take me the first night?” she asked, backing away.
“But I didn’t! And this is me thanks! Tell me whose it is! If he took you unwilling, by God, I’ll see his balls swinging from me bowspr’t. Hell, I’ll hold him down so you can cut them off yourself, but you have to tell me who!”
First time since her first day aboard, Cate was afraid of him. His beard had grown to a deep ebony bush, and obscured his face, so similar to that day. The dark smudges under his eyes rendered him even more sinister. His sword and pistol were across the room. She eyed the weapons at the mizzen and in the urn at the door as she continued to back away. She didn’t think he would use them against her, but he also looked the right Tartar, and capable of anything.
“Nathan,” she began levelly. “I don’t understand—”
He went dead white and charged. Stumbling back, she came up against a trunk. He grabbed her by the throat and bent her back over it, slamming her head against the wall. She tore at his hand; the very one she had fought to save now squeezing the life from her. His eyes, now inches from hers, had gone as black and sightless as a shark’s. His thumb gouged her windpipe, and her limbs grew heavy, too heavy to move. A roar filled her ears, and pinpricks of light began to flash at the edges of her vision. A remote voice warned she was about to be killed, and would never know why.
As suddenly as Nathan had attacked, he broke away. Cate slumped atop the chest, wincing in pain as she clutched her throat. Raggedly panting, Nathan closed his eyes in an effort to regain a level of self-control.
“You’ve been on this ship for nigh on to two months,” he began, his voice breaking with emotion. “I’ve offered you safe haven. I’ve not asked a thing of you, not a goddamned thing.”
He pivoted and kicked a chair, sending it tumbling. He took an angry swipe at another, and prowled the room like a caged cat. Grunting in effort, he threw open a gallery window. He braced his arms on the frame, his back heaving with each breath.
“I just want to know whose it is,” he said. Grinding his head into his forearm in anguish, his fist pounded the wood in rhythm with each word. “I just need to know who you’ve been with.”
It took Cate a moment to get his meaning and her mouth sagged. “You think I’ve been bedding someone?” she wheezed, her throat not yet fully recovered. She stood on shaky legs. “You think I’ve been cavorting with one of your crew?”
“I dare say ’tis fairly obvious,” he said, coldly over his shoulder. “Was it someone on this ship, or was it someone on the Constancy? Don’t tell me it was Harte or Thomas!”
Days of tension had taken its toll, and now she was the one to snap. “What do you care? You have no claim on me. It is none of your bloody damned concern!”
Whirling, he kicked over a stand, sending the candlesticks atop it clattering to the floor. Her sewing box was sent flying next.
“It is my concern!” he bellowed.
“Who made you my master?” Seething, she stalked toward him. “Pray enlighten me as to which angers you the most: that I bedded someone, or that it was someone other than you? Let me tell you, Captain Blackthorne, just because you’re the captain does not allow you the right to expect anything!”
By now they were nose to nose. Nathan was rigid with fury, the tails of his scarf curling around his shoulders like serpents.
“Pray allow me to tell you a thing or two, madam. As captain, I have the right to do or expect anything I damn well please. And if I had wanted to have you, I’d have goddamned had you! What with your whoring around, being a gentleman was lost on you.”
“I’m obliged to defer to your expertise on whores. Unlike you, I don’t swive everyone or everything that passes.”
“You think if you can seduce me—”
“Seduce!?”
“Seduce me into stuffing your quim,” Nathan continued over her sputtering objections. “And you made double-damned sure o’ that.”
“What are you raving about?”
“Once again I tried to be the gentleman, but oh now, you’d have none o’ that. All to assure that bastard you’re carrying could be passed off on me.”
In an enraged blur, Cate seized the first thing within reach—an unsuspecting