Juliet bit the inside of her lip. She did remember a moment, scant though it had been, when her curiosity had almost got the better of her. She had been with Gabriel, and they had recognized the Dove at anchor when they passed French Key. The two ships had put in to barter a portion of their cargo to the Dutchman in exchange for sheets of copper plating, and a combination of foolish circumstances had placed the two of them on deck under the stars with his hands up her shirt and his tongue halfway down her throat.
“That was a mistake. We had both been drinking, and—”
“‘Twas no mistake, lass. You were as hot for me as I was for you. ‘Twas your brother who interrupted us, plague take him, but it’ll not happen again. I’ve taken precautions this time to ensure we’ll not be disturbed.”
He raised a hand and snapped his finger. Almost immediately, the silhouettes of four burly men stepped out from behind the rocks and stood with their arms crossed over their chests, their grins showing through their beards. Four more appeared on the left and another two came over the crest of the dune. In all, they formed a protective semi-circle around the little inlet, leaving no escape other than the sea.
Stupid, stupid, stupid to have wandered so far down the beach.
Stupider still to have unbuckled her sword and guns, leaving her with only her wits, which were in damned poor shape, yet sobering fast. She was a strong swimmer. It would be a hellish long pull through the currents that ripped across the mouth of the harbor, but with luck she would not be dragged out into the ocean before she had a chance to pour a few broadsides down the Dutchman’s throat.
No sooner had the thought passed through her mind than she heard a faint splash behind her. Before she could react, a thick arm had snaked around her waist, another around her neck. Juliet twisted around and thrust two fingers in the direction she though her attacker’s eyes should be. She hit one, feeling it squish against her fingernail, but was too far off center and missed the other. Even so, he howled and loosened his grip enough that she was able to turn and drive a knee into his groin.
She broke free and but heard more footsteps splashing through the water. There were five of them this time, converging on her like mongrels, laughing, reaching out to grab her arms, her legs, her waist. The first one to reach her had his nose smashed and the bones driven into his face by the heel of her hand. The second roared and spun away, his face cut open by the wedge of coral she swung up from the sandy bottom. She started to run for deeper water, but someone snatched her hair from behind and jerked her head back. Someone else clubbed her temple with a fist, causing an explosion of pain in her head that made her limbs turn momentarily to jelly.
A moment was all they needed to lift her out of the water and carry her to shore. She was squirming and swearing by the time they dragged her free of the surf, but they only tightened their grip and lowered her onto the sand like a sacrificial offering. They stretched her arms out and pinned them flat, they spread her legs impossibly wide and planted a boot firmly on her hair to keep her head anchored to the ground.
Anders Van Neuk stood and brushed the sand off his breeches. He looked down at her, shaking his head as if he was terribly disappointed in her behavior.
“We can do this one of two ways, lass. You can show a little proper enthusiasm, or you can lie there with all these fine lads watching. Either way, I’ll be between your thighs and I’ll be enjoying myself.”
“My father, my brothers will kill you,” she hissed.
“Aye, that is a consideration,” he agreed, beginning to unfasten buckles and belts. “But I figure by the time they start to wonder what’s happened to you, you’ll be tucked up safe and sound on board the Dove and we’ll be under way.”
“They’ll come after you. They’ll hunt you down like a dog and flay the skin from your body strip by strip.”
“It’s your own skin you should be worrying about now, lass, and how much of it will be left when the Spaniard finishes with you.”
“Spaniard? What Spaniard?”
“Ah, now, there’s the beauty, you see, in flying the Dutch flag. Happens I was in Porto de Manati not four days ago when a shipload of Spaniards came in, rescued off some small hillock of sand in the middle of nowhere. One of them was a real handsome fellow, no ears, no manners to speak of but then show me a papist who does. At any rate, it seems he lost his ears on the Santo Domingo and was most anxious to make the acquaintance of la rosa de hierro again. So anxious, he’s offered to give the man who brings you back to him ten times his weight in gold—which in my case, is considerable, you will admit.”
“You would sell me to a bloody Spaniard for gold!”
“If it was just the gold, lass, I’d sell you back to your father for the same amount. But the thing of it is, the Spaniard is also offering a Let Pass, good for as long as we sail these waters, giving us the right to trade in any port, purchase any cargo, take away as much profit as we can carry in our holds. I grant you, it takes away the fun of blasting the bloody papists out of the water, but it saves my guns and my ships, and it will make me a rich, rich man. In truth,” he added, “it was my intention just to tap you on the head and take you back to Porto de Manati trussed up like a guinea fowl, but...” he paused again and the hard green eyes roved down her body. “You look such a tempting morsel all wet and shiny, I’m of a mind I should sample the wares first... just to make sure it’s worth all the trouble.”
His hands went to his waist and began to unfasten the leather thongs that bound his codpiece. Juliet twisted and writhed, she swore and spat, but on a word from Van Neuk, the hands clamped around her wrists and ankles tightened like iron shackles. A grunt warned her he was free of his breeches, and Juliet cursed again when she saw him drop onto his knees. His flesh was thick, jutting out at the base of his belly like a wooden club, and as he worked the skin back with one hand, he tore open her shirt and reached for her breasts with the other. His nails were long and ragged, the palms tough as leather and she had to clench her jaws to keep from screaming as he scratched and kneaded and nearly clawed her nipples off her body.
His men started to make lewd suggestions. One offered to hold her mouth open if he wanted to give her a taste of what was to come, another offered to shut it with his fists to spare them all the steady stream of oaths and curses she spat at them. The Dutchman merely slapped her hard across the cheek to silence her, then took a sharp dagger to the inseam of her breeches. The point sliced her twice where her squirming forced the knife to cut more than the cloth, but he was not deterred. His fingers probed her crotch and the knife was starting down the other leg when the sound of steel striking steel broke his concentration and he turned to search out the cause.
Two men with swords were fighting up on the dune, and as Van Neuk watched, one of them—his own crewman set there to warn of any unexpected company—screamed and fell, clutching his belly with his hands. The swordsman whirled and came running down the beach, sending up clods of sand behind him. Two more Dutch crewmen drew cutlasses and charged to meet him, but a stab and a slash sent them screaming onto the sand.
Anders growled and barked an order. The boot shifted off Juliet’s hair and she was able to raise her head in time to see Varian St. Clare meet his new attacker with a fierce display of cuts and strokes that sent the man’s weapon flying up in the air. Varian caught it and brought both blades slicing down across his opponent’s neck, nearly severing the head from the shoulders.
Three more of the men holding Juliet leaped to their feet and ran into the fray. Juliet was able to make a grab for the knife Anders still held poised over her crotch. She caught his wrist and twisted it back, thrusting it upward toward his chin. He reacted, but too slowly to deflect the aim, and, willing every ounce of strength into her fists, she jammed the knife up and in, feeling it cut through cartilage and bone, splitting the windpipe and scraping all the way to the back of his skull.
Van Neuk’s eyes bulged. He clawed at her hand, trying to drag the knife out of his throat, b
ut it was lodged too deep in his brain and he was already dying. Juliet rolled out from beneath him as he pitched forward onto the ground. She sprang to her feet and ran for her swordbelt, drawing her blade, twirling in a spray of sand to meet the two men who were hurdling around the rocks and coming after her. Her rage was at such a peak, that she pierced the first man straight through the chest, punching the blade clean through his spine and out the back of his doublet.
The second brute managed a swipe with his blade before she dropped him, and when she whirled to find a new threat, the two shadows that had hung back against the rocks, scrambled up the dunes and were swallowed into the night shadows.
“Are you all right?” Varian ran over, wiping spatters of blood off his face.
For a moment she was too furious to answer. Furious at herself, furious at Anders Van Neuk, furious at all mankind.
“Juliet—?”
“Leave me alone! Just... leave me alone!” She started to walk back down the beach, but stopped after only a few steps and stood there panting, staring at the lights in the distance. After all the talk, all the bravado, all the displays of skill and strength to prove she was the equal to any man, a bastard with a penis could still have taken it all away from her.
When she could trust herself to speak again, she turned and looked at Varian.
“Where did you come from? How did you know where to find me?”
“I saw you slip out of the tent, then I saw the Dutchman leave right after. I thought, by the look on his face, he was up to no good, so I made some excuse and followed. Are you all right? Did he... hurt you?”
She followed his gaze down. The one leg of her breeches was split and hanging from her thigh like a skirt, and where her thigh showed through, it was smeared with blood.
“The bastard cut me. Other than that... no, I’m not hurt. I would not have let him hurt me either, so if you’re standing there waiting for me to thank you for saving me from being raped, you will have a long wait.”
She brushed past him and leaned over the body of the Dutchman. There was no question he was dead. His eyes were wide, glazed, staring at the huge dark stain that had spilled beneath him in the sand, his hands were still frozen around the hilt of the knife protruding from his throat.
“He’s lucky he died so easily,” she muttered. She glanced around at the other bodies sprawled in the sand and pointed at one of the smaller ones. “That one will do. Help me get his breeches off.”
A few minutes later, Juliet was lacing herself into the dead man’s garment. She was cold, suddenly, and thankful for the warmth of her doublet. Gathering up her belts and hat, she started back down the beach, but once again she stopped and retraced her steps. With Varian watching, she dragged the half naked body over beside that of Anders Van Neuk. She arranged it face down with the buttocks in the air, then took her knife and sliced the other leg of her discarded breeches, leaving them clutched in the Dutchman’s bejewelled hand.
“Let whoever finds them think he died buggering one of his own men,” she spat.
After scuffing any telltale tracks she had made in the sand, she led the way back toward the lighted end of the harbor, saying very little until they drew near the long row of beached longboats.
“I would appreciate it if you did not mention this to my father. I think he was counting on the bastard’s support.”
“What about the men who escaped? Will they not tell a different tale than the one down on the beach?”
Juliet offered up a crooked smile. “I will be surprised if the Dove is still in the harbor come morning. If it is, then a new captain will have already assumed command, one who will not care how he came by his captaincy, only that he was saved the trouble of taking it himself. Murder is a natural means of attrition in this line of business.” She tossed her hat into the first jolly boat they came to and shoved the keel into the water.
“Where are you going?”
“Back to the Rose.”
“I’ll come with you,” he said, following her into the surf.
“No! I mean... no, I would rather you didn’t. Besides, you might be needed here.”
He tucked a finger under her chin, tipping her face up to his. She tried to flinch back but he caught her by the shoulders and made her look at him.
“Will you not allow me even one small illusion, madam? That you might need me just a little more tonight?”
She looked into his eyes without answering, without moving. His thumb caressed her chin for a moment, sensing another rejection in the tremor he felt there, but when his hand started to drop, she caught it, stopping him before he could turn away.
“Actually... I might need your help. Just a little.”
She swayed and started to slump forward. Varian caught her under the arms and when he lifted her, he felt where her breeches were soaked with blood along her thigh.
“The bastard cut me,” she whispered again. The words, muffled against his throat, trailed away as her body went limp and her head fell back over his arm.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
“I do not faint. I have never fainted in my life.”
“All right. We will say that you lost so much blood, it was a wonder you lived to draw another breath.”
Juliet’s eyes narrowed. “We will say nothing at all, sirrah. And look you here—” she pointed to the cut on her thigh which, although far from being a scratch, had certainly not been life-threatening. “Half an inch deeper and it might, indeed, have pierced the main vein.”
Varian obeyed and looked, trying not to smile at her sulk. The cut was as long as his hand and had bled profusely, but the edges were sealing without the need of stitches. There was a smaller slash further down her leg and two deeper ones near her ankle where the Dutchman’s knife had taken several stabs at catching the bottom of her breeches. He suspected the latter would cause the most discomfort when she tried to put her boots on.
Varian leaned over and kissed her thigh, and from there, it was only a matter of turning his head before he was kissing her somewhere else equally pink and tender.
The berth, they had discovered, was far too narrow for the two of them to occupy with any comfort and so they had ended up dragging the thin mattress onto the floor. Varian had spent the night simply holding her, for once they were back on board and he had helped strip away the bloody breeches, her bravura had finally failed her and she had begun shaking like a leaf.
The sight had struck him like a physical blow. She was always so sure of herself, so much in control, in command of her emotions that the sight of something so utterly female, so impossibly human made him want to slay dragons for her for the rest of his life.
He had bathed the blood from her thigh, tucked her into a clean new shirt and sat on the chair cradling her in his arms all night.
She sighed and nestled her head against his shoulder. “I just heard the watch bell and the sky is growing lighter. Johnny Boy will be knocking on the door soon to bring me my biscuits and cheese, while your man Beacom will be ringing his hands, convinced we have slit your throat and buried you in a sand dune.”
“Beacom is learning to adapt quite well to my long absences.”
She sat forward and stared into his eyes a moment before she kissed him. There was nothing provocative or seductive about it. It was just a kiss, a coming together of lips and breaths, the touching of flesh to flesh; nevertheless the contact produced a ripple of pleasure through both of them.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“For what?”
“For last night. For being on the beach, for bringing me back to the ship and tending my wounds.”
“Believe me,” he murmured, “it was my very great pleasure to rescue you. And of no lesser consequence to discover you are human after all.”
“You had reason to doubt it?”
“Reason? Do you have any idea what wealthy young noblewomen your age are doing at the moment in England?”
“I can only guess,” she said, venting an
elaborate sigh. “Embroidering monograms on linens? Anguishing over which frock to wear for dinner? Which of the Bard’s plays to attend?”
“For a certainty they are not planning how to attack a Spanish fleet. And had they been assaulted by a brute like Van Neuk, chances are they would have remained in shock the rest of their lives. Good God, Juliet. You are the captain of a fighting ship. You wear breeches and boots and sing sea chanties with pirates until the sun comes up. You sleep an hour a night, if that. You wield a sword like a demon fairy and you have a ship full of sailors hanging off your every word and command. Look, for pity’s sake, what you have made of me in less than a fortnight. You have me carrying false papers, bearing false witness, committing acts of treason and sedition, not to mention corrupting poor Lieutenant Beck into following suit. You have me sleeping on wooden floors and enjoying it as if it were a feather bed! In truth, if there were any more women like you in these Caribbean Isles, I would worry for the safety of all God-fearing men who trespass here.”
Her face tightened a moment before she wriggled off his lap. She searched around the clutter of papers on the desk a moment to locate tinder and flint, then lit a candle.
Varian stood to stretch his legs, wincing as he straightened the knuckles down his spine. He flexed his arms and raked his fingers through his hair, then wandered out onto the gallery.
Night was receding as if some giant hand were drawing back the blankets. A thin band along the eastern horizon was pink and gold and pewter gray, the colors changing almost moment to moment as the sun rose higher toward the sea. There were still torches and bonfires visible on the crescent of the shoreline. The breeze was cool, but laden with the threat of tropical heat, and it brought the smell of woodsmoke, of cookfires, of sand and salt and fish over the harbor. Most of the ships riding at anchor had huge lamps burning on their upper decks and Varian could see the silhouettes of tiny figures in the various stages of changing watches.
There were so many men, yet they entrusted their fates to so few. Did they ever question the decisions of their captains? Were they ever apprised of the incredible odds standing against them before they embarked on a venture such as the one they were about to undertake?
Pirate Wolf Trilogy Page 60