Louise Allen - Seduced by the Scoundrel

‘I am,’ Luke said. He returned to his position by the hearth. ‘Mr Dornay—so far as the Governor is concerned—is a poet in search of solitude and inspiration for an epic work. I told him that I am nervous of being isolated from the inhabited islands by storms or fog, so I keep my stock of provisions high, even if that means stockpiling far more than one man could possibly need. And there are thirteen of us and we are most certainly here in secret.’

She stowed away the surname. When it came to a court of law, when she testified against the men who had imprisoned and assaulted her, she would remember every name, every face. If he left her alive. She swallowed the fear until it lay like a cold stone in her stomach. ‘A poet? You?’ He smiled, that cold, unamused smile, but did not answer. ‘When are you going to let me go?’

‘When we are done here.’ Luke pushed himself upright and went to the door. ‘I will leave you before the men eat all of my dinner. I’ll see you at supper time.’

His hand was on the latch when Averil realised she couldn’t deal with the uncertainty any longer. ‘Are you going to kill me?’

Luke turned. ‘If I wanted you dead all I had to do was throw you back or leave you here to die. I don’t kill women.’

‘You rape them, though. You are going to make me share your bed tonight, aren’t you?’ she flung back and then quailed at the anger that showed in every taut line of his face, his clenched fist as it rested on the door jamb. He is going to hit me.

‘You have shared my bed for three nights. Rest,’ he said, his even tone at variance with his expression. ‘And stop panicking.’ The door slammed behind him.

* * *

Luc stalked back to the fire. He wouldn’t be on this damn island with this crew of criminal rabble in the first place if it was not for the attempted rape of a woman. Averil Heydon was frightened and that showed sense: she’d had every reason to be terrified until he took her away from the men. He could admire the fierce way she had stood up to him, but it only made her more of a damn nuisance and a dangerous liability. Thank God he no longer had to nurse her; intimacy with her body was disturbing and he had felt himself becoming interested in her more than was safe or comfortable. Now she was no longer sick and needing him, that weakness would vanish. He did not want to care for anyone ever again.

The crew looked up with wary interest from their food as he approached. Luc dropped down on to the flat rock they had accepted as the captain’s chair and took a platter from the cook’s hand. ‘Good stew, Potts. You all bored?’ They looked it: bored and dangerous. On a ship he would exercise them too hard for them to even think about getting into trouble: gun drill, small arms drill, repairs, sail drill—anything to tire them out. Here they could do nothing that would make a noise and nothing that could be seen from the south or east.

Luc lifted his face to the breeze. ‘Still blowing from the nor’west. That was a rich East Indiaman by all accounts—it’ll be worth beachcombing.’ They watched him sideways, shifting uneasily at the amiable tone of voice, like dogs who expect a kick and get their ears scratched instead. ‘And you get to keep anything you find, so long as you don’t fight over it and you bring me any mermaids.’

Greed and a joke—simple tools, but they worked. The mood lifted and the men began to brag of past finds and speculate on what could be washed up.

‘Ferret, have you got any spare trousers?’

Ferris—known to all as Ferret from his remarkable resemblance to the animal—hoisted his skinny frame up from the horizontal. ‘I ‘ave, Cap’n. Me Sunday best, they are. Brought ‘em along in case we went to church.’

‘Where you would steal the communion plate, no doubt. Are they clean?’

‘They are,’ he said, affronted, his nose twitching. And it might be the truth—there was a rumour that Ferret had been known to take a bath on occasion.

‘Then you’ll lend them to Miss Heydon.’

That provoked a chorus of whistles and guffaws. ‘Miss Heydon, eh! Cor, a mermaid with a name!’

‘Wot she want trousers for, Cap’n?’ Ferret demanded. ‘Don’t need trousers in bed.’

‘When I don’t want her in bed she can get up and make herself useful. She’s had enough time lying about getting over her ducking,’ Luc said. He had not given the men any reason to suppose Averil was unconscious and vulnerable. They had believed he was spending time in her bed, not that he was nursing her. His frequent absences seemed to have increased their admiration for him—or for his stamina. ‘I’ll have that leather waistcoat of yours while you’re at it.’

Ferret got to his feet and scurried off to the motley collection of canvas shelters under the lea of the hill that filled the centre of the island. St Helen’s was less than three-quarters of a mile across at its widest and rough stone structures littered the north-western slopes. Luc supposed they must have been the habitations of some ancient peoples, but he was no antiquarian. Now he was just glad of the shelter they gave to the men on the only flank of St Helen’s that could not be overlooked from Tresco or St Martin’s.

Stew finished, Luc got to his feet, took a small telescope from the pocket of his coat and turned to climb the hill. It took little effort, and he reckoned it was only about a hundred and thirty feet above the sea, but from here he commanded a wide panorama of the waters around the Scillies as well as being able to watch the men without them being aware of it. Beachcombing would keep them busy, but he did not want a knifing over some disputed treasure.

He put his notebook on a flat rock and set himself to log the patterns of movement between the islands, particularly the location of the brigs and the pilot gigs, the thirty-two-foot rowing boats that cut through the water at a speed that left the navy jolly-boat crews gasping. The calculations kept his mind off the woman in the hut below.

With six men on the oars the pilot gigs were said to venture as far afield as Roscoff smuggling, although the Revenue cutters did their best to stop them. They got their name from their legitimate purpose, to row out to incoming ships and drop off the pilots who were essential in this nightmare of rocks and reefs.

The gig he’d been given for this mission lay on the beach below, waiting for the word to launch with six men on the oars and the other seven of them crammed into the remaining space as best they could. Beside it was his own small skiff that he used to give verisimilitude to the story of his lone existence here.

For the men hunting amongst the rocks below him what happened next would bring either death or a pardon for their crimes. For him, if he survived and succeeded in carrying out his orders, it might restore the honour he had lost in following his conscience. Luc shied a pebble down the slope, sending a stonechat fluttering away with a furious alarm call.

Scolding loudly, the little bird resumed its perch on top of a gorse bush. ‘Easy for you to say, mon cher,’ Luc told it, as he narrowed his eyes against the sunlight on the waves. ‘All you have to worry about is the kestrel and his claws.’ Life and death—that was easy. Right and wrong, honour and expediency—now those were harder choices.

Averil sat by the window with the old sack hooked back and studied what she could see through the thick, salt-stained glass. Sloping grass, a band of large pebbles that would be impossible to run on—or even cross quietly—then a fringe of sand that was disappearing under the rising tide.

Beyond, out in the sheltered sound, ships bobbed at anchor. Navy ships. Rescue, if only they were not too far away to hail. She could light a fire—but they knew Luke was here, so they would see nothing out of the ordinary in that. Set fire to the hut? But it was a sturdy stone building, so that wouldn’t work. Signal from the window with a sheet? But first she would have to break the thick glass, then think of something that would attract their attention without alerting her captors.