“Thank you, nay.”Gabrielle smiled at her friend.“I cannot let go of him in this place.”
The woman nodded her understanding.
Finally, Lazy-eyed Smity materialized out of the crowd, like a man emerging from Hades, an uneasy grin on his face.“Cap’n.There ye are.”He grabbed the bottle, took a big swig, and wiped his mouth with his sleeve.“Ye were right, Cap’n.Allard sailed into the harbor jist a few minutes ago.Saw ’im meself, did I.”
Gabrielle couldn’t quite discern why, but Smity seemed a bit over-anxious, more enthusiastic than his usual irritable demeanor.
The captain took no note.Instead, he slapped the table with a grin, then motioned the barmaid over who’d served them.Not that she’d been too far away, for the poor lady’s flirtatious glances oft found their way to Cadan.
She rushed over to him and promptly perched on his lap.Though the captain attempted to nudge her off, she began showering his neck with kisses.
Oddly, irritation clawed up Gabrielle’s throat.Or was it jealousy?Absurd!She was only shocked to see such blatant behavior in any woman.Pursing her lips, she wanted to look away, but found she could not.No doubt the captain was enjoying the trollop’s attentions.
Then why did he suddenly rise, shove her from his lap, all the while gripping her shoulders to prevent her from falling?
She gave a childish pout, clearly upset at his rejection.However the gleam returned to her eyes when he reached inside his waistcoat and placed two gold coins in her hand.
Then leaning, he whispered something in her ear, to which she smiled and nodded.A plan for a future assignation?
What did it matter to Gabrielle?Men.All the same, the lot of them.
The woman sashayed away, drawing the gaze of every man at the table, including Cadan’s.Yet when he spun back around, his glance found hers.And for the briefest of moments, a flash of something crossed his eyes, but what she couldn’t tell.“Stay here,” he ordered, then pivoted and approached the man pouring ale behind the bar.
Gabrielle couldn’t hear what he said, nor did she care.She was only glad when he returned and announced they were leaving.
Thankfully Matthew had mostly slept through the entire ordeal.What a good boy.
No sooner did they walk out into the night air than she peeled back the blankets to check on him.
Omphile leaned over.“His first trip to a tavern, and he slept the whole time.”
“Hislasttrip to a tavern,” Gabrielle said emphatically.
“Is he to be a preacher then?”Pell slipped beside her.
She glanced down at her son’s sweet face.Her father was a preacher of sorts.But how could she recommend such a profession when she believed God had let her down?
“Perhaps,” was all she said, as a sudden ache spread across her belly.No doubt her body was still recovering from childbirth.
Thankfully, the captain didn’t go far before he stopped at the same church they’d been at before.Only this time, they inched around the brick building to the back.Gravestones rose from the misty ground like the tongues of the dead, screaming for help.
A chill scraped over her.There was only one thing left on the captain’s agenda and that was trapping Allard.She looked over to ask Pell the plan, but he was already moving toward Cadan.
They skirted around several tombstones and a few wooden crosses before halting in the far corner near a copse of trees.
The captain gestured for her and Omphile to stand by one of the grave sites.“Remain here, my lady.You, as well, Omphile.”
He then commanded two of his men to hide in the nearby brush and two more to dig on the other side of the tombstone.The pirate she assumed was her guard, despite the captain’s denial, took up a position beside her.
Clinging tightly to Matthew, she glared at Cadan, the blood in her veins turning to ice.“Your trap is set, Captain.How appropriate that you are to dig my grave here in a graveyard.”
???
Cadan drew a deep breath of the night air, ripe with the loamy scent of overturned earth and the putrid odor of decaying bones.A mist clung to the ground as tightly as death clung to this place, penetrating his skin with the hopelessness of the eternally damned.
Two of his men pretended to dig at the back of the tombstone, whilst Lady Fox and her babe remained in full sight before it.Hidden in the shadows of a batch of Ficus trees to his left stood two of his men, blades drawn, pistols primed, at the ready.
Unease prickled on Cadan’s neck.Not simply due to the mist and the eerie place, but because something wasn’t right.He didn’t know how he knew or why, but something was amiss.Perhaps ’twas Smity’s odd behavior.Cadan had never seen the man express any emotion save sullen peevishness, yet he seemed overly anxious when he’d arrived at the tavern.Odd.Perhaps Durwin’s greed had dribbled onto the bosun, eliciting an excitement over the treasure they would find.And then there was the strange observations of Lady Fox.
