Many times their bodies crashed together as close as lovers, only to untangle their weapons and strike at each other once more. The chase around the room continued.
Until the unthinkable happened.
As he stepped out of reach of the rabid Chinese pirate, Andre caught the heel of his boot on the edge of his sash. His legs spread wide and out from under him. He slipped on his unwound waist sash as it dragged upon the floor. With a distraught cry, he dropped to his knees, while Zheng, with a foaming, maniacal grin, raised his broadsword in both hands high above his own head.
~*~
The first clash of cutlass against sword reverberated up Louis’ arm, rattling his teeth loose from his head. mon dieu, he had forgotten how strenuous sword fighting become. each subsequent connection with his opponent rendered arm weaker. fingers grew numb as they clutched the grip.
Tingling sensations coursed up his arm as he spun away in his trademark move that usually resulted in him running his adversary through. This time, however, the endeavor simply sent him out of his foe’s striking range. A good result, but not quite what he’d had in mind. The Chinese enemy continued his offense by running forward, not winded in the least.
Out of breath, out of strength, Louis bent at the waist, gasping for air, positive each breath would be his last as he surrendered to his age and lack of stamina. His muscles disobeyed his brain’s command. His sword arm quivered, rebelliously stationary at his side. Watching his opponent charge toward him between wheezing breaths, he sent up a half-formed prayer to take care of his son when he was gone.
Out of nowhere, in the blink of one bleary eye, someone came to his rescue. His savior brandished a long sword, his footsteps echoed through the hall like a battle challenge as Louis, unable to stand upright any longer, slid to the floor in boneless shame. The shape took form as Limey, swinging his sword like a windmill. In swift and dangerous retribution, he knocked Louis’ adversary back on his ass with that man’s weapon clattering across the hallway.
Louis watched in amazement from his crouched vantage point as the Chinese guard cowered on the floor, staring up into Limey’s thundercloud dark face. The Brit’s sword hung perpendicular to the unarmed man’s chest. The Chinese man’s eyes closed. His face calmed. He accepted the inevitability of his death. Only Limey didn’t send the kill stroke.
Uttering an animal growl, he pivoted, while Ting appeared with what looked like silken cord between her graceful fingers. She knelt beside the guard and made quick work of tying his hands and feet together like a sacrificial pig’s. She then rose to her feet as Limey held out his hand to Louis. While Louis regained his footing and his breath, de Gallo, and Madame Liu fended off the other attacker, who was no match for them. He soon ended up like his counterpart.
All three pirates looked down at the trussed guards. They wiped sweat from their faces and glanced about for enemy reinforcements. The grunts and clanging of metal upon metal in Zheng’s antechamber drew their attention.
Groaning with every move he made, Louis stepped toward the doorway, putting a gentle hand upon Limey’s shoulder along the way. “I did not thank you for saving my life, Master Wharton. I am in your debt. Name your price and I will gladly pay it.”
Limey looked down into his face. “I will think hard, Le Commandant, before I name my price, and I will expect you to hold up your end of the deal.”
Louis grinned. “That’s alright, boy. There’s no time limit, except for me own mortal one.”
Limey nodded. “You would have got the bloody bugger eventually, sir.”
Louis cackled, his equilibrium restored, until he looked through the doorway at his son fighting Zheng.
“Merde.”
~*~
He was slipping. Bloody, buggering hell, he was slipping on his own damn sash. To hell with those Chinese and their silken death traps.
Andre couldn’t stop his crashing descent, even as his eyes flew to his opponent raising his sword for the deathblow. Gravity pulled Andre down, down to his knees in a bone-jarring crunch, slamming his teeth together hard enough to crack them.
Disjointed pictures of Sophie flew through his brain like parts of a scattering puzzle. There he saw himself dancing with her when they first met. The next puzzle piece flashed to her lying beneath him, trembling as he attempted to make her his.
As he rolled on the floor below Zheng, his mind zipped ahead to when he made Sophie his, and lost a part of his heart in the process. Next, the island, with her screaming she was drowning while he laughed his head off. Sophie clasped to him under the waterfall, crying in ecstasy.
The puzzle of his most recent past, slid together in a mosaic of emotions and flashes of light. His heart, at once together and split apart, forever lost in one misstep within the present.
“No,” he shouted, looking at the gleeful warlord as he stood above him. He’d lost his wife, the love of his life, to this maniac. He wouldn’t let him take his life as well. In a last burst of life-saving energy, Andre executed a wild somersault, using his downward momentum to spin head over tucked heels away from a most certain death.
Tilting to his side at the last minute, he raised his sword and slashed with the strength of his last fight for life. The sword made a swiping connection across Zheng’s back of the knees, severing the tendons and ligaments.
The Chinese murderer screamed in sudden agony and shocked disbelief. He dropped to all fours as blood spurted everywhere, onto himself, the walls, floor, and even Andre, who gathered his feet under him and rose above the writhing, shrieking man.
It was the moment he’d plotted for, the moment he’d dreamed about in bloodthirsty reverie. Andre reached with his free hand to pull his pistol from his belt. He pointed it down at Zheng with a steady hand while that man stared up at him with glassy, pain-filled eyes. He took a deep, steadying breath, pulled back the hammer of the gun, closed one eye, and—
Boom!
Flinching, Andre flicked the hammer closed with his thumb, and dropped his weapon to his side. In disbelief, he watched a spreading flow of blood widen across Zheng’s chest from a shot not fired from his pistol. He looked around in confusion.
Madame Liu stood in the doorway with her arm extended, gun smoking. Lowering it, she raised her gaze to meet Andre’s. As if a daze, she crossed where he stood, until they were scant inches apart.
Andre opened his arms, pulled her against him. She spoke into his shoulder. “I stole your chance for revenge, Captain. For that, I am sorry, though, I would do it again in a heartbeat. May our loved ones rest in peace at last.”
Her body trembled while he looked over her shoulder at the doorway where his father, his first mate, Limey, and Ting all hovered. His eyes tracked along the walls, where Zheng’s minions ranged, silent, unsure. Lastly, he dropped his gaze to the dead butcher, the man who had decimated his future at the same time as he’d erased his past.
He pulled Madame Liu closer. “Dead is dead, Madame. By your weapon or mine, we've rid the world of one more bloodthirsty tyrant, and you may take your place as rightful ruler at last. Too bad we could only kill him once."
She gave a slight laugh, and he held her away from him, looking into her eyes. Reassured by her tiny nod of encouragement, he released her as Ting ran forward, enveloping her mother in a blast of tears.
Andre wiped the sweat and Zheng’s blood from his face with his arm, and looked toward his father in the doorway. He walked to him, allowing Louis to enfold him in a quivering embrace. He felt his anxiety, his fear, and even some of his sadness, melt away in the arms of his father.
“You scared me, boy. I saw ye slip and thought ‘this is it.’”
Andre squeezed his father’s bony frame. “So did I, Papa. So did I.”
~*~
Andre walked to the water’s edge one evening some days later, a feeling of ennui overtaking him. He should have been at peace. He’d avenged his wife’s murder, and his father had reinstated one of the Confederation’s best leaders to power.
> Nevertheless, as he smoked one of de Gallo’s cheroots and watched the tide, he admitted to himself he felt no better. Earlier today his father had told him he’d received word as to the whereabouts of Sophie’s rapist, and Andre’s heart had skipped a beat. As long as he had a duty, an objective to fulfill, his life had meaning.
However, he still did not have Sophie. He would never hear her voice, would never feel her touch, and would never see her again, except in his dreams. No matter how many times he killed Zheng, no matter if he found and confronted her attacker, it would never bring her back.
“Captain?”
A sibilant whisper came from behind him on the sand. Pulling his pistol as he whirled around, he found himself face-to-face with one of Zheng’s guards. One who had recently pledged allegiance to Madame Liu. The man cowered under his glare.
“What do you want?” snapped Andre, resenting the intrusion of his introspection.
“Sir, begging your pardon sir, but I have newly returned from trade in the Caribbean. Your territory, sir.”
“I’m well aware of my holdings, idiot. Get on with it.” Andre waved his pistol. The guard ducked, but stammered on.
“Along...along the c-coast of Venezuela is a...a small fishing village, sir. They struggle to make ends meet there. Well, sir, they claim...they claim to have a miracle in their midst.” He paused. Andre took a deep draw on his cheroot before motioning with his hand to carry on and finish this tale.
“The-the miracle is a woman. A woman with no past. You see, one of their fishermen found her in their waters, injured, and brought her to their village to nurse her back to health. Now their sea has become plentiful with fish. It’s believed her rescue brought good fortune to the entire population. She is a true miracle-maker. The-the people there call her mujer sin pasado, woman without a past. She has no recollection of who she is or how she got there. I-I thought you might want to know." He paused, his swallow loud in the absolute silence following announcement.
Under Andre’s intense stare he fidgeted, and then continued. “You see, sir, she had been shot and left for dead. The villagers resurrected her, and now they are being blessed.”
Chapter Twenty-One
“All hands on deck. Step to, you scurvy landlubbers. Move your lazy arses or there will be hell to pay. Master G? Front an’ center, double time. Sacrebleu." Andre stormed onto the Jade Princess shortly after dusk that evening, dark hair swirling about his face and a sense of urgency in his heart. It didn’t matter that their impending journey would take at least three months. He needed to go Venezuela now, to see this miracle with very own eyes.
Mère de dieu, what if she’d been alive all this time? The thought didn’t bear second-guessing. This mujer sin pasado had to be Sophie. No other explanation fit.
Nervous energy goaded him as he paced before the wheel, awaiting his first mate’s arrival. All the while, he pictured Sophie as he’d last seen her. The pure shock in her eyes, the spilling blood, her headlong tumble into the dark waters below...
With an expletive dropping from his lips, he spun away, chest tightening at the memories. Merde. If this woman was indeed Sophie, how had she survived that wound, that fall? What did it mean she had no past? Andre paused in mid-pace. That last question bore more study.
Staring out at the waves, ignoring the hustle of half-dressed crewmembers gathering for his orders, Andre contemplated their volatile union. Did it mean she couldn’t remember their history together, or did her lack of memory mean Sophie didn’t want to remember? After all, they’d had a rocky relationship, and neither of them had ever said ‘I love you’ to each other.
It had taken her “death” for him to realize he loved her. He didn’t want to waste any more time. He would tell her as soon as he saw her. Whatever the reasons for her lack of memory, they didn’t change his feelings. He would confess his love, she would be overjoyed to see him, and—
“Sí, Capitán? what is wrong?"
Head jerking up, he faced his first mate, not registering when that man had appeared. He’d been lost in his fairytale ending. He scrambled for authority.
“We sail at high tide on the morrow. Ready the ship, the crew. I’ll take no excuses. Any man not willing to go can stay behind and help Madame Liu rebuild her territory. Now, master G.
The Spaniard stared at him in disbelief, shuffled his feet. “But Señor, cook will need more time to gather food, the men, extra shot for their guns.
“Then they’d best get a move on, Master G,” Andre bellowed. “We leave on the tide.”
“What’s all this caterwauling about?”
Andre and his first mate turned to find Louis shuffling toward them, obviously awakened by their voices as well as by all the activity suddenly rampant on deck. Andre noticed how old his father looked. The lines on his face were more pronounced, the new bags under his bloodshot eyes, and the mussed, gray hair.
Andre swallowed his tension, his misgivings. He left his first mate’s side, couldn’t hide the catch in his voice as he answered Louis, “She’s alive, Papa. Sophie’s alive.”
In the midst of tucking in his voluminous shirt, Louis’ head bounced up. He frowned, gaze narrowing on Andre. “Sophie’s alive? Where did this folly come from, Andy? The bottom of a rum bottle? She’s been gone over four months, son. Who told you this lie?”
“It’s not a lie, Papa. I’m not drunk, either. There’s a woman in a Venezuelan fishing village. She was found in the water, wounded. She can’t remember her past. It’s her, Papa. I know it is. We need to make all haste back to the Caribbean, to Venezuela. I must see her with my own eyes.”
Doubt rose in his father’s eyes. Andre took a deep breath, readied himself for the brewing argument. Therefore, he was surprised when Louis replied, “There is no detriment in assuring ourselves of the veracity of this tale. If you feel this is what needs doing, son, we are all behind you, eh, Master de Gallo?”
Louis shared a look with the Spaniard, who gave a nod. Satisfied with his father and first mate’s acquiescence, Andre strode toward his waiting crew.
~*~
They’d been at sea for weeks. Africa had come and gone with little to no resistance from the Cape, and the more temperate weather conditions along the South American coast sped the Jade Princess along. Those factors, as well as Le Commandant’s magical touch upon the helm. Yet Andre fretted, pacing the deck whenever he was not steering, or standing at the very bow of the ship above the bowsprit, deep in thought.
They needed to move faster. Now that there was hope, there was no time to waste. This woman—she had to be Sophie. That was the only explanation that made sense. There could not be another. God would not be so cruel as to make him lose her again. At least he hoped so, although his relationship with God was checkered at best. He continued to worry, to will the Princess to move faster, to carry him ever closer to his destination, perhaps his very destiny.
“Capitán."
The summons came at sunset. Andre left the larboard rail, realized they were getting close, that de Gallo might have good news to impart. Good news, yet unnerving at the same time.
With measured steps, he approached his first mate at the wheel. Limey looked up at his passing while he greased lines nearby.
“Aye, Master G?”
“We have reached Venezuela.”
His announcement should have wrung “Hallelujah” from Andre’s lips. Instead, he stared into the distance without benefit of spyglass, straining to see the coastline in the gathering twilight.
“We should enter the harbor of Caracas at first light, Señor," de Gallo continued.
Andre gave a tight smile. “And then the search for the mujer sin pasado begins."
“Is there something amiss, Capitán? Something, perhaps, I could help with?" de Gallo’s voice had dropped to almost a whisper.
Andre shrugged. “She is the proverbial needle in a haystack, Master G. We have only a general area of where Sophie, if she is Sophie, has been living.”
De Gallo transferred his stare over the helm. The tropical darkness enveloped the ship in its thick humidity, clinging to the skin like a clammy membrane. It sent the off-duty pirates up from below decks to lounge upon the guns like overheated walruses, shirts hanging open and legs dangling bare-footed.
“We can sail on by, sir, if you think this trip a lost cause, and we’ll be back in Tortuga within a day.”
Andre curled his lip at his crafty sidekick, answering as he removed his head kerchief and wiped his chest with it, “You know damn well I can’t do that, Master G. I don’t want to do that. Merde. Do you realize, mon ami, that tomorrow I may hold her in my arms at last, or I will know once and for all that she is gone to me forever? I fairly tremble for fear of the outcome."
“I take it, Señor, that you have finally found the answer to my question about love, no?"
Half-turned away from his first mate, Andre swung back around. “You deserve the Cat for your insolence, Master G.”
Instead of becoming contrite, de Gallo grinned back at him under his razor-thin mustache. “Tell me I’m wrong, Capitán, and I will speak no more upon the subject."
Andre dropped his shoulders and let his head fall back. He spoke to the limp sails above. “Aye, Master G. Damn your soul, but aye, I’m in love with my absent wife. Too late to tell her so, too early to die of a broken heart.”
“Do not despair yet, Capitán. You have not gone ashore. Wait before give up hope. There cannot be that many women who were shot and left to drown here in the Caribbean. You have a good chance this woman is your wife."
They held gazes for several beats before Andre patted his loyal first mate’s shoulder and moved past him. “I desperately hope you are right, mon ami. I so desperately do."
By the time dawn rolled around, uncharacteristically foggy and misty for the Caribbean Sea, the Jade Princess had moored in Caracas’ harbor. Andre, his father, and Limey had already rowed ashore to make inquiries as to the whereabouts of the mujer sin pasado.
Everyone in the town knew of the miracle. All were eager to give directions to the pirates, who soon found themselves rowing back out to the Princess. They needed to sail around the coast to the small fishing village of Ticaragua, and possibly the end of their seven-month journey.
The Pirate's Bride Page 22