a coquette, I knew how to lace myself into a bosom-revealing gown and touch a man until his eyes crossed and his brain exploded.
A sweaty tumble beneath the blankets with Ashley Cutler wouldn’t convince him to free me. But if he believed I carried his babe in my womb, that would change everything.
He wouldn’t send me to the gallows.
Because he wouldn’t execute his own child.
Win his heart or conceive his baby.
For either of these plans to work, I needed to get close to him. Close enough to take his seed into my body.
As I stared at his beautifully sculpted back in the darkness, it shouldn’t have felt like such a hardship. He was a gorgeous man, and I’d done worse things to survive.
If I succeeded in bedding him, I would be betraying the husband who betrayed me. The thought made me sick because, God confound me, I still loved the king of libertines.
But if I did nothing, I would hang. I would die. It wasn’t the best option.
If Priest were here, I knew what he would say.
The crazy son of a bitch would tell me to lie, steal, cheat, maim, kill, or fuck whomever I needed to stay alive.
As I closed my eyes and drifted to sleep, I heard his growly Welsh accent in my ear.
Survive, my love. No matter what.
“Ow!” I yanked the needle from the pad of my finger and stuck the bleeding appendage in my mouth.
My frustration with sewing had been mounting all day, but I refrained from tossing the nearly finished garment off the balcony.
I’d woken this morning alone and hadn’t seen anyone except the young soldier who delivered my meals. Wherever Ashley spent his waking hours, it wasn’t here.
But he’d been ever-present in my mind.
As I measured, cut, and stitched in the chair at his tidy desk, I ruminated the art of intimacy. Touching, kissing, undressing, drawing him into my body… I imagined licentious scenarios in every combination of positions I’d seen performed in cities, gutters, and taverns.
Of course, I had my own experiences with Priest and others to draw on, but I was rusty. And after Priest’s betrayal, I lacked the confidence I once had.
Was I still desirable? If I were, would Priest have strayed?
I powered through the negative thoughts and conceived a fantasy where Ashley devoted himself to the service of a lady pirate, where he wanted me beyond all else and became my professed lover. As my fingers worked the sewing needle, my mind erected illusions of us naked, entangled, licking, whispering, caressing, and rutting day and night.
Immersed in my carnal imagination for hours, I allowed myself to feel every reaction—fear, trepidation, doubt, denial, acceptance, hunger, pleasure—until I became…not jaded. I could never become hardened to a man’s touch, and when it happened with Ashley, I would experience all these feelings again. But I mentally prepared myself for it as best as I could.
I came to terms with the role I would play as Ashley’s prisoner-turned-lover.
Now I just needed my hands to follow my head.
Returning my attention to the garment on my lap, I finished the final touches.
Stays were the foundation of a woman’s total look. Whether I went on to knit the fashionable undress of a servant or the stifling gown of the gentry and middling sorts, I had to start with this essential piece.
The boned body was necessary to achieve an elongated torso, cinched waist, and encased bosom. Since I’d worn these contraptions most of my life to support my back and breasts, I’d learned how to make them from scraps.
For the boning, I used narrow strips of pasteboard—thanks to the thick paper I’d found in Ashley’s desk. If he’d needed those drawings, he should have been more explicit.
You will fashion a proper wardrobe for yourself before you leave these quarters.
Every time I repeated his command in my head, I grew more irritated. So much so, I raided his armoire, too.
The fine silk of his shirts provided a lovely exterior to cover the stays. And since he owned more gold-embroidered blue frocks than any man required, I tore apart some of those.
The brocaded fabric, with its soft textures, voluminous pleats, and vivid blue dye, would constitute a bodice and skirt that I would later sew together.
It was a lot of work for a single informal gown. But I refused to sit in this cabin for the next month and be petulant about it.
Pushing back the chair, I rose to my feet and wrapped the stays over the shirt I’d