Chapter Fourteen #2
Lucien ground his teeth together. “Then pray it hasn’t.” He strode to the rail, scanning the rigging. “All hands, reef the sails. Keep her nimble!”
The crew scrambled, moving with practiced efficiency, though more than a few glanced nervously at the dark shape chasing them.
Abigail clutched the rail, the color draining from her face.
The ship pitched beneath them, her knuckles white where she gripped the wood.
“I’m not sure I could bear facing him again,” she whispered, her voice raw with more than seasickness.
Tears shone in her eyes, catching the morning light before the wind tore them away.
Lucien’s jaw flexed. He wanted to tell her she wouldn’t have to, but the words turned to salt on his tongue. Promises at sea were fragile things.
“Hold fast.” He kept his voice low and steady. “He won’t take you. Not while I still draw breath.”
The deck shivered beneath them as the schooner responded, sails snapping, lines creaking under the sudden strain. Pierre called out from the rigging, voice cutting through the wind. “They’re gaining on us! Too fast!”
“Don’t let them get a broadside!” Lucien barked, eyes scanning the horizon for the reef surrounding Dauphin.
The wind gusted, and the ship heeled hard, fighting against the current. He ground his teeth and steadied the wheel. Too exposed. Still too far out.
A deep boom split the air.
The first cannon shot thundered across the water, distant, yet close enough for the sound to crawl beneath the skin. A geyser of seawater erupted off the schooner’s port side, sending a shower of salt and foam toward the sky.
Miss Ross flinched beside the rail, her hands gripping the slick wood. “They’re firing at us!”
“Not yet,” Lucien said, forcing calm into his voice. “That was a warning.”
He adjusted the wheel, knuckles white, guiding them toward the twisting blue-green stretch ahead where the breakers turned uneven and pale over hidden shoals. His eyes flicked from the compass to the shifting color of the sea, reading it like an old map.
Miss Ross slid to the deck, leaning against the rail, one arm wrapped around her knees, the other clinging to a sheet line. If possible, her face had gone paler. “You should go below deck. You’ll be safer down there if Thorne is able to get in range.”
She shook her head. “I can’t move.”
He’d half a mind to bring her down there himself—was about to—when a subtle shudder ran through the boards beneath his feet.
Damnation.
The rudder had scraped the bottom. Any shallower and they would run aground.
“Hard aport, helm now!” He grabbed the wheel, turning it with all the leverage he could muster. “Ease the sheets! Back the foresail!”
The schooner answered sluggishly, bow yawing as he fought to keep her from settling deeper in the sand’s grip. He squinted at the narrow channel ahead, where pale breakers foamed over the shoals and the water turned the color of sand. One wrong tack and they’d rip the keel out from under them.
“Let me see the map.”
Pierre slid it from beneath his arm and flattened it against the binnacle, one finger stabbing at their position. “Here. The channel deepens again past this spit.”
Lucien traced the route, jaw tightening as his finger skimmed over the jagged contour of the reef. Too long, too tight a run, and the tide was falling.
“Fuck.” He tossed the map aside. “We’re not going to make it.”
He jerked his gaze behind them, where the Vengeance had slowed, hugging the edge of the reef.
The distance gave him little comfort. With careful maneuvering, she could still swing broadside and bring her guns to bear.
As if his thoughts summoned it, a puff of smoke burst from her side, curling white against the blue sky.
The ball hit water just off their port bow with a plume of spray.
Pierre cursed in French. “If we stay aboard, they’ll hole us through.”
Lucien’s eyes flicked toward the distant bluff, where the crumbling outline of an abandoned Spanish fort caught the first hints of morning light. “We make for shore then. If we can get to the old fort, we might have a chance at holding them off.”
“Whatever we choose, we need to move now,” Pierre’s voice carried over the slap of loose sails above. He jerked a thumb toward the Vengeance, where longboats had already been lowered into the water, oars flashing.
“Lower the anchor!” Lucien’s shout carried over the deck. “Drop the longboats and arm yourselves well.”
The men scrambled into action, grabbing weapons and slinging ladders over the rail. Longboats swung against the schooner’s side, ropes creaking and straining beneath their weight. They splashed into the waves as the men scrambled in, oars stacked and ready.
Lucien strode across the quarterdeck to where Miss Ross still sat with wide eyes.
He extended a hand. “Let’s go.”
Her fingers gripped his, and he hauled her to her feet, his hand sliding to the small of her back as he guided her down the steps toward the nearest longboat. Another cannon boomed from the Vengeance, the splash uncomfortably close. Miss Ross froze at the rail, shaking her head.
“I don’t th—”
Lucien didn’t hesitate, bending to hook his free arm behind her knees. Without waiting for her permission, he lifted her into his arms. With a yelp, she wrapped her hands around his neck, the dampness of her dress pressing through his shirt.
“Hold on tight.” He swung a leg over the rail and onto the first rung of the ladder.
Keeping one hand tight around her waist, he slid down toward the water, each passing second stretching thinner than the last.
When his feet hit the bottom boards, he pivoted, setting Miss Ross into the center of the longboat as the men around them began to row.
“Let’s go!” he barked. “Aim for the bluff!”