The Captain's Caress (17 page)

“It might not be so terrible,” she said, but in the pit of her stomach a painful knot formed.

“It would be much worse than you imagine, but you don’t have to worry about that. You’ll probably never meet him.”

“Why not?” Summer slewed around to face Brent, eagerly looking into his eyes. “I thought you said he was going to ransom me. That’s what you want, isn’t it?”

“It was at first.” Brent’s countenance was expressionless, and hope died in Summer’s breast.

“Do you think he will send someone, or come himself?” Her voice was flat, unemotional.

“I’d be able to answer that question if I knew why he wanted to marry you, but I can’t think of any reason he’d be so anxious to get you back that he would travel three thousand miles. He’ll most likely send Brinklow with an offer.” Brent’s eyes warmed with desire as they rested on Summer’s bare shoulders. “If Brinklow tells him what you really look like, he won’t believe he’s getting anything but damaged goods.”

Summer blushed scarlet and bit her lip.

“Since Gowan knows I’m the one who’s holding you, he would guess how I mean to take revenge,” he added.

“And you didn’t disappoint him, did you?” It galled Summer to be called damaged goods. She rose to select a gown. “You’ve effectively ruined me for any husband.”

“Except myself.” Two words, but at last he had given her some indication that he might care for her. Summer’s resistance collapsed, and she admitted that she was already helplessly in love with him.

“No one wants a debauched woman,” she answered, trying to keep her voice calm. “Not even as a servant.”

“But you’re not a debauched woman to me.”

“Why do you keep taunting me!” she flung at him, naked despair in her voice. “You know you can’t wait to be rid of me. There’re only two reasons you come near me: lust and revenge. You must be sorry I’m not a simple native wench you can put ashore at the next port and then forget.”

“Who could stop me from doing that, treating you
just like a simple native wench?”
he said, his voice like iron. “And what would prevent me from forgetting that I ever set eyes on you?”

“Nothing,” she said piteously, and the fight went out of her. “Nothing and no one.” Her shoulders drooped as she was overcome by the futility of her situation.

“I don’t intend to dump you anywhere,” said Brent, as he ceased buttoning his shirt. “You are lovely and you have a most inviting body.”

“How easy it must be not to think of anything except your lusts,” she reflected rather sadly. “That way you have nothing to regret. Unfortunately, I have other matters to consider, and there are lots of things I regret.”

“I can think of only one.”

“What’s that?” she asked, unable to still her tongue.

“That there is so much between us you find difficult to forget.”

Summer’s heart lurched painfully in her chest, hope once again tormenting her. Surely he wouldn’t keep saying these things if he didn’t mean them, but if he did, why did he continue to use her so cruelly?

“I’ll
never
forget what lies between us no matter what happens,” she announced passionately. “It may not be of much importance to you, but it is to me.”

“Anything can be forgotten or forgiven,” he said bracingly. “All you need to do is put it out of your mind. Then you can start over with a clean slate.”

“There are some things a person never forgets,” Summer proclaimed angrily. She snatched up her gown and drew it over her head.

“Nonsense. You only remember unpleasant things if you want to.”

“Trust a man to come up with a stupid remark like that.” Summer pulled irritably at her gown to settle it into place. “You act as though forgetting involves nothing more than turning your back.”

“You can do it if you want to,” he insisted, a note of entreaty in his voice. “Here, let me help you before you rip your gown.”

“Just keep your hands on the buttons,” she snapped impatiently, but she stood still as he deftly assisted her, though her thoughts were in utter chaos. She wanted desperately to believe him, yet she was afraid to. There was so much to hope for if she could trust him; there was so little to live for if she couldn’t.

Chapter 14

Summer couldn’t sleep. Brent’s words kept ringing in her ears, needling her until her brain was seething with speculation. She distrusted his every utterance, but his assurances continued to spark tiny flames of hope in her heart. She told herself that she was an idiot to heed such tempting beacons of hope, but every time she lay back to sleep, unbidden dreams of blissful tomorrows made their way into her consciousness to fret and bedevil her.

It was hard not to think of Brent when only a black, hopeless future lay ahead. She couldn’t go back home, and even if there was no possibility that Brent wanted her, she could never love the earl or anyone else.

Something told her there must be a way out, a path to happiness, if only she could find it. She couldn’t give up hope just when she’d glimpsed the bliss to be found in the arms of a very special man. It would have been far better if she had gone straight to the earl without meeting Brent; she would have been miserable, but she would never have known this rapturous torment, this agony of being in love.

You’re a simpleton to place any dependence on words spoken only to calm you, she told herself angrily. You’d better be giving some serious thought to your prospects before you find yourself forced to do anything just to stay alive. Mooning over a brute of a pirate is a sure way to end up with no future at all.

In spite of Summer’s attempts to sustain her anger by enumerating Brent’s iniquities, she was forced to admit that she was hopelessly in love with him. That awful realization made her feel like a wandering soul willed by unfeeling Fate to worship the agent of her own destruction. Her anger rekindled every time she thought of the humiliation she had known at his hands, but then she pictured him as he moved about the ship, looking like a young god, and everything else became meaningless. While envisioning his muscled torso or his handsome, sun-bronzed face, all she could remember was the comfort she found in his arms.

She would not give up just yet, not as long as they were at sea and there was still time for him to learn to love her. She forced herself to smile even though she felt like throwing herself on the bed and crying her heart out. She might
be
desperate, but her pride would not allow her to advertise that fact.

Moodily Summer stared out the window. Multicolored stars distributed by a prodigal hand littered the dark velvet sky, and a soft breeze gently caressed her cheeks, cooling some of the turbulence within her. She rested her chin on folded arms as she gazed absently at the moon. Riding low on the horizon, it cast a pale yellow trail across the rippling waves, its hypnotic presence lessening her tension and easing her fears. Soon the soothing waves of sleep began to lap at the edges of her mind, beckoning her into the blissful relief of unconsciousness.

You’re acting like a hopeless romantic, she told herself as she sank lower and lower into a subliminal world. When he smiles at you, you forget every cruel, degrading thing he’s ever done. And you let his occasional flashes of humanity deceive you, though he’s proved over and over again that he’s an unfeeling monster. Any man who would force his attentions on a helpless young woman night after night can’t be trusted, not
ever.
He never balks at embarrassing you in front of the crew, he cruelly abuses you if you dare to disagree with him, he laughs at you when you make a mistake. He’s a brute and a bully, he’s obsessed with his bestial lusts, and he’s only nice to you occasionally because you’re pretty to look at. If you think for one minute that this experience can be turned into an enduring love, then you’re witless enough to deserve the dreadful fate in store for you.

Feeling that she had effectively dealt with her tendency to depend upon such a mountain of conceit, Summer sighed and sank further into her stupor. As the last anchors of inhibiting consciousness were unleashed, the image of Brent’s laughing face floated before her mind’s eye. Then it haunted her dreams like a gadfly, always flitting beyond her grasp, laughing at her efforts to capture it or to escape its bothersome presence.

The door swung open without a sound. Brent stood framed in the opening, through which a shaft of light fell to illuminate Summer’s shadowy figure.

“Not asleep yet? Dare I hope you were waiting up for me?” he asked, closing the door behind him. There was a hint of hopefulness behind the mockery in the softly spoken question.

Summer woke from her light slumber. “I knew you would come,” she said sleepily.

“That doesn’t sound like an invitation.”

“You’ve never needed one.”

“Nevertheless, I would enjoy feeling your arms about me in a real embrace. It’s hard to make love to a limp fish or a snarling catamount.” He loosened his tie.

“It’s dangerous for a fish to get too close to a shark,” she answered in a listless voice.

“Is that how you see me?” he asked, genuinely surprised.

“Sharks are predators; they devour whatever they choose and destroy their victims in the process.”

“I plead not guilty to the last charge.”

“I suppose you think the first one isn’t important.”

“Not if it doesn’t hurt you.”

“Did you ever consider what might hurt me?” she asked, somewhat embittered. “You never ask what I want.”

“You wouldn’t let me come near you if I did,” he said, grinning in a way that caused her heart to flutter. “Think of all the pleasure you’d miss, and the agonies I’d suffer every time I set eyes on you.” He pulled off his shirt and tossed it into the corner.

“Do you think I enjoy being mauled every night?”

“That’s not exactly how I’d put it.” Brent sat down to take off his shoes. “But I remember a definite improvement in last night’s performance.” He tossed aside one shoe. “I particularly liked the way you responded to my kiss with your tongue.” He tossed aside the second shoe. “Of course I found it very encouraging when you cried
‘More, oh please, more!’”

“I don’t remember last night.” As she lied Summer saw the ground caving in under her. “But I do remember that I never invited you to share my bed.”

Brent stood up and loosened the strings of his pants. “I keep telling you this is my bed, and may I remind you that you’re still in it.”

“I’ll be happy to get out.”

He dropped his pants to the floor. “But I don’t want you to go,” he said sweetly. He faced her in fully aroused splendor. “I’m anxious to take up where we left off.”

Summer recoiled from the sight that frightened and fascinated her at the same time. “You’re nothing but a low, rutting beast,” she hissed, but her words lacked conviction.

“It’s not my fault that the sight of your incredible loveliness excites these low desires in me. If you looked like a peasant wench, I wouldn’t be so anxious to share your bed.”

“If I were a peasant wench, I wouldn’t be here,” Summer retorted. He sat down on the bed, but she moved as far away from him as she could.

“Talking about things that don’t exist is a waste of time. You look like Venus must have been meant to look, and I want you so much it hurts.” His voice was rapidly losing its clarity, and he pulled her inexorably toward him. Slipping his left arm around her and dipping his right hand into her gown to cup a firm breast, he kissed its hard nipple, letting his tongue tease her as he gently forced her back down on the bed.

“But I don’t want you to want me,” she protested faintly, her breath rough and uneven. “I want to be left alone.” She squirmed as he slipped the gown over her shoulders and exposed her other breast to his hot hunger.

“That can’t be helped,” he murmured as he peeled the gown from her. “You might enjoy our moments together if you didn’t fight me so hard.” His lips played across her belly causing her muscles to tense. And when his hand found the inside of her thigh and then boldly entered the soft warmth between her legs she nearly ceased breathing altogether. She gasped and her body rose off the bed as his hand and then his lips caused an explosion of intense pleasure to erupt through her loins and race to every part of her body. She was horrified that he would take such advantage of her helplessness, but she was beyond resistance.

White-hot throbbing pleasure sapped her strength, and all determination to resist wilted in the steaming atmosphere of his torrid desire. She gave in to his advances, floated on waves of the enslaving sensuality that engulfed them both. Each was absolutely necessary to the fulfillment of the other. Beyond considering anything except her need to be one with the man she loved, Summer abandoned all restraint and threw herself wholeheartedly into the hot embrace of her lover. She clung to him, driving him with her demands, scorching him with her heat, until they reached a consummation almost too exquisitely painful to endure.

Chapter 15

The cool morning breeze struck Summer with bracing force when she stepped out on deck, her limbs heavy with exhaustion, her brain still numbed by sleep. As usual she had been the last to wake, and she was very late; several events, including Brent’s first wrestling match, had already taken place.