The Pirate Hunter''s Lady

  James turned Jack’s head on the pillow, examining the place behind his ear where the original wound had been. He probed the wound gently, his face grim. “He needs a surgeon.”

  “In short supply on Haven,” her father answered.

  Mrs. Pringle pushed into the room behind Diana. “I knew he looked queer. I spoke to him right after you and Isabeau went down to bathe, my lady, but he seemed fine.”

  “But he complained of his head hurting?” James asked her.

  “That he did. He said it hurt something fierce, but otherwise, he was as cheerful as ever.”

  James laid his hand on Jack’s forehead. “His wound is hot, but his face is cold. Ever do any trepanning, Admiral?”

  “I’ve seen it done once, at a distance. The surgeon was competent. I have no idea what he did.”

  “What is trepanning?” Diana asked.

  James had gone cool and remote again. “You drill holes in the head, through the skull. It relieves the pressure, or lets out the humors, I really don’t know. Seems to work, though.”

  “Can you do such a thing?” her father asked.

  “I always employed a surgeon who knew what he was doing.”

  “As did I.”

  The two ship’s captains looked at one another. “We could attempt it, I suppose,” the admiral said.

  “We might kill him. I wouldn’t know where to begin.” James glanced out the narrow window. “But you have a boat. I can make for Plymouth. Sixty miles, is it? I’d likely find a ship of some kind between here and there. More, probably.”

  “English ships, happy to capture you,” her father said, looking stern. “I will go.”

  “I can sail that craft faster and farther than you can. And Diana will need you here.”

  “I’m too old, in other words?” the admiral snapped.

  James’s expression hardened. “This is not about pride, this is about Jack’s life.”

  Her father deflated, and Diana clenched her fists. “If you gentlemen will let someone else speak, I think you are both mad.”

  James shook his head. “There isn’t a better idea.”

  “I could go. I can navigate that gig as well as any officer. I often do when we sail it.”

  James and her father both said “No!” at the same time.

  “I am an excellent sailor, taught by the best,” Diana said, staring them both down. “And I’m not wanted by the British navy.”

  James raked her with a cool gaze. “I’m sure a crew would be delighted to come across you alone in that little gig, all fire-haired and in distress. Besides what would happen to Isabeau if you wrecked the boat and sank like a stone?”

  Diana stilled, her arguments dying. James was right, drat him. Harm to herself meant harm to Isabeau. Also his comment about a crew finding her alone chilled her. Diana was the daughter of a prominent admiral, yes, but not all ships roaming the waters were English.

  “I’m the best person to go,” James said. “And we all know it. There’s no other choice.”

  He straightened from the bed and moved to the door. Without pausing, he went out. They stood still, staring after him a moment, before Diana realized what he was doing.

  Diana pushed past her father and Mrs. Pringle and hurried out of the room. She heard Isabeau come behind her, then her father start after Isabeau and pull her back.

  Diana ran down the stairs and out the front door that James had left open behind him. She knew he hadn’t departed so the rest of them could debate what to do, giving them time to come to a conclusion. James was heading to the cove to launch the boat. He was leaving.

  He could move swiftly and decisively when he wanted to. By the time Diana reached the gate to the beach, James was already at the boat.

  She pounded down the beach and to the cove. James was untying the gig when she ran up, panting, grabbed the gunwale, and hung on.

  “James!”

  James kept coiling ropes, throwing them to the bottom of the boat.

  “I’m coming with you,” Diana said.

  James looked up at her. She expected him to drawl something sarcastic, or to lift her over his shoulder and carry her out of the way, or maybe tie her up again and leave her trussed up on the beach.

  His green eyes were cold, unyielding, as he tossed another rope into the boat. “All right. Get in.”

  Diana had opened her mouth to argue. Her jaw hung there, agape, for a moment while she wondered if she’d heard aright.

  James pushed the boat into the water. Diana got herself over the gunwale and onto a seat as the first wave caught the prow.

  “Wait,” she cried, standing up. “They won’t know I’ve gone. I have to tell them.”

  Without changing expression, James threw in the last rope and climbed into the gig. He came to Diana where she stood balancing against the waves, then shoved up her skirts and reached for the waistband of her breeches.

  “What are you doing?” she cried.

  “Untying your britches,” James said calmly.

  Chapter Twenty

  Despite Diana’s attempts to stop him, James ruthlessly dragged the breeches down her backside and off her. Rising, he balled the garment in his hands and flung it as hard as he could at the retreating shore.

  The breeches landed with a splat on the wet sand, the constant breeze ruffling them.

  “James!”

  “They’ll figure out you went with me when they find them.”

  Diana stared at him, but his face was expressionless. She couldn’t tell if he were teasing, triumphant, or angry.

  The shore receded behind them, the breeches a forlorn lump in the sand.

  Diana sat back down with a thump. “Oh, for heaven’s sake.”

  Without another word, James moved to the mast and began hoisting the sail.

  *** *** ***

  Diana’s father kept an astrolabe, compass, and chart stowed carefully under the bench at the gig’s tiller. As James worked the sail, he barked an order to Diana to steer the boat north- northeast.

  She knew he tested her boast that she could navigate as well as any naval officer. Diana lifted the astrolabe to the horizon, sighted along it, checked the reading, checked the compass, checked the chart, and adjusted the tiller.

  James raised the sail and positioned it to catch the wind. The small craft rocked, out of the cove now and rushing into the swells.

  James tied off the sail and made his way to the stern. The wind caught his hair, which had grown longer during his stay on Haven, the sun burnishing the black until it shone.

  He took the astrolabe, checked its reading, and then looked to see how she’d positioned the tiller. Diana returned his gaze, one brow raised. “You see? As good as any lieutenant.”

  James didn’t answer. He seated himself on the bench in the middle of the boat and held the sail’s ropes, ready to wind or tie off, whichever way the wind shifted.

  Diana watched his chest muscles play beneath the loose coat as he watched the sky and made small adjustments to the sails. “Did you not believe that a mere woman would be of any use on a boat?” she asked, trying to make a joke of it.

  “I’ve had women on my crew from time to time,” James said, still watching the sails. “Only one at present. Her husband taught her to sail, and she’s damn good. One of my best.”

  “Does her husband sail with you too?”

  “Nope. I think she killed him. He was a privateer and beat her black and blue for the fun of it. I never asked her straight out.”

  Diana digested this in tight silence. “If I had gone with you last year when you asked me, would you have expected me to join your crew?”

  “Not necessarily. But if I’d found out you could navigate, I’d have put you on the quarterdeck with Henderson.”

  Diana imagined that life — by day marking charts and taking readings, looking after Isabeau as the little girl scampered about the ship. At night, lying in James’s arms, gazing out at the stars as they went by.

  “Have
you had many women on your crew?” Diana asked over the wind.

  “About ten. Over the years.”

  “Were any your lovers?”

  James tied off the rope he held, rose, and unwound another one. “Why do you want to know?”

  “I am curious.”

  The wind blew his dark hair across his eyes, and he raked it free. “Two of them were.”

  “Will you tell me about them?”

  “No.”

  Diana watched him across the wave-tossed boat, but he returned his attention to sailing. She gave a cool shrug. “No matter.”

  James shifted the sail again, and Diana shivered. The sea wind was sharp, though the sun shone mightily. She’d have a sunburn in no time.

  To stop herself thinking about James’s past lovers, Diana opened the cabinet beneath her where she’d found the astrolabe and yanked out a fisherman’s knitted sweater. She pulled it on over her head, trying to put her arms through the sleeves and hang onto the bouncing tiller at the same time.

  She tangled in the garment. Her head jammed against its shoulder, and she flailed, trying to punch through the sleeve.

  A strong hand pulled her free. James sat down beside her, holding the sleeve steady so she could thrust her arm through it. Diana wriggled the pullover around until it sat right, then she drew a deep breath. The garment cut the wind somewhat, warming her.

  James wrapped one arm around her and pulled her close. “I’m glad you came with me,” he said, kissing her hair.

  “I heard you argue fiercely against it,” she said.

  “I argued against you going alone, which would have been idiotic. But two can manage the boat better than one. I’d say we can average about five knots, if the weather holds, and we’ll be in Plymouth by dawn.”

  “You going alone would have been idiotic too,” she argued. “What would happen when you landed and started asking for a surgeon in that Charleston accent of yours? You’ll give yourself away as soon as you open your mouth.”

  “I know people on the coast who will be willing to help me.” He gave her the ghost of a smile. “For certain services rendered.”

  His face, clean-shaven, still smelled of soap, and his green eyes warmed her.

  “Services? Did you expel pirates for them?”

  “Let’s just say they and I share a dislike of prowling English frigates.”

  “They’re smugglers, you mean?” Diana heaved a resigned sigh. “I ought to have known. Your world is upside down from mine.”

  “Those smugglers are fine people compared to your respectable captain husband.”

  Diana privately agreed. If James’s friends could help Lieutenant Jack, she would overlook a little smuggling. She knew that for the poor families living along the coast, smuggling was sometimes the only way they could put bread in their bellies. Of course James would seem a hero to such people.

  Diana adjusted the tiller as the wind shifted. James wound another rope and sat back again, cradling Diana into him.

  She felt his heart beating against her back, steady and confident. James must have made voyages like this hundreds of times, dashing across open water on some mission or other, capturing pirates or harassing British frigates.

  He rested his broad hand on her abdomen, his touch warm through the pullover. If their purpose were not so dire and the danger not so great, Diana would love this. Sailing alone with James under the late spring sun, cradled in his arms, facing whatever adventure they encountered together . . . Heaven.

  It was illusory, this feeling. Likely when they made Plymouth and found a surgeon for Jack, James would send Diana back to Haven and rejoin the Argonaut, wherever it might be. His mission of finishing off Mallory was done. He had no reason to stay.

  “James,” she said. “Why did you come to Haven by yourself?”

  His lips warmed her above her ear, his whiskers like fine sandpaper. “I was shipwrecked, remember? I didn’t have much choice.”

  “But why did your crew not try to rescue you? Your Irish lieutenant and Mr. Henderson seem competent enough to find you.”

  James adjusted a rope before he answered. “The Argonaut had something else to do.”

  “But you could have gone with them — whatever they are doing to the English navy that you do not want me to know about. Then you could have hunted Captain Mallory with them. You’d have found Haven eventually. Why did you want to do it alone?”

  Diana waited for him to drawl something sarcastic or to simply not answer at all. But James said, “It was something I had to do for myself.”

  “But you let Jessup go.”

  James’s hand tightened on the rope, his fingers going white. “Yes. Now it’s over.”

  He spoke in a monotone, emotionless. Diana turned in his arms and looked up at him. His gaze bore the same blankness she’d seen when she found him washing himself over and over last night. A stark look, a vast emptiness.

  “How can you say it like that, as though it doesn’t matter?”

  Anger flickered in his eyes. “Because it doesn’t matter. Would killing Mallory have brought my brother’s wife back to life again? Restore Paul’s life and happiness? I can never do that. No matter how many pirates I hunt down, I can never make it better for him.”

  The bleak conviction in his voice made her heart ache. “You were trying to avenge them,” she said. “To avenge Paul’s wife for him. As you promised.”

  “Revenge is an empty waste of time. I knew that. I have known that for a long time. But I kept pursuing it, like had no choice.”

  Diana remembered her own petty vengeances against the husband she knew would never love her. She’d encouraged gentlemen to flirt with her, to punish Edward for disliking her. But all her theatrics had not brought him to her, had not made him care for her as she’d hoped a husband would care for a wife.

  “There is a choice,” she said softly. “We both chose revenge.” She reached up, smoothed her palm across his cheek, and leaned her forehead into it.

  He did not speak or change expression, but he remained with her on the bench, the two of them taking warmth and comfort in each other as Haven dropped behind them to become a speck on the horizon.

  *** *** ***

  They pulled the boat onto a strand near Plymouth in the early hours of the morning. Diana was asleep on her feet. She stumbled behind James as he half led, half dragged her across the shingle and to welcome yellow lights.

  Diana wanted nothing more than to fall upon a bed, and she hoped James’s friends would let them into those tantalizing, warm rooms where she could sleep. But no, they were walking farther up the strand to a person holding a smuggler’s lantern. This man greeted James, babbling in an almost unintelligible dialect. Diana was too tired to bother to understand him.

  Then they were in a dark village, and then a public house, with more yellow lights and a plump woman missing most of her teeth. This woman led them up a narrow, enclosed staircase — Diana had to hold on to the walls to keep from tumbling back down. But James was behind her, James with his hand on her back, and she would not fall.

  Then they were in a warm chamber, a parlor with firelight and a table and a large, fat bed with curtains.

  Diana could not remember the publican’s wife leaving, or James stoking the fire high. She only knew that he was lifting the fisherman’s sweater off over her head and then unfastening and pulling off her damp clothes, and removing her boots. He carried her to lay her on the bed in her chemise, smoothing a coverlet over her.

  He began to turn away, but Diana reached for him. “Stay.”

  James hesitated. She expected him to turn and leave her, to go confer with his smuggler friends, but after a time, he nodded and began stripping off his clothes.

  Diana drifted in and out of sleep as she watched him undress, and then he was standing before her, naked and beautiful, the firelight touching his muscles and glistening on the unshaven bristles on his jaw.

  James climbed under the covers with her and slid his wa
rm body next to hers. He wound one arm around her and cradled her against him. Diana murmured, happy, and snuggled down into sleep.

  *** *** ***

  James watched her sleep. Her canny questions on the boat had unnerved him until he’d not known how to answer. She’d always seen straight into his heart, even last year when he’d abducted her, when she’d been all haughty and cool.

  The best thing for James to do was leave her, to find a lady who didn’t know him at all. He could sate himself physically and forget all about Diana Worthing.

  Not likely.

  The night was quiet. The village lay about a mile from shore, too far to hear the familiar roar and hiss of breakers on the beach. James had sent word via the publican to a friend, Augustus Tolliver, a fancy name for a man who mended fishnets. Augustus had a second occupation, of course, as did most people on this coast, one way or another.

  Augustus had sent messages off to Plymouth for a surgeon, who would no doubt arrive at first light. James hope Lieutenant Jack could hold on long enough for them to sail the surgeon back to Haven.

  James had been tempted to ask for news of the Argonaut, but he only trusted Tolliver so far. Tolliver would do anything for a handful of coins, and James did not want to let it be known that he’d become separated from his crew. He’d missed his scheduled rendezvous with the Argonaut by weeks, but O’Malley and Henderson would know to linger.

  James’s eyes drifted closed, but he did not want to sleep. He needed to stay alert for Tolliver’s return message, and he was never easy when he landed in England.

  He’d wanted to decline Diana’s invitation to lie here with her, because he did want to remain awake and watchful. It would be best if James could find the Argonaut and get Diana safely on board. They’d sail the surgeon to Haven for Lieutenant Jack, and then James would have Diana to himself.

  On the Argonaut James could teach Diana how he really felt about her. What they’d done last night had been only the beginning. He wanted to teach her and teach her until he’d gone through all the things he knew, and then they’d learn the things he’d only read of in books. And James had read many books . . .