“Nice,” Sam said, turning around to admire the place.
“I think so.” His compliment pleased me. I walked to the end of the room, where my desk sat across the top of the table, forming a T shape. It was my father’s, and he’d brought it over from England after he’d decided to settle here. When Tom died, it was the first thing I’d brought in, needing to make the place mine.
Sam followed me and ran his fingers over the wood. “English oak. It’s beautiful.”
I’d forgotten he lived aboard a ship—he would know the color and feel of all kinds of timber. Sailors often spoke about wood as if it were still part of the tree, a living thing, carrying in it the kiss of the sun and the breath of the wind in the branches.
“They’ll be here soon,” I said nervously. “Perhaps you should get behind the curtains.”
He picked up a paperweight and turned it over in his fingers. “I don’t like skulking.”
“Sam... you promised. You said that the council won’t let you stay.”
He gave me a moody glare. “Maybe if I—”
I gasped as the handle of the door turned. “Shit! Sam!”
In seconds, he’d dropped to the floor and crawled under my desk.
The door opened and several men walked in—the blacksmith, and the owner of the timber yard. I snapped my sagging jaw shut and walked forward to welcome them, trying not to think about the lusty pirate currently secreted beneath my desk.
“Gentlemen.” I gestured for them to take a seat, and welcomed the others as they began to turn up. The girls brought in teapots and plates of freshly-cooked biscuits, and everyone sat, ready to begin the day’s business.
Henry Cook was one of the last to arrive. I smiled and gestured to a spare chair, trying not to let my dislike show on my face. He was tall, although not as tall as Sam, with odd, pale eyes and a dark, greasy wig that looked as if it had never been washed. I felt a sudden wave of relief that Sam refused to wear a wig. Later I might be able to slide my fingers into his long locks and see if they were as silky as they looked.
I shook my head, trying to shake thoughts of him out of my mind, and sat at the head of the table, taking great care not to look down as I tucked my chair under. I could feel him there, though, firm against my knees and feet. I crossed my legs at the ankles, and felt his hand rest there, warm on my lower calf. I was tempted to kick him away, but his touch was gentle and reassuring, so I let it stay.
“Gentlemen,” the mayor said, ignoring the fact that not only was I present but they were all currently sitting in my tavern, “the first item on the agenda is current steel prices.”
It was always this way, and rarely did they raise any issues that were of interest to me, but when Tom had died I’d offered the council one free visit a week with a girl for each member, and that had been enough to keep them holding the meeting at the Twisted Lime. That way I felt I held some small standing in the town, and so far everyone had been respectful enough to let me keep the position.
Still, I found the meetings boring, and my attention soon turned to the feeling of Sam’s hand on my ankle. His thumb stroked my calf, and as I settled back in the chair and prepared myself for the usual thirty minutes or so of dull conversation, Sam’s hand crept up my leg to my knee.
I didn’t react, but my heart began to beat a little faster as he stroked up and down the lower half of my leg, slipping his thumb behind my knee to brush the sensitive skin there. It had been an eternity since I’d had a man in my bed, and even longer since anyone had touched me with anything like the gentleness Sam was touching me with now. My lips parted, and I began to drift into a hazy dream world as his hand covered my knee, then slid slowly up my thigh.
The climate in Nassau was generally hot and sultry, and the only clothing I wore beneath my gown was a linen chemise. The touch of his fingers on my bare thighs sent tingles skittering through me.
The rogue... I knew I should kick out or reach down to slap his hand away, but the sensation was so beautiful that I didn’t want him to stop. I felt him shift beneath me, moving between my knees, and then he put his hands on them and pushed them apart.
I bit my lip to stop myself exclaiming, and held my breath. His hands stroked up my thighs, gentle and soft, and I tingled all over, my nipples tightening beneath the bodice while muscles I’d forgotten I possessed clenched deep inside.
He stroked down, up, down, up, going further up each time, and then he rested his hands on my inner thighs right at the top and pushed them a little wider.
The mayor was still droning on, with the blacksmith and some of the other shop owners interjecting from time to time, and nobody was looking at me. Thank the Lord, I thought, because I knew my cheeks must be flushed as my face felt hot, burning with embarrassment and desire.
Sam touched his thumbs to the base of my mound and stroked up, lightly at first, and then again pressing more firmly, spreading the moisture I knew must be there up through my folds.
I suppressed a groan, unable to believe he was doing this to me right in the middle of a public meeting. The man had no morals, no decency—and yet I couldn’t bring myself to scold him for it.
I felt him slip his right thumb down and slide it inside me, pushing it deep until the base of his thumb met my thigh, and then he removed it and brushed up to my clit and circled the pad over it.
I caught my bottom lip between my teeth, knowing I couldn’t close my eyes or they’d all think I’d fallen asleep, but my eyelids were growing heavy with desire, fluttering as he continued to stroke me.
He had to stop soon, didn’t he? Surely he wasn’t going to carry on until I...
He shifted beneath me, and my thoughts shuddered to a stop as I felt him press his lips against my thigh.
No...
He kissed there, then up a little higher, his tongue coming out to lace against my skin in between each kiss, moving closer and closer to the top of my thighs with each press of his lips.
The mayor had stopped speaking and Henry Cook was talking now, complaining about some fight that had broken out the day before in the square. I couldn’t concentrate on his words though because Sam’s lips were still moving, kissing slowly up my thigh, and then I felt his hot breath between my legs.
I had to stop him. I couldn’t sit in a town council meeting and let a pirate perform oral sex on me. But Lord help me, I couldn’t stop him—I felt myself moistening, swelling in anticipation of his tongue.
And then he did it—he leaned forward and brushed his tongue up from my entrance to my clit in one long, slow lick.
I covered my mouth with my hand to stop myself moaning. No man had ever done this to me. I’d seen it enough times in the private rooms to know it happened, but Tom had never been interested in giving me pleasure, and this first sensation of a man’s warm, wet tongue on my most intimate area almost made me cry.
Sam stopped and brushed his hand along the outside of my thigh in a strangely reassuring manner, almost as if he was aware it was the first time someone had done this for me. Then he lowered his mouth again, and I felt the soft, sexy swirl of his tongue over my clit, the sensual, slick slide of it down into my folds.
My eyes were open, but only just, and my gaze grew unfocused as all my concentration centered on the amazing sensations radiating throughout my body. My limbs released the last dregs of tension, and my thighs relaxed, falling open to welcome his touch.
He continued to give me long, slow licks, following them with a tease of my clit with the tip of his tongue. At the same time, he inserted two fingers inside me and began to stroke them in and out, pressing firmly against the front wall of my vagina.
I’d rarely had an orgasm with Tom—if I’d had one it had been more by luck than skill, and I couldn’t believe Sam was paying me such attention with no thought to his own pleasure.
I felt my climax building and panicked, knowing I couldn’t come in front of the town council, but it was too late, too late, and the tension spread throughout me, culminating
in strong, exquisite clenches of my internal muscles around his fingers.
“Oh!” I said out loud at the final, intense pulse.
As one, they all turned to look at me.
Sam withdrew his fingers, and I was sure I heard a stifled chuckle beneath the table.
I pushed myself upright and moistened my lips with the tip of my tongue.
“You wanted to add something, Mrs. Woodville?” asked Henry Cook, his pale eyes narrowing.
I cleared my throat. “My apologies—I just meant to say I agree with the mayor that there should be a guard placed on the storage facilities at night. I’ve had two thefts of wine from there.”
“Thank you,” the mayor said. “Then the motion is carried. We will organize a guard forthwith.”
I leaned back, relieved that I appeared to have covered myself.
Beneath the table, I felt Sam’s hand rest on my calf. I kicked it away, and this time I heard a definite chuckle.
I ignored him, though. The meeting was drawing to an end, and the council members were putting away their notebooks, their eyes brightening as the time approached for them to claim their weekly prize with the girls. I rang the bell on my desk, and almost immediately the door opened and a line of my girls walked in. The men chose their partners and exited the chamber bound for the girls’ rooms.
Only Henry Cook remained, shuffling papers on the desk and refusing to look up until the last man had left the room.
The door closed.
Chapter Five
Henry had never taken advantage of my offer of a free girl. I wasn’t sure if that was because he felt it beneath him, or if he just didn’t have those kind of urges. He was married to Beth, a timid mouse of a woman who had never said two words to me or any of my girls, and I couldn’t imagine she was able to provide much entertainment in the bedroom, but Henry didn’t come searching for alternative companionship so she must have lit his candle in some way.
“All the powder in the world couldn’t cover up those kinds of bruises,” Liza had once commented when she’d spotted Beth at the local store, so I guessed his tastes lay in dominating those weaker than him. Well, if he thought I was easy pickings, he had another think coming. I was determined I wouldn’t roll over and show my stomach. I had a few tricks up my sleeve, including a notorious, if somewhat licentious, pirate stowed under the table.
“Madam,” Henry said as I waited near the door for him to leave. “May I beg a word?”
You can beg all you like but you’re not getting what you want, I thought, although I didn’t say the words. “Of course.” I decided not to sit back at the head of the table. Sam was there, and I needed what little wits I still possessed after his lewd actions.
I walked around the table and took the seat opposite Henry. “What can I do for you, Mr. Cook?”
“It is more what I can do for you, Mrs. Woodville.”
I cleared my throat. “What do you mean?”
“Have you given any further thought to our conversation?” It was the nicest he’d been to me for weeks, and I bristled. I wanted him to be his usual mean self so I could show Sam evidence of how he was treating me.
“You mean the one in which you produced a fake document and demanded I hand over my tavern to you?” My voice could have cut glass.
His jaw worked as if he was chewing toffee, but he didn’t say anything. I thought of Sam, sitting under the table with his hands around his knees. He would be frowning, no doubt wondering if my monthly cycle was due to start in a day or two.
Henry pushed himself to his feet. He walked away, over to the window that looked out onto the orchard, his hands behind his back. I resisted the urge to duck under the table and yell at Sam I’m not going mad!
“I am a decent man,” Henry said. “I have no wish to see you cast out on the streets, Madeleine. Give me what is mine by law, and I will ensure you are kept on at the tavern.”
My eyes widened. He meant as a whore. I felt the blood drain from my face.
I saw no problem with women earning a living from selling their bodies. For many it was the only way they could avoid destitution. Young women of low birth had few choices open to them, and lying on their backs and opening their legs was a lot easier and more profitable than working their fingers to the bone in the fields.
But I had never done so myself. His insinuation that the oldest profession was the only one left open to me was an insult that hurt me to the core.
“Thank you for being so considerate,” I said. Icicles dripped from my words. “But the law had no part in that document. It was not my husband’s signature, and my body will be stiff and hollow and crawling with maggots before you call this tavern your own.”
Henry stared at the view for a moment longer. Then he turned and walked around the table. He passed by my desk, beneath which Sam was still sitting, and he strolled along the other side of the long table toward me.
I refused to move, even though he walked with menace. He approached me, and continued to walk forward, forcing me to take a step backward, although I hated myself for it.
My back met the wall with a bump, and he moved until his body was almost touching mine. Although he wasn’t as tall as Sam, he still topped me by a few inches, and he looked down his long nose at me, his pale eyes filled with hatred.
He surveyed me with clinical, cold interest, the way a doctor might peruse a hacked off limb with fascination. “You think you are superior to me,” he said with dawning realization. “You consider yourself above me—you, the owner of a whorehouse and the widow of a weak and feeble idiot.”
He barely murmured the words. Almost certainly, Sam would not be able to hear him.
For the first time, though, Sam’s presence and his witnessing the conversation became less important than me making this man suffer.
“I am above you,” I whispered. “I’m so far above you that to me you are just an insect.”
He shot out a hand and grabbed my throat, pinning me to the wall. His fingers tightened, and a deep loathing filled his eyes. “I will find it,” he snarled. “I know you think you have hidden it where nobody will ever discover it, but once I have this house I will tear it apart until it is mine.”
My protest came out as a strangled cough. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Sam rise to his feet and step toward me with a face like thunder, but behind Cook’s back I held up a hand, and he stopped.
“It will never be yours,” I spat, and I brought my knee up with such force that it connected with Cook’s sorry excuse for manly parts as solidly as if I’d hit him with a chair leg. He doubled over, exhaling with a wail.
Sam frowned as I clasped my throat, but I gestured to him to hide again, and with a glower he sank beneath the table.
“Get out,” I said to Cook, whose chin rested on his knees as he clasped both hands between his legs. “And don’t you dare think about returning unless you come with an apology.”
In too much pain to argue, he stumbled to the door, wrenched it open, tottered into the corridor, and disappeared down the hall.
Starting to shake, I sagged back against the wall, my hand at my throat.
Sam reappeared and strode over to me. “Are you all right?” He cupped my face, lifted my chin, and examined my neck.
“I’m fine.” I pushed his hand away.
He glared at me. “You should have let me turn his face to pulp.”
“Although that would have given me great satisfaction, his henchmen would only have taken his place.” My voice sounded hoarse, and Sam reached across the table for a jug of water and poured some into a cup for me. “Thank you.” I sipped it, grimacing as I swallowed.
“Because they will come looking for the item he is searching for,” Sam said.
I swallowed some more water, welcoming the cool slide of it down my throat. “Yes.”
“Do you think you owe me the courtesy of telling me the whole story now?” His blue eyes were like discs of ice. He did not like being lied to.
I pulled out a chair and sank into it. I’d hoped to keep it a secret from him, but clearly I was going to have to tell him everything or he wouldn’t help me any further.
“I don’t think you knew my father. Before he came to Nassau, he was fond of gambling. My mother brought a sizeable dowry to the marriage, but within a few years he’d spent all the money. When I was five my mother left our house in London and took me with her to live with her family in Devon. My father regretted his actions and wanted to win her back. He put aside his gambling, but even though he worked hard in the shipbuilding yard for a year, he could only make enough money to barely get by, and there was never enough to save. He turned to piracy and travelled to the Bahamas. He built the Twisted Lime and started to save money with the intention of bringing my mother here.”
“I didn’t realize the Lime belonged to your father,” Sam said softly.
“Yes, the tavern has always been mine,” I said, “although naturally it passed to Tom when we married. Anyway, before my father died, a pirate by the name of Mark Little came to Nassau. He was in high spirits and visited the Lime to celebrate. He soon became drunk as a preacher. When he was in his cups, he told my father that he had been to Tahiti, and there he had found the biggest pearl ever discovered.”
Sam’s eyebrows rose. “A black pearl?”
“Technically, yes, but actually it is more a blue-silver.”
Sam’s eyes widened. “You are talking about the Sky Pearl?”
“Yes.”
“I thought it was just a myth.”
“No. It is real.”
Sam studied me, and I could see his brain working furiously. “What happened to it?”
“While Little was staying at the tavern, he got into a fight with another sailor and was killed. My father found the pearl amongst his effects. He sailed back to England with the intention of giving it to my mother, only to find she had died. So instead, he took me from her family, brought me back, and I grew up here.”
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