Page 45 of A Prince Among Pirates
Thankfully, at leastoneof us is competent. I didn’t even see Captain Sharpe get to his feet, but there is a sickening snapping noise, and the guard closest to him crumples to the floor. Sharpesmirks at me, a mischievous gleam in his eye that both terrifies and enthralls me.
The gun on me wheels about towards Sharpe, but he is ready for it. He grabs the barrel and yanks, knocking the Frenchman off balance. I realize I am, once again, being useless, and I thoughtlessly throw myself into the man’s back, grabbing him about the waist to tackle him to the floor.
He loses his grip on his weapon, and as I push myself onto my hands and knees over him, the butt of his gun comes slamming down into his temple.Twice.I grimace at the second blow, but before I have time to get to my feet, Sharpe grabs me by the collar as Renard had and yanks me up.
I’m getting a little sick of being treated like a rag doll.
“Where’d you learn to do that?” he asks, sounding a little too incredulous for my liking.
“They forced me to play rugby at Eton,” I explain, smoothing out my trousers.
“You’re brave, Kitten—I’ll give you that,” he says as he thrusts me towards the door. I hear him toss the Frenchman’s gun to the floor, and as I glance back over my shoulder, I see him scoop up the gun I dropped instead.
The instant I push the door open, a hand darts out from nowhere and grabs a fistful of my hair. I cry out as I am dragged to the deck. Before I can haul myself back up, I am yanked once again to my feet by that hand in my hair. I yelp again and grab for the man’s wrist.
“Can you make up your mind?” I demand.
He turns me, hooking an arm around my throat as he pins me to his chest and drags me back a step. I am left facing Captain Sharpe and Tristan, feeling rather ridiculous.
Sharpe raises my gun to point it at the man holding me. Shit—I probably should have told him it isn’t loaded. “Release him and we won’t shed any more blood,” he says.
It is only then that I realize there is a pool of blood on the deck between us, and an officer lying face down in it. I look away quickly and try to wrench myself free. As I do, I hear the click of the trigger and wince.
“Kitten, you…!”
I don’t hear the rest of what is likely a string of curses from Captain Sharpe, for the man holding me suddenly lurches forward, and we both tumble to the deck. I yell—all right,scream—as I land mere inches from the pooling blood, kicking my legs until the Frenchman is off me.
Then Tristan is pulling me up, and I see that Trevor has tackled the Frenchman from behind. Renard helps Trevor to his feet, then steps forward with a knife in his hand. I realize he is about to kill the man, and I turn away—just in time to see the officer from this morning struggling to stand a few yards away.
He pulls a pistol from inside his uniform jacket, and I turn to shove Tristan just as the shot rings out. Tristan hits the floor hard, but I am frozen in place, heart pounding. I am only distantly aware of Trevor tackling the officer to the deck and hitting him repeatedly in the face as I stare down at the new hole in my shirtsleeve.
“Trevor, let’s go!” Renard yells as he steps past me to haul Tristan to his feet.
Sharpe’s hand clamps around my wrist, and he pulls me towards the stairs to the poop deck. “Trevor,now!” he shouts. The whole ship has surely heard that shot. I glance behind me, relieved to see that Trevor has obeyed and is running towards us.
He follows Sharpe and me up the stairs, where Tristan and Renard are already standing beside the grappling hook and the bloodstain from tonight’s first kill. I want to vomit, but my stomach is so knotted, I can hardly even inhale.
Sharpe releases my wrist as he peeks over the side, down to the skiff. He takes one look at the rope, and then my face, and shakes his head with a silent chuckle. What is it about this man that makes me feel soseen? Even when I don’t want it?
He pushes my pistol into the front of his trousers—damn you, Tydes—and mounts the rope, then hoists me over his shoulder without warning. A second later we are dangling over the ocean, and I fear I might faint from the rush of terror. I grip the back of Sharpe’s jacket as he lowers us, far too fast, down towards the fathomless ocean below. And then I am on my back on the floor of the skiff, panting as my blood rushes and my head spins.
Sharpe is grinning as he takes a seat behind my head, staring down at me. “Well, well—the kitten has claws after all,” he says, and that’s the last thing I hear before, humiliating as it may be to admit, I faint.
Some hours later I wake once again in Captain Sharpe’s bed—but this time my trousers are, blessedly, still on, and the ship is not being blown to smithereens. I slide out from under the bedclothes and smooth the wrinkles in my shirt as best I can. I freeze at the sight of the bullet hole in my left sleeve, and my heart does a strange little skitter as I recall how close Tristan and I were to being shot last night.
I’m still staring at the fraying hole when Captain Sharpe’s smooth baritone startles me from my thoughts.
“You’re awake.”
“Very observant.”
“Are we going to be bitchy now?”
I turn to him. He’s sitting at his desk, leaning back in his chair with booted feet up on the desktop. He has a glass of port in one hand, and his brow is arched as he stares right back at me.
My own brow twitches, but so does the corner of my mouth, and a moment later we are both laughing.
I push thoughts of nearly dying aside and make my way over to his desk in my stocking feet. “How long was I out?”
