Pirated Love (25 page)

“That’s different!” she replied emphatically, and meant it.

“How is that different?”

“I am the captain!”

“Does that mean that you own me?”

“I do not own you, you are my wife!”

“Then does that mean you own me?” she repeated, annoyed.  She was trying to remain reasonable, but she was certain that Tina’s anger could be heard throughout the ship.  Lord knew, her anger had been felt all day long.

“I do not own you, but you should respect me and what I say,” she tried to argue, but hearing herself, she was believing it less and less.

“Then you should respect what I want and say too,” her voice quieted in the hopes that Tina’s angry tone would lessen.

“I do respect you, and I listen to you all the time,” she countered, her voice was not getting any softer.

“Apparently you do not if you react this way when I simply did what you did too.”

“So this was to pay me back for my cutting my hair without consulting you?” her voice was incredulous.

“No, I am not that vindictive or childish, but I saw your point that it would be easier to take care of on this long voyage.”

Tina could not see past the red before her eyes, she was so angry.  “But you disobeyed me!”

“Are we back to the argument that you own me and I must obey you because I married you?”

“No, I do not own you, but I told you specifically that I did not want you to cut your hair, and you deliberately disobeyed me!”

“It was not a matter of disobeying you.  I
heard
that you liked my hair longer.  I felt that cutting it was necessary so I do not need to brush it out every time I come back in the cabin from being on deck and in the winds.”

“Then you should have stayed in the cabin more!”

“Is that what you really want?  Me to stay in the cabin all the time?”

Tina knew she was being unreasonable at this point, but she could not see a way to gracefully back down and slammed out of the cabin.  Everyone stayed out of her way, including Sir Barkley, for the rest of that day.

Claire had started going to the kitchen for meals instead of having someone bring them a tray, which was not always a good idea anyway with the way the ship rolled sometimes.  This also allowed her to socialize and get to know the other men on the ship.  Most, if not all the men who had not liked the idea of her sailing with them, were long gone.  The ones who still did not like it, just stayed away from her, and she respected that.  Some did not think having women on a ship was lucky, some felt she distracted the captain from their pirating, and some plain out did not like women.  They avoided her, and she was fine with that aspect of their relationship.  She noted, when they stopped in a port, it did not stop these men from seeking out whores though.  They apparently had a problem with her being a lady, something she could not hide due to the circumstances of her original abduction and Tina’s having married her.

Today, she sat in the kitchen for a fine meal topped off with a bit of cake that was left.  Finding out all the men had a sweet tooth meant they had to increase their stores of sugar and flour so she could occasionally bake for them all.  The smell evidently carried to the other ships in the fleet, and her gifts to the other ships’ captains were greatly appreciated.  The gifts she received in return from these captains and hopeful sailors were prodigious.  She had more hair combs and gee-gaws than she could ever hope to wear, and some were quite ugly.  She hoped she could trade or give some of them away at some point and that they would stop giving her these trinkets now that her hair was gone.

“She is on a fine terror,” the cook, Geoff, commented as he served her plate.

“She has got no one to blame but herself,” Tina responded as she said a short prayer and dug into the delicious concoction.  Her coming to the kitchen had endeared her to many because it meant she was no better than the rest of them and socializing with them had further made her one of them.

“She is blaming enough of the rest of us,” he muttered.

Claire had to admit that was true.  She had tried to get Tina to talk it out, but the haircut was too new and too in her face, and while Claire loved it for its shorter feel, it made her head feel terribly lighter.  She had saved the long tresses carefully to find a wigmaker to sell them to.  She knew the blonde color alone would fetch a large sum, especially because it was natural.

“You know they cut hair like this in France,” she commented in return.

“You ain’t in France though, are ya?” he teased back and then lost his smile as he looked beyond her to the slate green eyes of their red headed captain.

“Where’s my dinner?” she asked ominously and Geoff hurried to dish up her meal, which consisted of roast pork, a type of potato that was found only in Africa and which he could not pronounce, but it was like a sweet potato, and beans…,eternally beans.  They carried these dried in bushel bags and it was a daily staple.

Tina sat down and did not look at her wife.  She was less angry, realizing she had over-reacted and having thought about what her wife had said.  She did not own her; she did not want to own her.  She did, however, want respect and consultation, but was that not what Claire wanted too?  She ate quietly, ignoring her wife, and drinking half a bottle of wine before returning to the deck; no words were exchanged between the two women.

Tina took the wheel from James so he could go down and eat.  Sir Barkley was at her side as usual, and nosed under her hand to get her to pet him briefly before sitting down and putting his nose into the wind, content to be at her side.  As the wind blew through her hair, escaping from the tie, she thought about what she did want with her wife.  She knew that she could not always stay on ship, as much as she loved it.  It was why they were transitioning from being pirates to traders; it made sense.  Time changed things.  Someday she might have to give up the sea as well.

Later, when the second mate relieved her, she returned to her cabin to find Claire busy doing needlepoint.  Sir Barkley walked in and lay down on ‘his’ rug on the floor with a flop.  Tina was not sure what to say to her once she closed the door behind her and bolted it.

“What do you want out of this marriage?” she ventured to ask.

Claire looked up, surprised at the question.  She had thought they would argue some more about her hair and her position on board.  She had been exerting her independence more and more, and she knew Tina did not like it.  She thought about the question though.  “I want your love and respect,” she finally answered, carefully.

“Do you not think I wanted the same?” Tina asked, as she watched her, her arms folded across her chest.  Claire’s hand worried at a stray thread.

“We’ve never really spoken about what you want.  I mean, even this adventure to the Orient was a surprise to me,” she said, gesturing.

Tina nodded.  “I am not used to discussing my plans with anyone, and you know I share more with you than most, but it occurs to me that I never asked you what you wanted.”  She waited for Claire to look up before adding, “I asked you to marry me so you would be with me always.  I did not want to lose you, but I never asked you what you wanted out of the marriage?”

Claire mulled over what Tina was asking her.  “I…I do not know,” she stuttered at first.  “When I thought I was to marry, I thought I was going to marry a man and have his children.  He would have made all the decisions.”  She swallowed, realizing it was not like that with Tina.  “I cannot give you children, obviously, but it does not mean that I do not want them.  I saw how the children in the village adore you.”  She thought a little longer, realizing she was just talking, not really answering the question.  “You do not expect me to do your bidding all the time as a man would, do you?” she turned the question on Tina. 

Tina pulled off her jacket and hung it on a bedpost.  It gave her time to think about what Claire was saying.  Her swords were hanging there and she briefly checked them out of habit, but her knife was on her belt, she would not need them unless they were attacked.  She sat down on the edge of the bed across from Claire to talk to her.  “Sometimes, as captain, I must give orders, and I expect them to be obeyed without question.  Sometimes it is a matter of life or death.  I think you and I need to communicate more about personal decisions, but the ones regarding this ship, I expect to be obeyed regardless of what you think.”

Claire was taken aback by Tina’s tone.  She understood the words, but Tina had not addressed the first part of what she had said, she had absolutely ignored it, she felt.  This was not about children anyway, it was about her cutting her hair and disobeying her.  “And if I do not agree?” she said stiffly.

“Then you and I discuss it,
later
.  I am the captain of my ship and I cannot have you openly disobey me or the men will lose respect for me.  Things have been...tense here the last couple of days and they have, of course, noticed.”

“You’ve been behaving like a petty child who did not get her own way...” Claire began, but Tina held up her hand.

“I was angry, I will admit, but I realized I was wrong.  It is
your
hair.  You are not my servant to command, but I have to ask you to never openly flaunt that you are disobeying me again.  If I allowed that, then I might as well give up my command,” she explained, hoping that Claire understood.

“I am sorry,” Claire said, contritely.  “I did not think it would be such an ordeal to cut my hair,” she put her hand up to touch the short tresses.

“It is not just about you cutting your hair.  No I did not like that you did it.  You did have a point that I did not discuss it with you when I cut mine.  It is the way you flaunted it, and it allowed the men to see that I do not have your respect.”

“But I do respect you...” she insisted.

“Not if you behave the way you did.  That’s what angered me.”  Tina looked at her sadly.

“I am sorry.  I did not realize the men would interpret it that way.”

“I do not give orders just to hear myself speak.  It is my ship, my responsibility.  I asked you to marry me and I feel you are my responsibility too.  I want to make you happy, but I am obviously not if you disrespect me.”

“But I respect you, Tina...” she tried to insist again.

“Not if you are enjoying a joke at my expense, which the men interpret differently than you intended,” she pointed out.

Claire had not looked at it at all that way.  She had thought Tina was just angry that she cut her hair, had disobeyed her.  “I am sorry!” she said, contritely.  “I will not do it again.”

“Thank you,” Tina acceded and decided to drop it.  She was weary of fighting with her.  The anger had really made her tired as she had taken it out on everyone who she thought was laughing at her behind her back.  She stood up and stretched and Sir Barkley looked up at her and yawned himself.  “I am getting ready for bed now,” she stated, but did not ask Claire to join her.

Claire watched, resuming her needlepoint as Tina used the boot jack to pull off her knee-length boots, one by one.  Quickly, she stripped out of her clothes and, leaving her shirt on, she crawled to the far side of the bed so that Claire would not have to climb over her when she herself went to bed.  Sir Barkley sat up hopefully and watched Tina for a moment, waiting in vain for an invitation to join her on the bed.  Sighing gustily, his disappointment obvious when the invitation was not forthcoming and she ignored him too, he lay back down on his rug.  Claire sat there thoughtfully a while, wondering at their conversation.  When she heard Tina snore slightly, she began to put away her needlepoint and get ready for bed herself.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

It was two weeks later, they were getting into warmer and warmer waters as they neared the equator, the closest part of the Earth to the Sun, or so Tina had explained to Claire.  The men were wearing loincloths and nothing else.  For many it showed off heavily-muscled limbs and torsos that made Claire blush at the amount of skin it exposed.  Others were skinny and limber, but still too much skin was exposed for her delicate sensibilities.  Tina and Claire both had stripped down to lesser, but still modest clothing.  In Tina’s case, this was a short-sleeved version of her flowing shirts, the sleeves ripped from the shirt, and short pants.  Claire could not get herself to boldly wear such an outfit as Tina’s.  Despite the wrappings around her ample breasts, she was still obviously female, the blonde’s own frame was in a dress with only one petticoat and this too was sleeveless.  She had found in the weeks of travel that she tanned a golden brown and her blonde hair was almost white in appearance; its shortness now made her look like a very pretty boy.

“Sail ho,” one of the men called from the upper spars of the masts.

Tina looked where the man was pointing and pulled out a spy glass to get a better look.  The man on the mast had a better view since he was high above the ship and did not have the waves to contend with in his view.  She scanned the horizon and only saw one white sail on it, but could make out nothing else to tell her the nationality of the ship.  She looked behind her slightly at the ships traveling with them on each side of her own ship and then back further at the ones trailing because they were not as fast as her own.  She wanted to see if they saw the ship, only one of them showed activity that indicated they too had seen the ship ahead of them.