Page 31 of Maggie and the Pirate’s Son

“You miss them,” he said, instead.

She shivered and he drew closer, lending her some of his heat.

“I miss a lot of things,” she answered.

“Then why sneak aboard? Why not go home? You had to know you might never see them again.”

She was quiet for a long moment and then she shrugged. “I suppose I missed the illusion of independence most of all.”

Christ, she looked young, crowned by starlight. How was it possible for one so unseasoned to have already been both married and widowed? What on earth had ever given her the sense of freedom she was missing enough to board his ship? And what had taken it away?

He cleared his throat again. “Aye, an illusion is all it ever is. We’re all of us at the mercy of our fickle mistresses, the winds and tides.”

“Is it true the moon controls the tides?”

“Some say so.”

“And others?”

“Others say it was the Norse god Thor,” he teased. Finlay Shaw, the formerly wretched cousin-in-law, wasn’t the only one who could fill her head with ancient tales.

The girl turned to him, her eyes alight with glee.

“What’s so funny?”

“Just imagining my mother’s face to hear me discussing pagan deities.”

He laughed out loud. “That would be her concern? Not the pirate ship in the middle of the ocean and you parading around all but indecent in my breeches?”

“I don’t parade!” She dipped her head to hide an elfin sort of smirk. “Go on then, tell me about Thor. Has he a star up there?”

“Nah, he made the stars, innit?”

She laughed and turned the radiance of her smile back to the cloudless sky.

“The story goes, Loki challenged Thor to a drinking contest, but he secretly connected the god’s cup to the ocean. No matter how hard Thor tried, he couldn’t drain it because, after all, it was the whole ocean, but his efforts created the rise and fall of the tides.”

“A likely tale,” she said in a dreamy voice, leaning back to tilt her face up even farther.

As she had in the rigging, she fit just perfectly against him. Every hair on his body stood erect as though leaning to meet her, and he fought the urge to rest his chin atop her soft head.

“Jory would say, ‘Leave it to men to give the credit to a man,’” she said.

“Ah, but Thor wasn’t just any man. He was a god.”

She shook, either with a chill or silent laughter.

“Are you cold?” he asked, rubbing his hands along her arms before he caught himself.

“A little,” she admitted. “One of the reasons I snuck aboard was to travel someplace warm.”

“I recall the isles can be unforgivably fresh.”

“Fresh,” she laughed. “Spoken like a local. What’s the warmest place you’ve ever visited?”

How could he tell her he’d sailed to many ports but rarely explored them?

“There’s nothing finer than to dawdle on the deck as a bright sun warms you from the outside in.”