Geared for Pleasure (25 page)

Yet, he never did. As far as she knew, Freeman only spoke at length to the captain and herself. And recently to Bodhan, which only made Phina like the brothel owner more. Freeman was the best judge of character she knew. Still, apart from trading supplies and hiring the occasional crewmember, he had chosen silence over verbal communication. And people believed
she
was talented at misdirection.

Phina knew that others, more often than not, believed Freeman a big, hulking, slow-witted mute. It was his own form of the dodge. The illusion he projected to the world as Captain Amaranthe’s first mate. And it was a good one.

Men were easy enough to understand as a rule. Most clothed themselves in selfish needs, spoiled and longing for approval. Easily threatened. In the rougher parts of the world, you could be small and brilliantly silver-tongued, or large and stupidly obedient, but anything outside that expectation—indeed, anything more complex—was viewed with suspicion. The people the Deviant crew needed to work with did not trust complexity.

Freeman was truly intelligent, strategically brilliant, a
gifted healer and pilot. He could also crush a man’s throat with the fingers of one hand and no doubt memorize a scholar’s book of poetry while doing it.

He was a dangerous enemy and an irreplaceable ally. Not even Captain Amaranthe understood his complexity. And Phina knew if Freeman had his way, she never would.

His eyes, more golden than brown, twinkled, disrupting her train of thought. That was another thing the captain never seemed to notice. How handsome he was.

“I should speak more and you should flirt less. Each is as likely as the moons rising in the morning.” His strong, square jaw tightened as he nodded in the direction of the men on the main deck below. “Why are you hiding? No one is a stranger to you here. Unless there is something you have yet to tell us about our new arrivals. Any irate victims or broken hearts I should be wary of?”

She avoided his knowing gaze and took another fortifying gulp of the jugged courage. Swallowing, she forced herself to offer a careless shrug. “I dislike change. The Deviant can practically fly itself, no offense to her pilot, yet we are filling up on crew, and the Siren is currently out of commission, leaving me to search for distraction elsewhere. My kind is inherently predisposed against change.”

He tilted his head, the dark gold of his shaggy hair falling over his forehead. “You are rarely this poor a liar, Seraphina. Are you taking responsibility for her disappearance? The queen was
theirs
to protect. If anyone is at fault it would be them.” He was silent for a moment, as though contemplating his own words. “However, I cannot blame them, either. They have both had a rough time of it. And it seems Queen Idony and the Khepri kept secrets from all of us, even her closest companion guards. No matter how powerful the ship, no one can fly it blind. We need to find this Tower Orr. And we need to question Dare’s companion about the dagger.”

Phina turned to study Cyrus once more. He had removed his
shirt and his back was uncovered for her view. His skin had been darkened by the sun since last she’d seen him like this. It appeared harder. Battle-roughened. Her lips tightened. It had also been whipped. The long, deep scars crossing his back said he hadn’t enjoyed it.

She wanted to taste it. Kiss it better.

In the last few days his hair had grown, an indigo shadow covering the scars on his head. Phina recalled gripping that head, fighting to keep her claws retracted as he took her to the brink only to leave her there, beginning her torment anew.

Freeman lowered his voice in warning. “Do not growl or they will find you out. No one has told him you are on the ship yet. That will happen soon enough. The captain allows them this moment to relieve their tension. For the Sword to prove he is fit to fight. But her patience will not last. I’m surprised she has restrained herself this long. To have so many men on her ship, to let so many know what we are doing… it’s not easy for her to obey this particular request from the queen. It would help if she had more information. A direction. I believe she thinks the Queen’s Sword will be the key.”

Phina would get it for her if she could. But she had a sinking feeling that she was the last person Cyrus wanted to see.

Alive.

“I taught you better than this, Senedal. Unless your intention is to shame me in front of this new crew.”

Dare rolled her blue eyes at Cyrus playfully, her cheeks glowing from their invigorating match. More than invigorating. Dare, it seemed, was just warming up for more. Cyrus, on the other hand, was ready to lie down once more. Or have another cup of that hot, restorative tea that monster of a first mate brought to him twice daily since he’d arrived on this unique airship.

Dare shook her head. “You think I hold back, Arendal?”

Cyrus grunted, evading a low dagger strike with a swift side step. “I know you do. I believe over a decade of training you have given me insight into how you think. You still let your thoughts and feelings distract you.”

She stepped back, a strange expression on her face as she looked over his shoulder. “Perhaps you are correct.” Dare bit her lip in a telling gesture that Cyrus recognized from when she was a child. She was unsure. He lowered his weapon.

Her shoulders squared and she raised her voice. “Seraphina? Cyrus believes I am too tenderhearted to give him the sparring match he desires. I think you would be a better opponent for him, don’t you?”

Cyrus turned as if in slow motion, noting the pity, the apology in Dare’s gaze. His hand instinctively tightened on the hilt of his borrowed sword.

He saw the tall first mate standing on the higher steerage deck, looking down at something, or someone, at his feet. The man shook his head and took a jug away from a slender hand connected to a feminine arm.

An arm marked with unmistakable Felidae spots.

When the woman stood and turned, Cyrus watched as the distinctive limb became a figure. A curvaceous, nubile body barely covered in a tight corset and topped with a wild mane of fiery red hair. His heart began to pound. It beat out an angry rhythm in his head. In that rhythm was a name.

Seraphina Felidae.

There were images that had sustained him under the burning heat of the sun and plagued him during the long, cold nights he was away. They had kept his rage alive and focused his energy. They’d helped him escape his shameful fate and arrive, insensate but alive, at the Deviant.

All of those images had been of her.

Her bare breasts filling his hands. Her sharp teeth digging into his flesh. Her cries when he’d licked one velvet marking on her spine, his hips pounding against her again and again.

The look in her emerald green eyes when he’d asked her to stay the whole night. Desire and regret. She’d kissed him and he’d felt the sharp sting of a dart piercing his flesh.

In those moments before he lost consciousness, he’d cursed her, and himself, for being taken in. For believing the power of the need between them was real enough to risk his mission. To make himself vulnerable. His own desire had betrayed him, but she had dealt the killing blow to his pride and opened the door to the enemy while he was at his most vulnerable.

Seraphina Felidae. She was here. On the Deviant.

He snarled. “I accept your replacement, Dare. Gladly.”

His gaze was trained on her every movement, noticing her hesitation. Her tension. It seemed she did not want to fight him.

He would have to change that. “How did she convince you to let her on board?” he asked to the group at large. “She must have given someone as hard a ride as she gave me. She is talented in that area. Almost as talented in bed as she is at deceit.”

“Cyrus.” Dare whispered the admonishment, but he would not listen. She couldn’t know what he’d been through.

“You forget my abilities, brother. I know what you are feeling. Just remember, she is loyal to our queen. Our ally.”

“She is loyal to no one but herself.” He knew Seraphina could hear him and saw her tail stiffen at the insult. “How could she be? We all know what she is.”

He was a bastard, but he could not help the elation that coursed through him as he watched her leap over the balustrade and onto the deck. Adrenaline raced in his bloodstream despite his fatigue. Rage gave him strength.

He was Wode.

She held up a hand and caught the two daggers someone tossed her way with an ease that had Cyrus licking his lips in anticipation.

He smirked. “No whip, Felidae?”

“You’re injured. Being what I am, even I would not kick a wounded babe for sport. Besides, I need no whip to beat you. We all know what you are as well.”

They circled each other and to Cyrus it seemed everyone else disappeared. Only she remained. Her intoxicating scent. Her body.

Her betrayal.

“What a reunion to wake to.” He chuckled bitterly. “James Stacy and his friends, the brothel owner, and now you. Am I to believe I’m back on the Siren? That the past few months were merely a nightmare? Or did you all want another chance to sell me to the highest bidder?”

Seraphina flinched, her body tense. Wary. “Much as I’d love to blame them, you and I both know they had nothing to do with what happened to you. Why waste all that passion on people who have not earned it?”

“Why, indeed.” He strode closer to her, his sword out, leaving himself wide open. “You want passion? Fight me.”

She made no move to strike him, though he noticed her knuckles were white around each dagger’s hilt. He wanted her to. He wanted a reason to release all that was pent up inside him. All that pain. All he had been through. And all the while the people he loved in danger because he allowed this woman to come to his bed. “How much was I worth?”

“What?” She shifted, taking a step back.

Cyrus moved closer, unwilling to give her a chance to escape. “The Queen’s Sword must have been worth something. They went to so much trouble to take me out of a heavily guarded submersible. That is no easy feat.”

“If only, Arendal.” Bodhan’s voice was condescending, a grating and unwelcome interruption. “The Deviant’s crew plucked me out of my bed without a single shot fired. The Siren’s security has been lacking of late.”

James Stacy groaned behind him. “I’ve apologized for that, sir. It will not happen again.”

He wanted them gone. Wanted their silence. If he had a gun…

Seraphina inhaled sharply. “Keep out of this, all of you. This is between sword boy and I, isn’t it, Cyrus? I tied him up and dragged him unwillingly to my bed. I personally gave him each new scar on his body.” She smiled and licked her lips, taunting him. “Oh and did I mention? I thoroughly defiled innocent Dare in front of Bodhan and a paying customer.”

Cyrus could not stop the raw sound of outrage that escaped from his chest. She knew. Knew the words to rend his control from his grasp. To shred it to pieces until he was more animal than man. She had done this to him. Made him this beast that couldn’t think. His head was clouded, his body aching and his heart fighting to explode from his chest.

Her fault. Seraphina Felidae.

He dropped his sword and reached for her, taking her to the ground with an ease that should have given him pause. His legs pinned hers while one hand gripped her wrists above her head.

The other curved threateningly around her throat, applying momentary pressure.

“Fight me,” he growled. Why was she lying there? She had the strength to buck him off, to claw at him and force her release.

Her green eyes were huge. As mesmerizing and exotic as he had remembered, with an expression he’d never seen in them before. Regret. Her breath against his lips was sweet with drink and the flavor that was hers alone.

He caressed her neck, silently cursing the marks he could see
forming on her silken skin. Why did he care? Felidae pheromones inspired lust, not guilt. She had sent him to his end. Or believed she had. She’d taken everything that made him what he was. Why did he suddenly want to beg her forgiveness?

“Fight me,” he repeated harshly.

He felt a sharp point pressing his chin upward until he caught the captain’s eye. He hadn’t noticed her approach.

Her expression was chilling. “
I
will fight you, Wode. In fact, if you are not off her before I press this colorful gem on the hilt of my sword, I will fight both pieces of you that remain. I doubt, either way, that it will be a challenge.”

Cyrus got to his knees and stood swiftly, his hands out to show he meant no harm. What had come over him? No matter how livid he’d been when he’d seen her, there was no excuse to harm a woman. “My apologies. Her presence surprised me.”

Captain Amaranthe hesitated, then sheathed her sword and studied the silent crowd. “As for the gawkers. That is enough sport for the morning. Despite what Bodhan may have told you, this is no pleasure cruise. We need to post watches fore and aft, and I expect the deck and all its workings to sparkle.” Her hazel eyes darkened. “If I must sustain you with food and drink, and, it seems, all of my best liquor, you will earn your keep.”

He noticed her expression soften as she reached out a hand to help Seraphina to a standing position. “Shall I kill him for you?”

The pale Felidae shook her head and he thought he heard her whisper, “I’ve done enough.”

He watched her turn to walk toward the lower cabins, stopping when she reached Dare’s side.

His companion guard reached for her. “I
am
sorry. I did not believe he would react so strongly.”

Seraphina took her hand and squeezed. Cyrus frowned. Did
Dare trust her, then? How was that possible? With her abilities how could she?

“He is not himself. They did more than wound him. Vayun,” Seraphina muttered loud enough for him to hear as she pushed Dare’s hands gently away. “
He
smells of vayun. Remnants only. If given in excess it can still be detected for several days. He is no doubt suffering withdrawal along with the last of his illness.”

Was this a trick?
She
was defending
him
? Cyrus stepped forward swiftly. Too swiftly. “How do you know what they gave me?” His laugh was bitter. “Oh, I beg your pardon, I forgot. You were the one who fucked me, stuck me, and handed me over to them.”