Chapter Two #2
“You’ve done a good job at keeping yourself presentable. Considering how slow your beard is to grow, well, it’s still a weekly commitment, is it not?” He narrowed his eyes at me. “You didn’t lie to me about your years, did you?”
I snorted. “Aye, yes, I’m actually twelve, didn’t you notice? What the fuck, Dinesh? That ain’t so nice. I’m as manly as you.”
He raised his eyebrows, and I glared at him.
“Fuck you, the situation is due to my hair being red, I expect. Red-haired people don’t grow as much body hair. Or so I’ve been told.”
“By whom?”
I grinned. “Several of my previous lovers, in fact. So there.”
His amused smile faded. “Exactly how many men have you invited into your bed, Simon Bartholomew White?”
“That’s none of your business. I could ask the same of you. But I won’t, because I fear I do not want to know that number.”
He gave a nod. “Yes, well, let’s call it a draw, shall we?”
“What a good idea.”
“Why don’t you accompany me to the galley, and we’ll grab something to eat?” he suggested.
“All right. Give me a moment.”
Normally, Mr Guthrie or Domingo would bring us something to eat, so the fact that Dinesh was going to seek out his own food meant that he did have things to do. Whilst I got dressed, he explained why.
“I’d like to gather a few things to give as gifts to our hosts. I also need to check in with Hillier and ensure he knows exactly where I want to drop anchor.”
“Always a good idea to smooth the way with tokens of appreciation,” I said.
I looked forward to meeting Francis Bell, and meeting the woman who had enticed him to leave a life of piracy for a chance at landlocked domesticity.
As I pulled on my jacket and made my way past him, Dinesh gave me quite the smack on my arse. I yelped, taking a quick step to the side, but giving him an amorous look as the fire lit within me.
“Eh, now. Shouldn’t start something you can’t finish,” I drawled.
He smiled, slow and deliberate, with the most devilish look in his eyes.
“I assure you, I can finish the job, and I will, only not right at this minute. I’ve a mind to take you over my knee later today, redden that perfect bottom, and make you squirm like the naughty lad you are.”
I put a hand to my chest and affected a look of shock, whilst my loins quickened. “Surely you wouldn’t treat me in such a roguish way?”
I watched the desire rise in his gaze as my own matched it.
“I certainly will and you know it. And you love a good hiding.”
I shrugged and opened the door.
“I’ll never tell,” I said, as Squid looked up from his book with raised eyebrows.
“Hmm. A secret,” Squid muttered, gazing at me with curiosity.
“Yes. The exact measurements of Dinesh’s cock.”
“Rooster,” Captain Martin muttered, rolling his eyes and blushing with embarrassment.
Ha-ha. I could make him squirm too.
Squid was nonplussed.
“If you keep claiming the captain’s prick is gigantic, the crew are going to think you are overcompensating for a deficit,” Squid said matter-of-factly with a glance at Captain Martin, who looked concerned.
“Except that I know for a fact a few who have also seen the appendage in question and can corroborate your assessment.”
I glared at Squid and then at Captain Martin, who blushed further and shrugged.
I knew he’d personally entertained a few members of his crew at various times before I’d come on board and claimed all of his attention. I only hoped I could hold his focus, since he was quite an amorous fellow with questionable appetites.
But then, so was I. And anyway, we’d sworn sexual allegiance to each other so that we wouldn’t be worried the other was off entertaining other men.
“Quiet, you,” I said to Squid. “You shan’t remind me of Dinesh’s opportunistic allegiances and besmirch the simply beatific romance we’ve got going here.”
Dinesh took my elbow and tugged. “Come along.”
I turned to wave to Squid as Captain Martin dragged me toward the galley.
“But I need to visit the privy,” I gasped, the movement of being pulled along jogging my full bladder.
“So do I.”
He stood me outside the blasted thing and made me wait whilst he took his own time emptying his bladder, with quite the production. Listening to another man’s gigantic stream hitting the porcelain whilst the pressure on your own organs increases is not amusing.
“I’m going to piss myself!” I complained.
“Go ahead.”
“Yes, you’d like that wouldn’t you? Christ almighty, the depravity of your soul, I swear to God—”
The door opened.
“But I want to watch if that’s going to happen,” he said with a smirk.
My eyes bugged out of my head, and my mouth hung open. “You bloody pervert.”
He grinned. “You do know me.”
“I thought I did,” I said weakly, pushing past him into the privy, then slamming the door on him. I let go of my stream, listening to his laughter outside the wooden door and turned my face up to heaven.
“Is there anything that man doesn’t find stirring?” I asked of God or whoever might be up there. “Never mind. Don’t answer that.”
I focused on the relief of pissing after holding my water so desperately and blithely wondered what filthy game we might play involving piss and endurance. Dear God, the man was turning me into a profane vessel for whatever he desired. There really was no hope.
I whistled a merry tune as I put myself to rights, washed my hands with the fancy soap, and dried them on the cloth.
Upon my exit, Dinesh held out his hand. “Breakfast, then?”
I put my hand in his. “Aye, that’d be grand.”
As we went down the steps and along the passage to the galley, we heard some strange, yet familiar, phrases.
“Take it from behind! What a trollop!” was spoken in a woman’s voice with a French accent.
Dinesh and I exchanged world-weary glances as we walked.
“The captain’s cock is a truncheon!” The words were spoken in an almost exact mimic of my own voice.
Captain Martin stopped walking, his expression going from one of merry ease to extremely cross in a matter of a moment.
I loosed my hand and kept going, pretending I hadn’t heard a thing.
But the captain stepped forward, grabbed the neck of my jacket and jerked me to a stop.
“I told you not to teach her that,” he seethed, his eyes lit with an angry flame that was not the one I liked to see there.
I took a breath. We’d been through this already.
“You did not say: Do not teach the bird to say that my cock is a truncheon. You didn’t.”
“Simon Bartholomew White. Are you honestly going to be that dense?” Some of the anger had flown, because he knew I was right.
“Maybe.”
He waited, holding tight to my jacket, probably thinking of ways to make me sorry.
I protested, lifting my hands in a gesture of helplessness. “But it’s true! Your cock is a truncheon. I’ve said that since I first saw it. Felt it. Got ploughed by it!”
“That may be so, but I don’t need her saying those words. In your bloody voice. All the fucking time.”
“I’ll talk to Domingo.”
“What on earth is he going to do about the situation? He barely has control over that bloody bird!”
I frowned. “How dare you speak of Esmaralda that way? She is Domingo’s dear pet and companion, and I—”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake. I need coffee,” he said, letting go of my jacket and shoving me forward. “Get me some, and perhaps I shall forgive you.”
I stumbled into the galley, followed by a vexed Captain Martin, and sure enough, Domingo’s small black and yellow mynah bird—the notorious-by-now Esmaralda—greeted us from her perch on the pot rack.
“What a trollop!” she said in the woman’s voice, and then, in mine, said, “The captain’s cock is a truncheon!”
“Domingo!” I yelled as I didn’t see him nearby.
“For fuck’s sake,” the captain sighed, eyeing the bird with particular enmity.
A young fellow came out of the back rooms, gathering his long black hair with a red ribbon, an untied chartreuse robe floating around him as he moved towards us.
He was wearing a colourful pair of cropped trousers, a linen shirt embroidered with daisies, and a rolled blue scarf as a belt.
And red velvet bedroom slippers of which I was profoundly envious as they looked much more comfortable than the scuffed and stained, second-hand deck shoes the captain made me wear.
The pair of slippers were one of the few things, along with the robe and the bird, Domingo had been able to bring when we’d escaped the Turnkey tavern and Cayonne.
But I didn’t like to think about Cayonne.
“Esmaralda! Must you keep on? Shush now. Here’s a caraway seed.”
The bird took the offering from Domingo’s delicate fingers, and eyed the small pile of seeds he placed near her.
“I am so sorry, Captain Martin. Simon. For the life of me, I cannot get her to stop saying that.”
Domingo glanced at me and barely maintained his serious, apologetic expression.
“Is there coffee, Domingo?” Captain Martin asked. “I smell a brew, I believe.”
“Yes, of course. There’s a fresh pot on the hob,” he said, gesturing towards the iron stove in the centre of the room.
I strode past him, grabbed a stoneware mug from the cupboard that latched when the door was closed, in case of rough seas, filled the vessel with hot coffee from the steaming pot, then carried the mug to the captain, offering the hot drink with a cheerful smile.
He scowled as he took it, eyeing Esmaralda, who munched happily on her seed, which she held in one little claw as she bent to peck at it with her tiny beak.
Remarkable that such a diminutive creature could make so much of a ruckus and create such enmity in the captain, who was otherwise quite a relaxed and confident man.
With a cock the size of his, he should be proud.
I didn’t honestly know why Esmaralda’s frequent proclamations upset him so much.
After he’d taken a sip or two of his coffee, his fierce expression relaxed. Domingo and I had filled mugs for ourselves and joined him at the table.
“Have a seat, Dinesh,” Domingo said. “I’ll bring you some food in a moment.”