Chapter 9
For the first time in days, Amaya awoke to sunlight pouring through her window. The intense rays stung her eyes, causing her to groan and roll over to face the opposite wall. Her muscles ached, her body resisting movement.
Sluggishly, Amaya pulled herself out of bed and sifted through the pile of clothes Serena left for her.
She took her time getting dressed, slowly assembling an outfit consisting of a white blouse with puffy sleeves, a maroon wrap skirt with an asymmetrical hem, and a black, lace-up bodice that held it all together.
The top was too big and slipped off her shoulders, but it would have to do.
As she was adjusting the top, she realized that the small puncture wounds in her arm from Corsair’s claws were gone.
Strange.
She didn’t have new shoes, so she bent to tie her gold flats around her ankles. They looked closer to brown now, with the metallic coating scraped off.
The final touch was her room key, which she tucked under the blouse for safekeeping just as she normally did with her mother’s necklace.
When she crept outside, she found Mouse slumped on a chair in the hallway, arms folded and chin to his chest. Asleep.
Amaya could hardly blame him. Instead of letting him sleep in his own bed after days on the Bitterwind, Lord Lexington had put him to work watching her.
Amaya didn’t have the heart to wake him, so she tip-toed around the boy and scurried up the stairs.
Perhaps she should have been more nervous. This was absurd. Was she actually about to march upstairs and have breakfast with a bunch of pirates, like she was one of them?
It didn’t seem she had a choice if she wanted to eat. So, breakfast with pirates it was.
The mess was empty last night when Mouse showed it to her, but it was bustling with energy and activity this morning. There were probably two dozen men crowded into the open room, with more coming and going. Amaya paused in the doorway, fighting for her bearings.
A buffet occupied the far end of the space, where a large man with tattooed arms and a jovial grin handed out mugs of coffee and plates piled high with bacon, eggs, and toast with jam. The sweet and savory smells made Amaya’s mouth water.
Her presence garnered attention, several men looking her way and then turning to murmur something to their companions. Amaya pretended not to notice, folding into the line until she reached the tattooed pirate. He beamed, handing her a mug of coffee and a plate with extra bacon.
“Miss Amaya,” he said. “Mouse wouldn’t stop talking about you yesterday. I’m Ozzie.” His warmth instantly helped Amaya feel more at ease.
“Nice to meet you,” she said, smiling pleasantly. “I loved the stew last night.”
“Happy to hear it. I do hope you’re feeling better.”
Amaya nodded and moved along, letting the pirate behind her get his meal.
She was like a lost schoolgirl trying to decide where to sit, except all the students were men who probably wouldn’t blink if their captain asked them to kill her. The few tentative alliances she’d acquired thus far—Mouse and Serena—weren’t here.
Instead, her gaze fell on a small group she mostly recognized, gathered in the corner.
Sebastian and Edmund sat on one side of the picnic-style tables, the latter with his head bent over a book.
William Lexington sat on the other side, next to an unfamiliar man with deep olive skin, close-cropped hair, and a blue jacket constructed in a distinguished silhouette she recognized.
It wasn’t the Royal Fleet jacket Victor wore, but it was similar.
It was as good a place to start as any. Amaya forced herself to take a step toward the table, then another.
“I still can’t figure out what the deal is with this house,” Edmund was saying, flipping through his notebook. “Where is it?”
“Perhaps it’s unimportant,” the man with the blue jacket said.
“Then why were these blueprints in the lockbox with the necklace?”
“Excuse me.” Amaya turned heads when she approached, clutching her plate and mug as she strove to keep her hands from shaking. “Mind if I join you?”
Sebastian’s brows jumped up and Edmund frowned. Lexington wouldn’t look at her. It was the blue-jacket man who stood, rising from his seat beside the captain.
“Not at all, my lady,” he said, bending in a gentlemanly bow. “Although, we’ll have to become better acquainted at a later date; I was just leaving. Please, take my seat.”
“Oh. Thank you.” Amaya set down her mug and plate, extending her hand. Could this man be another potential ally? He clearly had ties to Sorrento—that jacket fit him too well to have belonged to anyone else. “I’m Amaya.”
“Markus Lockwood. It’s a pleasure.” Instead of shaking her hand, he took it in both of his and pressed a polite kiss to her knuckles. Amaya blinked in surprise, not expecting manners from a pirate.
Lockwood turned to Lexington. “I have the inventory report from the Bitterwind ready when you are, Captain.”
“Good,” Lexington said. “I’ll join you shortly.”
Markus Lockwood departed and Amaya sat down in his place, careful to keep a healthy distance between her and the Sky Lord. The persistent intrigue of his presence lured her gaze all the same.
She stubbornly resisted, focusing on one thing at a time.
Her food.
Her coffee.
Sebastian, Edmund, the floor.
Anyone but him.
Edmund was staring at her like she’d grown a third eye. “You let her out?” He directed his question at the captain.
Lexington curled a hand around his mug, his grip tight.
“She’s not a dog, Ed. I gave her permission to roam the ship.”
“She is right here,” Amaya cut in. Just because she accepted that kind of thing at home didn’t mean she had to here. Nibbling on her toast, she took notice of the book lying open before Edmund. “Have you figured anything out?”
“We found a few things,” Edmund said. “Two, to be precise. Corsair wrote in his journal that Graven believes you’re directly descended from Ronan Pearce himself. Any comment?”
“Not really. No—wait.” Amaya thought through Corsair’s history presentation. “My great-grandmother was the original owner of the necklace, I know that. And Ronan Pearce allegedly designed it. If he gifted it to her, maybe they were . . .”
She shook her head, not particularly enjoying the suggestion that her entire family line was built upon an extramarital affair.
Lucy had not, in fact, been married to Ronan Pearce.
She would have had to pass her son off as legitimate to avoid scandal and social ruin, which meant any affair couldn’t have been too distanced from her marriage. But . . .
“It’s not impossible,” she decided, looking up at them. “Does that change anything?”
“Apart from providing additional confirmation that you have—uh, had—the Skystone, I don’t think so. But it would rewrite history a bit; Pearce never recognized an heir.”
Amaya made a mental note to ask her father to investigate that when she got home. If nothing else, it would be interesting to know.
“What’s the second thing?”
“These.” Edmund slid over a set of blueprints. “They were stowed away with the necklace and the sketch.”
Amaya leaned over the table, her pulse jumping when she recognized the cover design on the prints. The image depicted a distinctive house, practically hanging off the edge of a cliff, with “Starcrest Peak” scrawled above it.
“That’s my lake house,” she said. Corsair hadn’t been interested in the coordinates inside the locket—he said he already knew. This must be why.
Edmund looked aghast. “It’s your what?”
Amaya couldn’t help the smirk that played across her lips. “My lake house. It was my great-grandmother’s, too.”
She took the blueprints and flipped through them, recognizing the layout instantly. The bottom right-hand corner of each page bore a set of initials: RP.
Everything clicked in that instant. Somehow, Graven had gotten his hands on these blueprints and traced them to Pearce . . . traced the house to Amaya’s family . . . and found the necklace that matched the design sketch hanging around Amaya’s neck.
Of course it all led back to Starcrest Peak.
After all, the house’s coordinates were engraved into the very locket that the pirates stole from her—right beneath the photo she was so desperate to retrieve.
“Damn. Whether you’re related or not, Pearce and your great-grandmother were definitely secret lovers,” Edmund said.
Amaya didn’t disagree. The evidence seemed incriminating.
“Do you know where the house is?” Sebastian asked. “There’s no location on the prints.”
“Obviously. But you shouldn’t need me to tell you that.” Amaya looked between each of the men, assessing their blank stares.
So they hadn’t found the coordinates yet.
She sighed, rolling her eyes. “You haven’t even looked at your ‘Skystone,’ have you?”
“I’ve looked at it more than enough,” Lexington grumbled.
“I’ve tested it, and we’ve studied the sketch dozens of times,” Edmund said.
“I’ve . . . looked at it once,” Sebastian said.
“Well, none of you have really looked.” Amaya extended her hand to the captain. “May I see it?”
Lexington met her eyes and narrowed his. He must have sensed she had some kind of ulterior motive, because his answer was a decisive, “No. You can tell us what we need to know.”
“Not for free,” Amaya retorted, tilting her head. “You’re a pirate, I’m sure you can respect that. Besides, it’s better if I show you.”
She didn’t want a man’s big, clumsy fingers digging her photo out of the locket, and it wasn’t like she had the coordinates memorized.
Lexington scoffed. “You’re in no position to negotiate, Sinclair.”
“Yes, I am. I have something you want.”
“Sebastian, can you find out the location of the Sinclair family’s lake house?” Lexington asked, turning to his first mate. “I imagine it’s somewhere along Lake Anna.”
Shit.
“It’ll take a few calls, but yeah. ‘Course,” Sebastian said with a shrug.