The Pirate Captain (85 page)

The faces of her partners soon blurred, no man being allowed more than a few steps before she was whisked away by the next. Smalley, all arms and legs, resembled a child’s whirligig as he cavorted around the fire. Hughes, singing in Gaelic at the top of his lungs, fell into a jig that instantly took her back to the Highlands and Hogmanay celebrations. Towers’ diminutive height brought his face—much to his pleasure—in line with the edge of her bodice, earning him admonishing glares, and ultimately his skipper’s warning hand on his shoulder. MacQuarrie, normally as stoic as one of his guns, verged on giddiness. Millbridge was the surprise. He moved with surprising gentility and poise, a distant-eyed gaze indicating he saw a face other than hers.

In the midst of it all, a firmer arm took her by the waist, and she looked up into Nathan’s face. Coils of energy shot through her from where his hand rested at the small of her back, quickening her heart and tightening her belly. She made a conscious effort to breathe, for at some time or another, she had stopped. As he took her other hand, their wrists brushed against each other, and the throb of the music in her blood was replaced by the tempo felt there. His hip pressed against hers; realizing how closely he held her, he made a visible effort to step back. It was odd for him to have nothing to say. Instead, he winked and launched them around the fire.

Barefoot, stripped to his shirt and breeks, Nathan moved with the lithe elegance she had witnessed for weeks, now alive under her hand. With his a gypsy-charmer smile, his eyes held hers as they twirled. She couldn’t look away, had she wanted. The world outside his arms faded; she didn’t recall her feet touching the ground. She was vaguely aware of him being tapped on the shoulder again and again by her next hopeful partners, but to no avail. As long as she was indulging in dreams that night, she allowed herself another, wondering what lay behind the fire-touched eyes that held hers.

With a flourishing swirl, they stopped, leaving her to wonder if it was just them or if the music had ceased. Moisture gleaming on his cheekbones, Nathan bowed and pressed his lips to her fingers. He stepped back, and before the shock of his appearance had worn off, he was gone.

As Cate was swept away by her next partner, the spell was broken, the ghost of Nathan’s hand at her waist lingered, a reminder that it hadn’t been a dream. She shied when anyone made to touch her there, lest the feeling be erased. Through more jigs and reels, she felt Nathan’s gaze following her. Catching a glimpse of his fire-lit profile as she spun past, she thought she may have seen admiration in his expression.

A Griseller, a great bear of a man, facial features buried in a ferocious mat of black hair and beard, picked her up and let out a gleeful bellow. With a vise-like grip about her middle, he whirled and stomped around the fire, all the while howling in Gaelic. She was caught between laughing and gasping for air when he put her down, the next man snatching her up before he stumbled off. After one rollicking reel and jig after another, Cate was at last too breathless to go on, her lungs boring her ribs into her stays. The men begged for her to continue, but relented when Nathan—boots, baldric, and pistol in place, his hat square on his head—waved them off. They left in a chorus of jeers and cat-calls, for everyone knew what a man and woman did in the dark.

The feel of where his hand at her back was still there. She longed for him to touch there just once more, but the respectable distance was resumed as he steered her back to their fire. Ever-hovering, ever-protecting, but never venturing those final few inches which bridged between friends and…well, never mind.

Dabbing the sweat from her temples and lifting her hair from her damp neck, Cate realized she had forgotten about Prudence. They found the girl roughly where she had been left, a short distance from their fire. She had now been joined by a young seaman. Seated a discreet distance apart, they spoke between themselves, so enraptured the earth could have fallen in around them, and they wouldn’t have noticed.

“Money well-spent, don’t you think?” Nathan said as they drew up a short distance away.

Cate whirled on him, gaping. “Nathan, you didn’t!”

“Very well, I didn’t. What? ’Tis only for tonight. Better him, than her setting her sights on someone else,” he said, shuddering. “And it didn’t come as readily nor cheaply as you might be led to believe. I had to persuade one of Thomas’ lads. There wasn’t enough money in the Spanish Main to persuade any of our people. Ignorance can sometimes be bliss,” he ended in wonderment.

“But now she thinks—”

“That a lad wishes to spend an evening with her,” he said evenly.

“You sold her.” She could feel her color rising at the thought that Nathan had been so callous.

“No, I bought her a gentleman caller,” Nathan said with marked patience. “I’m letting nature take its course, with a little help. What’s the harm, eh? She doesn’t have to sit the night alone, and the lad earns the company of someone what doesn’t have hair growing out of every crevice. You’d think a soul might get a little thanks for his efforts.” He displayed a small pout.

Cate eyed Nathan, and then the lad. Too young to have lost his lankiness, he bore a strong jaw that promised of character to come. Non-descript in his sun-drabbed clothes, he was yet to have found his identity in the way of dress or accoutrement. On second observation, it did appear to be near to what Nathan represented. Prudence’s gentleman caller appeared innocent enough, indeed far too young to pose a threat. It was worth bearing in mind, however, that just as every other man on the shore, he was a pirate.

“I’ll thank you, when I’m surer of what just happened,” she said, and went to find a place to sit, well within sight of the young pair.

###

Nathan wove his way between the torches and fires, dodging the drunk-to-the-point-of-stupor men, looking for the two women who currently bracketed—and plagued—his life. One he hoped desperately to find, the other he crossed his fingers desperate not. One made his balls tighten, the other made them seize.

He’d been called off on some insignificant detail of business—a near brawl requiring careful negotiations lest there be dismemberment—and had returned to their fire to discover that not only had Creswicke’s noisome wench disappeared—Thank the gods! He’d paid good money for that small blessing—but Cate and Thomas as well. Snuck off together was his first suspicion, but a more tempered voice offered a host of explanations.

At his inquiry, Pryce mumbled something indiscernible, but had no specifics to offer. It would appear his First Mate had found the bottom of his omnipresent, supposed-to-be-secreted flask more than once that night.

Contrary to all hopes—and vehemently cursing the Fates for such foul and black luck—it was the Yellow Nemesis he encountered first, perched on a log. Following the direction of her intent gaze, he located what he truly sought. His first urge was to race forward, but stood off.

It was Cate, close enough to see, but too far to hear. She stood at the base of a tree, her slender form silhouetted against a fire’s glow. Face upturned, she was laughing with Thomas. The breeze brought the sound of it, a rippling, throaty sound suggesting roughened velvet. When echoing throughout his ship, it was a pleasing sound, but brought a sickened feeling when heard intertwined with Thomas’. Could the man never laugh, without sounding like a damned old lecher?

He felt a tightness that was not the fault of his breeches. “Easy lads
.
I know ’tis been a time, but there will be none of that, not now, at any rate,” he murmured.

He knew he was staring, but didn’t give a rat’s ass, if anyone saw. Lost in her beauty, he was. Too many times, she had caught him gaping like a sun-struck dullard. He wondered if that was normal for
friends
.

Damnation and seize my soul, I’m learning to hate that cursed word.

Cate moved and the light caught her eyes.

Emerald blue: is there such a color?

Well, there bloody well must be, because you’re looking at it, mate.

He learnt such a color meant she was at peace…happy.

About bloody time!

So rapt in watching, he stumbled into the log where the Demon Seed sat. He was obliged to catch himself by her shoulder to keep from toppling over the bloody thing. Chin propped in her hand, she barely acknowledged him. He lowered down next to her, both now engrossed in the same vignette.

Prudence dreamily sighed. “He is rather dashing, isn’t he?”

Nathan sat back, brought up short by the thought. “Really? You think as much? All things considered, I hadn’t really considered it.”

He cocked his head and squinted, trying to imagine what a woman might see.

Well, aye, tall and blonde…and big…blue eyes, and a nice laugh, and a big smile—not unlike meself—and charming, a man with his own ship…Oh, bloody hell!

He buried his face in his hands. Many a time he and Thomas had vied for the attentions of the same woman—actually came to blows, the once—but he had never actually
saw
Thomas for all his attributes.

“Don’t you think he’s handsome?” Prudence tore her eyes away long enough to look to seek affirmation. It was baffling why women were constantly doing that: asking questions with answers they already knew.

’
Twas like a bloody test, all the time.

“Aye, I suppose,” he said, in strained off-handedness.

Cate laughed again. A purling, seductive sound on the evening air, it was. She moved into the firelight. Now he could see the angle of her body, those wide shoulders and delicious curve of collarbone. She bent toward Thomas to hear amid the surrounding merriment, and then put her mouth nearer to say something in his ear.

Suffering Jesus on the cross!

Friends, remember?
A chill rippled between his shoulders, and he felt sick.
So, that’s what it means.

“Aren’t they enchanting together?”

Prudence’s voice jerked him back to reality. “What?”

“It’s perfect.” Her eyes shone with romanticism. “The wild pirate comes and rescues her, then carries her away into the sunset on his ship, forever happy.”

Prudence heaved another sigh. “Just look at them together.”

“I’d rather not.”

###

Thomas laughed softly and lifted his hat a fraction. “I beg your leave. My men await, but I shall return.” His features gilded by the fires, a smile lurked at the corner of his mouth.

Cate watched Thomas stroll away, coattails swinging with the roll of his step, so much like Nathan’s, a seaman’s gait. There was another ghost shadowing his movements, however, and the sight of it made her bite her lip. She heard a faint metallic tinkling, hesitant but near. She turned to find Nathan standing half-immersed in the night shadows. He shifted and the moonlight caught his shirt. It gave off an ethereal glow, harkening to the visages just seen in Thomas’ wake.

“Been there long?” she asked.

Nathan broke a crooked smile, the one that always came when he was uncertain. It disappeared quickly as he stepped forward. He cleared his throat, and then made a poor attempt at nonchalance.

“Thinking I might have overheard things perhaps not intended for me ears.”

Cate chuckled quietly. “Hardly. What could I possibly have to say to Thomas that you shouldn’t hear?”

His mouth took an odd twist. “One never knows, does one?”

Folding his hands behind his back, Nathan rocked on his feet, and cleared his throat again. A tentative smile played briefly, a nervous, failing flicker. “Nice evening, isn’t it?”

It was not so much the inanity of what he said, but the strain in his voice that caught her attention. “Yes, it is,” Cate said, curious as to where this charade would lead.

He jerked dramatically, as if just discovering a downed tree and made a wildly errant gesture toward it. “Would you care to sit?”

Cate allowed Nathan to see her seated. It was disquieting the way he hovered, as if she were an infirmed old aunt, sitting only as an afterthought. He leaned on his arms on his thighs. It might have been a casual pose, except for his heel tapping the ground, and his hands working against each other. Something was bothering him; experience had taught waiting was the best means to learn what.

A deep laugh—unmistakably Thomas’—drew their attention. Looking, she felt Nathan’s eyes darting between his friend and her.

“You fancy him, don’t you?”

The suddenness of Nathan's inquiry startled her, as did the solemnity with which it came. It was an unreasonable question, yet reasonable for him to ask. Looking down the beach, her gaze lingered on Thomas, now standing by a fire, chatting.

“What makes you ask a silly question like that?” Cate asked, painfully conscious of the miserable job she did of gleaning her defensiveness.

Nathan’s mustache took a wry twist. “I’m not daft, nor blind. I’ve seen you looking—that look.”

Cate groaned inwardly. So, he had noticed. It had been foolish to think he wouldn’t. In spite of his disarming and off-handed demeanor, he missed blessed little.

“You’re right, but it’s not what you’re thinking. It’s just so difficult.” She sighed, vigorously rubbing her forehead, as if it might erase the images. “He reminds me so much of Brian.”

Nathan swiveled to regard Thomas. “He was that tall?”

She closed her eyes to recall: Thomas’ chin met just between her brows. “Actually, Thomas is a bit shorter; my head used to fit just under Brian’s chin,” she said to her hands in her lap.

Irresistible forces compelled her to watch as Thomas crossed his arms and cocked one hip, intently listening.

“It’s not just the height. It’s his walk and his smile. There’s that little something at the corner of his mouth…” Her voice caught and the tears welled. Thomas’ image blurred, erasing the differences and rendering him even more like Brian. There was far more to it: the way he laughed and jested, swung his arms or crossed his ankles as he sat. No matter how hard she tried to focus on the differences, the likenesses always elbowed their way to the surface.