Devon Monk - Tin Swift

“It’s done me no harm.”

He stared a little too long, then finally turned his gaze back to the star in his hand.

“Don’t normally have to reveal all my secrets just to get a woman to kiss me. A well-timed smile usually does the trick.”

Rose’s face warmed from that comment, but she tried not to let it show. “I can’t imagine those were all your secrets, Captain—”

“Lee,” he said.

“Lee,” she repeated. “Surely there’s one or two surprises left to you.”

“Might be at that,” he said softly.

Then he repocketed the star, and before she could come up with the next thing to tease out of him, he was shifting sideways to her, one hand firmly at her back so she could lean against it if she needed to, the other gently brushing a strand of her hair from her cheek.

And then, without asking, without a word, without permission, he lowered his mouth to hers.

Rose stopped breathing. Stopped thinking. She’d been cornered by boys and kissed before. It was always rough, not always innocent. But she’d never had a man do this.

Lee held her lips with his own in a sort of embrace, moving slowly, as if showing her the steps to a dance she should follow. She moved with him, and shivered when his tongue dragged delicious warmth along her lower lip.

And then she paid no mind as to what came first and what came next. She opened her mouth to him, wanting that warmth inside her. He tasted like bourbon and something pleasantly richer.

The heat of his mouth sent flames over her skin and she wanted to stretch into that feeling. His lips were soft, but insistent. His stubble scratched along her cheek and only made her want more of his skin, more of his body against hers.

He seemed willing for that too. His hand slid along her thigh, cupping the outer curve of it before he slid his palm over the crest to rest upward on her hip.

That wasn’t where she wanted him touching her. That wasn’t the only place she wanted to be touched.

She couldn’t seem to get near enough with these layers of clothes between them.

Unthinking, she lifted her left hand, her wounded shoulder.

Pain shot white-hot through her, stealing her breath, vision, and body.

When the pain and white pulled away, leaving her aware of her body again, of her own skin and thoughts and breath again, she heard her own screams.

She clamped her teeth together, trying to breathe instead of moan. The pain was getting less. Of course it was getting less. She’d be fine. Just fine. In a minute.

And beyond the rattling of her thoughts, was Lee’s voice.

“You’ll be fine, Rose,” he was saying in a constant string, as if reciting the words of a hymn. “Almost there now, and we’ll get your medicine, nice soft bed, blankets, and sleep. This will all be a dream, a bad dream, but you’re going to wake up, and you’ll be fine, Rose.”

She tried to focus on the world around her. Black. No glittering brass or deep rose-colored wood of the boiler room. And it was cold. They were outside again. He was carrying her back to the cavern.

She rested her head against his shoulder and closed her eyes. His words fell around her like a gentle net, holding her close, keeping her there, anchored in her own thoughts, in her own skin, away from the clawing pain.

Distantly, she heard the sounds of other voices. Mr. Hunt’s low growl, Mae being calm as ever. She wanted to tell them not to fuss over her so, but by the time she got the words together, she was lying down on the cot again, and Mae was urging her to drink as much as she could out of the cup she held to her lips.

Rose drank the cup dry. “Thank you,” she whispered.

“I’m going to repack your shoulder as soon as that starts working,” Mae said. “Don’t worry. You’ll be asleep soon.”

Mae moved to set the cup to one side and she could see Cedar Hunt and Lee Cage both standing at the foot of her bed, facing each other, and neither one of them looking happy with the other.

She didn’t know what they were all worked up about. Yes, she was wounded and the pain had been something awful. But she didn’t plan on giving up breathing anytime soon. There was too much of life she still wanted to see in the time she had left. Too much of it she still wanted to feel.

“Take your discussion outside, please, gentlemen,” Mae was saying. “Rose needs a little rest now.”

Rose didn’t know if they did what Mae said or not, for she was falling down and down into darkness and was asleep before she could hear what either of the men answered.

Cedar paced outside in the afternoon sunlight, taking a short break from helping with the repairs on the Swift to get a drink of water. He’d been in to see Rose and Mae. Rose hadn’t woken since Captain Hink had brought her back to bed, clear out of her head with pain.

Being around Mae, who was helping organize the supplies for the ship and taking care of Rose, just made him restless.

What they needed was for this ship to get off this rock, get moving, and get them as near to Kansas and the coven as they could be. They needed to hunt the Holder, and he needed Mae in her right mind. Permanently.

The wind shifted, coming down from the northeast. Cedar paused, lifting his face into it. There was a feel to the air, the slightest scent of the Holder.

It was just a moment, almost too faint before it could be acknowledged.

And maybe he was wrong. Wishing for something he wanted so badly did not make it true.

Still, he waited for that faint song to rise on the wind, the faint scent to return, but there was only silence and the stinging smell of snow.

Miss Dupuis strolled out of the caverns toward him. She wore a chocolate brown and plum dress, cinched in tight at the waist with ruffles beneath the hem giving the skirt shape. A hat sat jauntily to one side of her head, and her hands were covered by close-fitting brown silk gloves. Cedar hadn’t seen a woman in such formal wear since his days back east.

Her man, Otto Theobald, and her woman, Joonie Wright, were not at her side.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Hunt,” she said, stopping beside him, her eyes cast to the Swift , where Captain Hink hollered at his crew to work faster. Beyond that, the expansive Coin de Paradis had her envelope fully inflated, looking like she’d leap to the sky at any hard wind.

Cedar thought that might be true if it weren’t for the ropes knotted around metal hooks jutting up out of the rock that kept her tight to the earth.

“Afternoon, Miss Dupuis. Will you be leaving soon, I suppose?”

“No.”

Cedar gave her a look. “You’ll be staying here, then?”

“No. Or rather, I hope that isn’t the case. I was wishing to have a moment to speak with you, Mr. Hunt, but you have been a busy man.”

“Not doing anything now,” he said.

“Yes. Good. Would you be willing to take a short walk with me?”

Cedar glanced at the ship. The Swift was nearly ready to fly again in his estimation. Cedar and the others had been working since Captain Hink had roused everyone out of bed before daylight. The crew had put themselves to the task of repair with a single-minded determination.

Pounding rivets and hauling metal and timber had done Cedar’s temper some good. Enough to entertain a short walk.

He figured what little needed yet to be done on the ship was more suited to Captain Hink’s and the crew’s expertise.

“Of course.” Cedar motioned with his hand for her to walk with him, and started off down the path that led around the bend in the terrain.

“I’m afraid I haven’t been completely forthcoming with you, Mr. Hunt,” she said. “There was a very specific reason Captain Beaumont brought myself and my companions here through the teeth of a storm.”