The Blue Diamond (The Razor's Edge Book 1) (12 page)

“Sandy!” Miranda cried as
she bolted towards them. “Where the hell did you come from?”

“Well, I come from that
skiff over there, but I’m here for ye, lass,” he said, lowering his head and
looking up at her.

“I’ll be damned, sir, that
just isn’t good enough!” Miranda shouted as she turned away and headed back
down the beach, with him running close behind.

“What’s that supposed to
mean?” he called out.

Miranda spun in the sand and
shouted, “You knew it all along and strung me on! You knew Ivory was in that
house, and you knew he had her the whole time. I should run you through and
leave you for the birds!”

“Now wait a minute there,
Miranda.
 
That be the other reason I’m
here. Don’t ye see? I came ta’ help and ta’, well…”

“Well… what?” she asked,
flipping her head towards the horizon.

“Ta’ beg yer forgiveness…
and help you get Ivory back.”

“How do you propose to do
that?”

“Look you redheaded pistol,
I’ve never deserted a crew or chased down a woman in me life, so I deserve at
the very least a bit a’ respect for this!”

“Oh! So, I’m just supposed
to believe you did all of this for me?”

“Goddamn it ta’ hell, woman,
are ye blind? Why else would I do such a thing?”

Miranda struggled to stay
put as much as she could, but a moment later, she ran towards Sandy and leapt
onto him, throwing her arms about his neck and knocking him flat on his back in
the sand.

“So does this mean you’ll
take on an old fool like me?” Sandy asked with a grin.

“Oh, shut up, and go help
load that boat,” she said, looking down at him.
 
Then, she pressed the first gift of a kiss on his salty lips.

“What the…Miranda, who the
hell is this?”

Miranda rolled off of Sandy
and found a very disturbed looking Tommy Boston standing over them. “Hello,
Tommy. I swear I can explain.”

Chapter
Thirteen

Ivory had finally dozed off
when a light tap came at her door, followed by the familiar turn of clanking
keys and the click of the lock. “Who’s there?” she asked with a heavy sigh,
balling her fists at her sides. The sudden anticipation of who her visitor
might be caused her to straighten her dress as she jumped to her feet and
pressed the backs of her legs against the cot.

The door pushed open and
Master Green ducked his head to step inside. “Madame, I hope I am not
disturbing you.”

“Surely anything that
disturbs me is of no concern to you,” she said as she lowered her head and
waved him off.

“Aye, but you are wrong.
First, allow me to assure you; we only do what we must, as would you given the
same circumstances.”

“I wouldn’t turn on a fellow
fortune hunter, sir, especially one who saved my life once and delivered me to
the doorstep of your captain.
 
So, please
do me the favor of not comparing your circumstances to mine,” Ivory said as she
sat down and leaned back on her hands.

“This business is never
clean. We all do what we must to survive.
 
Yet, you threw yourself into muddy waters last night, with no
misgivings… and you still smell of the rose,” he said as he took a seat in the
lone chair and folded his arms at his wide chest.

“And you smell of a snake in
the weeds. What do you want? As you said, I’ve given all of myself, so you’ll
find none of me left to offer,” she hissed through her teeth as she sat up.

“You must not flatter
yourself. It is beneath you to do so.”

“Then what do you want,
Master Green?”

 
“Do you know why these people have put this
bounty upon you?”

“I don’t know, nor do I
care.”

“Yes, you do,” he insisted
and leaned towards her. “The captain believes there was something more valuable
than slaves and rum aboard that ship when you took her.”

“Well, he’s wrong.”

“No, he is right.
 
And if you have a brain in that head of
yours, you will do what is best for yourself and offer him something more
valuable than your body against fifty thousand pounds…and save yourself.”

“If he wants to know
anything he can come down here and ask me himself.”

“He is not going to do
that.”

“Then, I suppose we are at
an impasse.”

“You can simply relay the
information through me. I have no reason to betray you.”

“You’ve already betrayed me,
Alphonse. You betray me yet again by being his messenger, and you betray
yourself as a fool for thinking I would concede. He can fight his own battles,
can he not?”

“This is not a battle,
Ivory. This is a war to him.”

“I haven’t backed down from
any battle or war, and I don’t intend to start now, even when I’ve but days to
live. Do you know that feeling when you line up, with guns, swords and pikes in
hand, and the air is filled with the burning smell of flesh mixed with
gunpowder, and that rush washes over you like a wave of cool water while you
lie in wait for the call to board? That’s how I feel every second of my life
now. I’m just waiting to board.
 
And when
the time is right, and when I hear that cry to go, that cool wave of
anticipation will be replaced with the fire to fight.
 
And make no mistake, Master Greene, fight I
will…until my dying breath.”

Throughout her speech, Ivory
hadn’t realized she was now standing, looming over Master Green, no more than a
few inches from his face, and his cutlass blade now poked through the material
of her gown, puncturing the thick brocade of her bodice.

“Please, sit down. I do not
wish to harm you.”

Ivory gathered herself and
backed away. Slowly, she lowered back onto the cot. Green rose to his feet and
placed his cutlass back in his belt. “When I told you this was not a battle to
him, but a war, I did not mean a war against you, or even his conscience. I was
referring to the war within his heart.”

“What heart?” Ivory laughed.
“He has no heart; he told me so himself.
 
And what do I care of his heart anyway? He certainly cares nothing for
anyone else’s.” Ivory turned away from Green and watched as the water rose and
fell outside her window.

“Perhaps you are right,
but…perhaps you are very, very wrong.”

The door slammed and the key
turned, leaving Ivory alone once again, until another knock came and a tray of
food was placed on the chair.
 
It stayed
untouched, until the young sailor who brought it came back later to retrieve
it.
 
She had considered overtaking the
boy, but decided against it, knowing she’d still need to overcome the armed
guard just outside the door. She needed a better plan. “You there, may I have
some paper and a quill and ink, please?”

“I’ll have ta ask, Madame.”

“You do that, but bring it
back as soon as possible.
 
And see what
you can do about getting me a candle in here. It’s rather impossible to write
in the dark.”

The young man picked up the
tray and bowed out of the room as Ivory stared out the window, watching the
setting sun on the water and awaiting the sleep that would elude her until the
darkest hours of the night. She was certain that by now, her cousins knew of
her fate and would be on their way to find her.
 
But, as she lay there in the dark wondering why the candle never came,
she decided her own fate and vowed to wait this out until she had no recourse
but to buy her way out of her predicament—which was something she believed
would shatter her pride.

* * * *

 
“Hold the boat, James! I have to run back to
the house; I’ve forgotten something,” Keara said as she was just about to board
the last skiff to the
Cutlass
.

“We’ll never catch
them.
 
You do understand that, don’t
you?” James said, taking hold of her hand before she ran off up the beach.

“I know. That’s why I’m
going back.”

When Keara returned, they
pushed off, and all were present and accounted for aboard both ships. Once they
weighed anchors, both vessels were ordered at full canvas.
 
Keara headed inside to Ivory’s cabin and sent
for Cass and Miranda.
 
“Close the door,”
Keara said when they arrived.
 
She looked
up from her seat behind the desk and leaned back in the chair. “Well, here we
are, on our way to Nassau. Anyone have the slightest idea what we’re going to
do when we get there?”

Cass walked towards her and
took a seat in one of the chairs facing the desk, and Miranda followed, taking
the other. “Take that ship and get Ivory back?” Miranda suggested, followed by
rolling eyes and raised eyebrows from her comrades. “What?”

“Mir, we need a plan of
action. First of all, this isn’t some merchant ship whose crew will shudder and
piss themselves when we pull aside them. The
Cat
is a beast of a ship, with a crew to match,” Cassandra
explained.

“Then what can we do? Say we
follow them all the way to Nassau…then what?” Keara asked.

“We’ve never even been to
Nassau,” Miranda pointed out.

“True, but Willy has. He’s
been on every rock in these waters,” Keara commented as Miranda stood and
headed for the door.

“Where are you going?” Cass
asked, turning in her chair.

“We don’t have time for all
of this talk. I’m going to get Sandy. If there’s anyone who might have some
answers, it’s him.”

“Now, why didn’t I think of
that?” Keara smiled.

“Jealous, cousin?” Miranda
sniped as she flounced out of the room.

“Cass, I need to ask you
something,” Keara said.

“Shouldn’t we wait for
Miranda?”

“No. Just you and me this
time.”

“This sounds serious,” Cass
said as she twisted and repositioned herself in the chair.

“I brought them.”

“You…brought them. Brought
who?”

“Not who…what.”

“Ke, what did you bring?”
Cass asked, leaning in and placing her hands on the desk.

Keara grinned slightly and
tilted her head. “The diamonds.”

“All of them?” Cass’s voice
raised and she was halfway to her feet.

“Wait! Listen, it’s a last
resort. You know Ivory would never try to buy her way out of this. She’s too
stubborn, but we must have a back-up plan. Besides, what good are they doing
just sitting there back at the house, locked up for all these months? We need
them, Cass, and you know it!”

“But all of them, Ke? All of
them?”

“Well, fifty thousand pounds
is a lot of money.”

Cass fell back into the
chair, and her head dropped back for a moment.
 
Then, she slowly tipped it forward, glaring at Keara. “Christ, Ke, the
blue diamonds alone are worth tens of thousands.” She sighed heavily, rubbing
her forehead, before her hands fell limp over the arms of the chair.

“Consider it, as I said, a
back-up plan,” Keara argued. “You know as well as I do that we’ll never catch
them. There’s a very good chance we can get this ship up to five knots, but
that’s a stretch, and only under the best conditions. The
Cat
does at least six, with reefed sails.”

“I’ll have to take your word
for that since you are the expert on all things sea-worthy, but here we are
already with a back-up plan for a plan we don’t even have yet. I need to think
things through and speak to Sandy. Without any intelligence as to how and where
Carbonale is handing her over, we’re just chasing our tails.”

The door opened, and Miranda
and Sandy entered. “Sandy said he’ll be more than happy to enlighten us on the
course and intentions of the
Black Cat
.”
Miranda took Sandy’s big bicep with her right hand and stroked it enticingly
with her other.

“Ladies,” Sandy said, and
nodded.

“Come in, please, and close
the door,” Cass said, as she rose from her chair and waved at it for Sandy to
sit. “You’re taking a great risk in doing this. We appreciate your assistance.”

“Ye can thank Miranda here.
She can be a persuasive woman, that’s fer sure,” Sandy said with a soft chuckle
as he watched her walk around behind the desk and lean back against the window
sill.

All three women stared at
him, waiting for him to speak, but there was dead silence for several seconds.
 
Finally, Keara spoke, “It’s alright, Sandy. Go
ahead, we’re listening.”

Sandy repositioned himself
in the chair and cleared his throat. “The Captain—Captain Carbonale that is—was
very tight-lipped about the whole scheme, ye see. He only tells Master Green
what he’s up ta’, and then Master Green gives the orders.”

“Master Green?” Keara asked
and looked over at Cassandra.

“Master Green is the
quartermaster of
Le Chat Noir
, or
Black Cat
as we call her. Very large
Jamaican man, with the most distinctive set of green eyes,” Cass spoke as if
she were remembering a pleasant dream.

“I’m fairly certain I know
who he is,” Keara said. She rolled her eyes and nodded again at Sandy to
continue.

“The day we found Captain
Shepard, truth be told, we’d been following the longboat fer nearly a day. We’d
been looking fer her three days, but when we caught eye of her, Green held back
and said she wasn’t goin’ nowhere, so we took our time catchin’ up. We was
aboard the small sloop, and she’s pretty quick, so I wondered what we was
waitin’ fer, but, well…”

“Go on…please,” Cass said.

“We plucked her from the
longboat and brought her aboard, so Master Green could make sure she was still
alive. I was along for the raid on the
Diamond
,
so I knew she’d been out there fer at least four days, and I honestly didn’t
expect to see no signs a’ life. She’s a tough one, that woman is. Well, when we
brung her back ta’ Kingston and handed her over ta’ the Captain, I got my pay
and went off ta’ the pub. That night, when I returned ta’ take my watch for
Master Green, I overheard the Captain tellin’ him about the bounty on Captain
Shepard, and about the trip up ta’ Nassau, which you already know.”