Pirate Wolf Trilogy (12 page)

Dante glowered
while Pitt stepped quickly into the breach. “You must have had an
excellent navigator and pilot.”

“We did,” she
said evenly, turning to meet the smiling green eyes. “Me.”

The smile was
startled off Pitt’s mouth. “You?”

Spence settled
his weight back in his chair, balancing precariously on the two
hind legs while he folded his arms across his chest. “Best damned
pilot I ever had at the helm. Hell, she once took us through
Magellan’s Straits in a storm. An’ her charts? Ye’ll see none their
equal. If anyone can run us up the arse o’ yer rogue captain, it’s
my Isabeau.”

“A woman,”
Dante muttered, still disbelieving, “at the helm of a ship? Has the
world gone mad?”

Beau glared at
him. “Only the small portion with you in it.”

“Well,
regardless,” Pitt interjected quickly, “it does work to our
advantage that we know precisely where Bloodstone is going.”

“To London, ye
mean.”

“To London.”
Pitt nodded. “He’ll waste no time boasting his prowess to the Queen
and her counsel, likely taking all the credit for the venture in
the same voice he uses to mourn the loss of Simon Dante.”

“Aye, an’ he’ll
do it all with yer gold in his pockets.”

“My gold,”
Dante agreed, finally tearing his gaze away from Beau. “Which could
be half yours if you brought me within striking distance of the
cowardly bastard.”

“
Half?”
The tiny glands under Spence’s tongue squirted with more than
casual interest. And, looking at the hard gleam in Dante’s eyes, he
saw no reason to doubt the man would, indeed, pay the price gladly.
The
Talon
would be
doubly burdened and moving slower than a snail, taking longer
routes around known lanes of shipping in order to avoid being set
upon by scavengers. Two weeks of plodding could be made up in a few
days of spirited sailing with the wind in their teeth.

“Beau?”

She looked at
her father, amazed he was even considering the possibility. “What
if the zabras did make it back to a Spanish port? What if there are
a dozen ships out there right now hunting for a wounded
privateer?”

Spence pursed
his lips and had to acknowledge the threat. The Spanish coast was
less than two hundred leagues off the starboard beam, and if they
had indeed sent out hunters …

Something
else the Frenchman had said caused Spence to frown and turn to
Dante again. “Ye said yer mission was not yet finished after ye
left Vera Cruz. What more were ye plannin’ to do?”

Dante drew a
deep breath and avoided catching Pitt’s eye. “We were planning to
make a small detour past the harbor at Cadiz.”

Spence’s
chair thumped forward and he shook his head as if to clear water
from his ears. “Cadiz? Did ye just say
Cadiz?”

Dante smile
grimly. “That was the same response Bloodstone gave me. He wanted
no part of it, either, and was planning to separate from us once we
veered east.”

“Why, by God’s
grace, would ye want to veer anywhere near Cadiz and risk the
charred toes and crimping irons of Philip’s Inquisitors?”

“Pitt,” Dante
said on a rum-laced sigh.

“Pitt?”

“
A damned
efficient fellow. Too efficient at times. While most of my men were
busy picking the treasure house at Vera Cruz clean of anything that
glittered, Pitt was bending over a packet of letters and documents
waiting to be included in the next flota to Spain. He thought they
might provide the Queen and her councillors some interesting
reading.”

Dante held out
his cup for another splash of rum. “As you must know yourself, over
the past year, every ship that leaves an English port sails under
orders to keep their eyes and ears open. Although Drake and the
other sea hawks have been warning Elizabeth to prepare for an
invasion from Spain, without any real proof of Philip’s plottings,
she cannot justify emptying the treasury to build more warships.
She is stubbornly determined to find some way to negotiate a
lasting peace, despite every logical sense and argument telling her
she should be adding to England’s pitifully small navy, not tying
their hands behind their backs.”

Spence felt a
chill run down his spine. “Are ye sayin’ ye have such proof?”

“
I have
more than rumor and gossip. I have letters from the governors of
Panama and Mexico applauding the King on his choice of Don Alvaro
de Bazan, Marquis of Santa Cruz, to
lead the invasion fleet.
I have documents that read like
a list of supplies and provisions the governors will be able to
provide, as well as an estimate of a million ducats’ worth of gold
that will be available
before spring
to pay for the army. Of course, he may have to amend that
estimate somewhat now, but there are other lists, other provisions
promised in such quantities as would suggest the rumors we have
been hearing are all true. Philip is preparing for war.”

“And you were
planning to stop him by sailing into Cadiz and spitting in his
eye?” Beau asked wryly.

“I was planning
only to sail past the harbor and see for myself what strength he
has hidden there. Cadiz was mentioned prominently in nearly every
document, as was Cantabrico and Lisbon. Frankly, I have no idea
where Cantabrico is, and Lisbon is too well protected, the harbor
being enclosed and well fortified. Cadiz, on the other hand, is far
enough south and too deep in Spanish waters for them to even dream
of an Englishman sailing down their throat.”

“
No more
probable than an Englishman sailing into Vera Cruz and making a
withdrawal from the King’s treasure house?”

Dante actually
smiled up into the amber tiger eyes. “Exactly so.”

Spence grumbled
deep in his chest. “Still an’ all, do ye not know what they do when
they catch an Englishman, or do ye just not have any particular
love fer yer nether parts? It’s torture, lad, with hot irons and
wooden racks and red-hot faggots thrust up yer arse; all done in
the name o’ Catholic purification. Afterwards, if ye survive, it’s
into a galleass with ye, chained to an oar till ye die or the ship
sinks.”

“I am well
aware of the fate of captured crews, Captain, but I am also well
aware of the fate that awaits England if Spain has a thousand ships
to send against us.”

Spence had no
retort and Dante’s gaze traveled beyond the rim of his cup, lifting
to Beau’s stubbornly set chin and firm, bow-shaped lips.

“I thought you
relished a good challenge, mam’selle?”

“If it is a
sane and sound one, I usually do.”

“Of course,” he
mused, “if you are simply not up to it…?”

“You obviously
weren’t.”

Dante scraped
to his feet, looking for all the world as if he ached to have his
hands around Beau’s throat again.

“You have a
singularly sharp tongue on you, mam’selle, and you seem bent on
testing its edge on my patience.”

“You have a
singularly sharp arrogance about you, m’sieur, and you seem to
think that because you are who you are and you have been so
grievously maligned, it gives you the right to treat others with
contempt and disregard.”

“Only those who
deserve it,” he snapped. “You seem to have conveniently forgotten
you held a knife to my vitals and threatened to blow a hole through
my chest. Such refined behavior warranted a little disregard, in my
opinion.”

“You seem to
have forgotten you held a pistol to my head first and threatened me
with rape. Hardly an honorable accounting of yourself.”

“It was hardly
an enthusiastic threat,” he countered evenly, his gaze sliding down
the tautly held length of her body. “Or delivered with much
conviction.”

“
Scarcely
any conviction at all, Captain. I have encountered more
substantial
threats from boys.”

“I’m sure you
have. Youths and weanlings, no doubt, who find the dirt under your
nails most appealing.”

Beau’s cheeks
flushed crimson and he started to raise his cup in a salute to his
own wit. He never quite completed the maneuver, for the cup slipped
out of his fingers and splashed the remaining drops of rum down the
front of his shirt. Dante blinked and stared at the splatters for a
moment, his face contorted with surprise and not a little shock as
he started to pitch forward, his legs turning to jelly beneath
him.

Spence caught
him up under one arm. Beau, who was closer than Pitt and reacted
instinctively, propped him by the other.

“Indies Gold,”
Jonas said, wobbling none too steadily on his own feet. “Knocks yer
ballocks down to yer toes if yer not used to it—or if ye haven’t
had any solid food in yer belly.”

“I’m sure he
will thank you for the excuses,” Beau muttered, struggling to hold
her balance under the weight of the muscular shoulder and arm. “If
not the swollen head and rancid tongue he’ll have come
morning.”

“
Now,
daughter—Christ, he’s a heavy bastard—show some Christian charity.
Ye heard all he said, did ye not? Fer all his bluster, he’s a brave
man. An’ ye know yerself 't would be a worthy challenge to see if
we could catch up with the cowardly whoreson bastard.”

Beau glared at
her father and could see he had already absolved Dante de Tourville
of any blame for his churlish behavior.

“You might call
it brave to face six ships alone,” she pointed out. “I would call
it reckless and foolhardy. As for chasing after Victor Bloodstone
…”

Dante’s dark
head swung loosely around, seeking her voice. His face was hanging
between his shoulders, level with her chest, and as he opened his
mouth it pressed against the soft cushion of her breast.

“A woman at the
helm of a ship,” he muttered. “Another at the helm of England’s
destiny. What next, I wonder. Petticoats in the yardarms and
breeches in the kitchen?”

Beau cursed and
jerked away, leaving Geoffrey Pitt to scramble and catch his
captain before both Dante and Jonas Spence found themselves in a
heap on the floor.

“
You’d
best get this drunken lout to bed before he feels my knife on his
vitals again,” she directed Pitt crisply. “And tell him from me
that he is to touch nothing—
absolutely nothing
—in my cabin or when I do run him up Bloodstone’s
arse, it will be from the spout of one of his own damned
cannon.”

“I … will be
most happy to convey your message.”

“You may convey
this as well,” she said, throwing the blur of steel that was her
stiletto, embedding the point in the tabletop. “Unless my eyes
deceive me, there are creatures in his beard and in his hair. They
had best not find their way into my bed or belongings, or I will
come for him myself and scrape him bald. What is more, there is a
bar of lye soap on the gallery ledge. You might consider using it
yourself, Mister Pitt, unless you share your captain’s affection
for his own filth.”

“Er … not at
all, Mistress Spence. But in Simon’s defense it must be said we
were hardly concerned with cleanliness.”

She planted her
hands on her hips and glowered. “I am not anyone’s mistress, Mister
Pitt. On board this ship, I am just Beau. Or Mister Spence, if your
tongue has trouble with simpler things.”

“The simpler
the better,” he avowed, refusing to take offense at her tone. “For
I would indeed have trouble addressing you as Mister.”

Beau cocked an
eyebrow warily, wondering if he was mocking her or if he was truly
so magnificent a fool as to think a charming smile and twinkling
green eyes would make him seem less of an ogre than his
black-souled captain.

Mocking, she
decided, and with a parting curse she scowled her way out of the
cabin.

Balancing Dante
on one shoulder and carrying a lit taper in his free hand, Pitt
shuffled into the dark cabin next door. He propped De Tourville
against the wall and searched out a lantern, glancing around as he
did so, wary of disturbing the slightest mote of dust. Not that
there appeared to be any to disturb. The cabin was neat and clean,
devoid of the mustiness and clutter that warmed the atmosphere in
Spence’s cabin. The walls were bare planking, the berth was high
and narrow and looked as comfortable as a coffin. Most of the free
space was taken up by a large chart table positioned to catch the
best light from the gallery windows. There was a storage bin
holding rolled charts and maps, a bookcase neatly stacked with
volumes held in place with leather strapping, a sea chest, and a
small desk weighted down under various navigational
instruments.

Dante’s eyes
opened a slit. He was not entirely drunk, which Pitt had already
deduced, but neither was he completely without a strong whirling
sensation in his head.

“You have that
disapproving look in your eye again,” he said to Pitt.

“It was a cheap
way to end an argument. Were you afraid she was winning?”

Dante swore and
rubbed his temples. “I was not in the mood to justify myself to a
woman.”

“No? You seemed
to be in the mood for something. Your tongue was sharper than I’ve
seen it in a long time.”

“I said nothing
she did not deserve.”

“Mmmm. Just
enough to stir her blood into helping you chase Victor Bloodstone
to ground. Do you think she can do it? Do you really think she can
pilot this ship?”

“If she can’t,
she’ll find herself accidentally fallen over the side one dark
night.”

“Your usual
subtle solution,” Pitt remarked dryly. “Of course you could always
try something a little less drastic and work some of your
immeasurable charm on her.”

“To what end,
pray?”

“Well, she is a
female and soft in all the right places.”