Kate Hoffmann: The Pirate

As she crawled into the bed and pulled the covers up to her chin, she tried to quiet her frenzied thoughts, tried to put all that had transpired out of her mind. She pulled the pillow over her face and practiced a relaxation technique she'd learned in a meditation class. Slowly, she felt herself drifting off, slipping into sleep by degrees.

Sometime in the early morning, just after the sun came up, she woke with a start. Pushing herself up, Meredith looked around the room in confusion. The gentle roar of the waves and the sound of blue jays in the trees told her that the storm had finally passed.

Her muddled mind flashed an image of a man with long dark hair and a perfect profile, dressed like a pirate. Meredith groaned and punched her pillow, then flopped back down. She had dreamed the dream again, only this time, it had seemed so real, so vivid she could recall nearly every detail as if she'd actually lived it.

"Go to sleep, Dorothy," she muttered to herself. "You're back in Kansas, now, safe and sound."

The noonday sun filtered through the lace curtains of the bedroom window. Meredith squinted against the light and yawned. With a soft moan, she stretched, throwing her arm out to the side. But instead of hitting the mattress, her hand came to rest on something hard and warm and very muscular. She turned her head and noticed a man's leg.

Levering herself up, she screamed. A hand clamped over her mouth. "'Tis me, Merrie. Do not be afraid."

She looked up into familiar blue eyes, eyes that she thought she'd seen in a dream, eyes that were ringed with red and filled with exhaustion. He sat on the edge of the bed, facing her, his hair wild and windblown. She swallowed hard and he slowly pulled his hand from her lips, leaving a warm, tingling imprint where he had touched her.

"Griffin?" she whispered. Hesitantly, she reached out and touched his face to be certain he was real.

He stared at her, long and hard, his expression etched with confusion. "I believe you," he said softly. He slowly wrapped his arms around her waist and lowered his head to her lap, then closed his eyes. "I believe you. Now find a way for me to return."

Meredith hesitantly reached out and stroked his hair, hoping to offer some comfort. The long strands slipped through her shaky fingers like fine silk. Her fingertips brushed against his temple and she let them rest there for a moment, enjoying the warmth of his skin, feeling his slow, strong pulse.

"I should have believed you, but I thought…" He paused and drew a ragged breath. "I thought you were mad. And now, I am beginning to believe I am the one who has lost all sense of things."

"I know how you feel," she said as she gently brushed a raven strand from his cheek. "Believe me, I understand. But there is no other explanation." She felt his tension abate, his coiled muscles relax, and she listened as his breathing grew soft and even, calmer.

She hadn't dreamed him. He was real and he was here, caught in a time and place where he didn't belong. Why she believed it all, she didn't really know. She'd taken an incredible leap of faith, believed in a concept that most academicians would find improbable, if not downright impossible.

But she did believe and that was all that really mattered. Somehow, he'd crossed a bridge, turned a corner, opened a door and stepped through. Fate, or destiny, or some force greater than both of them had brought him here, to Ocracoke and to her. And now, a strange man lay in her bed, yet she felt not a trace of insecurity or apprehension.

He wasn't here to seduce her. In fact, she suspected what he was feeling right now was paralyzing fear. He clung to her, his face buried against her stomach as if she was the only familiar thing in this unfamiliar world. Strange, how such a fierce man could suddenly reveal such a vulnerable side of himself. Meredith moved her fingers to his forehead, smoothing the hair away from his brow.

It felt so natural to touch him, as if they'd known each other forever. Yet, she knew that wasn't true. They barely knew each other at all. But they did share an astounding secret and in that, they became unwitting companions, confidants, strangers who had no one else but each other to cling to while they untangled the mysteries of his trip through time.

"Why am I here?" he said.

"I don't know," Meredith replied. She searched her mind for an explanation, any explanation. As she ran the situation around in her mind, a slow, sick feeling gripped her stomach.

Oh, Lord, maybe it wasn't fate that had brought him here. Maybe it was her fault! Meredith sank back into the pillows and stared at the ceiling, unable to untangle what had happened in the past twelve hours. So maybe she did have occasional fantasies about pirates. That certainly didn't mean she'd summoned this man out of his own time and into the twentieth century.

Discounting that explanation, another came quickly to mind. Maybe she'd brought him here for professional reasons, to help with her work on Blackbeard. It seemed more than a coincidence that he was spying on the same man she was studying. The Sullivan Fellowship had become an all-consuming dream, but it was just that, a dream.

Was she really the one who'd caused this man such unhappiness? Had she somehow played God with his life and brought him here for her own selfish reasons?

"I've never seen anything like it," he murmured.

She looked down to find his eyes open and fixed on her face. He pushed up and braced his head on his elbow. His fingers toyed at a button on her nightshirt.

"Wha-what?" she stammered, realizing how close his fingers were to the bare skin above her breasts.

"I'm not sure what it was. It was like a carriage without horses. It moved under its own power. I looked for the sails, but I could not find them."

"It-it's called an automobile," she explained, pushing back a wave of guilt. "It was invented by Henry Ford in 1903. An engine makes it go, but don't ask me how. The internal workings of a car remains a mystery to most people."

"Have you ever ridden in a carriage like this?"

"I own one, but I left it on the mainland when I came here. Most people own their own car. There are some places in this country where there are roads that are six lanes across and cars travel very fast."

"How fast?"

"Seventy miles an hour."

Griffin frowned in disbelief. "Does this not harm a person, traveling at such a speed? Would his limbs not be torn from his body?"

"No," Meredith said. "We have airplanes that travel much-" She paused. There was no reason to tell him more. "Never mind."

He sat up and stared into her eyes. "I don't belong here," he said.

She nodded. "I know."

"I must return and finish what I have started."

"Do you mean Blackbeard?"

"I made a vow on my father's grave that I would avenge his death. Teach robbed me of my father. I plan to make him pay for that crime and all his others."

"How?" Meredith asked.

"I sail on Teach's ship, the Adventure ," Griffin said. "I believe they would call me a spy. I work for Spotswood, the governor of Virginia. Like me, he is determined to bring the pirate down. The contents of the purse are the proof we need to bring action against Teach, to raise a force and capture him. He will be hung for his crimes and I will be there to see it done."

"I-I know a little bit about Blackbeard," Meredith explained, not willing to tell him everything. If her connection to Blackbeard was part of the reason he was here, she couldn't tell him. He'd only blame her. She'd have to find a way to return him to his own time, and then maybe she could tell him about her work. "I teach history at the College of William and Mary. I'm considered an expert in American maritime history."

He frowned. " You teach at William and Mary?"