She moved away from the door just as a tap came upon it. It opened, and she saw that Lord Cameron stood there, a lamp in his hands glowing cheerfully against the darkness. “Milady,” he murmured, bowing to her and handing her the light.
Unnerved, she felt her fingers tremble as she took it from him. “How did you know!” she gasped out.
“It is my ship. That is why I knew that there was no lamp here,” he told her.
He had known that there was no light, not that she was terrified beyond reason of the darkness.
“And,” he added, “your father has warned me that you do not care for the darkness.”
“Oh,” she murmured, lowering her lashes. Drat father! she thought. What had he been doing to her? Giving away her every secret, and selling her, body and soul! “Er…thank you,” she managed. Still, he hovered there in her doorway. Darkness hid his eyes and his features and she sensed him on different levels. Perhaps the Hawk had made her more attuned to the body. She felt the heat and energy of his presence, and breathed the scent of him. He smelled of very fine leather and good Virginia tobacco in a subtle and pleasant way. He was not at all, as a man, repulsive.
He was her husband, or so he claimed, she reminded herself, and was seized with a fierce shivering. He had given her a separate cabin, she quickly assured herself. He would not fall upon her, he would not demand his marital rights.
But perhaps he would!
He stepped through the doorway and looked about the cabin. “Is everything to your comfort?”
“Everything is fine!” she cried with vehemence. He looked her way, a smile curving into his lip. “You are very nervous, milady.”
“I have been greatly unnerved by your comments.”
“You mustn’t despair.” He came closer to her. She backed against the wall, turning her head from his, terrified that he meant to touch her. She had fallen from the arms of one charming rogue to another, she thought briefly, one a pirate and one a lord, and both far too arrogant and assured.
His knuckles grazed over her cheek. She barely held back a scream, and a soft gasp escaped her.
“You are my wife,” he said.
“I am not your wife!” She stared at him again, her eyes sizzling. “And don’t be so sure that all the pirates shall hang! I have come from London, sir, and I am far more abreast of certain news. I was in the mother country when Queen Anne died, when they reached over to Hanover for King George. The rights for trial upon men such as Hornigold and Blackbeard and—and the Silver Hawk—must come directly from the monarch. No new commissions have been granted by King George as yet. It was my understanding—”
“My dear lady, do tell me! Just what is your understanding, and from where do you draw upon it?”
“I do read the papers, Lord Cameron. And there was a great deal of talk in high places about the king offering a pardon to what pirates would surrender and swear an oath by a certain date. Perhaps these fellows will surrender, and there will be no need for murder.”
“Murder! You call the death of a pirate murder?”
He spoke with a certain ferocity, but she sensed that he was smiling beneath it. Was he laughing at her? Was he furious with her? She didn’t know.
“Bloodshed, Lord Cameron.”
“You are opinionated.”
“Yes! I am most opinionated, and very brash and outspoken, not at all ladylike, and surely not possessing qualities that you might want in a wife!”
“Ah! So you admit that you are my wife!”
“No!” she cried, alarmed, pressing ever backward against the paneling. She tried to straighten, to stand firm. He was a gentleman, a lord. He would not seize her, would he? “No! Why in God’s name are you doing this! I had thought you opposed to this barbaric treatment of marriage, of—”
“I have discovered myself quite pleased—Lady Cameron,” he said very softly. Chills swept along her spine. There was something about his speech…the soft, low, deeply modulated tone and cadence of it reminded her of the other. She was suddenly desperate for him to leave. She would have said anything just to be free of his presence then.
“Milord—” she whispered, but it was not necessary. He did not touch her, he moved away from her.
“There is ample oil for the lamp to burn until daylight,” he said softly.
Then he left her, closing the door behind himself.
Skye remained against the paneling for a long time. Then she slowly exhaled and, in time, pushed away from the wall and sank down to her bed. She lay there fully clothed and thought wretchedly of the morning, and of the night that had passed before. She could not forget the Hawk. She could not stop thinking of everything that had passed between them, and she could not stop feeling as if her very heart bled. She could not love such a man; she could not even care for him! But she did. Heat washed over her with memory. Yet how carelessly, how callously, he had cast her aside! He spoke of money and ransom endlessly, yet she had, in the end, been worthless to him. He was a pirate; she had been a whim, an adventure, and the adventure was over now.
The adventure was over.…
