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

by Eris Adderly

  “I remember no such thing, Captain,” came Till’s rumbling reply from somewhere over her shoulder.

  “Of course you don’t, Mr Till, because it never happened. You see Graves? I will choose who and what is allowed to come aboard this ship, and I alone. You’re here to patch up my crew after a skirmish, Butcher, not to be choosing out passengers on a whim.”

  “I’m sorry, Captain,” the surgeon said, not sounding sorry in the least. “I wasn’t aware this would be an offence.” He swept a lecherous eye in Hannah’s direction once more and unleashed half a grin that made her blood run cold. “I was going to share them, Sir. I thought the crew might like a bit of sport along the way. Pass the time and all that.”

  “We’ve found the source of your problem, Graves,” the captain said. “I haven’t taken you aboard to think. Let me remind you of the position you’re in, friend—it’s only because your brother is Harbourmaster and has plenty of good coin to offer that you’ve been allowed to escape Bristol with your neck unbent.”

  Hannah forgot her nudity for a moment, her interest piqued by the sordid situation the captain was detailing before her. So Graves wasn’t such a trusted crew member after all, it seemed.

  “Captain, I didn’t mean any—”

  “Listen carefully, Graves, for I’m not fond of repeating myself. If it weren’t for me, you’d be stretched from the gallows by week’s end, your stinking corpse food for the crows, right next to the bodies of those whores you played your sick little games with. You can thank your brother for bribing your way out of that port, and you can thank me for taking his purse and spiriting you away from the hands of the law.”

  “Yes, thank you Sir, I—”

  Blackburn didn’t let the flimsy apology interrupt him. “I expect you to make yourself useful and scarce on this trip, Graves. I have your brother’s coin in hand now, and as you’ve yet to prove any sort of medical skill, which you claim to have, you’re so far just as much use to me adrift in the Atlantic as you are on my decks. Do I make myself clear, Surgeon?”

  “As clear as the day, Captain,” Graves affirmed, stealing a quick murderous glance at Hannah. On what must be his first day aboard The Devil’s Luck as well, he, too, had earned Blackburn’s irritation. The captain had also robbed him of his prize, and this made her feel a new stirring of fear. She would need to avoid this man as best she could; he looked a vengeful type.

  “See that it stays that way, Graves. Now out of my sight.” The captain dismissed him and the surgeon slithered off, as though trying to move away from Blackburn’s scrutiny as quickly as possible.

  With a final glance for Hannah and Mr Till, he turned on his heel and strode away from the mast, calling orders to his crew as he went. “Hawke! Run and tell the cook I’ve need of a word with him, and fetch Mrs Collingwood’s maid from below. Mr Osbourne! Gather those charts of yours and meet me in the council room. We’d best take a look at our heading.”

  Hannah watched his back as he receded, leaving her to the appraising eyes of the crew. The reality of her situation settled on her. She would stand here for five hours, the whole of her body bared to the lustful gazes of passing sailors with no way to hide or cover herself from their scrutiny. The tears that had been building in her eyes began to spill over her cheeks at this humiliating injustice.

  Till stepped around from behind and assessed her with frank eyes. His gaze lingered for a shorter time than she would expect on her jutting breasts and clenched thighs, though, and she thought she saw what might have been a look of sympathy ripple over his features. He gave a tight shake of his bald head, as though he did not agree with this ‘discipline’ of the captain’s. His duties aboard the ship called to him, however, and he moved off to attend them rather than invite her questions.

  She stood there now—well, was held upright, really—against the mast, her pale flesh feeling sun and breeze where it had never known them. She noted the coils of rope at her hips covered the downy folds of her sex from view, and she thanked the Lord for small favours. Five hours was beginning to look like a very long time indeed.

  Some of the crew did stop to ogle her, and a few made further crude suggestions, to which she did not respond, but for the most part, they went about their duties. As far as she could manage to turn her head, she saw the men at their tasks. Needle and thread were at work mending torn clothing and sails. Brushes scrubbed across decks and calloused hands tarred lines.

  Hannah let her gaze settle on the horizon and between the endless blue of the sea and sky, and the gentle rolling of the ship over the swells, she fell for a time into a sleepy trance. Her eyes were partially lidded as her mind blocked out all other sensations but the rise and fall of the waves and the scent of salt in the air as the sun marked out time with its arc overhead.

  A strange caress at her shins startled her out of her dreamy stupor and she let out a short gasp of surprise. None of the crew stood anywhere near her now, and she thought the sun might be starting to affect her senses before she looked down to her ankles to see a robust ginger tabby cat grazing its chin against her.

  If her circumstances hadn’t been so lamentable, she would have laughed. A ship’s cat, kept aboard to root out vermin. Here, at least, was one member of the crew who didn’t care a whit for her nudity. The furry beast was probably wondering why she didn’t crouch down to offer him a friendly scratch behind his ears.

  “I see you, Puss,” she said in a low voice, hoping not to attract attention her way. Perhaps she might have a single friend on this cursed ship, once the captain cut her down from the mast. There would certainly be no Mrs Hadley for company aboard this vessel.

  With a start, the cat left off his rubbing at her shins and gave a hiss, arching his back. He ran off down the deck with a bristling tail.

  What in the …

  Graves stepped around the mast from behind her.

  His eyes painted lecherous strokes over her bare flesh and he all but salivated at her helpless form, prevented by the secure coiling of lines from fleeing or striking out at him.

  “Well,” he said, his voice slick with lewd intent, “I’d hoped the first time you made your way out of your fine clothes for me it would have been a bit more private, but I suppose this will have to do.”

  He stepped toward her and her heart began hammering in her chest. They were not supposed to touch her! And him least of all, she’d gathered from the captain’s earlier dressing-down. His dirty fingers came to the pale flesh at her waist and again her eyes shut in denial. Dare she cry out? How long before the captain returned to enforce his orders? Would the other men stand by and do nothing if she called attention to the surgeon? Or worse, join in?

  “Such a pretty little dove,” he cooed at her, his tone sickening. “So soft. So delicate.” He snaked his hand over her ribs to bring his thumb over her nipple. “Oh yes, the things we’ll get up to. You’ll see.” A rough tweak at the tender pink bud brought tears to her eyes.

  He brought his other filthy hand to her throat, drinking up her terror and pain. “I wonder,” he mused, as though he were contemplating the addition of sugar to his tea, “if I should make use of my scalpel before or after I’ve sampled this lovely cunt of yours? Or do you think you’ll see the way when I show it to you? Perhaps I won’t need to dispose of you at all …”

  A sob choked out of her as the hand torturing her nipple slid down her belly and over the ropes at her hips. His fingers were trying to work their way into the gap below the rope that hid her most intimate areas from view. She thrashed her head from side to side and whimpered in the only pathetic form of protest she had left.

  As if in answer to her silent prayer, a heavy hand thumped down on the knobby shoulder of Doctor Graves as someone jerked his body away from Hannah. Her vision no longer filled by the yellow smile and rapacious eyes of the surgeon, she saw Mr Till towering over Graves, his features stern and disapproving.

  “Did you not hear the captain’s orders, man? I believe we both stood not ten
feet from this spot when he said ‘hands off’.” Till had not released the surgeon from his grip, which Hannah now knew first-hand was near unbreakable.

  “The captain only wants a hole for his knob, Till. Ought to be loosened up a bit, if you ask me,” he replied, hawking a gob of spit onto the deck. There was something false about the way he tried to speak like a common sailor, though Hannah could not put a finger on what made this important.

  “I didn’t ask you, Graves. No one did. Now go find Adams and see if the cooper has any more work for you, seeing as no one is dead or dying at the moment as needs your attention.” He shoved the surgeon with a powerful thrust away along the deck, and the scrawny man careened against a wooden crate from his momentum. Graves sneered at them both and, massaging his bruised shoulder, turned to march away.

  “And Graves,” Till called after him, “I’ll be reporting this to the captain.” Graves gave him a final snort of disgust and disappeared into the swirl of sailors moving about on deck.

  At the departure of the surgeon, Hannah felt some unnameable barrier break within her and she burst into great racking sobs. Hot tears burned down her face and she cried until she coughed and choked. The accumulation of events had tipped over some final ledge and become too much. The captain’s hands on her in the stateroom, her body exposed to Heaven knew how many strange men, the repulsive attentions of Graves … How could she possibly bear any further indignity?

  She felt a new hand on her face now and she grimaced, her eyes still clenched shut against the reality before her. But the touch was light and a gentle thumb wiped the scalding tears from her cheek. Her eyes opened at this unexpected contact and she was surprised to see Mr Till’s tattooed arm lifted in front of her. He brushed away the wetness on the other side with the same care as he’d done the first.

  “Ah, look, Mrs Collingwood,” he said, a quiet caring in his eyes that did not match his intimidating appearance, “now I’ve gone against the captain’s orders myself.”

  Hannah sniffled at his gesture of kindness, not sure if she should respond at all. His gaze assessed her before looking about himself, appearing to make some decision.

  “You’re most of the way through it now,” he pointed out, as if trying to encourage her to bravery. “And Graves won’t be back.”

  Till turned to put his back to the mast alongside her and he slid down the length of the wood until he came to sit on the deck, his legs stretched out in front of him, crossed at the ankle. He produced a curved dagger that might have been a twin to the captain’s and set about cleaning from under his fingernails.

  “Thank you, Mr Till,” she said in a voice low enough that only he would hear. She was not certain whether she held more wonder that at least one man aboard this ship was not set on injuring her, or that she had thanked a man who not long ago had held her in place to be molested and aided in stripping her out of her clothes.

  But even then, his only words were to diminish the harm that might come to you. Perhaps …

  After a long moment, fraught with indecision as to whether she would be taking one step too far, Hannah elected to dip a toe into chance.

  “Mr Till.”

  “Mrs Collingwood.” Ah, she saw how it was. The man would give nothing up but that she worked for it. She swallowed to wet her throat.

  “What will happen to me?”

  As far as she might strain to look down, from where he sat, Hannah could only just see the top of his head and part of his cheekbone, but she heard the quartermaster let out a breath through his nose.

  “Captain’s the kind of man who speaks plain,” he said, resuming his work with the blade as he spoke. “I expect he’ll find some way for you to earn your keep, just as he said.”

  Her face pinched in at this. It was just the answer she knew was coming, and yet hoped against hope not to hear. “And is this necessary for me to earn my keep as well?” she said, nodding to the ropes tethering her person to the mast as though he were looking up and could see her gesture.

  Till laughed and turned the palest green eyes in her direction at last. The discomfort from the coils of rope was now second to the unwanted feeling that gaze stirred in her belly. Damn you, Hannah, no!

  “This?” he said, gesturing at the mast with a wave of the dagger. “No, I expect he’s just irritated you fancy yourself too good for the likes of him. Thinks this’ll take you down a notch or two.”

  A notch or two! How Hannah could become more indignant than she already was, she didn’t know, but it was just how she became.

  “You helped him bind me here, Mr Till. What do you think?” They were rash words for someone helpless.

  “I think you’re too good for any of us,” he said, coming back to his feet. A tattooed arm reached around behind his back and sheathed the dagger. “I also think if you were a man you’d have felt the lash, instead. I’d count myself fortunate it was only the mast, if I were you.”

  The quartermaster faced her now, the bulk of his body blocking most of the sun. He laid a heavy hand on the mast to the right of her face and the scent of salt and man was in her nostrils. Hannah prayed he took no notice of the rise and fall of her chest as it grew in time with the pace of her heartbeat.

  You have no business. No business at all, Hannah.

  “Mr Till,” she said, not even sure what she was asking for, her voice no more than a whisper, “please …”

  He took a single step closer, not moving his hand, his face so near to hers she had trouble bringing him into focus. Here was a man exercising an enormous amount of will: she could see it in the bunch of his shoulder, the flex of his jaw. And those eyes, God help her.

  “Please what, Mrs Collingwood?” His voice was slower, deeper, quieter than the sea, and Hannah was in over her head.

  She held his gaze, unable to look away, searching, pleading, for possibly longer than she’d dared to with any other man. It seemed he even loomed closer, but she couldn’t be sure it wasn’t just her imagination run rampant. Hannah wanted to run, and run as far and fast as she could from the lightning crackling over the surface of her bare flesh.

  Yet after a moment something dammed up in his expression and the need was gone. Till withdrew his hand from the mast and stepped back, stemming the merciless flow of Heaven-knew-what between them. Without another word, he gave her a final, unreadable look, turned, and walked away.

  She watched him move off along the deck as far as the strain of her neck would allow, and thought he might be headed below again, perhaps to speak with the captain. There was nothing she could do now but wait. Wait and be left to the horrors of her own mind’s inventions.

  … he’ll find some way for you to earn your keep …

  She felt their eyes on her again, first the captain’s and then the quartermaster’s, and every muscle on her tired frame clenched without prompting.

  As Hannah sagged into her bonds, exhausted from the day’s events, she thought as she drifted once again into her trance that the world was a much larger and stranger place than anything the pages of her books could have possibly led her to imagine.

  * * * *

  Edmund strolled back to his stateroom, hands clasped behind his back, deep in thought. They had not been aware of it, caught up as they were in the events of the moment, but he’d been headed to the foremast to check on the bound and lovely Mrs Collingwood, and had come into view just in time to watch Till rip that snake of a surgeon away from her.

  He sighed to himself as he made his way back below deck. They would have to do something about that Graves, and it would probably end with a dagger sticking out the back of the man’s grimy neck. But his thoughts were not on his newest and most irksome crew member at the moment.

  Benjamin Till, Quartermaster aboard The Devil’s Luck, had done nothing more than carry out his orders as his role dictated when he put a stop to Graves’s pawing at Mrs Collingwood. When he’d wiped her tears and sat watch to ward off any further mischief, however, that had been the work of Benjamin
his friend, and not the second in authority aboard his ship. Edmund had seen that Benjamin had matters well in hand, as he always did, and so he’d turned unnoticed to go back to his cabin.

  The heels of his boots settled on the stateroom’s table and he tilted his chair back in thought. As of that morning his agenda had been to sail from Bristol and point his ship toward Nassau, and nothing more unusual than that, unless he counted the addition of the already-troublesome surgeon to his crew. Now he was sitting here wasting time speculating about the potential of a woman he hadn’t even invited aboard, and hauling Benjamin along for the ride. Though to be fair, one of them was always pulling the other into some bit of bother or another. There was plenty of nonsense to get up to in more than twenty years.

  As a boy, Edmund had spent a great deal of his free time exploring the streets of Kingston, messing about as young boys are wont to do. Whenever he could escape from his lessons and the host of various other duties expected of him as the son of a moneyed household, he would trip down to the harbour to watch the ships meander in and out and, in general, make the sort of mischief that is the speciality of a boy on his own.

  When he’d met Benjamin, the town had not been quite as busy as it was now. He’d only been eight years old, and the earthquake that destroyed Port Royal in 1692, bringing the bulk of the trade business onto the island proper and into Kingston itself, was still four years distant.

  Edmund had been a rather solitary individual as a boy. With no siblings, a distant father, and a mother he didn’t know at all, the lion’s share of his companions existed in books. The place he went nearly every time he tired from wandering the streets of Kingston was Mr Ivey’s tiny bookstore.

  There were more than books there, of course. One could buy maps, and pamphlets, and almost any other thing that came through the port with the printed word on it. His father would allow him, on occasion, some small coin to spend in the shop, but even when he had none, Edmund would loiter there, at the kind indulgence of Mr Ivey, pulling books from the shelves and getting lost in the adventures of others.