Total pages in book: 173
Estimated words: 163328 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 817(@200wpm)___ 653(@250wpm)___ 544(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 163328 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 817(@200wpm)___ 653(@250wpm)___ 544(@300wpm)
If the king’s men found him, they would hang him.
I jumped in to help Jobah, my hands shaking as I shoved the heavy containers. “How many guns?”
“More than we carry. You should hide in the hold with your husband.”
I flung him a glare that would’ve shriveled the testicles on a lesser man.
“Yes, I know. You’d rather hang.” He sighed. “It’s your neck.”
It would be every neck on my crew if I lost command of this ship.
“What are we dealing with?” I heaved another barrel.
“We believe she’s a one-hundred-gun ship of the line.”
“A warship? What the—?”
“That’s confirmed!” Reynolds scrambled down the companionway behind me. “Captain! Topside, now!”
“I’ll finish here.” Jobah gave me a push. “Go.”
My heart rate blew up as I chased Reynolds to the top, scaling ladders, sprinting through passageways, and shouting, “All hands on deck and man the guns!”
“Thirty-two-pounders. I count twenty-eight of them.” Reynolds stood beside me on the upper deck, his knuckles blanching as he passed me the spyglass.
I raised it to my eye and swallowed a gasp. The salt-smeared telescope brought the full-rigged warship into focus. The finest ever built at Woolwich Dockyard, if I were a day old. And she prowled just forty yards to starboard, maneuvering to fire from her broadside.
“Fifty-six demi-cannons and culverins split between the middle and upper gundecks.” My stomach buckled as I continued to scan the armament. “Twelve six-pounders on the quarterdeck.”
“Four more on the forecastle.” A heavy sigh. “We’re outgunned, Captain.”
One hundred guns made to sink galleons in the war against Spain. Hell, the demi-cannons alone boasted enough firepower to blow every vessel west of England out of the water. Including mine.
As I glared through the glass, the warship hummed with organized activity. Lines of uniformed officers gestured and shouted. Seamen ran along the gangways and swarmed the shrouds. Soldiers stood at the stern near a swaying jolly boat, ready to cross at the captain’s command.
They can try.
My gunners were prepared to fire the moment that jolly hit the water with rowers. As long as I breathed, the king’s navy would not board my ship.
But the flutter of fear I’d carried from the bilge was careening into a tumult. Whatever happened in the next few minutes could end my life and the lives of my men. If we fled, the warship would open fire. If we fired first, we would be blown to hell.
Our fate rested in the hands of one man.
High above the belly of His Majesty’s Ship, the navy captain stood at the rail with his lieutenants, watching me through his spyglass as I watched him.
He was easy to identify in his dark blue frock coat and pristine white breeches and hose. Gold embroidery banded the wide cuffs and standing collar and edged the jeweled buttons that glinted down the front closure—all meant to signify wealth and status.
“Who is he and what is he doing in the West Indies?” Heart racing, I lowered the glass and glanced at Reynolds. “That ship was designed for naval tactic. Why isn’t he in the Mediterranean fighting Spain over territories?”
“The war must have ended. If that’s true, he’s here on another mission.”
“Pirate hunter.” I gnashed my teeth and returned to the spyglass.
Fringed with white feathers, the captain’s three-cornered hat matched the blue of his coat. I wished the wind would rip it off his head, so I could analyze his facial features. Was he young? Inexperienced? Just another spoiled, listless aristocrat looking for adventure?
I would love to show him a good time. With a firepot of broken wine bottles, saltpeter, resin, and rotten fish hurled at his rigging. The stink alone would cause the contents of his stomach to empty all over his gold-trimmed finery.
But in my seven years of pirating, I’d never fired upon a British warship. Because I didn’t have a wish for death.
The captain shifted away, ambling to the quarterdeck rail and peering down into the waist of the warship. Hundreds of sailors stopped what they were doing on gangways and shrouds, and every head turned toward him as if awaiting his command.
Gripping the rail with all the power his rank awarded him, he spoke words I couldn’t hear. Long minutes passed. Then all at once, the seamen resumed their tasks.
“I loathe them and everything they represent.” Reynolds glared at the warship. “All those pompous guns, the uniformed soldiers, the elaborate figurehead with a gaping maw of teeth… Like we’re supposed to tremble in fear of the king’s almighty will.”
“Don’t you?”
“Tremble?” He shrugged. “That depends on you. What’s your plan?”
With a final look at the navy captain, I handed off the glass. “I’m going to make his arsehole clench.”
“It’s about time.” Reynolds tossed me a speaking trumpet.
I jumped up onto the gunwale, balancing on the narrow ledge, and raised the funnel-like instrument to my mouth.
“What business do you have in my waters, Captain?” I shouted across the restive waves.