Tempting the Pirate

by Tamara Hughes

  The streets were full to brimming with the town’s inhabitants, mugs already in hand. They slowed their pace as they merged with the crowd. James took the bag from her and tucked it under one arm, nudging her ahead of him.

  A group of grubby women in ragged gowns hawked their bodies in front of a crumbling church. “Come ’ere, ’andsome,” a redhead crooned to James as they passed by. “Follow me inside, an I’ll ’elp you get closer to God.”

  He waved the woman off and grabbed Charity’s arm. They passed by a wagon stacked high with barrels, four horses tied in front, and ducked inside a stable. Besides two horses standing quietly in their stalls, the place was deserted. They headed to the back of the building where James pushed her inside an empty stall and thrust the burlap sack in her arms. “Hurry. Change back into the gown. The crew will be looking for a woman dressed as a boy.”

  After closing the door, she dumped the contents of the bag onto the fresh bed of straw and rifled through the contents, finding her shift and stays. “What now?” she asked, tugging the scarf from her head.

  James combed his fingers through his hair and heaved a sigh. “I’ll find you a room at the closest inn, where you’ll be safe from discovery, and then I’ll attempt to find you passage off the island.”

  She removed the shirt and the cloth that bound her breasts, her lack of clothing raising tingling bumps on her flesh despite the stall door that separated her from James. “What of your men?”

  When he looked up, his attention landed on her bare shoulders and stayed there as if he was entranced by the sight. “I’ll arrange for your safe departure before I worry about them.”

  Although he couldn’t see anything below her shoulders, his perusal warmed her skin and quickened her pulse. She picked up her shift and wriggled into it, her thoughts tumbling to the last time he’d looked at her that way. The pleasure he’d given her in the hold of the ship still shook her to her very depths. What they’d shared had been so intimate. No one had ever touched her the way he had. “How many women have you lain with?” She had no idea where the question had come from, or why she desperately wanted to know the answer.

  His gaze rose to her face, his eyes wary. “Why do you wish to know?”

  The self-proclaimed lover of women no doubt had dallied with an abundance of exotic beauties. “How many women have you lain with?” she asked again, a bit firmer this time, despite the niggling notion she might not want to know.

  He shrugged. “A fair number.”

  She positioned her stays and jerked the laces tight. “That’s not an answer.”

  His brows slanted, a crease between them. “What do you expect? I don’t number them like conquests, or notch my belt with each one.”

  She bristled at his indifference. He couldn’t recall how many? “Why not number them?” Without faces or names, they meant nothing. “That’s what those women are. Conquests.”

  “No, not conquests. I don’t seek out women to tarnish, but if an enticing situation presents itself…”

  A situation like what passed between them in the hold. She scowled as she untied the cord about her waist. The thought burning a hole deep in her chest. Their time together must have meant little to him.

  “No matter what you think, I treat women with the respect they deserve.”

  “Do you?” What a lie. Women were pretty playthings to him, nothing more. She removed her trousers, letting her shift fall to cover her thighs. “Do you give them your trust?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Have you told any one of them a well-guarded secret?”

  He shook his head. “There’s been no need.”

  She huffed out a breath, outraged for all womankind. “Respect is more than good social graces. It involves trust and honesty, sharing the innermost part of yourself.”

  “I think you’re confusing respect with love. Hardly the same thing.”

  Love. She’d only experienced the emotion once, with her mother. Never the romantic kind. Although James inspired new emotions inside her… That couldn’t be love, could it? What did it feel like? “Have you ever been in love?”

  “No.” He peered toward the door to the stable, a muscle in his jaw flexing. “I spend my days at sea or in ports around the world. It would be a disservice to any woman to pledge my love only to leave her for months on end.”

  The grim sincerity of his voice left no doubt that these words were being chosen carefully because they applied to her. Not that she cared. Still, her breath left her on a long, disheartened exhale. “You could take her with you.”

  His gaze swung back her way. “Out to sea?”

  She nodded. “Why not?”

  “What’s a woman to do without lady friends, regular baths, and decent food? A sailor’s life involves stormy seas and the threat of pirates. It’s dangerous.”

  Lady friends? A novel concept. She had none. As for baths and food. Such trifles. “Women aren’t as fragile as you think.” She stepped into a petticoat and fastened it about her waist. “You say women don’t belong at sea, that they can’t survive the boredom and hardship. You’re wrong. I didn’t always reside in a big house with servants. Before my parents died, we lived in the country. We grew our own food and made our own clothes. We even had chickens and pigs.” So long ago. She donned her remaining petticoats, then began to pin her stomacher to her stays. “My mother…my mother worked all hours of the day without a complaint.” Her mother had been so much more than the woman who had abandoned her during the storm. How had she forgotten?

  “You don’t understand.”

  “Then explain it to me.”

  The lines of regret on his face drew her in, and she waited for what he would say next.

  He inhaled slow and deep, and studied the door between them. “A couple of years ago, my younger sister, Isabelle, stowed away on my ship. I didn’t find her until we were well on our way. She convinced me not to turn back.”

  The similarity to her own circumstances made her cringe. No wonder his first instinct had been to send her away.

  “When we ran into bad weather, I told her to stay below decks. Isabelle didn’t listen. She thought she could help.” He pinched the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes, his lips turning down at the corners.

  “James.” She rested her hand on the stall door, wishing she touched him instead. “You don’t need to go on.”

  He swallowed, the sound carrying. “Swells washed the decks, and I didn’t see her until it was too late. She was swept overboard, and she drowned.”

  Drowned. Mercy. “I’m so sorry.”

  His head jerked in a nod. “She was sixteen when she died.”

  What happened was terrible, yes, but did James really wish to spend the rest of his life alone? “Your sister’s death was an accident. It could have happened to anyone. You said yourself the last navigator aboard Neptune’s Mercy had met that same fate. Women are not the weak, feeble creatures—”

  “Who’s in here?” a gruff voice asked from the stable doors.

  Charity’s stomach clenched, and she stepped back, the straw coarse beneath her feet. She snatched up her gown and slid her arms through the sleeves. James took one look at her, still partly undressed, and rushed through the stall door. He pulled her against him and pressed his lips to hers in a hungry kiss that sent a riot of sensation spiraling through her belly. She forgot all else, her hands finding the feathery softness of his hair. His hand covered her breast, and she leaned into him, eager for more.

  “Get out!” ordered the same gruff voice as before.

  A gasp sprang to her throat, and she pushed against James’s chest, but he held strong, keeping her in place. “We’re not done in here,” he insisted. “She said—”

  “I don’t give a donkey’s arse what she said.” The stable man had a well-lined face and an angry grimace. He pointed a thick finger at Charity. “I’ve told them girls many a time not to bring their business over here. They’re to stay at the church.”

&
nbsp; He thought she was…that she was a prostitute? Her back stiffened, a few choice words on her lips, but she had no time to say them. James grasped hold of her hand and marched from the stall as if he were most indisposed. “We’ll finish over there then.”

  When they reached the stable doors, he slowed and nodded toward her gown, her stomacher still unpinned from her dress. She hurried to correct the situation, her mind befuddled. The kiss had been a ruse done for the benefit of the stable man? Her body refused to believe so. Her insides still twitched and tingled, her nerves dancing with abandon.

  Their conversation about love and family came to mind, tamping down the desire that remained. He’d soon leave her and never look back. If she valued her heart, she’d best keep that in mind. Maybe to be safe, she should tell him, tell him… What? Never to touch her again? To stop his flirtations before she lost all sense and begged him to stay with her forever? Impossible. His easy charm and open affection were as natural to him as taking air into his lungs. To ask him to stop would be asking him to cease being who he was. And who he was made her feel… Her heart lurched, as if warning her to tread carefully. Suffice it to say, she very much liked the man he was.

  Once she finished the task of dressing, James ushered her forward into the crowds once more. Farther down the street, mostly men roamed about—drunks who laughed too loud, the stench of their filthy bodies overpowering the smells of stale rum and cooking meat. A pig roasted on a spit to one side of the dirt road. “Six pence a pound,” a short, bearded man yelled as he turned the rod that rotated the sizzling meat.

  Charity shrank into herself as the leering eyes of several drunken sots studied her. She sidled closer to James, using his body to shield hers from view.

  The stares sharpened to questioning looks, and the hair on the nape of her neck stood like porcupine quills. What did these men think of her? An oddity to be sure. And how soon would word of a cowering woman spread to Captain Shevington, giving her away? Stepping out from behind James’s shadow, she attempted a smile, her lips twitching with the effort. Be strong. She needed a way to escape notice. Charity glanced back at the prostitutes and blew out a sigh. She had no choice.

  With a nervous swallow, she tugged off the leather strip that held her hair back and shook out the strands, then grabbed James’s arm, pressing her chest into him.

  James raised a brow, his eyes roaming over the rise of her breasts, heating her blood, before a look of understanding settled over his features.

  She forced her attention away to study the reaction around them. Suspicious scrutiny ceased, replaced by a few bold inspections.

  A young, somewhat clean sailor swaggered forward, his hair the color of straw and the side of his neck covered in the tattoo of an angel. “’Ello, beauty. Buy you a rum?” With a confident smirk, he clasped her arm in a bruising grip and dragged her from James’s side.

  Panic blazed to life. “Let go of me.” She struggled to pull free, but he held firm.

  He tucked a coin between her breasts, the metal heavy and smooth. “Let’s put that pretty mouth to good use.”

  All fear drained away, replaced by an insatiable need to strike out. She reared back to slap the arrogance off his face when James grasped the hand that imprisoned her.

  “Leave her be,” he growled.

  A glint of metal flashed beside her, and as quick as a striking snake, the sailor slashed at James’s wrist.

  Muttering a curse, James pulled away before the blade could touch his skin.

  The sailor waved the knife in the air. “Stand down, you buzzard.”

  A wry smile twisted James’s lips. He clasped the pistol at his hip and pulled it free, pointing the barrel at the sailor’s chest. “Hand her over. Now,” he commanded, his voice deadly calm.

  With a growl, the sailor thrust her back toward James. She stumbled, then righted herself. Laying a protective arm around her, James steered her away from the swine.

  “Bitch,” the blond man spat out as he followed them down the street. “I would bet I can service you better. My prick is likely twice the size of his.”

  James flinched and began to turn about, pushing her behind him. She resisted the move. James might shoot the man yet.

  Instead, she strung her hands around James’s neck and leaned into him, forcing words from her mouth she’d never thought she’d hear herself say. “I assure you, sir, his prick is almost more than I can handle.” With a bravado she didn’t realize she possessed, she grinned wickedly. “He satisfies me in every way.”

  A look of annoyance reddened the man’s face. Charity stiffened. Over his shoulder, she spied The Judge marching down the street, several crewmen at his side. He was supposed to be locked aboard the pirate ship.

  James must have seen The Judge, too. His arm tightened around her. “Go find another doxy to warm your bed,” he told the blond man. His fingers slipped inside her bodice and plucked out the coin. He tossed it to the sailor who’d followed them. “Make no mistake. I will kill you if you take another step this way.”

  The sailor scowled, but turned away as James ushered her toward the nearest tavern. Inside, a bar took up the whole of the back wall, the stools before it occupied with a contemptible sort. Tables littered the floor space with nary an open seat. A few barmaids mingled with the lot, hanging on this one or kissing the neck of another.

  “There are rooms upstairs.” James nodded toward the corner where a stairway rose to the second floor. “We’ll get you settled in one, and then I’ll come back down to find you a ship off the island.”

  “No.” The word was out before she’d thought much about it.

  “No?”

  “I don’t want to sit locked away somewhere wondering when or if you’ll be coming back.” The worry would be too much.

  James stared her in the eye. “I’ll come back. You can be assured of that.”

  She shook her head. “Who’s to say I’ll be safer there alone and unprotected? I’d rather stay with you.”

  “What if someone recognizes you?”

  “They won’t. In this dress, I look like any other woman in this town.” She adjusted her bodice to better display her breasts. “As far as anyone is concerned, I’m one of them, simply trying to earn my keep.”

  “I don’t think—”

  “You have no hold over me. You can’t tell me what to do.” Her mind was made up. She’d far rather face the dangers down here with him than the unknown that awaited her upstairs alone.

  With a quiet curse, James claimed her hand and traveled through the crowd. He stopped at a table in the far corner where two men sat with mugs in their hands.

  “Join you?” James asked.

  A big brute of a man with a scar spanning from his ear to his chin turned to them. His gaze roamed as far as Charity’s chest. He gave a grunt and waved them to the two open chairs.

  The wretch beside him leaned closer and squinted at James, his monstrous jowls swaying with the movement. “You’re not one of ours. Who do you sail for?”

  His fetid breath reached Charity from clear across the table. She raised a hand to her nose to keep from gagging.

  James motioned to a barkeep, who hurried over, a bottle and mugs in his hands. “I sail for Captain Whitholm.”

  “Never heard of him,” the scarred one said, his interest fading as he watched the portly barkeep refill his mug at James’s command. Once the liquor was poured, he lifted the drink and nodded to James. “Fortune to you and yours.” He took a healthy gulp, then swept a hand in Charity’s direction. “Nothing for the lady?”

  “There’s no need—” she insisted.

  “What’s this?” Sir Smellsalot laughed, the few teeth he displayed blackened by decay. “A whore not acceptin’ a rum when it’s offered. Ha.”

  Very well. If that’s what the women here did. She rested a hand on James’s cheek with a mock-pleading look. “Buy me a drink, love?”

  After a short pause, he motioned to the barkeep, who placed a full mug before
her.

  “Leave the bottle.” James paid generously and the man strode back to the bar with a spring in his step.

  All eyes settled on Charity in expectation, so she lifted the mug. “To your health.” A sweet, fruity smell teased her nose, promising a flavor that wouldn’t be so bad. She tasted a sip. A sharp burn coated the back of her tongue. She forced a calm face, even summoning a small smile for the benefit of those who watched.

  The ape across from her stroked his fingers along his scar. “Come now, lass. You’ve barely touched it. Drink up.”

  “Rest easy,” she assured him, silently cursing the jackass. “Just testing its quality.”

  Smelly jabbed Scar in the ribs. “Testing its quality,” he chortled.

  Giving a weak laugh, she joined in their humor and turned a pleading eye to James.

  He lifted an eyebrow and shrugged.

  “Fine then.” Under their watchful regard, she took a larger swallow. The liquor scorched her throat this time, its flavor heavy on her breath.

  “That’s the way,” Scar cheered.

  She smothered a sour face, and soon the effects of the drink mellowed to a smolder. Her muscles relaxed. All the while, the two pirates continued to stare as if enthralled by her every movement. She tested the theory, brushing her tongue over her lips, tasting the last remnants of rum. Both men watched intently, one swallowing and rubbing his mouth with a grubby hand.

  Charity cast a glance at James, a knowing wink ready, and stopped short at his fierce gaze.

  He sat rigidly, his hand clenched around his mug so tight his fingertips were pale. And his eyes… They devoured her in a look so primal, her body throbbed in places well hidden.

  James took up the bottle and poured out another round of drinks. “I’m looking for a ship willing to take on passengers.” The slightly strained quality of his voice didn’t settle well. Tension at the table rose with a narrowing of eyes.

  “You’re deserting your ship?” Smelly scoffed, each word punctuated by a gust of death laced with rum.

  Calmly, James took a sip of his drink. “My captain’s had us docked for months. It’s time to be off, especially now that I hear tales that the Royal Navy is planning an attack.”