Hold Your Breath 03 - My Captain, My Earl Read online

  Since after that first day when she stitched his head, he had had almost no contact with her. The crew had kept him more than busy the past week, and there had been no need.

  He paused, suddenly at a loss now that he was sitting next to her. What did one say to a young woman with the peculiarity of captaining a pirate ship?

  “You have surprised me, Jase. After our first encounter, I did not think it possible for you to survive on this ship. Survive with this crew.”

  He nodded, his eyes squinting at memories from the last ship he was on. “Your crew is far above the kind that was on the Rosewater.”

  “But my crew can be harsh. It is our way. But you have escaped that. You have been true to what you said you would do. You have kept your head down, followed orders, done all that has been asked of you and more.”

  She leaned forward, head cocked as she looked at him. “I did not see it in you at first. I did not think you capable.”

  “No?”

  “No. Your ire—your hackles prickled too quickly when we first talked. A man with that much unwarranted pride rarely does well on the Windrunner.”

  Jason’s eyes swung to the vast blackness of the night ocean. He had seen too much of it in the past years. “I will be honest, Captain Kat, I am just looking survive. Survive so I can get to dry land. This is the first hope of that I have had in two years.”

  “Two years? How did you get on the Rosewater?”

  “Unfortunate circumstances.” He stood abruptly. “I should retire.”

  “Avoidance does not make the truth disappear.” She looked up at him, the challenge clear in her dark blue eyes, even in the moonlight.

  He stood for a moment, then sat heavily, the crate creaking. It was not like he needed to hide the truth at this point in time. “I was gathering evidence of treason against several men when I was bound and gagged and tossed into the hold of a ship. I presume they discovered my investigation. I have been a slave to three more ships since then. The Rosewater was the last one.”

  “No wonder you took up a weapon so quickly against your Rosewater mates.”

  “They were not my mates.” His fist curled. “Captors, at best. Demons from hell, at worst.”

  “Truly? If I recall, they did not seem to have much skill in the way of fighting.”

  “No. They were worthless. But I was one against the number of them, and they liked their cat-o-nines.”

  She whistled low, shaking her head. Her eyes came back to his. “That much anger, it makes it interesting that you have done well on our ship. I have heard nary a negative word from the crew about you.”

  “Your crew has respect amongst them.”

  “Aye.” She nodded. “That is also our way.”

  When she said the word “aye,” it suddenly occurred to Jason the oddity in his conversation with the captain—her accent was gone. When they first spoke a week ago, and in every order she gave the crew, her odd sailor accent and mariner talk swallowed most of her words.

  But not now.

  And that was exactly how he had been lulled into conversation. He could have just as easily been sitting in a London drawing room chatting with a lady of the ton—well, maybe not a lady of the ton, but a gentle lady of the countryside, yes. But they were a wide ocean away from the drawing rooms of his past.

  What was she?

  “Your talk. Your language, Captain Kat. It is not guttural. It actually has remnants of refinement.”

  She laughed. It was a warm, throaty chuckle that disappeared low over the water. “I slipped with that, but thank you, I think.”

  Her eyes moved to the stars as she propped her head on the thick wood rail behind her. “Truthfully, this is how I hear language in my mind. I dream like this. Think like this. But I maintain the accent for the crew, lest they think I am edging into a proper lady. They get uncomfortable when I slip. My father had several English tutors for me that were extremely proper with their grammar. He grew up in England and wanted me to learn to speak like an Englishwoman—for what purpose, I know not—I have no intentions of getting anywhere near that part of the world.”

  She shrugged. “It is possible he eventually wants to return to England. I do not know. But he always demanded—still does—that I only speak with the utmost propriety in front of him. But that does me little good with a crew of salty dogs.”

  “And there is no need to toss your accent for me?”

  “No, Jase, there is not.” She laughed again, her eyes still to the darkness above. “You are ridiculously far from being a mariner. We have never had a proper Englishman aboard, save for the tutors. So I find you a curiosity. Plus, it is nice to be able to be natural in speech with someone other than my father.”

  “You maintain quite the facade with the men, do you not?”

  Her eyes swung down to him sharply. “Rude. I would take offense and have you flogged were you part of my crew.” Then her eyes softened. “As you will be off the ship within a fortnight, I will allow it to slide.”

  Jason braced himself. The last thing he needed was to have her change her mind and throw him in another ship hold instead of bringing him to land. He was suddenly acutely aware he was treading in dangerous waters speaking to the captain with such informality.

  But then her posture relaxed, and her eyes went to the crow’s nest. “It is also why I like the night. The simplicity. No airs to put on. No pressure. The stars. Open waters. Salty breezes. Freedom, if only for a few hours.”

  “I think this is the first time I have met someone who has strived for a veneer of downward rather that upward mobility, even if it is an act.”

  She shrugged. “Whatever serves the ship. And the ship demands I lead the crew. Just because I accept what I must do, Jase, does not mean I choose it when given the choice.”

  She went quiet, and the lapping of the ocean against ship tempered them into a comfortable silence.

  Deep in the moving shadows, Jason watched her watch the sky, trying to place her into some sort of category of women he had known in his life. The proper lady she bore little resemblance to, except for her speech. God forgive her, she wore a shirt and breeches. But that didn’t necessarily put her into the whore category, either.

  She was a leader—a good one, he had to admit—from what he had observed over the past week. The crew respected her. He had never heard them say one ill word about her and her decisions—even if she was nowhere within ear-shot.

  She was fair. She treated the men with respect, but nor was there the slightest coddle of womanly attentions to them.

  His eyes swept over her form. There was definitely a woman’s body beneath the linen shirt, vest and breeches. This was the first time he had been close enough to really study her, but the shadows hid much of what he was curious about.

  She wasn’t exactly clean, but then again, none of them were. It was hard to tell if she was pleasing to the eye through the dirt and the bandana covering her entire forehead and skull—he guessed so, by the classic lines of her jaw and cheekbones. Her eyes were stunning, if nothing else.

  “Why do you hide under that?” Jason pointed at her head.

  “What?” Her hand went to her head, touching the red cloth. “Oh, do you mean the bandana?”

  He nodded.

  “Would you think of me as a woman if you had to look at my hair all day?”

  “I do think of you as a woman.”

  “A woman before a captain?”

  “Yes.”

  “Dear God, I pray you are the only one on board with that thought.”

  “It matters that much?”

  She looked at him, fingernails plucking the edge of the wood crate. “Yes, it matters. It matters to the hierarchy of the ship. To the respect I must demand. To the respect I have earned.”

  “You think the respect hinges on your hair?”

  “No. But I will not allow a reason that is not a reason to affect my control on this ship. I decided long ago I either needed to crop it to my skull or keep i
t hidden. I chose hidden.”

  Jason latched onto the tiniest thread she just offered—a thread of something genuinely personal about herself. He leaned forward. “What on God’s earth could have led you to this life?”

  “I was not led.” She stood, turning to lean her belly on the railing as she watched the waters. “I was born into it. It is all I ever remember. The only life I have lived. I have no mother. My father is a captain, always has been, so I grew up on this ship.”

  “But how did you survive? Being a fem—” He cut himself off, eyes shifting to the rigging off the mast.

  She laughed. “Being a female? It is a fair question. I take no offense at it. I know I am a woman—and an oddity. The crew may respect me, but truthfully, the only reason I can do what I do is my father. He is a force among men. A giant. I have survived unscathed thus far because of the loyalty—and fear—he inspires. No man has ever dared to touch me. And when he could no longer captain, his crew became my crew.”

  “Can I ask you a question?”

  Her head swung in his direction. “You have not curbed yourself thus far, Jase, so am I to stop you now?”

  “Have you killed? You are a pirate.”

  “You are trying to figure me out?”

  “Yes.”

  “Let me first correct you on a fact you have already convinced yourself to be true, Jase. We are privateers, not pirates.”

  “Upon whose authority?”

  “Upon the letter of marque and reprisal from your very own England.”

  “Those ended with the war.”

  “Did they? Are you sure? You have been ocean-locked for a long spell.”

  “What need is there now for privateers?”

  “There will always be need as long as governments are greedy, Jase. I would think a man of your age would have already figured that out.”

  He stood. “Do not speak of my homeland with such disrespect.”

  “And do not take a tone with me, boy.” She glared up at him. “Your loyalty is quaint, but it is not my country, not my loyalty. I can see it for what it is.”

  “But that same government gives you breadth to attack the innocent.”

  “Posh. No innocents. We do not prey on honorable causes. We only come out occasionally. My father’s health no longer allows him to captain, but the crew—even though they are all wealthy in their own right—they need the adventure. These runs keep them happy. Keep my father’s…investors…happy. Keep my father safe from their threats. So we set sail, take down ships that need to be taken down, and return home.”

  “That simple?”

  “That simple.”

  He looked down at her, realizing that not only was he a good head-and-a-half taller than her, she was noticeably slight. That she managed to captain a crew the size of hers without trouble was actually quite remarkable.

  “How long have you been captain of the Windrunner?”

  She crossed her arms over her chest, turning to him. “Two years, now. There have been no complaints.”

  “I do not imagine so. Kill to keep everyone fat and wealthy, and all is well?”

  “I do not take a share of the prize, boy. It is blood money.”

  “So you do kill for it.”

  “I try very hard to spare lives—even for those that do not deserve that courtesy. But the deaths—I make no apologies for. I do this to keep my father safe, safe from threat.”

  She moved closer to him, anger in her steps as one hand went to the railing and the other to the silver hilt of her cutlass. “You are no different, boy. Tell me you would not have killed members of the Rosewater’s crew if you had first managed in-hand a true weapon instead of a mop handle?”

  Jason’s jaw clenched. “Maybe. But that was for protecting my own life. Not another’s.”

  “So you would not kill for someone you loved?”

  He shrugged.

  “No answer, boy?”

  “Yes. Yes, I would kill for someone I love.”

  “Then please, cease your judgment of me, boy.” Her arms re-crossed against her chest as she tilted her head, craning her ear to the deck. “I do believe Frog has repositioned and is currently quiet. I think it would do you well to get more sleep in before the crew puts you to work at dawn.”

  Realizing his insolence had, again, put him in treacherous waters with this captain, Jason took the suggestion for what it was. A command.

  He gave her a crisp nod, and walked to the steps descending from the quarterdeck. He started down the stairs, but before his head disappeared from her view, he stopped.

  “Captain Kat.”

  “Yes?”

  “Is your name really Kat?”

  “No.”

  He waited, poised on the steps.

  She sighed, uncrossing her arms as she walked to the wheel. “It is Katalin. Katalin Dewitt.”

  Surprised she answered him, Jason gave another nod and descended.

  { Chapter 3 }

  Two days later, Jason slogged a heavy slop bucket from the ship’s galley across the deck. The bright sunlight hitting him after being below deck, it took him a few blinks to realize the crew had converged on one side of the ship.

  Setting the bucket down, he walked to the jostling bodies and stopped at the outer back edge of the crowd that had gathered. Between the yelling and shouts around him, he could hear a heated argument going on in the front of the crowd.

  Jason leaned toward Clegg, one of the scrawniest of the crew, who was hopping, trying to see over the heads of the men in front of him. “What is going on?”

  The sailor didn’t take his eyes off of the wildly waving arms in the front of the crowd. “Not sure. Longboat not be there.” He pointed to the side of the ship. “I ‘ear a scream an’ splash an’ the boat not ‘ere no more. ‘Eard something ‘bout Cap’n. Not rightly sure what that be.”

  Jason pushed his way through the crowd, stopping once he got to Poe and Frog at the railing, throwing arms and spit and bellowing at each other. A small pair of boots sat on the deck between them.

  Jason snatched a flailing tattooed arm from each man. Both went instantly silent, fierce faces turning to him.

  Jason dropped their wrists. “What is happening? Where is Captain Kat?”

  Frog opened his mouth first, mostly to cut off Poe. “Cap’n be limber, so went onto the boat to untangle rigging that caught. Then bloody dumb arse, Poe,” he smacked the head of the man next to him, “cut the bloody wrong rope while Cap’n still be on there and it fell.”

  Jason pushed between them to look over the railing. An upside-down longboat bobbed in the water, several ropes along the back still attached to the ship.

  Jason looked at Poe. “Captain has not come up?”

  “Nope,” Poe said. “She be a good swimmer. Don’t know where she be.”

  “Why is no one down there?” Jason looked back and forth between the two. “She could be trapped.”

  “Good idear, matey,” Frog said. “Ye get down there.”

  Jason looked down at the rolling waves and swallowed hard. “Give me a damn rope.”

  Within minutes, Jason let himself down the side of the ship slowly, hand wrapped tight on the rope. Edging into the water, he refused to give up his death grip on the lifeline until a rope from the longboat floated near him, and Jason grabbed it, pulling himself to the boat.

  Hand searching in the water, he found the edge of the longboat and moved alongside it, scanning the surface of the water.

  “See anything, mate?” Frog yelled from above.

  Jason shook his head.

  “Check the other side of the boat.”

  One hand on the rope and the other moving him along the edge of the longboat, Jason searched the water. Still nothing.

  “Dive under, matey. She be under it, maybe.”

  Two deep breaths, one to steady himself, and the other to fill his lungs with air, and Jason ducked his head under the water. He opened his eyes, the salt instantly stinging, but he kept them op
en, searching through the shadow of the boat. He kicked upward, finding the shallow air pocket left under the boat, and gulped air.

  Heavy—panicked—panting greeted him. He turned to the sound.

  “Captain?”

  Her back to him, she spun, sheer terror on her face.

  “It’s caught. My foot—” Her words cut off as her breath went out of control.

  “Stop. Slow down. Breathe.”

  Shaking her head furiously, she jerked out of control, shoving the immobile wooden plank seat that was behind her. Water went splashing, and the boat rocked, sliding further down in the water, tightening the air pocket around them.

  One hand still gripping the side of the boat, Jason dropped the rope and moved to her, grabbing the back of her neck, forcing her face into his.

  “Breathe, Katalin, breathe. I will untangle you.”

  She tried to jerk away from him, screaming, but his hand held her solid.

  “Katalin. Breathe, dammit it. Stop fighting it and let me untangle it.”

  Her wild eyes found his, stopped, focused, and then she stilled.

  Gulping air, she closed her eyes tight and nodded.

  Jason let his hold on her neck relax.

  She nodded.

  “Is it a rope? Do you have a knife?”

  Her eyes stayed tight against the world. “Waist.”

  Jason’s free hand went down her body, circling her waist before he found the hilt of a blade. It slipped out of his hand as she kicked, her arm hitting his as she treaded water.

  He kept his swear to himself, hoping the blade didn’t just sink to the ocean floor. His hand followed the same path along her body, finding the blade again and pulling it free.

  “Your right or left foot?”

  “L-left.”

  Before giving himself a chance to think about it, Jason sucked a deep breath of air and went under. He grabbed her left leg with both hands, following deeper into the water until his fingers felt skin and ran into the rough rope her ankle strained against. Three quick saws at the rope, and her foot jerked free.

  Surprised it had been that easy, Jason grabbed the wooden seat the rope had been wrapped around, and followed it to the edge of the boat, pulling himself into the small air pocket again.