The Pleasure of Your Kiss Read Free Page B

and ruthless.” The lieutenant darted a glance at the growing chaos behind him. “Please, miss, we haven’t much time to get you the two of you out of harm’s way.” His voice cracked, betraying both his youth and how near he was to succumbing to panic himself. “If they board us …”
    There was no need for him to finish. Nor did Clarinda have the heart to point out that if the Corsairs succeeded in boarding the ship, there would be nowhere she and Poppy—or any of the other women on the ship, including the captain’s wife and their own maids—could hide to escape the pirates’ brutal clutches.
    She closed her fingers around Poppy’s trembling hand, dredging up a reassuring smile from the reserves of her faltering courage. “Come, my dear. It seems we’re about to embark upon a much grander adventure than we anticipated.”
    The lieutenant drew his pistol and started back across the deck, gesturing for them to follow. They raced after him, hand in hand like two frightened little girls. They were halfway to the narrow passageway that would carry them deep into the tenuous safety of the hold when Clarinda stumbled to a halt.
    Giving Poppy an apologetic look, she wrenched her hand free and went flying back across the deck.
    “Clarinda!” Poppy screamed, terror ripening in her voice. “What are you doing?”
    “Proving myself a sentimental fool,” Clarinda muttered under her breath.
    The scandal sheet still lay beside the chair where Poppy had so carelessly tossed it. As Clarinda snatched up the page with the likeness of Captain Burke sketched upon it, a round of pistol fire erupted from somewhere on the ship, followed by the ringing clash of steel against steel.
    She wheeled around and went racing back to her friend’s side, yanking the breathless Poppy into a dead run to make up for every step of the ground they had lost. She had no intention of letting anyone else suffer for her folly. The lieutenant had just wrenched open the hatch and was frantically waving them toward the shadowy mouth of the passageway. They had nearly reached him when his expression underwent a startling transformation.
    His mouth went slack. He gave Clarinda a bewildered look, as if someone had made a joke at his expense that he didn’t quite comprehend.
    Then he slowly lowered his gaze to his chest.
    That was when Clarinda saw the tip of the silvery blade protruding from the center of it.
    Poppy let out a bloodcurdling scream. As the lieutenant pitched forward, Clarinda started toward him, instinctively trying to break his fall. But as she reached for him, that same long, curved blade was wrenched from his back and brandished in their direction. The lieutenant collapsed to the deck in a bloody heap, leaving the two of them all alone to face half a dozen men armed with pistols and scimitars. Their turbans and flowing robes were already spattered with blood, little of it their own.
    Her breath shortening to terrified pants, Clarinda began to back away from them, dragging the paralyzed Poppy along with her. She gave the ill-fated young lieutenant one last look, but from the blood trickling from the corner of his mouth and the mist already claiming his eyes, clearly he was beyond anyone’s help. He looked even younger in death than he had in life. Clarinda’s savage regret that she hadn’t at least been allowed to cradle his head in her lap as he died coalesced into a fierce urge to protect and survive.
    Thrusting Poppy behind her, she reached up to the brim of her hat and whipped out the only weapon at her disposal. She thrust the pearltipped hatpin toward the advancing men. “Stay away from us, you miserable brigands. Or I’ll run you through, I will!”
    The men might not have understood her words, but there was no mistaking the murderous look in her eye. The hulking giant gripping the bloody scimitar glanced from the long, curved blade of that weapon to the slender needle gripped in Clarinda’s white-knuckled hand.
    His