Fortune Trilogy 1 - Fortune's Mistress

by Judith E. French

  Vaguely, she was aware of him lowering her to the deck, of his mouth and hands moving over her body, soothing the ache between her legs, washing away the pain and replacing it with overwhelming desire.

  “I want you,” she whispered. “I want to be part of you.” She opened her eyes and stared into his, opening for him like a flower to the sun.

  He uttered her name as he entered her, slowly, tenderly ... filling her with his love. And this time, he was right. There was no more pain. There was just this man ... this moonlit night . . . and the exquisite rapture of her own body.

  On the twenty-third day out of Santa Cruz, the wind died. The ocean lost its bright blue hue and took on a somber brown. There were no whitecaps and no fish jumping. Mats of rotting seaweed floated on a murky sea—a sea as flat and lifeless as glass.

  The sails had gradually lost their fullness until they hung limp in the hot sun. Lacy lowered a weighted line over the side to try and see how deep the water was, but she ran out of line at two hundred feet. She tried fishing, but to no avail. Nothing moved on the surface or below it.

  “They call this the Horse Latitudes,” James said. “The area is known for calms. When we get farther south, the wind will pick up again.”

  “If we get farther south,” Lacy answered. She had always loved the sea, but she found these conditions disturbing. Even the air seemed dead and full of foul vapors.

  “If you were a witch, you could call up the wind and push us through this,” he said.

  “Don’t make jokes about such things.” Her relief at his lack of fear concerning her curse was genuine, but she still wondered what he would do when she lapsed into another spell.

  “It’s all a lot of nonsense,” he’d said, when she’d explained to him why she’d been sentenced to hang. “The judges should be hanged for stupidity. No intelligent person has believed such hocus-pocus for a hundred years.”

  Nothing she could say could convince him that she did have true visions of the future.

  “I’m an educated man, chit,” James said as he took a reading on their position. “I’ll need more proof than your tall tales before I believe in what I can’t see.”

  “The English court believed in my curse.”

  “The English courts are run by asses.”

  She didn’t want James to be afraid of her, but neither did she want to be dismissed as being too stupid to know what unnatural power she possessed.

  “I never claimed to be a devil worshipper,” she protested. “My granny said everything comes from God. She said if I did have the gypsy sight, it was God’s will, not Satan’s.”

  “There are a hundred explanations for what you call your visions,” he replied. “And none of them involve witchcraft.”

  She knew that she had never practiced sorcery, but it made her uneasy when James spoke of witchery in jest. “I saw a woman burn once for less than I’ve done,” she said.

  “Poor wretch. But the fact that someone murdered her doesn’t prove she was a witch any more than the fact that they wanted to hang me for piracy makes me a pirate.” He tapped the sundial, then checked his readings once more. “I’m sure of how far south we are. It’s the distance west of Africa that’s tricky,” he said.

  Her eyes dilated in astonishment. “You don’t know where we are?”

  “Of course I know where we are. We’re becalmed in the Horse Latitudes.”

  “How far from land?”

  “That’s the part I’m not certain of.” He carefully rolled the backstaff in oiled cloth and tied the bundle. “We’ve made good time, but I can’t be certain if we’re sailing at five knots or six. It makes a difference in determining how far we’ve come, and how far we have to go to reach the Caribbean.”

  She regarded him shrewdly. “It’s been my observation that the more a man talks and the more fancy words he uses, the less he knows about what he’s doing.”

  A red flush showed under his tan. “You can’t judge distance at sea like you can say it’s fourteen miles from here to Banbury Cross. The tradewinds blow in a circular pattern. We have to travel farther to—”

  “I know about wind and current, James Black. And I know how long our food and water will last. What I don’t know is how long this voyage will take. Do you?”

  He shook his head. “Not exactly.”

  “And do ye know how long we’ll be becalmed here?”

  “A few days, maybe.”

  “Maybe. What if it’s weeks?”

  “Then we eat less.”

  “And if the wind doesn’t return?”

  “It will,” he assured her. “Sooner or later, it will.”

  “It’s the later I’m worried about.”

  He dropped an arm around her shoulder and tilted up her face to kiss her. “We’ve not come so far and risked so much,” he said, “to end it all here. Have faith in me, Lacy.”

  His mouth encompassed hers, and she sighed, knowing that James would put an end to her arguments by making love to her. He had only to touch her, and her thoughts tumbled over and over like driftwood in high surf. When he kissed her, nothing mattered but his caresses ... his provocative murmurs. He was a fever in her blood, and she couldn’t get enough of him.

  James had kept his promise about giving her pleasure. He was a tender, passionate lover and a good teacher. It was so easy for her to be caught up in the rush of this new and thrilling emotion ... so easy to forget that what they shared couldn’t last. That although he made love to her, he didn’t love her ... at least not in the way that promised forever.

  This moment. This hour. This day. It was all she had, and all she’d ever have. Why not make memories with James to keep her warm when she was alone again?

  Why fight with him when it was so much nicer to kiss, and touch, and laugh at silly nothings?

  They slept together now. They’d made a bed of folded sails on the cabin floor and covered it with blankets. When she woke in the morning, she was in his arms. He was the last thing she saw before she closed her eyes, and the first thing she saw when she opened them. He was her world. Yet he was as much a mystery to her as he had been when she’d first caught sight of him at Newgate Prison.

  “Who are you?” she’d asked him over and over.

  “You know who I am. I’m James Black, and I’m going to make you a rich woman.”

  “I want to know about your past.”

  “That’s not important,” he replied, taking a clean linen shirt from his green leather chest. James had won big at cards the night he’d spent on Santa Cruz, and he’d spent most of his money on a pair of calf-high Spanish leather boots and a gentleman’s wardrobe. “What’s important is who I’m going to be. When we find the treasure, I’ll be welcome in any house in England. I can buy a title. Charles has sold enough of them since he’s returned to the throne. What do you think? Shall I ask for an earldom, or something higher?”

  She closed her eyes and let herself be swept up in James’s sensual kiss. He couldn’t hurt her as long as she remembered that he was a heartless rogue. As long as she didn’t trust him. As long as she used him, as he was using her ...

  The winds returned as James had promised her. After eight days, the sails caught enough wind to move them fitfully west. A week passed and then two more. The provisions ran low, but there was enough water, and twice Lacy caught a fish to add to their larder. The weather was warm and the sea ever-changing, from blue-green to gray.

  Lacy knew she should have been driven to distraction by James’s constant presence and the size of the boat, but she wasn’t. When they weren’t making love, they talked for hours without stopping and laughed at silly nonsense. As long as she didn’t ask about his family or childhood, James was good-natured and fun to be with. He showed a genuine willingness to treat her not just as a woman, but as a companion—a friend. And for a girl raised around rough seamen, it was a relationship she accepted easily.

  The only thing she couldn’t share with James was her dream of owning a farm. She�
��d never been able to tell her father or brothers about her idea, and she couldn’t tell James either. If he ridiculed the notion, it would cut her too deeply. “You’re a wrecker’s whelp with salt water in your veins instead of blood!” Red Tom had shouted when she’d protested that she hated the life he led. “Born to it—die to it. Ye be no better than the rest of us. You who lured your first ship on the rocks before ye could man an oar.”

  And it was true. Even now, she could close her eyes and see the bodies strewn on the rocks after that shipwreck. She hadn’t known why her father had told her to stand on that windy outcrop of stone and wave the lantern in the dead of night, but she’d damned well done it. The Dover Merchant, storm-tossed and desperate, had heeded the light and run closer to the cliffs when they should have sailed out away from them. Seventeen dead from that night’s work, and a goodly amount of silver in Red Tom’s pocket.

  She’d never forgiven her father for that night. And she’d never forgiven herself. Child or not, her hands were stained with the blood of the passengers and crew. What right did someone like her have to judge James Black? And what right did she have to dream of fields of wheat and land that no man could take away from her?

  So the long sea voyage passed, day by day. One morning there were dolphins swimming around the boat; they kept pace with the Silkie until dusk, then disappeared. Another day, Lacy sighted a flock of sea birds, flying too high for her to tell what they were. But the birds flew west, in the same direction the Silkie was sailing; and the sight of them assured Lacy that somewhere ahead was land.

  The following afternoon, dark clouds scudded across gray sky, and the waves churned into frothy whitecaps. A squall passed just north of them. Sheets of rain drenched the Silkie, but although James trimmed the sails, the little boat was in no real danger.

  Lacy was crossing the deck to bring him a mug of brandy to warm his innards when suddenly she was overcome with dizziness. The tin cup dropped from her fingers and rolled over the side in slow motion as she fell backward into a black void.

  Aqua-blue water surrounded her, so beautiful and clear that she laughed for the wonder of it. Strangecolored fish swam around her; orange-striped, spotted lime, and vivid yellow and black. Lacy reached out her hand and touched a bright blue one just before it vanished through a crack in a rock. Abruptly, a giant green-headed eel dove at her with yawning mouth and teeth like daggers. She jerked back her hand, twisted and tried to swim away, but the hideous monster came after her. She screamed once, a silent scream of terror—

  In the blink of an eye, Lacy’s surroundings changed. She was no longer beneath the water. She was standing on the deck of the Silkie staring toward starboard as a wall of black water rushed toward the little boat. Before she could move, the giant wave struck.

  The awful sound of splintering wood resounded in her ears as she opened her eyes and looked around in bewilderment for the mug of brandy she had been carrying. “What the—” she began.

  “Lacy!” James knelt beside her and helped her up. “What happened? Are you hurt?”

  She tried to sort out the images in her mind. An eel ... aqua water . . . “The wave!” she cried. Wiggling free of his arms, she ran to the tiller and brought the small craft about. “The sails!” she shouted. “Lower them. Quick.”

  Her heart hammered against her chest. Her mouth tasted of base metal. Her nails dug into the wood of the tiller.

  “What the hell?” James came toward her. “Why are you altering?”

  “Please, don’t ask me why!” she cried. “There isn’t time. Just do as I say. Close the hatches and lower the sails.”

  Grumbling, and clearly disgusted with her, he did as she bade him. Then he came back to the stern and stood before her, arms folded, face set in hard male lines. “Explain yourself, woman,” he said, “or else you’ve given me good reason to think you should have been in Bedlam instead of Newgate.”

  She didn’t even try to reply. She held on to the tiller, teeth clenched and eyes averted. An hour passed, perhaps less, she couldn’t be sure.

  James’s badgering had ceased. Now, he only sat and glared at her.

  The coming of the wave was almost an aftermath. The wall of water was not as large as she had seen in her vision. It was no more than twenty feet high, but if it had hit them unawares, it would have capsized the Silkie.

  Just before it hit, James threw his arms around her. His hands covered hers on the tiller, lending his strength to her own and giving her something solid to hang on to.

  But the Silkie didn’t founder.

  At the last minute, both of them leaned into the tiller, quartering the terrible wave. The bow of the boat rose up with the swell, plunging into the heart of gray-black bore, then dived through it down into the trough. Not straight down. Not down to the ocean bottom as she could have done if they’d been pointing directly into the wave.

  Instead, the Silkie went down and down until Lacy thought her heart would burst from fear. The pink’s wooden ribs creaked as she rolled from side to side. And in the brief seconds before the bowsprit began to climb again, James’s grip tightened on her, and she heard him shout her name above the roar of water.

  Then, when it seemed all was lost, the Silkie rose out of the chasm, shook like a wet dog, and found her balance again. For an instant, James held Lacy. Her eyes and ears were full of spray, but she thought she heard him say, “... love you.” He kissed her roughly, then shoved her toward the bow. “Looks like rough weather ahead. You’d best get below, woman.”

  She stopped and drew in a deep breath of wet, salt-tinged air. The squall that had missed them earlier circled around and began to pound them with wind and rain.

  Still, Lacy stood there, one hand against the mast, savoring the joy of being alive. The cold downpour, the icy blast didn’t dismay her. The sensation of air and water, the smell of the storm, the feel of the wooden boat beneath her feet made her want to shout with exhilaration, and she knew from the glow of James’s face that he felt the same way.

  When the storm passed and the seas were calm once more, he came below. “I’m freezing,” he complained.

  “I’ve soup,” she replied, “and it’s hot enough to warm your bones. But first, ye’d best get out of those wet clothes.”

  He stripped off his wet shirt, and she toweled him dry with a blanket. At first, she rubbed his broad back briskly, but gradually her motions slowed. The blanket fell to the deck between them as she pressed her cheek against his skin. He turned and took her in his arms.

  “James ... I ...”

  He crushed her against him and silenced her with a searing kiss. His hands tangled in her hair and he pressed her back against the ladder. Warmth flooded her body as she felt the pressure of his engorged manhood against her belly.

  “Your soup ...” she teased.

  “Damn the soup.” He ran a possessive hand over the curve of her hip and lowered his head to kiss her again.

  She was still laughing when he carried her to the bunk and made urgent, glorious love to her far into the night.

  James never repeated the words she thought she’d heard him say after the wave passed, but there was a new tenderness in his touch, and his eyes reflected the emotion that filled her own heart.

  Neither one could sleep afterward. Instead, they went on deck together and sat side by side through the long hours of darkness. And when sunrise appeared over the eastern horizon, Lacy saw driftwood bobbing on the water and heard the cry of seagulls.

  “We’ll be sighting land in a day or two,” James predicted.

  “Aye, it looks like we’re getting closer.” She watched as he checked his compass reading and adjusted the tiller. “We’d not have survived the wave without my warning. I saw it, like a dream, but not a dream. When I fell on the deck, Jamie, I had another spell. Did ye not notice?”

  “You slipped on the wet deck. An accident, nothing more. Not witchcraft, and not bad luck.”

  “Then how did I know the wave was coming?”
r />   He shrugged. “Woman’s intuition.”

  “Are ye so blind, man, that ye cannot see? I’m a witch. I’m cursed with the gypsy sight.”

  James looked unconvinced. “Would it work with piquet? Can you tell what cards an opponent has drawn, or what cards are next up in the deck?”

  “I don’t think so. It never happens when I want to see what’s going to happen.”

  “Then it’s useless, and you’re poor shakes as a witch. I’d try for another occupation, if I were you.”

  “I saw something else, too—during my trance. I saw a horrible green-headed eel. It came after me with its mouth open.”

  He scoffed. “Like as not you cracked your head when you fell. I’ve seen stars myself when I’ve taken a hard knock, but never eels. One thing I can say for you, Lacy Bennett. You never bore a man.”

  “Ye can stand there and tell me ye believe in woman’s intuition and not witchcraft?”

  “Woman are perverse creatures put here by the Creator to plague men. You don’t think like men, you’re hysterical, and you can’t be trusted any farther than your husbands or fathers can see you. It’s no surprise to me that you sense natural events like storms. A smart horse can do the same thing.” He grinned at her. “I’m glad I brought you along on this voyage, instead of a horse. There are some things that only a woman can do.”

  “A smart horse? You’re comparing me to a horse?”

  He shrugged again. “At least no one would think to hang a horse for running to safety before a storm. Don’t misunderstand me, sweet. I like women. I like them very much.”

  “You just don’t trust them.”

  “No, Lacy, I don’t. Not even you.”

  “Well, then, at least we both know where we stand. For I don’t trust you either,” she said. “And I warn you, if ye try to cheat me out of my share of the treasure, there’ll be hell to pay.”