by Paula Quinn
His men agreed and he hurried to meet them at the ropes.
“What happened to ye?” He heard her asking her cousin before Kyle carried her across the sea to Poseidon’s deck.
Alex watched them return and was thankful, so thankful that they both lived.
When he landed on his deck, Caitrina lifted her icy blue gaze to Alex but severed it too fast to see what he feared he felt for her in his eyes. He dipped his gaze to her hands trembling at her sides. He noticed, too, that her bottom lip was quivering a little. He wanted to go to her and beg her forgiveness.
She turned back to her cousin. “I feared ye certainly dead.”
“Thanks to the captain, I’m not.” Kyle looked at Alex and smiled at him. “And neither are ye.”
Her smile on Kyle faded and she shook her head. “If we had not been thrown off one ship we wouldna’ have ended up on the other.”
“I was wrong in my decision to leave ya with anyone else,” Alex admitted, then glanced up at Gustaaf and scowled for all he was worth.
“Just a few more moments fer either of us and yer apology would mean nothing, Captain. As it means nothing now.”
She was correct and he felt like hell over it. He hated that he felt like hell. He hated it even more when they reached the Caicos Islands the next day and she still hadn’t said a word to him.
They docked on Parrot Cay, a small island off the western shores of North Caicos. It didn’t matter if the navy found him here. According to his father’s map, the Quedagh Merchant was hidden in Dominica. Besides, this was his home, or the closest thing he had to one, and he wanted to see his foster family.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Trina sank her teeth into the drumstick of a chicken prepared and served with mangos and ginger. She groaned with delight around an enormous bonfire burning below a low full moon and just a dozen or so feet away from the roaring ocean. Parrot Cay was the most enchanting island she’d ever been on. The landscape was so different from Skye’s. Often inundated by the tide, the island was composed of mostly salt marshes and tidal flats, save for sheltered mangrove villages scattered throughout, like the one she was in now.
She’d wanted to discover other cultures and the island life was as different from living in the mountains as she could ever hope to find.
If she wasn’t so miserable about Alex abandoning her and Kyle so quickly, she would be enjoying finally exploring her dreams. He’d asked for her forgiveness more than once since he’d retrieved them. But she hadn’t given it. Could she ever forgive him?
One thing at a time, she cautioned herself and sampled jerk pork for the first time. She groaned again. Her aunt Isobel was the best cook she knew, but island food was better than anything she’d ever tasted. Everything, from grits made from dried conches or peas to apple rum cake, cherry tarts, dishes prepared with dates and almonds and fruit called guava, drinks made with passion fruit and papaya, to their spicy ginger beer, was prepared to perfection with love and served with warm smiles.
As a matter of fact, most of the men were smiling at her… rather dreamily.
“Dinna’ enjoy yer food so much, cousin.” Kyle smiled into his beer.
Trina rolled her eyes and wiped her mouth. She grazed her eyes over the captain, barely giving him notice, but catching his gaze on her. So what if he was more beautiful than a beach lit in flames of gold and ruby left by the setting sun? Lucifer was beautiful and look where it landed the angels that followed him.
She turned her gaze on the women instead. They were exquisite, exotic beauties with dark brown skin and colorful sarongs wrapped tightly about their heads and voluptuous bodies.
Trina wondered how Captain Kidd hadn’t settled here and wed one of them already. A thought occurred to her that made her find him where he sat around the huge bonfire, his arm tossed lightly over his bent knee while he laughed with his friends. She’d never asked him if he was wed. What if one of these sensual women was his wife?
Not that she cared. Not anymore. Not after he left them to die. It didn’t matter that he’d come after them. He’d left them. He hadn’t even given her a chance. He saw a thief and he tossed her away without mercy.
Let him have a wife. Trina would pray for the unfortunate lass tonight before she went to sleep.
“Ya be likin’ heem, den, gal?”
“Pardon?” Trina looked up at the island girl draped in bright canary yellow and emerald cotton and smiled. “I dinna’ understand.”
The girl crinkled her brow beneath her ornately folded head wrap and slipped her huge coal-colored eyes to Gustaaf.
“She asks you if you like him?” Gustaaf supplied between bites of jerk pork.
“Who?” Trina asked.
“Dee captin.”
Trina laughed but the sound fell like tin on her ears. “Nae. Nae, I dinna’ like him.”
“Why not?” the girl asked, seemingly astounded. Before Trina could reply, she brought her knuckles to her waist and called to Alex.
“Alex, why dis gal not like ya?”
Trina wanted to dig a hole in the sand and jump in. She didn’t look at Alex while he heard the question.
“Because, Anjali,” he called back, “I left her with evil men and she and her cousin nearly died.”
“Dat’s a good reasin,” Anjali said to her. “Why did he leave ya wit dees evil men?”
“He thinks I wish to steal from him.”
“Do ya?”
“Nae.”
Anjali straightened her spine and gave Alex a hard look.
“I’ve apologized,” Alex assured her, “but she hasn’t fergiven me.”
“Ya will work on it harder den.”
Alex smiled and Anjali shone against the firelight like polished onyx. Did the native woman care for him? Did he care for her? Anjali likely knew if he had a wife—on this island or any other.
“Do ya think ya will ever share words with me again, Miss Grant?”
She looked up, surprised that he would show interest at all, and in front of the crew, in whether or not he ever spoke to her again. She remembered the stark fear in his eyes when he broke down Henley’s door and saw her. It kept her awake all night. She told herself he was afraid she was about to stab him, but it wasn’t that. He’d been afraid of what he’d find when he got there. For just an instant, her heart warmed with the memories of what she felt for him. What she had felt for him. Some of it remained, she would admit, but she was too angry, too hurt.
“Would sharing words with ye now suit ye, Captain?”
His smile widened and he gave her a slight nod, giving her leave amid the group.
Trina set her food down on the straw mat beneath her and folded her hands in her lap. “After I watched a group of men haul my cousin overboard, into the sea and out of my life, I found myself alone on a ship with men who either wanted to slit my throat or use my body fer sport.” She was thankful, at least, that he wasn’t trying to interrupt her to defend himself. He sat quietly while she spoke, as did the rest, as ghostly pale as the moon above him.
“Thankfully,” she continued, “I had learned tactical defense from my kin.” She lifted her chin, proud to claim such warriors as her family. “I killed some of them.”
“I heard ’twas eight,” called Mr. Bonnet, who was to Alex’s left.
“I take no pride in what I was forced to do in order to stay alive.” Her eyes slipped back to Alex. He was staring at her. She’d grown to womanhood among lots of men. Not one of them ever looked more repentant in his life than Alex did now.
“The rest of the crew may disagree,” she said, looking around the fire at the faces she knew. She returned her gaze to Alex. He deserved this. “But ye are an unjust captain. Ye didna’ consider my argument. Ye offered me no defense but sentenced Kyle and me to death, had ye arrived just a few moments later. Fer that, I think ye are unfair and cruel, and I will be leaving yer presence as soon as I can.”
“Miss Grant,” he said, stopping her from turning away. “I agr
ee that what I did was cruel. But unfair?” he asked, setting his drink in the sand. “Ya tried to steal from me. The evidence was in yar hand. What would—”
She didn’t hear the rest. Och, she wanted to fling her bowl at his head! She couldn’t, she’d already spoken mutinous words and was at risk of being hanged, so she stood and walked away into the darkness, rather than look at him… speak to him, without killing him.
He’d rescued her and Kyle. Why would he if he still believed her guilty? When would he cease with this foolish accusation of her wanting his map?
His strong fingers clamping around her wrist stopped her. She spun around and glared at him.
“We’re goin’ to get this settled between us once and fer all,” he promised, his heavy voice playing over her ears like the waves dancing beyond the dunes when he moved past her. “Come with me.”
She dug her heels into the sand. “Where?”
“The water’s edge. I feel more at home with the sea beneath my feet.”
When he tugged, she tightened and braced her legs. He merely slanted his mouth and his brow at her. “Truly?” he asked, as if her not trusting him was the most preposterous thing imaginable. “Ya’re not still afraid of me, are ya?”
“Why should I not be? Ye cast Kyle and me to the sharks already. How do I know ye dinna’ have another shark waiting at the shore fer me?”
“Because I fergave ya fer tryin’ to steal from me, Caitrina. I thought I proved that to ya when I came back fer ya.”
She felt her blood boil. She didn’t know what to say, so she took a step closer to him, pulled back her hand, and slapped him hard in the face. When he drew his palm to his stinging cheek, she stepped back, uncertain of what his reaction would be. He could stab her right now. Who would avenge her? Kyle? He would die. Gustaaf? He would die too. She rested her hand on the hilt of the cutlass he’d returned to her yesterday, and waited.
“Do ya feel better?”
“Nae,” she lied. Striking him had helped ease her frustration a bit. “One or more might do it though.”
“Later,” he offered. “Right now, I would offer ya yar fair trial. I will listen and consider whatever ya tell me.”
“That’s it?” she asked, letting him lead her to the shoreline. “Ye’re not going to hurl me into the sea fer slapping ye?”
“I’ve been slapped before.”
“Och,” she said, glaring at his back. “I dinna’ doubt it with all yer merry adventures in brothels from Portugal to Paris. But I’m certain ye’ve never been slapped with such purpose before. I refrained from punching ye only because if I didna’ knock ye oot, ye were more likely to stab me.”
He laughed, then looked over his shoulder at her. He drew her closer against his side and spoke softly close to her head. “Ya think I would stab ya, Caitrina?”
The rich cadence of his voice seeped deep into her nerves, her muscles, her bones, and coaxed her to lean into him for support. “Let us get back to the matter at hand.” She separated herself from him by a hair. The size of him walking beside her on land felt too good, too right, to move too far away. The heat between them sizzled. “I was in the middle of retying my bandanna when I noticed the door in the wall swinging open.” She told him the rest, realizing that she had told him all this before. He just hadn’t listened then. He did now. “I never noticed it before. ’Twas well concealed.”
“Aye, ’twas,” he agreed. “And I know fer certain ’twas locked when I left the cabin.”
She knew how bad it looked for her. She had no proof of her innocence. But she was innocent. She wanted him to know it. He was wrong to have punished her, and if he continued to mistrust her, staying with him would be foolish. Someone else knew where the map was hidden and had been looking at it. “If I didna’ open the door, there is only one other person who was inside the cabin.”
He smiled and she knew she was losing him. “Not him,” he said, shaking his head slowly. “Someone else must have been there before him. Anyone, Caitrina, but not Samuel. He was with me when they hanged me father. When me father’s entire crew, men we’d known fer decades, abandoned him when their support would have been most appreciated. ’Twas Sam who stood with me and watched with me while me father swung.”
“I have no other explanation,” she told him softly, realizing that it might be easier to convince him of her innocence, rather than his friend’s guilt. She stopped walking and made him stop too. She looked up at him in the moonlight, knowing this was her last chance to make him believe her. She wouldn’t fail. “If I knew what to say to help ye believe me, I would say it. I have only my word, and though I may have given ye the impression that I dinna’ follow my cousin’s…”—she paused then corrected herself—“my kin’s standards of integrity, let me assure ye, my word means much to me. I dinna’ want yer map, Alex. When ye made me a part of yer crew and gave me a share of the earnings, I admit, I considered the worth of the Quedagh Merchant and what a share of that booty would be. Also, would it not be more prudent to let ye find it, then kill ye afterward?”
He smiled, and damn her but she missed looking at his smile aimed straight at her. But whatever amusement he found faded rapidly as something dawned on him. She was telling the truth. His gaze deepened and darkened on her. “Fergive me fer almost gettin’ ya and Kyle killed. I never would have fergiven meself if I’d been too late.” He took a step closer to her and lifted his thumb and index to her chin and held it. “The thought of it sickens me. If I knew what to do to help ya fergive me, I would do it.”
“D’ye believe me then?”
“Aye,” he said, dipping his face to hers. “I believe ya. Will ya accept me most heartfelt vow that I will never treat ya cruelly again?”
“Aye,” she whispered back, tilting her mouth up to meet his. Moving closer, taking her face in his hands, he covered her. He consumed her in white flames too hot to withstand. Her blood sizzled at the flick of his tongue over her lips, urging her open for him. She obeyed and relished the deluge of him, tasting her with searing, open kisses, branding her with long, lazy strokes of his tongue inside her mouth. When his hands swept down her shoulders, her back, settling over her buttocks and squeezing, she tugged at his hair, his shirt. Her wanton reaction was met with his gripping her rump and pressing and lifting her hips to his. She felt him grow stiffer while he guided her over his desire.
Trina had never been with a man, but she wanted to be with this one. She wanted him to strip her of her clothes, hoist her to his hips, spread her legs around his waist, and drive his manhood deep into her. She wanted to look into his eyes while he took her, run her hands over the tight plains of his body, and kiss him until she went mad in his arms.
She heard the sound of drums playing in the distance—or was it her heart? Music filled the air with celebration, joy, and something a bit more primitive.
When Alex picked her up and carried her away to a small private inlet, she didn’t protest but coiled her arms around his neck.
“Be with me, lady.” His breath seared her lobe when he bent to whisper to her. “If ya refuse me I’ll go mad.”
“I willna’ refuse ye, Alex,” she promised. Cupping his neck, she pulled him down until his lips hovered just above hers. Before he covered her mouth, she whispered, “I surrender myself to ye.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Normally, Alex wouldn’t care where or how he took a woman, but Caitrina Grant wasn’t just any woman. She was a woman he was falling in love with. How had it happened? Almost losing her didn’t make it happen. His heart was already lost; almost losing her just made him admit it to himself. Him. Alex Kidd, in love… and not the love he had felt for Madalena. No, he’d been a boy when he let Madalena bewitch him. What he felt for Caitrina was what a man feels in his heart for a woman. A passion for her that cannot be quenched.
And he tried to quench it. He didn’t want to be too rough with her, knowing, after she told him, that she’d never done this before. But she drove him mad with desire.
He kissed her while he carried her. When she tugged at his shirt, as eager for him as he was for her, he had to battle the urge to tear off her clothes and take her until he groaned at the moon.
He stopped kissing her to look down into her eyes. “Ya tempt me beyond reason, lass.” Even as he spoke, she closed her eyes and parted her lips, proving his words true.
He set her down in the sand and untied her earasaid. She turned with him when he spread the plaid out before them, eager to be back to kissing him. He obliged, taking her in his arms and bringing her with him to the ground. They undressed each other, working frantic fingers through laces and buckles until they both lay naked beneath the moonlight.
Alex took in the sight of her body like a starving beast. How had so many men on Skye resisted this perfect being, when he could not? Did she not beguile the hearts of other men? They were fools. He smiled at her. And now she was his, pure, timid in her dimpled smile, yet fearlessly coiling her legs around his. He wanted to take her every way possible, even in her mouth. She made him hard, hot, and ready. He traced his tanned fingers over her pale, creamy skin, loving the fragility it added to the vision of her. He knew he was falling, or had already fallen, by the way his heart swelled with emotion for her.
“I’m not afraid,” she whispered against him.
Somehow her admission sparked the flames scorching him. He cupped her ankle in his hand and raised her leg over his shoulder. He licked his way along her inner thigh until he reached the crease in her leg. When she realized what he meant to do, she tried to pull away. He held her still, cupping her hips in his hands. He dipped his face to the tuft of soft curls taunting him and spread his tongue over the hidden treasure. She groaned and arched her hips, inviting him to partake to his pleasure. And pleasure he took, drinking of her to the point of her release. Stopping short, he rose up over her, his heavy cock dangling between them. He looked down into her eyes and basked for an instant in the raw desire he saw looking back at him.