The Pirate Lord: Aristocrat. Rogue. Spy.

by Catherine Lloyd

  “Damn his hide!” Bronwyn shouted and then clapped a hand over her mouth. “Forgive my outburst, Mrs. Langley, but I believe he has taken my brother. Roddy is missing. Does his father know where Stagholt has gone?”

  Mrs. Langley’s brows lifted. “You have a familiar way of addressing his lordship, Barlow. Lady Gage says only that the young man is no longer with us. Her husband does not know where he has run off to and the entire company is in an uproar over it. It is a pity. He was the finest and most intelligent of the lot, though he is certainly a nasty scoundrel.”

  Jenny ventured out of the washhouse, drying her hands on a towel.

  “One of the footmen overheard the discussion in the study, Miss Barlow. Lord Stagholt has been called away on an urgent mission. He is to go to sea.”

  “Stuff and nonsense,” said Langley. “Why should his lordship go to sea? He was in training to be a man of God before his ship was set upon by pirates.”

  “When did he leave?” Bronwyn’s mouth was dry. She gave Jenny a sharp look.

  “At midnight, miss.”

  “That is no concern of yours, Barlow. You may offer your assistance to Mrs. Knowlton in packing her trunk and then return to my office to collect your wage. That will be all.”

  Bronwyn darted upstairs to her room and stuffed her meager possessions in the valise. She checked that the pistol was there and the shot. She would need money for her passage and money to bribe the soldiers to let her pass unmolested. The worst of her imaginings was being taken for a spy and held for questioning. There were far more desperate evils that could befall a woman traveling alone but Bronwyn opted not to scare herself half to death before she began.

  “Lord, I know it is wrong to steal, but on this occasion I must. I pray for your forgiveness and for the money to repay my victims when I’ve got Roddy back. I also pray that Jon Stag breaks out in boils.”

  She slipped the silver Revere tray into her valise and escaped the house through the French doors in the ballroom.

  Jon had Roddy. He had taken her brother and pressed him into service just as he had done in Penzance. She fingered the smooth heavy handle of the pistol and hurried along the snow-dusted path to the jetty at the foot of the Governor’s mansion.

  It was still dark, being so early in the morning and the snow muffled her approach. The helmsman did not know she was behind him until he felt cold metal pressed to his temple. He bolted upright. A girl in a hooded cloak stood over him.

  “You rowed a man and a boy out to a ship called the Marguerite this morning, did you not?

  “No, miss.” The fellow shook his head resolutely.

  “Yes, you did, you stupid fool. The boy was my brother. The man was Jon Stag. I don’t care about the man but the boy is mine and this is the second time that pirate has taken him from me. There will not be a third. You will row me out to the Marguerite. I have no money to pay so I must threaten you with bodily harm if you do not. I am sorry to do this—I will be sorry to kill you if you do not take me to them, but I will kill you.”

  The helmsman jumped half out of his skin. “He said you had a temper and I was to watch my step,” the man grumbled as he cast off. “I didn’t believe him. What could a slip of a girl do says I, and here is my answer. Well, get in, get in. I’ve been expecting you.”

  “How is that possible when I didn’t know I would be coming myself until just now?” Bronwyn sat in the launch with the pistol poised. The helmsman took up the oars.

  “Jon Stag said a young lady would be arriving looking for her brother and she’d be mad as a hornet he tells me, and I’d best do as she says. I’ll row you out to the Marguerite, miss, if that’s what you have your heart set on. Jon Stag and the boy arrived at midnight, but it was not to the Marguerite that I rowed them if he’s the one you’re after.”

  “Where then?” Oh dear God, she really was going to kill him!

  “To a ship what is moored in the main harbor, a merchant ship by the name of Nathaniel. It is one of Lord Stagholt’s fleet, miss. Jon Stag’s father.”

  Bronwyn cocked the pistol. “You are lying. Jon Stag would never sail on one of his father’s ships. He was to take over as captain of the Marguerite. What game are you playing?”

  “God as my witness, ‘tis no game! Jon Stag was to captain the Marguerite as you say, but he refused the letter of marque. He sent a rider with a message for Hezekial Garnett declining his request, saying he is soon married and unwilling to leave his new bride. It is a disappointment to be sure, but Mr. Garnett said Jon Stag had done enough for the cause and he wished him joy. Another will be found to take Captain Stag’s place. I have Garnett’s letter here if you care to read it. One of Revere’s minutemen delivered it on horseback before we pushed off. ”

  “So … he is married and they are sailing to England … he’s made his choice.” Bronwyn’s lips were numb. She had no strength in her body. At the mansion, no one had actually said the engagement was off, only that Jon had run away. And there had been no sign of Cecily Knowlton this morning. “Why did he take the boy with him?”

  The helmsman shrugged. “To assist with this and that on the journey. A cabin boy, I expect.”

  Of course. Her ladyship would require a cabin boy. “Has the ship weighed anchor?”

  “No, miss. They’ll be waiting on the wind.” The helmsman tugged on the oars.

  Waiting on the wind….

  Sailing was dependent on the wind, a thing not seen but with such power it would carry a great ship across an ocean. Jon Stag was the wind in her life, a force of nature that blew where he liked for as long as he liked. He could carry her to wonderful distant places or leave her wrecked on a rocky shore.

  The sky was leaden promising more snow. Bronwyn was cold but she felt she could not be cold enough. If she could stop the blood in her veins, she would, and gladly. Her body was once again betraying her. Her damnable heart was breaking apart and her eyes burned with tears.

  The sails emerged out of a ruddy dawn sky, soft on the horizon, waiting to be swollen to pregnant fullness by a strong west wind.

  The Nathaniel.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  BRONWYN ALMOST forgot the stretch of water between them and stood up in the launch, prepared to leap aboard. Frantic at the thought of missing this chance and never seeing Roddy again, she strained to grab hold of its thick wooden hull. The ship was mammoth, more imposing than the Black Adder; getting aboard would be no small thing.

  The helmsman called out to have the step ladder lowered. Bronwyn didn’t hesitate; she slung the valise across her chest, grabbed hold of the lower rung and scrambled up, quick as she could before she was discovered.

  “Godspeed,” she called down to the helmsman. “Forgive me for threatening you with harm as I forgive you for your debt against me and mine.”

  She turned with her pistol cocked and came face to face with Lord Stagholt.

  Her breath caught.

  He was magnificent in a long black velvet jacket and a shirt of pure white lace. He wore a cloak that billowed with the rising wind, pulling back to reveal his long legs and muscular thighs outlined in snug breeches. His black leather boots stopped above the knee. Pirate and viscount, conjoined in one man, Jon was at ease on board a ship or on the dance floor of a lavish ballroom. His lordship’s good breeding and civility masked his pirate ruthlessness.

  She could never have bested him, Bronwyn realized. From the first, Jon Stag had won. As if to prove the point—here she was again, trying to recover her brother from a pirate who now had her heart as well.

  “Where is Roddy?” She had to bite down on her lip to keep from crying. The shock of seeing him so abruptly was doing terrible things to her heart.

  Jon bent over the railing. “Hold, helmsman! Hold!” He turned back to Bronwyn. “If you want to leave with Roddy, I won’t prevent you.”

  “A noble offer, sir!” she bellowed, slightly hysterical. “Why did you take him if you were going to let him go so easily? Never mind—I know
the answer. You stole him to serve as cabin boy for your lovely, but unloved, wife. This is the cruelest trick you have played on me thus far. You have no heart in you, sir. You and Cecily are well matched!”

  “Guilty as charged, although Miss Knowlton would disagree. She released me from our engagement last night when my father disinherited me. However, I am guilty of dragging Roddy from his bed to provoke you to come after me. Nothing else would have induced you to leave Gage’s employ and I could not sail for England knowing you were in danger. You are free to go if you must. I will not hold you back. But Washington’s men are going to win this war. Make sure you are on the right side when they do.”

  His ebony hair clung to his broad forehead. His gray eyes were almost pewter in the pale morning light. Bronwyn fixed her eyes on his lips, disbelieving what she had heard.

  “I don’t understand. The helmsman said you turned Garnett down because you could not leave your new bride.”

  Jon took a cautious step nearer as if he expected her to vanish in the morning frost. “Do you remember our first night together? You claimed to be married to a fool who ran off to war before the marriage could be consummated. And like a fool, I believed you. I said I would face court-martial before I would leave you so unsatisfied.”

  Her cheeks and neck burned. Bronwyn prayed no one had overheard. “I remember.” She swallowed hard, her heart was choking her and blood roared in her ears. He had to say the words. She could not say them for him.

  Roddy arrived out of nowhere, running toward her at top speed, dodging crates and sailors working on the rigging. “Winnie! Winnie! Captain Stag said you would come! You mustn’t be angry with me because he said you would come and he was right!”

  “Roddy! Thank God. We are leaving this ship. Captain Stag tricked me into chasing after you and I don’t like tricks.”

  Her brother didn’t move. “No. I am going to stay. You always make the decisions for me and I can make them for myself. Captain Stag did not trick me or drag me off the street as Mr. Hawkins did. He asked me if I wanted to go and I said I did. I did not want to leave you but he said you would follow and you did. There has been no trick. We are sailing to England.”

  Bronwyn dropped to her knees in front of him. “Dearest, we don’t belong here. This is a private vessel. It costs money to book passage to England.”

  “We have berths already. I am to sleep in a hammock with the other fellows, and you and Captain Stag will share a cabin near the master quarters. If we run into pirates, Captain Stag will know what to do and I am to help with the rigging.” Roddy backed away from her. “I like being at sea. You never do what I want to do. I am not going back, Winnie. I’m staying.”

  Roddy spoke with a new maturity that she had not heard before. He would not be budged. If she was leaving the ship, she would have to do it without him.

  She straightened and met Jon’s eyes in despair and accusation.

  “I have said nothing to influence him,” replied Jon in answer. “Your brother knows what he wants. It is in his blood, Bronwyn. The boy wants to go to sea.”

  “And what do you want,” she asked mockingly. “What does Lord Stagholt, third Viscount and master of Huntington Hall want with the poor daughter of a curate?”

  He opened his mouth to say something and then seemed to decide against it. Jon leaned against the deck railing with a sinfully wicked smile on his handsome face.

  “You have enough information to go on, Miss Barlow. Roddy has told you that we are sharing a room. You know that I turned down my command to be with my bride and I have abducted your brother to force you to sail with me. What do you think I want?”

  “You want me to pretend to be your bride. What else can it be? I am not as easily caught as that, sir. I can pay for a berth in steerage.”

  “Really? With what money, pray tell. You have lost your little bag of farthings.”

  She pulled the silver tray out of the valise. It gleamed in the golden light of dawn. “I am more pirate than curate’s daughter. I have my ways.”

  “I apologize for underestimating you, Miss Barlow.” He appeared disappointed and moved as if he intended to walk away from her.

  “Hold! Our business is not concluded just yet, Lord Stagholt. You have deprived me of a brother and I can ill-afford to lose one.”

  Jon lifted his eyes to hers slowly. “We seem to be at an impasse,” he said with a slight smile, recalling their first argument. It was enough to encourage her.

  Bronwyn moved toward him. In a single fluid motion, she tugged his black hair free of its ribbon. Glossy waves hung to his shoulders and he looked every inch a pirate. It lifted and flung wide behind his head. The wind had come. The sails of the Nathaniel were filling.

  “If you are determined to have the boy in your service, I shall need something from you. I never give something without getting something in return.”

  Jon’s gaze grew heated. “Name your price, Miss Barlow.”

  “My price is a husband.”

  Bronwyn met his eyes steadily. He loved her, of that much she was certain but did he love her enough to marry her now that he was third Viscount?

  She licked her dry lips, at last finding the courage to demand what she wanted from him. Jon was right when he said they were frightened of different things. Ever since her parents died, Bronwyn had been frightened of becoming attached to another human being. She was ready now. Like Roddy, she wanted to put away childish things. She wanted to belong to Jon body and soul, whatever the cost, whatever the risk.

  “My dearest love … Jon … I love you too much to be anything but your wife. I need you but I need you to marry me. I am sorry to speak so plainly, but I feel I must with something as important as the way I feel about you. I want to marry you and I want you to marry me. Those are my terms. Do you accept?”

  Her heart was pounding.

  Jon tilted his magnificent dark head to the sky and laughed—a full-throated sound of pure happiness that warmed her frozen flesh.

  He swooped down, lifted her in his arms and crushed her against his chest with a bellow of conquest that echoed across the water.

  “I do, my lady. My dearest, darling Bronwyn … I most certainly do accept.”

  §

  EVERYTHING THAT followed was eventually forgotten in the mists of time. The minister appearing as if by magic on deck with his Bible in hand; the hearty well-wishes of the captain and crew, and Roddy’s excitement at giving his sister away, until at last, all that remained of Bronwyn’s memories of that day was all that was important.

  The taste of Jon’s mouth on hers…

  The scent of his skin…

  And the security she felt in his arms when they both fell asleep to the rocking of the waves.

  THE END

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  DEAR READER: In the age of ebooks, readers are the curators of literature. The New York Times doesn’t have as much influence! Thank you for taking a moment to leave a review of this novel and helping other readers in making a decision. ~ Catherine Lloyd ~

  About the Author

  Catherine Lloyd loves reading, watching great episodic television, and writing romance. Love stories that are hot and soul-satisfying are her drug of choice. She was inspired to write The Pirate Lord after watching the series, Black Sail and remembering the fun and adventurous pirate romances of her youth.

  Lloyd has explored all shades of romance from small town romantic comedy to medieval adventure romance to the gritty dark love stories of Victorian Age villains. In Lloyd’s novels, the journey belongs to the heroine as her spiritual, physical and intellectual metal is tested by the man she grows to love.

  The author has two grown children, two stepdaughters, a cat named Harry (who thinks he’s a dog) and five grandsons. She lives with her long-suffering spouse in the country where she enjoys having no hobbies and writes full time.

  Contact Catherine Lloyd at writewoodcreations@gmail.com

  Or visit: Writewood Creations

  Or visit
her Author Page on Amazon

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  Heat Level: Sizzling

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