Caution to the Wind (11 page)

“What she means, sir, is that we aren’t related by blood,” explained Neil with an exasperated sigh. “Her father took me in and raised me until he left for the fight. For the last couple of years, it’s been just Mandy and me. She’s every bit a sister to me even though we aren’t related. I’m sure the confusion in her response is because she couldn’t figure out which answer would seem less like a lie.” He laughed. “She’s not very good at deception.”

“Like hell she isn’t!”

Both Amanda and Neil jumped at his outburst. Will ran a hand through his hair while he fought to regain control. He centered his gaze on her face because every time he let his attention slip to her narrow waist and long shapely limbs, his concentration crumbled. If he could barely hold a thought with her in the room, his ship would be in chaos if he let her run loose among his men.

But what to do with her? He grimaced, recalling his conversation with Doctor Miller. He could hardly just drop her off at their next port of call and leave her to fend for herself. She couldn’t be more than, what? Seventeen? Eighteen?

“I suppose you’re not as young as you claimed, either?” He held his breath, waiting to see if she would reveal her true age.

“No, I’m twenty-one.” Defiance flashed in her eyes, and he couldn’t blame her. It had been a rather ill mannered question.

But twenty-one? He would never have guessed she could be past her teens. However, it had taken spirit and courage to do what she did, face what she faced in her short time aboard ship. The rebel in him admired her pluck, despite her deception. He sat back in his chair, staring at his two charges, not sure what course to take. He had never been so flummoxed in his life.

“Captain, lone ship off the port bow,” Buck said from the doorway.

Will stood, a sigh of relief escaping his lips. The English merchants were something he could handle, and he didn’t think he had ever been so grateful for their appearance. “I’m needed on deck,” he said to no one in particular. To Neil he added, “Get to your station.”

Neil flew out the door in a shot.

Amanda turned to follow, but Will grabbed her arm. “Not you.”

“Excuse me?” she asked, bewilderment reflected in her wide eyes. “The doctor won’t need me for awhile, but I should at least get out of these wet clothes.”

“I want you to stay in my quarters where it’s safe,” Will said, his voice making it clear it was a command not a request. “You can dry off with one of my towels and wrap yourself in a blanket until your clothes dry.” He tried to ignore the image of her lithe, naked body wrapped in his bed sheets.

“Safe? Why?” A red flush crept up from the base of Amanda’s neck to her temple. Had she been holding a similar image?

Amanda tugged at her arm, but Will didn’t let go. Her stormy green eyes were only inches from his. Her blonde hair, curled about her cheeks and forehead, invited him to brush it back. How had this delicate creature survived on his ship for so long?

“Because women don’t belong in a fight,” he said without thinking, noting with some surprise that he didn’t say they didn’t belong on a
ship
. “It may be some time before we return to Baltimore. I will return you to your family, but in the meantime, it’s my duty to protect you.”

“Protect me? It’s your duty to protect all your crew. Why should I be any different?” She stared up at him, green eyes blazing, and issued what amounted to a challenge. “I am a member of your crew, aren’t I?”

Will ran his hand across the back of his neck. She had a point. She did the work of two men with her role as the doctor’s assistant and his personal cook, and her performance had been exemplary. But looking into her eyes, Will couldn’t block out the undeniable fact that she was female.

Amanda stretched to her full height, yet her forehead only came to the top of his collar. An attempt to intimidate him perhaps? His pulse quickened, but it wasn’t intimidation that stirred his blood.

The pressure proved too much for Will. He had a potential prize off the port bow. He really had no idea how far off, yet he couldn’t bring himself to care now that all the repressed desire of the last few weeks flooded his veins.

He struggled to refocus his thoughts. Did the English ship look low in the water, implying they were heavy with cargo? Did the
Amanda
have the advantage? Had the other ship struck her colors, or did they turn to fight? None of those concerns mattered anymore. If he was to have any hope of composing himself and taking charge of his ship, he needed to take action.

He lowered his face to hers and inhaled her soft scent. She smelled like a woman. How could he not have noticed that before? Mustering every ounce of self-control he still possessed, Will brushed his lips against Amanda’s. He couldn’t risk more than that. He would be needed on deck soon, and it would be all too easy to get carried away, to lose himself in her.

Amanda didn’t close her parted lips when Will caressed them with his own. She stiffened, but just for a moment, when he pulled her to him. Then she melted in his arms, molding her body against his.

He ran his hands up her arms and trailed his fingers across her neck before cupping her face in his hands. She rewarded him with a soft sound, half moan, half whimper, in the back of her throat.

He would have stopped if she had shown the slightest resistance. She didn’t.

Amanda kissed him back, inexpertly perhaps, but there could be no doubt about her intent.

With a sigh, he pulled away before passion consumed them both and he lost all sense of duty. She wobbled for a moment then settled herself against the edge of his desk, a faraway look in her eyes.

“When I get back, we’ll talk about how to return you to your family.” He snatched a key from his desk and left the room without looking back.

Chapter Eight

Amanda steadied herself against the hard edge of the captain’s desk. She brought hesitant fingertips to her tingling lips. The captain had kissed her. Why had he done that?

The harsh click of a key in the lock brought her back to her senses, and anger swept away her confusion like a spring tide. The man had locked her in his quarters!

“What the…!” she yelled at the heavy oak door.

She still couldn’t bring herself to swear even after more than a month of living with sailors, but her mind easily filled in the missing words. She strode to the door and gave it a kick. Pain radiated through her toes and up her calf. She cursed her own impulsiveness, the door and the captain—all in a single breath. Toes still smarting, she turned to pace the limited space afforded by her makeshift prison.

“I am just as much a part of this crew as any man aboard.” She advanced on one wall, spun on her heel, and hobbled the five paces that brought her up against the door. “More than some.” She shook her fist at it.

She pivoted on her heel again, grinding the momentary shame she felt at such an uncharitable thought into the rough planks. “But I do two jobs,” she informed her own conscience and the captain’s empty chair.

She spun and did another turn about the room. “Granted, I’m terrible at fighting, and I hate every minute of it,” she stopped and stared at his chair, seeing his implacable face instead of the chair’s slatted back, “but the doctor told me, more than once, how indispensable I’ve been to him.”

She hobbled once more about the room.

When she had completed the small circuit, she waggled a finger at the phantom captain. “And where would you be without my cooking? Probably dead at the bottom of the sea from burnt toast and charcoaled eggs. That’s where you’d be!”

She covered an unladylike snort with the back of her hand. Scolding an empty chair would get her nowhere.

“The captain and his stupid rules.” Amanda fell into his chair with a thump and crossed her arms over her chest.

She hadn’t changed from the person she had been an hour ago. Just because he knew her secret didn’t make her any less competent, any less useful, any more
female
. The word reverberated in her skull. Never did she think she would come to despise who she was, but right now she would give anything to cast off the anchor that her own sex had become.

She had been a valuable member of his crew, both as cook and the doctor’s assistant. She had! She let her head roll back and stared up at the ceiling. Men passed over her, preparing for battle, and slivers of daylight streaming in from the deck above flashed on and off, on and off, on and off.

Why couldn’t he see he needed her?

His parting words drifted back to her, and she stopped seeing the flashes of light and darkness, stopped hearing the running footsteps and excited shouts of the men. What did he mean by take her back to her family? She had no family to which to return. Did the captain think Neil had lied when he said their father was dead?

The skin around her eyes tightened until she thought her eyeballs might sink into her skull, leaving her a soulless shell. Amanda took a few deep breaths and rubbed her temples. Focus. She needed to focus.

She had been locked in his quarters, a virtual prisoner during a battle with an English ship off the bow no less! She set the side of her index finger against her lips. She had once heard Buck tell a young sailor to keep a close eye on a group of captives because, as he put it, “a prisoner’s primary duty is to escape.”

“Well, then,” Amanda pushed herself out of the captain’s chair, “that shall be my first priority too.”

After that, she would find a way to make the captain see her worth. But for now, she would fight one battle at a time.

She strode to the oak door and rapped on it, her knuckles making a dull thump against the solid surface. With her light frame, it would be foolhardy to try to break it down. Perhaps if she knocked harder she might convince someone to open it for her. No. Before a battle, everyone would be on deck. No one would hear even if she pounded on the door until her fists were bloody.

Except, perhaps, Doctor Miller.

He would be busy, readying his equipment and preparing the common area for casualties. Amanda put her ear to the door in a futile attempt to detect sounds of activity beyond her prison. She might be able to yell loud enough for him to hear, but in all likelihood, the captain had already told the doctor she would not be attending him.

What more had he taken the time to share?

She straightened and rested her fists on her hips. Well then, if she couldn’t break the door down, nor enlist help from the outside, she would have to find a third avenue of escape.

She studied the lock...copper, faint patina about the edges, familiar design. The room about her faded, replaced by the memory of an eleven-year-old Neil standing triumphant in the hallway outside his bedroom. She had threatened to lock him in his room. He dared her to try, claiming he didn’t need a key to unlock the door. When she told him she didn’t believe him, he proved it to her by showing her how to do it. It took a couple of tries, but with Neil’s teaching, she mastered it soon enough.

“Thank you. Neil,” Amanda whispered, for once grateful for her brother’s antics.

Amanda scanned the captain’s quarters for something long and thin but sturdy enough to do the job. Her gaze landed on the brown and white turkey quill in a silver stand at the edge of his desk. No, the hollow tip would break too easily and could jam in the lock. Although he deserved it, she’d hate to have to explain to Captain Stoakes how she had broken his lock and his favorite quill.

Then she remembered a metal instrument—V-shaped and about the size of her hand—she’d often seen lying atop the pile of charts on his desk. One of its pointed arms might be thin enough to slide into the keyhole.

Amanda strode to the desk and rummaged through chaotic stacks of charts, resisting the urge to tidy the captain’s belongings while she searched. She rifled through the papers a second time, still failing to turn up the mysterious device.

“It’s got to be here somewhere!” She yanked open the flat middle drawer on his desk and shoved a stack of parchment to the side.

“Ouch!” Amanda brought her finger to her lips and sucked at a spot of blood forming at the tip. “For a man who runs a tight ship, you could do with a little personal organization,” she mumbled, still sucking on her sore finger.

She pulled out the item she had been seeking and held it up to the light streaming in from the high windows. The slim shape might do well, but would it be strong enough? She tugged at the tip of one metal arm.

“I hope that was supposed to happen.” She scrunched her nose at the single arm that had come off in her hand.

“Oh well, no hope for it now.” She shut the drawer and tucked the remains of the instrument into the waistband of her breeches.

Kneeling before the door, she inserted the slender, metal arm into the keyhole. Her hands trembled, partly from the delicacy of the task, partly from residual anger, mostly, she admitted with some reluctance, from the memory of his kiss.

She probed into the dark recess. With her plan of escape in motion, her anger receded, leaving room for other more perplexing thoughts. Her lips tingled anew with the memory of the warmth of his mouth on hers.

She had never been kissed by a man. Although some of her more adventurous friends had said it could be quite enjoyable, that didn’t even began to describe it. A picnic at the lake on a warm summer afternoon was enjoyable. Or a good book in front of the fire on a winter’s eve. Or…well, a million other mundane things, his kiss not included.

Her hand stilled. His kiss was like the warmth of the sun on her face.

Amanda pounded her fist against the door.
Focus
.

Why had he kissed her? Kissed her and then told her they would talk about putting her ashore after the battle? He said he would return her to her family, but the only living relative she had was aboard this ship. But then he knew that, didn’t he?

She scowled and rattled the pointed metal around in the darkened hollow of the keyhole. Perhaps he meant he would find a way to return her to the farm where she could waste away, scratching out a meager existence among her few remaining chickens. She stabbed at the inside of the lock. Maybe he thought she could marry one of her snaggle-toothed neighbors. Anything to get her, a
woman
, off his ship. He acted as though her sex posed a bigger threat than the English!