“Hmm. Something like that.” He leaned back against his desk and crossed arms over his chest.
“Tactics no gentleman should employ.”
“Again with the gentleman.”
Sorrow claimed her heart for this man. Something terrible had happened to him. “You could be, you know.”
“Too late for that, I’m afraid.” He gripped the golden emblem hanging around his neck.
“Someone betrayed you.” She sensed it, though she knew not how.
He snapped his gaze to her. “An easy guess, Miss. Everyone has been betrayed by someone.”
“I have not.”
He studied her, then pushed from his desk and walked to look out the stern windows.
Bandit followed and settled into a patch of warm sunlight.
“Then you are most fortunate,” he said, still gazing out upon the sea. “But why should I expect otherwise when you have been raised by parents who love you and have a family who cares for you?”
His words floated through the cabin in a dark mist of sorrow and anger. She swallowed a lump of emotion. This man had been terribly hurt. She knew it. But what to do? How to reach him?
He spun to face her. “I saw you in the market with them. You were giving food and clothing to the poor. Why? Why would a dreaded pirate give anything away for free?”
Shock buzzed through Emeline. “To help the unfortunate, of course. To give them hope.”
“Pish!” He snorted. “You give them food for a day or two and then leave. How is that hope?”
The deck heaved and shouts echoed from above. Emeline gripped the edge of the desk to steady herself, debating whether to bother telling this volatile man about Jesus. “We give people hope by telling them there is a life beyond this one, an eternal paradise, and a God who offers them a way there through His Son.” There, she’d said it. Come what may.
Instead of the fury and disgust she’d endured from many people she’d witnessed to, this man merely stared at her as if a halo had appeared atop her head. Bandit, however, leapt up and down on the window ledge with glee. Smart monkey.
Blake frowned. “I didn’t take you for a fool, Miss. Only fat wits believe in myths. For even if this God of yours exists, He takes no care for His creation.”
Emeline raised her brows and gestured to the Ring on his finger. “This from a man who believes a Ring has magical powers. And I’m the fool?”
Fury stiffened his jaw. He rubbed the stubble on it, eyes narrowing.
She swallowed hard. Perhaps she’d finally overstepped.
b
Hang it! This woman and her brazen tongue. She dared call him a fool! The man who held her life in his hands. How utterly surprising…completely baffling…andquite refreshing. Not once had she used her feminine wiles to seduce him. Not once had she played the coquette in order to gain her freedom. If he were honest, it might have worked, for he found himself completely enchanted by her—a rather foreign sensation.
And that must never be. He touched the Ring, studying her. Too much was at stake for him to be distracted by a woman—anywoman.
“I will set you free on the first civilized island we encounter, Miss.” He poured more rum, finding he needed its numbing effect at the moment. “Until then, please remain in your cabin where your needs will be provided.”
He could tell from the look in her eyes she didn’t know whether to believe him or not. No matter. The sooner he was rid of this mystifying woman, the better.
b
Emeline emerged from below deck to a glorious salty breeze that caressed her skin and ran cool fingers through her hair. She’d felt the brig slowing, heard the orders to lower and furl sail, then detected the mighty splash of the anchor. Yet she’d been unable to determine where they were from the limited scope of her porthole. Now, closing her eyes, she raised her face to the warm sunlight, relishing the feel of it—of being outside once again. Until Finn all but shoved her from behind.
“Quit dawdling, wench.”
She stumbled across the deck, only then seeing that they had anchored in Basseterre Bay of St. Kitts Island. She recognized the port immediately, for she’d been there before with her family. Hope sprang in her bosom, a hope that had long since dwindled from spending two days alone in her cabin. Loneliness had done a dire work on her, torturing, taunting, and filling her head with thoughts of never seeing her family again. Yet now…perhaps Captain Keene intended to keep his promise, after all. If so, a surprising turn of events.
