
Havana, Cuba
Pilar Banderas scanned the slew of vessels anchored in Havana’s crowded harbor. She needed to steal a ship. Disguised as an old woman and wearing a worn head wrap, a shapeless blouse, and dusty skirt, she leaned on a cane and continued her slow walk down the docks. Two brigs belonging to the hated Spanish navy were quickly ruled out as candidates due to their size and the surety of punishment should she be caught aboard. There were other vessels about, both smaller in design and tonnage, but these required more crew members than she had access to, so she quickly eliminated them as well. The most likely candidate was a two-masted schooner named the Alanza. Having sailed similar ships in the past, she knew it would easily make the journey to Santo Domingo for her rendezvous with the gunrunner and wouldn’t need a large crew. She’d had her eye on it since beginning her surveillance yesterday and the more she observed it, the more she cottoned to it. From intelligence gathered from friends inside the city, she knew the Alanza’s owner to be a wealthy American named Noah Yates, and that he docked in Havana annually to sell Oriental silks, spices, and other exotic goods to those with the coin to waste on such extravagances. Last night, he was seen escorting one of the city’s fabled beauties to the theater and after returning her home, he’d spent a few hours at a popular gambling hall where he won a sizeable amount of gold. Were he to lose his ship, he was undoubtedly wealthy enough to commission another, so she felt no remorse.
Pilar was an araña, a “spider,” one of many who gathered information on behalf of the Cuban rebels determined to rid their beloved island of Spanish rule. The last attempt at independence, known as the Ten Years’ War, ended in 1878 with a negotiated surrender by the rebels, but she and her compatriots were convinced the next campaign would be a success mainly because of the prowess of rebel leader General Jose Antonio Maceo, affectionately called the Bronze Titan by his followers for the color of his skin and his fearlessness on the battlefield.
Her decision on the Alanza made, she picked her way through the crowds and moved back to the three-legged stool that marked her spot on the busy dock, where Cubans of every hue, age, and size hawked everything from food and drink to religious medals in an effort to supplement their paltry incomes, all under the watchful eyes of the increasing numbers of Spanish soldiers on patrol. For the past few months, hundreds of new troops had been brought in to help keep the crown’s boot on the neck of the people. In a shameless effort to quell the rising dissent, thousands of people tied to the rebels had been rounded up and forced into squalid camps filled with despair, disease, and too little food. But instead of breaking the spirit of the movement, the calls for freedom were intensifying with the dawning of each new day.
In spite of the island’s underlying tension, the air near the docks was alive with the smells of food cooking on small braziers, the sounds of peddlers and musicians and the tangy scent of the sea.
“Where’s your badge, old woman?”
Pilar slowly raised her attention to the man who’d spoken in such a sneering tone, and eyed him for a moment. He had a thin, light-colored face, was dressed in a tight, Spanish-cut suit, and his hair was slick with pomade. “What badge?” she asked as she lined up the fish she was selling as part of her ruse.
“The badge that gives you the right to be on the docks.”
The graft in Havana was so pervasive even beggars were required to pay a bribe to beg. “I don’t need one.” Out of the corner of her eye she watched her friend Tomas ambling innocently in her direction. He was posing as her fisherman son in order to be part of her eyes and ears. He was also good in a fight should the need arise.
“Everyone needs a badge to be on the docks or you’ll have to leave.”
“Says who?”
“Says me.”
“And who’s your master?” she asked careful to keep her voice in the register of the aged.
His scowl announced he was not enjoying being challenged. “I have no master.”
“I think you do. His name is Gordonez. Yes?” She knew who ran the docks.
He stiffened.
“My name is Banderas. Tell him I am here on business and I don’t need his people fouling my web.”
Apparently infuriated by her refusal to be intimidated, he drew back his fist, but her steely glare gave him pause.
“Do you see that man there in the green shirt?”
He took a look at Tomas, who’d taken up a position a short distance away while the crowd flowed around him.
“He has a knife that can fly from his hand to your heart before you can blink an eye. If you prefer to die today, go ahead and strike me.”
His eyes widened.
She used her true voice: “Go give your master my message before I have you killed just for blocking my view.”
Plainly furious, he gave her a final glare before striding away.
Tomas walked over and added a few more freshly caught fish to her stacks. They’d been friends since infancy and shared the common pain of having their fathers hanged by Spain during the Ten Years’ War. “Who was he?”
“One of Gordonez’s men. I sent him away with a message that I hope he’ll take to heart. I’ll not have this ruined because he wants a tribute.”
“Let’s hope he does, because our prey approaches.”
Two men, both tall and brown skinned, wove their way down the crowded walkway, eschewing the offerings of the legion of hawkers. “Which one?” she asked.
“On the left. The other is his business associate, Kingston Howard.”
Pilar saved evaluation of Howard for later and discreetly focused her attention on Yates. His thick black hair was pulled back in a queue. Its texture and length heralded a man of mixed blood. As he drew nearer, she realized he was even taller than he’d initially appeared. His shoulders in the well-cut gray suit were wide and powerful. There was a silent power in his carriage, giving the impression that he was not a man to be underestimated or toyed with. As she took him in, from those shoulders to his expensive boots, an uncharacteristic frisson of nervousness coursed through her and she wondered if choosing another target might be more prudent. As he turned his face from his companion, she noted the cool depth in his dark eyes and the wicked scar that ran along his cheek. “Dios!” she whispered sharply. The scar was startling, but seemed to heighten the granite lines of an arrestingly handsome face.
“He won’t be easily bested, Pilar. Taking him on might be a mistake.”
She agreed, but the rebels needed those guns. At the conclusion of the Ten Years’ War, personal possession of firearms had been outlawed, so the populace was forced to deal with smugglers. “There’s no time to search out anyone else. If we don’t meet Octavio tomorrow night, he’ll sell the guns to another buyer.” The old smuggler was a family friend but business always outweighed the personal, and he wouldn’t wait forever, no matter how much gold he’d been promised.
By then Yates and Howard were abreast of Pilar’s position, so she called out in her crone’s voice, “Won’t you try this fine fish, gentlemen? It’s fresh.”
They shook their heads and continued walking.
“Fish is good for bed games,” she added. “Makes you strong and hard. Helps a handsome man last ’til sunrise.”
That earned her a slight grin but they shook their heads again and moved on.
“Bed games?” Tomas asked over a chuckle. “What do you know of that?”
Rather than admit the truth, she offered up instead, “I know we have to have his ship.” She stared at the retreating back of Noah Yates, hoping this wouldn’t be a mistake.
She was about to say more, but was interrupted by the return of Gordonez’s man.
“He wants to see you.”
“And if I refuse?”
He gave her a cold smile. “Then he will alert the authorities of your presence in the city, and we both know you can’t afford that.”
She looked to Tomas, who was observing the man malevolently.
“Alone,” the man added smugly.
“No,” Tomas replied coldly.
Pilar put her hand on his arm. “I’ll be fine.” She doubted Gordonez wanted his illegal operations impacted by General Maceo’s wrath should something happen to her. He might be a snake but he wasn’t a stupid one. “I’ll meet you after we’re done.”
Tomas nodded tightly, but promised. “If she is harmed in any way, my knife and I will come hunting—you.”
The confident smile withered.
Victorio Gordonez lived in a fine house on the outskirts of the city. He cultivated the façade of a wealthy businessman, but what lay beneath stank of corruption, extortion, and murder for hire. When Pilar arrived, his man escorted her to a study that was overly decorated with statues of saints and nude women. “He will be with you shortly.”
“Shortly” dragged on for over an hour. She knew the delay was an attempt by Gordonez to upset her, so instead, she used the time to devise her plan for Yates. She decided on one that was both simple and direct because that always worked best. Attempting something complicated and involved meant too many things might go wrong.
“Ah, Pilar. I wondered which Banderas sent the message.”
Destiny's Captive Page 1