“Are ye a sailor, lad?” he called back to me. I was trying to decide what to do. I couldn’t wait to run back to the McCormack’s house and share every last bit of this with the girls but I couldn’t move. I didn’t want to move. I could have sat there all night and just watched him and listened to him. It was then that I decided that was exactly what I was going to do.
“Ivan,” I replied.
“What’s that?”
“The name is Ivan. Ivan Razor.”
“Good name, lad. Rasmus Bergman, but my mates call me Razz. You, may call me Captain Bergman.”
“You’re a captain?” I gasped, and I clambered to my feet and extracted myself from the heavy coat.
“Aye. I…lost my other ship not long ago and not far from here.”
“Lost it?” I asked.
“So, you didn’t answer my question. Do ye sail?”
“I have sailed. I sailed here from America, and from London to America before that.”
I did my best to sound brave, as if I had the experience, but something told me he could see right through me. I imagined he could see me swabbing decks on the Demon and feeding chickens in Charles Towne. I wondered if he could also see me killing. He leaned back and looked at me over his shoulder and gave me that eyebrow again to confirm it. “What are ye lad, fifteen?”
“Eighteen,” I shouted back. “I mean to say…eighteen, Captain.” I swallowed hard and looked away.
“My arse you’re eighteen. What I meant to ask was, do ye know the ropes? Can ye sail?”
Here was a man, naked as a fish in the sea, yet he was still completely a man. As I stood there in my wet boots, waistcoat, and breeches, I was still no more than a bold and careless girl playing dress up. The very spirit of his existence was a man. His masculinity was a tangible feeling, just being near him. I told him the truth. A man like Rasmus made it impossible to lie anymore tonight—at least about sailing.
“I know a bit about it. I worked on the ship that brought us, I mean me…to Jamaica. I swabbed and tarred the decks. I raised sails—with the other mates, I mean. I learned a good amount in those few weeks.”
“That’s a good start, I suppose,” he said. He stood and walked to a small sloop that was tied off on the opposite side of the pier. “I’ll be right back. Don’t run away, son,” he said as he gathered the still wet clothes and climbed aboard the sloop.
I thought I should run away. Every other thought in my head was to run, and yet I still didn’t. I couldn’t. I wanted more of him. I wanted to listen to him speak. I wanted to watch him stroke that damn beard. God help me, I wanted him to throw me over his shoulder again. My head was swimming, and I was wondering if I’d hit it on something when he threw me in the harbor. Yes, that’s it. I was chewing the fingernails on my left hand and pacing for the few minutes it took for him to jump back onto the pier. He was back, and unfortunately, dressed.
“Shouldn’t ye be getting on home?” he asked, raising one red eyebrow.
“I suppose that would be the best thing to do. I’m getting very itchy in these wet clothes.”
“Show me the way,” he said as he took me by the elbow and pushed me along.
“Wait, you can’t…”
“I’m not going to rat ye out. I just want to make sure you get there in one piece.”
“Captain, sir,” I stopped and pulled my arm free of him. “I got down here in one piece, and I’m sure I can get home the same way.” I was becoming as angry as a hurricane, and quick, but I didn’t know why. I wasn’t sure if it was the way he treated me like a child, when beneath my façade, the woman parts of me were stirring like a cyclone, or because I still had to keep up this masquerade and not have him see me for who I truly am.
“Well then, let’s walk together, and you can tell me a little more about your journeys.”
I walked on. As we made our way through the streets, I was careful not to fall out of character again, and although I strolled as close to the complete truth as I could, I did embellish just a tiny bit. I didn’t dare expose the number of killings I’d done. I didn’t think he’d believe me, anyway.
“Well, we can say goodnight here, Captain,” I said when the lantern light of the McCormack’s front porch was a good, hard stone’s throw away.
“Is that it?” He leaned back a bit and gripped the lapel of his coat. “Beyond this stone wall and fancy gate?” He looked down at me so wide I could see the whites all around his blue irises and his eyebrows disappeared beneath the brim of his hat. “Rough life ye got there, lad.” He chuckled.
“I’m just staying here with my mates until I can find my own place.”
He stroked his beard and appeared to have a long deep thought about something. Then, he said, “Tomorrow morning at sunrise, meet me at my sloop.”
“Why? Are you planning to throw me overboard?” I laughed. He smiled.
“I was thinking I haven’t anything planned but lying about, so maybe I could do that while ye take my little Blue Oyster out and stretch her legs.” He winked.
I bit my lips closed and held myself upright with all I had. “I believe I also haven’t anything worth telling to do tomorrow.”
“It’s settled. Fair winds to ye, lad.” He bowed and turned to go, but then he stopped as I was about to scale the wall and sneak back in. “I almost forgot…” he said as he stepped towards me. I could feel the air around him dart out of his way until he was almost flush against me. He took me by the shoulders and said, “It’s an odd feeling when I’m this close to ye. I don’t believe I’ve ever found myself this close to another man in my whole life that I wasn’t beatin’ the tar out of. What’s even stranger is the peculiar urge I’m feeling at this moment to kiss ye goodnight.”
I shoved off from him and he tugged me back. “I beg your pardon, Captain. I believe we’ve already established that I am not…”
“A man,” he finished for me. As I gaped at him in silence as he continued, “I was in His Majesty’s Navy, and I’ve sailed every body of water as could keep a ship afloat, lass. I can tell the sexes apart from a hundred yards.”
I lowered my head at the realization that I’d fooled a bunch of silly drunks and a horny tart, but I’d never be able to fool a man like Rasmus Bergman. Not only that, I wanted him to kiss me. I wanted to know if that fire in his beard would burn my mouth, and I longed for those meaty paws to stroke me everywhere. His hold on me was so firm that I was stunned at the tenderness in his touch when he lifted my face by the chin with his fingertips.
“I’m not going to kiss ye, lass. I’ve no intention of taking advantage of ye at all, and I meant what I said. If ye plan to carry on as a man, whether or not ye prefer tits, I’ll not expose ye. The way I see it, a woman would have to have a mighty damn good reason to play a man, and I love a mystery.”
Rasmus released me and when he let go, I caught myself on his sleeve to keep from falling. I felt as if he was still holding me up by the chin. “Sunrise,” he said with a nod and walked away.
“Wait!” I shouted after him. “When did you know?”
He turned back to me and said with a smile, “Lilly’s a pain in the arse and a pushy little broad, but she’s the finest set a’ tits in that tavern. There ain’t a red blooded man alive who’d not at least have a little nip of one before he shoved her off. Goodnight…Ivan.”
Chapter Nine
~Fire and Ice~
I knew it was way past midnight, and yet I heard noises coming from the cottage behind the house. I was about to make the climb up to the back porch roof and in through the bedroom window but I stopped and listened. Within a few moments, I knew exactly what I was hearing. I slinked the twenty or so paces across the backyard and lay back flat against the wall as I slid to the side window. It was folded open, and the closer I moved towards it, the more I needed to see who either Watts or Townsend was enjoying their time with.
When I turned my head to get my right eye around the corner far enough to catch a glimpse, I recognized instan
tly the giggles and voice of Miranda. She was naked to the waist and sitting astride River, who sat shirtless in a chair. A single candle burned on the table next to them, illuminating their lust as they explored each other’s bare flesh with their hands and mouths. Oddly enough, I was more embarrassed than angry. My cheeks flushed and I turned away quickly, trying to decide what I should do. My first instinct was to slit his throat, but damn that stinking swab; he had somehow tricked me into liking him.
“Y’are a saucy lass, Miranda. You’ve stole me heart and soul,” River moaned.
“That’s ‘cause we’re pirates, you see. You better be careful, or I’ll steal everything you’ve got,” she giggled.
“Yer no pirate, but yer a mighty good thief.”
“What thief? You gave yourself away, and quite willingly, too,” she laughed.
We’re pirates she’d said. What the devil was she up to? I thought to myself that I really needed to break this up before it went too far, and I walked to the door and knocked. I could hear the rustling of clothes being roughly pulled back on, and I almost laughed at how comical the sight must have been. “Miranda? I know you’re in there,” I said in my sternest tone.
The door blew open and River stood with his hands outspread against opposite sides of the door frame. “Now, don’t be cross, Miss Shepard. We was only messin’ around a bit.”
I reached around his waist, snatched Miranda by the arm, and pulled her out from behind him. “Forget about it, River. Goodnight.”
“Aren’t you going to kill him?” she screeched and yanked hard away from me. “He said you told him if he came near me again, you’d kill him,” she whined as I snatched her again and drug her across the yard in the dark.
“Hush. You’ll wake the whole house,” I moaned. “And do you want me to kill him, for Christ’s sake?” I stopped and glared at her.
“No! Lady Millie knows I was with Watts. She said she didn’t care what we did ‘cause we’d all be gone soon enough. She was very drunk though when she said it. You told us to keep them occupied anyway, remember?”
I shoved Miranda hard ahead of me and said, “Get in the house and go to bed before I whip you.” Then, I turned back to speak to River.
“River, open this door. I need a word with you,” I said as I knocked.
As he opened the door and swished his arm across his body to welcome me in, the smirk on his face told me plainly of his disappointment at being interrupted.
“Miss Shepard, I swear to ye…”
I pulled out my razor, flipped it open, and I laid it against River’s throat. His hands flew up at his sides, and I broke the skin and warned him not to move. I ordered him to sit down in the chair he’d been professing his love in a few minutes before.
“Life, and its twists and turns, aye, River?” I said. I stepped behind him and held my razor against his neck.
“What do ye want? I promise I won’t lay a hand on her again,” he said as beads of sweat formed on his forehead.
“Why did Lady Millie allow you two to be alone together?”
“I don’t know. I swear it. Miranda knocked on the door around midnight and said Lady Millie sent her.”
“Sent her? You don’t expect me of all people to believe that, now do you?”
“If ye don’t kill me, I will tell ye somethin’, but only because I’m tellin’ ye the truth of my feelin’s for Miss Miranda. I do love her, and I want her to be me lady.”
“You, my dear Mister Watts, are a fool’s fool, and you don’t make a woman your lady by getting up under her skirt,” I said as I retracted my razor and backed away. “Your intentions with Miranda are not my concern at the moment. I need to know what Lady Millie is up to, and where has the Captain been? I haven’t seen him since dinner two nights ago.”
“Miss Shepard…”
“I believe we are more than well acquainted enough for you to call me by my first name, Samuel.”
“Miss Ivory,” he said as I rolled my eyes at him, “they’ll kill me if I tell, and for the first time in me life I got somethin’ worth livin’ fer.”
“How old are you, River…really?” I asked. I leaned back against the small table and ran my fingers lightly over the candle flame.
“W...well, I’m not yet twenty, but I think I’m older than seventeen,” he said. He began to relax, and he leaned forward with his forearms on his thighs and looked up at me.
“You really don’t know, do you?”
“No. Barclay picked me and a few others off a ship bound for Barbados when I was just about waist high. I don’t know what happened to me parents. I reckon they’re dead. He had three of us lads, line up to lift a sack a’ sugar. I was the only one who could, so he snatched me up by me neck and made me his cabin boy. I don’t remember much before that day,” he said and stared at the floor.
“No, I suppose you wouldn’t.” I sighed, and memories of my own harshly interrupted childhood flowed into me and softened my temperament. I paced the room and pulled myself together. “Who’s going to kill you—other than me that is, unless you tell me what’s going on here?”
“The lady herself for one, and maybe Rip.”
“Rip? I thought he was your best mate?”
“Rip ain’t nobody’s best mate but Rip’s.” River stood and walked to the window and scanned the yard. Then he did the same with the door.
“Are you expecting someone?”
“Listen, ye better take them girls and get as far away from here as ye can.” He was speaking quietly, but he was animated and waving his arms. His expressions were damn near frightening.
“Not until you tell me what’s going on.”
“Please, just do what I said.”
“Whatever this is, does the Captain know?”
“No. He’s blind ta’ her schemes.”
“That’s it. I’m not leaving here until you tell me.”
“She sells ‘em,” he shouted at me in a whisper, again with his flailing arms. “She sells ‘em off ta’ pirates fer their damn fuck tents. She gets twice as much when they’re clean and pretty. Now please, will ye just go?”
“Who else knows about this?” I ran to the window and door myself this time and drew my razor, too.
“All I know is the Lady and Rip have connections ta’ pirates outta Kingston, Tortuga, and a few other places, and they’ll be comin’ in ta’ port any day now ta’ collect.”
“How do they even know she has ladies to sell?” I couldn’t believe I was asking that question. Selling human beings had always been high on my list of things I loathed, but to know I was now among them, not once but twice, burned in my chest as if I’d been hit with a pistol shot.
“They don’t, but at least one a’ their ships comes through here ‘bout once a month, and the first place they stop is the Golden Gull.”
“Is that why you and Rip were there last night?”
He sat back down in the chair and clasped his hands between his knees. “Aye. Rip was leavin’ word with his contact there that he had four pretty young things, fresh off the boat. Barclay was the ring leader, but since ye killed ‘im and a lot a’ his fella flesh-peddlers, that left Rip in charge.”
My mind was racing back to my meeting aboard ship with Willy and Green and our discussion of the plot to sell us. But then to bring us here for his wife to sell us out the back door was just more than I could stomach. Everything began to make sense to me. All of the shrouded truths and secrets became as clear to me as the turquoise waters of the bay.
“They know you know, right?”
“Aye, miss. They pulled me inta’ it on this last hunt. Rip said we’d get paid ta’ bring the girls fer the rich old man. Then, they’d bring ‘em here ta’ make ‘em think they were safe. Miss Millie would clean ‘em up and put pretty dresses on ‘em. Then, she’d tell Cap’n McCormack some of ‘em had run off, but she really sold ‘em. Barclay used Rip ta’ make the trade down at the Gull.”
“We were told that the reason we were brought here
to the McCormack’s was to be protected. Obviously, now I know my instincts to leave this house were right. So, what’s Lady McCormack’s connection to Barclay?”
River looked up at me with a crooked smile that conveyed a thought I didn’t want to imagine, and then he said it. “Word is they were lovers.”
I shook my head. “And the unknowing Captain delivered us right into the hands of our sellers. What’s ole Millie going to do now without Barclay to protect her?”
“Why do you think she lets Rip and me stay here? She’s actin’ kinda crazy, though. Earlier, she was out here layin’ inta’ Rip for lettin’ Barclay get killed. Rip didn’t dare tell her you and them girls done it, because he knew she’d kill ye, and you ain’t worth nothin’ ta’ him dead. I’m trapped in the middle a’ all this. I don’t want ta’ do this, but once they tell ye what they’re up ta’, ye better do what they say, or ye’ll end up missin’.” He blew out a heavy sigh and then fell silent for a moment, pacing about the room.
“Go on, please. You can trust me, I promise you.”
“Willy and Green would save who they could, from what I was told. They’d have some big red-haired fella arrange to carry some of the girls to Nassau where he had a safe place for ‘em until he could get ‘em passage back ta’ wherever they was stole from. If they could get ‘em ta’ his sloop before they’d ‘run off’ as she’d say, he’d get ‘em outta Port Royal.”
“Big…red-haired fella?”
“He was a pirate, too, I’s told. But he ain’t ‘bout the peddlin’a’ flesh, neither, and speakin’ as ta’ how I seen it, that man’s the only pirate Barclay ever run from. Cap’n used him fer a while ta’ search fer his daughter, but he ain’t never turned her up.”
“Daughter?”
“Cap’n had a daughter named Eva ‘bout your age. She run away when her mother died. Stowed away on a ship. Heard tell ’twas sacked by pirates, and she ain’t been seen since.”
Demons & Pearls (The Razor's Adventures Book 1) Page 8