My Runaway Heart (28 page)

Didn't his men realize that Lindsay could be no part of
their world, a world so fraught with danger their own survival was continually
in question? But he could feel the heavy pall over the
Vengeance
lifting just as surely as the sun peeking out after a
storm as Lindsay's blond head appeared above the railing.

Not only Dag, but Cowan and Walker were there to help
her over the side and greet her. Jared was tempted to turn his back to the
entire proceedings, although he could not bring himself to. Almost resenting
the smile she gave them, no matter her heart was surely not in it, he could not
stifle his wrenching relief that she was safe.

He felt his breath jam as their eyes met across the
distance separating them, Jared jolted by near-physical pain at the hurt in her
gaze. But he hardened his heart, Lindsay not appearing surprised at all when he
voiced a brusque command.

"Walker, have the helmsman set a course for the
English Channel. We're taking Miss Somerset home."

"
Cap'n
. . ."

Jared looked at Cowan, who had hastened across the deck
to the opposite railing. A disquieting intuition gripped him before his first
mate had even uttered another word.

"
Cap'n
, have you the
glass? I think those devils may have found us."

Cursing under his breath, Jared pulled the spyglass
from his belt, but he didn't have to use it. He could easily see the ships in
the distance, four altogether, their taut sails stark white against a dark,
angry line of clouds gathering to the west. But it was an alarmed cry from
aloft that made him slam his fist upon the railing, a sailor having clambered
up the rigging to the main topsail yard.

"Ship approaching from the north,
Cap'n
, and four at the west sailing straight for us!"

Jared lowered his head, such odds not unknown to him,
but for the first time in his life, he hesitated.

They were coming for him, he knew it, coming for
him
and his crew, determined to capture them and win the
reward. But every man aboard the
Vengeance
had sworn to fight to the death rather than face prison again or hang from a
noose—so what, then, of Lindsay? His plan to protect her had failed completely,
just as he'd failed to help Elise, and now they faced a greater, potentially
insurmountable trial—

"Jared, the men await your orders."

First realizing that Walker had joined him on the
quarterdeck, he met his friend's intense scrutiny, saw the concern
there
and the urgency. It spurred him, those ships at a
swift glance not so close yet that outrunning them would be impossible, but he'd
be a fool to think they weren't in danger.

"Loose the sails! Every man to his station!"

The words were no sooner out of his mouth than the ship
seemed to come alive: sails unfurled and swelling with the wind, sailors
priming guns while others scaled the rigging. Jared looked next to where
Lindsay still stood by the railing, Dag at her side.

"Dag, take Miss Somerset below to her cabin and
then return to the quarterdeck. We need all hands—"

"
Cap'n
, the ship at the
north!" cried the sailor who still clung to the main yard, a spyglass
clutched in his hand. "It's the man-of-war
Trident
!"

Chapter 25

Lindsay felt the strange hush fall across the
Vengeance
as if the sailor's cry had
sucked away all movement and sound except for the flapping sails and the
schooner creaking as it was steered hard to the wind. Yet in the next moment
activity resumed with a furor that she'd not seen before, Jared's face grown
hard and impassive as granite, his roared commands filling the air.

And one of them was for Dag to escort her below at once.
Lindsay knew there was no hope of her remaining above deck, even if she had
wanted to. If she'd ever wondered what it might be like for the ship to face a
true battle, she felt it now, struck by a terrible sense of foreboding as
chilling as the sudden cool gust of wind whipping at her hair.

It smelled of storm and rain, the sun sinking into the
west already obscured by ominous clouds. Her last glance of Jared before she
ducked her head into the hold was of him staring to the north, the tension in
his body as palpable as Dag's nervousness. She had never seen the Norwegian so
agitated before.

"What is it, Dag? Do you think we won't be able to
outrun them?"

She got no answer, the big man clearly anxious to
return above deck as he led the way swiftly to Jared's quarters and shoved open
the door, his agility again surprising her for someone so large. She had no
sooner stepped into the cabin than the door was closed firmly behind her, and
suddenly she felt as if she were reliving what had happened two weeks ago.

Yet it wasn't the same. So much had changed—everything
had changed, and not simply the fact that no guard was stationed outside. Still
incredulous that she was actually aboard the Vengeance, she knew, too, that she
wouldn't want to be anywhere else, no matter the peril they faced.

She had realized that when she'd thought first to row
away from the ship after the cannon fire had chased the
Killigrew
brothers away, but every stroke of the oars had made the ache in her heart only
worse. Despite everything Jared had said to her, everything he'd done,
something inside Lindsay would not allow her to relinquish all hope. She had
seen too much in his eyes, felt too much in his kiss.

And she had seen enough lust on the faces of Michael
and Ian
Killigrew
to know that Jared had never looked
at her in such a vile way.

Glad that at least one of the oars she had hurled at
them had struck home, the memory of Ian's pained cry still fresh in her mind,
Lindsay moved to the porthole but lost her balance when the ship suddenly
listed sharply to port. She cried out as her shoulder struck the cabin wall,
but her pain was nothing to the dread that seized her when she heard a
deafening thunderclap, the sound so close she felt the entire ship shudder.

"Oh, Lord, no, they can't be firing upon us!"
She made it to the porthole despite the heavy list, her eyes widening to see
rain pelting the glass.

Nervous, near-giddy laughter escaped her; it wasn't
cannon fire but thunder she'd heard, the
Vengeance
overtaken by a sudden squall. Yet her laughter froze in her throat when she saw
a huge ship plunging through the rolling, rain-lashed waves toward them, her
heightened sense of foreboding almost choking her.

"They're going to ram us," she murmured in
horror, thinking to run but not knowing where, and unable to tear her eyes from
the terrifying sight. The words were no sooner off her tongue than the
Vengeance
listed severely to starboard
and seemed to surge forward, throwing her to the floor. She could do nothing
but close her eyes and wait for the impending impact, so certain the two ships
were going to collide that she screamed when the cabin door burst open and
slammed against the wall.

"Lindsay, get up! Come with me now!"

Astonished to see Walker grasp her by the shoulders and
help her to her feet, Lindsay felt as if a cold hand had taken hold of her
heart.

"Is it Jared? What's happening?"

"Move, Lindsay, there's no time! He sent me down
here to get you out of the cabin—now!"

Half stumbling, she obeyed, the American grabbing her
arm and almost dragging her along with him into the passageway. She heard men
shouting, the air crackling with tension,
then
the
thunderous boom of cannon as if every gun on the
Vengeance
had opened fire.

A horrifying answer came too soon. Lindsay screamed
again as an explosion so near to them rocked the ship; she and Walker were both
hurled to the floor, her head hitting something hard.

Dazed, she lay there; as if from a great distance, she
heard more screams, but they weren't hers. She tried to speak but couldn't, her
last shred of consciousness like a bizarre dream as she was hauled across the
floor, the acrid smell of gunpowder enveloping her, choking her. Dimly, she saw
Walker's face,
cut
and bleeding. Then everything went
black.

***

It was the sound of fierce pounding that roused her,
Lindsay unable to guess, when she opened her eyes and tried to gather her
bearings, how long she might have lain there in the bunk . . .

A bunk? She raised herself up shakily on one elbow,
grimacing at the pounding in her head which seemed as fierce, matching her
sudden confusion. The last thing she remembered, she and Walker had been
running and

"Oh, God, help me! Help me!"

The agonized cry coming from somewhere behind her,
Lindsay rolled over; her startled gaze flew to the bloodied sailor who lay
stretched out on a table,
Cooky
and his two kitchen
assistants frantically working over the injured man. Recognizing the crew's
quarters, she thrust herself from the bunk, paying no heed to the aching in her
head or to her wobbly legs as she hurried to
Cooky's
side despite the pitching deck.

"What happened? Can I help—what can I do?"

"Help us hold him down, miss. We've got to cut the
fragment from his leg."

As a gag made of rope was thrust into the wretched
sailor's mouth, Lindsay did as she was told, squeezing her eyes shut as his
muffled cries filled the large cabin. His agony was mercifully short-lived.
When she looked again, the man had fainted. She almost felt like fainting
herself when she saw the bloody knife in
Cooky's
hand
and watched him throw a jagged chunk of metal to the floor with disgust.

"Damn the bastards! Hit us from the stern, they
did. Had to be the
Trident
, too, may
her timbers rot in hell. A broadside. Most of the shot fell short—we were far
enough ahead, thanks to
Cap'n
turning the ship to
starboard—but a few did their damage, as you can see. I only wish that was the
worst of it."

At
Cooky's
heavy sigh,
Lindsay felt a chill course through her. "There . . . there are more
wounded?"

The grizzled old sailor's grim nod made Lindsay look
around. She was astonished that she hadn't seen the half-dozen men lying
drugged and bandaged in nearby bunks.

"Thank you kindly for your help, miss. We'll
manage fine now. This is the last of them."

Grateful to hear at least that bit of good news,
Lindsay shuddered as the pounding through the ship continued unabated.

"They're plugging up the holes left from the
Trident
's cannon, miss. Walker told me
you'd taken a blow to the head. A bit of laudanum—"

"No, no, I'm fine," she murmured, although,
in truth, she didn't feel fine for the disquiet filling her. If there were so
many wounded, had anyone been . . . ? She wanted to ask
Cooky
,
but she couldn't bring herself to, the man already busy with bandaging his
patient's ravaged leg. And the other two sailors helping him looked so somber, matching
the gloom that tinged the air, that Lindsay felt a sharper chill.

Cooky
would have told her if
anything had happened to Jared, wouldn't he?
she
assured herself wildly. Swallowing hard, she left the crew's quarters and its
cloying stench of blood and sweat. The ship was rolling so heavily that she had
to brace her hands against the bulkheads, suddenly remembering the squall that
had come upon them just before the attack.

Lindsay felt her heart lurch as she remembered, too,
Walker's words when he'd burst in upon her—something about Jared sending him to
get her out of the cabin. And that cabin lay in the stern . . . Jared must have
known it was in the line of fire

"Miss Somerset, I wouldn't go above deck if I were
you."

She turned to see two sailors who'd just come through
an adjacent passageway, their faces blackened from gunpowder, huge mallets in
their hands and other tools stuck in their belts. She realized then that the
pounding had stilled, these men obviously the ones who'd been hard at work
plugging the holes made by cannon fire.

"We're not going to sink, are we?" she asked.

"No, the damage has been fixed, at least for now,"
the sailor closer to her added quickly, reassuringly. "But not above, not
yet. There's rigging down and sails torn and a shattered top foremast to be
cleared away—"

"I won't get in the way, I promise." She
turned to go but stopped, surprised, when the man reached out and caught her
arm.

"Miss, it's not a pretty sight. They're still cleaning
up the mess—"

"Mess? If you mean the damage you mentioned from
the attack—"

"Not that. We've four men didn't make it, miss. I
think
Cap'n
would want you to stay below, especially
. . ."

The sailor fell silent, glancing uncomfortably at his
companion, his face so grim that Lindsay felt her breath stop when the second
man uttered a low curse. She looked from one to the other, her voice sunk to a
hoarse whisper.

"Dag?"

They didn't need to answer, their grave expressions
telling her all she needed to know.

Tears blinding her eyes, she fled to the main
companionway, not heeding what the sailor had told her, not caring. She could
think only of Dag . . . and of Jared, his anguish at Dag's side just yesterday
leaping to her stricken mind. Her eyes were so clouded she stumbled upon the
third step, made slick from rain and blood; suddenly she felt strong hands on
her shoulders and she looked up, Jared's gaze burning into hers as he made her
climb back down with him into the hold.

He was drenched from head to toe,
a
wildness
in his eyes that she'd never seen before, a fierce desperation
that touched her very soul.