The Devil's Tide (33 page)

He pulled her close, reaching around and cupping one of her breasts. "Maybe now." His other hand slid around her waist and down her stomach.

She grasped his hands, holding them still. "But you just went to all that trouble to get it on."

"I enjoy unwrapping my presents."

"I'm not a present." She slipped out of his embrace and swiveled to face him, stepping behind the tub. "And you already have a woman."

"You mean the whore?"

Kate put a finger to her lip. "I was certain she had a name."

He circled the tub to get at her. "Has she? It seems to have slipped my mind."

"No it hasn't," Kate said, positioning herself behind the tub. "She's brought you a fortune." She brushed a fleck of dust from her bodice, murmuring, "Possibly misfortune."

When she looked up, Vane had stopped moving and was studying her skeptically. "Do you know something I don't?" he asked.

She shrugged. "I know she murdered my friend, Nathan Adams, and betrayed her master, Blackbeard." She glanced at the ceiling. "Or did she? I'm indefinite about that last bit. Oh well, I suppose we'll find out soon enough."

Vane grinned shrewdly. "You're trying to raise my suspicions."

Her head sank into an innocent shrug. "Merely voicing my own."

"You're a devious woman," he said, moving around the tub. "And I'm hard."

"And I'm sorry."

"I want you."

"Out of the question," she replied, evading him. She crossed the room to the dressing table and appraised herself in the mirror. "But thank you for the clothes. I rather like the bodice. The thorns are a particularly nice touch." She poked one of her breasts with her index finger. "And these
do
look fantastic."

Through the mirror, she saw Vane adjust himself in frustration. "I'm not accustomed to being denied," he fumed. "I could take you right now, if I wanted to. I doubt Griffith gave you a choice in the matter. How long was it before he took you? The first night or the second?"

"The taking was mutual."

"I find that difficult to believe."

She shrugged. "I don't care what you believe."

"Did you pretend to enjoy it? Or worse yet, did you
actually
enjoy it?"

"I enjoyed it," she answered. "When he was inside me, I thought about all the ways I might do away with him." She drew her hair away from her missing ear, running a finger over the rough, red skin. It looked hideous. She was thankful it was so easily concealed. "And one day, when he dropped his guard, I finally did it."

"And did that make it all better?" he asked.

She nodded at him through the mirror. "Yes."

Vane glanced downward. "Oh dear. I seem to have gone soft."

Kate tried to adjust her hair in the mirror even though she knew it was futile. The red tresses were wild and scraggly beyond repair. For a year, the wind had been her only comb. Her skin had gone a bit lighter, after being deprived of sun for a week. The wound on her cheek had healed to a thin indent, detectable only in angled light, offering a faint reminder of her short time with Benjamin Hornigold.

Vane walked to the edge of the cave, locking his hands behind his back and looking down upon his kingdom. Kate pulled herself from the mirror and crossed the room, approaching the edge cautiously and leaning forward until she could almost see the eastern dock below. Most of the caves cut into the eastern wall had gone dark, where pirates were sleeping. A few caves were still lit, and she could see men within. One man was framed at the edge of his cave, staring into the canyon, sipping a goblet. Another was pacing in circles, lost in thought. A third was relaxing in a chair, with his legs crossed. Vane had built quite a community, hollowed in the rock. She saw another man shimmying up a ladder toward his cave, wobbling as though he was very drunk. She wondered how often pirates plunged to their deaths.

"You see that brigantine?" Vane said, pointing at the eastern dock. "The one your ship docked behind?"

"Yes," she replied nervously, unable to bring herself any closer to the edge.

"That's
Ranger
."

Kate rolled her eyes. "What an original name."

He ignored the jest. "I'm allowing Jack Rackham to captain her. I've half a mind to take her back.
Valiant
is fast, but she's no
Ranger
."

"It's a very pretty ship," Kate said. She slowly backed away from the edge, for fear of passing out from nausea and toppling over.

Vane guffawed in pleasant surprise. "It's good to see you're afraid of something."

"I fear a great many things," she assured him.

He scratched the back of his head, suddenly perturbed. "I do wish you'd ask me something about, well, me."

She resisted a laugh. "What should I ask?"

"Oh, I dunno," he said, looking around. "There must be something you want to ask me. Anything. First question that springs to mind. You must have a hundred."

She bit her lip. "I can't think of anything."

He sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose, then threw up his hand. "Maybe you're curious how I came to pirating?"

"Not really."

His jaw hardened.

Kate saw movement in the cave across the way, at the opposite end of the bridge that extended into Vane's loft. A stout man with a red bandana and a bushy red beard emerged and started over the bridge. He wore a red shirt and brown pants, shredded at the ankles. His feet were massive, with gnarled toes. He was sweating terribly, and his muscular chest heaved as though he'd been running. "Captain Vane, sir," he called.

"What is it?" Vane said with a touch of irritation.

"I know it's late, sir," the stout man gasped, unable to catch his breath.

The captain feigned confusion, looking at the stars. "Is it? Or has the sky been prematurely veiled by a large blanket pricked with holes?"

"It's one of
Crusader's
men, sir," the other man went on. "One of them you wanted we should put in
special
quarters, if you catch my meaning, sir. Goes by name of Ogle, sir."

"Yes," Vane grated impatiently. "Get fucking on with it."

The stout man glanced uneasily at Kate. "Well we was torturing him . . . "

"Naturally," Vane replied, rolling his eyes.

" . . . and he said something I wager you'll want to hear."

Vane embellished a sigh. "And what would that be?"

Bigfoot swallowed. "I think you should hear it for yourself, captain, sir."

"Fine," Vane sighed, ushering him away with several flicks of his wrist. "Off with you. I'll be there presently."

Bigfoot nodded and started back across the bridge.

Vane retrieved his coat, but he left the ring of keys on the dressing table. "You're welcome to wait until I return."

"In your bed?" she replied with an exaggerated swoon.

He grinned. "It is quite comfortable."

She teased him with a smirk. "Save it for Annabelle. I'll not divvy a man with another woman, let alone the woman who murdered my friend." She inclined her head, adding casually, "Not while she's alive, anyway."

The kitchen was a long, cavernous room, which was accessible from the eastern dock by a thirty foot tunnel that burrowed into the mountain. The room was brightly lit, with four sconces running along either wall. Two long benches stretched across, and there was a massive oven in the back, carved into the rock. Near the oven, a heavyset chef was plucking feathers from a limp chicken, while his black assistant prepared a stew in a large iron pot. Chickens strutted around the room, pecking at crumbs. The wobbly floor was matted with hay. The air was teeming with the competing stenches of hay and chickens and raw meat, and Annabelle nearly gagged when she first entered.

She had been wandering Pirate Town for hours, well aware that she should be impressed by everything she saw, but all she could think about was what Vane had been doing with Kate Lindsay all this time. She hadn't seen Lindsay since Vane had invited her to his quarters.
That bitch gets to see his quarters before I do?
Annabelle wanted her dead, reward be damned.
I should have tossed her to the sea alongside Nathan. He would have liked that.
She knew Nathan had fancied Lindsay more than he'd ever been willing to admit.
Who wouldn't?

Killing Nathan had been easy. Truthfully, it was easier than she thought it would be. Her body had shuddered as the pistol kicked in her arms with more force than she expected. One minute he was alive, the next his brains were leaving his skull. His last moment was one of comprehension, forever frozen on his young face. In that moment, he finally understood who she was. After his body vanished into the deep, she'd hardly given him another thought.

But she hadn't been able to murder a woman, let alone a woman who had suffered indignities at the hands of Edward Livingston. A woman who survived Livingston deserved to survive anything. Annabelle realized now that she had used the reward as an excuse to spare Lindsay's life. She humiliated her instead, to remind her who was in control, but even that had been a thinly veiled excuse not to kill her.
Crusader
carried enough treasure to last a hundred lifetimes, and procuring Lindsay's reward would be problematic at best. There had been no real reason to keep her alive, other than sympathy.

I should have been stronger,
she told herself.

She would correct that mistake. Lindsay was just a woman, and she was made of the same flesh and blood as any other. She wasn't invincible. She could die as easily as anyone else, and Annabelle knew just the man for the job.

Gabe Jenkins was seated at the far end of the room, near the oven, hunched over a steaming bowl of stew. His shirt was tight across his muscular back. Thick curls dangled over his brow, darkening his eyes. His jaw worked slowly as he chewed. He didn't look at her as she approached, but a slight tilt of his head told her he knew she was there. She took a seat beside him on the bench and scooted close, nudging him with her hip. "I was looking for you," she said.

He glanced apprehensively at her, briefly making eye contact. "What do you want?"

"You're mad," she said, making a sad face.

He stirred the mysterious contents of his stew with a large wooden spoon but didn't take another bite. "You figured that out, did you?"

Annabelle resisted a smile.
He's fetching when he's angry.
This wouldn't be difficult. If he was angry, it meant he cared. "You feel betrayed," she said. It wasn't a question.

He tried to shrug casually, but his bulky shoulders were too stiff. "What do you care?"

"I'm here asking, aren't I?" she said.

He shook his head, snickering loudly, and swept his curls back into place with a quick, furious hand. "You're here because you want something. Don't pretend. Only time you pay attention to anyone is when you want something. Everyone knows that now. Shame Adams figured it out too late."

She flinched, blinking rapidly. "That's not a very nice thing to say, Gabe Jenkins."

"The truth isn't always a very nice thing to hear, is it?" he shot back, flashing a glare. "Anyway, it doesn't matter what I think. Only thing that matters is what Teach will think when he finds out what's happened here, and I have a feeling that'll be sooner than you expect."

An icy chill of doubt riddled her arms with gooseflesh. She clutched his wrist. "Do you know something I don't? Answer me."

"No," he replied, staring at her hand as if it was a very large spider. "But I know how Teach works. No one escapes him for long. You should know that better than anyone, having spent so much time with him. It baffles me that you'd try something like this and honestly think you can get away with it."

"I
did
get away with it," she reminded him.

"Everyone thinks that," he chuckled sardonically, "until Teach's ship is bearing down on their stern. Hornigold probably thought that too, but he didn't count on being traded for a woman."

"Teach can't get in here," she assured him. "This place is a fortress."

"He'll find a way," Jenkins replied. "Why do you think Vane's been so careful not to get on his bad side all this time? He's afraid of him. He may not say it, but he is. Everyone is, as well they should be."

Her palm slapped the table. "Vane was quick enough to accept the plunder I brought him."

His laugh was bitter. "I heard a song once. I can't remember the lyrics, save for one. 'A bit of shine sets every pirate out of his mind.'"

She leaned closer. She knew he liked it when she was close, even though he pretended he didn't care. "Well, it's not like you're going to tell Teach, right?"

An amused look passed over his face, followed swiftly by dread. "I don't have to. He'll find out with or without my aid. He knows things. I don't know how, but he does."

"What do you owe him, anyway?" she asked. "It must be something important, if you'd kill a friend over it."

He slapped the spoon into the stew, splattering the table. "But I didn't kill a friend under Blackbeard's orders, did I? I only
thought
I did."

"I am sorry about that," she said, trying to sound as genuine as possible, though she couldn't even recall the name of the man Jenkins had killed in that cave.

"You don't look sorry," he returned. "I'm a bloody idiot."

There was a long, uncomfortable silence. Her stomach broke it, unleashing an embarrassingly loud growl. Jenkins slid the bowl her way. "Sounds like you need this more than I do. I'll be dead soon anyway."

She laughed. "Why do you think that?"

"Because you're going to have me killed, just like Ogle and Red Devil. No one can find them. You told Vane to do away with them, didn't you?"

She nodded slowly. "Yet you're still here. What does that tell you?"

He frowned, unable to come up with an answer to that one.

She dipped the large spoon into the steaming muck and lifted it cautiously to her mouth. The stew was thick, permeated with strips of chicken, chunks of potato, and maybe bread. It wasn't particularly tasty, but it was better than nothing.

"So if you're not going to kill me," he said finally, "what is it you want? You must have kept me alive for a reason."