Chapter Ten
“Do you want to spy on them?” Mini hopped down from the roof.
Nick blinked. The child who had suggested to Kit that he should whip him with his tail now looked at him as if they were co-conspirators. Was this a trap? But even if it was a trap, what were they going to do, kidnap him?
“Do you have a way we won’t get caught?” Nick asked.
Mini scuttled to the cabin wall, bringing them out of sight of the nearest sailor, and then, with a casual shove, an entire panel of the wall pushed in.
“Quick,” Mini hissed.
Mini fit easily; Nick did not. He contorted his broad shoulders to squeeze through the gap, emerging into a closet just large enough to fit the two of them.
Mini waited with a grin like the Cheshire Cat’s.
“Evie helped me make a latch that works like a door. See?” He showed Nick that the panel, which looked like a wall from the other side, was in fact a trap door complete with hinges and a lock.
“Did you steal those?” Nick asked, amused.
Ignoring the question, Mini pulled Nick by the collar to the front of the closet and pressed them against the door. “You can peek through here.” He pointed out a slim horizontal crack in the wood.
Nick crouched to get eye level with the very obviously chiselled gap, and he peered through to see Kit standing midway down a long, empty hall, facing a door. The door was open only inches, a shadowy figure in the gap.
Her hand came out, catching Kit’s.
An unnatural stillness settled over Kit. Mini clambered over Nick’s back, trying to see too, the little brat jostling Nick until he hissed at him to stop wiggling.
“…them off,” his tattoo translated.
Kit reached for his gloves and slipped them off, hands visibly shaking. Desre snatched an uncovered hand.
Kit reeled back from the contact, and Desre snarled.
The door flew open, and she stormed from her room, advancing until Kit’s back struck flat against the wall of the hallway.
Fear flashed in his eyes. He was so much taller than her, so much stronger, but as she caught him by the neck, he seemed like a child pinned by a monster.
Lantern light shone on Desre’s swollen nose and bruised eyes.
Mini made a sorry sound and slid off Nick’s back. The trapdoor opened and shut with a soft thud. Nick stayed rooted to the spot.
“You are born from a race of thieves, hardly better than wild animals,” Desre hissed. “And you all act as if I repulse you.”
Something happened to Kit. His hands, in trembling fists at his sides, went slack. The tail, which had a stranglehold on his own leg, loosened, till the end rested flat on the ground. The fear left Kit’s face. “You don’t repulse me, my lady. I love you.”
Chills prickled over the back of Nick’s neck.
Kit, he had learned, wasn’t particularly good at hiding his emotions. When he was annoyed, his tail lashed. When he was embarrassed, he growled. When he was guilty or ashamed, his eyes darted around, avoiding Nick’s gaze.
The dazed adoration of Kit’s I love you was genuine.
Desre must have realised too because her fury eased. The ugly hooks in her mouth settled into a grim smile.
It was wrong.
Nick had known Kit for only a week, but he knew beyond any doubt that he was petrified of Desre. Nick wasn’t looking at evidence that Kit had tricked or deceived him—he was looking at the reason why.
“Good,” Desre purred. “Take those off.”
Kit’s hands slid to his trousers. In his haste to obey her, the wad of cotton holding the coffee beans spilled out, seeds plinking against Kit’s tail as they fell. He didn’t react to them, eyes glazed over.
Nick jumped to his feet and ripped the closet door open.
The sound was drowned out by the entrance to the cabin bursting open at the same time.
Men crowded the doorway, and Desre’s head whipped towards them, her shriek filling the air at the same time as they all cried out something Nick’s symbol didn’t translate.
Desre whirled away, retreating to her room and slamming the door shut so hard dust rained down from the ceiling boards.
Another door opened, and Captain Hin, dressed in sleeping garments, emerged.
He spoke to the men as he entered the hall.
He hesitated at Kit’s side, but if he found it strange that the visiting captain was leaning against the wall with his trousers undone, shaking so hard his teeth rattled, it didn’t show on his face.
Captain Hin glanced at Desre’s door, something distasteful in his expression, but he turned from Kit and left with his sailors.
Nick eyed Desre’s door, and he realised that Kit was doing the same, staring at the handle with his chest heaving.
Jesus Christ. Nick’s heart squeezed tight enough to bruise.
He quietly went to Kit’s side, who looked at him without seeming to actually comprehend his presence in the hall.
“Come on,” Nick murmured quietly. He never backed down from a fight, so tip-toeing around someone was the last thing his instincts told him to do.
But causing a scene when he was the one who was going to get hurt wasn’t the same as causing a scene that would get someone else fucking raped.
Nick retrieved Kit’s gloves from the ground and pushed the leather against Kit’s palm, careful not to actually touch skin. Kit’s fingers reflexively closed.
“Let’s go before she comes out.”
Nick guided him towards the exit only for Kit to stop, eyes flashing down to the floor.
Kit hissed out through his teeth, folding forwards to the ground.
Nick stopped in alarm, looking for injuries, but he realised quickly the source of Kit’s distress was nothing physical.
He was staring at crushed coffee beans. Captain Hin had stood on two, reducing them to powder.
Kit plucked up three intact beans and then twisted, desperately seeking the last one.
“Kit,” Nick hissed, eyeing Desre’s door. “Leave it.”
Kit ignored him, but Nick wouldn’t allow him to get stuck in the same situation again for the sake of one coffee bean. He caught Kit by the arm and pulled. Kit’s head snapped up, and he violently wrenched his arm free of Nick. Nick met Kit’s widened, wild eyes and swallowed hard.
“Kit,” Nick repeated. “Leave it.”
Kit hesitated, eyes sliding to Desre’s door.
To the ground. To Nick. He stood, taking shaky steps towards him.
Outside, Captain Hin and the men who had rushed into the hall were crowded around the base of one of the masts.
The canvas sail flapped in the wind, a loose line whipping dangerously across the deck with each crack of the sail.
Nick skirted around the edge of the chaos, as far from that rope as they could get, and guided Kit through a crowd of men cowering in the doorway that led below deck. It wasn’t until Nick got Kit to his room that he released a held breath.
Kit sagged against the door, a light tremble shaking every limb, and a flinty look in his eyes that Nick thought he was trying to hide. Kit struggled with the gloves, and Nick watched, feeling helpless, as they fell to the ground. A wounded sound from Kit’s throat cut Nick to the quick.
Nick retrieved the gloves and shook them out. And he then, very carefully and while avoiding skin contact, guided them onto Kit’s hands.
Kit, barring the door with his body and with his head down-turned, let him.
The second the gloves were in place, with the long sleeves of his shirt carefully overlapping the leather, the trembling eased. Kit’s shallow breaths deepened. Nick eyed his tail and saw with considerable relief that it was hanging in the air, neither slack on the ground nor strangling his own leg.
“I’ll make tea,” Nick murmured, at a loss.
His dad would know what to say. His dad would know what to do.
Nick didn’t. He wasn’t good at talking to people—wasn’t good at being anything but combative.
Everyone he’d ever been close to described him as gruff; it was just how he was.
But Nick couldn’t bear to be gruff with Kit right now.
He didn’t know if Kit could take it after that, and he certainly didn’t deserve it.
Kit leaned against the door as if it was the only thing keeping him upright, but his face turned to follow Nick as he moved around the room.
He stoked the stove fire and brought water to a boil.
He took the tea leaves from a crudely carved wooden box—one of the children must have gifted it to Kit—and copied the way Kit always carefully poured the hot water through the leaves into cups.
Nick placed the teas down on the table and sat. He didn’t pressure Kit, and after several minutes, he straightened away from the door and approached. He sank into the nearest chair, deathly silent.
“I think it tastes the same as when you make it,” Nick said.
He had a million questions, but none were appropriate to ask. He’d snag Mini and demand an explanation. He couldn’t ask it of Kit.
“How did you resist her?” Kit’s voice cracked.
Nick’s breath caught when Kit raised his eyes, filled with torment. Pain.
“That first night when I brought you here, she tried to use her influence on you, but it didn’t work. Can you tell me how? Please? I can’t help you get away, we need you, but I’ll do anything else.”
Nick thought back to that night on deck.
To Desre holding his hand, skin-to-skin contact, and grabbing between his legs.
She’d been trying to do to him what she did to Kit, but there had been no effect.
Nick rubbed his elbow, where his skin had burned that night.
Like his translation symbol did for hard words, only ten times worse. That had blocked her.
Nick pushed up his sleeves and looked at the crowded symbols.
His artistic brother had taken liberties; one design blended into another, making it difficult to tell where one symbol ended and another began.
Nick had been so preoccupied with everything else going on; there was no way he could pinpoint exactly which symbol had reacted. He had the general area, though.
When Nick raised his head again, Kit was watching him with desperate eyes.
And kidnapper or not, Nick decided that he was going to help Kit.
Regardless of the fact that he wouldn’t help Nick escape, he wouldn’t be able to stomach himself if he listened to this plea—a plea to not get raped—and ignored it.
“I’ll help,” Nick promised. “Whether that involves figuring out which of these symbols blocked her power or personally chucking her overboard.”
There was no you can’t say that about Lady Desre this time.
Kit breathed out hard. He rose and cupped Nick’s cheeks, a sudden firm grip that held his head still as Kit rubbed his jaw into Nick’s crown.
Sweat and fear lingered on Kit’s skin, and then a sudden burst of musk hit Nick’s nose, so potent he tasted it on the back of his tongue.
“Thank you.” Kit curled forwards, and Nick’s nose scrunched as Kit’s tongue swiped across his cheekbone.
Nick squeezed his eyes shut as several more tongue licks descended on his face.
He vaguely recalled Jasper doing the same to Laurence but couldn’t remember the circumstances.
He recalled thinking that he’d have shoved Jasper away if he’d tried to do the same to him, but Nick simply held still for Kit. “Is this a ‘kit’ thing?”
Kit faltered, hot breath tickling Nick’s temple. Nick’s eyes were shut to protect his eyes from that tongue, but he could feel the weight of Kit’s gaze. “Yes. It—I am just scent-marking you.”
“I… Okay? Right. Fine.”
A wet tongue slipped up his cheek, dangerously close to the corner of his mouth, and Nick became very aware that Kit was leaning heavily against him, making his way onto Nick’s lap inch by inch.
“Why?” Nick asked, getting hot.
Kit hesitated again. Nick began to open his eyes, but Kit made a displeased noise, and his tongue swiped at an eyelid.
Nick growled an objection and squeezed his eyes shut again.
“Seriously? Come on. I’m trying not to get grossed out here, so just answer me.
” Nick was, in fact, having to work much harder not to get turned-on.
That musky smell was going to his head, and it just felt all kinds of wrong to be feeling attracted to someone who had almost got raped.
It just—no. Nick wasn’t doing it. He wasn’t being that guy.
“It’s a kit thing.” Kit’s tone was all lie.
“Oh, don’t you—mm!” Nick shut his mouth as that tongue swiped his upper lip.
Kit’s gloved hands held Nick’s face still as he explored every inch of skin with that damned tongue.
And between his chin and jaw, Kit sank into his lap, tail curling around Nick’s arm.
Nick attempted to open his eyes twice—and Kit tried to lick them—and every time he tried to talk, Kit’s tongue was there to stop him.
Eventually, he loosened his hold on Nick’s face, one arm curving around his neck as he nuzzled his cheek. Kit released a satisfied hum, spreading that heavy musk. Nick felt it seeping into his pores, drying into his skin with the saliva.
There was a rumble in Kit’s chest, a purr.
Kit finally pulled back, getting off his lap. With a little amused noise, he nudged Nick’s chin. “You can open your eyes.”
Nick did and glared up at Kit, whose eyes sparkled back at him in amusement. His tail curled around Nick’s leg, his entire body relaxed. Kit sank into his chair, his body movements languid. Pleased. Kit sipped the now-cold tea. “Very tasty,” he purred.