The Winds of Fate (31 page)

Devon could barely believe when he saw her head emerge from the companionway. She had arranged herself on the deck like a flower. His deck.
The Sea Scorpion
. The little witch. She dared to defy him. He continued to climb down the foremast.

How did she get loose? Bloodsmythe. He had a soft heart. He cut her loose. Bloodsmythe deserved the cat-o’-nine’s to his back.

He dropped to the foredeck and moved to find Bloodsmythe, but pivoted when a group of his men surrounded her. Devon knew they wouldn’t dare harm her. He had sworn them to the articles. They understood the consequences of going against those articles.

“Now aren’t you the prettiest thing I seen in years,” said one of his men.

“I’ll wager she’s prettier than any of the women I’ve seen on Tortuga,” voiced another.

It galled Devon when Josiah knelt in front of her with his hands folded in supplication.

“Do get up,” she urged, a rose tint hinted on her cheeks.

“I cannot until ye understand ye’ve stolen me heart.” He took his hat off and held it in his hands. “Here it is, squeezed in your sweet little hands. So I’ll be pledging my betrothal in a comely manner, and ye’ll be so smitten ye’ll be giving me the answer I’m hoping to hear.” He whistled through his two front missing teeth for his fellow pirate to commence serenading her with a violin.

Devon cursed. His men were like lap dogs panting, and Josiah’s pathetic proposal. And now the cruelty Willie sawed on his violin, screeching and scratching, making his ears bleed.

“I will?” she said, smiling down on Josiah.

“Aye, that you will, darling,” Josiah said, sticking his thumb over his shoulder. “But then look at your choices, these blokes, rough around the ears, none of them a gentleman like meself, who’ll give ye laughter, joy, and never a dull moment.”

Devon caught Claire’s laughter, like an angel’s, it tinkled over the soft sea breeze. “You can’t seriously be declaring marriage.”

“I am,” Josiah gave a long love worn sigh. “Is that not what ye want to hear?”

“I-I appreciate the honor of your request, but−”

“Marry me. I swear ye’ll not regret it.”

Devon loomed on the foredeck above the small assemblage. His teeth ground as she continued to entrance his men. Bloodsmythe crossed the deck and caught his eye. He halted as much surprised of her appearance as Devon. He shook his head and shrugged his shoulders in bewilderment, denoting his silent befuddlement, as a clear “no” in his involvement of that escape. All men cranked their heads to see their Captain. Devon stared them down in a possessive way that shouted,
keep off
as clearly as words−everyone, except the captivated Josiah. He had not, as yet, caught Devon’s eye. One by one each man turned to his task.

Claire thought it odd their rapid departure. She shook her head. They must have to get back to their chores. Only Josiah remained. She admired his persistence and hated to disappoint the charming pirate, but disappoint him she must. “I−”

A shadow menaced over her. Nerves tingled on the back of her neck. Josiah’s throat worked up and down like wash on a washboard.

“This charade has gone on long enough,” Devon cut in tersely.

“Good day, Ma’am. Nice to make your acquaintance,” Josiah said. He bobbed his head and rose so fast, she thought he’d jump from his skin.

If only the initial courage she had mustered for a confrontation had not fled like an outgoing wake. She stood with a feigned nonchalance she was far from feeling.

“How did you get out of the cabin?”

The Captain was at his most commanding. Claire bristled. “I am so sorry,” she responded, sounding anything but. “I did not realize I would not be allowed to take a walk. If there are other ship rules you wish me to follow, pray write them down.”

“Only to see you flout them later. This is my ship, and I am in command. Is that too much to expect?”

“I was looking for you.” Claire attempted to control the conversation despite her knees shaking. “I expect an apology.”

The look on his face was priceless, a mixture of incredulity, amazement and disbelief.

A vein pulsed in the side of his neck. “I rarely apologize. A benefit to my rank. Who after all, would dare bring me to account for my actions?”

Claire kept her distance. “The great man I once knew, did not hold his heart hard to get even, but passed on his revenge to raise superior.”

“Was it not thrust upon me by the injustices of a cruel and greedy aristocracy? Your precious King James created this.” He swept his arm wide across his ship. “This is what I am now and where revenge is, let the great ax fall.”

“An eye for an eye leaves everyone blind,” she made to slip by him, but he blocked her. She was forced to look up at him.

“Blind to what? Blind to an aristocracy that can do to common men whatever they wish? My mother was a sweet, beautiful woman. An English nobleman took a fancy to her. One day, my father and I were called to the nobleman’s home to care for his very ill wife. Once my father realized that the nobleman’s wife was not ill, he knew it to be a ruse. We rushed home and discovered my mother raped and beaten. The nobleman’s name revealed with her last breath. As you are well aware, English nobles wield tremendous power in Ireland, holding immunity from prosecution. Against everyone’s warnings, my father called him out. The nobleman−skilled with a sword. My father, no skills except that of a gentle healer. At the age of twenty-four, I watched my father toyed with, laughed at, and dispatched ruthlessly. He died in my arms. In retaliation, I burned down the nobleman’s stables and was caught attempting to set fire to his house. The sordid irony−the
nobleman free from the murder of both my parents while I was to hang. I fled to Europe, picked up soldiering, a far better occupation that has prepared me for this life.”

The pain she heard in his voice was so keen it made her close her eyes, reliving the pain of that final scene. “I am so sorry. I cannot imagine−” Claire’s heart slammed into her with a sickening thud. No wonder he hated her. She symbolized the aristocracy that killed his parents. The aristocracy who made him powerless. The aristocracy that enslaved him. All the injustices, beyond what anyone could conceive had been hurled on his head.

Aching for him, a deep understanding of him rose inside of her. She could picture him as a young man helpless and unable to defend his mother and father. She understood the suppressed guilt he shouldered that exaggerated the worst of his flaws, making him more reckless, impulsive and judgmental. She prayed the old festering wound brought to light would somehow release him from the agony of his soul.

She laid her trembling fingers on his arm.

He brushed them away. “Do you think I want your pity? I don’t care what you feel. I have a need for justice burning so deep within me I’d go to hell and back for the sake of it. So resign yourself. There will be time enough to settle scores, depending when and how I choose will be up to my inclinations. And understand I don’t believe in soft solutions. Be aware, Claire Blackmon...” His Irish accent clipped the syllables of her name, infusing it with complete contempt. “The retribution I seek from you will be sweeter than flowing honey.”

They had been conversing so loudly, Claire could not help but notice their audience who pretended nothing unusual was going on between her and their Captain, casting conspiratorial winks at one another.

“Is everything all right over there, Captain?” Bloodsmythe yelled from the foredeck, shading his eyes with his hand from the bright sun.

“Nothing I can’t handle,” Devon said. A burst of male laughter followed.

Claire had no trouble interpreting their masculine amusement. She wished every male on earth to Hades at the moment. With the most blistering spot reserved for Devon. She raised her knee.

Without warning he jerked her into his arms, holding her tight against him, her hands touching his chest, his body, hot with anger. “You nearly crippled, Le Trompeur.” His eyes glinted sharper than the point of a knife. “No one insults me. Not without paying a price.”

The rough magic of his lips heated and tormented her, rousing a sudden fever that was hard and searching. His hands slid down her back, forcing her tight against him, allowing her to feel his strength and power. The kiss went on and on, shamefully she responded to the endless teasing, drawing a soft moan from deep in her throat.

Distantly, she heard laughter. From a deep dreamy haze, Claire, horrified, realized what she was doing. She pushed at Devon, pummeling him with her fists, her resistance a pitiful thing in the face of his superior strength. When Devon finally pushed her away from him, her blood pounded, her face burned with humiliation. Their audience hooted. Claire clapped her hands to her face, her body shaking. His breathing was harsh and ragged, his expression incensed. Lust all but smoked from his frame. Her mortification complete, Claire raced past him to his cabin to salvage the last remnants of her sanity.

Half seated in his bed, propped up by pillows, Claire had sifted through many books. For several hours, she held onto this mind numbing activity, too afraid to venture out, needing to forget that horrid experience on deck and feeling defeated on every front. What a fool she had been to think she could rile Devon on his own ship.

Though he kissed her on the deck as though she were the most precious find of his life, Claire willed herself to remember how the man, the pirate terrified her, fearful of his passion and his anger. Afraid of the way he touched her, afraid that she would never be able to forget.

Claire wrapped her arms around her legs and rested her chin on her knees. For just a moment, she managed to recapture the faint, indefinable feeling from her childhood that proved to her, beyond doubt, that she’d had parents who’d loved her. The memory of that one vivid precious moment, that vision from her past, reminded her of something she had always known in the depths of her heart−if her parents had lived, it would have made all the difference in the world.

Yet the crucial loss of her parents, followed by the great miseries she endured existing on the streets of St. Giles, created a disconnected wound that never healed. Shattered by feelings of abandonment, Claire struggled with loneliness and fear, creating an emptiness that silently leeched away her confidence.

On Devon’s ship, the old ache of loss had a new sharp edge, because now she was swimming in uncharted territory. Wallowing in self-pity would not solve a thing. She had been thrown into a strange world with strange people, and rather than brood about her past, she’d somehow manage to deal with the present.

Claire thought about the children at the orphanage on Jamaica. She loved them like her own, filling a crushing unexplainable void rising inside her. She had been driven to make them feel happy and secure. Doting on them like a loving parent to the point of exhaustion. Was her drive to help them impelled by the crushing need for them not to feel abandoned?

With Devon coming back into her life, her world once more turned upside down. Was he taking her to the ends of the world? She pressed her hands to her temples, her head hurt with her impatience to know her fate. Her future didn’t concern him.

The door opened and Devon entered. Claire made it a point to pretend he wasn’t there, skeptical as she remained of his silence, she preferred not to get caught up in his whirlwind machinations. She read her book, surreptitiously watching him beneath lowered lashes. His white shirt opened carelessly half-way down his chest so that the furring of dark hair covering his body laid tantalizingly visible, the muscles in his arms and thighs, rippling as he moved. Claire suddenly
wanted her cousin’s sound advice. What would she say to Lily
? I can’t be alone with Devon because I’m afraid he might ravish me? I can’t be alone with him because I’m afraid I might ravish him?
When he removed his shirt completely, she glanced in the opposite direction, making a study of the wall. She heard him laugh.

Claire clapped her book shut, refusing to look at him.

Devon cleared his throat. “Madame,” he began awkwardly. She turned her head, permitting herself a withering stare.

“I see you are making an effort to charm me,” he said.

“I wasn’t about to beguile,” she snapped.

Devon shot her a hard look, shrugging into a new shirt and buttoning it angrily. She could see him glowering at her, clearly disliking her answer. “How did you get loose?”

“As leader of pirates, I assumed your clever mind would have figured it out.”

He stepped toward her. She hastily produced the knife from beneath her pillow and dropped it in his hand. “You should be more careful in the future.”

He pivoted and threw the knife. End over end it twirled, pinning to the center of the door. Her hand flew to her chest. He threw back his head and roared with laughter then flung himself in a chair. “You were saying?” He put his feet on the bed and crossed his legs.

Claire could not breathe then she burst out laughing. “I deserved that. Will you never cease to amaze me?” she said solemnly, warming to the old, impetuous Devon she had cherished. For just this moment, she wanted to forget he was a pirate.