A Buccaneer at Heart

  The surface was clear. Halting before it, he set her hips on the edge, then laid her down.

  Aileen felt the cool wood of the desk against her back. She wrestled her lids up enough to look at him as he pushed her skirts to her waist. He glanced up and met her eyes.

  She studied his features. There was nothing of softness in his face, no give, no quarter. Only a stark need, a ruthless hunger.

  A sense of quiet wonder bloomed inside her as she realized she was looking at the real Robert Frobisher without any veneer at all.

  He shifted against her, and she felt him like corded steel within her, large and intrusive, but oh, so very welcome.

  He made her feel needed; an elemental want burned in his eyes.

  He made her feel desired—as if she was as essential to his well-being as he now was for hers.

  Most importantly, he made her feel whole. Whole in a physical sense, complete in a way she’d never imagined. But most wonderful of all, he made her feel whole emotionally, as if in him—with him—she’d found her true place.

  Her true reason for being.

  She felt him brace his feet on the floor, pressing his hips deeper between her widespread thighs. His gaze drifted from hers, lowering to gaze at what he could see... The air played across her naked belly, and she fought a silly blush. As if he somehow sensed her reaction, his gaze flicked up to her face again, then he reached out and closed his hands about her already swollen breasts.

  He squeezed as he withdrew, then he plunged deep again.

  Her lids fell on a soft moan as sensation flowed through her, from where his hands claimed her breasts to where they joined, from where he repeatedly filled her to a steady, relentless beat, and pleasure burgeoned and rose in a long, rearing wave within her.

  It felt earthy and delightful and wondrous.

  Addictively delicious.

  Robert watched her face as he claimed her. As he made her his in this most fundamental way.

  He felt the moment—its significance and importance—in his bones. Felt all the façades, all the other shades of his personality—those he employed with everyone else—fade and fall away.

  Leaving only him—the true him—exposed. The him that needed to bury himself so deeply inside her that she would never be free of him again.

  Or he free of her.

  He’d known that having her as his wife was his destiny for days, had sealed that fate as his future twenty-four hours before. But he hadn’t foreseen the enormity of this thing—the sheer ungovernable force of his own need, of his own commitment to their shared path.

  But all of that—all he truly felt—came together in him now and flowed through his veins like the headiest elixir.

  He let that incomparable feeling have free rein and rejoiced as he drank in her responses, as she closed her hands about his wrists and writhed on his desk, soft moans and sobs falling from her kiss-swollen lips as he plundered her body and she took him in.

  And held him. As she claimed him as he claimed her.

  She gasped and came apart again, clung and clasped him tight as his own storm broke, as the tension imploded and streaked down every nerve and he climaxed in a paroxysm of pleasure so intense he literally saw stars.

  And he finally understood what it was to love—to make love with no barriers, with nothing held back—with no safety net at all.

  In that last moment of lucidity, as, propped on his braced arms, he hung over her, spent and wrung out, yet still floating on that distant plane that could only be reached, it seemed, this way, he finally comprehended the totality of what he’d invited into his life.

  And realized he wanted it—that he would fight to the death for it—to keep her, and it, and all it meant.

  Forevermore.

  * * *

  Later, moving like ones drugged and with nothing of their customary decisiveness, they disengaged, bathed, and fell into his bed.

  Bliss still coursed through their veins. Wrapped in each other’s arms, naked limbs entwined, they surrendered to the moment.

  They slept, for how long neither knew. They woke and made love again, lazily, this time, spending long moments in mutual exploration, in furthering their understanding of the delights of shared pleasure.

  Later still, cocooned in a warmth that had nothing to do with physical sensation, a glow that reached past his bones to his soul, Robert lay on his back, his arms crossed behind his head, and stared at the canopy.

  Aileen lay sprawled half over him, her head on his chest, her hips angled over his, her legs tangled with his; her fingers idly plucked at the wiry hair that decorated his chest.

  Carefully, he drew in a breath, feeling his chest expand against her cushioning curves. His eyes still on the canopy, he stated, “Just so we understand each other fully, I intend asking for your hand. However...” He frowned; he pressed his lips together as he searched for the right words to explain his nebulous yet insistent compulsion. “I’m captain of this ship. Asking you to marry me while we’re on board—especially while we’re at sea—is tantamount to asking you to tie your life to mine while you’re completely and utterly in my power.”

  She shifted over him, raised her head, and studied his face.

  He felt her gaze, debated, told himself he was a coward, and met it.

  She searched his eyes. For a long moment, she considered him, then she murmured, “I am going to accept, you know.”

  He grimaced and looked up—away—again. “It’s not that. And Lord knows, I don’t want you to say no, but... I need you to say yes when you could, if you wished to, say no.” He glanced at her again. “Does that make any sense at all?”

  Her features eased. Her lips curved gently, and she patted his chest. “Yes. It does make sense.” She held his gaze, far more fearless—more fierce, truth be told—than he. “You’re a considerate man, Robert Frobisher, and you have a deep mind. I’m looking forward to unraveling all its intricacies.”

  He wasn’t sure if that was a promise to look forward to or a threat likely to lead to damnation. But she’d agreed... “I thought,” he said, somewhat diffidently, “that we could use the voyage to learn more about each other.” He focused on her eyes again. “I know your family, but I don’t know you.” When one brassy-brown brow arched, he smiled wryly and amended, “I know a lot about the sort of woman you are, enough and more to know I want you as my wife, but I know next to nothing of what made you as you are, virtually nothing of your personal background.”

  “And I know next to nothing of yours.” She studied him for a moment, then her brows quirked. “Does it strike you as odd that we’ve known each other for only a handful of days, yet we’re both envisaging spending the rest of our lives together?”

  He hesitated, but her eyes—the openness, the lack of screens or distance—encouraged him to say, “From the moment I laid eyes on you, I knew you were the woman I’d been waiting all my life to meet. And I’ll remind you, you had a loaded pistol leveled at my heart at the time.”

  She smiled—a preening, delighted, very feminine smile.

  He jiggled her. “Well? You’re supposed to say something similar back.”

  She laughed. “That’s the diplomat in you speaking, but...” Her eyes twinkled. “I will admit that, when I first set eyes on you, albeit from afar—when you attended Undoto’s church with Sampson—I definitely noticed you in a way I have never noticed any other man. Almost as if a deeper part of me, some primitive instinct, knew you were the man I would want for my own.”

  He felt ridiculously satisfied. He tightened his arm about her. “So I’m to be yours?”

  She snuggled her head down again. “If you will be, I’ll return the favor.”

  He smiled and felt contentment slide through him; it wasn’t an emotion he had a great deal of experience with, but he recognized it
and gloried. “That’s good enough for now.” He couldn’t resist adding, “Although I suppose I should warn you that Frobishers have never been considered...easy mates.”

  She snorted trying to suppress a laugh. “You’ve just made me reconsider allowing my brothers to speak to you prior to us marrying.”

  He chuckled—then he heard a rattle and a thump outside the door. He raised his head and heard footsteps retreating down the corridor. Almost immediately, the ship’s bell started to clang. He counted four strokes, then glanced up at the window across the stern. “Four bells, and it must be the afternoon watch.” He pushed back the covers and got up. “And I suspect that rattle and thump was Foxby delivering a tray.”

  Aileen pushed up in the bed, her brow wrinkling. “Four bells...that’s what? Two o’clock?”

  Robert nodded. After pulling on his breeches, he headed for the door. “Come on.” He paused with his hand on the door latch. “It’s time we got started.”

  She arched her brows and swung a bare leg out from under the covers. “Started on what? Our journey home is already under way.”

  His attention had deflected to her long, slender limb. He raised his gaze to her eyes and smiled. “Not that journey—the other one. The one that leads into our future.”

  Her eyes rounded, but she immediately rose.

  He drank in the sight, then—perfectly certain there was no crew member lurking—he opened the door, bent, and picked up the tray Foxby had left. He stepped back, kicked the door shut, and carried the tray to his desk.

  Wrapped in his sheet, Aileen joined him there—ready and eager and perfectly willing to make a start on their next shared adventure.

  * * *

  Through the rest of that afternoon and into the evening, Robert settled back into his long-established position as captain of The Trident. Yet Aileen only had to appear—not even by his side but simply within his or his men’s sight—to underscore how much even that aspect of his life had changed. And would change still further.

  To a man, his crew respected and valued her. Shooting to save him had won their respect, but shooting to save Benson had won their hearts. Not one of them accorded her anything but smiles and the offer of ready hands should she need assistance.

  They watched over her, too, as she walked his decks; although he would trust every one of his men with his life, it still took him a few hours to convince his primitively protective side that he could, indeed, trust them with her, too.

  That, and also that she was by no means a weak woman unable to protect herself.

  Once he’d achieved that acceptance, his crew’s support gave him a modicum of mental space, enough to allow him to resume his duties and effectively reassert control of his vessel.

  By evening, when after the meal—one he and she had taken with his officers in his cabin—he emerged onto the deck for the later dogwatch, he felt unexpectedly settled. More deeply at peace than he’d felt possibly ever before, and certainly looking forward with an enthusiasm for life that, over the past years, he now accepted he’d been lacking.

  That he’d lost, but found again, now that Aileen had come to stand by his side.

  He was amused to discover that she appeared to take that definition of her position somewhat literally. He’d left her in the cabin unpacking her bags and stowing her belongings in the space he’d cleared for her, but he’d been at the wheel for barely five minutes when, a warm shawl wrapped about her head and shoulders, she emerged from the companionway. She stood surveying the deck—much as he often did—then she turned and climbed the ladder to take—resume—her position beside him.

  The ship was heeling quite strongly, not yet dangerously so but enough to have waves breaking over one side. He glanced at her. “You’ll get damp if not drenched standing out here.”

  She shrugged. “I won’t melt.”

  He faced forward and hid his grin.

  That was all they said to each other for a considerable time. But he sensed she was taking in everything about the ship, noting how his watch scurried about the decks in response to his commands, and what changes those commands resulted in. The sails, the ropes, the shifts in the wind, and how he managed them.

  Aileen drew her shawl tighter about her shoulders. She found herself fascinated all over again by this until-now-unseen side of him—the captain in action commanding his ship. It was all she could do to quell an appreciative shiver. There was something about the sight of him standing with legs braced, his hands riding lightly on the huge oak wheel, his gaze trained on his sails and yards as he guided his ship onward at what, to her, felt like reckless speed, but which, she’d been informed by the crew, was nothing unusual for this vessel, that did rather more than tickle her fancy. Even as she glanced at him, the wind ruffled his dark hair, flicking it away from the planes of his face, leaving the chiseled lines revealed.

  She drew in a deep breath and looked out over the ship—at the crew who had been so welcoming, and also forthcoming; they’d answered all her inquisitive queries without reservation.

  Fascination and curiosity for the moment appeased, she gave herself up to the quiet of the evening, to the wide expanse of blue-gray ocean stretching away in every direction, to the steady surging of the sea beneath the hull, to the music of the waves rhythmically shushing susurratingly over the railing, the melody occasionally punctuated by the crack of a sail, the creak of a spar, or the caw of a passing gull.

  The skies were tending gray, clouds massing off the larboard side.

  “A storm’s coming.” Robert’s voice slid into her thoughts.

  “Do you think it will catch us?”

  He studied the horizon for several seconds before replying, “The northern edge of it will whip over us.” She felt his gaze touch her face. “But we won’t be slowing—better for us to race through and past.”

  She nodded. “I’d heard that ships like this usually run with all sails flying, day and night, and through all weather.” She looked up at the sails—counted. “You have seven up on each mast, but that’s not the most you can carry, is it?”

  “There’s one more set—the moonrakers—but in weather like this, I tend to keep them in reserve.” After a moment, he said, “You clearly have your sea legs. Have you sailed often before, or is the ability an inherited one?”

  She laughed. “A bit of both, I suspect.” Without waiting to be asked, she filled him in on how much sailing she’d actually done while visiting far-flung ports in pursuit of her brothers.

  Robert listened and learned. He wasn’t surprised when, in return, she asked him about his family. This was, after all, what this next phase would entail, with each of them filling in the background of the other. He did surprise himself with the emotions he felt while describing his parents, his brothers, his cousins. The connections he didn’t normally think of, that he took for granted, yet that made him the man he was.

  In telling her about his parents, and admitting that for most of their married life, his mother had sailed with his father—no point trying to hide that, because his mother, Elaine, would certainly inform Aileen of it the very first chance she got—he recalled a long-buried conversation with his mother, one from a decade ago, when he’d been so much younger. When he’d just been setting out on this seafarer’s life and had still been somewhat starry-eyed as to what his future would hold.

  He’d asked his mother how he would know when he met the right woman for him; even now, he could hear her reply echoing down through the years. When it happens, you’ll know. When she looks at you, you’ll feel ten feet tall, and at the same time, you’ll feel so grateful that she sees you and accepts you as you truly are that you’ll want to fall groveling at her feet.

  With those words ringing in his brain, he looked at Aileen.

  She felt his gaze and looked up—her brandy-colored eyes fully open and wide, her gaze
direct, honest, and unshielded—and he saw himself reflected in her eyes, knew that she saw him as he truly was.

  And knew his mother had spoken true.

  He smiled, and Aileen arched her brows.

  With one arm, he reached out and tugged her to his side. His other hand on the wheel, he bent his head and found her lips with his—felt simple joy rise through him when she immediately responded, warm and soft and simply her.

  When he raised his head and looked forward again, checking the waves ahead, from the corner of his eye, he saw her tip her head, regarding him shrewdly, then she asked, “What was that for?”

  He grinned. “That was for being you.”

  Her laugh was all sunshine and happiness. When he glanced sidelong at her, she caught his eyes. Then she smiled and settled under his arm.

  And together they looked forward as he steered The Trident on, to the end of this journey and into the one beyond.

  * * *

  They saw out the dogwatch, then retreated to his cabin.

  They undressed and prepared for bed, all the while—apparently both of them—telling themselves they were too old to need to indulge again so soon.

  That conviction lasted only until he slid beneath the covers and bare skin touched bare skin.

  Had mere lust ever burned this strongly?

  An hour later, when they both lay slumped on their backs, staring up at the ceiling as their hearts slowed and their skins cooled, he remembered his intention in setting out on this mission. And snorted in self-deprecation.

  “What?”

  Without looking her way, he murmured, “I left London with the firm intention of dealing with this mission quickly and cleanly—so I could return, report as required, and then set about rectifying the lack in my life by looking about me for a wife.” He turned his head and met her curious gaze. “It never occurred to me that completing the mission might, itself, result in me finding said wife.”

  She smiled, then laughed—that throaty, sultry laugh that never failed to catch at something deep inside him. “Fate, my darling, has been playing with you.”