“Keep him away from me, Mr. Hansom! He’s horrible! A brute! I won’t stay with him another moment!”
The Americans were confused and angered when Hansom only laughed at Danty’s mistress. Not only was he amused at her distress, he clutched at his sides with the force of his laughter.
Alexis was not stopped but she found it difficult to maintain her terror. She ran to another of her men and beseeched him with the same plea. His reaction was identical to Hansom’s. Alexis looked around at her crew. All work had ceased and there were secret smiles giving way to unrestrained laughter. The Americans were the only ones not smiling. She decided it was time to end the charade, though she enjoyed seeing the astonished faces of her men. Now they would get to see the astonishment on the faces of the Americans.
She returned to Hansom and smacked him soundly on the back. “All of you! Back to work! Mr. Hansom! Since when has anything I said ever been so funny?” She glared at him while he tried to choke back more laughter. The men had returned to work, but she knew they were all surreptitiously watching the five Americans for reactions.
As Alexis walked toward the men she did not realize the first dawning of truth was coming over them. With their eyes they followed her movements and they shared the same thought: the predator was gone but it was inherent in those long, lean legs approaching them in purposeful strides. They looked to one another as if to confirm their nagging suspicions that the whole world was turned on its head.
Alexis saw their looks and she smiled at each of them in turn. Hansom was directly behind her, still trying to maintain some composure. She poked him in the ribs with her elbow, never taking her eyes or her smile from the men in front of her.
“I usually run a pretty tight ship, gentlemen,” she said. “You will have to excuse our meager attempt to have some fun at your expense. I am happy you decided to stay with us.”
She held out her hand, but the men could not find one among them who would take the extended greeting. Alexis dropped her hand to her side, fully understanding their reluctance and confusion.
Hansom stepped forward brusquely. “Captain Danty has just given her welcome to you. I think you had better reciprocate.”
As expected when the truth was revealed, Alexis’s men had the enjoyment of five mouths simultaneously dropping open. A new roar of laughter shook the ship. Alexis heard the sound and she smiled. It had the sound of pride.
“You should do as Mr. Hansom suggests,” she said firmly. “Or I will have to throw you over the side as I did the other gentleman.”
Jaws snapped shut and hands were promptly extended. Alexis greeted them with the same grace she would have used in the drawing room of her home on Tortola. She assigned tasks to each new crew member but they all seemed reluctant to move. This she did not understand for she was used to having her orders obeyed.
She looked at them for an explanation and Ned Allison spoke up. “Captain Danty, I mean no disrespect but I feel as if I’m the victim of a joke. Are you really what Mr. Hansom told us?”
“I am. Everything you heard was true. The proof of the marks of the man I seek are not on my face. They are on my back. He murdered three people I loved. I intend to bring him to my justice.”
“And may we know who the man is now?” asked Ned.
“Of course,” she replied. “His name is Travers. Captain Gordon Travers of His Majesty’s Royal Navy.” There was a gasp of surprise from one of the men and Alexis turned to him. “You know of him, Mr. Jordan?”
“Yes,” he whispered. “I served with him for eight months, then I was transferred.” He started to turn, to show her Travers’s discipline on his back but she halted him.
“That will not be necessary. I am familiar with his handiwork and the work of his men. Mr. Hansom, find these men some shirts and get them a decent meal before they start work. Mr. Jordan, when you are through, report to me. I want to discuss what you may know of his present assignment.”
“Yes, Captain,” he answered quickly.
And that was how Jordan, Allison, Redland, Wilkes, and Ford joined theDark Lady.At the next unveiling, this time onAriel,these five were part of the laugher when Peters, Randall, and Davie Brandon stared at Alexis with slackened jaws and wide eyes.
After she had added twelve new members to her crew and was still no closer to finding Travers, Alexis made the decision to return to Roadtown and give the members of her original crew an opportunity to leave. Ten of them did, returning to their jobs on other Quinton vessels. Hansom was among those who left, satisfied Alexis had found a crew who was fiercely dedicated to her and skilled in battle strategy.
In his place Hansom recommended Kurt Jordan and Alexis agreed. Jordan, an experienced seaman with twenty-five years behind him proved himself a valuable addition. He worked tirelessly, poring over charts with Alexis, plotting new courses, and seeing that her orders were obeyed to the last detail. He amused her with stories of Charleston when she mentioned it had been a destination of hers at one time. At forty-five he was a rugged man, with hair bleached almost white by the sun and deep lines creasing his face around the mouth and eyes as if they had been etched there by repeatedly defying the biting spindrift.
Jordan’s reassuring image faded from Alexis’s mind when she heard Peach slip the approved manifest under her door. She stepped out of her bath, wrapping a towel around her, and picked it up. She glanced at Jordan’s scribbled corrections and placed the paper on her desk, assured everything was in order for tomorrow.
Going to London was a desperate gamble she hoped would give her the information she needed. During eighteen months of searching for Travers in dangerous ports, eluding French privateers as well as the British ones, it seemed as if he had disappeared completely. She and Jordan decided he must have been reassigned and she wanted to get word of this from the Admiralty in London as well as news from Frank Grendon about Quinton Shipping.
She dried herself briskly and discarded the towel. In her bureau she found her nightshirt. Invariably her thoughts drifted to Cloud as they always did when she readied for bed and slipped on the one concrete reminder of him. She liked to think of him now as she lay her head against the cool coverlet. It was only during the day when his memory came unbidden to her—when one of the men said or did something that made Cloud’s image leap to her mind—that she forced the memory back. But night was different. She touched the collar of the shirt lightly, enjoying the feel of the soft material beneath her fingers. She rested her head in the curve of her elbow, breathing in the scent of him that seemed to cling to the material. She had repaired the worn elbows and replaced the buttons several times but never considered parting with it. After Lafitte had returned her to Roadtown, she never wore the shirt except at night, deriving comfort from it as if she slept with him.
And there were nights she required his comfort, required the closeness and strength he had always been able to give to her. During the day, she missed his company, missed his conversation and guidance. At night she missed his love-making and the little intimacies of sharing a cabin and bunk with him. She fondly recalled the times Cloud had unwound her plaited hair and brushed it until it crackled and shone. She could almost feel his fingers gently tugging at the short hairs at the nape of her neck and the sensation was so real, and so powerful in its realness, that she shivered. She could clearly remember how his fingers would lazily shift their concentration from her hair to the contours of her shoulders and back; how they would be delicately massaging at first then become increasingly sensitive in their contact, exploring and sensuous.
At that point she would turn to face him and boldly offer her mouth, breasts, and hands for his pleasure and hers. There were occasions when he sought what she offered greedily, unable to resist what he thought his alone. There were also those occasions when he was able to draw out their pleasure, teasing her with his sensitive mouth. His lips would alight on a particularly receptive area below her ear, her neck, or her elbow; and she would tense in anticipation of his next soft contact. His lips would circle her nipple lazily, and her breast would swell and harden in response as if reaching for the rough moist flicks of his tongue.
Sometimes he would pull her onto his lap so that she straddled him and tease her still further with what she could feel straining against his trousers. She would squirm indelicately in this position, trying to make him break his rigid control, trying to make him understand as she narrowed the space between them that she was ready for him now. He would lower her to the floor or take her to their bed and the teasing would end as their naked bodies met. The union of their flesh was invariably exciting and heated, loving and satisfying. And later they would whisper phrases lovers universally share or sleep lightly, resting, until fresh desire woke them and urged them on to new pleasures.
The memories made Alexis restless. She shifted her position slightly, kicking aside part of the blanket until one leg stretched free of the confining wool. Cloud had always laughed at the way she kicked the blankets around, but he never seemed to mind when she pressed closer to him for warmth.
She wondered how he would be involved in the impending war. The Americans were at a loss to find any other alternative to the infringement of their rights. Did he know that after she found Travers she would come to him and fight beside him? Yes. He would know.
