Page 5 of Rears & Vices

That was it for Everard.

“For God’s sake, enough,” he spat. “Can we not let him have his sight?” He used his most authoritative, crisply squared captain’s voice, and pointed to the marine to the right of the prisoner. “You, there. Take off that damned blindfold.”

The marine—a sunburnt fellow—hesitated, damn him. “Sir?”

The pirate had gone still.

“If you please, Private.” Move your redcoat arse. Everard had some authority left; he might as well use it for aught.

“Aye, sir.” The marine leaned in, and he was the least vicious of the three chosen, apparently, because instead of slicing it, and probably a good chunk of the prisoner’s blond braid along with, he carefully picked at the knot.

Admiral Johnson sighed but said nothing. His secretary was still scrambling to reset his desk in any case. D’Arcy shifted in his seat, hands in pockets. And when the marine had the knot nearly there, Everard spoke once more.

“And the gag. He needs must speak his defence.”

“Aye, sir.”

The broad shoulders twitched again, the strained abdomen spasmed. The gag was spat vengefully out; the blindfold fell away.

Beside him, D’Arcy inhaled sharp.

Everard couldn’t breathe.

It couldn’t be. Absolutely, not in a thousand years was it he.

D’Arcy nudged at his knee, and whispered, frantic, “Ev. Ever. Hey. You’re pale as ash, man.”

He meant for Everard not to visibly react, not to obviously recognise the defendant. It was too late for that; he’d felt his jaw go slack.

It can’t be him, he thought idiotically. No.

The secretary had got his desk upright again, and began transcribing Everard’s words—his words, championing the prisoner’s welfare.

The pirate levelled his teary—teary, oh God—gaze on Everard. His face, in utter contrast to the white chest, was tan and smooth beneath an unkempt beard, with sharp angles all over, and hard blue eyes, too; but the lips weren’t hard at all but the most beautiful pair Everard had ever seen on a man—save one. This one.

Everard hadn’t listened for the man’s name in the charges. It maybe wasn’t even the same. But he knew it. Knew it well. Had thought of it too often in the past three years, alone in a swaying bunk.

Vitaliy. Vitya. Vitya…

“Thank you, de Anglada,” Vitaliy Gray said.

D’Arcy cursed beneath his breath, groaning. “God’s teeth.”

That was about the size of it.

“What?” The admiral shifted himself to glare, hand on a hip. “Anderson,” he barked. “You have prior acquaintance of the prisoner?”

Prior acquaintance. Did he ever. The problem, Everard thought, was that he in fact had a very good memory. It took no prompting at all to remember the thick, blond-fuzzed thighs pressing close and warm. Not even a glance, to remember wrapping his hands on either side of the tapered waist, to remember marvelling down at pale, furred valleys gleaming with sweat. Vitaliy Gray.

An eidetic memory, it was called. While extremely useful for sine, cosine, and tangents, ship’s logs, and correcting the purser on the occasional “slip-up” in crew pay—it was also absolutely, positively horrendous when trying to deny one’s acquaintance with a pirate and remembering instead the man’s prick stuffed inside him.

“Ah…” Everard cleared his throat. What to say?

Captains were recused out of courts martial for conflict of interest as a matter of course. But this morning they were at minimum: five officers. He could recuse himself now, and if he did, Vitaliy wouldn’t hang today.

“Anderson?” Admiral Johnson pressed, sounding impatient.

But certainly he would hang, just as soon as another officer could be had and the trial held de novo. It wouldn’t take long. A day. A week. Multiple offences and felony sodomy? He’d hang.