Virgin Star (44 page)

"All right, you know what has to be done. We are going to blow up the opium stockpile. Knolls, Hanson, and Cherry Joe are in charge of the goods. You will number forty-five. Two pistoles for each of you, two shots each pistole, a hundred and eighty or so shots all together. If only half of these are well-aimed, we can take out a guard of one hundred and fifty and more if you count on my luck." He replaced the other pistole. "I would be surprised if the warehouse has a guard over twenty. Any questions?"

"Sean," Kyler said, motioning. "I want to take out the cannon fire too—they could reach us if they tried. I already have a bad case of island fever, and I've only been here a couple of days. I'd hate to be stuck in the place."

"Aye, aye," a number of the men said.

Kyler was right, he saw. "Very well." Seanessy sighed. "That's a two-man job. Two men and a hefty bag of rocks going against a standing army of two thousand. Who's got the grit for that?"

Seanessy's gaze swept the crowd as the men exchanged glances. An argument followed on who should go. Finally, Toothless's cagey voice rose above the others, "Ye should go, Edward!"

"Me?" Edward questioned.

"Aye." Toothless nodded, as if in agreement with himself. "Why, yer nerves are as smooth as the King's breakfast cream. And I don't know a braver soul—"

"Oh, why not?" Edward said with a shrug. "I don't mind walking among two thousand armed men. Especially if I live to tell about it. And with that in mind"—his gaze turned to the old man—"I want to take the slyest, craftiest, most devious bastard on board with me."

Naturally everyone turned to stare at Toothless. The older man swore softly, viciously, before saying, "Well, I would go with ye now but me shoulder's givin' me pain, the cursed arthritis, you see, and I don't figure I could be liftin' bags of rocks very far."

"Arthritis?" Slops questioned, appearing quite concerned to hear the complaint. "Ah, ye poor sod. Now which shoulder do ye feel the pain in?"

"This one here," Toothless said.

Slops's fist slammed into the shoulder, throwing Toothless back a step with a howl of pain. "There now," the huge man said. "I'd wager the arthritis pain is a distant memory."

So the matter was decided. The men turned to the important matter of determining the odds of their success and then placing wagers. Seanessy listened to this, becoming increasingly irritated as he did, then quite put out when the odds finally settled at fifty-fifty. "Have I ever lost yet?"

The men took the important fact into consideration. The odds were adjusted. Seanessy was pleased with the outcome. He turned back to his quarters, opening the door and stepping inside. The door shut quietly behind him. He stared in silence.

Shalyn was fixing her hair, which was hard with the way her hands trembled so. She was so frightened! Frightened of what he would say to her, this man who was her husband. How would he explain how she came to be dropped beaten and battered on Seanessy's doorstep? How would he explain the virgin star, her dread of ropes, and her certainty of being killed if she were ever caught?

Why, dear Lord, was she so afraid?

She stuck one pin in, than another. She abruptly became aware of his presence. She looked up and suffered a moment of bewilderment upon meeting his stare; her mind was so fixed on the evening ahead.

"Do I look that changed to you, Seanessy?"

"Aye..."

The confirmation sounded in a husky nod. She indeed looked changed. The thick mass of gold hair made a loose crown atop her head. She wore an old-fashioned gown in the classical style of the French Napoleonic court, many years out of date, and that was odd and disconcerting. He was used to seeing her in his own clothes. This was an empire gown of delicate violet and green flowers on whitened China silk, the most expensive silk, and so fine it shimmered as she moved. He had made a fortune importing shiploads of the fine cloth to England two years ago; he knew it well. The short sleeves and neckline were modest and he was glad for the favor—the last thing he needed was a little more temptation from the girl. A violet ribbon gathered tight beneath the ample swell of her breasts to drop to the floor in a small trail. He had never seen her in feminine attire; he had never even imagined the scene.

Gone was the barefoot girl in breeches. Here was a young lady who seemed at once beautiful and as delicate and fragile as a dandelion on a breeze. Her air of extreme fragility played a curious tune against his masculinity, and why it bothered him he could not say, past that it did. The startling change registered with alarm in his mind.

She reached a hand to the virgin star on her neck, anxiously, unnerved by the way he stared. She tried to break the spell. She bent over the trunk to retrieve the long white silk gloves. "Tis too warm, I think, for these gloves, or a shawl. This dress too—I wonder what he will think—"

His gaze narrowed, "You wonder what he will think?"

Startled eyes shot up to him. Her own words penetrated her anxious mind and brought a pained moment of horror. She had been about to make a jest of being a duchess, the wife of a duke, hoping to relieve her tension and fear a bit. The fear only increased as Seanessy came quickly to her side. A hand snaked around her arm to lift her up. "Just who the hell did you dress for, Shalyn?"

He heard her startled gasp, her sharp intake of breath, then watched the outrage filling the lovely amber eyes. Outrage changed to red-faced fury. "How dare you!"

She slapped his face.

"Huh!" His eyes narrowed; his temper rose. "Oh, please—the banalities of a how-dare-you and a hand slap! Is that the best we can do now, child? Has our dear duke reduced us to simpering sighs, practiced faints, and a pretty silk dress—"

This was too much!

Cobra fingers shot a well-aimed and powerful blow to his esophagus, doubling him over in the instant. His arms reached to tackle her but she circled out with a lift of her knee into his groin. His painful grunt sounded much louder than the slight rip of her dress across the line of the bodice. With effort he managed to lift his head up to see her.

She sighed softly and smiled prettily. "Is that more to your liking, Seanessy?"

Softly, slowly, he said, "I'm going to kill you, Shalyn,"

A very real shriek sounded as she spun around and ran for her life. Kyler was shouting at the men securing the cannons with bowline knots as he too had begun loading and cocking his pistoles. The sun had set; the duke would be here soon. Everything was readied—

A beautiful young woman, barely recognizable, raced out of the captain's quarters and dashed across the deck of the ship. The waiting men turned to see a streak of silk and heard Sean's low and vicious curses. Seanessy caught her at the galley steps, lifting her into the air as he tossed her on his shoulder to carry her back inside, swearing all the way. Oly barked at this fun, more when the girl literally flipped off his back and landed catlike on the ground, facing Seanessy.

Kyler sighed. The other men whistled with manly appreciation for the acrobatic and admirable escape. Sean wiped his chin before he looked up to see her there. She was breathing hard and fast, her eyes alive with excitement, with the determination to make him regret every word he'd said.

Desire struck as he stood there, so hard he went weak with it. His arm snaked out and grabbed hold of her skirt. She swung around, but the skirt ripped more. Seanessy chuckled with the mistaken idea that she was doomed and thereby missed another turn of the girl's feet as she raised her knee and swung her leg high in the air to hit his face with the hard edge of her heel, a punishing blow that brought another round of applause.

Butcher clapped and hooted with the rest of the men.

Seanessy was chuckling, a low animal like sound that raised the hairs on the back of her neck. "Give it up, Shalyn, I warn you now—"

"Never!"

She managed to land another blow before he threw her bodily over his shoulders and secured her there long enough to get her back to his quarters. The door shut. He crossed the space, threw her on to the bed, and pinned her there.

A wild kind of excitement shone in her eyes as she squirmed beneath his weight. The movement shot a hot rush of warmth between her legs. All the exertion of the fight changed to something else, something that warmed her blood and sweetened every breath drawn into her body.

Still it just wasn't fair. "Loose me! Loose—"

He struggled up from the onslaught of sensations coursing through him, long enough to wonder how quickly he could come out of his clothes, then he managed to respond. "Why should I?"

"Because I won the fight fair and square!"

"I believe I am the one on top!"

"Well ..." She grasped the truth of this. "Maybe, but for no more reason than brute force!"

"Which is good enough for me, Shalyn. Good?" he questioned arid then chuckled, "Did I say good, Shalyn?" His darkening gaze left the curve of her mouth to travel to the swells of her breasts pushing against the silk fabric of her still intact bodice. He reached a hand to encompass the tempting peak, teasing her through the cloth. His voice changed, deepening, as she arched her back and bit her lip. He wondered again how quickly he could come out of his clothes. "Such a forceless word. I did not mean it. Not when I'm describing something so grand as to land me over this slim body of yours," he said, even as he gathered up the silk skirt to bring it to her hips, gathering her tighter against the hot waiting part of him.

Her hands quickly undid his buttons and she was pulling off his cumbersome shoulder harness. He helped the effort. This was tossed to the floor. He was kicking off his boots, then his pants, when abruptly she was struck with a sudden realization. She reached to brace against his shoulders. "Why, you provoked me on purpose! So I wouldn't be so afraid!"

"Shalyn," he said, looking up into her darkening eyes, feeling the thrilling drive of his pulse as he kissed her once, then again, "I am so glad to be of service. And I wish I were that clever and certainly that noble, but the truth is, my purpose in provoking you was far more, well, let's just say base."

"I might have guessed/' she said as he ripped the remaining bodice of what moments ago had been a gown, then pulled the thin straps of the chemise from her shoulders to bare her nudity. He brushed aside the virgin star before his lips found the coral tip of the tempting peak.

"Seanessy," she said, the excitement pounding hotly through her limbs, more as his mouth drew warm circles there, and her last coherent words were: "Perhaps the next time you mean to part me from my clothing, you could simply put a hand to the buttons. I'm sure it will save you a fortune in gowns ..."

His laughter caused sparks of pleasure through her. "Shalyn, if you wanted a more conventional type you should have thought of it before you landed on my doorstep ..."

Tyler finally spotted the longshore boat moving slowly toward the ship. It appeared much like an Italian gondolier with its gold lamp swinging eerily across the darkened waters. "All right. Here he comes."

The frantic knock on the door told Seanessy his time was up. Every inch of her skin, every nerve and fiber of her being felt stroked, aroused, fanned, and finally rocked with a violent pleasure that sent her swirling into blackness, only to return to feel the pleasure seizing him.

As his senses returned and collected and he gathered her love-soaked body against his, he said, "Now as the man spins the tale he says is your life, you'll have a bit of me inside you to remind you of to whom you belong and where you'll always be. Shalyn, I love you…"

"Forever?"

"Aye, forever..."

Emotions shimmered in her eyes, and when he sealed this promise with another kiss, she met his lips with her own undying passion, passion he felt rocking his soul ...

Seanessy slowly fitted his shoulder harness back into place before turning to help her into a pink silk dress she drew out of the duke's trunk. Like the other one, this too was many years out of fashion. The shimmering pale silk slipped over her, fitting perfectly. He started to do the buttons while she tried to work her hair back up. The virgin star still sat on her back, but he was staring at the bodice as he tied the ribbon behind her. The five inches of material barely covered the tempting lift of her breast. If one stared and he was, one could view the small mark.

It was such an odd design. Not a decorative mark...

He brushed the virgin star back around to her front. The heavy jewel swung around her neck to rest just above the cleavage. The heavy gold chain sliced the mark in two.

He wondered how the duke would explain that...

From outside he heard the duke and his men climbing aboard. He saw the beat of her pulse at the nape of her neck. He lightly brushed his lips over the spot. A delicious shiver like an aftershock raced down her spine. She turned to him.