The Devil's Luck (The Skull & Crossbone Romances Book 1)

by Eris Adderly

  “Is there a body aboard this ship, Mr Till, who doesn’t earn his keep?” The captain took on the tone of a professor, accustomed to receiving rote answers from his students. His hands moved to rest at his hips, pushing back the heavy fabric of his coat as he made a circuitous path across the room.

  “No there is not, Captain,” came the requisite answer.

  “Earn our keep?” Hannah bristled, no longer able to maintain her silence. “And what of the coin my father sent on? The gold earns the keep of a passenger, does it not, Captain?”

  “I’ve received no purse from any Richard Symes,” he said with the cool raise of a brow and the beginnings of a devious smile. He moved closer, speaking to his man, but with eyes trained ever on Hannah. “Did you, Mr Till?”

  “I can’t say that I did, Captain,” Till said, unfolding his bulky arms from in front of his chest. An absent set of fingers tugged at one of the several gold earrings dangling from his ear. “I’d be certain to remember taking in any coin for a passenger, Sir. Not to mention two.”

  “You see, Mrs Collingwood?” the captain said. “My ship has received no pay for your passage at all. I’m afraid we’ll need to find some productive use for you.” Her heart jumped when his eyes flickered over the neckline of her gown and she realised with a start that coin was the least of his interests. “It won’t do to have my hard working crew seeing a body sitting idle while they toil at the lines.”

  Before she could think, he closed the remainder of the distance between them in one swift stride and snatched up her wrist in a grip like a vice, jerking her toward him.

  Hannah squawked in protest and yanked her arm back, trying to wrench her hand free, but the captain’s hold was tenacious. This situation was going very wrong, very quickly.

  “Mr Till.” He pronounced the other man’s name like a summons, as Hannah tried again, even with her captured wrist, to pull away and put more distance between herself and the menacing captain. Her next half step backward choked a startled gasp from her as her body collided with an immovable wall that hadn’t been there a moment ago.

  Till moved silently for such a large man: Hannah had not even noticed him slide into place behind her. His hands came up to take hold of her arms, just below the elbows, and he had no trouble circling them completely, given her delicate frame compared to the sheer size of the man at her back. She tried jerking away from him with a grunt of effort, but his grip held fast.

  “Let go!” She heard her own voice crack as panic rose in her throat.

  “Shhh, Mrs Collingwood.” Till leaned in and spoke against her ear in a voice far too gentle and intimate for the situation at hand. He used the tone of a parent who aims to brace their child to have a splinter removed from a tender foot. Despite his smooth tones, the implication that she would strongly object to whatever was coming next did nothing to quell the clamouring of fear rising within her.

  They were moving backward now as Till’s hold forced her to step with him the few paces to the sleeping birth at the rear of the cabin. The huge man at her back came to half-lean, half-perch at the edge of the raised bed, clutching her to his chest as her eyes darted around the room, frantic, searching for any avenue of escape from the increasing desperation of her circumstances.

  The commanding officer of The Mourning Dove loomed again in front of her, filling her direct line of sight. With her options for retreat removed now by the firm grip of Mr Till, the captain bridged the gap between them. In a final smooth step, his hand came to rest in a loose, casual display of power on her throat.

  Hannah stiffened and felt the heat of a blush rise to her face as she took in the connotation of being trapped now against not one, but two firm male bodies. The warm press of muscle both in front of her and behind was startling in its intimacy, and she was quite sure she had never felt the part of the prey animal during any embrace from her late husband as it was most certain she did now.

  “Captain,” she began, her words shaking as she met his dark eyes, “I don’t know what you think you’re about, but this cannot be. My father is—”

  “Your father is not here,” he said, gaze traveling from her eyes to linger on her mouth, and then lower. “But you are.” The hand at her throat trailed up her neck to her neatly pinned hair as she flinched away from his touch.

  This reaction only brought her more firmly against Mr Till, however, and she thought for a moment that she felt the subtle, meaningful press of something hard against her backside through the layers of her skirts. She steeled herself against the implication.

  The captain’s thumb was at her jaw, smoothing over her features the way one would handle a fine piece of porcelain. His hands moved to the wide-brimmed silk hat she wore and, finding its long pins, tugged them out, tossing pins and hat onto the berth behind them. Dark eyes met hers again with ominous intent, but the captain spoke to the crew member pinning her from behind as if she weren’t there.

  “Mr Till, can you tell me … does our fair passenger happen to smell as pretty as she looks?”

  Hannah felt Till’s face come down at the side of her throat and her heart raced as he inhaled, taking in her scent. There was an almost imperceptible grinding of his hips against her, and the vague hint of his arousal she’d received before was now plain.

  Oh please, dear Lord, not this.

  “Aye, Sir, like a bit of springtime, she does,” Till said, his voice lower still, mouth just behind her ear.

  At his man’s confirmation, the captain bent to the other side of her neck and drew in a breath of his own to sample her scent for himself. This was dangerous territory these two men were dragging her into, and her mind raced in circles, finding no way clear.

  “So she does, Mr Till.” He spoke his agreement against her throat, his hands moving to cup her shoulders as he pressed her body between them. “Very lovely indeed.” The captain took license with his lips now, tilting his face to move them below her jaw.

  The situation had moved beyond outrageous. A different man at each side of her, sniffing at her like hounds on the trail of a pheasant? The mouth of a man whose name she didn’t know burning over her skin like a lover’s, while her maid waited alone in another dim cabin, oblivious to her lady’s predicament? This was bloody nonsense!

  She wanted to scream at the two of them. Kick and lash out until she broke herself free of their insidious grasp, but the trembling height of her fear had her body frozen stiff and her tongue unable to form words.

  Till’s implacable hold on her arms that was beginning to grow painful. It didn’t matter which direction she attempted to pull herself to escape the unwanted hands or lips or bodies, there was always another scandalous obstacle whichever way she squirmed to avoid their touch. Forward or back, left or right, she met with smothering masculinity at every turn.

  As if they moved in planned concert, the captain took over Till’s grip on her right arm, freeing his man to cross his tattooed forearm over her collarbones, drawing her shoulders back against his chest. Hannah received an abrupt reminder that the large sailor at her back was shirtless as the skin above the neckline of her dress made direct contact with his.

  This new press of bare flesh, small though it was, stirred a reaction in her which was altogether inappropriate, considering the circumstances. The feel of him against her upper back was the sort of thing that would wrinkle her nose on any other day. But despite the slick of the sweat cooling on his skin from the hard work he’d no doubt been engaged in before the captain pulled him into the cabin—a texture which ought to disgust—a slow wave of warmth was rolling over her hips, and it found its insistent centre between her thighs.

  Hannah remembered her body’s anticipation building this way on her wedding night over eight years ago, when she stood before her husband clad only in her shift, only that day able to name herself Collingwood instead of Symes, anxious to learn the truth behind the giggles and whispers of her silly peers. That was before she came to know the reality of what her … services … to
her late husband would consist of, before the reality had disabused her of any notions of joy and pleasure in the act. Hannah knew her reactions for what they were: animal and irrational.

  The captain dipped his right shoulder now, his free hand reaching down to gather at the fabric of her skirts and petticoats. When she saw his intent, she broke from her trance of fear and unwanted arousal with a violent start and kicked at him with a desperate foot.

  “No!” The cry tore loose from her throat. “Captain, you mustn’t!” Her straining against the confining arms of Mr Till began again in earnest, but the man pulling the hem of her dress over her knee was not dissuaded.

  “Oh?” he said, the movement of his hands belying the innocence of his tone. “Mustn’t what? Make a thorough inspection of some precious cargo?” He smirked as he gathered the bottom of her shift together with the rest of the many layers of fabric, drawing the lot higher still and exposing her thighs in a most improper way.

  “I’m not bloody cargo, you perfect beast!” She hissed and brought her knee up in a reckless effort to ward him off with a blow to the groin.

  He dodged her attempt with no effort at all and wedged a thigh between her legs instead, her skirts now bunched up above the place where she felt the cloth of his breeches against her bare thigh. Her chest was a battleground for her heart and lungs to see which could work the hardest.

  “Ah, do you see Mr Till? There’s some fire in the good Mrs Collingwood.” The captain’s jest brought a rumbling chuckle from the man behind her, whose desire was now unquestionable as it pressed at her bottom.

  “Let’s see what coin you have brought to pay for your passage, my dear,” he said as his fingers moved between them again, pushing their way up her thigh in their renewed quest.

  Hannah’s eyes shut on their own in a fruitless attempt to block out her surroundings. It was a pointless defence. She knew what would come. Her eyes could relieve her of sight, but her other senses betrayed her, filling her with an acute awareness of two sets of male hands on her, the sound of two men’s deep breathing and her own blood rushing in her ears.

  The inevitable came to pass and she felt the captain’s fingertips brush against the centre of her treacherous ache. Hannah jerked at his intimate touch and tried in vain to angle her hips away, her pleas for him to stop disregarded. He was not content with a mere light petting, where she’d hoped he would be satisfied with her shame and leave off, but pushed his way further into her secrets, carrying out a thorough inspection as his earlier words had promised.

  Her breath became ragged and the close confines of her stays did not give her room to fill her lungs as fast as her body needed air. She was beginning to feel faint. He probed a bit more, ignoring her whimpers of protest, and a wide smile broke over his otherwise stern face. His fingers stopped their lewd exploration and he drew his hand out from under her skirt to hold it at eye level for the benefit of his conspirator.

  “Mr Till, it appears that her purse is overflowing indeed,” he said as she opened her eyes to see his first two fingers glossy with her humiliating wetness.

  Oh, Hannah, for shame!

  “It is that, Captain.” Till nodded in appreciation, his voice low and smooth with what she imagined to be barely contained lust.

  Despite her brief marriage, her experience with such things had been minimal, and the animal way these two men were pawing at her was quite removed from anything familiar. Her body however, much to her horror, seemed more than ready to receive such attentions.

  No! This is not how a woman behaves.

  Hannah tried to gather her courage, pinned as she was between Till and the lecherous captain. In what she hoped was a steady voice, she demanded of him, “What is your end, Sir? You cannot hope to escape punishment once your actions against me are discovered! What sort of officer are you, to treat a passenger so? The crew of a respectable ship such as The Mourning Dove should have relieved you of command by now if they knew of your behaviour!”

  Her tirade did nothing to quash his malefic grin. Brown eyes glittered, holding her gaze as he cleaned his damp hand with the rumpled folds of her dress.

  “You see, that’s where the source of your dilemma lies, Mrs Collingwood,” he said with a note of triumph. “I am not the captain of The Mourning Dove.”

  “What? Then who is?” Outrage flooded through her at the thought that there was a superior officer aboard who could have prevented this scandal from occurring in his own stateroom.

  But Till’s addressed him as Captain this whole time. What have they …

  “Oh, I am Captain, you may be sure of that, my pet. But this vessel you and your maid have boarded is most certainly not The Mourning Dove, and we carry no passengers, paying or otherwise.” He flashed his teeth at her, revelling in her confusion before dropping the final blow.

  “No, this isn’t The Mourning Dove at all, Mrs Collingwood. You have the privilege to sail upon The Devil’s Luck.”

  Hannah had been a very practical and even-tempered person her whole life, disdaining the hysterics of what she felt were the typical examples of her gender. With the impossible words from the man before her, who seemed to be upending her fate without a drop of effort, however, today seemed like a day in which she might finally get to practise that most feminine of arts and faint on the spot.

  The contest her heart and lungs had waged came to a crashing halt as both simply stopped their work altogether at the blow of this news. Hannah’s mouth went dry and her insides knotted in terror, her hopes for salvation burning as a ship besieged and sinking like a dead thing to the bottom of the sea.

  You’re ruined, Hannah. Ruined.

  * * * *

  Chapter Two

  A Pair of Gentlemen

  * * * *

  Hannah was overwhelmed.

  In the space of mere hours, she had gone from sitting in the common room of an inn in the Port of Bristol, ready to journey to Boston and start a new life, to the midst of a scandalous groping by two strange men in the stateroom of what turned out to be the wrong ship altogether.

  Events were moving with far too much speed for her to digest them.

  That Doctor Graves. I should’ve known something wasn’t right.

  The grimy surgeon must have lied to her, then, to lure her aboard this ship that was, in the dreadful captain’s words, ‘not The Mourning Dove at all.’ And when he’d given the galleon’s actual name it rang with a vague, but disturbing familiarity in her ears.

  “The Devil’s Luck?” she repeated, fighting through her outrage for comprehension. Why did she know that name?

  “That is correct, Madam,” the captain said in a mockery of formality, considering the lewd way she remained pinned between him and his man. “Edmund Blackburn, at your most humble service.” He inclined his head with a smirk, adding to his parody of genteel behaviour.

  “Blackburn …” She mouthed the word to herself, dredging her mind for the answer to why that name, as well as the ship’s, sounded like something she’d heard before today. Perhaps the two were connected?

  Blackburn. The Devil’s Luck. The Devil’s L—

  It struck her like lightning, then, and her eyes jumped back to his face as she recoiled in horror, which, of course, thrust her more firmly back against Mr Till.

  “You’re Black Edmund?” she said, incredulous.

  “The very same.” His words reeked of satisfaction, a single dark brow arched in subtle enjoyment of her reaction. “Although I do admit to not choosing that particular nickname for myself.”

  Hannah thought her heart would surely beat its way straight out of her chest as the storm of realization buffeted from all sides. “This is a bloody pirate ship?” Her voice rose in disbelief, holding out futile hope for his denial.

  The disaster before her was escalating from very bad to catastrophic. It was not bad enough that this damnable surgeon had deceived her and her maid into boarding the wrong ship, leaving her with no idea at all how she would manage to find a way ba
ck to Bristol. No, to heap trouble higher upon that incredible disaster, the vessel she found herself on, the infamous Devil’s Luck, had to have for its captain one of the most notorious pirates to spice the gossip and dinner conversations of the port elite in recent years.

  Edmund Blackburn. Black Edmund of The Devil’s Luck. Hannah shuddered.

  “She’s very clever, Mr Till,” he said over her shoulder to the fortress of a man still holding her in place.

  “There’s no doubt, Captain,” his man replied, amusement in his voice as he shifted his bulk behind her, causing her backside to slide against him.

  This could not be possible, not for her.

  Surely he’s having a laugh. This cannot be true. It cannot!

  Hannah’s mind could not even begin to encompass the enormity of the misfortune she’d fallen into in the span of half a day. And if her own circumstances had grown so desperate, what of Brigit’s? How in God’s name were they to extricate themselves from this?

  Rational thought, normally her constant companion, fled her, and she stamped forcefully at Till’s foot, hoping he would be startled into releasing his grip. All she received for her effort was a controlled grunt of pain from him and a tightening of his arms.

  “And determined as well,” the captain remarked on her continued defiance. “Mrs Collingwood,” he said, bringing a knuckle below her chin to tilt her face up to his, stilling her struggles with the intensity of his gaze, “I do appreciate a woman of such … passion. As you can imagine, The Devil’s Luck is not a passenger vessel and I don’t make a practise of bringing extra bodies on board, but it appears that Doctor Graves has neglected to consult with me on this matter.” He cocked his head, making some decision before he spoke his next words.

  “Regardless,” he said, “I have you here now and I have no intention of heading back to Bristol against the tide to cast you ashore. However you’ve come to be aboard my ship, Mrs Collingwood, I do believe we’ll come to know each other very well, before all is said and done.”