Never Trust a Pirate (16 page)

He was scarred. Not whip scars, as many sailors bore, but other, myriad wounds, some deep, some shallow, but bad enough to have left the marks of abuse on his strong, wiry body. But those were commonplace next to the strange picture that covered his left shoulder and snaked down his side.

A tattoo. She knew sailors often got them, just small blue marks on their arms or shoulders, but this was something very different. It seemed to be a cross between a snake and a dragon, and it was full of colors she’d never seen before. The scales seemed to glow in the gaslight, reds and blues and greens, moving as he moved, a sinuous dance across his muscles. She simply knelt there and stared at him in mingled awe and astonishment. And something else, something she refused to recognize. If he touched her again she wasn’t sure she could summon her moral outrage.

She scrambled to her feet. He must have felt her eyes on him, or maybe she’d made some involuntary sound. He turned around without putting on his shirt, and she could see that the tattoo reached over the top of his shoulder, one scaly, beautiful claw pulling at his skin. Oh, God, he had nipples, she suddenly realized. She’d forgotten that men had them as well, though in their case they were useless.
Useless, but fascinating. It had been too dark to see Tarkington, but his cool skin had been covered with pale fur, whereas Captain Morgan had nothing but a faint trace of dark hair disappearing beneath his breeches, and he looked warm enough to…

“That’s Ren,” he said in a conversational tone.

She knew she must look like an idiot as she stared at him blankly. “I beg your pardon?” She knew it sounded too upper-class once the words were out, but she had to hope he hadn’t noticed. Even though she suspected the captain noticed everything.

“My tattoo,” he said. “Her name is Ren. She comes from the Japan Islands. Their dragons are a bit different from ours.” He moved marginally closer to her. “Ren is an elegant specimen, but I should warn you; she eats little girls for breakfast.”

Good God, why should that start a strange warmth in her belly? She rallied herself, belatedly, trying to draw her gaze away from the mesmerizing dragon. “Then it’s a good thing there are no little girls in this household.”

His smile could almost be called predatory, and he still held his fresh shirt in his large, capable hands. “I’m not sure Ren knows the difference. Though she does like being petted.”

All right, this was getting to be too unnerving.
“I didn’t realize we were trading with Japan.”

“England wasn’t at the time. When we sailed there we weren’t under the flag of any country.”

“You mean you were a pirate.”

His mouth curved up in a faint grin. “I prefer
privateer
. You’re very knowledgeable about my career. Did you have any other questions?”

He was close, too close. If she turned to run he could simply reach out with his long, strong arms and stop her. But if she backed away from him he’d know she was scared. “When were you there?” she said, then realized a maid didn’t ask such questions. Nor stand there like an idiot staring at him. Remembering that when she was
young she’d wanted to run away with pirates or the gypsies, and here she had both in one irresistible package. But she didn’t have those daydreams any longer, she reminded herself.

The captain didn’t appear shocked at her impertinent question. “Five years ago. Just before I took up with Russell Shipping.”

He made it sound as if he’d been her father’s partner, not his employee. Though indeed, she remembered her father’s particular affection for this one captain of his. At least until the end, when he’d suddenly withdrawn his command and left that cryptic note. “Never trust a pirate…”

He came closer, so close that she backed away without thinking about it, almost knocking over the bucket again. “Aren’t you going to ask me the next question?”

“What next question?” she said dazedly. There was no place she could move, except forward, toward him, toward the warm, seductive length of him. She was so tempted. When he kissed her she forgot everything, her rage, her sorrow, her doubts. All that existed was him, and God help her, she wanted him.

What was wrong with her?

He leaned forward, his mouth almost brushing her ear, and her entire body felt as if it were on fire. “Did it hurt,” he whispered. For a moment she thought he was asking her a question, and then she realized his meaning. She jerked away from him, trying to pull her scattered brain together, and she met his hooded gaze with the best version of limpid interest she could summon. Not this man, she reminded herself.

“Well, did it?” she asked. “They do tattoos with needles, don’t they?”

There was just the faintest light of amusement in his dark eyes. “It hurt like bloody hell.”

“Then why did you do it?” She should stop this conversation immediately, grab the bucket, beg his pardon, and run like the wind. Instead her feet were frozen to the floor.

“Pain isn’t something to be avoided at all costs, Mary—that’s the name you’re using, isn’t it? In fact, there are those who can find a certain pleasure in pain.”

“I cannot imagine it. Sir,” she added. What did he mean,
that’s the name you’re using
? What did he think she was?

His smile was fleeting, disturbing, a flash of white teeth in his dark face. “If you’re a good girl sometime I might show you,” he said softly.

Good luck to that
, she thought grimly. She had to get away from him, as quickly as she could. She’d always been able to put importunate young men in their place—she certainly should have been able to handle a retired pirate.

But this man was different from the London beaus, and he was about as easy to handle as one of the wild jungle cats she’d seen in the London Zoological Society. He fascinated her, drew her, frightened her, when she was a woman who refused to be frightened. But she couldn’t make herself leave him. Maybe it was that unsatisfactory time in Tarkington’s bed that was suddenly making her think about things she shouldn’t be thinking about. Such as whether he would feel the same between her legs, if he’d be harder, if he’d be larger, if he’d know how to awaken her longings instead of driving them away as Tarkington had done. She already knew the answers to those questions. He’d pressed against her, that hard, rigid part of him, so very different from her limited experience. And she’d felt more pleasure from his mouth than she’d received from all of Tarkington’s fumblings. She could suddenly see why some women sought out the degrading experience. For the sake of kisses like that it would almost be worth it. Almost.

She could feel her face flush.

“Whatever are you thinking about?” he said with a soft laugh. “Whatever it is, it must be quite decadent to make you blush like that. Would you rather I put on my shirt?”

He was so close she could see the tattoo perfectly, stretched across his golden skin with gold-tipped scales. So close she could feel the heat from his body, so close she could simply sway toward him and she’d be in his arms. She wanted him to kiss her again, she wanted him to touch her again.

She was crazy, she told herself. Tarkington’s efforts shouldn’t make her think of the captain in the same light. There’d be no reason she’d ever want to do that again unless she had to. Marital relations were just the faintest bit unpleasant if not for the snuggling before and after, and there hadn’t been enough of either. She was hardly eager to try with someone new. The captain didn’t look like a man who snuggled.

In fact, he was a man who might very well have betrayed and murdered her father, a man who was disturbingly shirtless in a bedroom in the middle of the night, watching her with unreadable dark eyes.

She started forward, but he was too close, his eyes glittering and wary in the darkness. “Beg pardon, sir,” she said breathlessly, reaching for her accent and knowing she fell short. “I don’t know what got into me. I didn’t meant to fall asleep. I was tired—I just closed my eyes for a moment. Please don’t tell Mrs. Crozier.”

“Mrs. Crozier answers to me,” he said, not moving. “You may come to my bed any time you please.”

She took a deep breath. “I’m a good girl, sir.”

“And I do prefer bad girls,” he said with a sigh. “But good girls don’t lie. And they don’t move into a man’s house and pretend to be a maid.”

A moment of shocked silence in the darkness, and her irrational longing vanished into cold fear. “What makes you think I’m pretending anything?”

“A maid doesn’t speak like a toff sometimes, a Geordie the next, and a Cockney for good measure. A maid doesn’t have your lack of
stamina or your dull but expensive clothes or your dislike of being told what to do. And a maid would know how to kiss. I could teach you.”

“Why?” The question came out before she could stop herself.

He laughed. “Don’t be ingenuous, my sweet. I don’t kiss strange women on the docks of Devonport unless I want to fuck them.”

Her cheeks flamed at the crude word, at the image. He remembered. Of course he did!
Steady on
,
girl
, she told herself. This was a tricky game she was playing, and she had to watch her step. “I told you, sir, I’m a good girl. And why would I pretend to be something I’m not?”

“I have no idea. That’s why I’m asking you.”

She took a deep breath. She’d thought this through ahead of time, prepared for questions. “It’s simple enough, sir,” she said, favoring her Northern tones. “My mother was from Lancashire and me father was from Shepherd’s Bush, and I worked for a lady who gave me some of her cast-off clothes and was helping me learn to better meself, including my way of talking. If it weren’t for her husband sniffing around me skirts I would be well on my way to being a lady’s maid by now.”

“Maybe he recognized his wife’s skirts.” He was entertaining himself, she thought, irritated. This was a game to him. The odd, sensual languor in the air was simply part of his entertainment, the bastard. He continued, “You don’t like it when Mrs. Crozier or Miss Haviland tell you what to do.”

“I don’t like Mrs. Crozier or Miss Haviland,” she said, then could have bit her tongue, but he simply looked amused. He moved back, and suddenly Maddy could breathe again, though the strange tension inside her still held.

“I’m not sure I blame you. But being in service means being told what to do.”

“That’s what me mother said,” she replied pertly. “I’ve always been a bit impertinent. I need to work on it.”

For a moment he was silent as he considered her. “I don’t tend to sleep with my servants,” he said in a soft voice, out of the blue, and she could feel her face flame.

“Then why did you kiss me?”

“Some temptations are too difficult to resist, and I don’t tend to resist even the easy ones. Come to my bed and we can pretend you’re exactly what you say you are.”

For a moment she was struck dumb, a rare occurrence. He was appalling, bewitching. She should slap his face, but she didn’t dare touch him.

He was watching her, and she would have given almost anything to see what lay behind his enigmatic expression. Was he going to let her go or take her back to that soft, enticing bed, cover her with his strong body, push that hard part of him between her legs, kiss her into senselessness…? Her entire body tensed at the thought, flooding with heat rather than ice, which made no sense. She wanted it. She wanted him to kiss her again, to touch her, take her, to give her no choice.

Had he read her mind? Could he see in her eyes the need that plagued her? He reached out one hand to cradle her face, his thumb gently caressing her skin, and she wanted to turn her face into that hand, to bury herself in his body, lose herself, forget everything. She held very still, unwilling to pull away, unwilling to go forward.

Finally he spoke. “If you won’t come to my bed then go to your own,” he said, dropping his hand and moving out of the way.

That wasn’t disappointment flooding her, she thought. It was relief, though she didn’t make the mistake of thinking she was safe yet. She picked up the bucket, tossing his ruined shirt inside. She edged toward the door, carefully, and now there was real amusement on his face, his eyes glinting in the darkness.

“Are you afraid of me, little girl?” he murmured. “The big bad pirate, plundering and pillaging? I’ve given that all up for Lent.”

She didn’t smile. He hadn’t truly dismissed her, and she was uncertain what to do. There was a long silence, and then he stepped back. “I’m going to bed,” he said, reaching for the fastening on his breeches. “You can stay there and watch me disrobe if you like. You’re no housemaid, and sooner or later you’re going to tell me who you are, and you’re going to be naked with me. Beneath me. Or above me, in front of me, any position I can think of. But for now you’d better run like hell.”

Finally,
finally
common sense hit her. And Maddy ran.

Shit. Shite. Shit. Shite
. The words went round in her head, a litany of obscenity that would have pleased her no end if she weren’t so disgusted with herself. She’d never been sure which term she liked more,
shit
or
shite
. The stable hands had used
shite
with abandon, the sailors seemed to prefer
shit
, and Nanny Gruen had washed Maddy’s mouth out with soap the first time she’d dared utter it when she’d dropped a rock on her foot. In fact, she could still taste the nasty, almond-scented stuff, and she’d hated almonds ever since.

But it was a damned fine word, particularly when she’d made such a mess of things. And here she’d been so cocky, thinking she was doing such a brilliant job of her masquerade, when all she had to show for it was blistered feet and hands, a suspicious employer, and not a damned bit closer to the truth than she’d been when she’d left Somerset.

Not to mention the fact that she’d been ready to forget everything for the touch of those sure hands. Shit!

Nanny had warned her when she’d used the word
damn
or
blast
. She knew other words as well—her education had been very thorough—and there were worse ones she kept for special occasions, like the one the captain had used. But that word was dangerous, it conjured up physical intimacies, not anger, and she couldn’t use it. She really shouldn’t use any of those words. In fact Bryony, whose own language could get a bit salty, would often berate Maddy for her
ability to curse, and she’d tried to behave herself, particularly when she was traipsing through society in search of a proper husband. Things had changed with her father’s death, and she’d been confused, hurt, and above all, angry. She was beginning to cherish those words she’d heard and hardly begun to use.