Cruel laughter reached her ears. “Ah, Toothless, ye know I’d love to have another wench in my bed, but I willna be stealing from the Queen. Orelia will have all her slaves, half-dead or not.”
So, she was dying, and her last moments of life were to be serving a foreign queen. But mayhap this Orelia would know that she, Faryn, was no ordinary slave but Irish nobility. She didn’t belong here. Aye, she would plead her case with Queen Orelia and beg to be sent home.
When she looked up, Faryn noticed that the rest of the slaves had departed the ship and she was alone, still crouched on the cold splintery gangplank. The boards shook beneath her and the thunderous methodical thump of boots on wood sounded behind her.
“Stand, slave, or risk another lash of the whip.” The captain’s voice was softer than it had been before.
Faryn chanced a glance above her and was taken aback once more by his appearance. So dangerous, and yet he’d showed her a kindness before that he didn’t have to.
He moved to hold out his hand, the light glinting off a large and sharp sword as his arm gently nudged it. From his other hip swung a black leather cat-o’-nine-tails.
Faryn shuddered. She didn’t want to take his hand.
She wanted to disappear. Her hair cascaded down her back like a cloak, and for a fleeting moment, she wished that the cloak of hair could make her invisible. Foolish thoughts of a desperate and scared woman.
She shook her head and tried to stand, almost making it but collapsing again onto the hard wood.
“Will ye take my help now, lass? Or shall I let ye fall another time?” His voice was soft, not at all in tune with his devilish appearance. Again, he held out his hand.
Squeezing her eyes tight, she reached up and placed her cold, trembling fingers into his warm, rough hand. She expected to be roughly yanked to her feet and shoved or whipped the rest of the way down the gangplank. Surprise registered again as he gently lifted her up to her full height. When his gray eyes widened slightly, darkening with hunger as they traced the outline of her body, she was once again reminded how very nude she was. She crossed her legs, covered her mons with a hand and attempted to cover her breasts with one arm, but he only chuckled at her foolhardiness.
“Dinna ye know, leannan, I’ve seen ye without a stitch on, nigh on a month? We stripped ye bare when first we boarded ye upon my ship.” He leaned in close, his white teeth showing between two wide masculine lips, and whispered, “I’ve touched ye. Weighed and measured ye. Found ye ripe for the picking.”
Faryn gasped. “Nat!” A shiver raced along her limbs and her traitorous body reacted to the wicked words whispered to her even as her mind abhorred it. She wanted to remember the feel of this devil man’s hands on her, but she could not, and part of her wondered if he was simply messing with her head.
“Oh lovely, dinna worry, your maidenhead is still intact. That is Queen Orelia’s to take from ye.”
Her mind whirled in confusion. Orelia was a woman. How could she possibly do such as he suggested? Unless she meant to only sell Faryn upon gaining her. She would be sold to the highest bidder, no doubt a nasty, foul-smelling nightmare of a man. Well, she vowed, she’d kill herself first.
Unless… There must be a way to escape this fate. The man exuded a sensuality that gave her an idea, though she wasn’t certain she could pull it off in her current condition. However, there was only one way to find out—she had to try.
“Please, Captain… What is your name?” She leaned toward him, letting the tips of her breasts rub seductively against his black linen shirt. She shivered from the sensations—her mind warring with her body—she wanted only to entice him and yet she enticed herself as well. She hurried her proposition before words failed her. “I can assure ye my family can pay ye ten times what ye’ll receive from…your queen.” That was a lie, of course. She might have been borne of Irish nobles, but they’d been wretchedly poor for far too long.
He did not move, nor did his facial expression change. Had she succeeded only in tempting herself? But they she saw a heated flash of desire in his eyes, before he shuttered it.
“Captain Noir.” As he said his name, his fingers danced along her waist, over her ribs and just under her breasts. “But ye needna bribe me with…these.” He brushed the undersides of her breasts, sending wicked frissons of heat straight between her legs. “Or your money. I do my duty as I see fit.”
Faryn gulped. She was hungry for something beyond her imagination. Wicked. Wanton. Why did this terrifying man, this Captain Noir, make her feel like she wanted to lie down beside him, have him crush her, sink into her?
She shook her head again and looked down toward her bare toes. What was she thinking? To give herself to this scoundrel just to get away from a queen who could possibly help her? Once Orelia knew who she was, she wouldn’t sell her. And to think she’d been about to disgrace her family.
Faryn blamed it on a month of near starvation.
Her mother and father would never forgive her. And her betrothed! He would surely search the open seas calling every pirate he found into battle only to die at the end of the blade, all to revenge her honor, which moments ago she had been willing to give away. Tears of frustration stung her eyes.
She stepped back from Noir and whipped around, intending to walk the rest of the way down the gangplank, her head held as high as she could possibly hold it under the circumstances.
His hand, rough with calluses, gripped her arm, stopping her. “What is your name, leannan?”
“Faryn. Lady Faryn. My father is a powerful man. Ye shall all be punished severely for stealing me away. And I shall rejoice when the cat-o’-nine-tails rips into your bare arse.”
The captain had the audacity to smile. Although it wasn’t a curving of the lips filled with humor but of cruelty and distaste. He laughed at her.
“Lady Faryn ye are no longer. Ye will serve the queen. Your family’s titles mean nothing here.
Curb your tongue of threats, for they will only see ye harmed.”
Faryn wrenched her arm from Noir, her resolve restored, and stalked down the rest of the gangplank, acutely aware of the air hitting her behind, her thighs, her breasts, places that had never felt the cool air or spritz of seawater before.
“Be wary, lass, for ye have descended upon the first gate of hell, where no earthly man of morals would dare to cross. Our queen is not a queen by divine right but by right of the blade.”
Faryn didn’t turn back, nor did she take heed to what he had to say, though she did shudder.
WRAITH WATCHED THE SWAY OF CREAMY WHITE BUTTOCKS AS THE RAVING BEAUTY WALKED
determinedly away. Despite her being aboard ship for thirty days, her long golden hair still held luster as it hugged her body and waved with the breeze. He imagined running his fingers through her hair, gripping it in his fist and giving it a gentle tug. He couldn’t help but smile, for never had he met a woman as tart of tongue and simultaneously innocent as the day she was born.
Cruel world that it was, she would be wasted on the hedonist ways of the queen, then most likely tossed to the wharf.
Dammit, he wanted her!
For himself.
She was a right beautiful woman but beyond her beauty there was something more. Her fiery spirit stirred his blood. And he’d a need to set foot in Ireland. This blonde vixen might be the key to his entry.
The queen did owe him a hefty sum for bringing the nearly two-dozen slaves this trip had proffered. However much he abhorred doing her dirty work of transporting her sex slaves, at least she kept her mouth shut about his true identity. Perhaps he could convince Orelia that instead of his usual charge for shipment, he would take half and the lass. Indeed, she would have only sold Lady Faryn to some sop for less than he would bargain for her.