The Pirate's Duty (Regent's Revenge #3)(75)

“Didn’t ye? Ye’re alive. He tested me, and ye won.” He wanted to pull the trigger. She could see it in his eyes. Their father’s wish had come true. Charles was the killer Gabriel Thorpe had always wanted him to be. “Their blood is on yer hands, Sister.”

Oriana shook her head, fighting back the guilt that had eaten away at her soul for years. Eliza’s death wasn’t her fault. It wasn’t!

“And just like ye begged for your life then,” he shouted in her face, “I would hear ye beg again.”

Consumed by a rage she’d never known, Oriana lunged at him, aiming the blade at his heart.

Tom intercepted her, grabbing her from behind. She shrieked and kicked but to no avail. “Cap’n, there be another way to make her talk.”

Charles ripped the dagger out of her hands. “I’m running out of patience.”

Tom struggled to contain Oriana as she thrashed in his arms. “If ye want to control your sister, there be another way.”

“Why shouldn’t I just kill the both of ye?” Charles’s jaw worked, and veins bulged on his forehead, creating a V shape that arrowed to his callous eyes.

“She’s sweet on that one.” Tom pointed above his head where crewmen secured John on the gangway. “As in, she loves him.”

“No!” Oriana tried to jerk free of Tom’s hold. “Leave him be, Charles!”

Charles cackled. The elation flashing over his face brought her perilously close to tears. She refused to bleed for the demon again as he yanked her away from Tom and angled her head, forcing her to look at John. “Introduce me to my sister’s lover.”

Tom waved his arm, and the crewmen dragged John down the quarterdeck companionway ladder to the upper deck. Oriana schooled her features, managing to keep her face stony and unchanged. When John failed to move, her heart hitched and her breath seized in her lungs. There was a long list of horrible things Charles would do to John in order to make her talk. Nausea swirled up inside her just thinking of his torturous methods and what, perhaps, John had already endured.

Canvas protested against the complexity of its rigging, blocks and tackle creaking as a southwesterly wind shifted. The deck gave a gentle heave, rolling beneath them.

How long could she hold on before John was dead? Minutes? Hours?

Charles sneered. “Revive him.”

A bucket of water was sloshed over John’s face, the contents flowing over him in a tidal flood that swept over the planks. He shook his head, groaning to life. He secured his bloody knuckles on the deck and struggled to rise, his face distorted by hatred and something more frightening . . . the hunger for vengeance.

Oriana drew in a shuddery breath. She had the distinct feeling John already knew her brother. Perhaps as a former revenue officer he had sought recompense for her brother’s misdeeds. And if John was the real Regent, could he defeat Charles?

“You bastard!” John shouted, spewing blood.

“Who are ye?” Charles demanded. “Ye act as if ye know me.”

“Let’s just say I’m someone who’s waited a long time to meet you face-to-face.”

“If anyone knows where the gold is hidden, Cap’n,” Tom said, “it’s him. Found the two of them together in the old cellar. She told him where it is. I bet my life on it.”

“Him?” Charles asked.

“Let me go!” Oriana cried, desperately trying to yank free of Charles’s grasp.

“So it’s true. Ye’re taken with this one.” Charles hooted maliciously. “Is it a fight ye want, man?”

“Aye.” John’s voice was clipped, murderous. She’d never heard him sound that way before. She felt a death grip on her heart when next he spoke. “You sank my ship. You killed my men.”

“John!” A vengeful man made mistakes, and Charles didn’t play fair. He always got the upper hand. Always. “Don’t hurt him, Charles. He has nothin’ to do with this.”

Charles backhanded her again. Traitorous tears careened down her cheeks. She stumbled into a support column, latching on for dear life. Buckets were dangling above her head, and she knocked one down, picked it up, and slung it at her brother’s back.

She couldn’t lose John, no matter who he was. Not now. Not ever.

Charles staggered forward, then turned to face her. “I’m goin’ to take great pleasure in makin’ you suffer.”

“Words of the gods!” a strange, intimidating voice declared.

Charles stopped in his tracks and curiously sought out whoever had dared openly defy him.

Heads turned quickly as if on swivels. Crewmen stared agog at a man dressed in black as he nimbly jumped onto the starboard rail. Four other men—all tall, regal, brave, and incredibly brawny—landed beside him. More boots hit the deck as innumerable pirates scrambled over the rails.

“It’s the Black Regent!” several crewmen shouted, scattering. “We’re under attack!”

Glee filled Oriana’s heart, even if she had been wrong in assuming John was the Regent. And for the first time since Tom Digby, as the impostor Regent, had forced Oriana and John on board Charles’s ship, hope swelled in her breast.

“Let the woman go.” The devilishly handsome Black Regent dropped onto the gangway like an avenging angel. The tails of his mask flapped in the wind, along with his dark shoulder-length hair. The lapels on his black shirt fluttered about his neck, adding mystery and roguish appeal. He was straight from a gothic romance novel, and his dashing, daring, and deadly demeanor forced Oriana to see she’d been blind to believe Tom was the Regent.