Sea Scoundrel

  * * *

  At nearly midnight Grant finished his errand, shook Captain Davenport’s hand and thanked him, satisfied with his night’s work. When he returned to his ship he gave orders the dory await his return.

  “Shane, wake up.” His brother sat right up, always ready to respond in an emergency. “Captain Davenport is willing to take you aboard. I just want to know one thing.”

  “What?” Shane pushed his hair from his eyes, and scrubbed at his face with both hands.

  “Does Rose want her daughter back?”

  “Of course she does!”

  “Captain Davenport needs an extra man. Two of his crew were lost in a storm. He’ll take you on. Go back to Rhode Island for Rose’s daughter. From what you said about her mother, she’ll do more harm than good to a little one. After that, fast as he can load his cargo, Captain Davenport’s sailing to London. You get the baby in Updike’s Newtown and return to Providence in time to join him. You’ll arrive in London, two, maybe three weeks behind us.”

  Shane listened, his face registering stunned amazement. “I can’t believe you’d do this for Rose. I mean, I’m important to this ship. You can hardly do without me.” He grinned.

  Grant cuffed him. “Your watering pot is not going to be happy ‘til her chick’s back in the nest, and you’re not going to be happy ‘till you’re in there with them.” Grant tried to be stern, but from Shane’s grin, he could tell it wasn’t working. “You know damn well, you’re the best mate a man could want, but I’ve got Jasper and Sven.”

  Grant began to pace. “I must be getting soft, but since you told me about Rose’s little girl, I’m plagued by the memory of us, barely out of leading strings, setting off in the middle of the night to find Mother. The look on the old man’s face, when he caught us, telling us she was no good, that we were better off without her; it’s haunted me. I hated him for that as much as I hated her for leaving. And I hated myself, most of all.

  “Rose’s baby should be with Rose. She shouldn’t grow up thinking her mother deserted her, or, dammit, that it was her fault her mother left. Go get her, Shane.”

  “Aye, aye Cap’n.” He pulled on his pants. “I’m going to let her meet her new papa ‘cause I’m going to marry Rose soon as I get to London.” He threw clothes into his sea bag. “Don’t tell anyone where I’ve gone. I want to see Rose’s face when I put Amy in her arms.”

  “Whatever you say. Get going. Captain Davenport’s a fair man, but we’ve kept him waiting long enough.”

  Shane smiled, slapped his brother on the back, threw his bag over his shoulders, and left without another word. Standing on the deck of his ship, in the dark of night, the Captain watched his best friend board The Connecticut.

  Eight bells. Midnight.

  In his cabin, he poured himself a brandy, relaxed against the cushions on the window-seat and watched the Connecticut as it got smaller in the distance. He missed Shane already. There had been just the two of them since he was ten, Shane eight, and they’d always looked out for each other.

  It wasn’t Shane’s sailing off that really bothered him, Grant knew. But his brother would soon become a bigger part of Rose’s life. He would have a family apart from his older brother. He guessed that was how life should be. Hadn’t Shane said so? Hell, he just hoped they’d be happy.

  Grant closed his eyes for a minute, and he saw children of different ages, lined according to size. The littlest, a girl, about two, on the left, a boy, twelve or thirteen on the right. Dimples, red hair, laughing green eyes. Patience, scooping the babe into her arms.

  Her eyes were loving, her smile welcoming as she looked at someone he could not see. Jealousy filled Grant, regret. Another man taught her passion.

  But, no help for it.He remembered the look of loathing on his mother’s face when he reached for her, his confusion at her disgust. He had always feared getting close to anyone, except Shane, who suffered as he did.

  Now he found himself weakening. A small breasted girl—no, a woman—with auburn hair, and a smile to make the heather bloom, called to him. Patience. He gave up, and let the fantasy play out.

  But children were no longer part it. Patience wore a long rose nightrail, impending motherhood making her glow. He went to her, cupped her ample breasts and realized he’d have to tell her that when she carried and nursed their . . .her children, she would have a bosom.

  She’d like that.

  But he was shaken. It seemed too possible. Too real.

  “No.” He shouted into the empty cabin. There’d be no loving and no risk of not being loved in return. No rebuffs. Grant stood, shook his head. He lived on his own and wanted it that way. He refused the dream. “No, no, and no!” he shouted, tossing his brandy glass against the wall.

  He embraced the sound of shattering as he undressed and climbed into his bunk. And as he closed his eyes, he wished his soul did not also feel shattered.

  Sleep, drive her from my mind, he prayed as he drifted.

  Patience lay beneath his questing hands. He kissed her breasts, her lips, touched her everywhere. She gloried in his attention, did things that made him shudder and harden. He would slip into her velvet sheath when he could wait no longer. Any minute now.

  Grant fought wakefulness against the disorienting pounding in his head.

  Patience knocked on the Captain’s door again. She had to know the truth. Now. “Captain? Captain, are you in there?” She opened the door to his cabin, went in, and shut it behind her. Had he sent Shane on the Connecticut just to get him away from Rose?

  He slept. She watched him for a minute, wishing, but anger beat longing. She shook him, hesitated. Perhaps she should wait until he came up on deck. No, dammit, she was mad.

  His chest and shoulders were exposed, a sheet covered the rest. Deciding she’d better not touch him, she bent to his ear. “Captain,” she whispered. “Captain, wake up, please. I need to speak with you.” Why was she being so polite when she wanted to throttle him, she was so angry?

  But it seemed cruel to startle even the snarly Captain awake. Sighing, she spoke a little louder. “Captain. It’s Patience. Can I speak to you?”

  His sleep-glazed eyes opened and as she was about to speak, he pulled her, in one fluid motion full on top of him, and his arms closed hard around her.

  His mouth opened and came for hers. Lightening struck when they kissed, his mouth performing a hot, fierce, plundering.

  The angles and contours of his body seemed to meet her own. She loved moving with and against, into and along him, wished, almost, that they might go on forever, living out their lives here in this bunk, kissing, holding, discovering.

  “Lets . . . ” He nipped at her lips. “Remove.” He nipped again. “Your nightrail.”

  Patience evaded the next nip. “I’m not wearing my nightrail.”

  Her answer seemed to freeze him. He stilled, scanned her face, the cabin. Then he pushed with such strength, she toppled to the floor.

  He growled when he saw what he’d done, and offered his hand.

  She ignored it and rose on her own. “Thank you very much. I must say, your good morning is decidedly unique.” She dusted herself off and looked at him lying there breathing hard, chin pointed toward the ceiling, one arm covering his eyes, one knee bent beneath the sheet. “Anything more to your morning ritual I should be aware of, Captain?”

  “Get the hell out!”

  “I would like to speak with you about Shane.”

  “He’s gone.”

  “That’s what Jasper said. And I want to know why?”

  The Captain removed his arm, the look on his face hostile, angry. “Not that it’s any of your business, Lady Patience, but The Connecticut’s Captain needed a first mate.”

  “And you needed?”

  “What the devil are you talking about?”

  “You needed to keep Shane and Rose apart. You said you didn’t like their friendship.”

  “You are an ignorant little miss. They are not
friends.”

  “You could never understand anything like that, could you? You’re cold and hard-hearted.”

  “It was a business deal, Lady Patience. The Captain needed Shane, and I needed two barrels of good French brandy.”

  “I guess you couldn’t have struck a better bargain than that, could you Captain?”

  “Yes,” he said in disgust. “I could’ve traded Shane for a good French whore.”

  In disgust, she left him.

  Days later, alone in her cabin, Patience paced, beside-herself worried. With Shane gone, Rose had resumed her habitual lament. Her grieving was so quiet now, it seemed almost deeper than at the beginning of the voyage. And the more restrained Rose’s grieving, the more Patience worried.

  Angel, never having got over setting fire to the ship, had taken up the womanly art of needlework, her stitches reminiscent of the loose rigging. Grace became her ever-patient teacher; Sophie hadn’t the perseverance for it.

  Patience was disgusted with the lot of them.

  She threw herself onto Rose’s bunk and lay on her stomach, knees bent, feet in the air. She was disgusted with herself as well. The Captain hadn’t spoken to her in three days, wouldn’t even look in her direction.

  And all she could think about were his shattering kisses as she’d lain atop him in his bunk. Fool that she was, she was actually happy to have experienced just that much passion. He made her aware of herself as a woman, something she would never forget. Unfortunate, however, that her only experience of passion would be with the ornery Captain of the Knave’s Secret.

  Oh, but he was such a sinfully-handsome beast.

  They’d shared other kisses, small ones, other touches, and there was the dancing. That was heady. But the other morning, with him sleep-warm and lusty, well, that had been sheer bliss. She became all liquid and willing just remembering. His tongue invaded her mouth, his lips skimmed hers, angling this way and that, taking and taking. She couldn’t seem to give or get enough.

  Patience touched her cheek where the Captain’s morning beard had rubbed it raw.

  She pondered how his hands had slipped to her bottom and pulled her against him, how deliciously, wonderfully wicked she’d felt lying atop him, parts of him, hard rigid parts, seeming to belong just there, nestled into welcoming parts of her.

  A sweet, cloying warmth invaded with a vengeance. She took a great gulp of air, let it out in a whoosh, flopped onto her back, and placed her feet flat on the wall.

  How could a memory make her feel prickly needy? How did the Captain feel when he remembered? Probably angry, like when it happened, the way he’d been since.

  Patience pushed both feet hard against the wall, shrieked once for satisfaction and jumped from the bunk. She exited the cabin and made for the main deck. She had to stop thinking about it. She had to forget this odd craving to repeat the experience. Captain Grant St. Benedict disliked her, and she disliked him. He’d sent Shane away to be nasty, to separate him from Rose. For that alone, she wasn’t speaking to him.

  She found Sophie in the galley. She’d been so taken with cooking the flying-fish, she’d become enthralled with cooking anything. Doc, a fatherly man in his fifties with a white beard and beaming smile, seemed to enjoy teaching her. Even now, his laughter confirmed it.

  “Where’d Angel go this morning, Sophie?”

  “To feed Horatio.”

  Doc sobered. “Horatio?”

  “Horatio, the pig. He’s our pet,” Sophie said with a smile.

  Doc’s laughter grew until he had to wipe his eyes with his apron. “Angel’s going to be mighty surprised at how she finds Horatio this morning,” he said catching his breath.

  “Why?” Patience and Sophie asked together.

  “Because we’ll be roasting him, soon as he’s slaughtered.”

  Sophie paled and ran from the fo’c’sle.

  After a stunned minute, Patience followed, but she didn’t see Sophie anywhere. Where had she said the pig was kept?

  Barking, screaming, shouting, and an equally loud squealing, made Patience lift her skirts and run.

  Red and Izzy knelt holding a huge frightened porker on its back while being accosted by the pig’s protectors. Angel cracked each man over the head with a broom while Sophie wielded a huge coil of rope, slamming it against Izzy yelling, “Murderer!”

  Horatio tossed his head from side to side, squealing relentlessly. Angel finally tossed the useless broom and began kicking the pig’s assailants. One well-aimed sally split Red’s chin. He let go of the pig to grab his face, blood dripping between his fingers.

  Despite Sophie’s attempts to knock him unconscious, Izzy tried valiantly to clutch Horatio single-handed, but he couldn’t do it. The terrified swine jumped up and began a squealing run for its life. Wellington followed barking steadily. Pittypat fled for its kitty life tripping a sailor coming into the fray.

  The huge porker jumped over the forward hatch and made his way to the fo’c’sle deck nearly succumbing when Paddy came up behind him, and threw his arms around the animal’s belly. The pig dragged Paddy—or Paddy rode the Pig; it was difficult to tell—nearly fifty feet before the poor boy had enough sense to let go.

  Patience tried to help Paddy and stop the pig at the same time landing herself in a heap, skirts over her head. Fortunately, everyone was too busy chasing Horatio to notice.

  Their evening meal continued across the deck, Angel and Sophie in frantic pursuit. Patience wondered how they intended to protect Horatio even if they caught him.

  With a growl of fury, the Captain joined the fray. “Bloody, useless jackasses. One crazy pig and two women against a ship full of men. And you call yourselves sailors! Catch him, damn your hides!”

  Shanks tried, then Dublin, even Sven. All made missing tackles, Shanks and Sven knocking heads into the bargain. All in all, his sailors failed to respond to the Captain’s direct, if ridiculous, order.

  Rose and Grace arrived adding their screams to the uproar.

  With two sailors waiting aft, Horatio seemed finally cornered as he wove in all directions.

  As Patience and the Captain caught up, the pig scooted down the cabin hatch, making for the Captain’s cabin direct. And they were right behind.

  Through the open door the pig shot, then circled the beautiful cabin like the cornered prisoner he’d become.

  Wellington’s constant barking seemed to make him more skittish, so Patience put the pup in Rose’s arms and shoved her and Grace out the door.

  Horatio knocked over two more chairs, and jumped on Shane’s bunk to evade the Captain’s tackle, which caused the furious man to tumble off his brother’s bunk and slide into his sea chest.

  Horatio’s eyes rolled in his head, his squeals demented. With nowhere else to go, the crazed animal jumped on the window seat, then made for the open sea by jumping through the window, glass flying in all directions.

  He’d barely hit the water when the sharks following the ship put him out of his misery. Piggy suicide.

  Angel and Sophie screamed.

  The Captain wiped his bloodied hands with a cloth and glared at her as if she, alone, had caused the fracas. It was all Patience could do not to say, ‘It wasn’t my fault,’ but in a way, it was. These were her girls, after all.

  Still, he didn’t say a word.

  Silence, punctuated by Angel and Sophie’s sobs, lengthened to the point you could cut the tension with a knife, and a good thing no knife was available, because from the look on the Captain’s face....

  “You must understand, Captain. The girls thought of Horatio as a pet.”

  “You must understand, Lady Patience, the sailors thought of him as their supper. They aren’t going to be happy the sharks had pork tonight and they didn’t.”

  Angel and Sophie gasped at his heartless statement.

  “Get them the hell out of here!” the Captain snapped.

  Patience called to Grace, waiting in the companionway, and handed the sobbi
ng girls over, then she examined the Captain’s angry face. “What are you going to do?”

  “Board up my window for starters.”

  “I’ll change the bunk, sweep up the glass, and wash the floor. That should take the piggy smell out of the room.”

  The Captain scowled, opened his mouth, clamped it shut, shook his head, and left.

  Patience washed and scrubbed until the room shone bright.

  When the Captain returned to board the windows, she had just finished. He looked around. “Thank you. Though I think it the least you could do, under the circumstances.”

  “Sometimes you can be quite disagreeable.”

  “Not as disagreeable as I might be. I could think of several forms of punishment for those two, but I’ll refrain, this time.”

  “Why?”

  “Because, when I was on deck, I realized discipline was unnecessary. A lot can anger a sailor, Patience, and there’s much he can forgive, but taking away his food, that he will not forgive. They’re so positive you and your girls are bad luck, I’m worried they’ll try to throw the lot of you overboard.”

  Patience couldn’t hide her concern.

  “Don’t worry,” he said. “As much as I’d like to, I won’t let them.”

  “I’m sorry about the entire incident, Captain. Truly.”

  “Are you?” He was suspicious of her apology, she could tell.

  “Yes,” she said. “I love pork.”