“A brute?” The man in black grinned and clicked his tongue. His tan skin, weathered by salt and sea, cracked into almost friendly planes.

I flickered a smile and tossed my braided hair over my shoulder. Still, he didn’t look at me.

Appearing almost friendly, he spoke again. “I prefer to be called Russian Jack. Not a brute.”

My breath caught in my throat and a rabid murmur escaped Sully’s lips but formed no words. He didn’t have to. Tales of Russian Jack and his sea-faring brutality, not unlike the one’s Sully was telling only moments before, were so prominent along the London streets I’d almost figured him to be a man of fiction than one of flesh and blood.

“I see my reputation has preceded me.”

He showed innocent ships on the high seas no mercy. Russian Jack never left captives alive and he took no prisoners. His ways were ruthless and his soul long since damned. I should be scared.

Why aren’t you shaking, Red?

A flash of movement caught my eye. Sully’s brother Johann!

I tried not to stare as Johann crept up behind Russian Jack, his sword drawn. Just a step or two closer and he would be in the killing zone.

Without warning, the deadliest pirate to sail the Atlantic let out a roar. Spinning on his booted heel, he drew his cutlass. As Johann raised his blade above his head to strike, Russian Jack slashed him across the middle.

I watched as Johann’s eyes widened and his hands flew to his gaping gut. Before he could make a sound, Johann’s body fell with a sick thunk at Russian Jack’s feet.

“By God’s Blood man.” Sully’s voice was a croak as he fumbled with the gold knots of his blade’s handle, which was still securely tucked at his side. “You’ve cut down me brother!”

Finally, Sully freed his sword and brought it aloft. I couldn’t read his eyes, but surely he meant to avenge his brother’s death. Before his blade reached its deadly arc, he hesitated.

Sully was no killer and he knew it. His hesitation proved to be a fatal mistake.

Russian Jack slashed my fiancé through the heart as easily as he would slice a crust of bread from the loaf.

The light, like a flickering candle down to its final moments, faded from Sully’s brown eyes as he turned to me. Ever slow, he sank to his knees. Behind him, Russian Jack flicked Johann’s blade with the tip of his boot. It flew expertly into his outstretched hand.

Sully clutched his sword in one hand and the hem my skirt in the other. His eyes locked onto mine. Pleading. Afraid.

I looked for any sign of apology in his deep brown eyes, any hint of regret for leaving me at the mercy of a notorious killer. I found none. He wasn’t afraid for me. He was simply afraid to die.

I stumbled backward. Sully collapsed on the deck at my feet. His scarlet lifeblood pooled around the russet haired body that would move no more.

Russian Jack studied Johann’s sword briefly before tossing it to a potbellied pirate. A snicker rippled over the lot of them as the short man plucked it from the air like an apple from a tree.

An angry breath slapped my lips in a huff. Without thinking of anything aside from Russian Jack’s lifeblood spilling alongside my fiancé’s, I bent and snatched Sully’s sword from the deck with both hands. I may be just a young slip of a girl in the eyes of a ruthless sea gypsy, but as a London debutante, I had one thing they didn’t. Honor.

The snickering stopped.

Despite the sudden silence, Russian Jack paid me no mind.

I lifted the tip of the blade until it pointed squarely at his back. No need anybody know this is my first time to handle a cutting instrument of any sort.

“Russian Jack.” I was powerless to quell the tremble in my voice or the tremble in my hand. “Today, you’ve breathed your last. Let it be known that woman named Redella Jerningham took your life to avenge the murder of her fiancé.”

Finally, the green-eyed buccaneer cast a hollow glance in my direction. I hoisted the blade in a wide arc above my head. From the corner of my eye, I saw the hairy pirate beside me draw Johann’s blade, but my realization was too late. He thrust it toward my neck with a deadly growl.

Like the striking of a snake, Russian Jack drew his cutlass and deflected the blow that could have easily relieved me of my head. I flinched as someone’s sword met my cheek and opened the skin of my once-flawless face, gifting me with an angry, gaping gash.

My eye twitched, but I didn’t cry out. Blood ran down my face and neck in a sticky ooze, like holy tears from a virgin statue. Fresh rage fueled my hands and brought Sully’s sword down with a whistle.

It missed its mark.

Quicker than my eye could follow, Russian Jack’s blade was held at ready. He nodded at me as though to invite me to tea.

I jabbed.

Our blades met midair with a clang.

“I could teach you how to do that, Redella Jerningham.”

Spatters of blood dotted the white, wrist-length gloves I’d slipped on this morning, when the world still made sense. I raised the blade like an axe and brought it down with all the force I could muster.

Russian Jack stepped slightly to the side and my silver met the deck in a purposeful crack. Splinters scattered like birds from a gunshot. “With proper form, you’d be deadly.”

I thrust the blade again, feeling full well the weight of the steel in my burning muscles. Russian Jack didn’t have to move much to dodge my attempted blows, but dodge them he did. Expertly. It was as though we were embroiled in a masquerade dance, and the night was coming to an end.

My chest heaved and my face throbbed as I stumbled forward. The probing eyes of the men who’d overtaken The Scarlet Rose, those who had stood idly by as Sully was murdered, followed my every move.

I willed my sword to rise for just one more blow. With quivering arms, I managed to heft the blade over my shoulder. My breath came faster and none of us aboard knew what would come next.

“You killed my love,” I managed through clenched teeth.

Russian Jack leveled his blade at my exposed middle. I didn’t look away from his direct stare, even though the tip of his sword met my breast. “My dear girl, you have yet to discover what love truly is.”

I sucked in a deep breath and arced the blade in what should have been a death blow. My heart slapped wildly inside my chest, like a bird’s flailing attempts to escape a creeping housecat. Russian Jack’s handsome face never changed expression. Before I could end his life, he flicked his wrist in a movement so subtle, it would have gone unseen should I have averted my glance. Sully’s blade flew from my sweaty palm and tumbled overboard, through the remnants of the fog and into the frothing sea that lapped at the hull of The Scarlet Rose.

I stared at my empty hands to the tune of quiet laughter from the pirates as Russian Jack sheathed his cutlass. The weight of his stare was heavy on my face and I lifted my chin to meet it. The sails creaked and slapped as The Scarlet Rose rode the waves and a passing shadow of pelicans, hunting for a meal, clouded us momentarily.

Russian Jack, unlike his crew, wasn’t laughing. Those green eyes burned with an intensity that turned them from their saltwater shade to almost black.

I shivered helplessly as he closed the space between us. Before I could move, he took me into his arms.

“Love,” he growled. “By God’s Blood I’ll show you love.”

Chapter Four

Swansea, Wales

And you did, Jacky,” I whispered into his shoulder. “That time with you was—”

He growled in response. That low, soft growl that not just anyone got to hear. I’d come to know it well. “Aye, it was.”

The chilled ocean breeze kissed my skin and sent a shiver up my spine. Or maybe it was being in Jack’s arms again that did it. “I thought I would never feel you again. I still can’t believe you’re here.”