Page 53 of Captive of the Pirate King
Locke plants his hands against the wall on either side of my head. “No matter how your body reacts to me, I’d never take you against your will. It’s important to me that you know that.”
“I don’t want to be your whore,” I whisper.
He nods, his eyes sad and sympathetic. “What if it was only a pretense? You’ve had practice now, portraying yourself as something you’re not. All you have to do is act the part. I won’t expect service from you—only your cooperation in this ruse, until we reach Ravensbeck, and perhaps a little longer if necessary, to convince everyone that I haven’t gone soft. I’ll pay you, and you don’t have to touch me at all.”
“So if I play the paid whore, you get to keep your reputation as the bad-ass Pirate King?”
He winces. “It’s the precedent that matters, the history of powerful captains keeping their women aboard. Look, I’ve already broken their trust by hiding your secret from them. I can’t go much further than this without stretching their allegiance to the breaking point.”
“Don’t you have some control over them, with the tattoos?”
“It’s not actually control,” he says. “It’s more of an emotional influence, a tug toward me, a rush of loyalty. But it doesn’t dictate their will or their choices. If other emotions are strong enough, like a sense of betrayal or unfairness, they can overcome that sense of duty to their king.”
He’s too close to me, looking at me so earnestly, with those long thick lashes fringing his ice-pale eyes. I turn my face aside, sighing faintly.
“Try to understand,” he murmurs. “The men might not respect me for showing mercy to a prisoner, but they’ll understand my claiming of a woman for my own lust. It’s my right as the Lord of the fleet.”
“It’s sick, and twisted.”
Locke’s fingertips graze my jawline, tracing my chin, then my lips. “I’m a pirate, love. I’m a little sick and twisted. And it’s either this, or I set you in a boat at dawn and send you away. Don’t make me do that, Veronica.” He sets his brow to the wall beside my head, his hair brushing my cheek. His body is pressed along mine. “I can’t do that.”
“You could go with me in the boat,” I whisper.
He lurches back, staring into my eyes with alarm and a thread of anger. “Go with you? We’d both die. And if we didn’t, I’d lose everything, Veronica. If you knew what I’ve sacrificed to build this empire, you wouldn’t ask me to yield it, not when there’s a way we can both be saved.”
I shift my eyes from Locke’s intense gaze. I’m holding too many conflicting emotions inside myself right now—my shock over his identity, my anger about what he’s guilty of, my shame at the idea of playing the whore, and my secret affection for him. Damn these heartstrings of mine! And through the whirling tornado of my emotions sings the sad truth that even though he obviously cares about me, he doesn’t care enough to sacrifice everything for my sake.
Would I even want him to? Would that be fair? I doubt I would do the same for him.
“Fine,” I grit out. “I’ll pretend to be your whore. But only until Ravensbeck.”
“And a little longer,” he presses. “Until I’m able to help you locate your brother.”
“How do I know you’ll keep that promise?”
“My word is good,” Locke says.
I laugh in his face, a merry, melodic sound I haven’t been able to make in weeks. It feels so good to laugh freely. I’ve been told my laugh is one of my best qualities, and apparently Locke thinks so too, because his eyes and his smile widen.
“Your word?” I laugh again. “That’s what I’m supposed to trust? The word of a lying, murderous, thieving pirate? You’re a despicable monster, expecting me to trust your promise after what you did to those poor women today. And the sailors I tried to save—you stood by and saidnothingwhile they were slaughtered in cold blood. You could have stopped it.”
“I didn’t want to reveal myself yet. But Neelan will pay for that breach of my law,” Locke growls. “Believe me, Veronica, you can trust my word. Nick trusted Locke, right? I kept your secret, even when you had no idea I knew it.” His lashes droop over his eyes, and his voice drops into a cajoling murmur. His mouth is a mere breath from mine.
I swerve my face away, not wanting to smell the addictive male spice of him, the salty musk of his skin. “I don’t know who you are. I guess I never did.”
Locke takes a step back from me, his arms falling to his sides. I’m no longer caged against the wall, so I should feel slightly less defensive. Instead I feel angrier—murderously, violently so. Helpless rage heats my blood, the burning anxiety of the past three weeks coming to a boil, and I feel as if I must let it out, or I’ll explode into irreparable shards.
“We’ll sleep a while,” he says. “At dawn you’ll dress in something that befits your new role, and you’ll come on deck with me, to witness the punishment of every man who was willing to hurt you.”
“You don’t give me orders,” I seethe.
“I do, though, Nick.” He gives me an infuriating smirk. “By any calculation, I’m entitled to give you commands. I outrank the cabin boy, and I own the whore.”
I fly at him with an aggrieved shriek, a storm of fingernails and flapping robe. I manage to get in a hard slap and a few red claw marks on his neck and chest before he hustles me over to the captain’s bunk and presses me down into the bedding. My robe has come undone, and my chest and stomach surge through the gap between the silky folds.
“Stop it, you little hellion,” Locke hisses into my face. “I’m trying to save your life. Don’t you understand that?”
“I do,” I snap. “That doesn’t mean I can’t be mad about the way you’re doing it.”
