This was what happened when a man made a naval captain his second-in-command. Kerr’s brother had sailed his first and last voyage aboardThe Lady Serpent.
His legs knocked into something.
He glanced down.
They had reached the upholstered sofa set at the fire; Culross held Meghan still. He could not put her down. As long as she was in his arms, no harm could befall her.
“He will not answer you, August, because he will not tell you that he attempted numerous times, but I forbade it.”
“Youforbade it, madam?”
“I did.”
The minx didn’t hear the rhetorical there. She wouldn’t have cared if she did. That was one of the things Culross lo—
His arms convulsed around her. “His loyalty is mine.”
Some color had returned to her cheeks. Good. Otherwise, he would be forced to shed the blood of another and tender it to her.
“As your future countess, am I not owed the same? Would you not want the second-in-command of your ship, the second only behind you, who stands between me and any risk, give me that same fealty?”
Meghan did not understand Culross’s call for allegiance first from Greyhold mattered not so that Culross held power over Meghan, but so that Culross knew everything about the spitfire in his arms, and everything that befell her, so he could keep her safe.
“No,” he gritted out. “I would have him answer to me.” The muscle of his jaw rolled. “And know that only if I die aboard this bloody vessel and my lifeless body is buried beneath the sea will he stand as I once did for you. You above all others.”
The man whom they discussed as if he were not present stood, arms clasped, behind him.
Meghan released a weary sigh and rested her cheek against Culross’s chest. In the mirror, he caught the slight apology she mouthed to the other man.
“August…” Meghan pleaded.
She would beg him.
Meghan caressed his cheek. “Please—he only tried to help.”
Twice.
For another.
Another one of those anguish-filled moans. Small like before, but this one slightly strained and a credit to the lady’s poor acting skills.
It turns out he had part of a heart after all, and that bothersome thing insisted Culross not shatter the lady’s illusion of some grand performance.
Culross gritted his back molars. “See a fresh bath, hot water, linens and mint is delivered,” he said in less stern tones for the second-in-command. “Fresh bedding. You are to steer, Greyhold.”
The quartermaster bowed and left.
What had happened to his iron-clad restraint? What in Culross had weakened to the point that he would bend as she begged him for another?
He took a breath—for her benefit.
And his.
It cost him everything to lay her down upon the Chippendale sofa. “Bloody hell, Meghan,” he said, shrugging out of his cloak with care so as not to spray water at her. “You look like death.”
She waggled her eyebrows. “It is a wonder I was never a Diamond of the First Water.”
“You are the damn sun to them.” His features grew dark; Culross hung his cloak on the nearest wall hook.
