Chapter 17
Pulse drumming painfully against his ribs, Percy took in the faces of the men in the taproom. He’d known there would be seafaring men around, but he hadn’t anticipated being noticed without his tattoos visible. What could he do now?
“Aye, I’m Percival,” he confirmed, gripping Heather’s hand and leading her between the tables toward the stairs.
“You fought in the battle of Dunsmere,” one man slurred in awe.
“Aye,” Percy grunted.
Another man stumbled forward. “I ’eard all th’ men wot tried t’ leave Butcher’s crew was killed.”
Fuck. Percy’s lips thinned. “At least one man didn’t.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Heather’s gaze swing toward him. A muscle twitched in his jaw as he hid a wince.
“’Ow do we know it’s ’im, then?” a new voice asked. “Lemme see yer tattoos!”
“It’s ’im,” the other man replied. “Y’ can tell…”
The voices faded away as he rounded the corner with Heather, and they started up the stairs. His pulse thundered in his ears, nearly drowning out his aggravated breathing and the creak of the inn’s wooden stairs.
The air grew increasingly dense with grease and heat with each floor they climbed. At last, they reached the top and closed themselves in their room.
It was precisely as he’d expected: peeling wallpaper, rough-hewn furniture set strategically about the small space, and—Christ, did he just see a mouse dart into the corner of the room? The air stank of sex and perfume. It was positively nauseating.
“Who are you to them, Percy?” Heather asked, whirling on him.
Percy leaned back against the door.
This was it, the end of any association she would have with him.
He closed his eyes against the hurt and betrayal he was sure to see on her face.
“Despite the public’s knowledge of my chosen name of Percival Baxter, these men also know me as Percival MacDonald,” he began, his throat tight.
“Adopted son of Benjamin MacDonald, known as Butcher.”
Heather gasped, and there was a shift of fabric, but Percy refused to look. “As you know, I was born and raised on the sea.” He swallowed past the bile in his throat. “Ben—Butcher—claimed me as his own. Said that while I resembled my mother, my spirit matched his.”
He cringed and pushed off the door, striding deeper into the diminutive bedchamber.
“Percy,” Heather said softly, a hint of pity in her voice.
Pity. Bah! Of course she didn’t pity him. She ought to be aghast at ever having spoken to him, let alone having allowed him liberties…
He raked a hand through his hair. Hell’s tits.
“You are not like Butcher,” she said.
“But I am!” He rounded on her, his cheeks hot and his gut knotted with shame.
She shook her head. “I know you, Percy—”
“No, you don’t,” he spat. “I was a pirate on Butcher’s crew, Heather. Do you not know what that means?”
Her lips thinned, and her eyebrows curved upward in a look of combined pity and pleading. Percy had to look away, focusing instead on the darkness beyond the window.
“I know that you feel guilt, and that you attempted to change your life for the better. That you dedicate much of your time to helping others. That your best friend, Leo, adores and trusts you, and that you faced imprisonment and death to help me.” The air stirred around him as she stepped closer, and he breathed in her floral, earthy scent.
“You did nothing more than what you were raised to do. And then you got out… How did you escape Butcher?”
“I leapt from a gun port as we sailed away from Barataria Bay—not far from here, in fact—and swam ashore. There, I changed my name, joined another crew, and then another, and another, captaining numerous pirate crews. Despite my change in name, word spread of my apparent lineage. It wasn’t long before Percival Baxter became just as notorious as Percival MacDonald.
“One day, I found myself on a privateer ship, where I met Leo. The privateers embraced me as one of their crew. Eventually, we were permitted to remain in England, though I daresay that is in large part due to Leo.” He sighed, sitting on the foot of the bed.
Deep self-loathing and despair churned through Percy. The truth was out. Now Heather would turn away from him in abhorrence.
His heart gave a hard thwump. He felt ill. Couldn’t bear the thought of her looking at him differently, of her hating him. Fuck.
She deserved so much better than him. Despite her already being ruined in the eyes of the haut ton, she could still find a good man who would give her the marriage, children, and large home that she probably wanted—that she deserved, damn it.
“No matter what happened in the past,” she said, stepping between his legs and sifting her fingers through his dark hair, “you are not what he tried to make you. If you were, you would not have cared to escape.”
He hesitated. “But…I killed him. If I were so different, I might have—”
“No.” She gave a swift shake of her head. “You oughtn’t think that way. Your actions saved us that day. You said it yourself: Butcher would have seen the entire crew murdered.”
While that might be true, he would forevermore be a man who killed his father.
Unable to let her go just yet, he wrapped his arms around her hips, pulling her against him and rubbing his temple into her abdomen. “I’m sorry.”
She was warm and alive. And comforting beyond reason.
“Shh,” Heather hushed, continuing to comb her fingers through his hair. “There is nothing for which you need apologize to me, Percy.”
He pulled back and met her gaze, his heart in his throat.
“I’m not a good man, Heather. I withheld the truth from you, from Grace, Juliana, and Maria.
I…I was not raised in a home with a family.
Before befriending Leo and becoming his valet, I…
” His throat bobbed, and he took a deep breath, steeling himself for the inevitable—and regrettable—pain he would cause her.
“Whatever my future, I will not intentionally bring a child into this world.”
Her eyes widened. “You don’t want children?”
Percy winced. “I’m afraid not. Just the thought of furthering Butcher’s bloodline veritably curdles my blo—”
She kissed him fast and hard, her tongue dancing with his, before she pulled back.
“I don’t want children either,” she confessed.
Hope wove around his heart. “Truly?”
She grinned. “Truly. But you must know that even if I did desire children—which I decidedly do not—there is nothing wrong with your blood. I like you just as you are—especially your pirate blood.”
Despite himself, the heated prickle of tears threatened behind his eyes. She likes me as I am, he marvelled. And she doesn’t want children. His heart gave another thwump, but this time in elation.
He matched her grin, and she kissed him again.
Percy came alive at the touch of her lips. He didn’t deserve to feel so good, but he was just selfish enough to accept what she offered, to the devil with the consequences.
They moved quickly, disrobing and tossing articles of clothing about until they stood nude, wrapped in each other’s arms. Percy’s body ached with need, his cock already leaking, begging to be buried in Heather’s sweet cunny.
Heather’s entire body fizzed with anticipation, and desire pooled low in her belly. She knew what pleasures intimacies with Percy would bring, and she could scarcely wait. The man not only kindled her desire but touched her heart. And she wanted nothing more than to feel all of him. Immediately.
“How would you like me?” she asked, tracing her fingertips along his tattoos, his skin hot beneath her touch.
He cupped her large arse and squeezed, groaning. “I want to fuck you fast and spend my seed on your glorious breasts. Then I want to sleep for an hour and do it all again.”
“Yes.” Heather nodded, her insides melting as a shiver wracked her frame. The contrast between his heat and the cooling air of the room added to the delicious sensations his words wrought. “Let’s do that, please.”
With the flash of a grin, Percy lifted her against him and deposited her on the bed.
“I won’t take my time,” he said, settling himself over her.
The heat of him, his beautiful heart, and his filthy words all made her core throb with need.
“I don’t want you to,” she breathed. “I want it as swift and hard as you can go.”
He winked at her. “Whatever you desire, sweetheart. But first, you come.”
Slicking the tip of his cock on her wetness, he used it to tease her, circling and circling, sending waves of throbbing, tingling pleasure through her. Her legs began to tremble, and a moan escaped between her panting breaths.
“Yes,” Percy growled. “You’re so good, so ready.”
He bent forward to take one of her nipples into his mouth, and she cried out at the sudden jolt of pleasure, clutching him to her.
“Oh, Percy!”
He rolled the sensitive bud between his teeth before he moved on to the other. She arched her back, pressing herself eagerly into him and silently urging him to take more.
The delicious swirling and circling continued, the head of his erection an ideal combination of velvet and friction. Her pulse raced, her breathing turned ragged, and the coiling pleasure wound tighter and tighter.
“Percy, I’m going to—”
He groaned, leaving her breast to trail his lips along her collarbone and the side of her neck. “Come for me, sweetheart.”
All at once, her back arched, and her inner muscles throbbed in time with her climax.
“Fuck,” Percy growled.
If he were a wagering man, he would say that he’d never wanted a woman more than he did right now. But the devil knew he felt that way every time he was with Heather. Hell, but his cods were drawn up so tightly he was ready to spend right then.
But not before he’d been inside her.
“Percy,” she gasped, tightening her hold on him.
Taking that as his cue, he lined himself up with her cunny and slid effortlessly inside her heat.
“My god, sweetheart.”
He had to move slowly, to savour every bit of being inside her, skin to skin.