Heather Graham - [Camerons Saga - North American Woman 02] (51 page)

It seemed that all of the ship was ablaze. Men were screaming; men were leaping into the water. The night was alive with light, with activity, with shouts, and still, with the clang of steel.

Skye grabbed on to a floating log. The cloak had been dragging her down but she clung to it once she had the log; it seemed to offer her a certain warmth, sodden as it was. Or maybe the fire was warming up the water, she didn’t know.

Perhaps her heart and soul had gone so cold that she could not feel any ice external to herself. Her father and her husband remained aboard the ship, and it burned with an ever-wilder frenzy.

“Scurry, men! If you would. By God, see! There’s enemy sails afloat!” someone called out.

More cries broke out in the night. Longboats broke away in the night, but Skye didn’t try to reach any of the pirates. She would wait. She would hold tight to her log and … pray.

“Lady Cameron! Lady Cameron!” someone shouted to her.

She turned about, and a gasp formed and froze upon her lips.

Lieutenant Governor Alexander Spotswood was sitting forward in a longboat, reaching out a hand to her.

“I—I can’t—” she began.

“Child, look who I have with me!” Spotswood demanded.

She looked past him. Lord Theodore Kinsdale peeked around the lieutenant governor’s shoulder, his eyes rheumy with tears, his mouth breaking into a hearty smile.

“Father!” she cried.

“Help the lass, help her!” Spotswood demanded.

Spotswood’s sailors reached into the sea for her. Skye flushed, and the men politely turned aside as she tried to adjust the sodden cloak and find a seat within the longboat. Theo’s ferocious hug nearly upset all of the boat, and she found herself held warmly in her father’s arms. She shivered and chattered insanely. Someone pressed a bottle to her lips. The brew threatened to burn her mouth.

“Drink it!” she was ordered.

She swallowed. Then she swallowed more deeply. The shivering at long last seemed to subside. “More!”

She swallowed more. The world was hazy around her. Maybe some of the rough edges of pain were eased.

“Bless God and the saints above us!” Theo muttered.

Skye pulled back. Her father—her dear, fastidious father—was torn and disheveled, from his unpowdered hair to his filthy mustard breeches and snagged stockings. He smelled like an animal hold and he was every bit as sodden as she, but she cried out and hugged him again, because he was alive and well. “Father! Oh, Father! Why did you come for me! I was safe; you could have been safe! And now …” Her voice trailed away. In her relief to see her father, she had momentarily forgotten the Hawk.

“I had to come, you’re my life, my only child. You are everything to me!” Theo reminded her.

“Oh, Father! I do love you. But now—”

“The Hawk!” Theo said.

“My God!” she breathed.

“My God, indeed!” Spotswood murmured, and he turned to her. “There, milady. I see him there, still aboard the ship!”

She strained to see past the fire and the smoke and she saw that the lieutenant governor spoke the truth. The figures of two dueling men could be seen, outlined clearly like black silhouettes against the fiery furnace of the blaze. They feinted forward, and they feinted back.

Theo placed his hand upon her shoulder. “ ’Tis the Hawk,” he murmured. “He tossed me overboard to the boats below with that vile Logan a-breathing right down his shoulder.”

“He’ll best Logan. He has to win, Skye. You understand that?”

She didn’t understand anything. She screamed suddenly, leaping up, for the pirate ship exploded, bursting in the night. But just as it happened, the silhouettes were still stark and visible. And one of them drew back his sword with a fierce and mighty swing, and sent it flying like a headsman across the other’s throat. And even as the explosion rent the air, sending both silhouettes flying into the dark and waiting water of the night, she could see a severed head go flying from a torso.

She screamed and screamed, clutching her throat. The explosion had killed the other man, surely! It was an inferno, and they were scarcely far enough away themselves not to feel the horrid heat of the blaze.

“Skye!” Spotswood called to her. “Dammit, child, sit, will you? Skye!”

Their boat tipped, and capsized.

And for the life of her, she could not care. She wanted to sink at that moment into the darkness. Life, she thought, had been darkness until he had lifted her from it. She wanted no part of the light, if she could not share it with him.

“Daughter!”

“Skye Cameron, come over here!”

Whether she wanted life or no, she was going to be forced
to live. The sailors righted the boat; her father grabbed her. When the boat was righted, they dragged her up. They all sat shivering.

Another explosion rent the pirate ship. The fire crackled high in the night, and then it began to fade. It would burn for hours, Skye thought, but never so brightly as now. By morning, the fire would be gone.

Spotswood inhaled and exhaled. “All right, men. I see no other of ours in the waves. Head toward the
Bonne Belle.
”

“No! We can’t leave!” Skye protested.

“My dear, there are other boats about.”

“No man could have survived that explosion!” one of the sailors said. He whispered, but Skye heard him.

“Now, now. The Hawk is known to be a survivor. Perhaps he has gone on with his pirate friends, and maybe that is best,” Spotswood said.

No, Skye thought. The sailor had been right. No man could have survived the explosion. Not unless he had leaped clear when the ship went to splinters.

Oars lapped the water. Theo pulled her close to him again and Skye rested her head on her father’s shoulders.

“Damn child, if I’m not quite a mess!” Spotswood murmured, very unhappily wringing out his wig. “I’m not even supposed to be here—this is North Carolina territory, you know. Not supposed to be here—I’m
not
here! If any man ever says it, I will deny it! Blimey, but you have given us a good soaking girl.”

She couldn’t respond. Theo took her face tenderly between his hands. “Did he hurt you, Skye? Are you well, are you fine? I was so terrified for you; all I could think of all the time was how very afraid you must be of the darkness.”

“I’m not afraid of the dark, Father,” she whispered, and she squeezed his hand. He loved her, and that was why he had come for her. She had to understand that. She had been willing to sell her own soul for Theo’s sake, and she was grateful beyond measure that he was alive. “I’m not afraid of the dark, not anymore.”

“There she is, right ahead, the
Bonne Belle
. And not too far from our own waters at that!”

The longboat came alongside the ship the
Bonne Belle
. “Captain, lower the ladder if you will!” Spotswood called out. “I’ve Lady Cameron and Lord Kinsdale safe and sound and with me!”

A cheer went up. Skye was helped up the ladder and over the edge, and she tried to smile to the young man who helped her so intently. She fell against the railing, though, and as her father and Spotswood crawled up behind her, she turned about to stare out to the sea, out to the night.

“Peter! Bring your mistress a dry blanket, and quickly!” Spotswood called out.

Peter! Skye whirled around and, indeed, Peter was there, rushing to her with a dry, warm blanket. He set it about her shoulders. “My lady, are we grateful to see you!”

“Peter!” She forgot protocol and hugged him fiercely, then looked to Spotswood. Spotswood shrugged.

“I already told you, dear—I am not here this evening. The
Bonne Belle
is another of your husband’s ships.”

“Oh!” she cried, then she turned back to the water again, and she started to shake and cry in earnest, tears cascading down her cheeks. She couldn’t bear it. She just couldn’t. She loved him too deeply, for all his sins, because of all his sins. He had always been there for her. He had risked his life time and again to save hers. He had come to her in darkness, and in light, and all that mattered now was that he was gone, and that life held no meaning.

“Skye!”

She heard her name as a rasping whisper, calling out to her from the fog of anguish that covered her heart. It was not real, she thought, but she turned slowly, and then her heart started to leap.
He was there
. Standing before her, drenched and dripping over the deck, barefoot and bare-chested still. He held no weapons, but faced her with his palms out, his heart within his silver eyes. He was alive.

“Roc!” she screamed his name in gladness, hurtling toward him, throwing herself against him. She cried his name again and again, holding close to him. She clutched his face between her hands and she showered him with kisses, his forehead, his lips, his cheeks, his sea-wet bare chest and shoulders. His arms
folded around her. He pulled her close, holding her wet and sleek to his heart. His fingers combed through her sodden hair.

“Skye … beloved …”

His mouth covered hers, and the warmth of a summer day exploded within her. He was alive! He was warm, he was real, he was with her, beside her upon the deck of the
Bonne Belle
.

“Really!” Theo Kinsdale groaned. “They’re barely clad, between the two of them.”

“Theo!” Spotswood reprimanded him. “Have a heart, sir! They are duly wed, and I might remind you, it was all your doing. Give them a moment’s peace, then I shall part them myself.”

A moment’s peace …

Skye didn’t hear the words. She was in her own world.

In paradise …

Touching him, feeling him, convincing herself with all of her senses that he was truly alive. Then he broke away from her, and she saw his face, stripped of his beard. His hair unpowdered, wet and trailing down his back. His shoulders sleek and bronze and rippling with muscle.

And Spotswood was here. The lieutenant governor! He would know—just as she knew!—that the Hawk and Lord Cameron were one and the same. And there would be no escape now. No escape at all. Roc had survived Logan and the fire just to hang!

“No!” she gasped in horror, staring at him.

“Skye—” he murmured.

“Ail right, my dear young friends,” Spotswood said, coming toward them. “I’m afraid I must interrupt you now—”

“No! No!” Skye cried. She held her husband tightly. “You don’t understand! You mustn’t take him—”

“But, my dear, I must—”

“No!” she cried.

“Skye …” Roc murmured.

But it was suddenly too much for her. She fought for reason; she fought for light. Darkness was overwhelming her. She clung to her husband, and his arms came around her. But
it was not enough. She fell into his arms, and the world closed in darkness around her.

“My God, what’s happened to her!” Theo demanded, pushing forward.

“Nothing, Theo, nothing. And it seems that the lad has her well in hand. She’s fainted, Theo, and that’s all. And for the night that the poor thing has endured, it seems little enough!”

“I will take her to bed,” Roc said softly.

“But—” Theo sputtered.

“They’re married, Theo!”

Theo tried with dignity to adjust his ragged clothing. “Quite right, Alexander, quite right. It’s just that …”

“Quite right, and that’s that!” Alexander said. “Lord Cameron! I need a word with you as soon as she’s settled.”

When she woke up, it was light. The sun streamed in upon her and she rose up, amazed to discover that she was home.

Home. Cameron Hall.

She was dressed in a soft blue nightgown with lace at the collar and the cuffs and hem. Her hair was dried and soft and she was comfortable. She had been out a very long time.

She lay upon her husband’s bed, and the very sight of it brought her up, amazed. “Roc!” she cried out his name, but he was not with her, and she had known that he would not be. Spotswood would have arrested him for piracy by now. They would take him to the jail in Williamsburg, and as soon as the court met, they would try him.

And hang him.

“Oh, no!” She leaped out of the bed, and she was amazed that she could have been out so long, and so completely. It was the liquor they had made her drink, she thought. Her head was still pounding. She pushed up from the bed, and she stared about the room. How ironic! Now, at long last, she slept in her husband’s handsome bed. But he was not with her. The sun streamed into this place that he loved so much, and she was alone with it. She let her hand fall to her abdomen, and she thought of all the time that had passed since she had first encountered the Hawk, and she trembled. He had wanted an heir. Perhaps that was what she had left. Perhaps she could
live to give him that which he had so desired, the son to carry on his name in this all-important land. “Please God, let it be that it is so!” she whispered.

Then she spun around, determined. She would not let the father hang so quickly, she could not! Her father would help her. Theo would testify that the Hawk had saved his life during the fire. There would be enough men to stand for the Hawk, oh surely.

She had to find her father, or the governor, or Peter, or someone. Ignoring her state of undress, she tore out of the bedroom and along the hallway with the portraits of the Cameron lords and ladies. She paused, and her heart beat fiercely. “I shall not let you down, I swear it! I will save him, I promise. I did not want to come here, that is true, but it’s my blood, too, now, you see. I think I’m to have his child, and besides, you see … I love him. With all my heart. He is my life, and this land is his passion, and therefore, it is mine.”

She was talking to portraits, she realized. But the Camerons looked down upon her, and she thought that they smiled their encouragement. The men with their silver eyes, the women with their knowing warmth and soft beauty.

She turned away from the portraits and ran down the elegant stairway. From the grand hallway she burst into the office.

Spotswood and her father were there. They were seated quite comfortably, lighting pipes, sipping coffee—out of fine Cameron cups.

Skye strode to the desk, facing Spotswood. “Where is he? I demand to know.” She spun around. “Father, you make him tell me where my husband is! I want to see him now. You may arrest him, but you’ll not hang him. I’ll fight you. I’ll fight you both tooth and nail until we are all nothing but blood. Father! He saved your life!”