you I had a prop’sition,’ the man slurred out with unstoppable determination. ‘Wife sale,’ he concluded triumphantly. ‘That’s how you peasants do it, don’ see why it won’ work for me.’
Luckily for him, too much attention was on the woman at his side for him to suffer for those reckless words, at least for now.
‘C’mon, gen’lmen, what am I bid? Ah,’ he said owlishly, his finger just hitting the side of his nose, ‘need to see more of the goods, eh?’
The girl stared serenely at Kit as if the sight of him negated the avid eyes and eagerly licked lips around her. Then her husband tore her high-necked gown from neck to navel, revealing her snowy breasts, rising proud above her chemise, and she looked for a moment as if reality was about to descend.
Kit’s hands tightened involuntarily into fists even now as he thought of the casual way that miserable drunkard had torn even that fragile protection aside to expose more than any woman should have to in company. Yet at the time Kit’s gaze had clung hungrily to her coral-peaked nipples despite his fury, and his loins had tightened viciously. He might have been filled with revulsion by the whole sordid business, but he had still been racked with such lust he became almost a stranger to himself. Unsure if he was more furious with himself for behaving like an over-excited lout, or her for being the siren he wanted above all others, he was still in thrall to Venus.
He had reminded himself that he was a successful man now, and when he wanted a woman he kept a willing one in luxury. Yet he met the densely blue eyes of his goddess and nearly fell headlong into her blurred reality. When her gaze faltered she had looked very young all of a sudden. He watched her sway and correct herself to stand as far away from the sot at her side as she could with his cruel fingers biting into her arm like fetters.
When Kit looked again, he decided he must have been wrong about her age after all, for her fathomless eyes were full of dazed sensuality as they met his. He felt heat shoot through him. The bidding was up to ten pounds when his brain finally persuaded his senses to pay attention and he knew that, whatever she was, he was going to have her tonight and that was that. No other man deserved her, and certainly none present tonight were capable of seeing she had a seduction fit for a goddess.
‘That’s giving her away. Fine-looking woman, even if has go’ tongue like an asp,’ the vendor claimed rather foolishly, but his audience scarcely heard him.
‘Twelve,’ an eager young tar shouted.
‘Twenty!’ the ship’s master Kit had been pursuing all week offered, and greedily feasted his eyes on mysteries only Kit should be allowed to see.
The rating fell back, disappointment written all over his tanned young face.
‘Thirty!’ Kit heard himself shout above the din.
The room went silent as a new tension filled the air. Kit knew he had been right in thinking this was the hideaway of at least one of the rogues he was after. It obviously took a brave man, or a fool, to challenge him here. He was certainly the latter, he decided wryly, as weeks of careful work went begging for the sake of a bought woman he intended having in his bed for many nights to come.
‘Any more f’r any more,’ her contemptible keeper bawled cheerfully.
‘Fifty,’ the master snapped, and Kit guessed he had already spent most of his ill-gotten gains after murdering half Kit’s crew and suborning the rest.
‘Sixty guineas,’ he countered quietly and his rival’s shoulders slumped, until he remembered how to lie again.
‘Seventy!’
‘If you got that much gelt you’ll pay yer shot fust, Toby Rigg,’ the landlady bawled from her vast chair by the fire. ‘Pay me what’s owed afore you bids for my drabs, or don’t expect me to ’ide you next time Lloyds men come arter you.’
‘Shut your loose mouth, you’ll be paid when I’m good and ready.’
‘You’ll’ and over me money now or soon wish as you ’ad,’ the woman rapped out implacably and her three burly sons gathered around her to discourage any counter-threats he might care to make.
‘You’ll ’ave it ten times over, when I gets my proper share.’
‘That fine gentleman you sets such store by is long gone, my lad, or I’m a Chinese; which I ain’t nor never will be. So we’ll take them seventy yellow boys on account, eh, m’lads?’
‘He’s coming back, I tell thee, and I’ll be a rich man when ’e does.’
‘You’m a damn fool, and I wants me money,’ the lady of the house informed him implacably.
‘Sold to the pirate captain!’ the goddess husked.
Taking advantage of the startled silence, his friend the barmaid pushed the goddess toward him.
‘Got it on you, Captain?’ she asked saucily.
Trying to resist the sensuous appeal of warm and curvaceous woman as the goddess snuggled into his arms and instinctively hid her nakedness against his broad chest, Kit decided it was time they got out fast. Sooner or later the inevitable brawl would break out, and even a man of his background would be helpless to protect her from random violence.
‘I’ll split the twenty I have got with you if you get us out of here with a whole skin. The rest when we get back to my ship.’
‘Ten guineas now?’ she bargained, and casually clouted an over-eager customer with a pewter plate.
Kit handed her his purse, certain he would shortly regret it. Of course he had wriggled out of far tighter spots, but not encumbered by a half-conscious goddess.
‘Here’s for you, lads,’ the wench shouted and threw a couple of gold pieces and all the silver high in the air so that it scattered round the room.
As fighting broke out, she grabbed the swaying Venus by her other arm and towed her away from the wife-seller who was now striving vainly against the surging crowd. Shouldering open the one stout door in the place, Kit gasped in air that might have seemed rank if he hadn’t just spent hours in a stinking tavern.
The cooler air felled his goddess like a hammer blow. Cursing bitterly, and not sure if he was more furious with her or himself, he swung her over his shoulder and started to run. He stood little chance of avoiding pursuit, so he had no choice but to run for his ship when the door behind them opened so abruptly Kit was surprised the bang didn’t shake the wretched place apart.
‘Run to the Ellen May,’ he gasped to the tavern wench.
The so-called husband was straw in the wind, but Kit’s rival in the bidding was a hardy rogue. Burdened with a drugged woman, Kit knew he would need a wonder to avoid a fearsome beating, especially when his tavern wench melted into the night. Nobody was more shocked than Kit when a rich contralto voice bellowed out, ‘Ahoy there, Ellen May!’ at the top of a very healthy pair of lungs. ‘Help us, oh, God help us!’ she managed in an ever-weakening voice.
‘Well done, Venus,’ he gasped
At the very least she had won them a few seconds’ grace as his pursuers tried to remember where and what the Ellen May might be. Kit took advantage of everyone to spurt towards
