Chapter 7 Blue Looks Good On You #2
Eyebrows high, Captain Rodrigo looks me over.
“You get very upset on his behalf. You’re a good friend to him, but surely you understood that Harlow would be devastated when he left last night.
It was the night they announced their engagement, and it ended with her alone and crying.
Any woman in their right mind wouldn’t tolerate that.
” He finally turns toward Vincent. “You, too. She’s your fiancée, what were you thinking leaving her like that?
You have to be aware of other people’s feelings. ”
“You need to be aware of other people’s feelings,” Vincent argues.
“I don’t want to be told how to live my life.
I’m doing more than enough right now for everyone else’s feelings.
So just stop.” He’s walking over toward me, and I’m so nervous because I have no idea what he’s going to say.
He could say anything in moments like these.
Thinking before speaking is not his strong suit.
“Whose feelings are you worried about if not your fiancée’s?” Captain Rodrigo asks.
I gotta bail him out. “We had a long talk about captain and crew and the decisions that we’ll be making soon. That’s what he’s talking about.”
Vincent is just standing beside me shaking his head. Seems like he’s getting ready to spill it, and I don’t want to stop him if he wants to.
“I’m not doing it. I will not be forced to marry her,” Vincent says.
“Who is forcing you?” my father asks him. “If you don’t want to marry her then why did you propose?”
Vincent locks eyes with me. I want to just tell our fathers the truth, and I know he does, too. Why can’t things just be easy for us? If either of us were a woman, this wouldn’t even matter.
A loud bang outside breaks the tension—all four of us jump at the sound. “What the hell was that?” Captain Rodrigo asks.
It sounded almost like a gunshot. My father storms out first, with the rest of us close behind. We’re walking quickly toward the bow of the ship, and all I can hear is screaming. Once we get on deck, there is nothing but chaos around the pier. People are running and shouting everywhere.
“What the hell is happening?” I ask. I’ve never seen anything like it.
Shit, we’re not even dressed; we’re still in sweatpants and T-shirts, and we’re unarmed.
In any other circumstance, our fathers wouldn’t allow us to walk on the deck in the equivalent of pajamas.
Mine would have shoved me right back into my room, and Vincent’s would have done the same.
I feel Vincent’s hand on my back. “I don’t know what’s going on,” he says. “But we need to get dressed and grab our weapons. I can’t protect—”
“I can protect you without my pistol,” I say.
He drops an eyebrow at me and looks left to right. “I don’t need you to protect me, I was talking about protecting you. I’m in charge of protection,” he says.
I pat his shoulder. “You are not in charge of protection.”
My father’s first mate, Lyndon, makes his way over to us. “Captains, a fight broke out. Captain Slicer sent a few men to destroy the pub. We caught one of them. He said he wants to meet with you two. Apparently, Captain Slicer doesn’t like how business has been running, so he’s making a comeback.”
“A comeback? What the hell is that supposed to mean?” my father asks.
“What’s he coming back on? I don’t see any ships,” Captain Rodrigo says, gesturing to the open water.
Lyndon is all sweaty; he’s wiping his brow with the back of his hand. His dark black hair is sticking to his forehead. “Well, all he said was that he’s making a comeback, and he wants to speak with you two.”
“So, where is he?” my father asks.
“Hey,” I whisper, bringing my mouth near Vincent’s ear. “Let’s go get dressed before they realize that we aren’t ready to go. We need to be ready for whatever the hell Slicer has planned.”
Vincent nods in agreement, and we start stepping back from the group slowly, trying not to draw attention to ourselves.
Lyndon shrugs his shoulders and finally takes notice of the two of us behind our fathers. “Don’t know…” he says eyeing us. “I don’t think Captain Slicer is here. This was just a messenger, but he seems a bit off. Speaking of a bit off—what are the, uh, two future captains behind you wearing?”
I close my eyes and exhale, while our fathers turn slowly around toward the two of us. “What the hell are you two doing on deck out of uniform?” my father asks.
Vincent speaks up, “We just woke up not that long ago and you two were talking to us in his room, then we came up here. We obviously didn’t have time to get dressed.”
“We’ll go now,” I say.
“Move fast,” my father says. “You two are coming with us.”
Captain Rodrigo turns back toward Lyndon. “Where is the messenger now?”
“He’s in the holding cell at Muffy’s. Really got under the skin of everyone at the bar by bringing Captain Slicer up like that.
Flipped a few tables, then ran through the port until a few of our guys tackled him.
Couple of shots were fired, but I don’t think anyone was hit. There were two others that got away.”
Vincent and I are walking quickly toward my room. I really want to hold his hand, but I know that I can’t. Will it always be like this? Will I always have to worry about holding his hand?
“Hey,” Vincent says elbowing me, “I didn’t bring my sword out with me last night.”
“It’s okay. You can use one of mine. Shit, you don’t have any extra clothes with you.”
“Nope. Should I just go back to my dad’s ship? Get dressed and grab my sword?”
I tilt my head at him as we finally walk inside my bedroom. “No. You can just wear one of my meeting suits. Just borrow something.”
He raises his eyebrows at me, picking his clothes up off the floor. Maybe that was stupid of me to offer, but we need to get back to our dads and figure out what the hell is happening.
“Oh shit,” he says, lifting the bottle of lube from the nightstand. “This was just sitting here open…our fathers must have seen it. Don’t you think?”
I shrug and walk toward my closet, opening the door.
“I saw your dad looking right at it. I don’t know what he thought, but he definitely saw it.
I wasn’t too worried, because you looked like you were getting ready to just tell them anyway.
” I chuckle. “You are a bit unpredictable sometimes. That was a quality I always had fun with, but now that we’re in a relationship, I have to say it’s a bit terrifying. ”
He laughs and closes the cap on the bottle, placing it back inside the drawer. “You said relationship again.”
I pull my mouth to the side peeking out of the closet at him. His dimples are undoubtedly the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen. I can’t even remember what it felt like to see him before I realized how attractive he was.
“I did say that.” I step back inside the closet and flip quickly through my jackets. My hands are shaking; how am I nervous to talk about this? We’ve fucked three times now; how can I feel so embarrassed?
“I don’t think I’ve ever heard you say you were in a relationship with anyone,” he says, “and today, you’ve said it several times.” He steps inside the closet with me. “I thought my best friend doesn’t do relationships.”
I shake my head. “That was before my best friend stuck his tongue in my mouth.”
A strong pair of arms reaches around my waist from behind. Vincent rests his chin on my shoulder. “That doesn’t sound like a very nice thing to do. Did you like it?”
I smile and tilt my head next to his. “I did.” The air between us is heavy with lust and desire.
“Mmm, me too,” he says, reaching both hands down the front of my sweatpants. I need to stop this, which is the last thing I want to do, but we really have to get dressed and meet up with our dads.
“You’re trouble,” I chuckle, wiggling free of his grip. “And we’re both gonna get our asses handed to us if we don’t hurry.” I pass him one of my blue coats, a shirt and a pair of pants.
He takes the hangers from me and eyes them. “My dad is probably gonna be pissed. I don’t even know what he is gonna look like when he sees me wearing your ship uniform. Wait, am I even allowed to?”
I shrug at him. “We’ll be captains in a few days, and someday we might combine crews anyway, what difference does it make whose uniform you’re wearing? My dad isn’t gonna care.”
“Alright. I don’t have much of a choice.”
We step outside of the closet into the room, and I toss him a pair of underwear. “Just wear them.”
Getting dressed across from one another is kind of difficult, because at the moment, Vincent is standing in my underwear, pulling on a pair of my pants, and I just want to tear into him.
But now isn’t the time for that. He’s looking up at me almost shyly, while buttoning them—they’re a little tight on him, since his ass is a bit rounder than mine, but lengthwise, they’re fine, since we’re practically the same height.
He steps closer, pulling his shirt off, and I swallow the urge to touch him… God, every single part of him turns me on.
“Boys! Hurry up!” my father shouts, banging on the door. We both jump at the sound and quickly finish dressing.
I’ve never seen Vincent in blue before this moment.
It’s unreal that a color can look so good on someone.
I’ve worn that color every day of my life, and yet somehow it looks like a brand-new shade of blue to me.
I’m kind of obsessed with the way he looks in my clothes, especially the way my pants fit his perfectly round ass.
It looks so juicy, like a delicious peach—I kind of want to bite it.
He holds his hands out looking in the mirror, then turns toward me. “I look ridiculous in this color, right?”
I shake my head at him and walk over, taking his hands in mine, and pulling him in close. “No. You don’t look ridiculous. You look like—”
“What? What do I look like?”
I take a playful bite of his earlobe, flicking his earrings with my tongue, then gently tug the lobe between my teeth. “Mine,” I whisper.
He pushes me back a bit and points to the door, with a smile on his face, his dimples on full display. “Our dads are out there; we have to hurry. You can’t be doing that.” He wipes his ear with his hand and moves toward my weapon rack. “Which sword can I use?”
“Whichever you want. The third one from the left is lighter. You could also use my pistol, if you want.”
He tilts an eyebrow at me. “No pistols for me. We don’t want my dad having a full-on heart attack; first I’m wearing your clothes, then I show up with just a pistol—he’d probably call off the captaincy promotion.”
He picks up a slender sword and moves it around.
He’s so graceful with it; he just handles swords so much better than I do.
That’s one of the reasons I hate them. Sword fighting is like an elaborate dance, whereas pistols just get the job done faster.
There’s no fancy footwork, just taking care of business.
Still, I do love to watch him fight with one.
“This one is perfect,” he says, sliding the sword back into its scabbard and hooking the holder onto his belt. “Can I use a hair tie?” he asks me.
I toss him an elastic from the top of my dresser, and he quickly flips his hair upside down, tying it in a top knot.
Damn. That’s what a future captain looks like. In this moment I want to drop to my knees and swear fealty to him. I would die for this man.
“Now, can I use Gwendolyn?” Captain Rodrigo asks, outside of the door.
I grab my pistol and stick it inside its holster. “We’re coming!” I shout.
Vincent walks toward me with a big smile on his face. “Wearing your clothes really does make me feel like I belong to you. Almost makes me feel like a piece of property. I don’t know why, but I like it.”
I grip him by the waist, jerking his body toward me. “You are my property, now. Seeing you like this is making me realize just how far I’d be willing to go for you. It’s almost frightening.”
“Don’t die today,” he says and kisses me quickly.
I smile and let go of him. As I open the door, our fathers’ jaws drop open at the sight of us.
“What the hell are you wearing? Where are your clothes?” Vincent’s father asks him.
“I didn’t bring any extra clothes with me,” he says shrugging.
My father is studying the two of us, and it’s making me a little uncomfortable.
As much as I hate to admit it, he’s extremely smart, but really, Vincent wearing my uniform doesn’t mean we slept together—he didn’t bring extra clothes, so he didn’t have a choice.
“Let it go, Rodri, he wasn’t planning on staying the night.
You saw his clothes on the floor earlier; you want him to wear something wrinkled? Besides, he looks good in blue.”
“No, he looks good in red,” Captain Rodrigo counters, looking the two of us over again. “Ah, damn it. Let’s go, we don’t have time for this.”
We walk behind our fathers who are having two completely different conversations, yet still keeping up with one another.
Captain Rodrigo is stuck on Vincent’s clothes, while my father is going over the plan for when they come face to face with Slicer’s messenger.
“Vincent,” Captain Rodrigo says. “You need to tell Matteo to meet us there. He’s going to be your first mate. You shouldn’t be leaving him behind in these situations. He’s always cleaning up after you…just like last night. Don’t know what Harlow would have done if Matteo wasn’t there.”
I don’t know if he’s just trying to goad him again or not, but Vincent doesn’t seem bothered by it.
“I have Sivan with me. I don’t need Matteo, Captain.”
Captain Rodrigo shakes his head but continues walking beside my father. “Well, with the way you’re dressed you look like Sivan’s first mate.”
My father looks over his shoulder at us. “Actually, I think they look more like co-captains, Rodri. Except for the fact that they don’t have cool hats like ours.”
“Co-captains…” Captain Rodrigo scoffs. “What an asinine idea that would be.”
My father stops in his tracks. “How is being co-captains asinine?”
“A captain already shares his wealth with his wife, is he to further share it with his co-captain? Four people sharing wealth before it even hits the crew… Asinine.”
“How did he come up with four people?” Vincent asks as we step inside Muffy’s pub.
“He’s saying both of us would be married to other people. You married to Harlow, and me married to—”
He drops his eyebrow down at me. “Don’t finish that sentence.”