Heather Graham - [Camerons Saga - North American Woman 02] (21 page)

He was upon her in an instant, bearing her swiftly up and out of the way. The speed and the force with which he moved sent them both flying down to the soft sand.

The mare’s hooves struck the earth, just inches away. Sand blew past them. Skye strained to sit up, but he was over her, his eyes on fire, his arms holding her tightly. Muscles clenched and unclenched within his face and throat and shoulders, and he railed against her. “Why, lady, are you always such a fool! You would cast yourself into any danger in order to get away from me! So you would not have me courteous, for I am a pirate still. Then, madame, let me play that pirate, and be damned with it all!”

“Bastard, let me up!” she cried. “You should have—”

“Aye, I should have! I should have given you free to One-Eyed Jack, and I should have let Logan take you and be damned with you then. Blackbeard could have been plagued with you as his prize, and I damned well should have let the horse mar your beauty forever, that you might haunt no other man with your glory and your fire. But you would have a
pirate, lady, a rapist, a rogue, and never a gentleman. Then let’s have it, for, lady, I am done skirting the thorns of your temper!”

She opened her mouth to scream and gasp in terror, for she had never seen him so angry. No sound left her, for his mouth ground hard upon hers with a punishing power. His tongue ravished her lips and teeth, forcing them apart. She gave way to breathe, and then felt the startling warmth as he filled her with the heat and lightning and intimacy of his kiss. She longed to fight, to twist. She had no power to do so. His fingers curled within hers, his weight bore her down upon the earth, and the passion and the savagery of his assault were stunning. She lay there and felt the ground, and it seemed to tremble beneath her. She heard the soft sound of the water, but it was no melody within her ears, it was a rush, a flow, a cascade. It mingled with the searing flow of her blood. She did not fight … she felt his lips, and the hardness of his body. She felt the sun, and the taste of the man, and the tempest of him.

And felt that tempest sweep into her being.

His hands were upon her, stroking the length of her, fire through fabric. They touched the bare flesh of her thighs, and she gasped, unable to breathe, for his lips burned their fiery path against her throat. They fell to the rise of her breasts, and still she did nothing but stare at the sky above her, beset by soft, flowing clouds. She felt the sun, but the sun had lost its heat, for fire burned deep, deep inside of her. It came where his lips seared her, where his fingers stroked her flesh, where the very hardness of his body drove her down to the earth.

His fingers tore upon the ribbons at her bodice, and the fabric gave way. Her breasts spilled above the bone of her corset and his lips found that tender flesh as his hand cupped the mound to the hungry desire of his teeth and tongue. A molten, demanding tug raked upon her nipple, and then it was laved by his tongue. The sweet, blinding sensation ripped into her like cannonshot, firing throughout her body. His beard teased her bare flesh with ever-greater intimacy.

“No!” she cried out suddenly, but he had seized her mouth again. She struggled, but fell limp as languor overcame her.
The very earth continued to tremble. Perhaps it was not the earth. The trembling came from deep within her, a beat, a pulse, a sweet yearning need to know more.…

She was not a prisoner. Her hands were free and they were upon his shoulders, and it did not occur to her that he was a pirate, only a man, and a man who had shielded her against all enemies. Muscle rippled beneath her fingers, and in this strange paradise with the water rippling around them and the tropical breeze a tender touch upon them, he was all that she had ever desired in the deep secret shadows of her heart. The scent of him filled her; the force of his passion swept her into netherworlds where nothing mattered at all except for the sleek animal grace of him, and of his touch.

Suddenly he wrenched away. He stumbled to his feet. His back to her, he looked up at the sky. “God damn you!” he raged at her. He jerked around, caught her hands, and pulled her to her feet. “What would you have of me?” he shouted.

She jerked away from his touch, horrified that it was he, and not her own protest, that had put a stop to what they’d been doing. “I wish that you would leave me be! I wish that I could be away from this place!” she cried, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. She could not erase the feel of his lips. She felt his eyes upon her, burning still, and she realized that her bodice was askew, her breasts bared and spilling forth. She blushed deeply, but she did not lower her head and fought for whatever control she possessed. Still her hands trembled as she brought her fingers to her laces. He tore his eyes from her breasts and looked directly into hers. “You will be gone soon enough, I swear it!” he told her heatedly.

She turned from him, running toward the offending mare. The frightened beast skittered away. An oath burst forth from him. “Don’t ever run from me, you little fool. You would never manage it, and in each of your attempts you are hurt or cause havoc!” He caught hold of the mare’s reins and brought her around. He reached for Skye’s waist.

“I can manage, leave me be!”

“You cannot manage.”

He set her firmly upon the horse. She picked up the reins
and stared down at him. “I think, Captain Silver Hawk, that you are running from me.”

His eyes narrowed. “Lady Kinsdale, I will never run from you, I swear it. I’ve tried to leave you be, as you so ardently wish. And even when you singe my soul with the heat of your flame, I do back away. Don’t try me again, lady. In this battle I tell you, the gentleman is surely giving way to the rogue within me, and if next tempted, the pirate will prevail.”

Hot shivers ran down her spine. She jerked the reins from his hand, nudged the mare, and turned to race away from the lagoon, and from the haunting, bitter laughter that played upon the air in her wake.

Skye returned to the stable in a tempestuous mood. She left the mare to Señor Rivas, and walked hurriedly into the house, ignoring Mr. Soames, who came to greet her by the stairway. She raced up to her room and slammed the door hard, then sent the bolts hammering into place at that door, and at the door that connected her room to the Hawk’s. She paced the room in deep agitation, then glanced at the connecting door again. The lock wouldn’t mean a thing to him if he wanted to reach her. A lock? Why the man fought battles upon the sea and had seized her very ship! What was a lock to such a man.…

A lock lay within the heart, or within the soul, or so he had told her. No man could hold the key to such a lock, unless it was given to him, and freely so. And this the Silver Hawk seemed to know, and know well.

She stiffened suddenly, aware of a door slamming below. The Hawk had returned, too, and it seemed that he, too, was not in the best of humor. His shouting could be heard throughout the house.

Skye raced to the hallway door. She could not make out the crisp words, only that it was his voice, deep and vibrant, commanding. She heard his footsteps upon the stairs, and then the door to his room opened and slammed, and she stood dead still, her hand cast to her throat. He would come to her then. He would ignore the door that lay between them, he would come to her in anger, seize her.…

Seconds ticked by. The door slammed again. The Hawk was gone. She breathed a deep sigh of relief and cast herself across the bed, then stared up at the canopy. Surely, he had business to attend to. And he had broken away, not she.…

She flamed with humiliation. He wanted her gone. This would not go on much longer. Perhaps, say what he might, he had his own sense of honor. She was his cousin’s betrothed, despite the fact that that cousin be distant, and born on the right side of the sheets.

Betrothed …

She had no wish to meet such a man! Not when her lips remained swollen and her flesh burned from another’s touch.

She sat up, pressing her temple between her palms. God help her, she did not know herself anymore.

She leaped from the bed and threw open the door to the hallway. Mr. Soames had said that he was there to serve her. Well, she wanted to be served. “Mr. Soames!” she called down the stairs.

“Milady!” Within seconds the elderly gentleman had climbed the stairs to reach her. “I’d have some brandy, if I may, please,” she told him.

He arched a brow in surprise that she should ask for spirits, but quickly lowered his brow again. “Yes, milady,” he said, and was quickly gone. She paced again as she awaited his return. He arrived with brandy and a single crystal glass upon a silver tray. She thanked him, and waited for him to leave.

“The Hawk will have supper with you, milady. He will knock for you at eight.”

“Will he? You must tell the Hawk that I do not care to have supper with him,” she said.

“But, milady—”

“You have heard me, Mr. Soames, and you have said that you will attend to my every wish. Well, I wish you to tell your master that I will not have supper with him.”

“Yes, milady.”

With no further display of emotion or opinion, Mr. Soames bowed to her and left her side.

She liked the brandy. It soothed her spirits and eased the tempest in her soul. She stared broodingly out the windows at
the startling blue beauty of the island. Bone Cay. Such an ugly name for such a striking piece of paradise.

The day grew warm and she opened the windows to feel the breezes. She cast aside her jacket and tried to cease her endless pacing. What would his reaction be? He had come back in a state of anger to demand that she attend him for a meal. Would he accept her refusal with a casual shrug?

The afternoon was waning, but her spirits slowly rose and her confidence returned in direct proportion to the brandy she consumed. He would not break the lock; it would be against his very peculiar code of honor.

Feeling hot and sticky as sunset neared, she called down to Mr. Soames again. He ran back up the stairs. She asked him sweetly if she might have a bath. He stared at her blankly, and she knew that sending a half-dozen servants with a tub and water would be a hardship on him as head of the household staff at this particular hour of the afternoon. She wasn’t terribly sorry. She didn’t care to be there. If they didn’t care to have her there, then they would hurry to see that she left. The Hawk had said that she would be gone soon. He had said it with a vengeance. Surely, Mr. Soames would help see to it that he kept that vow!

“I should like it very quickly, Mr. Soames!” she told him as innocently as she could.

“I shall do my best, milady.”

“Perhaps you could send my own young lasses along, and spare your own staff.”

“That won’t be possible, milady.”

“And why is that?”

“Well, they’re at the fish market, milady.”

“The fish market?”

“They wished to stay busy, and you had given them no word that you might require their service.…” His words trailed away. He had given the girls leave to go, she realized. She smiled. She had no rights here—except those given her by the Hawk, and it was the Hawk she longed to annoy.

“Whenever you can manage, Mr. Soames,” she said very sweetly.

She was quickly obliged. Very little time had passed before
Señor Rivas and one of his young grooms dragged up a brass tub, and then a stream of servants—household and estate men, so it seemed—arrived with water. She thanked them all charmingly. Mr. Soames himself came with towels and rose scents and a thick sponge. “If you require anything else …”

“Not a thing. Just my privacy,” she said.

“Yes, milady.” He bowed his way out. Skye stared after the closed door, suddenly sorry for making the elderly man miserable. His master had already screamed at him, and now poor Soames had the sorry task of telling the Hawk that his female prisoner had no intention of obeying his commands for the evening.

Her guilt faded away as she cast her clothing off in disarray. She had consumed way too much brandy, and she knew it. She didn’t care. It had eased her torment, it had made her almost cheerful. Content and relaxed, she crawled into the tub. She coiled her hair on top of her head and lazily rubbed the sweet-smelling rose-scented soap over her body. She smiled. There were benefits to being the hostage of a prosperous pirate. He did supply the finest in luxury accommodations, fresh from Paris.

She set aside her sponge and soap and leaned back, basking in the warmth of the water. With one eye barely open, she saw that the sun was setting, sinking into the horizon beyond the windows. The colors of the coming night were breathtaking, strident red, shocking gold, so very bright, so very deep.

She allowed her eyes to close. It was so easy, so gentle, to be there. The water was warm, near tender in its touch. Her head was so delightfully at ease.…

She was aware of shadows upon the rippling bathwater, then she was aware of nothing at all. Then she thought that she dreamed, for she heard a fierce pounding, and it was as if her name was being called from a distance.

There was a sound of thunder, stark, strident. Skye bolted up just in time to hear wood crackle and split, and to hear the Hawk slamming into her room, the door falling flat to the floor. He stared at her, his hands on his hips, his eyes on fire.

She parted her lips and tried to speak. He sounded as if he was strangling.

“My God! I thought you were dead!”

“You said I might lock the door—”

“Did you hear me! I thought that you were dead! I knocked, I shouted!”

“I—”

She slipped within the tub, nearly going under. He exploded with a furious oath, and she heard a new thunder. It was the sound of his footsteps, falling upon the floor. Then his hands were upon her, wrenching her up, and into his arms.

She soaked him. Water sluiced from her body to his own, and dripped onto the floor. He paid no attention to it, but stared at her sharply. Alarm swept through her, as shocking as his hands upon her.

She struggled against him. “I did not care to come to dinner!” she cried.

“But I commanded that you should.”

“I do not dine with thieves, with gentlemen rogues. Your manner does not save you from the truth! I will not sit to eat with a courteous—”