Christine Dorsey - [Sea 01] (10 page)

She’d seen copies of da Vinci’s sketches of human musculature, but she’d never seen such a fine example. The pirate captain should have been used as a model for the drawings. But since he wasn’t, perhaps she could sketch him.

Grandfather always told her she was very good with chalk. She couldn’t let the pirate know what she was about to do, but if she carefully kept her eyes on him, she could probably do a good job. Though he wore a white, billowy shirt today, she remembered what his chest and arms looked like without it.

Miranda swallowed. In the past, while studying works on the human body, she hadn’t experienced this warm, quavery feeling inside, but now staring at the pirate—

“What are you doing?”

Miranda’s eyes snapped to the captain’s, and she felt heat flood her face. He was looking at her in a way that made that honey feeling inside hotter and more molten. “I... I...” She couldn’t come up with any logical explanation for what she was doing because she honestly didn’t know.

“Whatever, I suggest you remember that I’m the pirate and you’re the captive and stop looking at me that way.”

“I... don’t know what you’re talking about.” He stood, and Miranda resisted the urge to back up.

“I think you do. And if you don’t wish to end up on your back with your skirts flipped over your head, you’ll remember my warning.”

Miranda’s face grew redder. Of all the insulting things. The man was a scoundrel beyond compare. “I believe you assured me I would be safe from rape.”

“I’m not talking about rape, Mistress Chadwick. And I think we both know it.”

Miranda did take a step back now. And then another. His eyes were narrowed, and he had a self-satisfied expression on his face that she found infuriating. “I have no idea—”

He was beside her so quickly that Miranda had no time to question his actions. “You lie very poorly,” was all he said before his mouth crushed down on hers.

She’d heard of kissing before—even the man and woman kissing that had nothing to do with the way her grandfather and father greeted her. But never had she imagined it to be anything like this.

Those strange feelings she worked to keep under control came blossoming forth. He was hard and hot, and Miranda imagined she could feel all the muscles in his body, while those within her seemed to melt away.

His hands grasped her arms; his mouth moved sensually over hers. And then he pulled away.

Miranda stared up at him, stunned. What in the world had happened? She searched her mind for some rational explanation for what she was feeling, and could find none.

For at that moment she longed to cling to his arm and beg him to kiss her again. He looked as if he might without being asked. But instead he turned and slammed out of the cabin, leaving Miranda to make sense of what happened.

“Damn!”

Jack hit the heel of his hand against a bulwark and cursed again. What in the hell was wrong with him? How could he do something so stupid?

All right. Perhaps he’d done stupid things before. But kissing Miranda Chadwick had to take the prize as the most stupid.

She was Henry’s daughter. And if that wasn’t enough, she was strange. Strange and complex. Jack didn’t like complex women... and he certainly wasn’t enamored of strange ones. Give him a nice, simple, good-hearted wench with a full luscious body and he was happy.

So why was he spending so much time thinking of his captive? Perhaps he did find her appearance pleasant. But large, deep blue eyes and a rosy mouth couldn’t make up for her weird behavior or who she was.

He liked a good tumble as well as the next man, maybe more. But he could control himself.

And he certainly had no intentions of seducing Henry Chadwick’s daughter.

So why did he kiss her?

“Maybe I’m just tired of her high and mighty attitude and that damn microscope.”

“What’s that, Cap’n?”

Jack spun around to see Scar Smite coming along the companionway. The oscillating light from the lantern threw grotesque shadows across the disfigured cheek for which he was named. “Nothing,” Jack said, turning back toward the ladder leading up through the hatch. “ ‘Twas nothing.”

Now he was talking to himself. God’s blood, nothing had gone right since he attacked that British ship and encountered Miranda Chadwick.

De Segovia hadn’t been on board as Jack hoped. Then he’d sailed south to see if he could discover any more about the rumor that de Segovia was returning to St. Augustine—only to learn nothing. If it wasn’t for the Spanish galleon the
Sea Hawk
had taken, it would have been a wasted trip.

Then, of course, he had sailed into Charles Town’s harbor ready for some peace and quiet, not to mention female companionship, only to be waylaid by Henry and his hair-brained scheme.

Jack shook his head as he came out on deck. No wonder he couldn’t keep his thoughts off Miranda Chadwick. He’d been too long without a woman. Something he would remedy the next time he set foot in a port.

With that explanation for the kiss resolved, Jack lifted his eyes to examine the sails. He pushed from his mind the niggling thought that there was more to it than that, and completely ignored the flame of desire he had felt when his lips touched hers.

“Come, look at this.” Miranda rose from the chair and motioned for Phin to take her place. King and another pirate, introduced to her by the uncomplimentary name of Scar, stood on the opposite side of the desk.

“Gawd’s but it’s ugly.” Phin screwed up his face in disgust.

“Get your arse outta that chair and give me a look.” Scar shoved at Phin’s shoulder, and Miranda resisted the urge to grab up her microscope and clutch it safely to her breast. But Phin moved, apparently anxious for someone else to view the horrid creature.

“Yowl.” Scar’s face registered as much revulsion as Phin’s had. “When I think of how many of ‘em I done ate over the years, I come mighty close to retchin’. Look at them devils, King.”

The huge blackamoor’s reaction was similar to the other two’s, but at least he didn’t threaten to vomit.

When they’d all had their fill of scrutinizing the maggot Miranda had placed beneath the lenses of her microscope, she was offered the chair. After placing a piece of parchment on the desk, she dipped her quill into the ink pot.

“What ye doin’ now?”

“Making a sketch of what I see,” Miranda explained as the pirates drew closer. For the last four days since Phin first looked through the microscope, pirates had been stopping by the cabin to see if the quartermaster was telling the truth of what he saw. Most all the men showed a curiosity that Miranda found wonderful. And even if they did ask so many questions and want to take so many looks through the lenses that she barely had time for her own experiment’s, she didn’t mind

Not all the pirates came to the cabin. The pirate captain remained conspicuously absent. Miranda hadn’t seen him since the day he kissed her. Even when she went on deck, he was nowhere to be found. Since the
Sea Hawk
wasn’t that large a vessel, Miranda assumed he planned it that way.

And that was fine with her. She didn’t want to be around him any more than he apparently wanted to be around her. Just remembering the gall of the man to kiss her like that made Miranda furious. And to imply that she wanted him to do it. Miranda nearly shook with rage. She should have slapped him! Yes, that’s definitely what she should have done.

And she would have if not for the total daze that kiss had put her in. She could barely remember the pirate captain leaving the cabin.

Miranda blinked, looked around her and noticed the pirates watching her intently. That’s when she realized she was sitting motionless, her quill poised above the parchment. She quickly set about sketching the maggot.

But just as the tip of the quill touched the paper a bellowed yell startled her, and she jerked, spoiling the drawing.

The pirates from huge King to wiry little Phin stiffened as the roar sounded again.

“Phin! Where in the hell is everybody?”

“Gawd’s teeth, I was supposed to be collecting a chart for the cap’n.”

“He sent me below to fetch you,” King admitted.

Scar shrugged. “I’m to be scrubbin’ the deck.”

Miranda glanced from one pirate to the other. They’d gone pale beneath their sun-darkened faces—except for King, but he looked equally distressed. And all because they had spent a little time with her. Perhaps it was more than a little, but still...

“I’m certain your captain will understand if I simply explain to him your interest in—”

“Gawd, yer ladyship, don’t do that.” Phin was busy searching through the charts and maps Miranda had pushed to the side of the desk. She hadn’t the nerve to remove them completely again, even if they did interfere with her work.

Phin’s expression brightened as he found the chart the captain wanted. “Just stay here, yer ladyship, and draw some pictures of them maggots. We’ll be just fine.”

There was a grumble of agreement as the three hurried from the cabin, leaving Miranda to wonder what kind of hold the pirate captain had that made these three men quake from fear when he bellowed.

“Where in the hell have you been?” Jack glared at Phin as he scurried up the quarterdeck ladder. “I’ve almost missed the noon reading.”

“Sorry, Cap’n.” Phin handed over the chart. “Visited the head. Somethin’ I et ain’t sittin’ right!’

Jack shook his head, then sighted the horizon through the quadrant. He supposed part of the fault for the late reading was his own. He could have gone below and retrieved the chart himself. Except he didn’t want to see Miranda Chadwick. Lord, the woman was keeping him away from his own cabin.

It was almost—Jack cringed—as if he were afraid of her. God’s blood, he was a pirate! He feared no one. And most certainly not a wisp of a woman.

He didn’t recall his men being such persnickety eaters. Jack took a healthy bite of beef and chewed... and chewed. Granted it was tough as an old rope—they didn’t call it salt junk for nothing. But still the way Phin, King and the others were picking at it, you’d think it was poison.

Maybe they always ate this way and he just wasn’t here to see it. Before the ill-conceived kidnapping, as Jack had come to think of his taking of Miranda Chadwick, he’d eaten in his cabin. Now the little lady had that privilege.