Hook's Pan (10 page)

“If we were sinking, then where is the water, lass? Hmmm? Now,” his warm breath fanned the shell of her ear, “when I remove my hand, you will not yell. The ship is full of men who’d do much to get their hands on a body like yours.”

Slowly, he peeled one finger off at a time. Her breathing was still choppy and hard, but his words had at least sunk in.

“But…but,” she stuttered, trying to get her thoughts in order, “I saw a whale, right outside my window and it was glowing and purple and bizarre and…”

His blue eyes were calm as they gazed on her face and it was that calm that eased her taut nerves. Wringing her hands, she licked her lips and nodded, beginning to suddenly feel embarrassed, which really sucked. She’d just acted like an ass, screaming like an idiot woman about the sinking boat.

But if it wasn’t sinking, what was happening?

She was going to ask him, when she noticed a gleam enter his expressive eyes. His gaze was slow and methodical as it traveled from the soles of her heels, up her thighs, her breasts, before finally coming to rest on her face. A small smile latched itself onto his wide (but not unpleasantly so) lips.

“I can see why the captain decided to keep you to ‘emself.” His normally cultured voice broke for a second and the accent was much stronger this time. Wiping his hands on his creamy white knee high trousers, he held it out to her. “
Monroe
 
Smee.”

Smee? As in
the Smee?
The bulbous nosed baboon? Why wasn’t he fat, or stammering, speaking in a high-pitched falsetto? Looking around the room, she had to admit it was as opposite from Hook’s as could possibly be. There was a bed pushed up against one corner of the wall, a lantern swinging from a hook beside it, and that was it.

Narrowing her eyes, she slipped her hand into his. His fingers were rough and his grip tight. “Do you own a red cap?”

A tiny line drew down between his brows. “What?”

“Never mind.” She shook her head. “Doesn’t matter. Where is the captain?”

He shook his head. “Topside, and you cannot go. There are men about. Until the captain deigns to let them know you even exist, you must stay below. ‘Tis Captain’s orders.”

She giggled, hearing the cartoon Smee in her head with his little snively voice. But this Smee and that Smee were not at all alike.

This one was glowering and his sun-burnished hair was poking up around his head like he’d stuck his finger in a light socket. In fact, the man was big and imposing. Though his voice wasn’t as whiskey deep as his boss’s, this was a man, and no doubt about it.

His skin was dark and golden, the musculature of his body obvious beneath the tan shirt because of the light that reflected off it, highlighting the taut lines of his body beneath.

She swallowed hard and took a step back. Years ago she’d taken a self-defense course in college, Krav Maga. Great for close combat fighting, but she was rusty and really didn’t relish the thought of getting down and dirty right now.

“Relax, you belong to the Captain, none can harm you so long as you remain under his care. That said, I’m sure the men must have heard your bloody screaming, thank the Goddess they are a superstitious lot and since we’re moving through the drop they likely believe it to be the voice of Calypso herself.”

He said it like he was chastising her. Jeez, not like she’d asked to get dumped here. “Good to know,” she grumbled.

“Now,” he tied up his shirt laces, “if I can trust you not to scream, I’ll go find him for you if you’d like.”

Did she want to see him?

Not really, but then again, she didn’t want to be alone either. She just wanted to talk, to understand what in the hell was going on. “Yeah, fine.”

Snorting with mirth, he opened the door, keeping a hold of her shoulder as he peeked out and looked both ways down the long hall. “Go back to your room. I’ll send him to you in a jiff.”

Tugging at her frock, she tiptoed back down the hall and into the room, closing the door firmly behind her with a loud sigh of relief.

She stared out the porthole, wondering if maybe she’d been going just a little nutters earlier. But no, the world outside was as alive and as fascinating as before, more so even, because now she knew she wasn’t going to drown if she stayed to enjoy it.

Letting go of the knob, she made her way back to the window, pressing her nose once more to the pane, and sighed in awe.

It was night when he’d left her here alone with her thoughts, but it didn’t look like any night she’d ever seen. The waters were a deep teal, but shaded like they might be at dusk. Creatures swam around.

Snaggle toothed sharks, their leathery hide shaded in colors she’d never seen on earth flicked thick muscular tails as they swam idly by. There were green sharks, pink sharks, red and blue ones. Tiny schools of fish zipped and darted around them, but what made them so amazing was that they were all a mother of pearl color, gleaming different shades at different angles. Beds of coral, in every color of the rainbow glowed, while the greenest seaweed she’d ever seen swayed and danced in the waters, looking like emeralds the way the light refracted off them.

Her mouth tipped into a tiny smile. She’d never been someone who’d thought much of the ocean, or the sea. Seeing a beach had never topped her bucket list, and yet she found herself wondering why not.

It was breathtaking.

“Beautiful isn’t it?”

Yelping at the sound of his whiskey deep drawl, she twirled and grabbed her frantically beating heart. “I didn’t hear you.”

He smirked, and her heart thrummed. The blood in her veins sang and her body once again went completely off kilter at the sight of him.

The man was potent.

“Smee said you’d called for me.” His lips twitched. “Rather loudly too. Something about a ship sinking.”

She chuckled, feeling heat slither up her neck and settle in her cheeks. “Yeah, well…” She pointed to the porthole. “It sure looks like we’ve sunk. How is this possible?”

A muscle in his jaw ticked as he stared at her. The heat of his gaze made her stomach bottom out and she curled her toes into the plush rug.

“What?” she asked, disgusted to hear the breathlessness in her voice. This wasn’t her first rodeo, and she was sure as hell no virgin, but something about this man made her feel dizzy.

He rolled large shoulders before leaning against the cabin wall, crossing his arms over his chest. A familiar pose she was noticing. “I’m just trying to see her in you.”

Her lashes fluttered. “So you believe that too? That I was a mermaid in a past life?” she scoffed, waiting for him to join in.

“You don’t? No memories of another life? I’ve been told, pretty convincingly, that you were.”

Brushing bangs out of her eyes, she shook her head. “No. No dreams, no memories of another life. And I definitely think I’d remember if I’d had a tail, wouldn’t you?”

“Happened a long time ago. So long in fact,” he pushed off the wall, and sat at his desk, yanking open a drawer and pulling out another decanter and tumbler, “that I doubt it myself.”

Popping open the bottle, he tipped it toward her, a question on his face.

“No, I haven’t eaten, I’ve got terrible gerd and trust me,” she laughed, “you do not want to be around me when I’m having an attack. I go all postal and grrr and rwar and it’s ugly.”

His brows furrowed and then he laughed, but the sound was one like he wasn’t sure whether he should or not. “You’re a strange, little bird, are you not?”

Every single Colin Firth fantasy was coming to life right now, and for just a second she was tempted to ask him to call her Ms. Bennet, just once…but maybe that was pushing it just a little too far.

She studied her nails. “I don’t know at all what you mean.”

“I mean,” he poured a glass full, drank it back and then poured another, “that you are always rambling on about the most nonsensical things and for reasons unknown to me I find you very amusing. Why is that?”

Walking over to the bed, she dropped down onto it, then crawled to the center before criss-crossing her legs. “You’re asking me why I amuse you? Gah, I don’t know. I amuse everyone, it’s why I’m so darn popular.”

He licked his lips, and just the sight of his bright pink tongue made her pulse flutter. “Did you know that red is my favorite color?”

“What?” She had a hard time tracking his change of topic.

Leaning back in his chair, legs sprawled out, he looked like the king of his castle and an excited shiver ran down her spine.

“The color of your underwear.” The glass hovered around his lips and she licked her own at the sexy drawl in his words. “Red. I like it. A lot.”

The man screamed sex, Gerard had nothing on him. If he thought he could intimidate her with his sexual innuendos he was dead wrong.

“I didn’t wear it for you.”

“I don’t doubt that.” He smirked and tossed back the drink. She frowned.

“Don’t you worry about rotting your liver? I’ve seen you chug one drink after another.”

“Yes, well I’m cursed to never die from drink, you see, travesty I find myself in. A pirate loves drink and here in Neverland it loves him right back. So what incentive have I to stop?”

“Don’t you even get a little drunk?”

He shrugged, stoppering the decanter and putting it back in his bottom drawer. “I do. But it doesn’t last nearly long enough. So,” he lifted a brow, clearly indicating her line of questions were over, “quite a predicament we find ourselves in. Stuck with each other for three days, what do we do now? I must warn you, as I feel it’s the honorable thing to do—though I’m rarely given to honor—that I will not fall in love with you.”

She scoffed. “Oh please, as if I asked. Love is for fools. For losers and assholes, I just like sex.”

“Mmm, I do like the sound of that.” He spread his legs wider and she could only imagine the thoughts tossing about his head, because they were definitely rolling around hers. She wondered how hard it would be to convince him to tie on a cravat, maybe take a dip into a body of water and come out walking slowly toward her with a smoldering look in his coal black eyes.

She licked her lips. “Too bad for you, because I’m already taken.” She lifted her hand, waving her fingers at him, then stuck up her pointer and middle finger. “Meet thunder and lightening.”

Those two fingers had brought her many years of pleasure.

He laughed. “You speak like a doxy, but somehow I do not believe you to be one. Not really. Pure bravado.”

“Please,” she rolled her eyes, “I’m the biggest whore there is. I sleep around, screw whatever I want, and never, ever, get my heart involved.”

She was such a liar. Somehow, over the years, she’d developed a reputation as being easy. It wasn’t true, she had standards. Yes, she’d taken lovers to her bed, but not without thought or reason behind it. True, she didn’t ever hand out her heart, but that didn’t mean she was heartless either. She just happened to enjoy sex, but she was always smart about it and careful with her partners.

His eyes twinkled again; she liked how they did that. Like the light of a star was trapped behind the obsidian gaze and every now and then it came out and winked at her. Somehow, she didn’t think he did it often, which made a weird, fluttery feeling feather somewhere in the region of her heart.

“If you are a whore, then I am a maid. No, little bird, I may not know you at all, but whore you are not. For if you were, you’d be all over me.”

Her thighs trembled, thank God he couldn’t see it. She shook her head, because he was so wrong. She did want to jump his bones. The man was the most wicked, delicious looking man she’d ever seen in her life. Big and brawny and darkly handsome—but she hated cockiness.

“Oh please, as if you’re some prize. Captain of a pirate ship, if whores are throwing themselves at you it’s only in the hope of booty. Is that what you call it?”

His lips tipped at the corner. “Make no mistake, they do want my booty. They want other parts of me too. Harder parts. Larger, firmer ones.”

“You’re sick.” Heat flushed her veins as her breathing increased just a notch, making her breasts feel heavy.