“The key words in that sentence being your enemy, not mine. Besides, I have work to do there interviewing everyone. And it’s way too dangerous for you to be on Turtle’s Back right now. Don’t you know that Bart is after your head? He’s promised three ships to any man who can bring in proof of your demise. If he’d seen you—”
“—we have gathered here today to witness the virtual bonding of this pirate to this pirate—”
“Sweetheart, it’s traditional for the bride to stand next to the groom during a wedding. I’m not sure what the etiquette is about holding a sword to the groom’s throat, but I’m going to go out on a limb here and say it’s not quite kosher. Especially when it’s the groom’s own rapier.”
I withdrew the sword tip from where I had pressed it against Corbin’s neck and handed it back to him. “You weren’t listening to me. No one is listening to me. I had to do something dramatic to make you pay attention.”
“—within the confines of the game, naturally, although I personally happen to think Corb and Amy are made for each other.”
“You may be on to something,” Corbin told Holder before grinning at me and holding out his hand. “Shall we, my dear?”
I crossed my arms over my chest and tucked in my hands. “No, we shall not. I told you I wasn’t saying I’d marry you. And don’t pull that ‘I’m safer with you’ crap. Bart is no threat to me, and I still have people to talk to on Turtle’s Back, so I’m staying there.”
“As the midnight blue water of the Seventh Sea flows eternal, so shall the (virtual) love of these two people. Corbin, do ye take this woman to be yers?” Holder, back in his monk garb, was clearly getting way too much into the ceremony that I never agreed to. He looked as happy as a shopaholic on Rodeo Drive.
“I do,” Corbin said, still grinning.
“No, he doesn’t,” I said, adjusting my arm so the pearl Corbin had given me to stop seasickness was hitting the correct pressure point. Amazingly enough, it seemed to keep me from feeling the least bit queasy.
On the main deck a collection of twenty or so men, including Bas, stood in a semicircle around the trio of Corbin, Holder, and me.
“Do ye promise to stoke her guns, and her guns only?”
“I do,” Corbin repeated, gently pulling me over until I stood facing him.
I glared. “No one stokes my guns without my permission,” I snapped, losing the slim hold I had on my temper.
“I’d never think of stoking without your express consent,” Corbin told me.
“Do ye promise to hoist no other mainsails than hers?” Holder asked.
“Oh, for God’s sake . . . this wedding is ridiculous! I never said I’d marry you!” I yelled, waving my hands around in frustration. “Why is no one listening to me?”
“I’m listening to ye, Amy,” Bas said. Bran squawked his agreement.
“Aye, I do so promise,” Corbin told Holder.
“Gah!”
“Amy, do ye take this man to be yers?” Holder turned to me.
I transferred my glare from Corbin to him. “No, I most certainly do not. I would never marry a man who didn’t listen to me. Been there, done that, got the alimony, thank you.”
“Aw, sweetheart, don’t break me heart,” Corbin said, grabbing my hands and giving them a gentle squeeze.
“Do you promise to climb no masts other than his?”
“I’m beginning to think you don’t have a heart to . . . what?” I looked at Holder, then back to Corbin. “Did he just say what I think he said?”
Corbin smiled a smile that had my legs turning to jelly. His gray eyes were almost luminescent in the glow of the oil lamps and moonlight, and they turned positively quicksilver when he leaned forward and whispered in my ear, “Don’t like to be on top? You pick the position, my sweet.”
Passion flickered from him to me, firing my blood until an inferno of desire swept through me. I cleared my throat. “I’m not saying no to that. In fact, I’m starting to think that that might be a good idea, although I’ve never done anything like that virtually before. But I’m sorry, Corbin. I want to talk to you first before we discuss terms of a marriage.”
“Do ye promise to load his guns with yer finest powder?” Holder asked me.
“You are deranged,” I told him. “This game has gone to your head, and frankly, I think you’re going to need deep psychological help when we get out, because those innuendoes are just way too over the line.”
“I’ll take that as an aye, shall I?” Holder beamed at us both.
“No!” I yelled.
“Aye,” everyone else on board yelled back.
“Then by the powers vested in me by the CEO of Buckling Swashes, our own Captain Corbin here—”
I sighed and gave up. What did it matter, after all? It was just a pretend marriage in a pretend world. It didn’t really mean anything. If it made Corbin happy, then he’d likely be obliged to do what I asked in terms of ceasing the hostilities with Bart.
“—I pronounce ye pirate and pirate, bound together so long as the game runs.” Holder paused for a moment. “Or until ye cancel yer account, whichever comes first.”
“Yarr!” shouted the crew.
“Ye can kiss yer pirate bride,” Holder told Corbin. “Anything else ye want to do is up to ye two.”
I tried to thin my lips at Holder, but Corbin claimed every last ounce of my attention when he ran a thumb over my chin, tilting my head back slightly. The warmth and desire in his eyes stripped all thoughts from my mind but how much I liked him, and wanted to be with him . . . and just plain wanted him.
“Shall we have a wedding night?” Corbin asked softly.
I stood clinging to him, my head spinning with the kiss he’d just given me, my lips tingling, my body demanding that I fling myself on him right then and there and satisfy all its wants. I started to say no, to explain that I didn’t find purely physical relationships at all desirable, that I needed an emotional bond before I could think of enjoying him in all the many and varied ways my mind was exploring, but before I could, Corbin nipped my lower lip.
“Fair warning, Amy—I’m falling in love with you. I know this isn’t the best way to say it, or even do it, but I can’t help myself. You’re all I can think of. You make me ridiculously happy, and I just want to be with you. If you’ll have me, I’ll do my best to make you as happy as I am.” His eyes were bright, and full of so much emotion a lump rose in my throat.
All resistance melted. How could I refuse such an offering of a heart? I couldn’t. “Yes, please,” I said, then gasped in surprise when he swung me up in his arms in the best romantic pirate hero tradition.
“Rum for everyone!” he called to the crew before carrying me belowdecks, to the captain’s quarters.
Their cheers and several suggestions of a ribald nature (which I hoped would go straight over Bas’s head) were shut out when Corbin set me on my feet, closing and locking the door behind us.
“What about Bas? I can’t just leave him—”
“He’ll be fine. Holder will keep an eye on him. He has three kids of his own.”
“He does? He’s married?”
Corbin nodded. “Since he was eighteen, to his high school sweetheart. Don’t let his flirty act mislead you—they’re very much in love. Hold just likes women, and comes across as a player, but he isn’t really.”
“Ah. Good.” I looked at the key he set on the desk bolted to the floor. “Are you holding me prisoner?”
His smile was full of promise. “That depends. Do you want to be held prisoner?”
“Hmm.” I thought about what I wanted for a moment. Aside from Corbin, which was a given at that point. “I’ve never been into men acting arrogant and domineering. I’ve always felt that a relationship, both the physical and emotional aspects of it, requires from both participants consideration, dedication, and an ability to receive pleasure from pleasure given.”
Corbin watched me carefully, nodding, his eyes glittering in the soft candle
light. Standing there in his swashbuckler’s leather pants, the loosely laced jerkin, the ruffly white shirt beneath it, he looked every inch a true pirate—a dangerous rogue given to heady passions who demanded everything, returning only what he wanted to give. Something incandescent deep inside me burst into being and gave me permission to indulge in my wildest, most secret fantasies.
“Oh, what do I know. Take me, Corbin. Take me now, however you want!” I threw myself on him, giggling when he whooped and scooped me up, depositing me on the big captain’s bed in the corner.
“Just so you know,” he said, his mouth hovering over mine, “I agree with everything you said about consideration and enjoying giving pleasure. In fact, I plan on being damned close to ecstasy with all the pleasure I will be giving you.”
“Oooh,” I said, my toes curling in my boots at the look in his eyes. I ran my hands up his arms, braced on either side of me. “How long does it take to sail from Turtle’s Back to your island?”
“About four hours,” he answered, his head dipping to claim a heated kiss. I squirmed with delight from the intensity of his mouth on mine, his tongue politely asking permission before sweeping alongside mine, curling around it in a way that had me tugging on him, desperate to feel the full length of his body.
He pulled back, gently nipping my lower lip.
“Hey,” I protested, disappointed.
He smiled. “You said I could do this however I want.”
“So you plan on frustrating me to death?” I asked, propping myself up on one elbow as he stood and peeled off his sword, boots, and jerkin. He stood in the billowing shirt and leather pants. “Oooh. I take it back. This part is nice. Go on, please.”
“Er . . .” He hesitated. “Amy . . . I don’t want you to be disappointed. You remember the blond version of me? Well, the rest of me doesn’t look like him any more than my head does.”
I smiled. “Corbin, I want you, not your idea of a woman’s fantasy. Now shuck those clothes and start pleasuring me, because I’m about to go up in smoke if you don’t.”
He hesitated for another second, then pulled his shirt off, quickly undoing the buttons on his pants. I rolled onto my side and smiled again, allowing my eyes to enjoy the view. He wasn’t nearly as muscle-bound as the blond version, and he had a cute little smidgen of softness around his belly that melted me, but I had absolutely no complaints.
“I’m sorry, I’m working on that,” he said, his hands splaying across his stomach. “Too much time sitting in front of the computer.”
“I happen to think you’re very sexy, with or without clothes, although right now I admit to having a preference for the without version. I approve of your chest hair, by the way.”
“Ah. Good.” He brushed a self-conscious hand across his chest.
“You’re not too hairy, but you don’t look like a plucked chicken, either. And I like your stomach. And your arms, and legs and . . . er . . . everything else. But I do have a question.”
He looked down at himself. “Seven inches, I think. I haven’t measured lately.”
I laughed, giving myself a moment to admire his seven inches, standing proudly at attention. “That wasn’t what I meant, although I appreciate the specifics. I wanted to know how you managed to make me look like I really look? I know you must have scanned yourself into the game, but you didn’t know me.”
“I wondered when you’d ask that,” he said with a little smile, moving to the end of the bed. He held out his hand. I rolled onto my back and gave him my foot. He pulled my boot off, his fingers stroking down my ankles and the top of my foot. My leg twitched.
“Ticklish?” he asked.
“Very.”
“Ah.” He avoided touching the sensitive bottom of my foot, bending over to kiss the inside of my ankle. A little shiver ran through me. “I didn’t scan myself into the computer, as a matter of fact. You’re telling me what you look like.”
He pulled off my second boot, giving that foot a kiss as well. Warmth pooled inside me, spreading slowly along my limbs.
“I am?” My voice was squeaky, but I didn’t care. Corbin climbed onto the bed, carefully moving my legs to kneel between my feet, his hands warm on my calves as they swept up toward my knees.
“Yes, you are. Your brain is sending every human player in the game an image of yourself. I’m doing the same. So in effect, you’re seeing me as I see myself, and I’m seeing the you that you see.”
“Oh, God. I need to lose ten pounds, and my boobs are too small, and my hips are too big, and we won’t go into the cellulite that I just know is growing even as we speak!”
He laughed, then stopped, frowning as he looked down at me.
“What?” I almost shrieked. “You can see the cellulite?”
“No, silly.” He flashed me a grin, then got off the bed, squatting next to it as he opened one of the drawers built into the bedstead. “I just thought that since we were doing pirate and the vixen, we might as well do it properly.” He held up a handful of navy bandanas. “You did say I could do whatever I wanted?”
“Yeeeees,” I said slowly.
“Good.” He returned to the foot of the bed, quickly tying a bandana around first my ankle, then the bottom corner of the bed frame. I looked in growing surprise from my bound foot to him as he quickly whipped another bandana around my second foot.
“You’re tying me down?”
“Aye.” He grinned up at me as he spread my legs, secured the other end of the bandana to the bed, adjusting the knot so it wouldn’t press on my foot. I had a brief moment of concern that when my clothes were off, all my secrets would be laid bare in that position, but I decided he’d see it all anyway, so what did it matter?
“That’s bondage, isn’t it? I’ve never done bondage,” I said, testing the bonds. “Certainly never the first time with a man.”
“Neither have I, but somehow, it seems appropriate that we should do something utterly out of character. Is the cloth tied too tightly?”
I wiggled my foot around again. “No. But it’s very . . . well, kinky, Corbin.”
“Do you want me to stop?” His grin faded. “I won’t do it if you don’t want me to.”
I thought for a moment. I disliked being out of control of any situation, but this was different. This wasn’t real, it was just . . . well, basically mind sex. Although Corbin’s hands on my naked legs sure felt real. I shivered again. “No, I don’t think you should stop. I’d be just as turned on without it, you know, because you’re incredibly sexy, but . . . well, I see your point about doing something totally different. It makes us unique, in a way. So it’s all right. Just don’t get too wild on me, okay?”
His smile returned, this time with extra wickedness as he slid his hands up my thighs. “No promises, my sweet. Now, shall we get down to business?”
Chapter 13
Take heart, fair days will shine;
Take any heart—take mine!
—Ibid, Act I
“Business?” I all but shrieked as Corbin caressed my thighs. “This is business to you? You have no real idea what business is, do you? Business is—oh, my God! That is not business! That’s a very sharp knife! This is payback from when I held a knife to your noogies, isn’t it?”
Corbin had pulled a dagger from beneath the mattress, the corners of his mouth curving as he bent down over one bound leg. His tongue snaked out and flicked across the crease at the back of my knee. I sat straight up and grabbed his head. “Oh!”
“Oh?”
“Oh! It means . . . oooooh, baby!”
He chuckled and used one hand to free his head from my grasp. “Do I need to tie your hands, too? I thought you’d like them unbound. I know I was looking forward to you touching me. But if you can’t control yourself, I’ll have to tie them, as well.”
I opened my mouth to tell him what he could do with his plans, then thought better of it. We were playing a game. A very sexy, erotic game, but still, it was a game, and I’d come to see the light as
far as a little play went. I lay back down. “All right. Hands down. For a while, anyway. But I reserve the right to gasp whenever I feel moved to do so. What are you going to do with that knife? I’m not at all into pain, you know.”
“Good. Neither am I.” His head dipped again, and he licked the back of my other knee. A tremor of desire shook me at the simple touch. Who knew backs of knees could be so sensitive?
“So then what are you going to do with it?”
His hand slid up my thigh, pushing my skirt up before it, his mouth trailing a line of steamy kisses. He stopped long enough to quickly undo the line of buttons that held the skirt together, tossing it on a nearby chair. “I know it’s a traditionally romantic belief that women like to have their underwear ripped off them, but I’ve always thought it sounded painful. I figured you’d prefer to remove yours in a less brutal manner.” He glanced down at the cotton and lace underwear I had fashioned from leftover bits of cloth and dress trimmings. “You don’t mind if I slice them off, do you?”
“Actually, I do. This is my only pair, you see. I wash them out every night, and pray they’re dry by morning.”
He looked up at me. “But you live with a bunch of women. Don’t any of them have panties you can borrow?”
“Okay, first of all, borrowed undies? No. Not done. And second, the group of women I live with specialize in activities conducted sans underwear, thus they aren’t articles in high demand. Last, but not least, you did your research a bit too well. Most of the women don’t even wear underwear, which, I gather from their surprised looks when they saw what I was sewing, is the norm. So, long story short: yes, I mind. Can I just take them off, and you pretend you cut them off me in a manly act of rampant desire?”
“Sweetheart, my manly desire is more than rampant, as you can plainly see,” he answered, untying my ankles. I smiled at the rampant parts and quickly stood to shuck my underwear.
“Er . . . I don’t have a bad self-image or anything. I mean, men don’t barf upon seeing me naked. But I’m not in any way perfect, and I’m afraid that if all you have to go with regarding my appearance is my image of myself, then my flaws are bound to be exaggerated.”