Lucy bit her lower lip, knowing if she caught even a glimpse of his face, she would be lost. But the fickle moon was her salvation and his downfall. It dipped behind a cloud, dimming until he was no more than a bearded shadow, striding boldly into her trap.
Gripping the letter opener in both hands, Lucy plunged it toward his heart.
She could not bear it. In that whisper of silence between one of his unsuspecting breaths and the next, she slammed her eyes shut, deflecting the blade to his shoulder.
Doom sucked in a breath through clenched teeth. Her hands empty, Lucy dared to open her eyes, but she could see nothing more than the steely gleam of his eyes as he glared down at her in disbelief.
“Why, you treacherous little witch! You stabbed me!”
He ripped the weapon from his flesh, then wrapped his other hand around her throat and drove her back against the foremast, pinning her there by flexing one powerful knee between her legs. His artful fingertips tasted every frantic beat of her pulse. He towered over her, the darkness flooded with the harsh rasp of his breathing and the heat of his fury.
Lucy had been wrong. This man wasn’t going to send her to heaven; he was going to personally escort her to hell. The bloodstained blade in his hand caught an errant beam of moonlight.
I heard he carves his mark on his victims just like the devil he is.
Although dreading the bite of the blade into her tender cheek, she swallowed her terror and turned her face away.
Doom tangled his hand in the hair at her nape and turned it back, his voice a strangled growl. “Why, I ought to—”
Without warning, his lips seized hers, his tongue ravishing her virgin mouth in a kiss so dark and full of power that her legs buckled beneath the force of it. Her hands fisted in his shirtfront, clinging as she melted against him in helpless surrender. Her world narrowed to the forbidden taste of his tongue plundering her mouth, the spicy musk of his scent flaring her nostrils, the unyielding press of his knee between her legs, making her ache and tingle in places she’d never even named. His warm blood soaked the flimsy bodice of her gown.
A disembodied voice floated down from the heavens. “Argonaut’s comin’ about, Cap’n. We ain’t got much time.”
Doom tore himself away from her with a grunt of pain. Before Lucy could regain any semblance of reason, he had untangled her hands from his shirt and thrust her into the harsh arena of the open deck.
He advanced on her, swaying like a drunkard, letter opener in hand.
She backed away, feeling naked, exposed.
His shaggy hair whipped in the wind. The shadows of the rigging crisscrossed his bearded face, weaving a tantalizing latticework of truth and illusion.
“Give your father a message for me, Miss Snow,” he shouted over the roar of the wind. “Tell him Captain Doom is coming to collect his debt.”
He stalked her; she took another step backward.
“What do you want from me?” she screamed, her throat raw with fear.
“Surely you’ve heard of pirates making their victims walk the plank.”
She nodded mutely. Her back came up against the starboard rail. He leaned forward until their noses touched. “Well, I haven’t any plank.”
The letter opener clattered to the deck as he snatched her up by the shoulders and kissed her again—briefly, savagely—before shoving her over the rail and into the sea.
Doom sank to his knees at the rail, losing the will to battle the strain of shock and pain now that the girl was gone.
“Cap’n!” Tarn called from his lookout position at foretop. He lacked the seasoning of Doom’s mate. His voice cracked with near hysteria. “Two ships comin’ in battle formation at port. We’ll be surrounded!”
Where the hell was Kevin? Doom wondered wildly. Still napping in the iron maiden? Sleeping off last night’s debauchery, no doubt.
“Hold our position,” he bellowed, peering down into the murky water.
Loss of blood must be making him mad. He couldn’t believe he was risking the lives and freedom of his crew just to make sure the chit could swim. Kevin was supposed to be the gambler in the family.
“Cap’n!”
Doom ignored Tarn’s plaintive wail.
The girl was splashing around in feeble circles like a wounded turtle. Christ, he thought, was he going to have to rescue her himself? As he was hauling himself to his feet to do just that, she found her bearings and struck out with tidy strokes toward the nearest ship.
Doom narrowed his eyes, his last doubt that she was indeed Lucien Snow’s daughter banished by her unfaltering instinct for self-preservation.
Tarn’s pleas had degenerated to mumbled Hail Marys, but still Doom waited. Garbed in that ridiculous wisp of white, the girl should be impossible to miss.
A cry penetrated the wind from the direction of the Argonaut. “Man overboard!”
“Now!” Doom shouted. “Get us the hell out of here!”
The trapdoors at the aft of the ship flew open, releasing clouds of billowing steam. The artificial mist shrouded the Retribution, disguising her intentions as the ebony silk of her sails unfurled to catch the brisk tail winds. She cut through the water toward the horizon, as sleek as a satin ribbon gliding through a woman’s hair. Tarn’s whoop of joy heralded their success.
One of the Argonaut’s sister ships fired a halfhearted shot, but was still too far away to give chase. The Argonaut herself had better things to do than pursue ghosts. Such as rescuing that charming little piece of flotsam he’d tossed into her path.
Grunting with exertion, Doom crawled to the capstan and collapsed on a pile of discarded rigging. He closed his eyes, wanting nothing more than to slink into the nearest darkened hole and lick his wounds, diverse though they might be. He’d survived five years in hell only to be nearly murdered by a prim young miss wielding a letter opener. Going light-headed with blood loss, he laughed, his head lolling back against the ropes.
“Hell, Captain, are you going to let Pudge sew you up or are you just going to sit here and bleed to death?”
Doom’s head snapped up at his mate’s approach. “You might wish I had when I’m through with you,” he growled. “What sort of pirate are you? I can’t believe you didn’t search her for weapons.”
The man squatted beside him, his huge hands surprisingly gentle as he pressed a cotton kerchief to the wound. “She looked harmless enough.” Supporting Doom’s wounded shoulder, his mate helped him to his feet.
Doom gazed off at the rapidly fading lanterns of the Argonaut, haunted by his brief glimpse of huge gray eyes fringed by charcoal lashes.
He pressed a hand flat over his chest. “Your mistake, man,” he said softly. “The little wench damn near got my heart.”
CHAPTER FOUR
London
“THE ABOMINABLE WRETCH!”
Lucy flinched as the Admiral’s fist crashed down on the newspaper spread open on his writing desk.
“Captain Doom again, Father?” she murmured, resting her paintbrush on the rim of the water jar to hide the sudden trembling of her hands.
“Who else? Just listen to what the scoundrel’s done now.” Ignoring his brass-handled cane as he often did when incensed, the Admiral rose to pace the drawing room, crumpling the hapless Gazette between his fists. “ ‘After bringing the HMS Lothario sharply to heel,’ ” he read, “ ‘the cunning captain not only stripped the ship of her booty, but her crew of their uniforms as well.’ Cunning captain indeed! The man may be cunning, but he’s no captain. He’s a pirate! A pox on decent seafaring men! How dare the press try to paint him as some sort of colorful scoundrel!”
Lucy smiled behind her easel to envision those bastions of nautical dignity reduced to shivering in their flannel drawers. “That is what the newspapers pay them for.”
He tossed down the paper in disgust. “I can assure you it costs far more to keep them quiet. If I hadn’t lined their pockets with gold, they would have turned your own encounter with the brigand into some s
ort of romantic escapade. You would have been ruined.”
Lucy’s smile faded. Her father of all people should know she hadn’t been “ruined.” As if believing her too harebrained to understand his tactless questions after her fortuitous rescue by the Channel patrol, he had insisted on having her examined by his personal physician. Over a month had passed since then, but the memory of those cool, impersonal hands on her still made Lucy shudder.
Her father mistook her shiver for one of fear. “No need for hysterics, girl,” he barked, startling her into dropping her paintbrush. “That rapscallion will never lay his hands on you again.”
Lucy rescued the brush and swirled misty fingers of blue through the crystalline water, remembering that dark interval when her fate had rested entirely in Doom’s implacable hands. They were all she had really known of him. Ruthless. Tender. Mocking. Stroking her nape. Cupping her cheek. Threading through her hair to hold her captive to his will.
Jerking herself out of her reverie, she tapped the paintbrush on the side of the jar, making the glass ring. “I have nothing to fear from Captain Doom, Father. He swore he was coming to collect his debts from you, not me.”
He grunted skeptically. “So you say.”
Avoiding his eyes, Lucy dabbed fluffy whitecaps on another of the seascapes her father adored, hoping he’d be pleased with the results. She’d never been able to hide anything from him. Even as a little girl, she’d often confessed her rare moments of mischief before they’d been discovered rather than risk even a hint of his reproach.
Yet she’d hoarded stolen moments of her encounter with Doom, fearing her father’s scrutiny would twist them into something monstrous and shameful.
Even now, his sharp eyes were assessing her as if it were she, and not Doom, who was the criminal. “You’re absolutely certain the wretch gave you no reason for his personal grudge against me? Spewed forth no accusations? Cast no slur upon my good name?”
Sighing, Lucy packed up her easel, resigning herself to yet another grueling interrogation where she would be forced to repeat every word and nuance culled from her encounter with the pirate. Almost.
She was saved by the appearance of Smythe in the vaulted archway. Her father disdained the gentry’s habit of adorning their servants in livery, preferring the military simplicity of cropped blue naval jacket and starched white knee breeches. Since Smythe had spent his youth as the Admiral’s chief petty officer before retiring to household service, the ensemble suited him. It was impossible to determine the butler’s age from his appearance. His dark hair was thickly salted with silver, yet his form was as trim and dapper as a much younger man’s.
He clicked his booted heels and gave her father a smart salute. “A Mr. Benson to see you, sir.”
The Admiral drew a compass and an astrolabe from his waistcoat pocket before finally locating his trusty chronometer, missing the amused wink Smythe shot Lucy before he exited.
“Twelve hundred hours on the dot,” the Admiral proclaimed. “Excellent! If there’s anything I can’t abide in a solicitor, it’s tardiness. The applicants should be fast on his heels.”
“Applicants?” Lucy echoed.
This time her father swept up the Gazette with triumph instead of disgust. He tossed it into her lap, stabbing his ruddy finger at the open page.
“ ‘Wanted,’ ” she read. “ ‘Reputable male skilled in art of protection. Military experience preferred. All inquiries to be directed to Heronius Benson, Esquire.’ ”
Before she could absorb the words, Mr. Heronius Benson himself strode into the drawing room and pumped her father’s extended hand. “Such a pleasure, Admiral. It’s not every day a man has the privilege of meeting a living legend.”
“I should say not,” the Admiral agreed jovially.
Lucy frowned at the newspaper as the men exchanged jocular small talk. Doom’s threat must have spooked her father more than she realized. She’d never known Lucien Snow to hide behind any man.
Declining the glass of sherry the Admiral offered, Mr. Benson settled into a wing chair of burgundy leather. He nervously smoothed his few remaining tufts of hair over his shiny pate. “My associate has spent the past week interviewing prospects. He’s promised to send over only the best of the lot.”
Rapid footsteps thudded toward the archway. Smythe’s clipped voice rang out. “I say, young man, get back here this instant!”
Astonished, Lucy dropped the paper. She’d never heard Smythe’s voice raised above its beautifully modulated baritone. Even more shocking was the sight of the staid butler sliding around the corner, his boots vainly seeking purchase on the polished parquet. His knuckles were curled in the collar of a young man straining against his grip.
The Admiral rose, his rigid posture making him tower over the low-slung writing desk. He despised a hubbub of any sort unless he was the direct cause of it.
Smythe avoided his icy glare. “Sorry, sir. He got past me.”
The Admiral’s contemptuous gaze raked the flailing pup. “If you’ve come to make a delivery, lad, I suggest you use the servant’s entrance.”
Smythe’s captive renewed his struggles, wiggling so fiercely that the butler was forced to free him or risk unraveling the remaining shreds of his dignity.
Shooting Smythe a triumphant look, the lad snatched off his battered cap. His freckled face had been scrubbed clean, but Lucy wagered she could have guessed his age by counting the layers of dirt around his neck.
“I ain’t no servant, sir. At least not yet. I come about the position.”
Lucy cringed with empathy at the boy’s crude brogue. The only thing her father hated worse than a Frenchman was an Irishman. The overgrown urchin favored her with such a beguiling grin that she could not help smiling shyly back.
“Lucinda!” her father snapped. “Don’t encourage the whelp!”
“I’m sorry, Father.” Cheeks flaming, she gazed at the half-finished seascape, wishing she could dive into the cool blues and grays and disappear.
The Admiral sank into his chair, cracking his bulbous knuckles. “Very well. You’re dismissed.”
Grateful for the reprieve, Lucy rose to go.
“Not you,” he snapped. She hastily sat as he jerked his head toward the young Irishman. “Him.”
The boy lunged forward, but Smythe already had him collared. “Don’t be so hasty, sir,” the boy pleaded. “I can scrap with the best of ’em. I’m small, but wiry.”
“As am I, lad,” Smythe said, plainly savoring the taste of victory as he dragged the interloper from the room.
The creak of the main door opening was followed by the muffled thumps of a body rolling down the front stairs. Lucy could almost see Smythe dusting off his immaculate hands.
Benson squirmed in his chair, but the Admiral pinned him into stillness with nothing more than an arch of one snowy eyebrow. Lucy busied herself with capping her paints, thankful that for once she wasn’t the recipient of that withering glare.
Even the sparse tufts of the solicitor’s hair seemed to wilt beneath its chill as the Admiral echoed ominously, “The best of the lot, eh?”
The Admiral’s words were to prove prophetic as the long afternoon wore on. The brash Irish youth, if not the most qualified, was without a doubt the cleanest of the lot. Lucy had never seen such a motley collection of men. None of them could have borne more than a passing acquaintance with soap or water.
An Oriental gentleman, who insisted on favoring them with a demonstration of his fighting skills, earned her father’s blistering dismissal by accidentally shattering the Admiral’s favorite bust of Captain Cook. A towering fellow, who shyly confessed his only experience with the criminal element lay in his many years as a pickpocket, was forcibly ejected by two footmen after Smythe caught him pilfering silver spoons from the tea tray.
After the footpad’s abrupt departure, Mr. Benson sank lower and lower into his chair until it seemed he might vanish altogether. His damp hair clung to his pate in defeated strands. The chronom
eter ticked away the minutes with ruthless efficiency as the Admiral lit a pipe and hunched behind the writing desk, puffing out billows of smoke like an angry dragon.
Lulled into near stupor by the potent combination of the fragrant smoke and the warmth of the autumn sun beating through the bay windows, Lucy was nodding over her cold tea when Smythe once again appeared in the doorway. His voice seemed to come from a great distance.
“A Mr. Claremont to see you, sir.”
Lucy frowned without opening her eyes. Was it her imagination or had Smythe lingered over the name as if it left a taste of foreboding in his mouth?
The Admiral’s voice dripped resigned contempt. “Send him in. He’s probably an escaped murderer or Captain Doom himself come to kill us all and put an end to this ridiculous farce.”
She heard Mr. Benson shift as if preparing to bolt. Spurred more by boredom than genuine curiosity, Lucy opened her eyes to lazy slits and peered through the haze of smoke to find a man standing beneath the archway.
A rather ordinary man, she thought sleepily. Her leisurely gaze drifted downward from his brown cloth cutaway tailcoat to the clinging doeskin pantaloons tucked into short leather boots. His garments were simple, but clean and neatly pressed. Even Smythe, who hovered in the doorway, eavesdropping shamelessly, would be loath to find fault with the crease in his trousers. His boots, though unfashionably scuffed, showed evidence of a recent buffing.
At the appearance of this model of presentability, Mr. Benson perked up, sniffing at the air like a hound on the scent of a fox.
The man was lean of hip and long of leg, but the breadth of his shoulders lent him an imposing air. He moved past Lucy’s corner with casual grace to approach the writing desk. A whiff of bayberry shaving soap made her nose tingle.
Oddly relieved that she’d escaped his notice, Lucy continued to study him. A pair of steel-framed temple spectacles perched on his nose. He drew off his hat. His neatly clipped hair just brushed his nape. Ordinary hair, she echoed. The shadows had painted it an innocuous shade of brown, but a persistent ray of sunlight sought and found in its depths a ripe hint of ginger.