The Duke & the Pirate Queen

by Victoria Janssen

  “I’m to be a prisoner in your cabin now, am I?” He grinned and swept through the doorway. “I feel a flutter of virginal apprehension. I’ve always wondered what went on in the cabins of privateers. Though I did fuck in a hammock once. That was terribly awkward, but it came out all right in the end.”

  “Sit.” She pointed at one of her two trunks that doubled as seats; they were spread with folded layerings of cloth, to pad the hardware fittings. Maxime did her bidding, but he sat straddle-legged, his cock and bollocks lewdly on display through the cloth of his trousers. Idly, he stroked the length of his cock, which was considerable.

  “Stop that,” she said. “I need to speak with you.”

  “Oh, I can speak and do this at the same time,” he said, grinning at her. “You’ve really made me wait quite a long time. I’m not sure I can wait much longer. I might have to ask Chetri to ease my pain—”

  Imena’s hand closed over the coil of line Norris had left behind. It was fairly soft, chosen so it wouldn’t snag silk clothing. “You were less asinine before I let you bathe me,” she said.

  His grin faded. “That was before you locked me up and left me, then sailed me out into the ocean without so much as a please or thank-you. I think that entitles me to be as asinine as I like.”

  Imena strode over to him. “Give me your hands,” she said.

  “Oh, no, you don’t,” he said. His irritation sounded genuine, and she felt a glimmer of triumph.

  She said, “You won’t fight me.”

  “Won’t I?”

  Imena grabbed his wrists and, in a few swift movements, lashed them together with a series of hurricane knots.

  Maxime stared down at his forearms, now wrapped in hempen line. “I didn’t think you truly would do it.”

  Imena grinned at him. Suddenly, she felt much better. She sliced through the long end of the line with her belt knife, knelt and snugly hitched his ankles to the trunk’s deck braces, which were loops of iron embedded in the planking. To do so, she drew his legs even farther apart. As she sat up, her mouth nearly brushed his knee, and she saw his thigh muscle twitch.

  “Tying my hands was enough to make your displeasure clear,” he pointed out.

  “Not for me,” she said. Her eyes were nearly on a level with his genitals; quickly, she shoved herself to her feet before he could get the wrong idea. “I’ll return in a while, and then I will talk and you will listen.”

  “Wait!” Maxime said. “We’re not finished. Why are you leaving me again?”

  Imena grabbed a piece of candied lemon peel and popped it into his mouth before she escaped. She didn’t trust herself not to truss him head to foot, just for the pleasure of seeing him at her mercy.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  MAXIME HEARD THE SHIP’S BELL RING TWO QUARTER hours before the cabin’s door opened again. Norris poked her head in, then slid around the door and shut it behind her, reaching for a basket on the deck. When she saw Maxime, she stopped and looked at him incredulously.

  “Is this your rope?” Maxime asked mildly.

  Her mouth opened, then closed.

  “You can have it back if you like. Though I’m afraid you’ll have to untie it yourself.”

  Norris clutched the basket to her flat chest. “I… The captain borrowed it? My line?”

  “She did.”

  “You’ll have to ask her about untying it, then.” Norris grinned and slipped out again, this time with the basket.

  Maxime cursed, but without much vigor. He returned to trying to lift his feet. The deck braces to which he was hitched showed no hint of movement and the sturdy decking didn’t even creak, no matter how hard he pulled. The knots on his wrists, he’d quickly learned, drew tighter if he struggled, and there was no accessible end for him to attack with his teeth.

  “Being kidnapped,” he said, “is much more dull than I would have expected.” Perhaps things would improve once the ravishing began. If it began. He was beginning to have his doubts.

  When another quarter-bell rang, he began to sing, loudly. “Oh, the army had no courage in them! But then came La Rose, the whore! She swore she’d put the courage in them! And give them something mo-o-ore!” He paused, and swallowed, wishing for another orange.

  “La Rose, she had a dainty hand! And lips as red as blood! She took the captain first in hand! And soon, upright he stoo-oo-ood!”

  The door slammed open. “My ship is not a bawdy house!”

  “They’re called licensed brothels in my duchy,” he said. He looked at her hopefully. “All that singing made me thirsty, and I recall there are seventeen more verses. Twenty-three, if you count the extras my aunt taught me. Those are even worse. There’s one where her dog licks—”

  Imena stalked over to stand in front of him. Anger had brought a high color to her cheeks, and he was forcibly reminded of how she’d looked as he’d pleasured her in the castle baths. He lifted his hand to touch her before remembering his wrists were bound together. She glared at him, then looked away, visibly collecting herself. She said, “I’ll get you a drink. Did I tie you too tightly?”

  She didn’t betray me. Until relief at that realization washed over him, Maxime hadn’t realized he’d been doubting her loyalty. He lifted his bound hands. “You could loosen these. I won’t be much good to you if my hands are numbed.”

  She propped her foot on the trunk beside him and placed his hands on her knee, unfortunately palm up, so he couldn’t sneak in a squeeze of her leg. She bent over his wrists, tugging at the knots. The faint rasp of hemp against his skin wasn’t entirely unpleasant. When coupled with the warmth from her hands, it was intriguing. Maxime leaned forward and nuzzled her bare scalp, letting the warmth of his breath caress her skin. A shudder rippled across her before she said, “Stop that.”

  “Why?” He bent closer, investigating the soft skin behind her ear. “You smell good,” he said.

  “Now is not the time. Occupy your thoughts with something else if you can.” With a final tug at the rope, she straightened and stepped back, out of his reach. She poured water from a stoppered jug and held the wooden cup to his mouth while he drank. After two cups, he refused more, and she said, “I’m busy up top. I promise, I’ll be back later to speak with you.”

  “You could untie me, then.”

  “I don’t think so,” she said. “You’re too unpredictable.” She smiled at him. “I hear tales of how creative you are. Surely you can amuse yourself for a little while.”

  Before he could ask her to untie his hands and provide him with pen and paper, she was gone. “Agh!” he growled.

  The cabin, he realized, smelled of her. Even pine tar and lemon oil could not conceal from him that she lived in this space, worked and ate and slept here. She would sleep nude on the spacious bunk across from him; the flat, cotton-stuffed mattress would smell of her skin even more strongly. He closed his eyes and inhaled. Her trunks were lined with cedar, whose scent impregnated all her clothing; sitting atop one of the trunks was like being close to her.

  He opened his eyes. “You are just as pathetic as Sylvie said,” he noted to himself. Smelling her furniture. He was behaving worse than the soggiest hero of a provincial melodrama.

  He’d wasted enough time with patience, waiting for her to speak of her interest in him, or at the least demonstrate she had an interest in him beyond her immediate needs. His seduction of her in the baths had gone well, much better than he’d expected, at least until she’d rejected him. That was the first advance he’d made since he met her. He needed to continue in that way, as talking didn’t seem to be doing any good. He could sway her with touch. A little sway, as a way into her thoughts and feelings, was all he needed.

  Therefore, he had to touch her again. That would be difficult at the moment, given that she’d knotted his hands together.

  His singing had brought her into the cabin. He would draw her into the room again, and then he would talk. Talking had served him well over the years. It was a lucky thing he’d honed th
e skill, because he needed it now.

  He stared at her bunk, unfocused his eyes and meditated on what he would say.

  Norris spotted another royal cutter from the upper nest, necessitating another alteration in Seaflower’s course and subsequent tacking to accommodate both the new heading and the change in wind. Chetri might have handled it all on his own, but Imena was reluctant to enter her cabin again, at least not yet.

  She couldn’t leave Maxime tied there indefinitely. Sooner or later, she would have to be close enough to him to untie him so he could put on the rest of his clothes. Then she would have to fight the urge to taste him again, mouth or throat or the muscle atop his shoulder, she didn’t care.

  Lust was ridiculous. And inconvenient, as well. She shouldn’t have let him bathe her, shouldn’t have let him kiss her, shouldn’t have let his mouth anywhere near her cunt. By the Great Whales of the Deep, she knew what he was. She knew he would fuck anything that moved, and she knew herself well enough to know she wasn’t strong enough to bear that, not for long.

  But she couldn’t think of anything else but having him. She wanted to grab him and shake him for enslaving her thoughts, but even that thought led, soon after, to her atop him, or him atop her, joined as tightly as tongue-in-groove decking.

  She could still feel his skin against hers, and the soft scratch of his beard against her inner thighs.

  She should just fuck him and be done with it. That was what some of her sailors did. A different partner in every port, met by chance, pleasured for a day and a night, then left behind with a kiss and a lingering smile, and perhaps a scratch mark or love bite.

  Sanji had been that to her, she realized. No matter how much she looked forward to seeing him upon sailing into port, or how she’d enjoyed their lazy afternoons together, once she was out to sea again he was forgotten. She’d thought more about his two sons than about him, knowing that if they ever married, those boys would be hers, as well; she’d wondered what it would be like to have children, and if she really wanted that at all. All those thoughts had trailed off before she could explore the idea too deeply. She tried not to wonder why, but her conclusion was inevitable: she had never seriously entertained the idea of marrying Sanji. He was simply too dull to marry.

  “I’m going below,” she said.

  She didn’t knock at her cabin door, since it was hers; also, despite knowing why he’d done it, she was still angry with Maxime for trying to seduce Chetri. She took perverse pleasure in denying him the small courtesy of a knock. She swung the door open without a pause and strode in.

  Maxime was still hitched to the deck braces. He was also, however, demonstrating an impressive erection. He rubbed his bound hands, or rather his rope-covered forearm, against one of his nipples while gazing fixedly at her bunk.

  Imena stared at his eyes, dark with passion, and the flexing of his shoulder and arm. Her mouth went dry, her cunt moist. She could almost see what he saw: the two of them, together in her bunk, bare skinned, undulating against each other like sea creatures. Or, better, Maxime still bound while she had her way with him.

  She needn’t be in a hurry to talk to him. Maxime was safe for now; she’d made him safe. Knowing about the threat to his life wouldn’t change anything in the next few hours.

  She could have him. He wouldn’t protest. He would be pleased, and she would be pleasured, and if that was all there was to be, she would be pleased, as well. She knew he’d had many partners; she’d watched some of them arrive and depart. She’d never heard any of them speak badly of him, which was impressive. Or was it because he said what his lovers wanted most to hear? She’d noticed he always made a special effort to remain on good terms with people. It seemed logical that this desire to please would extend to his sexual partners.

  Except she hadn’t wanted to hear about marriage. Not from him.

  She was being ridiculous, she thought. Maxime had said she ought to marry him, but he hadn’t really meant it. He needed to make a politically advantageous marriage. Even if he rejected all of King Julien’s candidates, he would have to marry someone of their ilk. Therefore, he could not be serious about her. Therefore, she could have him. Right now, if she chose.

  In fact, it was better if she had him now, because soon she would have to return him to his duchy, and there was no guarantee he’d ever approach her again. She felt better once she’d accepted both that she wanted him and that this would be short. She would be able to extricate herself without pain. He would allow her to do so. He might even make it easy for her. She said, “Maxime.”

  His gaze snapped to her face, and she realized he’d been so lost in fantasy that he hadn’t been aware she’d entered. “Come to set me loose, have you?” Very slowly, he licked his lips.

  Imena wiped her damp palms on her trousers. “If I unfasten your feet, will you promise to stay in my cabin?”

  “If that means you want to fuck, then yes.”

  Imena swallowed. The way he said it, direct but caressing, with a raw edge of wanting, made her knees tremble. If making the tide on land didn’t count, why did it count at sea? She swallowed again and said, “I think we’d better fuck and get it over with.”

  “I don’t think this will be over with quite so easily as that,” he said quietly. “I want a great deal more than a quick fuck.” He grinned fleetingly. “At the moment, though, quick is what you’ll get.”

  “Twice, then,” she said, falling easily into negotiation. “Once now, once later when I’m feeling a bit more reasonable.”

  Maxime dropped his bound hands into his lap, using his wrist to nudge his cock through his trousers. His eyelids fluttered at his own touch; he quickly withdrew, lifting his hands against his chest. “Twice isn’t reasonable. I’ll never be able to demonstrate my talents as extensively as you deserve if you only give me two chances. I think we should decide on a length of time.”

  Imena caught herself before she swayed closer to him. She’d been watching him touch himself, and hadn’t followed everything he’d just said, only the last sentence. After a moment’s mental fumbling, she said, “I won’t know how long to offer until I’ve had you.”

  He grinned. “After you’ve had me, you won’t be in any state to negotiate.”

  “You probably say that to everyone who crosses your path,” she said. “I’ve never witnessed the truth of it.”

  “You didn’t give me enough of a chance earlier. Untie me, and I’ll demonstrate.”

  Imena pondered for a few moments. “Maybe I won’t.”

  His dark eyes narrowed. “You’re angry.”

  “I am not angry.”

  “I did nothing to you—nothing you didn’t ask me to continue—so…are you still angry at your parents?”

  “I wasn’t angry with them,” Imena said, even though she knew she lied badly.

  “Are you angry with me? Because of what we did in the baths?”

  “I told you, I’m not angry.”

  “I think you are,” Maxime said. “It’s all right, you know. It’s only me.”

  “You’re my employer, Your Grace.”

  “Oh, it’s Your Grace now, is it? You can’t put that distance between us, Imena, not when you’ve brought me aboard your ship naked and tied me up in your cabin.” He smiled slowly.

  Imena took a deep breath, trying to calm herself. “One night,” she said.

  “A week,” he countered. “Days and nights. Shipboard emergencies don’t count against the time. You’re entirely too good at finding those.”

  Reluctantly, she said, “I accept your conditions. But for three days.”

  “Five. And if I was a whore, that would cost you my bollocks’ weight in silver. You’ll get me for free.”

  Not free. Not free in the least. “Four days is as high as I’ll go,” she said.

  He nodded slowly. “All right. Four days with an option of a fifth.”

  “I said nothing about an option.”

  “Who’s the diplomat here?” he asked. “You
’ll want that option later.”

  She sighed. “Fine.” It didn’t really matter what she agreed to, after all. He hadn’t been very careful in setting his terms. She’d never said he’d have unlimited access to her during the four days, just as he’d never specified what he would demonstrate to her. And it didn’t matter, anyway. They could never be together for any extended period. He would have to marry in the near future. Maxime grinned. “Now will you untie me?” He wriggled a bit. “And I need some help getting these trousers off.”

  Images rushed through her head and her mouth went dry. She loosened his waistband and peeled the trousers down to his knees. She studied the muscles in his splayed thighs, the weight of his bollocks, his cock thrusting up from a tangle of dark curls, its rosiness a sharp contrast to the pale skin on his belly. She remembered his solid flesh thumping against her hip, and contemplated how the soft warm weight of his scrotum would spill over her hand, how his cock might feel throbbing against the roof of her mouth while her tongue dipped and tasted and swirled.

  He could move his legs a little, but not enough to control his movements if she sat astride him, not properly. His bound hands would be in the way, though, and she wanted them on her. She wanted him to touch her as he had before, except this time she would be in control. She would take what she wanted from him. Though she had no claim on him at all, he’d said he would give her what she wanted.

  She said, “I’ve never bound a man in my cabin before.”

  She glanced up at his face, and he was watching her solemnly. He leaned closer to her, looking up into her face. “I provoked you. Take it out on me,” he said in a low voice. “Whatever it is. I don’t mind.”

  She couldn’t look away from his eyes. She’d never realized before that they weren’t entirely dark brown—there was a lighter, amber ring around the pupil that vanished as his eyes darkened with arousal. “Take—”

  “Take me,” he said.

  She fell forward, gripping his shoulders in her hands, and kissed him. Unable to tempt and tease, she sucked hard on his tongue while her fingers dug into his muscles. She felt his groan inside her mouth, the futile struggles of his hands against her chest. His forearm pressed hard against her breast, and she whimpered from the rope’s soft friction.