Chapter 23 Redemption
“It is I, Geneviève,” came a tremulous voice from the gloom.
Only then did her comely visage emerge from the half-light, her cheeks pale as alabaster, her lips tinted like rose petals.
The faintest waft of jasmine and orange blossom stirred a memory Caleb would rather bury.
With a curt motion, he slid his blade home.
“Are you not a trifle early for the exchange?” He snorted in disdain.
“And you, monsieur, are you not, as well?”
Beside him, Alden kept his cutlass steady, suspicion etched on his weathered face.
“I must speak with you, Caleb.” Her dark eyes darted to Alden’s blade. “Alone.”
Caleb inclined his head. “Lower it. ’Tis all right.”
Groaning, Alden sheathed his cutlass. “Beware, Captain. I’ve heard it said the viper smiles before she bites.”
The lady cast him a scathing look, then gathered her skirts and moved a ways off.
Against the protest of his better sense, Caleb followed, whispering a prayer for wisdom beneath his breath. He would not be beguiled anew.
“How did you know I’d be here?” he demanded.
She turned, moonlight glimmering in the sheen of her eyes. “You are a cautious commander. I knew you would survey the ground where my father bade you meet him.”
“Then, say your piece.”
Pain, raw and naked, flitted across her face as she stepped nearer. “Surely, you know.”
“Nay. Nor do I have time for your trifling dalliances.”
Her lips parted in wounded surprise. “Trifling?” The word cracked from her tongue as though it were an insult too grievous to bear.
Her bottom lip quivered. “Je t’aimais, mon amour.
I have always loved you. After our kiss…
I thought—” Her hand rose, fingers feather-light upon his cheek, her voice sultry as velvet.
“Geneviève,” he said, firmly taking her hand and letting it fall. “Whatever once blossomed between us has withered.”
Her eyes shimmered, disbelieving. “I was a fool back then. I begged your forgiveness. What more can I do?”
“And I forgive you,” Caleb said with all sincerity. “But some things cannot be forgotten.”
“Perhaps, with time?” she whispered, clutching the lapels of his doublet. “Forget that woman, Miss Starr. She’s but a rustic creature, unlettered, graceless. Her speech is coarse, her manners strange. What joy can she offer you?”
At every word meant to wound, Caleb’s heart only swelled.
He thought of Desi’s laughter, her curious speech, the way she bent to gather shells as though each were a treasure from God’s hand.
Her stories, her kindness, her humility.
These were riches no station could bestow. He loved her…utterly. He knew it then.
Mistaking his silence for compliance, Geneviève pressed against him, curves molded in desperate entreaty. “Take me with you, Caleb. Leave my father and this cursed place behind. I swear I shall bring you happiness.”
Pity alone stirred within him. “Cease this folly, Geneviève. ’Tis finished between us.”
Her eyes flared. With sudden violence, her palm cracked against his cheek, the sting searing his jaw.
She spat a torrent of French oaths, sharp as daggers, before spitting out in English, “Pigeon-livered hound, dastard, insolent cullion, mewling poltroon! I shall make you pay. You shall rue this day. Mark me, Caleb Hyde, you shall regret scorning Geneviève de Montverre, fille de Monsieur le Marquis de Montverre!” Clutching her skirts, she fled into the darkness, swallowed by the night.
Alden emerged from the shadows, lips curved in wry amusement. “You’ve ever had a gift for turning ladies fair to furies.”
“Let’s return to the ship.” Caleb marched past his friend.
“But we haven’t seen the auction yard.”
“I’ve seen enough.” Caleb glanced over his shoulder as they turned a corner and the moonlit yard shifted out of his view. He shouldn’t allow Geneviève to distress him, but the violent fury of her anger only added to the angst of this night.
Alden marched beside him. “She’s a silly woman. Put aside her tirade.”
“I agree. But ’tis not just her. We never caught the thieves who sabotaged the ship. Desi is being held hostage, many of the crew have fallen ill with some strange disease, and…”
“And?”
“I’m about to foist a deception upon a man who with a single word could have the Sentinel burned and us fed to the sharks.”
Back on the ship, Caleb stormed into his cabin. He still had two hours to go before his meeting.
“Might I suggest we use this time to pray for God’s aid and protection?” Alden plopped onto the chair as Caleb struck flint to steel and lit a lantern. No doubt ’twas a good plan, for the presence of the Almighty would surely calm his agitated nerves.
“Cap’n! Cap’n,” Shorty barged in. “Ye’s got to come quick!”
What mischief could be afoot now? “What is it?”
“They’s stringin’ ’im up.”
“Who?
“Liam. A group of sailors are set to hang him from that big ceiba tree just outside of town.”
?
Caleb barged into the clearing, shoving aside the press of shouting townsfolk, his jaw set, hand hovering over his cutlass.
Ahead, rising like some towering giant from the grave, loomed a monstrous silk-cotton tree, its gnarled trunk steeped in whispers of old superstitions.
At its base, buttress roots jutted from the earth like bones, while above, limbs sprawled outward against the dark sky.
A noose dangled from one crooked bough, swaying idly in the salty breeze, mocking the doomed soul it awaited. Liam.
His friend and bosun stood, hands tied behind him, head lowered as two men shoved him toward a large crate placed beneath the rope.
Jaw fixed with fury, Caleb quickened his pace, vowing by heaven and sea alike that he would not let his boatswain swing upon so profane a gallows.
The crowd seethed like a restless sea as he pushed through with Alden and ten of his men at his back.
“Hang the cheat!”
“String him up!”
The crowd roared as the stench of rum and sweat hung heavy in the humid night air.
Liam mounted the crate and faced the mob, his light hair matted across his brow, his face pale but defiant.
The leader settled the coarse rope about his neck and yanked it tight.
“What is the meaning of this?” Caleb shouted, drawing all gazes his way. “Release him at once!”
A hush settled over the throng as he stepped in the center, hand gripping the hilt of his cutlass.
“Yer friend owes us more than he carries in his purse,” the leader spat, brandishing a tally stick as though it were a writ of law. “He thought to cheat honest men, and in this port a cheat hangs.”
Caleb’s gaze snapped to Liam, but his bosun lowered his chin, jaw clenched. Blast the man’s pride!
“You’ve no right to hang a man without a proper defense. He’s under my command. If a debt is owed, I’ll see it settled with coin, not blood.”
Jeers erupted from the bloodthirsty crowd. “The rope be the only justice we need. It will pay in full!” Some of the men drew swords, others knives, their fury as thick as the humid air.
Behind him, Alden groaned. “Seems we have no choice. God be with us.”
Nodding, Caleb freed his cutlass, the bright edge flashing in the lantern light. His men did the same, a dozen blades rising like a forest of steel. The crowd froze, muttering. “You’ll not touch one hair of him,” Caleb growled, “save you wish to end your days beneath this tree.”
The leader’s eyes narrowed, weighing the balance of numbers, the raw determination in Caleb’s gaze. He set his boot beside the crate, threatening to kick it over and send Liam swaying. For a breathless moment, the fate of one man hung as precariously as that rope.
A man charged Caleb, a farmer’s pickax raised high.
Caleb swept it aside with a thrust of his blade.
A sailor barreled toward Alden, teeth barred, but he shoved him back with a growl.
The rest of Caleb’s crew lunged forward, knocking aside cudgels, steel meeting steel, forcing the mob to scatter.
Steel rang, fists cracked against jaws, grunts and groans filled the air.
In mere moments, the townsfolk realized they were no match against seasoned sailors hardened by sea and storm.
“Back up! They’ll gut us all!” one man shouted. Terror streaked across their gazes as they retreated, cursing and spitting and clutching bruised arms and bloody gashes.
“One man’s debt’s not worth me life,” another uttered as several of them darted into the darkness.
Still, a knot of men remained at the tree’s roots, venom in their eyes.
The leader stood beside the crate, daring Caleb to attack. Liam, his face taut, lips pressed to a thin line, hemp tight around his neck, still refused to meet Caleb’s gaze. One kick, one flick of the leader’s boot, and he would be gone.
Ignoring the searing pain from the recent wound on his shoulder, Caleb took a step forward, leveling his cutlass before him. “Name the price for this man’s life.”
The man sneered, his teeth yellow in the lantern light. “Price? Aye, he promised me the trinket he carried. The Ring.”
Shock rippled through Caleb, but he hid it behind a set jaw and steely gaze. “You’ll not have the Ring. Name your price or we’ll fight you to the death.”
Huffing, the leader ran a sleeve beneath his nose, his lips twisting as he pondered the offer. “Twenty pieces of eight,” he finally said. “Else he swings.” He nudged the crate, and Liam stumbled.
Unflinching, Caleb turned toward Alden. “Fetch the sum from the chest in my cabin.”
Alden’s brow furrowed, his scar tight against his cheek. “Aye, Captain,” he said before marching off.
Caleb snapped eyes full of fury back to the leader. “You’ve my word as captain, he breathes until the coin is laid in your hand. Harm him, and I’ll gut you where you stand.”
The rope creaked in the breeze, the silk-cotton’s ancient branches whispering overhead. The stand-off had begun, the fate of Liam balanced between a crate and a cutlass.
?
Liam rubbed his neck, the rope burn raw and stinging.
He’d accepted that his life would end this night, accepted that ’twas a fitting end for a young Irish lad who’d grown up poor and unloved, fitting for a man who’d wasted his life with women and game.
Even worse, a man who would betray the only person who had given him a chance at redemption.
What he hadn’t expected was that that very man would pay off Liam’s debt, would fight to save his life at the cost of his own.
What kind of man did that?
He couldn’t look at Caleb as they walked through the town back to the ship.
The stench of his betrayal joined the odors of spirits, sweat, and salt riding on the breeze.
Up ahead, the chime of a fiddle, laughter, and cursing floated atop lantern light flung onto the cobblestone from open tavern windows.
“Get it.” Caleb ordered.
Liam entered La Tête de Mort, plowed through the drunken mob, found the table in question, and retrieved the Ring where he’d stuffed it behind a loose plank in the wall.
If there was a God, he thanked Him then and there when his fingers touched the precious relic.
Caleb spoke not another word, nor did his men, until he entered his cabin and spun to face Liam. Alden followed him in and shut the door.
Liam swallowed at the fury simmering in his captain’s gaze. Had he escaped the noose only to be keelhauled?
?
“I’m going to give you one chance to explain yourself, Liam, before I decide whether to lock you below or leave you on this godforsaken island for those men to do with you as they will.”
“I couldn’t do it, Cap’n.” Liam gripped the green talisman hanging around his neck.
Caleb ground his teeth, waiting.
Liam stared at the deck. “I lost all I owned in a game. They told me to bring the Ring if I wanted to live.”
“Thunder and Flame!” Caleb cursed. “How did they know about it?”
“I don’t know. I swear. I ne’er said a word.”
Caleb pressed a hand on his throbbing shoulder. Rot it! The more he tried to keep the relic a secret, the more news of its power spread.
Liam shuffled his boots across the deck.
“Aye, I stole it. But I couldn’t go through with it.
” He raised his gaze to Caleb, moisture gleaming in his eyes.
“When I got there, I couldn’t betray ye.
So, I hid the Ring and vowed to pay off me debt with work.
I told ’em I’d be their slave, if they’d only let me live. ”
Alden slanted his lips. “Guess we know their decision.”
Caleb narrowed his eyes. “How did you know where to find it?”
“’Twas Ayida. After ye left, I came here to search for it. I heard her coming down the companionway, so I doused me flame and hid in the shadows. She knew right where to go, Cap’n.”
Ayida? Couldn’t be. Yet…the crash of porcelain and a broken teacup outside his door.
She was eavesdropping. But why? His heart shriveled.
Was there no one to be trusted? He shared a glance with Alden.
Perhaps only one. And God above. He glanced upward before he skewered Liam with another pointed gaze.
“You expect me to believe she simply gave it to you?”
“Nay.” He frowned. “I am loath to admit that I knocked her o’er the head and took it from the lass.”
Blowing out a heavy sigh, Caleb raked back his hair.
Liam rubbed the red mark around his neck. “I will ne’er defy ye again. Ye have me word, Cap’n.”
Sincerity and remorse rang in the bosun’s tone. But could Caleb trust him? Could he trust anyone? Even, apparently, sweet Ayida.
He’d have to deal with her later. For now—he glanced behind him out the window—he had a meeting to attend.