Brazen Temptress (33 page)

She turned toward her ship, but the Lord Admiral pulled the glass out of her hand before she could get it focused.

"As you can see, your husband is about to die."

"I wouldn't count out my husband just yet," she said. "De Ryes hasn't lost yet, and since he always wins against your poor fleet, I doubt today will be any different." At least she prayed it wouldn't be, for all their sakes. "And when he wins he'll sail straight for this bilge bucket of yours and send it straight to hell."

The Lord Admiral's mouth twisted with rage. "You arrogant bitch. Just like your mother. She was a fool as well."

Maureen stood her ground. "My mother had the good taste not to marry the likes of you. And she had the courage to save my father's life. Did any woman ever love you that much? For that matter, did anyone?"

His face mottled with an unholy fury and she braced herself for his retaliation, for she thought for sure he wouldn't let her live another minute. But even with his fist raised and ready to mete out his punishment, he suddenly stopped. His gaze turned toward the ships beyond them, his body stilled as if the sight before him left him in shock.

She swung around to the railing and climbed up to see the sight that had left the Lord Admiral gaping like a mackerel.

"Here, let me take that line," Charles said.

Julien looked over at his nephew in horror. "What the hell are you doing here?" He'd ordered everyone off the
Retribution
— at least he thought he had.

"You really didn't think you could run this ship single-handedly, did you?" his nephew said with a grin. Gone was the stylish young man-about-town, for Charles had stripped himself of his jacket and vest and now wore only a shirt and his breeches. Even his feet were bare, since it was obvious he knew what would come next. "I can sail and swim as well as anyone. You taught me."

"I didn't teach you to be foolhardy."

Charles shrugged. "Hardly that. I expect you want to live, considering Maureen is still out there."

"Your mother will kill me if she finds out."

"Never mind my mother." Charles laughed. "Your wife will have your hide when she finds out what you are going to do to her ship."

"I'll buy her another one," Julien quipped back, turning to watch the battle before them. He had to gauge their timing just right if he was to catch the British unawares. He needed them sure and cocky and so focused on sinking the
Destiny
that they would forget the smaller
Retribution
darting about them like an unseen gnat.

His shoulder throbbed, and he was having a hard time keeping the wheel steady. The currents from the ocean and the Thames were tricky, and with only the powder kegs on the deck, the empty holds left the ship tossing across the waves like a cork.

"Do you need a hand?" Charles called out.

Julien grit his teeth and shook his head.

Cannon fire blasted from the British warship. They both looked up to see how the
Destiny
fared.

It didn't look good. She smoked and faltered, and the British were tacking hard to move in for their final kill.

"Gads, how did they survive that?" Charles asked.

"Luck," Julien muttered, wondering at the wisdom of leaving Mr. Whitney to sail his ship. He was doing too good a job at appearing ready to go under. Julien turned his face to the wind to clear his eyes of the stinging smoke burning his vision.

"Isn't it about time?" Charles asked as another volley from the British cut through the battle haze toward the
Destiny.

Julien nodded, suddenly glad to have Charles's able assistance. Between the two of them, they swiftly cut all the lines holding up the remaining sails. The cloth unfurled, catching the wind and sending the
Retribution
seething forward through the churning sea.

Pulling hard on the wheel, Julien maneuvered the sleek little schooner about, setting a course directly between the
Destiny
and the British.

The wind kept up, pushing them forward, driving them directly into the line of fire. The acrid smoke grew thicker, and it was hard for Julien to see where he was going, especially this close to the belching British cannons.

"Are the fuses ready?" he called out to Charles.

"Ready."

"After you are done lighting them, get overboard. Swim as hard as you can." Julien caught up the rope at his feet and began lashing the wheel in a set course. Currents and winds be damned. They were close enough now to the behemoth vessel to count the hairs on the gunner — the
Retribution
sailing directly alongside the gun ports of the stunned British.

"Light 'em," Julien ordered, running alongside the deck and tossing grappling hooks into the British ship, while Charles ran from powder line to powder line, touching off the fuses.

Smoke and fire filled the decks of the
Retribution.

"That's the last one!" Charles yelled, heading to the side of the ship and diving for the water. Julien followed, but for a moment he paused on the railing, looking back at the British ship. The captain was shouting at his men to cut the schooner loose, but it was too late.

Too late to save his ship.

As the first keg exploded, Julien dove from the deck railing, hitting the icy water as flames leapt above him.

He swam as best he could underwater, the explosions above sending shock waves through the water.

First the
Retribution,
and then the second blast — the munitions on the now open and keeling warship.

As he came up for air, debris rained down around him, and he ducked down under to avoid being hit. When he surfaced again, the crippled warship was beginning to sink, its men calling out for help.

Ahead of him, Charles bobbed in the water, watching the sight before them. Julien swam slowly toward him, his one arm now useless. With his nephew's help they made their way to the
Destiny.

The damage aboard was just as Julien hoped — minimal. The smoke pots on the decks and the false tattered lines and debris his men had pulled from the masts had only made it appear the British were winning their fight. It was a trick they'd used more than once in the last year.

He sank to his knees, blood running anew from his wounded shoulder, the salt from the seawater burning his open flesh. "Cut loose the longboats so those sailors out there have something to save themselves with," Julien ordered. His men nodded and set to work. Unlike their British counterparts, the American privateers maintained a strict code of conduct for prisoners. Too many of them had lived under the British lash at some time in their lives and had no stomach for the brutality that ruled His Majesty's Navy.

Their war was one of honor and reputation.

Roger stepped forward. "I've got to get that bullet out."

"Not until I've found Maureen."

Ethan rushed forward, a spyglass in his hand. "I saw her, Father. I saw Mother. She's on that schooner." He pointed to the west of their position. "I saw her on the deck."

Julien rose and took the offered glass from his son. It didn't take but a moment to spy Maureen. She stood on a railing, her hands clinging to the lines. Her dark hair whipped and flowed in the wind.

As if she sensed him watching her, she saluted him.

"Go after them. Stop them before they hit the river," he ordered.

The Lord Admiral's schooner, with its four carronade on deck, was no match for the
Destiny.
In minutes they were bearing down on it, the privateer's cannon already reloaded and primed for its next battle.

As they drew alongside, every man aboard stilled at the sight before them.

For on the deck of the schooner, the Lord Admiral stood with a pistol to Maureen's temple.

"Back off," the man ordered. "Or watch her die."

"If you harm her you won't live a minute longer," Julien said, his hands gripping the railing.

He couldn't watch her die, not a second time.

His men held their muskets steady, every one trained on a member of the Lord Admiral's crew, and half a dozen aimed directly at the man himself.

Maureen's gaze caught and held Julien's. Her face was a mask of courage and bravery. She wasn't about to die, not if the proud tilt of her shoulders indicated anything.

And then she glanced down at her feet.

Julien's gaze followed, and there he saw it. The hilt of her dagger sticking out of her boot. The one she'd taken from the
Destiny
all those years ago.

Then she glanced up at the railing, as if telling him what she had planned.

The scene, one he'd played in his mind over and over since that day eight years ago, returned.

Maureen standing on the deck of the
Destiny,
a bloody knife in her hand.

But there was one difference. Unlike the madman grasping her now, he hadn't been holding a gun to her head and he would rather have shot himself than her.

"Please, no," she wailed. "Don't shoot me."

The helpless feminine pitch of her cry almost made Julien laugh.

Almost.

"I'm so frightened, Julien. Do as he says. Please don't let me die." Her wailing theatrics were starting to take on a flavor rarely seen even in the melodramas of Covent Garden.

Julien nodded to his men, and they started to move the
Destiny
off.

The Lord Admiral smiled, his finger cocking back the trigger. Maureen slumped into his arms as if in a deep faint. The man let her fall to the deck. But instead of the prone figure he likely expected, she rolled like a cat, pulling her dagger out of her boot and sending it sailing through the air, directly into the Lord Admiral's heart.

The man stood for a moment, wavering in disbelief, while a red blossom of blood spilled down his chest. The pistol in his hand fired, sending the bullet crashing toward where Maureen had stood.

But she was no longer there. She hadn't even stopped to see if her dagger had hit the mark, but instead had flung herself headlong over the railing.

Even as she splashed into the water, the Lord Admiral crashed to the deck of his ship, dead.

"Get her aboard," Julien called out. Then he turned to the crew on the schooner. "Get away from my ship, or you'll join your master in hell."

The Lord Admiral's men dropped whatever weapons they possessed and set to work turning their ship back to shore. Not one of them saw to the man's body, still staining the deck with his blood.

As Julien watched Maureen climb aboard, he finally succumbed to his own injuries. It was his turn to fall to the deck, the strident cries of his beloved wife echoing through his ears as he fell into a spinning abyss.

"What in bloody hell were you thinking? Blowing up my ship!"

He grinned and closed his eyes to the pain.

Maureen followed Giles and Webb as they carried Julien to his cabin.

Roger Hawley brought up the rear, having finished helping the few men who had been wounded in their fight with the British.

Now, with the threat of the Lord Admiral gone, Maureen had simply given Mr. Whitney's plan — get them as far out into the Channel as they could sail — a passing nod of agreement.

Julien was still out cold when they rolled him over and Roger began the process of cutting his shirt away. Maureen helped strip it, leaving Julien's back bared to clean the gaping wound. His injury looked terrible, but it wasn't the hole in his shoulder that caught her attention.

It was the
T
branded on his other shoulder.

"What is that?" she gasped, shocked at the hideous mark burned into his flesh. She'd felt that scar the night they made love, but he had told her it was nothing.

Now she saw how "nothing" it was.

"The brand?" Roger said, rather too nonchalantly. From the looks of the way the man worked, he was used to sewing up the wounds from battle. "He's had that for some time. I thought you knew."

She shook her head. "Who did this to him?"

"The bloody Brits," he said. Looking up at the two British noblemen still in the room, he made a rude noise in the back of his throat. "Beggin' your pardon, my lords."

Webb nodded at the man, obviously as transfixed by the ugly scar as Maureen was.

The wound looked old, as if it had been there for some time, but he hadn't had it when they married. She was almost afraid to ask, but her desire for the truth drove her further toward her suspicions. "Where did he get this? He's not a criminal; he's never lost a fight."

"Only one." The man reached for the basin Aunt Pettigrew had brought in and then opened his case to take out a probe. Without looking up he began the slow, laborious work of pulling out the bullet.

"How ... Where did this happen?"

He didn't look up but answered in his usual gruff tones. "With a British branding iron. As to where this happened, the same place we all received one. Jamaica."

"All of you?" she asked.

Julien's men, several of whom had poked their heads in to see how their captain fared, nodded.

She looked at Lord Trahern and Lord Weston for an explanation, but they both shrugged, obviously as puzzled by this as she. "Whatever for?" she persisted. "Why would any of you be branded traitors?"

Roger snorted and looked up from his work. "For you. Because he married you. When he married you and took his vow with the Alliance, he broke the agreement he had with the British. We all did."

Even though she'd told Julien she believed that he had tried to stop the British slaughter of the Alliance, she hadn't really let go of her memories. It seemed to her impossible to reconcile what she'd seen that day with Julien's assertions that he'd tried to stop the slaughter.

"You and I were both there," Maureen said to Roger. "The
Destiny
fought the Alliance. Julien sent the British word, brought them to the cay. Helped them destroy the Alliance."

Roger shook his head. "If you had stayed on the deck a little longer that day, you would have seen that our cannons were not aimed at your father's ship or any of the other Alliance ships. We moved in line with the British to get in close enough to cripple them. Not unlike what we did today with your ship."