Bound by the Heart (31 page)

"You damned fool," he cursed and drew her
against his chest. "You damned hotheaded little fool! You could have
killed yourself or been killed coming on board my ship waving a gun around."

"My baby!" she sobbed. "My Sarah!"

"All right, all right, she's fine." Wade
smoothed the hood back off her hair, nodding to Stuart Roarke as he did so.
"Have the child brought here."

Stuart adjusted his spectacles and looked down at the
smoking pistol in his hand. He said nothing, though, and left the cabin.

"Hush now," Wade said, brushing his lips
over Summer's temple. "Hush. You will have your baby in a minute. Are you
hurt? Did you hurt yourself?"

Summer had covered her mouth again and was gaping in
horror at the blood spreading wetly down Morgan's arm.

"I shot you!" she gasped. "Oh, Morgan
...
I shot you!"

He cursed again and released her. "By God,"
he muttered, "so you have."

"Oh, Morgan"—fresh tears spilled over her
cheeks—"I'm so sorry!"

He frowned and rolled up the sleeve of his shirt. The
ball had grazed the surface of the muscle of his upper arm, but there appeared
to be more blood than damage. The worst of the punishment, he noted with yet
another flow of curses, was divided between the corner of the wire-fronted
bookcase and the sill of the gallery.

"Oh, Morgan—"

"Damnation!" He shook his arm as the pain
began to wear through the numbing effects of the gunpowder. The blood had
trickled down as far as his wrist, and as he shook it, some spattered on the
floor.

"Oh, Morgan—"

"Say that once more," he growled, "and
I'm liable to forget why I brought you here."

He shook his arm out again and reached for the bottle
of rum on his desk. He unstoppered it with his teeth and spat out the cork,
then took several deep swallows before he held his breath and liberally doused
the wound.

"You'll be the death of me yet, woman," he
grimaced. "First sharks, then rip currents, now loaded pistols—"

Summer was neither watching nor listening. She was
reaching for the squalling pink bundle in Thorny's hands.

"Sarah! My beautiful Sarah, you're all
right!"

"Of course she's all right," Wade snapped.
"Did you think I would have her slung up in the rigging?"

"I didn't know what to think!" she countered
furiously, whirling to confront him. "Any man who would deliberately steal
a child away from her mother would be capable of anything!"

The
Chimera
swayed unexpectedly, catching Summer off balance.

"Here," Wade said gruffly, "sit down
before you fall down. And you'll watch your tongue with me if you value keeping
it. She wasn't stolen, and neither one of you is suffering for the
experience—yet."

Summer allowed herself to be helped into the leather
chair. She cradled Sarah and kissed the coppery curls, whispering reassurances
until her daughter's crying slowed to a dull fret.

"She's starved half to death," she said,
casting a scathing eye at Morgan Wade. "How were you planning to meet that
contingency, Captain?"

He merely glowered at her as Thorny cackled under his
breath and tied a strip of linen around the wounded arm. Sarah began to wail
bitterly at the layers of clothing that refused to obey her gropings and
Summer's temper flared anew.

"I hope you are satisfied with your night's work.
I have never seen her cry so hard. I trust you will not force me to fight my
way off your wretched ship now."

She started to rise, but another slight lurch set her
down heavily. Sarah wailed all the harder for the sudden jolt and needed to be
soothed and petted until she found the comfort of her thumb.

"Well, sir?" Summer demanded.

"Well, madam? You said the child was hungry. . .
. Feed her."

"Here?" she cried. "On this
...
this . . ." The word did not
immediately come to mind, and she released a sharp breath in exasperation.
"Am I free to leave?"

"You are free to go anywhere you like," Wade
said brusquely. "If it's ashore, however, you'll have to swim for
it."

"What? What did you say?"

Wade indicated the gallery windows. "It seems you've
just made it aboard in time. Mr. Roarke was able to catch the tide after
all."

"The tide—" Summer's mouth dropped open. Too
late, she realized that the cabin was swaying rhythmically—far too rhythmically
for a vessel moored to a stationary dock. "Oh, my God! You didn't! You
wouldn't!
My
God—we're moving!”

"I told you I was leaving on the tide," he
said easily.

"But not with me on board!" she cried and
jumped to her feet. "You have to turn back! You have to put me
ashore!"

"I'm afraid I can't do that. If we stop now,
we'll be caught in port until high tide tomorrow."

"Then you can just lower a boat and have me rowed
ashore when we clear your blasted port."

"I can't do that either," he said on a sigh.
"We've a fair wind by the feel of it. Enough to carry us out to open
water. I couldn't risk losing such a clean start, not when there would be so
many eyes searching for us in the morning."

Summer stared out the gallery windows in dismay,
watching the shore lights wink by at an alarming rate. She gasped as the full
import of his words struck her.

"You were waiting for me! You gambled I would
come after Sarah alone—that was why you took her!"

"Not such a gamble, in truth," he admitted.
"I fear I am almost coming to understand the way your mind works. Thanks, Thorny.
See if you can find the governess something hot to drink."

"Aye, Cap'n. B'ilin' 'ot, I warrant."

"If you had guessed wrong," Summer
persisted, ignoring Thorny's cackle as he left, "what then? What would you
have done then? What if I hadn't checked her crib until tomorrow morning?"

"You would have been a poor mother and not
deserving of her."

Summer was astounded by his audacity. He had kidnapped
Sarah and now kidnapped her. . . .

"Do you know what you've done?" she asked in
a horrified whisper.

"I have a fairly good idea."

The ship tilted as it maneuvered into the wind,
nudging Summer into the shattered bookcase. Wade steadied her, then selected a
thin black cigar from the humidor.

"You will forgive me if I leave you for a while.
Mr. Roarke may need me on deck."

"You can go straight to hell, Captain Wade, for
all I care."

"Now where have I heard that before?" he
grinned, pausing at the cabin door. "Make yourself comfortable. I'm sure
you know where everything is."

Summer clenched her teeth in fury and grabbed the
closest object she could lay a hand to. It was a heavy brass bookend, and it
crashed against the closing door, leaving an ugly dent in the blond wood before
it rebounded to the floor. She stared at the dent with a sense of helpless
outrage and slumped into the leather chair, refusing by sheer force of will to
cry. Sarah's crying startled her out of her stupor, and she immediately
unfastened her cloak and parted the bodice of her dress. She winced as the gums
clamped vehemently around the jutting nipple, but her anger soon welled to the
surface again.

What would Bennett's reaction be when he discovered
them gone? It would look as if she had run away to be with Morgan. Michael was
the only one who knew the reason she had come to the harbor tonight, but when
he found out the
Chimera
had sailed with both of them still aboard, he would
probably assume, like everyone else, that she had made the choice of her own
free will.

Bennett Winfield had never needed much provocation to
chase Morgan Wade. Now he would come after the
Chimera
with blood in his eye and the
full sanction of the navy behind him.

Summer was worried, despite her anger at Wade's
deception. He must know Bennett would come after them. As would Sir Lionel and
the entire British Navy if it came to light that she and Sarah were the victims
of a kidnapping. Morgan would be a wanted man. His letters of marque would be
useless in British ports; there would probably be an open warrant for his
arrest, if not an outright bounty placed on his head by the government.

Summer sat her daughter upright on her knee and coaxed
the bubble of air from her stomach. Sarah grinned and batted a fist against
Summer's chin, happy to have some attention at last.

"Why is he doing it?" Summer whispered.
"Goodness, how successful can he be as a privateer if he spends his time
kidnapping women and children!"

And then she saw it.

The bright red of it caught her eye over the top of
Sarah's head, and she opened the drawer in Wade's desk to see all the way
inside. It was lying there coiled neatly on top of his logbook where he could
not help but see it and touch it and remember every time he made an entry. It
was the red silk ribbon she had worn in her hair every day for the week she was
on board the
Chimera.

She knew it was the same one. It still had some of the
frayed threads poking through where she had torn it from the trim on her smock.
It had been all she had salvaged from her clothes. She could not even remember
when or where she had lost it. She lifted it gingerly out of the drawer and
held it closer as she thought back over the long months.

He had kept a trifling thing like this . . . why?

The only answer she could think of brought a flush
into her cheeks because she knew it couldn't possibly be true.

Summer looked down at Sarah and heard the sob escape
her throat as she saw the tiny fist clutch at the dangling end of the ribbon.

* * *

Captain Morgan Wade barked out a sharp correction to
their course and ran a hand through the waves of his black hair. His arm had
passed the painful, stinging stage and was throbbing in direct proportion to
the anger pounding in his temples.

Women! He'd spent half a lifetime avoiding them. They
were nice to look at and nice to keep a bed warm at night; he'd enjoyed more
than he could recount over the years, and none of them—not a one—had talked to
him the way this one did and got away with it. Certainly none had taken a shot
and lived to tell. So what did he need with her? And a child . . . what was he
thinking of?

Probably the same thing that had plagued his every
waking moment and even intruded in his dreams through this past year: a pair of
gray-green eyes that had the ability to set his blood boiling one minute and
reduce him to shreds the next. A body so welcoming and so perfect the memory of
it had left all others drab by comparison.

Morgan turned away from the deck rail and signaled to
Mr. Phillips to run up the
royals.

"Why don't you go below, Morgan," Roarke
said quietly. "You aren't really needed here; everything's under
control."

"What makes you think I'm needed below?" he
snarled. "She's already expressed her opinion of my night's work."

Roarke looked at the bandaged arm and smiled.
"She couldn't have been that angry, or she would have aimed for something
else."

Wade glared at him and muttered an oath. But he left
the bridge and ducked into the hatchway leading down to his cabin. He paused at
the door and caught himself about to knock—knock on his own door, for Christ's
sake—then set his mouth in a grim line and wrenched the latch open. She was
still sitting in his chair, although now her cloak was off and she held the
babe suckling at her breast. Her hand fluttered up to shield her nakedness,
falling again when she identified the intruder.

"There is a draft from the door, Captain. Please
close it."

Morgan shut the door but remained where he was,
frowning at the woman and child.

"You may come all the way in," she said,
mildly amused at his sudden awkwardness. "Unless you intend to shout and
stamp about, that is. Your daughter has been upset quite enough for one
night."