Page 62 of Devil of the High Seas
There was the crack of a pistol shot, followed by a searing pain exploding in her upper right arm. Sam screamed her name, but she didn’t dare look at him. She turned and faced the man who still held a pistol pointed at her.
“You used your one shot,” she said, her voice raspy. “You won’t get another.”
“Maybe not. But he will.” The pirate nodded to a third pirate who now joined them, pistol drawn and ready. The pirate who had dropped Sam picked him up again, and the third pirate held the muzzle of his pistol at Sam’s temple.
“Toss your sword down.Now,” the first pirate ordered. “Or either your or the boy’s brains will splatter this beach, and the other’s body will feed the sharks in the bay.”
Josephine’s shoulders slumped as she threw her blade to the ground. It sank halfway into the white sand. This was not a fight she could win. She was already growing weak with pain and blood loss.
“Who are you?” the man demanded.
Now was the moment to gamble whether as Gavin’s woman she would be worth more alive or dead.
“I’m Gavin’s wife.”
“Are you now? Howveryinteresting.” The man smiled, and the chill in his eyes told her that this must be Beauchamp.
“Take her,” Beauchamp ordered. “The boy too. If she thinks to fight us, we’ll remind her of all thebadthings that can happen to a child at sea.”
Josephine gasped as the massive pirate who’d first taken Sam suddenly grabbed her from behind, his arm wrapping around her neck and choking the air from her body as she was dragged toward the distant waiting boat.
“Now I have the one thing I need to kill a ghost.”
CHAPTER15
Something was wrong. Gavin sensed it the moment he smelled smoke upon the wind.
Something is burning.
They were perhaps an hour from the Isle of Song when he spied smoke on the horizon.
“Cap’n?” Ronnie stood at his side and handed him a spyglass.
“I don’t like this, Ronnie,” Gavin muttered. “It’s too early in the year to be burning the sugarcane fields.”
“Aye.” His quartermaster folded his arms and stared at the horizon where the smoke now billowed in the sky.
The column of smoke grew larger as they drew closer toward Gavin’s island. Gavin took the helm and guided thePixieinto the cove. The sight that met his eyes was one he would never have imagined. His beautiful home was nothing but blackened timbers and ash that drifted upon the wind like fiery snow.
“Christ... What happened?” the vicar asked as he joined Gavin at the helm. Gavin said nothing. The sight had struck him dumb, something out of a nightmare.
“Drop anchor!” Ronnie gave the order, and Gavin didn’t wait for a boat to be lowered.
He climbed down the side of the ship and plunged into the water so he could swim to the shore. No one greeted him with laughter or smiles. His Isle of Song was silent. Even the birds dared not sing.
He ran to the house, dripping wet, and stepped onto the once grassy lawn that had led to his beautiful home. The charred grass crunched beneath his boots. The second story of his home had collapsed. Only the ground floor remained, though all of the rooms had been gutted.
Gavin cupped his hands and bellowed, “Josie! Jada! Sam! Kai!” He shouted the names until his voice grew hoarse.
Just as he’d given up hope, a feminine figure stepped out of the woods. Jada, eyes wide with terror and hope. She wailed and ran toward him but collapsed onto the ground before she reached him, her body quaking with sobs. He knelt beside her, and she let out a scream.
“Jada, it’s me. What happened?” he asked as he wrapped his arms around her, absorbing her shaking. Slowly, the woman in his arms calmed, and her breathing deepened as her terror passed.
“Gav—Gavin?” She uttered his name with such broken hopelessness that he truly feared what she would say next.
“Where are Josie and Sam? What happened?”
“TheSirenreturned.”
