He kept his eyes on her even though the First Mate dressed to tease and in his arms to torment him did not look at him. She looked past him. Any success he felt fell even as they seemed to glide together. She moved around him like water, always flowing to each of his missteps, always finding the path past any obstacle, always through his arm but never could he really hold her. But Jax would take the feel of her, any that she gave, and for the moment, float.

Float he did.

When she finally looked at him again it was to guide him back to their purpose and reason for being here at all. It was not to dance with him. Jax should remember that. Even as her words trickled over his face he struggled to catch a breath and come up from the pleasures he was drowning in.

They were to spy. He glanced to her face and for the first time since she took his hand he looked past her and around her. They were not the only ones in the fancy hall. Right, he remembered. But he just wasn’t ready to release her. Not just yet. She said she did not know how to sneak and spy, well Jax could say he didn’t know either. But he had always enjoyed a game. This was just another game.

“There is a man standing close to plate of small vegetables. His eyes are curious. He has a beard that seems to me to be close to the skin of a rabbit, grays and tans more like fur than hair. Could it be he spies on the carrots and radishes? He means to take revenge for all his cousins caught unfairly while pursuing tasty treats.” Jax spun her around to view the man he noticed right there munching upon a carrot. He was watching them, well her of course, and when she turned toward him he tipped his head as he put another orange stick into his mouth.

“Or perhaps more of interest is the woman who holds a long silk cord in one hand and a glass in the other. Did I see her dip that cloth into the drink and then pass it over her lips? Could that be a piece of her skirt that she tore from the edge letting her ankles breath this night air? There might be things hidden under her dress that she is about to release. That she is about to feed from her own lips.” He turned them both around so the good doctor playing dress up could see the woman whose skirt was too short drinking with a kerchief dabbing at her mouth. When the woman saw them look at her she lifted her chin and quickly looked away.

“So much to see. So much to spy. All of them hold secrets and believe that they are much cleverer than they truly are.” He let his arm loosen its hold and for the first time since he started this crazy silly talk he looked to her. “Myself included, fair maid.” He stopped his dance and smiled.

Jax did not think he would find out anything more than he already had this night. He played all sorts of games but none of them involved gathering sneaky information of any value. He collected the memories of night flowers and the pictures of sunsets not the purpose of plans of rich pushers and pullers. Let better players play that game, like Ms Greene and the Captain.

If he could add something he would. Not so much for either of them as for the crew mate he had just had the pleasure of dancing with.

Almost as an afterthought before he lost her Jax leaned closer to his First Mate and whispered, “I have one secret myself this night. I am plotting and planning for you to allow me to say, just once, only once, your name. Not the title. Not the sir name, but your familiar name, your first name.”

He watched her eyes trying to judge how offensive he was, or how close to seeing the ice them return. But as he looked he saw someone else close beside them. He smiled again not sure he wanted to know just yet the reaction to his secret or strange tales.

“Ah, lovely Ms Greene." He made a grand gesture and bowed to her. "Thank you so much for the pleasant invitation. Might I introduce to you the most stunning of Night Blooms, Madame Beauchamp?” Jax had to admit he enjoyed his temporary spot between the two woman. So different from the deck of the ship and yet when secrets fell and spies were cast, so much the same.

Antonia whirled around at the sound of that voice, her face lighting with a wide and genuine smile for the helmsman, suddenly sure she had never been so happy to know Jax was close by. The rogue did not break character, the facade of Antoinette Greene firmly in place - and she was content that he did not do so for her, playing along as he had from the very first.

She curtsied low to her "guest," returning his bow with a deft display of grace. The rogue took in the clothing Jax wore, recognizing its origins of course - not that she would ever say a word -

- Though Antonia's mind was quite made up that Thomas, so tall and commanding a figure, wore these clothes far better than his helmsman.

And undergarments, it seemed. Yes, most certainly, undergarments...

"Well, in all fairness? We both know it was that devilish rascal, my Oncle Nathaniel, who secured your place here at this evening's festivities," she replied, all trace of the rogue's Cajun patois erased, replaced by the silken Parisian accent of the gentlewoman Antoinette. "But it is truly good to see you here tonight Monsieur Jax, and you certainly cut quite the dashing figure when not being nearly trampled in the streets of Port Royal."

"And Mademoiselle Beauchamp?"

She took a step back, all the better to take in the stunning loveliness that was the First Mate this night. She took one of Nicolette's hands, as nimble as they were deadly, between both of her own, giving her finger's a friendly squeeze. "It is my pleasure to meet you, and might I say? Your ensemble is breathtaking. You are positively radiant this evening."

Antoinette released Nicolette's hand, smiling widely at the sweet little detail she found so charming. Her own fingers went first to the velvety soft crimson and ivory hothouse roses she had braided into her ebony hair, and then reached upward, as if to brush the lovely wild blooms in the golden woman's long tresses - though she truly touched neither her, nor the night blooms. "Why, even to the flowers in your hair. Such a rarity!"

The gentlewoman turned back to the table for a moment, taking up two crystal goblets of red wine, offering one each to Monsieur Jax and Mademoiselle Beauchamp if they would.

"And touching on matters both rare and unexpected, I have had the pleasure of meeting - and sharing a dance - with your Capitaine Lightfoot already ce soir." The rogue knew there would be no need to expand on the message she received, with perfect clarity, instead adding only, "He speaks quite highly of the skills - and judgment - of you both."

Grey eyes turned toward the direction from which she'd only just come, utterly unable to make out either Thomas or the Commander beyond the voluminous skirts or over the heads of the partygoers.

"As a matter of fact, I have only just left him, talking with my Robert. Oh - pardonnez-moi, you met him only in passing, did you not Monsieur Jax? That would be Commander Robert Murray." Her gazed returned to the magnificent pair before her, wearing a mild smile that deliberately did nothing to hide the flash of confusion, and perhaps a touch of concern in her eyes.

"The officer in charge of the garrison of Fort Charles," she added meaningfully. "This is his home."

Thomas had been walking along with a look of detached interest, one hand clasped behind his back, and the other tending the glass of wine. When Commander Murray spoke however, Thomas could not maintain his guise of indifference. He froze in his tracks, and a bit of wine sloshed across his hand.

Copper eyes burned into the face of Robert Murray, and Thomas’ mouth became a grim line. His mind reeled, wondering at just how this man knew of Antonia being among his crew, and just where the Commander’s inquiry could possibly lead. A final thought ran through his mind, and it brought ice to his veins.

How many others know of Antonia? How can she ever be safe again?

“What game do you play at, Robert?” Thomas said, his voice venomous.

"Isn't that rich?" The Commander could not help but laugh, softly, just under his breath, shaking his head incredulously. "Oh come now Thomas, that was a touch humorous. Just think for a moment on the words you spoke. The game that I am supposedly playing - considering the lady of whom we speak?"

He laughed once more, as if he simply could not stop himself. "I am well aware you think me a stiff, overly-regimented dullard - or perhaps a besotted fool?"

"The latter might be closer to the truth, but no, I am playing no game - or rather not one that would harm a hair on her head. But I see I have made my point, hit my mark." His dark eyes turned meaningfully toward the ruby beads of wine just drying on Thomas' hand before returning to that intent copper gaze with a small, smug smile.

Thomas found no humor in the Commander’s response, and his features did not soften in rejoinder to the man’s assurances and mirth.

“I have never thought you a fool, Robert,” Thomas spat out the Commander’s name, “but what I can assure you is that you are indeed playing a game, and a deadly one at that. No matter your good intentions, if any harm befalls that woman, I will hold you personally responsible.”

Thomas stepped forward and pressed a finger firmly into the Commander’s chest. “If that should occur, old friend or no, I will make it my life’s work to make you suffer. I give you my solemn word.”

Confusion and anger boiled within him, and his jaw clenched with painful tightness. Thomas knew that he had been allowing his emotion to steer his action thus far, and he was now woefully behind the Commander in this exchange. Subterfuge was not his strong suit. Plain speech and direct action was Thomas’ forte, and against a man like Robert Murray, he was not about to stray from that path.

“Speak plainly. One gentleman to another. What is your interest in her, truly?

"Save your threats for a man not in command of the guns of Fort Charles, Thomas," Robert snorted his derision with a sardonic twist of his lips. Some quick riposte about 'gentlemen' flashed through his thoughts, but he let the moment pass. "My interest in her, is only ever her best interest."

"Take a look around you, Thomas. A good, long look... " He held his arms wide, encompassing the immaculate grounds, the grand plantation style home with its sweeping double staircase to the veranda, its immense stables. "I would give her this, to the very last. That is my intent. Can you say the same, Thomas? Can you, or a single 'privateer' in your crew, offer her anything to match the grandeur? The security or the life such a brilliant, magnificent woman deserves?"

"And even if her devotion does not rest with me exactly, not yet, her heart most certainly lies here in Port Royal. Have I been plain enough for you, Captain Lightfoot?"

Thomas veritably shook with rage. It was rage of impotence, and of poignant hatred. For a long moment he could only stand there, his eyes alight like stoked embers, impaled upon the Commander’s words. The apparent truth in the man’s speech, coupled with his abundant and smug confidence dominated Thomas’ mind, and he could not but stare.

Then, slowly, like the graceful dawning of the sun over the horizon, Thomas’ face began to soften. His gaze became confident, and the corners of his mouth curled upward into a smile that was cruel and poised. He removed his finger from the Commander’s chest, and pulled it behind his back to clasp the other.

“Your status is not lost to me, Commander. Your coin, your prestige—I am keenly aware of it all. But…” Thomas cocked his head fractionally to the side, “…perhaps you forget our past? Perhaps you forget how you came to know me? I shall remind you of something that you should fully recognize. You indeed command all the bronze of Fort Charles. You can order me clapped in irons, send me to the gallows, have me rot at the blocks, burn my ship, ad infinitum.

Thomas moved even closer to the Commander, his voice dropping to an even whisper. “But what you forget is that I do not command soldiers, I command pirates, and loyal ones at that. They are not men that fear the roar or your cannon, nor the muskets of your soldiers. They are not deterred by stone walls and the promised vengeance of some monarch from across the line. Honor is not their master. Kill me, cull my existence from this earth, and the last thing you will feel is the blood pooling in your throat as you choke upon it in your bed, lying alone and unloved.”

“For you see,” Thomas said, his voice now hard and icy, “when it comes to her, you will always be found wanting.”

Something dark, feral and eminently dangerous flashed across the Commander's face, contorting those stern features for a single, blazing instant to a mask of wild fury - a visage shadowed in a moment, manacled and caged by years of iron, unrelenting discipline as a dawning realization overcame him.

"You truly do not know, do you Thomas?" he growled with a throaty laugh, shaking his head with unfettered amusement. "You have no idea, why I have no need of a single cannon in my arsenal, no need to sink your precious Skate - not even to have you arrested or executed - to keep her here forever, one fine day to come. Oh, I was only ever vying for a little extra time this past day... "

The Commander's laugh grew, louder and longer, truly jovial now as his dark eyes crinkled at the corners with malevolent merriment, all at the expense of the pirate captain. "How Antonia does love her secrets. Like little else in all the world... " He turned on his heel, his back to Thomas now, waving one hand dismissively over his shoulder without a backward glance.

"Enjoy the party, Thomas!" he called, "The red is truly delicious, but it does stain horribly, splashed about in shaky hands. Perhaps best to stick with the white tonight... "

Thomas stood there, watching the retreating back of the red-coated Commander with all the seething turbulence of an autumn tempest in his veins. His rage and astonishment were a potent elixir, stinging and burning like acid as Thomas struggled to react. It took every ounce of restraint, every vestige of will, to stay his own hand from unsheathing the dagger at his flank, and burying it to the hilt in the Commander’s spine.

There was something strangely comforting in the very idea of such violent and rash action. The feral simplicity of it fed Thomas’ inner pirate like flames stoked by a bellows. For all of this violent pondering, in the end Thomas allowed himself only the riposte of a grim smile and a raised salute of his half-filled glass of red before draining it empty.

With a sharp breath drawn through his teeth as he swallowed the wine, Thomas turned on his heels and began to march towards the closest bar table. Wine was not the vital spirit at this point; it lacked the gravity, the weight, and the potency to accompany the night’s revelations. He needed something stronger to lubricate his thoughts, for at this moment Captain Thomas Lightfoot found himself staring into the face of the worst quandary he had yet known.

He had literally danced his way into a deadly chess match, and against a man he never fathomed would be sitting across the board. Worse yet was that Thomas was playing with his Queen’s intentions revealed, and she was left exposed and vulnerable beneath the obsessed gaze of a king named Robert Murray.

Damn the bastard! Damn that man and his desires!

“Gunfire,” Thomas barked to the servant behind the bar, “and sharply too.”

The young man saw the look upon Thomas’ face, and set to making the traditional drink of the King’s Army without so much as a whisper of pleasantries. In short order Thomas had a tumbler of cold black tea, and a tall shot of rum set before him.

“Here you are, sir.”

Thomas said nothing. He took the rum and dropped the shot glass into the tumbler of tea. In one large gulp he drank the inky black liquid, and thudded the tumbler back upon the bar top. The taste was horrid, and it curled Thomas’ mouth into a scowl, but the liquor had its desired effect. With the Gunfire still burning in his throat, Thomas felt his mind clearing, and the scowl eased off his face. In its place was left the mask of a cool and confident privateer captain that had not a burdensome care in the world.

Time for the next move.

With chin aloft, Thomas set out across the lawn, weaving through the guests on his way to where Antonia, Nicolette, and Jax stood in conversation with Commander Murray. Thomas caught the soldier’s eye as he approached, and he nodded to the Commander. The man nodded back, a slight but unmistakable smile of satisfaction upon his face.

“Good evening,” he said, offering a slight bow and nod to Nicolette and Jax. “What a pleasant night, wouldn’t you all say? I see you have met Commander Murray. Among His Majesty’s finest in the New World, if you appreciate the soldiering type.” He added with an easy chuckle.

Thomas kept his voice light and natural as he teased. It was not the easiest of feats, but he did his best to channel Antonia’s roguish essence.

“Though I’m no angler,” Thomas continued with a smile, “I should say that it would be a fine evening for catching silverfish wouldn’t you all agree?”

She always imagined it differently. She had played over the scene in her head over and over so many times over the years. In each of them she was triumphant, in each of them she was in control. Though she had a million scenarios she had played out to varying levels of satisfaction she had never in her wildest dreams played out the one that came to her without thinking, the one that came to her naturally. Much to her shame.

She was standing besides Jax, disarmed, enchanted by his whispers and the way the breath danced across her skin. Delighted by his ferreting out of secret tales and imaginings about their fellow guests. Disarmed and open, that seemed to be Monsieur Jax’s effect on her though she would not admit to being open. He spoke of her name, of his want to say it only once and though it thrilled her in ways she couldn’t have predicted, it saddened her too. Just once, only once. He only wanted it, her, once.

Before she could reply their missing crewmate arrived in a swirl of skirts and scents that made Nicolette dizzy with remembering. She had been that form before, skirted and corseted, polished and pretty. A flower to be plucked. Though she knew the lookout was much more than that it was still hard to focus, to form the proper words of response. Words that should have been second nature. But that Nicki was dead, long gone. Nicki was terrible at this spying business as she had so clearly said.

Then the Captain came and he spoke as well adding to the play she must find a part in. He able and skilled in this dance of words and entendres and she felt lost and superfluous and absurd all at once. She closed her eyes, pulling herself together, trying unsuccessfully, to close herself off. Her lashes cast a deep arc of shadow across her face in the candlelight of the room, but the shadows were not enough to hide the letter carved into her flesh, the unmistakable word written to tell all of what she was. She hadn’t forgotten, Jax certainly had read it right.

Despite her efforts she was still open when she opened her eyes. Open and mistaken in her orientation. She had thought she was turning to face the Captain but she had misjudged. Beyond his shoulder stood the man of the house, Commander Robert Murry. She knew him from out and about though not personally. She had seen him but never spoken with him and understood the connection with the skate and the friendship, or something like it, that had been between him and the Captain.

But it was the man approaching to his right that drew her eyes and made them widen in mute horror and fear. This was where she failed, this was where all that she had imagined the scene would be, all that she had pictured flew right out the window.

He was tall and softening to paunch though by no means was he fully soft, with a large blade of a nose and small black eyes that glittered like obsidian and were just as hard, just as sharp. He wore the dress uniform of a French Naval officer like it was a second skin. He inclined his head to speak to Commander Murry and his eyes caught sight of her but a moment after she had seen him. He froze, his expression did not change though his eyes hardened as they swept over her, condemnation in them as they took her in.

Blind fear filled her, animal fear that took her over to such a degree that she couldn’t have imagined it. In all her pretend scenarios she had, she’d never even considered this one. She made a quiet choking sound as all color paled from her face leaving the letter a stark lurid red in her whey-colored flesh. Then without conscious thought, she ran.

Into the night with a thousand demons chasing her, touching her, hurting her and humiliating her. She relived the whole thing as she ran as real as when it happened. The nightmare called up by all the fractures to her control that she’d been enduring and begun by the sight of that face. The face that had watched and seen it all, the face of the man who had commanded for it to happen.

Capitaine Rene Pouteau had won, again.

He stood among the finer players, more comfortable than Jax in their suites and silks. He had never had any desire to stand among Commanders. There were reasons, oh long lists of them, why Jax ran for any type or military service. He liked a good Captain but despised Commanders. The ones stomping right up were no exception. He had no real clue why anyone from their crew would pretend to be on this man’s arm, Commander MuffenMurray. Surely there were other ways to play this game. But then Jax didn’t pretend to know. He grinned to the Captain, “Lots of fish to catch this night.” Then back to the others.

“Is it the cool evening temperatures or the fragrances out tonight,” Jax flashed his most brilliant of smiles. “that have loosen tongues and let things not to be heard drift over the floor?” Jax shrugged. “I have good ears.” If he were to spy might as well pretend he did. He looked directly to the two dressed up men of Kings far away. His eyes pretend they knew something even when they did not. Then he turned his look to Captain.

But he lost any part of his game when to his shock the flower of his night turned and left, quickly, ran actually from all of them. Jax didn't mean to turn and watch her go, but he did. Was she that done with him already? She didn’t like his games? It didn't seems so to him. It was something else. He spun quickly back to the others and laughed.

“Oh now I have done it!” He let his head fall as he laughed. “I made the mistake of challenging her and she does so like to win.” He opened his arms up as he took a step away from them all. “And she does so, way too often. It’s a game.” Realizing he might be stepping all over his own feet he reached toward the lovely Ms Greene and tapped her shoulder, “Next game you will be it.” He chuckled. gave her a wink, and then spun around.

He would follow. Hell, he was done with this place anyway. Too many soldiers, too many smile that had no depth at all, too much lifted noses and high chins that never looked at the ground or people they trampled on. He had his dance. He could be done. Besdies the best part was leaving.

So he managed to weave through the room following where he thought she had gone. He wasn’t sure she would want him chasing after her. This was not some rescue, or some fool on a horse trying to save anyone. He was sure when he found her, if he did, he would just walk behind her and let her alone. He should let her alone. Damn if she would just do the same inside his head. Why was he even looking for her?

Or maybe she was his excuse to leave. Yea, that’s what he will tell himself.

It didn’t matter when he saw the back side of her exiting Night Blooms he hurried to follow. “I got your back!” he called in an almost sing song sort of call. The slap of her backhand, the coldness of her back shoulders, the retreating back curses he was sure she was mumbling. Still he got closer and he followed.

That perfectly placid expression on her exquisite face changed not an iota, no more nor less than sweetly content - or perhaps just a touch pleasantly confused - as Capitaine Lightfoot spoke of catching silverfish this night. How quaintly these strange folk talked here in Port Royal, but the well-traveled Antoinette was equal to it all of course, with all the aplomb worthy of a gentlewoman.

But the rogue's stomach flipped, likely only kept in its proper place by this ridiculously tight corset. Oh, she suspected the private conversation between Robert and Thomas did not bode well, but she had no idea the matter would turn so dire, so quickly. She took an overlong sip of her wine, all the better to wet her suddenly dry tongue. Oh, she'd gotten Thomas' message, loud and clear yet again. But damn it all - this entire venture was going straight to hell -

And then it took a turn straight to the lowest circle of the Abyss, or perhaps one lower than even Dante could have envisioned? Antonia watched, stunned and not even bothering to hide that fact, as Nicolette bolted from their small gathering, wide-eyed and terrified, without a word for a single one of them. Jax, being perpetually Jax-like of course, made some small jest, tapping her shoulder lightly as if to invite her to a game of tag one fine, future day. But there was no hiding the confusion in his eyes either, and the rogue could read the bewilderment on his face writ large as he turned to follow.

Antonia could spare only a helpless glance to Thomas, the slightest shake of her head to tell him she hadn't the least idea what could have possibly sent Nicolette running, as if she had the very hounds of Hell at her heels. But the Commander had been in the process of greeting a newcomer to their party, and the rogue forced the masque of Antoinette to return her attentions to the man whose company she was meant to be engaging this night.

"Captain Poutreau, so glad you could make it tonight... " The British officer's voice trailed off as he too followed Nicolette's flight, and the helmsman's chase.

"Well, that was... Unexpected."

Commander Murray smiled mildly, no more than an upward tilt of a single corner of his mouth. His dark gaze turning toward Thomas with a sardonic little tilt of his head. "Well, I imagine we should not lose all sense of propriety - that simply would not do. Captain Rene Poutreau, this enchanting lady on my arm is Miss Antoinette Greene; and the gentleman here would be Captain Thomas Lightfoot, a very old and dear friend of mine."

"Remind me again Thomas, what was it we were only just discussing? Your 'privateer' crew... Wait! It will come to me... Loyal, yes? Fearing neither the roar of a cannon, nor the musket of a soldier and... And... Undeterred by stone walls and royal anger? That was a more-or-less perfect paraphrase, was it not?"

He chuckled warmly, shaking his head. "So tell me Captain Lightfoot, what was it that just sent your First Mate to flight? The wine? Sugar plums and petit fours? Oh! I have it! The flower arrangements!"

It was all Antonia could do to titter politely, as if she had not the least idea what joke was being made, but was simply too polite not to at least seem amused. All she could do indeed, to keep her arm entwined in the Commander's without snapping it up behind her dear Robert's back, and burying one of her innumerable hidden blades to the hilt in his neck.

Or in the swarthy French Naval captain. A slow, ugly suspicion was dawning on Antonia, the rogue who heard much, the spider who listened far, far more than she ever spoke.

"First Mate?" Capitaine Poutreau's eyes followed after la putain with a grim smile and an incredulous shake of his head. His thickly accented English fairly dripped with contempt, though the smarmy grin never left his thin lips. "You monsieur, made a woman your First Mate?" The Frenchman snorted his derision with a laugh.

"Did no one ever tell you, that women have no place aboard a proper ship? What manner of vessel do you captain then, that should take on such... Such... Baggage?"

Thomas watched the retreating figures of the First Mate and Jax with a look upon his face of grim befuddlement. He caught Antonia’s slight look of defeat in the matter, and Thomas’ reply came without so much as a rise of his brow. If Antonia didn’t have a clue as to the cause of Nicolette’s flight, than Thomas certainly hadn’t the slightest idea.

The Commander’s introduction of the Frenchman called Thomas’ attention from his vanished crewmates, and back to his figurative chess match. With a smile lifted with wires of disdain, Thomas shook Captain Poutreau’s hand as the Commander presented him. He found the Frenchman’s grasp to be clammy and paltry—a decidedly French grip that reminded Thomas of a newt or gecko clutching at his hand.

As the Commander continued on, edifying the small group of their recent exchange, Thomas found himself chuckling in return.

“You are indeed correct, my friend. I was speaking of my crew’s loyalty and fortitude just scant moments ago, and I adhere to the notion still. But, let us be frank,” Thomas said opening his hands to the Frenchman and the Commander alike, “French, er, shall we say…puanteur, can overwhelm even the most hardened of noses, don’t you agree?”

Thomas aimed the sweet smile that now crossed his cheeks fully to Captain Poutreau. The mention of his having women amongst his crew, and all the insinuations that accompanied it, did not sting Thomas’ ego in the least. Though, the fact that this French toad of a man would deign himself worthy of comment upon Thomas’ crew, conjured up the urge to choke the man with the ebony ends of his own wig.

“Ah, my dear Captain,” Thomas replied, “it is indeed an odd thing for the master of a ship to be seconded by a woman, that much I wholly understand. Why, it has brought me to a level of gossip in the town that I simply never fathomed!”

Thomas began fanning himself theatrically with his hand, acting as if the very notion of his ship being the brunt of Port Royal’s social commentary as utterly exhausting. After several short puffs of breath, Thomas took a languid step closer to the Frenchman.

“In my case, however, I must confess that the arrangement is quite liberating. You see, it is so very tedious coveting the loins of the officer beneath you…” Thomas paused to giggle tremulously, “…I mean my last Second was such a strapping young lad, I could not but stare and dream all the hours of the day. Almost ran my poor ship aground I did! Oh it was so very unprofessional, and horrid for business.”

Another step brought Thomas decidedly too close for societal acceptance with the Frenchman. He looked into the man’s eyes for a long moment before slowly shifting the strange and starry gaze to the Commander.

“Old friends, Robert? You would describe us that way, wouldn’t you?” Thomas took a step back, much to the conspicuous relief of the completely unnerved Captain Poutreau. He ‘tsked tsked’ towards the Commander, shifting his expression to one of longing and remembrance.

“I suppose it was foolish to expect more from such a high born man. I am not but a common sea cur, a social pariah when compared to such an illustrious gentleman.” Thomas emphasized his words with a light wave of his hand, indicating the entirety of the Commander’s rigid body.

Thomas dropped his voice to a whisper, though one loud enough for all in the group to plainly hear. He lifted his eyes to the Commander, pursing his lips with an effeminate snort of his nose.

“Well, no matter now, we’ll always have that night in Saint Kitts, won’t we Robert?”

Phantom hands grabbed her, tugging at her, pulling her clothing from her as she buffeted around. No, that wasn’t real, that wasn’t what was happening. But the voices cackling at her, the jeers the cat calls felt real enough, so real her rational mind was almost convinced. But she wasn’t back on that ship, fighting off the hands of men she had served beside for years, men who had called her brother and sworn drunken oaths to always have each other’s backs. Men who turned on her when it was discovered it was sister not brother they should be calling her. Not men, sheep. They followed their commander’s orders lest they join in her punishment. That some had eyes wet with tears and apologies as they violated her mattered little.

But that wasn’t happening again, part of the screamed at her. These are memories, not reality. But the hands of the party guests she jostled in her haste to get out were real and in her maddened state the real touch simply reinforced the terror of the memories that were drowning her. She heard a voice call out behind her,

“I got your back.” It called, the words so like the one’s her shipmates had shouted back to her that she felt her terror rising up inside her like the swell of a wave, pushing itself out of her mouth. She put her hands over her mouth, clamping her lips shut and keeping in the scream that wanted to rip from her. No, she wouldn’t scream, not for him, never.

He won. He had won again but she wouldn’t scream for him.

Finally she was out of the press of bodies. Away from the finely dressed guests, or was it that she’d made her way off the ship, with its all too eager men? It hardly mattered. She was out in the cooler air and that was real enough. She stumbled to a stop and sucked in a deep breath of the cool air, sucking in the scream in the process. She took that scream and jammed it deep inside her with so many other screams she would not loose. She whimpered, but it wasn’t a scream so that was as close to victory as she would get this night.

Still not quite seeing she stumbled blindly into the night, needing to get away. She was broken, there was no doubt about that. She had been broken for so long that she forgot what it truly felt like to be whole. The closest she got was when she smoothed out all the jagged edges of herself, lining them up so that she presented a smooth, unblemished face to the world. The pressure of her control was all that kept the jagged shards lined up and when her control slipped, she shattered and anyone nearby was sliced and cut by all the sharp ends of her.

She found she had stopped and wasn’t certain when. The cold stone of a bench under her bottom when she came back to herself. She blinked her eyes slowly, they felt raw and swollen with tears. As they came into focus, blinking off the last few flashes of leering faces as she shrugged off the last few phantom touches and pinches she saw what lay before her, a small pond, man-made but pretty and floating on the surface were the red and pink and creamy white of night blooms.

The sight of them stabbed at her and her weeping began anew, not raw and ragged and terrified this time. The tone of her tears turned to that of infinite sadness as she realized just what it was she had lost. She couldn’t go back, not after this. She’d made a spectacle of herself. The slip up with the Captain in her cabin was nothing compared to this. She pulled her feet up onto the bench and with arms wrapped around her knees she let her tears come.

All the rogue really wanted to do in that moment - well, besides run after Jax and Nicolette, to either confirm or dispel her ugly suspicions - was burst into loud, raucous laughter.

Oh Thomas... Dear sweet, merciful heavens above but her lovely man was, quite simply, mad. Stark raving out-of-his-mind, but of course only in the very best way. Only her unshakeable, professional discipline kept the facade of Antoinette in place as she watched Thomas mince so prettily about the suddenly revolting Capitaine Poutreau, and then the Commander. Oh yes, the rogue was undeniably entertained! As far as she was concerned, her lovely man might have gone on and on with his little act - the horrified visages of both targets for Thomas' erstwhile attentions were eminently delightful.

On and on indeed, but for the fact she was not here tonight to be amused. Antonia had a job to do, and apparently she was making quite the hash of it thus far. To hell with the stylish hair, the resplendent jewels, the elegant gowns and the haughty airs that were the very lifeblood of the backwater 'aristocracy' of Port Royal. Not a jot of this mattered - not a single thing she had accomplished this past day - if the information she gleaned from the Plume's hapless captain had been compromised, or if Commander Murray somehow suddenly deserved some of her more brazenly roguish attentions.

And no matter her suspicions, she honestly had nothing to pin them on when it came to Nicolette's sudden break from their company. For the first time in some years, Antonia found herself at a complete loss - and she enjoyed this feeling not at all. She felt very much like a spider knocked from her web, without a grasp on those precious thrumming threads she so desperately needed to make sense of her world.

She needed an out as well, a breather, almost as desperately as it seemed the First Mate did.

It was the gentlewoman's tremulous hand that clapped to her mouth, those matchless grey eyes wide, horrified and brimming with glistening tears that had yet to fall as her gaze darted between Captain Lightfoot and her beloved Commander Murray.

"Saint Kitts?" she finally managed, shaking her head as if by this act she might somehow erase the words she had only just heard. "Robert? Is this... This man saying what I think he is saying?"

Her full, rose petal pink lower lip quivered with emotion as she peered up into those dark, thunderstruck eyes. "My father might be an Englishman, but in my heart of hearts, I am a Frenchwoman!" she began to wail, softly at first though her voice began to raise precipitously toward a heartbroken croak.

"And I will thank you, pretty man, to remember we French do not all carry a puanteur!" she hissed at Thomas, wagging her finger at him furiously before she turned on the Commander again.

"But being French, well... There may have been something we might have worked out together Robert, if you had only been up front with me from the start! Your bon ami certainly is lovely enough - we might have shared, or come to some mutually pleasing arrangement? A night with me, a night with your pretty man - communal weekends, perhaps? Why, we French are certainly not so bound by your silly English Puritanical notions as all that!"

"But to discover such a thing here, like this? That you would keep this from me? The humiliation, Robert!" Mortified tears began to course down her cheeks - a rather nice touch really, Antonia thought with some small satisfaction.

"You just keep your pretty Thomas then, and your... Your... Your nights in Saint Kitts as well, you duplicitous man!" The gentlewoman's hand shot out, delivering a stinging, openhanded slap across the Commander's cheek.

And with no further ado, Antonia turned on her heel to dart through the thronging guests, using every last grace in her impressive arsenal of shadowy moves to lose herself in the ball-goers and guests and servants. She bolted past the golden lights of the torches on the periphery, and made for the deepest gloom of the surrounding forest.

There had only ever been one man in all the world, after all, who could find Antonia when she went to hiding, and she desperately needed to speak with her beloved Captain Silverfish - almost as much as she needed her next breath.

Jax was sure the First Mate Doctor would run, stomp, escape back to her cabin. She could hide there just fine and has done so before. This was different, even Jax could tell, but he knew her room held parts of her in the books, in the clean space or privacy most at sea do not have. So he was surprised, well, shocked really when she didn't head in that direction. It was true her fast pace was a bit more panicked and distressed than her usually cold exit. Much different than they way she stomped away from him last time at the pond. With a forced walk as close to a run he ever saw a woman make, she was out of town before he ever realized. But then the path became obvious to him.

Night Blooms. They tuck closed for so long. He wondered if they could feel or sense the other flowers around them opening.

She was sitting there and her body changed. But Jax was not sure what that meant. He stood behind her. Now this was the hard part. What should he do? She came here, to the spot he shared with her. To the place he found comfort and wanted to show her, the beauty, the peace, the place where the rest of the bustle doesn’t notice so much. No Commanders here. But he wasn’t sure she wanted him either.

Night Blooms don't open that often. Many miss the flower.

Maybe something he did or said made her run. He could accept that. But here? Why would she run from him to this pond? Forget it Jax, he scolded himself. There was no way he would understand her. Since when did he want to figure out what anyone else thought? No, that was not something Jax had a very good handle on at all. It was all about what he felt. His gut mattered. And right now it was saying sit beside her.

Hell, he couldn't make things much worse, could he?

So Jax slowly moved to sit right beside the First Mate, whose name she still had not given him permission to use. He tried not to startle her making it seem like it was natural and expected that he would be there. He didn’t look to her as she was so tight in her own little ball. He looked toward the flowers as they spread over the pond fully opened to the night sky.

Sometimes just sitting by beauty was enough.

Jax put his arm around her not to hug her tenderly or crease her shoulder. It was the hang of an offered friendship arm, an attempt of understanding. He wanted to tell her it was all right. She could let go of anything here. It stays here. He has her back. But he wasn’t sure how she would take any of his silly attempts to do more than just sit with the scent of flowers and the light of the stars. If she looked to him, he knew he would smile.

She was doing everything wrong this night. Everything. Why not something more?

She wasn’t certain when she grew aware of his presence or the weight of his arm around her shoulder. She sobbed for so long that time felt meaningless. She felt as if her body had poured out every tear it ever could make and still she cried more. Her mouth was a desert from all that she had cried and her throat was raw. She was certain he had been there for a long time before she noticed, too lost in living her nightmares while awake, too deep into self-flagellation that left her bleeding and raw emotionally to notice him. He’d said nothing. Why?

So why not compound the mistakes then? Why not speak to this grinning man who would surely mock her for her faults. She had many and she deserved it. She wanted to bleed and so she opened herself up to him, turning her face to his like the night bloom turned to the moon. Her face was certainly red enough to match the blooms. As she unfurled herself from the tight knot, never letting his arm be jostled off of her shoulders, the blood on her arms was revealed. Dark strips on the cuffs of her shirt, peeking past the dusky rose of her jacket, matching half-moons of blood rimmed her nails revealing how past good sense she was as she’d scratched at her flesh.

Even then as she looked up at him with red-rimmed eyes she didn’t seem to notice the ragged flesh she’d left behind.

“I’m broken.” She said her honeyed voice raw and ragged, almost painful to hear in its contrast to her normal register. “I’m broken and I cannot be fixed. I thought I could be, I thought I could hold myself together and hide the broken edges but I can’t.”

A little whimper slipped from her and yet another tear fell over her ruined cheek. She pushed her hand against her mouth as if trying to push back in the despair that was choking her words. She dropped her eyes to the pond and its lovely burden but she did not see it. She saw nothing but her own flaws, blown up to gargantuan proportions.

“In my dreams I knew how I would be when I saw him again. I knew that I would be brave, I would be defiant. I would show him that he did not break me. But I didn’t do any of that.”

She looked back to Jax, her eyes so full of blackness and loss and madness that there seemed to be almost no blue.

“I ran.” She said and it rang out like a nail being driven into a coffin. Final and done. “I ran and I showed him all the ways he had hurt me. I showed him that his lessons worked. I let him break me, again and this time all he had to do was be there and I crumbled.”

At her waist her hands were moving again, unconsciously. The nails seeking out softness as if she could pierce her skin and let out some of the pain that was building up inside her.

Jax had no clue what she was talking about. He figured it didn’t matter much. He pulled his arm from off her shoulder and took each of his hands to hold her wrists. She wasn’t going to rip that beautiful skin of hers in front of him. He pressed her arms into her lap.

“Broken?” he snicker slightly, “Damn, you are the most interesting exciting hot mess I have ever seen.” He turned his head so he could really look at her eyes and he kept her hands still in her lap. “And have you looked around lately? The whole fucking ship is a pile of broken pieces. Think there might be a reason we all ended up there. Cause each of us stumbled in only part of what we were or should be.”

Jax stopped not sure any of that mattered so much. “Whatever it is whoever it was. Fuck ‘em. You did win. You are a smart talented woman in a place you have no right to be only because you got more balls than all of us wimps piled together.” Did he say that right? Well, too late to worry about that. He thought about trying to back step and maybe softening that, but, hell, he was broken too.

He did think about how just yesterday he entertained ideas of getting the curse of the woman, both of them. off the ship. Now he spun completely around and he wanted them there? This broken shit was catching. But he did want her there. She was a good first mate even if she fucked him up a bit. He wanted her there.

“Listen,” He took a breath, “I have sailed on too many ships. I jump one to the next because I can and I get tired of the ones that don’t work well for all different reason. I am broken. But this one sails like a baby because the workings are good. That’s you. That’s the Captain. You two ride the waters better than most. You are not broken as a first mate. You’re damn good. He didn't win nothing.” Well, of course Jax had no idea if that was true but this was a pep talk and truth hardly mattered. No, that was wrong, it did. Yet Jax was pretty sure whoever, whatever, didn't win shit.

He paused and let the pressure on her wrist slighten a bit. “And you dress up real fine.” He smiled with a small chuckle, “Dance good too. Broken? Fuck, give us broken over those dressed up dogs in heat any day.”

She didn’t struggle against his grip on her wrists, in truth she had been unaware of her own desperate clawing. It had just been one more pain in an ocean of pain and it’s cessation didn’t reach her nearly so well as his words.

That wasn’t to say his words made full sense to her, but they made her pause. They made her stop in her self-flagellation to try to follow them. His tone was not mocking, at least not toward her and that more than anything made her cock her head to the side, a strange bird like gesture to make the fine curve of her ear more a bowl that could catch and hold the words before they spilled out. The words they caught were simple and somehow profound.

She had balls.

She had balls, big ones. The thought made her giggle just a little and if the giggles had more than a little madness in them it wasn’t unwarranted. The tears that still fell trembled on her lashes danced to the rhythm of her giggles before spilling sideways down her cheeks.

He was right, even in her crazed state, aching and a “hot mess” she had to see the truth of parts of what he said. She was a good first mate, she knew her work and excelled at it. She was an even better doctor. And she had balls. She would take in the rest of his words and consider them when she was more whole. Perhaps more truth could be found in them. He was a surprising man after all, stranger things had happened.

She giggled again and slipping her injured hands out from his slackened grasp she twined them around his neck and allowed herself a quick embrace from the maddening man whose words made a strange sort of sense. She was broken, but so were they all. She just needed to line her pieces up again and all would be well. She no longer felt like her best answers lay down a long dark barrel. She did not feel the need to see if she was brave enough to pull the trigger.

She had balls, what need had she for an easy way out?

Moreover she had no cause to see the man who had broken her again, she would stay on the Skate until they left port. It was as simple as that. She stood, loosely twining her fingers with his and pulling him with her.

“You should come with me. We will get bottles of whatever you like, we will go to my cabin and I will read to you and you will read to me while we get so drunk the words dance even better than those dressed up dogs in heat we just left. And when those words are good and dancing I will maybe show you my balls.”

Commander Murray fumed. The set of his jaw accentuated the fiery light that shone in his eyes, eyes that were affixed upon Captain Thomas Lightfoot. As Antonia played out her masterful charade, the Commander kept his mouth tightly closed. When she turned and disappeared into the crowd, he did not give chase. With a tug at his red sleeves, a lift of his chin, and an incredulous wave of his hand, the Commander dismissed the Frenchmen, Poutreau.

The French officer had been standing rigidly by, utter dismay and embarrassment etched upon his face as he witnessed the Commander’s humiliation. It was much to the man’s relief when the Commander shooed him off, and Poutreau left on swift feet, heading intently towards the nearest supply of wine.

Unlike the other men, Thomas had bowed with an embellished air of apology to the offended Antoinette as she verbally assailed the Commander, and then hurried away in a flourish of skirts. The pirate watched her go, taking keen interest in the direction of her departure. Though he had no doubt that Antonia wished him to eventually follow and meet her, even when she wanted to be found the rogue could be inadvertently too good at her craft. Through the crowd, Thomas thought he caught a glimpse of Antonia’s silhouette vanishing into the gloom of the nearby forest, and he marked the spot in his mind.

“You will regret this, Thomas,” said the Commander. His voice was low, but as steely and hard as cannon bronze.

Thomas stood fully from his bow, and turned back to face his ‘old friend.’

“You have made an enemy of me when I needn’t have been. I only ever wanted her to myself, she deserves as much. But now…” the Commander stepped forward, and Thomas could plainly see the enraged quiver of the man’s flesh. “…Now this is a matter of honor and of pride. Words that mean nothing to a dog such as yourself. Trust me when I say that there will be hell to pay, Thomas. And you will bear the burden of it all.”

For a long moment Thomas regarded the Commander in silence. He wanted to retort, to spit his own threats into the face of the British gentleman, but he refrained. The thought of chess came once again into his mind, and he reminded himself that he was not playing only for his own life. He had the distinct feeling that the match was only just developing, and that the culmination was still frustratingly distant.

In the end, Thomas only nodded. It was a move of simple acknowledgement, one man stating his acquiescence to the reality of things, and his intent to play along. Thomas turned to leave, but not before looking over his shoulder one last time.

“I shall look for you on the field.”

With that, Thomas shuffled away into the press of party-goers. For a time he could feel the Commander’s gaze boring into his back, until he became truly lost amongst the crowd.

Though it took him much longer than Antonia, Thomas wove his way through the party, intent on avoiding detection as he moved ever closer towards the tree line where he had last glimpse his rogue. After almost a quarter-hour of meandering, Thomas at last found himself amidst the cover of mangrove and lemon trees.

Into the darkness he peered. If Antonia was there, he could not see her.

“Antonia?” He whispered.

Oohhh..did Jax have to control himself. First she put her arms around him. He wanted so badly to take hold of her. Really wrap his arms around her even tighter than he had at the dance. He wanted to push his face in her hair and his lips on her neck. Damn, he wanted that. But he didn't want her to stop giggling either. And for one of the few times, or were there more and more of them lately, he fought all of those feeling he had and thought with his head. This wasn’t about what he wanted. This was more. This about being with her and not fucking things up. He knew as much as he wanted to kiss her he didn’t want her cold eyes back. This was not the time to answer his needs but instead think of her. She thinks she is broken. As low as he was, and Jax thought he was, he couldn’t take advantage of that low point even if he wanted to. The real reason why was because he liked her. He really liked her. He cared about what she thought of him. How dangerous was that?

Oh boy, talk about broken, Jax was sure when this was said and done he would be in pieces.

But, right now, after he managed not to push against her and kiss her, he was having a good time. And she just added more.

“Books and booze!” He stood up quickly afraid if he sat there he would give in to his desires. “Brilliant!” He stood in his most dramatic stand with one arm out to his front like those poets and actors do and one hand over his heart. Jax cleared his throat and in a low loud voice he recited:

How he heard the ancient helmsman
Chant a song so wild and clear,
That the sailing sea-bird slowly
Poised upon the mast to hear,

Till his soul was full of longing,
And he cried, with impulse strong,—
“Helmsman! for the love of heaven,
Teach me, too, that wondrous song!”*

He let the feeling wash over him. Then he turned to Nicki and smiled reaching for her hand. He hadn’t meant to show her that but then, he was doing so many things he didn’t think he would or should. To cover his doubt he grinned and pulled her up off the seat.

When he wasn’t sure he often spoke, “And balls? You tease me unmercifully.” He had to keep control. It was the showing part that shook his resolve. Here in the night scent she should not offer that to him. She shouldn’t be here in the moonlight with the Night Blooms. Not with him. Not with flashes of poetry and promises of books. He wanted to keep her with him but he knew he better lighten his own arousal or he would mess up what he wanted even more. So he tied to spin her off the seat like a dance and then turn to leave toward the promise, books, booze, and balls. Away from the scent of the flowers and the lure of her arms.

“And though I know, as broken as you say, you are not a gambler, or a very good one.” He had to ramble on because his mouth still wanted to kiss her and if he yarmer maybe he wouldn’t. “Protest as you wish, I played that card game.” He teased her with a smile that felt natural. “I like a wager or two. So I will bet you one silver coin you will slur your speech before I.”

He laughed and while walking holding her hand still he had to add, “I am good with my mouth.” My kisses he so wanted to add but Jax was full of control. He used his other hand to point into his opened mouth and with a mumble, because he kept his mouth open as he spoke, “Cause, my feets have been in their many times.”

* "The Secret of the Sea” by
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (from Seaside and Fireside, 1850)

When he opened his mouth and poetry fell out she was transfixed. Freezing in place like a moonlit statue as a host of memories flooded her. Bare skin, slow breath as ink was applied slowly, lovingly across her skin, preceded by kisses that made her burn.

“Your body is poetry love, I am making the outside match the inside.”

A brush, not a needle, she was too squeamish for the latter, but the black characters that had been writ on her skin temporarily in ink had been indelibly etched on her heart. Or so she thought. But then why this flutter? Why this freeze when poetry tripped out of the mouth of a man as like to mock as to praise?

She did not understand him, not even a little. Perhaps that was it.

She blinked slowly, coming back into herself and finding that the broken bits of her very much wanted to smile. So she permitted it, a crooked, sad smile but one that reached her eyes and burned off some of the remaining madness. She could drink, she had learned more than just doctoring and sailoring in the Navy after all. He would learn this and his purse would be the lighter for it, or hers would. It hardly mattered.

“I will take your bet Monsieur Jax and I will have your silver come morning.”

She slipped her arm through his, like they had at the dance and they walked back up the path towards the town.

“Now what shall we read first and what shall we drink? I have a little of everything in print, but not much in the way of drink. We will need to stop and fix that.”

They discussed options for drink and options for books while they walked, pairing them with all the care of a master sommelier. For certain he was mad to pair rum with navigation treatises. Rum certainly went better with some anthropological works. She wondered sometimes if he was contrary just to see her flush and fluster and tried her best to do neither. But then she wondered if he kept at it because watching her simmer and struggle to hold herself under control amused him just as much? This was likely and she could find her way to do neither and suffered greatly for it, but it was the sort of suffering that was almost as pleasant as it wasn’t and she could think of no way to end it short of leaving his company and she was loathe to do that.

Regardless they made it to the ship, arms full of a collection of bottles bought seemingly at random and several were opened and more than half gone. They had lost one along the way and though there had been mourning for its loss, life was about the living after all, ink indelibly etched on her heart or not.

As they were hailed by the crewman on duty she paused and looked at him, her eyes open and vulnerable.

“I cannot be broken here. I cannot be less than what I play at.” She nodded, pleading with him to understand as she closed her eyes and let the mask slip back into place, her eyes when they opened were all ice. She hoped he understood that it was just for a moment, just until they were alone, safe with print and drink.

"Maybe?"

Strong, knowing hands snaked around the waist of Thomas' coat, The slight weight of a woman's soft body leaned against the length of his wide back. She stood to the tips of her toes, all the better for her velvety, lush lips to brush against the tender edge of his ear, her breath a gentle whisper against the nape of his neck.

Antonia had not wished to keep Thomas wandering through the wild Jamaican groves that bordered Commander Murray's estate, but she had to be sure her lovely man was not followed. Doubt had plagued her every step, from the very moment she conjured her makeshift escape from the ball. Questions hissing suspicions, knotting her gut with confusion, had haunted her thoughts and turned every last minute out here among the mangrove and the lemon trees into a small yet hellish eternity.

"Why, if you'd prefer the sweet-yet-carnally adventurous French gentlewoman, Antoinette Greene?" the rogue's warm Creole voice offered breathlessly, "I still have her clothes right here, and her jewels - though perhaps you would prefer her in her jewels alone? She shan't argue."

Long, deft fingers slipped within the confines of the dark silver jacket, leisurely unbuttoning the vest beneath. "Much. I imagine it would be quite a sight after all, and Antoinette is such a tractable, accommodating creature... "

Antonia laughed softly to herself, mirthlessly, as she leaned back off her tiptoes. And then she sighed, heavily, as she wrapped her arms tighter still about Thomas' waist, laying her soft cheek against the silver silk of his justacorps jacket.

"Bah, forgive me my silliness. Worry makes me act such a fool. What is happening, my sweet Silverfish?" she whispered, closing her eyes tightly, utterly defeated by her useless speculation. "What happened between the end of our single dance, and your conversation with Commander Murray? And what of the First Mate, do you know nothing more of her flight? I have a thought, and yet... "

Antonia bit her lip, hard, mortified by the breadth of all the questions for which she could offer her lovely man no good answers. "Forgive me please, for failing to show my worth. What have I missed tonight?"

Oh she was poetry. He saw her eyes look to his with concerned request for acceptance. He again needed control. She spoke from such a deep place he was moved. Poetry. All this time he thought her hardess was uncaring distance, and maybe part of it is. But he watched her put on that face. From pleading eyes to ice hard in seconds. She had developed the skill. It wasn’t her. He realized it was her cover for what she thought was broken. He could not help but want to hold the pieces.

If she needed that face then he would follow that, accept it, and keep any secret she gave very close to his heart. With his arms full came a glance from his crew with a question in the poor on duty man's eyes Jax shrugged. After the stiff walk and commanding eyes of their First Mate, Jax raised his brows and whispered, “Research.” He followed quickly behind letting her walk ahead as her position required.

He stood outside her door as she stomped in, waiting for permission. Like he was bringing her supplies or just crying her bags Jax stopped at the entrance and let his eyes glance around to see if the crew was watching. Those awake were working at loading and didn’t seem to notice. He was sure they did, but at least they didn’t make him pretend every long.

Jax closed the door behind him. He put down most of the bottles on the nearest table and helped himself to a good hard swig before he past her the bottle of some rye whiskey. He wiped his mouth as he offered her a taste.

“We should start with the hardest and work down to a child books. Do you have any children’s books?” He grinned to her thinking that was funny. But maybe the booze was kicking in. “And you better hadn’t be doing any of those trick drink things where you don’t really let it slid down or you put your tongue over the opening or anything. “ He squinted at her to let her know how serious he was until he smiled again.

“Now, you ready to be wooed by my smooth sensual voice?” In fact he was more thinking of listening to her. Still he could go first.

Did anyone see the way her knees shook as she walked across the deck to her cabin? Did they see the way her knuckles turned white as they gripped the bottles in her arms? Did they see the cracks in her façade that were growing with each and every step? Never had her cabin seemed so far from the gangplank, never had her steps there seemed so slow. The flight into the forest of earlier had to have used up all her speed and it felt as if she moved like Molasses on a late December morn, in a world far away.

But then she was in and slumping and only just remembering to call for Jax. Her heart pounded and the bottles felt as heavy as bricks but there was something strange to the moment, a feeling of giddy relief as if they had pulled something over on the crew. She had fooled them, let them think she was more than she was. Only Jax knew, and the part he knew was small. The sense of being open, even in that small way, was terrifying and she took the bottle he offered with alacrity and pressed her mouth to the lip just where his had been, taking in great mouthfuls like it was air and she’d run a marathon.

She held up the bottle in the faint moonlight that filled her room to show him its lowered level as proof of her intention to drink, and drink hard.

“No Children’s books.” She said as she set her bottles down and went about the business of making light for them to read by. Her childhood books were as lost as her childhood and she had no need for them now as it were. There would be no one to hand them down to. She shook off such maudlin thoughts. They had plenty to read and just as much to drink. She looked forward to both.

As her lamp sputtered to life and she adjusted the wick the light lit her skin with an amber glow that complemented its honeyed tones and made the shadows hide her scar. She looked almost whole as she grinned at him in reflexive response to his own bright grin. On her it was a shaky expression that was clearly not one she was accustomed to but for all that it pulled a dimple from deep in her whole cheek and was charming for all of that. She slid out of her coat and stood in the vest that cupped her curves and the ivory silk shirt with its now stained cuffs.

“No tricks with mouth or tongue, I promise. I will drink as honestly as you and we will see who stumbles and slurs first. But I will read first since you have already gifted me with poetry.”

She moved her hand in a sweeping gesture, offering up her shelves for his perusal.

“Pick something for me to read to you, anything. If it is not in English I will translate, thought I cannot promise as the night goes on that my translations will be all that accurate.” Her honeyed voice goaded him with nothing like malice, to do his worst. Print and language was something she excelled at and if felt so good to be at it, a bet, a challenge but with something she had control over. Her smiled broadened, her dimple deepened and she sat herself on the edge of her bed, waiting to see what he would pick.

She smiled. In the safety of her cabin she could show that face and he matched it easily smiling back. He tried to push away that uneasy feeling of being somewhere he didn't belong. Earlier he had no problems being inside her closed quarters. That was before he had much any concern for her at all. A woman where she shouldn’t be. But things changed. Now he wanted her on board. And more than that. He watched her drink seeing the liquid disappear from the bottle and down her throat. So she was good at that. She would read first.

Jax spun around and looked at the books. How had she found and kept so many? Jax knew few people who owned their own books and her collections was worth the gasp he released. She had information all over the place about so many things, plants, stars, theories of natural processes, healing studies from around the world and….there Jax found the book he wanted. He looked back to her and grinned.

“You have a prize here that I am going to swoon over while you read.” Jax pulled a book down and he held it in his hands. He looked at the cover and put his fingers over the name Jonathan Swift. Of course Jax leaned toward fiction, or poetry, or things light at heart. Oh he would read anything but those hours lost in someone elses world were the most precious times to him.

“It fits.” He laughed and handed her the book Gulliver’s Travels. He took a bottle and slid down onto the floor looking up at her just like a hungry child waiting for her to read. He was going to tease her about his swoons, or tell her she had to do different voices, or suggest she take another gulp before she began.

Jax didn't have to speak. No, he was ready, more than ready, to listen. His eager face, anticipated smile and eyes that glowed in excitement said more than his words could. He was just going to sit on the floor and listen to her read about adventures and things that were different than they seemed.