James spoke through her silence. “The cold-hearted Edward Worthing never gave you what you wanted, did he? If he had, you wouldn’t be such a firecracker.”
His words, and his bloody arrogance, both excited and exasperated her. “We are back to only you being able to fulfill my needs.”
James brushed his thumb across her lower lip. “I think I’ll have to pleasure you again and again before your fire is quenched. I hope that takes a long, long time.”
Diana hoped so too. Last night when she’d gone to bed for good, even through her fury at James and her father, she’d dreamed of the drowsy pleasure of James’s hands on her body. The dreams had nearly driven her mad, and she’d awakened sweating and tangled in the sheets. A tight twist of them had pressed to the hotness between her legs, and she’d moved on the fabric, enjoying the sensation.
Diana darted out her tongue to taste the tip of James’s fingers, where they rested on the corner of her mouth.
James’s eyes darkened, and he bent to her, his coffee-scented breath brushing her skin.
“No,” she murmured. “Isabeau.”
“Is watching the water and isn’t interested in fools of adults.”
That was likely true. Diana raised up to him and let their lips meet. James smiled into the kiss, cradling Diana’s head in his hand.
He explored her mouth with slow, hot strokes. Diana smoothed his hair, warm and rough under her fingertips. She was a fool, she knew, but right now foolishness was making her happier than she had been in a long, long time.
Still conscious of Isabeau, though the little girl was far more interested in what lay on the horizon than her mother and James, Diana eased away from him.
James smoothed Diana’s hair, his breath warm. “A lady told me, not long ago, that out on the seas somewhere I’d find the woman of my dreams. I thought she was being melodramatic, because she likes that. But she was right.”
Diana looked at him, surprised and half pleased. “What lady told you that?”
“Her name was Alexandra Alastair. Until she married, that is. Now she’s Viscountess Stoke, God help her.”
Diana’s eyes widened. The young widow, Mrs. Alastair, now Lady Stoke, was the granddaughter of a duke, which put her many rungs higher than Diana on the social ladder. Edward and Diana had received an invitation to the Stoke wedding, but Edward had been to sea at the time, and Diana had not wanted to attend alone, not knowing Mrs. Alastair well. However, she’d read with interest the newspaper articles describing the rather peculiar wedding at St. George’s, Hanover Square.
“How on earth did you come to know Mrs. Alastair? I mean, Lady Stoke?” Diana asked him, curious.
“Viscount Stoke is a grinning idiot called Grayson Finley. Once upon a time, he was my partner and friend. Then we became great rivals, and finally, enemies.”
Diana stared at him. “I heard the rumors that Lord Stoke had once been a pirate. I hadn’t believed them.” She let out a breath. “Though, I don’t know why I am surprised you knew him. I should not be surprised by anything you do.”
James looked out to the blue ocean, as though remembering his days here. “Finley was one of the best. I hunted him for a long time. Caught him a few times, but he always managed to slip the noose.”
“Are you still hunting him?” Diana asked.
James shrugged. “I gave it up. For the sake of his lovely wife.”
Diana breathed a little faster. “Then he truly was a pirate?”
“Probably still is. He sails around in that ship of his, the Majesty, though he claims he’s only keeping it for his daughter.”
Diana’s curiosity was thoroughly roused, but their gossip was cut short by Isabeau, who turned and tugged on James’s coat. She squealed and signed, then pointed to the water.
“What’s she saying?” James asked, even as his alert gaze went to the horizon.
“The sign means ship,” Diana said, her limbs tightening.
James took the glass from Isabeau, climbed onto the rock beside her, and peered through it.
Diana’s heart beat faster. James had thoroughly distracted her again, damn him, from the pirates, her father, and their danger.
“What do you see?” she asked.
“It’s way off,” James said, the glass trained on a seemingly empty spot.
Diana had her hand out for the spyglass even before he lowered it. “Let me see.”
James handed it to her, looking amused. Diana raised the glass, fiddling with it until she trained it on the tiny dot James and Isabeau had spotted. She stared at the little ship until she thought her eye would pop out.
James gently pried the glass from her. “Don’t hurt yourself.” He handed the spyglass back to Isabeau who eagerly sought the ship again. She at least thought it only a game.
“We’ll watch,” James said. “Don’t worry. We’ll see Mallory a long time before he makes shore.”
“And then what? You’ll challenge him to a duel?”
He shot her a look. “I do have a plan, Diana. I’m not going to let Mallory have this island or harm your father.”
Diana folded her arms. “What is the plan then?”
James’s gaze became unreadable, his thoughts closing to her again. “The nature of a plan is not to follow it too closely. And not to anticipate. I have many contingencies based on what Mallory says or what he does, or who is with him or not with him.”
“You mean you’re going to make it up as you go along.”
The corners of his mouth twitched. “A little bit.”
“You could at least tell me the basis of the plan. So that I will be ready for it.”
James slid his arm around Diana’s waist — trying to distract her again. Diana rested her head on his shoulder, her body simply doing it without her permission.
“Your part in the plan will be simple,” James said. “You and Isabeau will be hiding in the house, and you’ll not come out until everything is finished.”
“Oh, thank you very much. So you wish me to wait, wringing my hands, not knowing whether Mallory has murdered you and my father until he comes to drag us out of hiding?”
“I know it’s hard, darlin’.” James eased his hand down the length of her back. “But I can’t take the chance that Mallory won’t try to use you or Isabeau to get around me or the admiral. Mallory will do whatever it takes, and he’ll not care about hurting either of you.” James’s voice had gone cool, as cool as it had been when she’d first encountered Captain Ardmore, commander of the Argonaut. “And if anything happened to you . . .”
His voice had been quiet, but now his guarded expression vanished, and Diana saw in his eyes a pain so raw and old that she barely understood it.
This man hurt, and he hurt all the time. He hid it, Diana realized, behind his coldness, his sardonic humor, and the flares of passion he sometimes let her see.
Diana wanted to reach for him, to ease him, but the wall between them rose again, shutting her out.
Isabeau jumped down from the rock and handed James back the spyglass, finished. She held out her hand to James, and Isabeau danced on the end of it when he took it.
With a last glance at Diana, he let her lead him back to the path from the summit, the chill wind stirring his hair and the ends of his coat.
*** *** ***
For half a week, the sailing vessel hovered on the horizon, coming no nearer Haven, yet not drifting away either.
During that week, James remained elusive. He, Lieutenant Jack, and Diana’s father closeted themselves in the admiral’s study every night, door closed. Planning their strategy, Diana assumed, although she often heard the clink of the brandy decanter and smelled thick cheroot smoke.
Male rituals, she’d think, rolling her eyes. Designed mostly to exclude females.
Diana kept herself busy helping Mrs. Pringle and Jessup keep house, which included hunting for the small mirror Mrs. Pringle kept hanging in the kitchen. The mirror had gone mysteriously missing, and Isabeau vigorously
protested her innocence. The thing never turned up, and Diana promised Mrs. Pringle a new one as soon as they could sail back to the mainland.
On the afternoon of the fourth day, James descended from the island’s summit to tell them that the ship had turned and was heading straight for Haven. Diana experienced a moment of watery, unthinking, panic.
The admiral, Lieutenant Jack, and Jessup made ready to follow James on his orders. The admiral wore a haunted expression, but Lieutenant Jack seemed to have been swayed to James’s side. Lieutenant Jack and James grimly loaded pistols and stashed knives in coats and boots. Diana’s father would not speak to either of them, but he insisted on accompanying them to meet the ship.
James had again resumed the role of pirate hunter, damned if he’d let anyone stand in his way.
“If you get yourself killed, I will never forgive you,” Diana said to him as she stood at the front door, watching them all prepare to leave.
“Then I’ll stay alive,” James said. “The last thing I want is you scolding me for eternity.”
Diana glared, and he returned the look unblinkingly. James touched the small of her back as he passed her in the narrow hall, his fingers caressing briefly, then he left the house after Jack and the admiral.
“Men!” Diana exclaimed as she, Isabeau, and Mrs. Pringle watched from the front garden as the three gentlemen made for the cove. She dashed tears from her eyes. “They run off to face the danger, and leave us to pick up the pieces.”
Isabeau watched her, puzzled, but Diana could see that Mrs. Pringle, scowling at the retreating backs, firmly agreed with her.
*** *** ***
James felt tightening fury as he, Lockwood, and Lieutenant Jack made their way down to the gig. They would row around to the caves while Jessup descended from the cliff tops after sending James’s signal.
James’s anger rose further as they took the boat across the waves, until his vision was red around the edges. He forced himself to pause and catch his breath, to shut down the anger. He had to remain calm, to play out the scene with the icy steadiness that had made James Ardmore famous.
But James was perilously close to igniting. He’d hunted Black Jack Mallory for years, and to at last have the chance to get his hands on the man’s neck made him almost sick with eagerness. Lockwood would have to understand. This was James’s fight.
The sun on the water and sand glared bright, but the caves were cool and dark. Inside their shadows, James, Lieutenant Jack, and the admiral waited for Mallory to come.
James glanced at the lieutenant, and Jack nodded back, ready. James had offered to let Jack stay out of it, but the Englishman had refused.
James knew that, partly, Lieutenant Jack felt useless, and indeed, twice more that week, Jack had been laid low with headaches that had left him weak and sick. But the man had a natural gift for strategy, and he and James had worked out several scenarios for dealing with Mallory.
James idly wondered what Lockwood would do the moment James revealed the truth. Shoot James maybe? But then he’d have to explain to Diana why James was dead, and James didn’t envy any man that.
Rock clicked on rock. The three men looked up, but it was only Jessup, descending through the caves. Right on time.
Jessup reached ground and trudged to the other three. “Did what you asked,” he said in his scraping voice.
“Good,” James answered.
Fury filled him, making the very act of breathing hurt. James stepped forward, brought up his pistol, and put it against Jessup’s forehead.
Jessup looked at the pistol for a startled moment, then his face drained of color. “Damn,” he said.
Chapter Sixteen
Lieutenant Jack, to his credit, didn’t flinch, though he looked surprised.
Lockwood wasn’t surprised at all. He knew, and he’d known all along that the quiet Jessup was in truth the cutthroat pirate, Black Jack Mallory. But Lockwood’s expression remained defiant. “This man is under my protection, Ardmore.”
Silence fell in the cave, broken only by the hollow boom of waves and a gull crying as it swept past the entrance.
James’s pistol never moved. Finger on the trigger, he kept it against Mallory’s forehead.
“You know, I really liked you, Admiral,” James said. “I’d never seen Mallory face to face, so it took me a while to catch on. If you’d have told me who Jessup was, I could have saved us a whole lot of trouble.”
Lockwood’s eyes held sorrow. “I cannot let you kill him.”
Lieutenant Jack broke in. “Why not? From all Ardmore has said, this man is a killer himself. A brutal murderer.”
“He is,” James said. “I don’t think I can forgive you for letting him near your daughter, Admiral. Diana thinks he’s your friend, and such a help to you. You’ve let him be alone in the house with her, and with Isabeau. That has me mighty riled.”
“He is a friend,” Lockwood said. “And a help.”
Anger burned through James like lava through trees on a South Sea island. “He’s a pirate who’d think nothing of cutting your granddaughter to ribbons.”
Black Jack didn’t move. “That was a long time ago. I’m not a pirate any more.”
“Well, now, I’m sure the women and children you murdered will rest easier knowing that.”
James took a second pistol from its holster and cocked it. Black Jack only watched him.
“James,” the admiral said, his voice stern.
The affable man who’d called himself Jessup looked haggard and exhausted, his dark blue eyes ringed with shadows.
“Y’all need to go back to the house,” James said. “While Black Jack and I have a conversation.”
“Let it go, James.”
“Now, I can’t do that.”
“I made a promise,” Lockwood said. “Mallory came to me for help, and I honored his plea. What’s more, he’s become a friend. He could have killed or betrayed me many times over, and he chose not to. He has much remorse for what he’s done, but that was the past. Let him live in the present.”
Remorse. That word again. James felt no remorse. Black Jack Mallory should feel a lifetime of it.
James’s finger shook on the trigger. “What happened was this, Admiral. His own crew threw him off his ship. When pirates want a new captain, they hold an election. It’s real democratic. They elect a new captain, and that captain gets to say what happens to the old one. Sometimes they kill the old captain — but most of the time they just toss him off the ship and wave goodbye.” For the entire exchange, he’d kept his steady gaze on Mallory. “The Argonaut caught up with Black Jack’s ship about a year ago. My crew enjoyed themselves, and that ship is driftwood now, but old Black Jack was gone. So I decided to go hunting for him on my own.”
Lockwood’s face was grim. “Regardless of what happened, Mallory nearly died. I found him floating out at sea, half-starved and very ill. I nursed him back to health and told him he could live here and help me take care of the island. He has done just that. He’s become a loyal companion, and a friend.”
Hatred nursed for a dozen years ate through James’s veins. He shook with it. He was almost sick with it.
“Friend, is he? Mallory and his pack destroyed my brother’s life, did you know that? They were a fine, happy family — my brother Paul with his beautiful wife and two pretty daughters. And then Black Jack Mallory came along. Do you feel remorse about that?” James demanded of Mallory. “Murdering a woman and her two daughters, for fun? It turned my brother into a madman. Even I could never match his drive for vengeance. And mine is pretty good.”
Mallory didn’t flinch. “Maybe I did that. I was drunk or half-stupid with opium most of the time. I know I did terrible things.”
James barked a laugh. “Does the fact that you can’t remember mean you don’t have to pay for what you did?”
“No,” Mallory whispered.
“James,” Lockwood said.
“Admiral, I’d be obliged if you’d shut up.”
“You will not allow me to plead for a man’s life?”
“Any other man, yes. Not this one.”
Water swirled at their feet, cold as ice. From above, James heard a soft noise.
Diana. She was up there, somewhere, listening. He’d known Diana would never stay tamely in the house because James ordered her to. She must have followed Mallory to the opening above and remained there while Mallory descended.
“Lieutenant,” James said. “Take the admiral back to the house.”
“I think I should stay,” Lieutenant Jack said. “Mallory’s ship is on its way in any case.”
“That’s not his ship,” James said. “It’s a French frigate whose captain owes me a favor.”
Lieutenant Jack switched his gaze to James, his usually mild eyes filled with anger. “So you lied to us all this time, did you?
“If you’re waiting for an apology, I’m not giving you one.”
Lieutenant Jack lowered his pistol. “I had made up my mind that you had honor.”
“I don’t give a damn about honor,” James said. “I give a damn about justice.”
“That’s why I’m staying.”
James’s precarious temper splintered. He brought up his second pistol and shot the pirate Mallory through the fleshy part of his arm. Black Jack cried out and clamped his hand to the spreading scarlet stain.
Lockwood took a step forward. James thrust his other pistol against Black Jack’s throat. “Stay away.”
“James . . .”
In an abrupt move, James dropped his spent pistol and twisted Lieutenant Jack’s from his grip. He brought up both pistols. “See, I’m about to become very violent. If you stay, I might have to shoot you too.”
Lieutenant Jack stared at James, white to the lips. A deep anger stirred in his eyes, one James had never seen there before.
“James!”
The voice echoed from above him, clear and feminine. James’s name trembled through the cavern then was lost on the next crash of sea.