Page 101 of The Pirate Lord
He gave her no chance to say more. Throwing down his saber, he caught her to him and crushed her against his chest. She was really here! “Sara, my Sara,” he whispered into her hair, “you have no idea what I’ve endured without you.”
“No worse than I’ve endured without you.” She drew back, her tear-filled eyes scanning his face with tender concern. “Youlook far too pale and thin, my love. I’m so sorry. I truly didn’t want to leave you.”
“I know.” He ran his hands over her waist and ribs, scarcely able to believe he held her in his arms. “That’s why I’m here. I was on my way to England to fetch you when I spotted your brother’s ship.”
Sara’s expression turned irate. “Ann told you what happened? Oh, just wait until I seeheragain!”
“You mustn’t blame her for telling me, sweetheart. I’d already decided to go to England to carry the women who didn’t wish to live on Atlantis.”
Shock spread over Sara’s face. “You . . . you what?”
“You were right about so many things,” he said solemnly, “but especially about the women. I finally learned that. What kind of a paradise is there where people are not free?”
“Oh, Gideon,” she said, her voice choked.
“So I decided to take those women back to England who wished to go.” His voice grew earnest. “And once I was there, I intended to find you and beg you to return. That’s why Ann told me the truth about why you left. She was trying to keep me from coming after you. She said if I got caught, all your sacrifice would’ve been for nothing.”
“You should have listened to her,” Sara protested. “Didn’t you believe I would return? You should have, especially after she told you the truth.”
“It wasn’tyouI was worried about.” He looked beyond her to where her brother stood. The earl no longer had his pistol trained on Gideon, but he was scowling at him darkly enough to kill. Gideon’s voice hardened. “I feared that your bastard of a brother would never let you go.”
The earl crossed his arms over his chest, an impudent glare on his face. “The thought did cross my mind, Horn.”
“Hush, Jordan,” Sara said when Gideon stiffened. She lifted her face to Gideon. “What he did was awful, I know, but you must forgive him. He is my brother, after all.”
“Not by blood,” Gideon growled, his gaze still fixed on the earl. “And the man certainly doesn’t deserve to call you his relation.”
“I’ve known her longer than you have and taken care of her much better.” The earl stepped forward, fists clenched, only to find Barnaby’s pistol aimed at him.
Sara glared at Barnaby. “Put that thing down now, Barnaby Kent, or I shall never speak to you again!”
Barnaby glanced at Gideon, waiting for confirmation of her words. When Gideon hesitated, Sara scowled at him. “You arenotgoing to have my brother shot, Gideon, much as you may wish to. I know he behaved badly, but so did you. I wouldn’t let him shoot you for kidnapping me, so I’m certainly not going to let you shoot him for the same thing. Do you hear me?”
Gideon suppressed a smile as she stuck her chin out at him. She was as stubborn and demanding and loyal as he remembered. Thank God some things never changed. “All right, sweetheart. I won’t let Barnaby shoot your stepbrother. Besides, it wouldn’t do to kill an earl just when I’ve decided to retire from piracy, would it?”
When she beamed at him, then reached up to brush her lips against his, he caught her to him and kissed her long and deep, despite the strangled sounds he heard coming from her brother. When at last he managed to tear himself away from her mouth, Barnaby still held the pistol on his lordship, though a grin split the first mate’s face from one end to the other.
“Put the gun down, Barnaby,” Gideon said jovially. “It appears that Sara has come back to me despite Lord Blackmore’s machinations. So there’s not much point in shooting him now, is there?”
“I suppose not.” Barnaby stuck the pistol in his waistband.
“I take it that all the talk of shooting is over?” a new voice asked.
Whirling around, Barnaby exclaimed, “Who the bloody hell are you two?”
Gideon looked to where an older couple had emerged from the doorway beneath the quarterdeck and now stood at Barnaby’s back. Their eyes, oddly enough, were on Gideon, although there was no fear in them.
Twisting her head to one side, Sara looked at them, then looked at Gideon. A sudden uncertainty seemed to cross her face. “Um . . . Gideon, I’ve brought some people with me whom I think . . . I hope . . . you’d like to meet.”
The well-dressed couple were surveying him in a way that made him uncomfortable. “Oh?”
Stepping back from him, Sara swept her hand toward the older couple. “Gideon, may I present the Marchioness of Dryden, Lady Eustacia. Your mother.”
Thunderstruck, Gideon looked beyond Sara to the slight, dark-haired woman standing there. “My mother is dead.”
The woman flinched and started forward, but the tall man beside her held her back.
“She’s not dead,” Sara said gently, forcing Gideon’s attention back to her. “Elias Horn lied to you. The only true thing he ever said was that he was your mother’s tutor and she was briefly infatuated with him. Everything else was a lie. When he pressed her to run off with him, she refused. She never eloped with Elias Horn. She married your father instead.”
