A Pirate's Bounty (8 page)

“What is it?” Faryn came up beside him but couldn’t see past his broad shoulders.

“Ship.” His voice held no emotion but the clenching of his jaw gave way that it affected him.

“Friend or foe?” she asked, hoping against all hope it was friendly.

“My friends do not shoot cannons at me, sweetheart.” He chuckled bitterly. “That is unless I deserve it, and I assure you, I have not vexed any of my friends of late.”

She nodded, swallowed hard, remained silent.

Shouts from above and the pounding of running feet echoed in the captain’s quarters.

A crewman burst through the door and Faryn clutched her towel tightly to her body.

“Cap’n! Pardon me, my lady,” he bowed, but then returned his attention to Wraith. “
Avenger
’s under attack!”

Beside her she sensed rather than saw every muscle in Wraith’s body tighten. Her heart constricted and her stomach plummeted.

Today she would die.

Chapter Six

“Stay here,” Wraith ordered.

Faryn nodded, her throat tight from fear. She eyed him warily as he plunged his muscled legs into breeches, stuffed his feet in boots. He didn’t bother to put on a shirt but placed his belt at his hips, a gun on one side followed by knives, which made their way around his belt to the other side. A sword loop remained empty at his hip, as he held the long deadly weapon within his hand. He tossed a look back at her, one of longing, before heading to the door.

She opened her mouth to speak and held out a hand imploringly, but was unsure of what to say. “Captain,” squeaked out.

He turned to face her and, most likely seeing the fear and vulnerability etched on her face, turned around and in just a few strides made his way to her. He threaded fingers through her hair with one hand and pulled her face to his.

“Do not worry so, my love. I am the dread pirate Captain Wraith Noir.” He said no more, only captured her lips with his in a demanding, erotic kiss. One that broached no argument, one that said how powerful he was and that when he finished with his enemies he would come back to claim her.

When he pulled away, leaving her bemused, she gazed at his storm cloud eyes with glazed ones of her own. “Be careful, Wraith. Come back to me.”

He nodded once, his lips curved in a wicked smile and then he was gone.

She stood in the empty room, cold, alone and scared, and listened to the sounds of bloodshed being committed above, to the sounds of the dying and a faint triumphant calling, which she hoped was Wraith as he cut through the lines to regain control of his ship.

* * * * *

Wraith wielded his sword at the men who poured onto his ship like ants on a forgotten sweet mincemeat pie.

But his ship was no piece of pie, and was not forgotten either. His men and he would fight to the death to keep the ship. For this was his life, and the cargo it held more precious to him than anything else—the girl and his ticket to freedom.

The men they fought were not other pirates. Although the men were not dressed in uniform or in particularly lavish attire, their weapons were avant-garde, although he had the distinct impression they’d not been trained to use them. He felled one man after another until he came upon a gentleman who was dressed in noble attire. Sweat covered the man’s brow as he fought for his life against Churl.

He was pleased to see that most of his own men had gotten the upper hand and had either sent the attackers to their maker or tied them up as prisoners.

He stood beyond the circle Churl and the gentleman were making with their parried dance, arms crossed over his chest, fist swinging out every once in a while to knock a man who attacked him unconscious with the butt of his sword.

He liked to watch Churl fight. The man had a unique style of bringing his prey in, letting them think they had the upper hand and then springing an unseen hit on them.

He laughed aloud when Churl kicked the man in his ballocks, causing him to fall to his knees. The gentleman cursed and turned his eyes on Wraith.

“You the captain?” he asked at the same time as Churl prepared to butt him on the back of the head.

Wraith held up his hand and to Churl said, “Hold, man, let me speak to him.”

Churl nodded and snickered, giving the man a kick in the ribs instead. The gentleman doubled over, holding his belly.

“I am the captain of this ship. What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing attacking us? Are you mad, man?”

The man looked up, blood sweating into his eye from a cut on his brow. “You have something of mine, I believe.” His lip curled into a mean smile showing dark rotted teeth and a few spaces where teeth should have been. For all his noble clothes and weaponry he looked as though he drank a cask of wine an hour and never once cleaned his teeth with a bit of root or the like. There was something oddly familiar about the man. “And I want it back.”

Wraith laughed cruelly, sheathed his sword and walked forward, stalking the man. “You think to become a pirate yourself then, mate?”

“I am a peer and you shall address me so,” the man sneered.

Wraith shot forward, jolting the man. He grabbed him by his collar and lifted him up to face Wraith eye to eye. “A peer? On the open seas there are no peers, and here I am king.”

The man actually shuddered but quickly pulled himself to rights. “I shall require my fiancée. She is mine. Sold to me by her parents.”

“Fiancée you say? I don’t think so.”

“I’ve already had it confirmed by one of your men, Captain Noir. Lady Faryn is mine!” Spittle flew from the man’s mouth.

Wraith ignored the spittle. Ignored the red-faced man he held in the air. All he could think of was the beauty below stairs. How much she meant to him, and that he couldn’t possibly lose her. Especially not to this man. Not to this monster, with his blackened teeth and foul breath. His sweating, stinking body. His evilness that radiated off him in droves. She’d never make it.

Finally, Wraith smiled. It was a deadly smile. Cold, unforgiving. “Funny thing is, mate,” he said, dropping the man back on the deck, “I bought her myself. And I don’t take kindly to others stealing what is mine.”

The man on the deck let out a desperate growl and lunged at Wraith, a dirk which had before been concealed glinting in the sunlight. He jabbed at Wraith, who had to use his own hands to block the blows of the madman. With one click of his skull and crossbones ring, he sliced the man’s neck from ear to ear.

The maggot fell to the deck again, clutching at his severed neck, blood spilling from between his fingers.

“Shouldn’t have lunged at me, mate. ’Tis a shame, since I fully intended to keep you alive and negotiate.” Wraith wiped the thin blade on the man’s coat and then clicked the button to retract it back into his ring, watching the dying man look at his ring. “Thing comes in handy in a pinch. Didn’t even catch your name to ask the girl if you were her man. Could be I don’t have Lady Faryn onboard and my man was mistaken. Could be you died for nothing.”

Wraith left the man to die with the thought of his vile mistakes the last on his dying mind.

“We take no prisoners! Toss ’em to the sharks. Those who make it back to their ship are saved, those who don’t become feed for the fishes.”

His men shouted and cheered, happy to toss their prisoners overboard. He could hear the splashing with subtle differences. The splashing of those who could swim making a mad dash for their ship, and those who could not swim as they thrashed for their lives.

Life had made him a bitter man.

Now to find out who exactly his new bounty piece was.

* * * * *

He opened the door and let it bang sharply against the wall. Faryn jerked from her place at the porthole where she peered out onto the expansive sea.

“Men died today, woman. ’Tis your doing.” He scowled at her.

She scowled back, arms spread wide. “My doing?” Her voice was high-pitched, exasperated. “How in the world can you see fit to blame your pirating ways on me?”

“’Tis quite easy actually. They came looking for you.”

“For me?” Her face lost all color and she sank to the floor in a puddle of white linen.

“
Oui
. Never got the maggot’s name, but he had blackened teeth and claimed you for his bride.”

“No,” she whispered, shaking her head. “No, it can’t be!”

“Are you calling me a liar?”

She looked up sharply, tears glistening in her eyes, making his heart lurch. He longed to reach out and hold her, tell her everything would be all right, but he couldn’t. He needed answers.

“Tell me everything,” he demanded.

“I don’t know where to start.” Her voice was so small and vulnerable. Her hands clutched at the linen in a grip so tight her knuckles were white.

“Start with his name, who he was to you.”

“His name is Lord Menteur.”

The name meant nothing to him. “He says you were sold to him. What does he mean by that?”

Her face flushed red and she looked down at the wooden planks of the floor. “My parents gave him a large dowry to take me off their hands as no other man would have me.” She looked up, her wide eyes glassy with unshed tears. But he was struck more with the defiance he saw. She was a fighter and would not cower easily. “But you see, when you took me from the shore that night, he had not yet received the money. Menteur is in deep with his creditors. My father promised him a lot of money if he would only look the other way when there was no blood on the sheets. If he didn’t get the money, he would have been dead as the creditors would have killed him or sent him to debtor’s prison.” Her gaze flicked around the room, settling on anything but him. “Menteur would have killed me, I am sure. He all but promised once he got what he wanted, he’d be done with me.”

“Who is your father?”

“My father is Henry, the Vicomte de Bèziers.”

Wraith drew a deep breath, excitement coursing through his veins. He’d known her father was a powerful man, but not how close he actually was to getting his future back. The vicomte would be instrumental in his freedom.

“Was Menteur the man who took your maidenhead?” The bastard! He could kill him all over again!

“No,” she said, shaking her head, her long blonde locks bobbing against her bare shoulders. “I was naïve. Fancied myself in love and let a handsome young groom seduce me. He promised to take me away, to marry me.”

Wraith was affronted that any man would lead her astray—betray her, and so openly and on her father’s own land but then again, he’d kidnapped her… Women were so vulnerable. It made him angry, so angry in fact his blood heated with hatred. How many of the women he’d delivered to Orelia had been just like Faryn? And hadn’t he himself bargained for her—yet again taking control from her?

Disgust roiled in his belly.

“Had you no chaperone?” he asked absentmindedly, not sure why he’d even asked in the first place.

“My father chose the groom as my escort when I rode, as my maid was quite old. Francis had ample opportunity to woo me and he took advantage of that… Although I suppose I am to blame for most of it.”

“No, never, Faryn. Your father should have had more control over his men, and Francis should never have used you in such a way. Was he punished?”

Faryn shook her head, her eyes downcast. “No, he disappeared the next morning. We were found nude in my bed by my maid and she screamed, calling for my father and the guards. Francis fought his way out and I never saw him again.”

Wraith nodded. He thought of Menteur, wondered if the man had actually been behind Faryn’s fall from grace. He could have planned the whole thing—paid the man to seduce her. It could have all been a ruse to gain her father’s money. Then it hit him. Wraith knew instantly why the man had seemed familiar to him. He’d seen him before. Dealt with him before. The eve of his family’s murder. Menteur had come to their chateau, but he’d been dressed as a beggar. He’d begged food and shelter and they’d let him sleep in the stables. Must have been how the murderers had gained access—he’d opened the gates. But he wasn’t the mastermind. No, he wasn’t that smart—and he still had all of his fingers.

“Come, I have to show you something.”

Wraith took an iron key from behind a plank of wood that had blended seamlessly with the wall of his cabin. He was still shirtless and Faryn found herself breathing hard, her heart erratic at not just his near nakedness, but at what she’d revealed, how he’d reacted.

She’d seen the anger simmering inside him. And she was both intrigued and excited that he would be angry on her behalf.

He took the key to a chest beside his desk and unlocked the padlock, an audible click echoing in the silence. With steady hands, he lifted the lid, which made a loud creaking noise, as if rarely used. She half expected to see a skeleton or even the heart of Davy Jones pop out from the depths but instead he lifted a large package wrapped in dark green velvet.

He took it to the table where they’d eaten only that morning and set it down.

“This is proof.” A light came into his eyes.