My Lady Vixen (25 page)

Unable to think beyond the moment. Alexa soon found herself lying in the center of the oversized bunk, trembling with an excitement she was hard-pressed to conceal. She could feel his uneven breathing on her cheek as he settled beside her and held her close. Slowly his hands explored the hollows of her back, her breasts, and against her will she locked herself into his embrace. The sudden magnitude of their passion left them both shaken.

With trembling hands he finished undressing her, savoring every inch of her smooth satiny skin. And then he disrobed himself except for his mask. When his
mouth captured one breast and his hands the other, Alexa could not suppress the moan of ecstasy that escaped her throat. Her passion sparking his own, Fox seized her lips, pleasure spiraling through her as his tongue teased hers in a kiss so deep that she was filled with the taste of his magical touch.

His voice a husky purr, Fox whispered, “Touch me, Alexa, touch me with love.”

Obeying blindly, Alexa ran her hands experimentally along the broad expanse of his back, down a narrow hip, across a muscular flank and back again where they lost themselves in the curly hair at the nape of his neck below the bandana he wore to cover his hair. Unthinkingly, Alexa tore off the offending cloth in order to allow her hands free access to the thick locks that heretofore had been forbidden her touch. But the wonder of the discovery was lost to her as his tongue flicked across her ribs, setting her afire. Then he found the center of her need and explored it until she was gasping, moaning, calling to him to set her free.

His hands grasping her buttocks to hold her in place, Fox relentlessly plied his mouth and tongue, teasing, exciting, until the pain-pleasure became too much to endure and she exploded with a savage cry of pure delight that spilled out through the porthole to be lost on the crest of rushing water. Rising up he parted her thighs with his knees and entered her slowly, the hard proof of his virility hot and full in her velvet sheath.

“Come with me, my love,” he urged, thrusting until she gasped with delight. She started to speak but her words died as he kissed her and were replaced by a shuddering sigh. “Feel my need?” he groaned into her ear. “I’m near bursting with desire. Only for you, my love, only for you.”

Once again Alexa felt the tension building within her,
and sensing this, Fox met the fires within her with flames of his own as he grasped her buttocks, pulling her more firmly against his pounding loins. She met his thrusts joyously until the trembling began and waves of rapture convulsed her sweat-drenched body. Shouting his joy, Fox joined her in their spiraling journey beyond the sea and the sky.

Resting side by side as they caught their breath, Alexa reflected upon everything that had just transpired between her and Fox. It was a magical moment. A moment out of time and space where nothing or no one existed but the two of them passionately entwined on the oversized bunk. For a short time Fox had made her world right, inspiring her with all the love and tenderness she had always craved. But it could not continue, she was married to Adam and belonged to him until one of them should die.

Plumbing the depths of her heart Alexa realized that she was in love with two men. Men who were alike in many ways yet vastly different. Alexa found little comfort in the fact that she hadn’t meant to betray Adam with Fox, but that knowledge did little to assuage her guilt. Her straying thoughts abruptly evaporated as Fox boldly turned her toward him and slowly began to explore her body in a manner that soon left her gasping with desire.

Alexa closed her eyes and Fox softly kissed the dark lashes that lay like a thick, even scattering of cinders upon her downy cheek. Lovingly he caressed the black hair that streamed over the pillow and atop her breasts like an ebony river. And then he was inside her, claiming her again with all the vigor of a youth about to possess his first woman.

With each movement her body began to pulsate with sweet, tormenting pleasure until she was engulfed in a
maddening rush to attain the summit. When she reached the crest she waited but a moment for Fox to join her.

Sleep came, deep, satisfying, reviving. But for some unexplained reason Alexa awoke but a scant hour or two later. The lamp that ealier had lit their supper had finally sputtered out and the cabin was cast in darkness deeper than the depths of hell. But something bothered Alexa, some little detail that nagged at the corners of her brain. Abruptly she remembered. Fox’s hair! Driven to mindless passion she remembered that she had torn off his head covering in order to score his thick locks with her fingers. Suddenly her fingers twitched with the need to do so again. To feel those crisp curls against her palm, so familiar, yet, how could they be?

Then, a rumble of thunder startled Alexa, followed by a searing blaze of lightening that illuminated the cabin with its eerie glow. Alexa rose on one elbow to look at Fox, fearing that the flash had awakened him. But evidently he was so exhausted from his clash with the English merchantman earlier that day and from his vigorous lovemaking that he was oblivious to everything but the sleep that claimed him.

When the next bolt of lightening scored the heavens. Alexa found herself plunged into the grip of shock more profound than the most hideous nightmare. Somehow, while they were both caught up in passion. Fox’s mask had become dislodged and lay beside him on the pillow. His face, relaxed in sleep, was as familiar to her as her own. Her rage—clawing, all consuming—was so intense it threatened to destroy her. Looking back, Alexa realized her heart must have known all along what her mind refused to accept.

There was a certain strength revealed in the hard planes of his face and the mocking tilt of his brow. His hair was a thick lion’s main of burnished gold and even
in sleep his sensuous lips invited her kisses. Adam and Fox! The same man! If Adam loved her why couldn’t he have confided in her? Love is giving yourself, your thoughts, your trust, not just your body.

A feeling akin to hatred rose up like bile to choke her. She thought of her long repressed stirrings of guilt over her belief that she loved two men, that she had allowed Fox to creep unbidden into her heart. She wanted to awaken him, to lash out, to kick, to scream, to curse. But she did none of them, too befuddled to lift a finger in retaliation. She supposed Mac knew, and wondered how many others were aware that the Fox and Adam Foxworth were the same person. His name should have given her a clue but in her mind she could not equate the staunch royalist with the fierce patriot. Evidently, neither had anyone else.

She would pay him back in kind, Alexa silently vowed, for forcing her to unwittingly become a part of his charade. Someday she would find a way to punish him for deceiving her. Alexa wavered between waking him so she might confront him with his deception and allowing him to continue with his ruse, pretending ignorance. Suddenly a thought occurred to her and she smiled deviously. Two can play at the same game, Adam/Fox. She grinned impishly. Was not a vixen more cunning than a fox? Alexa stifled a giggle, more set than ever upon finding a way to tame a fox.

Curving her small body into that of Adam/Fox, Alexa allowed sleep to claim her. When he awoke her near dawn to brand her with his love once again, she did not protest, allowng him to think that she welcomed the embraces of a man other than her husband. As Adam, he no doubt felt a certain jealousy for Fox, knowing that his wife gave of herself so freely, without a thought to her legal husband. And as Fox, he could not help but
entertain the thought that the woman he professed to love was not totally his.

On the heels of her astounding discovery came the demise of the woman known as Alexa, and from her ashes rose the Vixen, older, stronger, wiser. Beware!

At Sea 1780

Booted feet planted firmly on the quarterdeck, that honored elevation on the stern that represented the captain’s authority, soft breezes ruffling her long blond tresses, the Vixen’s violet eyes skimmed the horizon. She had traveled over many roads during the past six months: progressing from the lady named Alexa, unsuspecting victim of men’s whims, to the Vixen, leader of men, captain of her own ship.
My Lady Vixen
, scourge of the English. She laughed softly, a low mirthless chuckle that caused the men working nearby to eye her curiously.

To a man,
My Lady
Vixen’s crew would have laid down their lives for their beautiful captain who led them so fearlessly against the enemy. Foremost among them was her first mate. Drake, who had once been Mac’s right-hand man aboard the
Lady
A but who now served her so well.

News of the war was not good as the new year of 1780
began. The British victoriously swept up through North and South Carolina. In September and October of 1779 General Benjamin Lincoln was unsuccessful in ousting General Prevost from Savannah despite the help of French naval and military forces under Admiral d’Estaing, and he fell back to Charleston. In this assault the valiant Count Casimer Pulaski, on the American side, was mortally wounded.

Of some encouragement was word that the Whig population scattered, though without much organization, and formed into groups of riflemen and mounted troops to harass the enemy with little mercy shown by either side. Though casualties on both sides were fearsome, daring and skillful leaders such as Francis Marion and Thomas Sumter kept the spirit of resistance alive by their sudden attacks and surprises on British outposts. And so the war continued, joined by yet another brave patriot, the Vixen.

Mesmerized by the steady rise and fall of the ship beneath her bare legs encased in short, cut-off trousers, Alexa traveled back six months to the day the
Ghost
sailed into Nassau. Two days previously she had inadvertently discovered that her own husband. Adam, was the man known as Fox. Hurt and enraged, she vowed she would one day pay him back in kind. Not even Mac was safe from her plotting, for he too had lent credence to Adam’s lie. For the time being it suited Alexa’s purposes to keep her secret, allowing Fox his deception.

Guiltless now that she realized she had not allowed a man other than her husband to make love to her. Alexa welcomed Fox to her bed following the first night they had come together so passionately, shocking Fox with her ardor. Alexa chuckled whenever she recalled his puzzled frown at her eagerness to bed him while
seeming to forget her husband completely. When, on their last night together. Fox asked. “Do you love me. Alexa?” she was quick to reply without a moment’s hesitation. “Aye, I love you, Fox.”

“More than Adam? Do you love me more than your husband?” Alexa could feel his breathlessness as he awaited her answer, and she smiled sardonically, wondering what perversity would cause a man like Fox to ask such a question knowing either way he was bound to lose. What devils drove this strong, arrogant man? she wondered.

Her answer stunned him and sent him storming from her cabin in a fit of pique. “It depends on whose bed I’m in when I’m asked,” Alexa replied sweetly, her wide violet eyes innocent of guile. The Fox had no way of knowing that out of the mouth of a lady came the words of a vixen.

Fox did not stay angry for long. Their time together was too precious for him to analyze and condemn words spoken in the heat of passion. The next day they arrived in Nassau on New Providence Island, one of the smaller but most important of the islands, islets and reefs that made up the Bahamas. Fox immediately escorted her to his house. Mac did not accompany them. He informed Alexa he would remain aboard his ship while she was being provisioned and expected to sail one week hence. Fox’s intention was to stay but one night in Nassau and depart on the morning’s tide. Both men expected Alexa to remain dutifully behind, safely ensconced in Fox’s small but comfortable house on the island. Both were badly mistaken.

Alexa spoke little during the short ride to Fox’s house situated on a bluff a short distance from the harbor. In 1776 Nassau was captured by the young United States navy, but after a few days the place was evacuated,
leaving a kind of void as well as a haven for privateers.

Most of the finer dwellings they passed were made of limestone available readily on the island. Huts were constructed of natural vegetation and were more numerous than the better homes. Though it was winter the day was warm with gentle breezes rustling through the trees. Thick woods surrounded the most exquisite beaches Alexa had ever seen, with long unbroken crescents of white sand and sparkling blue sea. Alexa was enchanted and her face must have shown it.

“I knew you’d like it, milady.” Fox smiled confidently. “The time should pass quickly for you in this paradise.”

“If I don’t die of boredom,” reprosted Alexa wryly. “Fox, won’t you please reconsider and take me with you?”

“No, Alexa. It’s out of the question.”

Alexa bristled but said nothing, her active mind already planning ahead. Before long they stopped before a square, low house built of natural limestone sporting a tile roof and covered veranda forming a wide porch. The house faced the sea and long shuttered windows across the front were opened to garner the breeze.

Alexa found the inside of the house airy and comfortable with furniture fashioned of rattan and bent into shape. Soft cushions provided comfort as well as color. In charge of Fox’s home during his long absences were a couple who, Alexa surmised from their features, were descendants of the original Arawak Indians who once resided on these islands, and their lovely young daughter who looked to be about eighteen.

Trini, a handsome woman in her late thirties, served as housekeeper and cook while her husband, Hunter, saw to the upkeep and sometimes served Fox aboard the
Ghost
. Their daughter, Lana, a coffee-hued beauty whose
dewy youth and innocence thoroughly charmed Alexa, helped her mother with the chores. Fox’s introduction left no doubt in the servants’ minds that Alexa was to be considered mistress in his absence. The family proved friendly and respectful and Alexa liked them on sight, especially Lana.