14. The Four
THE FOUR
Cecily hadn’t cried in a long time, and she wasn’t about to start now.
She lingered in the woods after Jack left, staring at the inn’s back door as she grappled with all they’d said.
The tears threatened to fall in a way they hadn’t since she was in Northgate over six months ago. She wanted to let them, but she didn’t dare with Jack so close.
Voices burst from the other side of the inn. “Jack!”
She pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes.
With a deep breath and a quick exhale, she pulled her frosty composure into place, locking her emotions into what was left of her heart—though they surely wouldn’t stay that way for long.
Then she started down the path behind Jack’s retreating figure.
“Where are ya, Copson, ya slippery bastard?” a man called.
Jack rounded the side of the inn, and a holler went up with the sound of slapped backs and raucous laughter.
“About time!” the man said. “We’ve been waiting for you to creep in.”
“Rough winter, Frederick,” came Jack’s steady voice, carrying none of the malice from moments ago. “Else we might’ve been here sooner.”
“So Greyson said!” Frederick’s voice lowered. “What a girl he’s got. Terrifying smile, that one.”
Cecily reached the front of the inn and lingered at the corner.
Jack stood in the street with a short, square-faced man with long dark hair he’d tied at the nape of his neck.
He was built like an ox, and the moment she appeared, his eyes, silver as coins, landed on her.
His brows rose, but as he started to speak, the door opened to release another man into the street.
“Copson,” said this second man in a thin, gravelly voice that sounded as though he’d been screaming. He was tall and willowy, handsome even though his hair struggled to conceal his scalp. “About time.”
“Killian,” Jack said, clapping him on the shoulder with a generous smile that made Cecily’s stomach bottom out. That smile felt like sunlight, and she’d basked in it these past days. Now she’d be relegated to seeing him give it to everyone else.
The door opened again, and four more poured out—Greyson, Hester, and two young women who were opposites in nearly every way.
One was short with dark features, and she’d tied a red scarf over her shoulder-length black hair.
Her arms were corded with muscle, and she wore a snarky smirk that promised fun, though Cecily couldn’t tell what kind.
Beside her was the strangest woman Cecily had ever seen—tall and uncommonly pale with a shock of long, white hair that seemed to float on the air.
Upon seeing Jack, she broke into an effortless grin, but then her smoke-gray eyes widened in horror.
She gasped and hurried forward to take his face in her hands.
“Jaaaack,” she breathed. “What happened?” She ran her finger along the scar on his cheek. “Noooo, not your face. It’s my favorite thing about you.”
Jack smirked. “You’ll be pleased to know I did my best to avoid it, Fay.”
“I suppose that’s all I can ask,” she said airily. Then she leaned in and kissed Jack square on the mouth.
Even though it was a short kiss—really more of a peck—something boiled violently in Cecily’s core.
She’d never make it out of Tortuga alive. Either Jack would kill her or some higher power would when she burned this island to the ground with herself in the very heart of it.
Fay gave him a single pat on the cheek. “Welcome home,” she said, then traipsed to Killian’s side. She hadn’t been gone for an entire three seconds before the other woman greeted Jack with the same kiss.
“Maria,” Jack said. “You look lovely as ever.”
“I’ve missed hearing such marvelous compliments in your pretty accent,” she laughed, her low voice resonant. She gave him a light punch in the arm and nodded to Frederick. “Why don’t you say things like that?”
“I tell you the exact same things,” Frederick said. “I just don’t sound like the bloody king of England.”
Maria noticed Cecily then. “Who’s this?”
The others looked at her—save for Jack, who faced his friends.
Frederick smirked and said, “Flavor of the week, Jack?”
They all burst into laughter. Cecily’s lips parted on a silent gasp, her cheeks flaming.
Did his friends think he was using her for fun too? Did they know he was capable of it, and did they find it funny?
Shame ran cold fingers down her back. Sixteen hundred harlots in Tortuga, plus one idiot girl who’d lost all sense in less than two weeks because of a pirate with a handsome face and a sword.
Jack was the only one, aside from herself, who didn’t seem amused. “That’s Cecily,” he said boredly. “Be careful. She cuts.”
“Ooh.” Maria examined Jack’s scar. “Do you know from experience?”
“Unfortunately.”
Maria turned to Cecily, impressed. “No one’s gotten that close to Jack in ages.”
“She’s my friend,” Hester announced proudly. “From prison.”
Fay, who’d been glancing between Jack and Cecily with a deepening frown, suddenly brightened. “What were you in for?”
“Murder,” Cecily said, her voice reedy and weak.
“I thought they hung those,” Maria said.
“Oh, no one would dare,” Hester said, like Cecily was some sort of exciting, legendary creature.
And oh, how she wished she could summon the strength of one, especially as Jack gave a heavy sigh that sounded like, If only. Though the others were eager to laugh and jest, she didn’t think the pirate heir was attempting to be funny.
To his friends, he asked, “Did you all get kicked out of the inn already?”
Bottles and flasks started appearing from pockets and the flaps of their coats as they insisted they didn’t need to be served by a barmaid in order to drink. A beach would be perfectly fine, they said—preferable, even, regardless of whether they were kicked out, which they most definitely had been.
Meanwhile, Hester moved to Cecily’s side. “Are you alright?” she whispered. “You look awful.”
“I’m—” Cecily stopped short of giving the same kind of offhanded assurance she always threw at Hester.
Today, she couldn’t seem to embrace her usual lies—not in a way that would convince her friend.
So for once, she gave Hester bald honesty with no pretense of strength or fangs or thorns.
“No,” she said, the word barely a breath. “I’m not.”
Hester frowned. “What happened with Jack?”
Cecily shook her head. “Not here.”
Instead of pushing, Hester gathered Cecily into her arms and said, “I think you’ll like Fay and Maria.”
It didn’t take long for Cecily to decide Hester was right.
The group set off down a thin trail through the woods. The men led the way, their banter echoing off the trees as they knocked each other off the path with hearty shoves. Jack’s voice trailed back to her, torturously happy as though he hadn’t threatened to gut her only minutes ago.
Her heart thundered in her ears, cursing her as a fool, fool, fool.
Fay and Maria slowed, allowing Hester and Cecily to catch up. Just before they did, Fay whispered to Maria, “We shouldn’t kiss Jack.” At Maria’s questioning look, she said, “Cecily’s English. They don’t do that in England.”
Cecily stiffened. Had she been obvious? Could they tell how she felt? She schooled her features, hoping to appear expressionless.
“Oh,” Maria whispered back. “Is she his?”
Tendrils of panic squeezed Cecily’s stomach, but Fay only sighed in response. Then the two broke apart, Fay gliding alongside Cecily while Maria walked with Hester.
Maria casually said, “These woods are haunted, so you know. Most people who wander in don’t make it back out.”
Cecily attempted a laugh at what she assumed was a jest, but it came brittle and broken. Hester whipped her head this way and that, scanning the trees as though a ghoul might drop from the sun-speckled canopy.
Fay’s giggle sounded like the tinkling of tiny bells. “She means to say it’s ours, since no one ever comes this way because of the frights in the trees.”
Cecily looked at Fay. “What kinds of frights—”
“Thank God for you two,” Maria barreled on. She waved a hand at the men walking ahead. “It’s been too male for too long. We’ve spent ten summers with those buffoons and have been dying for relief.”
Cecily wondered if Fay and Maria ought to be as frightened by a haunted forest as she and Hester clearly were, but they were unbothered, or perhaps they were only teasing. Perhaps that was the kind of friends Jack kept—ones who liked to scare others when they were already distraught.
Fay’s pale eyes fixed on her. “Don’t worry,” she whispered. “You won’t die.” Then she smiled like it was supposed to be comforting
“Finally, some balance,” Maria was saying. She threw her arm over Hester’s shoulders. “I say we’d’ve left these boys years ago if they weren’t so easy. And we’ve got no one else, really—save for Jack and Greyson, ‘cause they sail so far and much.”
“You’re from here?” Hester asked.
“I grew up in Tortuga,” Maria said. “My ma was a local and my da was a Spanish sailor, or so she said. She died when I was ten, then I found my way on a ship. Pretended to be a boy and earned my keep. S’where I met Frederick.
He started looking at me odd when I got to be a woman and my clothes couldn’t hide it as well.
He suspected I was a girl and followed me one night when I fancied a dip in the sea by myself.
He saw everything and liked it, so I invited him to join me.
” She winked. “I got better clothes and he keeps my secret so we make twice as much salary. Everyone thinks we’re friends rather than the most passionate of lovers, and we don’t hear shit about women being bad luck. ”
Cecily looked at Frederick ahead. She couldn’t help the way her eyes moved from him to Jack, so she faced Maria instead. “You pretend to be a man?”
Maria grinned and lowered her already deep voice. “Yes, ma’am.”