‘Thank you, ma’am,’ the cook said, then spoiled it by adding slyly, ‘nothing like a bit of exercise to give you an appetite, I always say.’
‘Quite,’ Averil retorted. ‘That hut was in a shocking state—it took a lot of work to tidy it up.’
Thwarted, Potts returned to his frying pan, glowering at the grins of the other men. They were good-humoured smiles, Luc noticed, neither jeering nor directed at the young woman on the rock. ‘Well done,’ he murmured. She narrowed her eyes at him, so he added more loudly, ‘I’ve a pile of washing needs doing.’
‘I am sure you have, Luke darling,’ Averil said, then softened her tone with an effort he could see. ‘I will need hot water, please.’
‘See to it after breakfast, Potts.’
‘Is she doing all our washing, Cap’n?’ Ferret asked through a mouthful of herring.
‘Miss Heydon is not doing anything for you, Ferret.’
‘Are you the man who lent me these clothes?’ Averil asked as Potts handed her a mug of black tea.
‘Aye, ma’m.’
‘Is Ferret your real name? Surely not.’ She took a sip of tea and gasped audibly at the strength of it.
‘Er … it’s Ferris, ma’am.’ ‘Thank you, Mr Ferris.’
The man grinned. ‘Pleasure to help the Cap’n’s lady, ma’am.’
The others said nothing, but Luc sensed, with the acute awareness of his men any captain learns to acquire, that something in their mood had changed. They had stopped thinking of Averil as a nameless creature for their careless pleasure and started regarding her, not just as his property, but as a person. She was frightened of them still, wisely so—they had not forgotten that she was a woman and they had been celibate for weeks. He could feel the apprehension coming off her like heat from a fire, but she had the intelligence and the guts to engage with them.
Miss Averil Heydon was a darned nuisance and enough to keep any man awake half the night with lustful thoughts and an aching groin, but he was beginning to admire the chit. Admiration did nothing to dampen desire, he discovered.
‘They’re coming,’ Tom the Patch said, his one eye screwed up against the sun dazzle on the waves.
Luc pulled out his watch. ‘They need to do better than that.’
‘Nasty cross-current just there,’ Sam Bull observed with the air of a man determined to be fair at all costs.
‘These waters are one big cross-current,’ Luc said. ‘You reckon you can do better?’
‘Yeah,’ Bull said, and nodded his curly head. ‘Easy.’
They are training for something, Averil thought, watching the men as she sipped the disgusting tea. Her teeth, if they had any enamel left, would be black, she was sure.
The men were a crew, a real ship’s crew, not a motley group of fugitives. They weren’t hiding here because they were deserters, or waiting for someone to come and take them off. It was incredible how much more she was noticing now her terror had abated a little. Instinct had told her to try to treat the men as individuals and, strangely, that had been easier to do over the shared food than it had been to pretend an intimacy with Luke that she did not feel.
Or, at least, she corrected herself as she felt the warmth of his thigh through the thickness of their trousers, she felt an intimacy, just not one involving any sort of affection or trust.
He was a good officer though, albeit a rogue commanding rogues. She had seen enough army officers in her time in India, and she had watched how the Bengal Queen was run; she could recognise authority when she saw it.
The men were focused on the approaching boat while Luke ate his bacon, his eyes on the pilot gig, too. ‘Why are you here?’ she asked, low voiced.
He shook his head without looking at her.
‘Deserters have no need to train for speed,’ she carried on, speculating. ‘And why steal one of those big rowing boats, why not a sailing ship? A brig—you have enough men to crew a brig, haven’t you?’
‘You ask too many questions,’ Luke said, his eyes still trained on the sea. ‘That is dangerous, be quiet.’
A threat—or a warning? Averil put down her empty plate and mug and studied his profile. She could believe he was a man of violence, one who would kill if he had to and do it with trained efficiency, but she could not believe now that he would kill her. If he had been capable of that, he would have been capable of raping her last night.
‘It is less dangerous to tell me the truth.’
‘For whom?’ he asked. But there was the slightest curve to the corner of his mouth and Averil relaxed a little. ‘Perhaps later.’
The rowers were close now and she could see Tubbs at the tiller and Hawkins heaving on an oar. Some sound must have escaped her lips for Luke turned towards her. ‘They won’t hurt you—you are mine now.’ He dipped his head and the shock of his mouth on hers, here, where the men could see them, froze her into immobility. It was a rapid, hard kiss on the lips, nothing more, but it felt startlingly possessive and so did the way his hand stayed on her shoulder when he stood to watch the men land, his pocket watch in the other palm. That big hand would curl into a formidable fist in her defence. She could feel the pressure of each finger and shivered—how would it feel if he caressed her?
‘Not bad,’ he called down to the rowers as they splashed through the shallow surf and up the beach. ‘You could do better. The rest of you, get going. On my mark—now!’
There was a scramble as the others heaved themselves aboard and began to back-water away from the shore. The first crew, without a backward glance, made for the fire and the food Potts had left for them. Then they saw Averil on her rock and they slowed like a pack of dogs sighting a cat, their eyes narrowing.
Luke left his hand where it was for a moment longer, then strolled down to meet them. ‘Close your mouth, Tubbs, or something will fly in,’ he said mildly. The man muttered and a snigger went round the group as their eyes shifted between Luke and Averil.
She wanted to run. Instead she got to her feet, picked up Luke’s plate and walked down to the fire. ‘More bacon, darling?’ Somehow she produced the purr that her friend Dita had managed to get into the most innocuous sentence when she wanted to flirt. Dita, who was probably drowned. Averil blinked back the prickle of tears: Dita would have both charmed and intimidated this rabble.
Close now, they gawped at her and Averil remembered what Luke had said about the wolf pack. These men eyed Luke as much as they ogled her, on the watch for his reaction, edgy as if they waited for him to snarl and lash out if they encroached on his property.
‘Will the others beat your time, do you think?’ she asked, direct to Tubbs.
He blinked, startled, as if the frying pan had addressed him. ‘I reckon we’re better by a length,’ he said when Luke did not react.
‘The boat looks very manoeuvrable. At least it seems so to me. I have been on an East Indiaman for three months, so any small boat looks fast.’ She sat on the grass by Luke who had hunkered down, apparently intent on the gig. Without looking at her he put out his arm and tugged her closer and the men’s eyes shifted uneasily. Now what? Instinct told her to keep talking to them, make them acknowledge her as a person, not a commodity, but she dared say nothing that would seem as if she was probing into their purpose here.
‘Had a lot of treasure on it, did it?’ Dawkins said.
‘Not bullion, I’m sure. But there would have been silks, spices, gem stones, ivory, rare woods—those sorts of things.’ There could be no harm in telling them; the cargo would have gone down or been ruined by the water.
‘You