At the sound of shouts and pounding feet, Ned stopped. Two men were running after a slighter figure—no doubt one of them had just been pick-pocketed or otherwise off ended by a street urchin. He hoped they caught the scamp.
“What do you suppose that was about?” Lieutenant Wallis stopped beside him.
“Nothing to concern us.” Ned nodded toward the shoddy building ahead of them. Light, noise, and a foul stench were pouring from it. “The Crown and Sword. This is where we’re supposed to be able to get information.”
Wallis looked at the public house with disdain. “Best have done with it, then, sir.”
“Agreed.” Ned straightened his plain brown waistcoat, wishing he could have worn his uniform. But the reports indicated the informant did not respond well to having men in Royal Navy uniforms enter his establishment.
The smell and noise inside the building made Ned’s head reel. He could swim underwater for quite a while, but he wouldn’t be able to hold his breath for as long as this would take.
He shoved his way through drunken men and drunker women toward the bar, ignoring the attempts of a few barmaids to get him sommat.
The dark-skinned man pouring something from a dust-covered bottle into an equally dirty glass eyed Ned suspiciously.
“I need to speak with Mr. Lynch.”
“Why’s he going to want to speak with you?” the barman grunted.
Ned pulled a small bag from his pocket and shook it so the coins inside jangled.
The barman jerked his head toward a doorway obscured by a thick black curtain. “He’s in the back.”
Ned nodded his thanks and headed for the curtain. He hesitated in front of it momentarily, remembering all too well the sight that met Emily St. Aubert when she lifted the black veil. He almost laughed at himself. If only his sister had not secretly tucked The Mysteries of Udolpho in his traveling bag before he’d left Plymouth. With no money to purchase books before setting sail, he’d turned to the ridiculous romance the first week to keep from running mad with boredom during his off-duty hours. He’d meant to pass it on to Charlotte once they arrived at Tierra Dulce.
Feeling quite stupid for his thoughts running in such a direction, Ned pushed the curtain aside and stepped into the room. Five men sat at a round table playing cards, with several more standing around looking on. None but the one sitting directly across from the door did more than glance around at Ned’s entrance before returning their attention to the game.
“Who are you, and what do you want?” The thick man with hair growing in odd patches over his head puffed on a thin cigar.
“Are you Lynch?” Ned’s voice hadn’t cracked at all…or very much, anyway.
The man paused before nodding.
“I’m Ned Cochrane, captain of…of the ship Audacious. I’m searching for someone, and I’ve been told you might have useful information for me.” Ned tossed the coin purse on the table.
Lynch grabbed the bag and opened it, peering into its depths for a moment before tightening the strings again and tucking it into his already burgeoning waistcoat pocket. “Who’s it you’re looking for?”
“A pirate. I don’t know which one, but he came to Kingston—to the Tierra Dulce sugar plantation—and abducted a young woman. I have been tasked with returning her to her family.” And to himself so they could get married. But Lynch didn’t need to know that.
An odd glint entered Lynch’s small, piggish eyes. “Very interesting. Just had someone else in here asking about the same thing.”
“Who?”
“Never you mind about who came asking. I’ll tell you what I told him. Shaw was in here a week ago bragging on how he was going to make himself famous and saying there was sommat being delivered for him to pick up in Kingston.”
Ned’s stomach turned. It was as they feared. Shaw had taken Charlotte. Reading reports of the rare survivors from ships the pirate attacked had given Ned nightmares. He prayed for Charlotte’s safety. “What was this thing being delivered?”
Lynch took a few draws on the cigar before answering. “Not a thing. A person. Ever heard of a woman called Julia Witherington?”
Julia? “Aye—yes, I know of her.”
Lynch nodded as if he’d given a complete answer.
“You mean to say that Shaw went to Tierra Dulce for the express purpose of taking Mrs. Ransome?”
“Ransome, eh? Heard the bird got married. Aye, he holds some grudge against her and her father, the esteemed admiral.” But from the sneer in Lynch’s voice, it was obvious he didn’t esteem Sir Edward much at all.
“Did he take both of his ships to Kingston?”
“Don’t believe so.”
“Where would the second ship have been while Shaw made this…pickup in Kingston?”
“Ah, now that’d be premium information, lad.”
Of course. Ned reached into his back pocket and withdrew a larger, heavier bag. He let it swing from his fingers rather than tossing it onto the table. “Where?”
“There’s a bay near the point at Negril where Shaw’s been known to lay up and count his gold. But you’d best not try to take even one of his ships on by yourself, boy. Even with a sixty-four-gun man-o’-war under your command.”
So much for not wearing his uniform to keep Lynch from knowing who he really was. “Thank you for the information.” He flung the second purse at the man, turned on his heel, and marched out of the place as fast as he could.
He didn’t slow or speak until he was almost at the dock.
Shaw. Shaw had Charlotte. If he’d meant to take Julia, what would the man whose depravity and cruelty were whispered about from one end of the Caribbean to the other do when he learned he’d taken the wrong woman?
Back in the boat, Wallis looked as though he wished Ned would confide his thoughts to him, but Ned wasn’t certain yet what he was thinking. All he knew was that he needed to get Charlotte out of that pirate’s hands as soon as possible, no matter what consequences befell his own career once his crew recognized her as Charles Lott.
William even now was sailing in the opposite direction. He’d determined that if whoever took Charlotte was serious about collecting a ransom, he would stay within a few days’ sail of Kingston. He’d created a plan for the two of them to circumnavigate the island and meet on the north side by midweek, gathering as much intelligence along the way as they could.
If Shaw had indeed taken Charlotte, the more than half-day lead he had on them meant he could already be docking in this protected bay doing…no, he wouldn’t allow himself to imagine what the pirate might be doing to Charlotte.
Dreadful determination descended into the pit of Ned’s gut. He had no choice. He must sail for the secret bay and engage Shaw.
Salvador glowered at Charlotte Ransome, looking for all the world like a lad in baggy breeches and a voluminous white shirt under a too-large waistcoat. His shoulder ached from landing on it when he’d tackled Charlotte only a few feet from the churchyard.
He hated to admit it, but she was more ingenious—and faster—than he’d suspected. At least his threat that he would take her back to the Crown and Sword, reveal her true identity, and leave her at the pub patrons’ mercy had gained her cooperation.
But how had she gotten out of the cabin? And who had been in her hammock when he’d returned for the letter just before leaving?
Charlotte rowed with the rest until the boat bumped up against Vengeance’s side.
“You, boy—Martin—you go up first.” Salvador waited until she’d gone halfway up before following her. Though she hadn’t been able to climb up the day they had gone for a nice long swim in the ocean, she had no trouble scaling the side of his ship tonight as if she’d been born to it.
Once on deck he grabbed her upper arm—his fingers and thumb meeting easily around the scrawny yet firm limb—and dragged her toward his cabin, ignoring the questioning looks from the crew still about on deck.
The half deck was lit by a lantern hanging over Declan’s shoulder where he sat outside the door to Salvador’s quarters.
“Welcome back, Cap’n. Get what you needed out of ol’ Lynch?”
“Aye.”
Declan looked up from the piece of wood he was whittling, frowning at the hard tone in Salvador’s voice. “What went wrong?”
By way of answer, Salvador reached up and swiped the hat from Charlotte’s head.
Declan dropped the figurine and the knife. “How—?” He jumped from his chair, his head crashing against the deck above with the sound of a cannon. The giant dropped to his knees, clutching the top of his head and groaning.
“Serves you right.” Salvador skirted around him and stormed into the main cabin. “Suresh. Suresh!”
“He’s not—” But Charlotte’s words died at the look of warning Salvador shot her.
He returned to the half deck and carried the still-groaning Declan’s lantern back with him. He crossed to the hammock and held the light over it before yanking the thin sheet off the writhing figure.
Lying on his side, hands and feet tied and his mouth gagged with what looked like Salvador’s silk neckcloths, Suresh’s dark eyes implored Salvador to release him.
Salvador lowered the gag and then began freeing his steward from his bindings.
“Captain, I am so sorry. It is my fault, solely mine. I do not know what happened, only that I was struck from behind. I woke up here and have been unable to escape.” Upon closer inspection, Salvador saw that Suresh’s feet were tied to the hammock’s ropes, and with his hands behind his back, it was obvious why he’d been unable to free himself.
After he was finished with the neckcloths, Salvador turned to Charlotte, who stood in the middle of the cabin toying with the bottom button of her waistcoat. “Explain.”
“You should have known I would try to escape.”
He sighed. “Yes, I did. But I obviously underestimated just how devious and hurtful to others you can be.”
Were those tears welling in her eyes? Surely over her failed escape attempt and not over his reprimand.
“I did not want to hurt Mr. Suresh,”—she stepped forward and looked around Salvador to the steward—“but I couldn’t be this close to land without trying to get away.” Her blue eyes snapped back to Salvador’s. “I waited until you left the cabin the first time, and as Mr. Suresh was leaving to follow you, I knocked him on the head with the heavy pewter candlestick from your desk. I tied him up and, though it took some doing, managed to get him into the hammock by letting one end of it down first, tying his feet to the other end, and then hoisting the head back up again.”
He had underestimated not only her cunning but her physical strength as well.
She again looked at Suresh. “I borrowed some of your clothing, Mr. Suresh, and I am sorry to report that when Captain Salvador unceremoniously threw me to the street, he tore the sleeve. I am very good with a needle. I can mend it for you.”
Suresh, as usual, said nothing.
Charlotte returned her gaze to Salvador. “After I was dressed in Mr. Suresh’s clothing, I exited from his cabin and made my way to the quarterdeck. And I did not mean to start that fight—please do not punish the other boy. He was fighting me because I took his hat.”
Salvador turned and paced the cabin—so that Charlotte would not see his expression. If she weren’t related to the officer tasked with hunting him down and putting him out of business, and if she weren’t a woman, he would offer her a place aboard Vengeance.
However, as things now stood, he could not risk another escape attempt.
“Suresh, go tell Declan to join us.” He did not bother to turn around to make sure his steward obeyed the order.
Moments later the steward and first officer returned together, Declan bent over to save his head from another encounter with the beams above until he stood under the skylight, where he could straighten to his full height.
Salvador leaned against the edge of the table and took a long moment to study each of the three people in the room. Charlotte Ransome, looking like a bedraggled boy in Suresh’s clothes, sat in one of the chairs, chewing the inside of her cheek. Suresh, trying to hide in the shadows, shame flowing from him in tidal waves. And Declan, the man who’d spent the last few hours guarding the wrong captive.
This was all Charlotte Ransome’s fault. Before she set foot on his ship, he’d controlled everything that happened on Vengeance. He supposed this was his punishment for doing something he shouldn’t have done in the first place.
He took a deep breath, steeling himself for the next wrong thing he was about to do.
“Captain Salvador, what are we going to do about Shaw’s taking Julia? Do you think he’ll really do it, or was he merely bragging about it?” Charlotte gnawed the tip of her thumb.
Her question knocked the wind from his sails. He’d been trying to figure out how best to tell Charlotte she would spend the rest of her time here tied to a chair, and she’d been worrying about the true problem.
Declan rested his hands on the table and leaned over it—close enough to Charlotte that, should she shift to her right, her shoulder would touch his arm. “You got confirmation, then? Shaw is taking the Witherington woman?”
Salvador sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. “Aye. Lynch said Shaw was here not a week ago talking about a package being delivered for him in Kingston. He knows Julia—Mrs. Ransome—is back in Jamaica, and he plans to exact his revenge upon Admiral Witherington and Commodore Ransome.” He shook his head. “And I, in my idiocy, made it possible for him to get to her more easily.”
“What?” Charlotte jumped from her chair. “You helped him? What would you do that for?”
“My dear Miss Ransome, by taking you and not your sister-in-law, I drew away the best protection my…Mrs. Ransome had: your brother’s ship and the other Royal Navy ship that arrived with him. I can only pray that the commodore had the good sense to set guards about Tierra Dulce to protect Julia before he left to search for you…for me.”
“How did he know she was coming?” Declan asked.
“Obviously, he had someone inside Tierra Dulce, just as we do.” Salvador ignored the way Charlotte gaped at him at that admission. “I never thought that new steward looked at all trustworthy.”
“The new—you mean Henry Winchester?” Charlotte dropped back into her chair.
“You met him, did you?” Salvador pulled out a chair and sat, pressing his knuckles against his temple and leaning his elbow on the tabletop. “I never met the man myself, but from the reports I heard of him, and from seeing him in Kingston, I am certain he is a blackguard.”
“Met him? He’s the reason I came to Jamaica. I thought I was going to marry the man. Now you say he’s dishonest and could be working with a pirate?” Charlotte’s voice increased in volume and shrillness with each statement. “We have to do something! We must warn Julia. She needs to know her steward cannot be trusted. Can we get back to Kingston in time? Do you think Shaw has made his move yet? Are we well armed enough to take his ships?”
Salvador chuckled at Charlotte’s sudden defection to his crew—and her forgetting he was also a pirate. He was glad she no longer thought of him as cut from the same cloth as Shaw.
“I would like nothing better than to protect Mrs. Ransome, but I fear by the time we could return to Kingston, it would be too late. Shaw will take advantage of the absence of your brother and his ships and move in to put his plot into action soon, if he has not already done so. And, no—we are not well enough armed to take down even one of Shaw’s ships, much less both of them.”
“You said he wanted to exact revenge against Admiral Witherington and my brother. Why? What did they ever do to him?”
“I do not know precisely what happened, but from what I’ve learned, it all stems from something that happened twenty years ago when Admiral Witherington first brought his family over from England.”
“William was on that ship. That’s when he and Julia met for the first time. She said she went out on deck dressed in her brother’s clothes and climbed to the mast top to see a French ship.” The smile from Charlotte’s memory faded. “Are you saying Shaw was on that ship too?”
Salvador leaned forward, elbows braced against his knees, plagued by his own memories. “He isn’t on the Navy List. No one by the name of Shaw served on Indomitable on that voyage.”
“But if we don’t know what happened twenty years ago, we don’t know what kind of revenge he’s seeking now.” Charlotte looked from Salvador to Declan to Suresh and then back to Salvador. “Do we?”
Salvador dropped his head into his hands. “I wanted to protect her. But instead I made it possible for him to get to her.”
Declan’s fist slammed onto the table, making them all jump. “We might not be able to catch him coming out of Kingston with her, but we know where he’ll head.”
“Negril.” Suresh’s soft voice came from the shadows.
“We can make it there and find a good place to hide and wait for him to show up. Soon as he does, we’ll have the element of surprise.” Declan paused.
Salvador stared at the rope jammed into the crack between the deck boards under his feet. If anything happened to Julia because of what he’d done—
“So we go to Negril.”
Salvador looked up at Charlotte’s emphatic statement. “We?”
She crossed her arms, glaring at him. “Aye, we. What choice do I have? I am not foolish enough to believe I’ll be able to escape—and even if I did, it would only serve to distract from the mission to rescue Julia. In for a penny, in for a pound, I say.”
“Meaning you will help us rather than hinder us?” Salvador straightened in his chair.
“Aye—especially if you’ll let me work out on deck.”
“No.”
“But I was a senior midshipman—captain of a watch—on Audacious. I’ve seen the young men on this ship. They need someone to set an example for them.”
“No.”
“You need me as part of your crew.”
In two strides, Salvador reached Charlotte and grabbed her by the bony shoulders. “I said no.”
“Not even assisting the sailing master by keeping logs?”
“No.”
“Jean Baptiste has been complaining that no one has been able to do a decent job of it since his last mate died of dysentery,” Declan added. “Besides, it will keep her busy and out of trouble.”
Salvador swung his gaze to his first officer and future brother-in-law. “Et tu Brute?”
Charlotte looked up at the giant of a man and smiled at him, turning Declan a shade of red Salvador had never seen. Wonderful. Now not only did he have to worry about rescuing Julia from Shaw, he also had to worry about Declan’s infatuation with Charlotte.
When God said vengeance was His, the Bible should have gone on to warn about dire consequences for anyone who decided to take his own revenge. For this was surely Salvador’s punishment for thinking he could take the task out of God’s hands. He prayed Shaw’s punishment was even worse.