MARRIAGE AND MONEY #3
“We wouldn’t have killed them if they hadn’t tried to fight us,” he said placidly, unperturbed by yet another shift in topic.
“There was a hard battle a few months ago, and we lost an entire ship and half the crew of the Fortuna Royale. A prison ship is easy to recruit. We assumed the prisoners would be men, but Copson ultimately doesn’t care who sails with him.
” He met her gaze, and for once there was no malice.
“We needed crew. This ship is meant to be run by no fewer than eighty men, and with the women, our number is still ten less than that.”
“Is that why I can’t leave till I’m released?” she asked.
“Unfortunately.” He looked back at the revelers. “Why do you hate Morgyn more than the others?”
Cecily held out her hand again. With a shallow sigh, Jack dropped another coin into her fingers.
“She’s good at getting power,” Cecily said.
“She’s not above anything, even death. One time, she wanted a crucifix one of the older women wore around her neck, but when the woman refused to hand it over, Morgyn convinced the guards to poison her.
She was dead the next morning, and Morgyn wore the crucifix to convince a priest she’d found God and goodness in hopes he’d request a lesser sentence for her.
” She shook her head, as horrified and ashamed by the story as she’d been when it happened.
It hadn’t been the last time Morgyn did something like that.
But Cecily had liked that old woman—she’d sung occasionally, and her voice had been so lovely.
“The others know she’ll stop at nothing to get her way, and it scares them into going along with whatever she says. ”
“Do you follow her too?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t care to, and I don’t fear her.” Though now, watching Morgyn with the pirates, she studied her crooked nose and felt the first tinges of apprehension. What could Morgyn do with an entire league of pirates at her beck and call if Copson allowed such a thing?
Jack glanced at Cecily. “Do the others fear you?”
She’d implied as much by saying she wasn’t afraid of Morgyn, but she also didn’t want to give Jack more reason to distrust her. “They’ve no reason to be,” she told him, ignoring the burn of his gaze on her skin. “I’ve done nothing to them.”
Out of the corner of her eye, the edge of his mouth lifted with cool amusement. “That’s not an answer.”
“It’s enough of one.”
Instead of pressing her on the matter, he asked, “Why were you in prison?”
She nearly blurted prostitution, but stopped short.
She didn’t have to be known by any crime here.
There were no records or identities other than the ones they presented, and while the women had their own ideas of what she’d done and who she was, anything they thought they knew was far from the truth.
Here was an opportunity to rewrite her past on her terms—or pretend it had never happened at all.
The silence stretched. Jack lifted another coin between them, but the sight of the gold—in exchange for her story—made her stomach turn.
Whore, she heard countless voices jeer from her memories. She would shut them up.
“I’m not for sale,” she said, the words nearly lost beneath the lively music. “Nothing about me is for sale.”
He waved the coin before her eyes. “You took it before.”
“I told you about other people.” She knocked his hand away. “That doesn’t include me.”
“Is the price not high enough?”
Her cheeks flushed with irritation. “There is no price.”
“But you’ll sell them out for coin.”
She pushed off the mast and faced him. The money vanished, and hatred crackled between them once more.
“I have to know my crew,” he said, holding her stare. “That includes you. You signed the articles.”
Her fingers twitched toward a shiv that wasn’t there. “That gives you no more than my loyalty and my work. You’re entitled to nothing else. I’ll give nothing else.”
His lips quirked into a self-satisfied smirk. “You’re giving me plenty, actually. Probably more than you realize.” He tilted his head, his eyes keen. “Why are you so defensive at the notion of being bought, Cecily?”
Her expression shuttered, and she took a half step back as though he’d struck her. “You’re manipulating me,” she said, incredulous.
He didn’t deny it. “I thought you’d be a little more guarded. A true outlaw would know better.” He inclined his head. “Must not’ve been in prison for long. How old are you? Twenty?”
“Nineteen,” she breathed. For so long, she’d shared nothing about herself with anyone but Hester, and that was only after weeks of being worn down into accepting friendship.
And now when a beautiful, irritating man offered a truce and gold, and she told him everything he wanted to know—and somehow he managed to learn things about her even by what she refused to say.
His brows lifted. “Couldn’t have been long at all, then.” He patted his jacket where the articles, and her life aboard this ship, were safely tucked away. “Before you design any more ways to do me in, I’ll bid you good evening.”
She didn’t wish him the same.