Pirate Wolf Trilogy (14 page)

Only
when
he
chose to end
it was she able to wrench herself free. When she straightened and
faced him again, it was with the gleaming threat of another
smaller, thicker blade grasped firmly in her hand.

“You son of a
bitch!” Crimson faced, she rubbed her mouth with the back of her
hand, removing the wetness. “How dare you!”

“I dared,” he
said calmly, “because you challenged me to.”

“
I
…
did
not!”

“You most
certainly did. With those big brassy eyes and that lovely, luscious
pout of a mouth. Perhaps you weren’t aware it was a challenge, or
perhaps you are simply accustomed to men who find your stubbornness
and rudeness intimidating. But only a fool would misread it as
anything else.” His gaze fell to the knife and his voice became a
lazy drawl of menace. “What’s more, I would suggest you put that
away before I mistake it for a challenge of another sort—or have
you forgotten my promise if you ever drew another weapon on
me?”

“I have not
forgotten,” she said tautly, quivering with fresh outrage. “Nor
have I forgotten you are not a man bound by conscience or burdened
by an overabundance of honor.”

“You are
forgetting patience,” he added succinctly. “Of which I am quickly
running short.”

Beau ignored
the warning flecks of blue smoldering in his eyes and turned
angrily to gather the charts she had initially come to retrieve. He
watched, a vein throbbing noticeably in his temple as she circled
behind the table to collect her brushes and pots of ink.

“I’ll have
someone tell the captain you’re awake,” she said crisply, and
headed for the door.

“Isabeau!”

She stopped and
glowered back over her shoulder. “I have not given you permission
to call me that. My name is Beau. Just plain Beau.”

His eyes took
in the soft cloud of her hair, the kiss-swollen lips, and the two
hardened nubs that crowned her breasts and pushed impudently
against her shirt.

“
If I
have discovered nothing else,
Isabeau”
he said quietly, “I have discovered you are anything but
plain.”

“
Just as
I have discovered,
Captain
Dante,
that you are no different from any other bandy-legged rooster, so
impressed with what you have between your legs, you expect every
woman on earth to be sweating and panting to have at it. Well, I am
loath to disappoint, but I have
seen
better”—she cast a disdainful glance down his
thighs—“and
had
better
without becoming the smallest part damp across the brow. And if you
ever …
ever
dare to
touch me again, I will fillet you in such small pieces, the sharks
will have to search the entire ocean to find a solid
mouthful!”

With fury
snapping in her eyes, she whirled and exited the cabin, giving the
door a resounding slam behind her.

CHAPTER
EIGHT

With the
weather clear and a brisk north-by-northeast wind blowing steady,
the
Egret
made good
time through the remainder of the week, skimming over the waves
like a frisky foal. The survivors of the
Virago
had been understandably withdrawn the first few
days and preferred their own company, but as their health returned,
so, too, did their spirits. Most, like their captain, vowed certain
death to the master and crew of the
Talon
if and when they caught them, and when all the treacherous
details became known to the crew of the
Egret
, it stirred equally strong sentiments in every
quarter. To abandon any ship in distress was to do the unthinkable.
To leave so famous a ship as the
Virago
and her crew as sacrifice to Spanish predators put every
man’s blood to the boil and had more pairs of eyes than those
belonging to the lookouts scouring the distant horizons for sight
of the fleeing vessel.

Dante de
Tourville had appeared on deck to the cheers of his own men and
those of the
Egret
Spence was
there to greet him and celebrate his recovery with a cask of
rumbullion, inviting both crews to toast the brave memory of
the
Virago
and her
daring forays against the papist plague. The pirate wolf had been
harassing the Spanish Main for the past decade and there were a
good many adventures to recount. It became a pattern of sorts after
that, for the men to set their work aside for a time each day and
gather on the main deck to share a tot of brandy or ale and listen
to the adventures of the
Virago.
Some had the
Egret’s
crew
poised on the edges of their seats, their eyes round as medallions;
others had them clutching their sides and rolling with
laughter.

“You would
think he walked on water,” Beau remarked dryly after a particularly
loud outburst of ribald humor.

“Who?” Spit
McCutcheon stood beside her on the forecastle deck looking down
over the daily gathering.

“The valiant
Captain Dante, who else? Is there some other icon on board with a
halo and crown of thorns on his head?”

She turned away
from the rail and leaned over her charts again. The sea was
relatively smooth and she had been able to take a fair reading of
their latitude from the astrolabe. It was a simple instrument used
to measure the altitude of the sun or a particular star. It
consisted of a large graduated ring of brass fitted with a sighting
rule that pivoted at the center of the ring. Suspended vertically
by the thumb, the rule turned about on its axis so that the sun
could be aligned and the altitude read off the ring. It was less
than accurate in heavy seas off the deck of a rolling ship, but in
smooth waters with little heaving, it fixed approximate latitudes
and, to an experienced navigator, an estimate of leagues traveled
and those yet to come before reaching port.

Beau’s working
charts were divided into grids drawn over rough sketches of the
oceans and continents; a series of small x’s marked their progress
against the readings she took off the astrolabe and the last
sightings of known landmarks. It was with a twinge of satisfaction
she studied her figures now and added another small x a good deal
north and west of the Canaries.

Five days into
the chase, they had covered roughly ten degrees of latitude.

“Almost two
hundred leagues,” she said, smiling up at Spit.

He only
grunted, distracted for the moment by the sight of a white streak
of fur racing down the main deck, followed in hot pursuit by the
axe-wielding Cook. When they disappeared from sight, his attention
wandered back to the cask of ale that had just been unbunged,
prompting him to hitch up his breeches and run a dry tongue across
his lips.

“I’d say that
were cause to join the celebrations, then.”

Her smile
tightened, then faded on a sigh. “Go ahead, if you like. I can take
the helm and finish out your watch.”

“Aye, an’ yer
father would tail me out for shirkin’ my duties.”

“Considering he
is in the midst of the crowd, I doubt he could justify punishing
anyone for laxity.”

"
Still an’ all,
I were lashed once. It wasn’t a treat I’d like to share again. Five
strokes, I had, an’ it left me raw enough to feel I were layin’ on
a bed o’ red-hot coals.”

Beau thought of
the marks crossing Dante’s back; it must have been like a foretaste
of hell.

Spit peered
slyly in her direction. “Cap’n Dante, now, he took his shirt off
the other day an’ set one o’ the younger lads to pukin’ his
biscuits over the side o’ the ship. Aye, it were just lucky for him
the wind was blowin’ in his favor.”

“I have seen
the marks.” Beau pursed her lips thoughtfully. “I wonder what a man
has to do to earn so many lashes with the cat?”

He snorted. “On
some ships? Might as well ask what a whore has to do to get
laid.”

Beau glanced
sidelong at the gunnery chief. “I’m sure I don’t know the answer to
that, either, Spit. Why don’t you enlighten me?”

The crusty old
tar looked embarrassed—for all of two seconds. “Warrant it ain’t up
to me to be enlightenin’ ye on the whys an’ wherefores o’ somethin’
like that, lass. Warrant ye should be lookin’ for someone with a
stouter heart an’ a stiffer pole than mine to be givin’ ye
lessons.”

“Too old and
withered to instruct me, are you?”

“Too old to
handle yer father’s fists, more’s the like. Now, enough o’ yer
heathen talk—tease a poor man’s pride, for shame. Why don’t we both
slink on down an’ catch a dram or two?”

Beau stared
over the rail a moment, then shook her head. “There should be at
least one sound and sober head on board.”

Spit scratched
at the white bristles on his jaw and crooked a rheumy eye in her
direction. “Ye don’t seem to hold an overly high opinion of ’is
lordship.”

Beau shrugged.
“I hold no opinion of him whatsoever.”

“
An’ here
I figured ye to be one o’ the first in line to listen to the
exploits of the
Virago.
Ye were
always crowdin’ the edge o’ the quay whenever Drake put into
port.”

Beau looked at
Spit in shock. “Surely you do not compare this—this displaced
Frenchman to our own Sir Francis Drake? You, who did not even
recognize his ship or his pennon when you first saw it?”

Spit grumbled
and scratched harder. “I recognized it well enough afterwards. It
were just … in the heat of the moment, it temporarily deserted
me.”

“
There
could be an inferno of flame and smoke surrounding the
Golden Hind
and no one would fail to
recognize her. Neither would they need to gather around a capstan
to hear tales of Sir Francis Drake’s adventures. What schoolboy
does not know he was the first Englishman to sail his ship around
the world? The first—and only one—to sack San Domingo and
Cartagena—
two
of Spain’s
best defended cities in the Indies—not to mention being the first
to cross Panama on foot and stand where he could see both the
Atlantic and the Pacifica at the same time! You dare compare
him
to an arrogant, ill-mannered
French bull rogue who cannot even steer his ship through a
gale!”

Sometime during
Beau’s diatribe, Spit’s eyes had widened out of their creases and
tried to direct Beau’s to a point over her shoulder. They flicked
again now, with a more meaningful intensity, and Beau whirled
around, the question dying on her lips when she saw Simon Dante
lounging casually against the rail, his arms crossed over his
chest, his mouth curved into a smile. It was impossible he could
have missed a word she’d said, for the argentine eyes were dancing
with amusement.

Beau had been
adroit in avoiding the company of the pirate wolf over the past few
days, managing always to be at one end of the ship if he was at the
other. Mealtimes were a challenge, for Spence insisted his daughter
share his table with Dante and Pitt. But she had been able to rise
to the occasion by changing her watches and inventing plausible
reasons to be at the helm.

Seeing him from
a distance did not prepare her for a face-to-face meeting. His jaw
was clean shaven, revealing a sharp and angular profile that would
have put the noblest aristocrat to shame. His mouth, clear of the
concealing black fur, proved to be wide and generous in shape,
blatantly sensual, easily provoking memories of their audacity. His
hair gleamed like polished ebony under the sunlight and fell in
thick, silky waves to his shoulders. There were still faint smudges
under his lower lashes, but they only emphasized the startling
color of his eyes and lent him a more dangerous air, as if he
preferred to stay always in the shadows while he observed the rest
of the world.

“So. Sir
Francis is one of your heroes, is he? Chaste and untainted by his
own fame?”

“He does not
require a round of free ale for men to appreciate his deeds.”

Spit started to
chuckle and covered it with a cough. Dante looked his way and
nodded an affable enough greeting, although he kept staring, kept
smiling, until McCutcheon cleared his throat with a nervous rattle
and excused himself under the guise of checking the set of the
topsails.

Beau stood her
ground. It was one thing to effect an avoidance of the man; quite
another to give the appearance of being frightened off.

De Tourville
uncrossed his arms and walked over to the table where her charts
were spread. He examined the topmost sheet with its rough scrawls
and hasty figurings, then lifted it out of the way to study the
more detailed, beautifully painted map beneath. Beau, like most
ship’s navigators, was an accomplished artist, recording by means
of sketches and paintings what a particular coastline or island
might look like from the sea. With no other means of recording what
they saw on their voyages, and verbal descriptions unreliable at
best, these paintings and maps, often displayed in cartographers’
windows, were the only means some people had of envisioning the
world beyond London’s city gates.

“Your work?” He
touched a long, tapered finger to the painting and added, “It
betrays the favor of a woman’s hand, but with an authority I would
not have expected.”

“Why? Because I
am a woman?”

He glanced up
and grinned. “Because I would not have guessed there to be enough
patience in you to sit overlong with a single-haired brush just to
show the probable variance of shore currents.”