He took the wheel, his hands sliding into grooves worn by a thousand hours beneath his calloused fingers and a twinge of guilt pricked at her as he stared out over the rolling sea. Though he had accepted his temporary demotion with grace, part of him must be rankled. Who wouldn’t be? With a heavy swallow, she walked away.
In her cabin, Samantha stepped over a pile of dirty laundry and went straight to the bookcase built into the wall. An eclectic collection of shells lined one railed shelf. She hefted the conch from her pouch and set it in the middle of the others.
Perfect.
She turned to her desk and slid open a drawer. Nimble fingers lifted the false bottom out, and she pulled a worn scrap of parchment free. Her fingers traced the faded lines of ink before she folded it and returned to the shelf. She flipped the conch over and slid the folded paper into the smooth pink of its spiral. A lump of pliable wax lay inside the drawer and she pressed it to the shell’s opening.
When all the gaps were covered, she gave the conch a good shake. The map remained secure.
Safe.
Just as her uncle had instructed when he gave it to her before this voyage.
Samantha sank into the chair at her desk and pushed aside a stack of papers. Her ledger laid open and she pulled it in front of her. She frowned. Where was her quill? Another flurry of papers, and she pulled it free. Her hair stuck to her neck in the still air and she sighed. Though she yearned to go back above and let the breeze cool her, there were numbers to be run.
Her uncle expected an accurate account of the cargo they’d pickedup in Nassau. A mostly legal run, so nothing too exciting. Her quill tapped the page. Barrels of rum, bolts of cotton, and most importantly, sugar. Those crates held heavy bars of gold nestled among the fine white crystals.
A smile tugged the corners of her lips.
Uncle Henry owned one of the biggest shipping companies in the country. His merchant ships ran up and down the coast, ferrying in goods from the West Indies and storing them in his multitudes of warehouses.
All a cover.
Behind the shield of his shipping empire, her uncle ran another operation. One in which he was known as Captain Remington, a notorious gentleman pirate. Beneath the benign facade of merchant ships, his fleet hid extra guns, men trained in combat, and always an empty cargo hold to stash smuggled—or stolen—goods.
Shouts above chased the smile from Samantha’s face and she jumped to her feet. Boots. Where were the blasted things? With a curse, she dug through the piles on the floor. She should have worn them on her excursion instead of going barefoot.
After wasting a full minute, she found them and tugged them on before racing up to the deck.
“Ship ahoy!”
Samantha’s eyes narrowed. This far off the trade route, there should be no other traffic. When she climbed up to the quarterdeck, Griff’s stony face confirmed her fears.
“Who is it?”
He handed her the spyglass and she whipped it to her eye. When she focused on the approaching frigate’s flag, a chill ran up her spine. The fifteen stars of the American flag flapped in the wind, but below it, a small flag bearing the Georgian seal garnered her full attention. None of the governor’s ships would stray this far off their route.
Unless they were pirate hunters.
“Damn,” she muttered.
“What are your orders, Captain?”
Griff emphasized her title, a clear message for her to choose wisely. The rest of the crew gathered near and fixed expectant gazes on her. The wise choice would be to stand down and fabricate a story to explain their location. Samantha turned back to the sea and took another look. Her fingers clenched around the spyglass when she zeroed in on the figure standing on the forecastle of the approaching ship.
Tall and handsome in his blue uniform.
And very familiar. She didn’t need to look at the nameplate at the bow to know the ship’s name. TheUSS Falcon.
“It’s Lieutenant Thompson.”
Griff yanked the glass and stared through it for a long moment. His lips drew into a thin line. “Insufferable cur.”
Samantha had to agree. Christian Thompson had recently arrived in Savannah with the lofty ambition of wiping out the pirate trade. And damn him if he wasn’t doing a good job at it. In less than three months, the young lieutenant had captured four ships. Every vessel that sailed in and out of the harbor now passed by the crow-picked skeletons hanging on Cockspur Island.
A clear—if not crude—warning by the lieutenant himself. Go pirating and meet the noose.
“Captain?”
