A Pirate's Possession (31 page)

Nate was watching his friend's progress as well and waited until Vincent had disappeared into his cabin before facing Claire.

“It's a stab wound. I imagine it's sore, but the bleeding is mostly stopped and there wasn't much there to begin with.”

“He almost fainted.”

Nate frowned. “Just now?”

“He set my plate down, and when he stood up, he swayed as though he were fainting.”

“Dammit. He did that when it first happened as well. I thought it was only the shock of the injury.” He looked back down the deck. “I'll keep him confined to that damn bed if I have to. I told him he shouldn't be about the ship.”

It must be really something
, she thought with a pang of envy,
to have such a strong bond of friendship.

Nate looked back to her, then down at her plate. “You didn't eat.”

Because she knew it would be agony to shrug, she didn't attempt to. “I'm not hungry.”

“You're as bad as he is,” Nate grumbled, then took a step closer and peered into her eyes. “How bad is the pain?”

“I could do with more rum if you can spare it.”

He nodded. “I'll be back.” He scooped up her plate as he passed then handed it to one of the men who showed interest in it.

Claire sighed. She'd never been one to depend on the drink to see her through her troubles. If she were, she'd have spent most of the last few years drunk. Still she knew Nate's presence meant he wanted to talk, and she figured the extra fortification the rum would give wouldn't hurt.

Her thoughts were heavy when he came back and passed her a small tankard of rum.

“Finish it. Then maybe you'll be able to sleep.”

“If I finish this, I'll be out for three days.”

His hand cupped her cheek. “Then at least you won't be in pain.”

She stepped out of his touch. “Not all pain is physical.”

“No, but it can be healed. All I ask is that you listen, Claire.”

Claire looked into the rum, nodding. And as he began to talk, she sipped.

“I'm Sam Steele.”

She choked on her rum. It burned in her throat and on her tongue. She fought the urge to cough because she knew the pain of doing so would bring her to her knees. She took slow breaths, her eyes watering, until the desire passed. Taking an unsteady breath, she wiped at her eyes.

“Sam Steele?” she squeaked.

Nodding, he watched her closely and explained. His reasons were as just and fair as any that could explain a man's decision to turn to piracy. Bad luck, a need to rise above the past. But she'd had the same reasons, and though a ship had never been a possibility, the chance to turn pirate had been real. And it had tempted her, the gold and the silver, the fistful of coins. She'd made her life harder by not taking that road, but it had never been one she'd regretted.

She swallowed more rum. The warmth of it flowed through her veins. It may have helped dull the truth of his words, but there wasn't enough in her tankard to take them away.

“You're not sorry.”

“No,” he said without hesitation. “I'm not.”

“How many lives were taken, Nate, for you to get rich?”

He flinched, then set his mouth into a hard line.

“That's all you heard, isn't it? Of everything I said, you're only concerned with the fact that I was a pirate.”

“Not was, is. And Sam Steele is not any pirate. Many men have died at Steele's hand.”

“Sam Steele wasn't always me.”

“Which changes nothing. Once you sailed away and made certain everyone knew Sam Steele was back and that it couldn't conceivably be Samantha, you could have stopped. Yet three years later you're still doing it. For what, Nate? You're richer than you need to be.

“I had nothing either. I was alone and miserable. Piracy loomed before me many times, like a shining jewel I could reach out and grab. If I did, my misery would be over. One good plunder, I figured, and I could leave, go back to a life of respectability.” She swirled her rum, drank a little.

“But I knew it wouldn't work. I'd lost enough self-respect marrying Litton, I wasn't about to lose the little I had left by turning to piracy.”

Nate's eyes hardened. “Yet you thought nothing of trying to steal the map from me at gunpoint, or again later when you came into my cabin and took it off my person. Does the line of right and wrong only include piracy?”

Her chin shot up. “I knew it was wrong, but I didn't trust you with it. I knew you wouldn't give it to me, that you'd do everything to keep me from what I wanted most.”

His voice softened. “There was a time I believed it was me you wanted most.”

Claire gripped her tankard against the effect of his words.

“For a time you were.”

“Ah. But no longer. I see.” He tapped the gunwale with his fingers and sighed heavily. “You showed me different on Isla de Hueso. There was no pretending there, not for either of us.”

Because he was right, and she wouldn't lessen what they'd done with a lie, she remained silent.

“Yet you wouldn't have lain with me had you known I was a pirate.” He watched her. “I have no problem with who I've become, Claire.”

No, she already knew that, and in some ways, she envied him for it.

He scraped his hands over his face. “Claire, the more I gained, the more I wanted. No treasure was ever big enough, no plunder too rich. I'm not an extravagant man. I've set most of it away.” He turned to the sea, drew a deep breath. “I guess because I had nothing for so long, I always think something will happen and I'll be back where I started. I saved most of it.” He faced her again, the sunset catching the shadows in his eyes.

“I'd planned to be done with Steele after the treasure was found. I already have a house to live in. We're going there now.” He smiled. “I think you'll like it. It would make a nice home for us.”

Claire's breath stuck inside her chest. They were the words she'd yearned for, but they were eight years too late. “Too much has changed, Nate. We're not those children anymore.”

“No, and I've no regrets about that either. Claire.” He placed one large hand over hers. “I built the house because I was planning to forgo Steele. I'd never dreamed you'd be back in my life, but now that you are”—his hand slid up her arm and curved warmly around her neck—“I want to share it with you.”

He'd promised her that once, when they were younger and she'd believed him with her whole heart and soul. But it was as she'd told him—she wasn't that girl any longer. She'd been let down by too many people, had them break their promises to her at each turn, or worse, betray her trust. Claire placed her forearms on the gunwale, the tankard safe within her hands. She was determined to keep her heart as safe.

“There's no future, not with us. You could have come to me when you'd learned I was engaged, but you ran. You could have told me everything when we made love, but you didn't. We don't have trust between us and I refuse to put myself in a position where I'll be disappointed and hurt yet again.”

Nate yanked his hand away. Cold air replaced the heat of his touch but it wasn't why she shivered. It was the stiffness of his stance and the fury in his eyes.

“You've been waiting for me to fail from the beginning. It's my fault you married another man, it's my fault you have to share the treasure, and it's my fault for being a pirate.”

He shoved off from the gunwale. The air swirled angrily as he paced. Claire turned, and was blasted by the fierceness of his gaze.

“You're scared to trust your heart, so be honest enough to admit that. You expect honesty of me, yet you cower behind excuses.”

She tossed what was left of her rum into the indigo sea.

“Where has my heart ever led me that was worth going? And if I frustrate you so much, you're welcome to leave.”

He came at her so fast she'd barely had time to blink and suddenly he stood before her, drawing her chin up with the pressure of his thumb and forefinger.

“You think I'll fail you, like your father did, like Litton did, and like you believed I had. Well, I won't. If you want to run, run. But you'll go knowing it's of your own doing.”

His mouth captured hers in a searing kiss. His teeth nipped, his tongue demanded. Claire's thoughts scattered. Every thought but that of him. In that moment, he was her world, her very breath. She let him ravish her mouth and ravished his at the same time. Heat exploded in her chest that had nothing to do with her injury. His tongue swiped at hers, swept her mouth. A strong hand held her back tenderly while his mouth plundered until her knees trembled from the onslaught and every bone felt as if it were melting.

He ended the kiss as fast as he'd started it. Claire stood disoriented a moment. Then her eyes cleared and she met the deep green of Nate's.

“That kiss was no lie.” He stepped back. “When you've come to your senses about our future, you've only to find me.”

Twenty-three

Claire had yet to come to her senses. He'd figured, by morning, she would. But that had been two days ago, and though she answered when spoken to, and did it so damn politely it made him want to plow his fist into something, she hadn't thrown herself in his arms and begged his forgiveness. Nor had she admitted to loving him.

Nate yanked on a rope, coiled it tightly, and wished women could be as easily maneuvered. What else could he do? They'd be in Santo Domingo tomorrow and it scared him to think what would happen. Once the treasure was sorted out, she could go anywhere. She was certainly independent and hardheaded enough to do whatever the hell she wanted. Save tying her up, there wasn't much he could do about that.

The hatch to his cabin banged open and every man on deck, as well as Claire, spun round. Only Blake's head and shoulders cleared the hatch; the rest remained in the cabin.

“Nate!” Blake's brown eyes looked wild. “We've got trouble.”

Nate ordered a crewman to the helm and raced down the ladder of his cabin. Blake was at Vincent's bedside. Vincent appeared asleep. Yet there was enough of Blake's anxiety thickening the air to make Nate's stomach clench in fear.

“What's wrong?”

“I can't get him to eat. He's barely drinking. When he tried to sit up, he fell over. Said the cabin was spinning. And he's fallen asleep again.”

Fear slid along Nate's spine. Vincent had been sleeping a lot. “It's been two days. He hadn't lost enough blood to be dizzy nor this weak.”

“Not that we know of,” Blake concluded, saying the words that had entered Nate's own mind. If he wasn't bleeding out, then that meant he was bleeding in.

“Jesus,” Nate said. Feeling his knees weaken, he grabbed a chair and sank into it. He looked at the dwarf's still face, at the paleness that had taken over the normally bronze skin. Vincent may have been in his mid-twenties, but he looked young as a boy lying there.

At the end of the day, he and Blake remained at Vincent's bedside. Vincent had woken up, given them grief for all too brief a time, then had fallen asleep again. Nate had gone on deck, had informed the crew of Vincent's injuries, and had given his orders. By whatever means possible, they were to get to Santo Domingo as fast as possible, not an easy trick with a ship burdened with treasure. He'd stayed on deck long enough to see that every sail was rigged and working. Now, in the small cabin, silence reigned. It bounced off the walls louder than cannon fire. The candles that flittered on the table added light, but they didn't add hope.

Blake poured more rum into their tankards.

“The winds are high, we're making good time,” Blake said.

Nate swirled the amber-colored liquid, then scoffed when he realized his thoughts were doing the same thing, going round and round and not accomplishing a damn thing.

“Will it be enough?”

Blake looked as worried as Nate felt. Lines creased his forehead and bracketed his mouth.

“I don't know.”

“He's bleeding inside and I don't know how to fix it. If I did ...” He bared his teeth and sucked in a breath. “If I did, I'd have opened him up, but I don't want to make it worse.”

Though Blake nodded in agreement, it went unsaid that they were thinking the same thing. Could it get any worse than it already was?

“God,” Blake said, pressing his fingers into his eyes. “I'm scared he won't hold on long enough for us to get him help. Alicia will be devastated if he goes without her saying good-bye.”

Nate smiled despite the fist that squeezed his heart. “He has a soft spot for Alicia.”

Blake met his gaze. “And she for him. And from what I've been able to see, he also has one for Claire. For a little man, he sure can get under the skin and stick there.”

Because he needed time to fight back the surge of emotion that wanted to douse him, Nate took the time to drink. Then setting the tankard down, he looked to the bed where Vincent lay resting. Nate held his breath until he saw the covers rise and fall with Vincent's breaths.

“You wouldn't have it any different,” Nate whispered and felt Blake's gaze shift to the bed as well.

“No,” his friend answered quietly. “I sure as hell wouldn't.”

 

 

By midafternoon the next day, Claire was beyond exhausted. Her shoulders drooped no matter how she fought to keep them straight. Her eyes felt as though they'd been washed in sand and her nerves were strung tighter than the ropes that held the sails. She hadn't seen Blake or Nate since yesterday and the fear and worry were eating her alive. She paced, cursed, prayed. She was ready to gnaw on the gunwale by the time Nate stepped from the hatch.