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The Sea Wolf had slept at her door.
Morgan came awake with a curse and a mouthful of pink silk. A sudden sharp pain stabbed his side as limbs and silk engulfed him.
“What the devil?” he asked. His hand brushed up against something warm and velvety. Something that felt incredibly good against his palm.
“Captain Drake, remove your hand from my thigh this instant!”
It was a wonderful wake-up surprise to find the woman he was dreaming of sprawled in his arms. Serenity’s outraged voice brought a rakish grin to his face. Before he could curb the impulse, Morgan ran his hand over the cool silk stocking, along the sensuous curve of her leg, feeling the supple muscles and delicate softness. But what he really wanted to do was cup the inside of her leg, especially the soft, warm juncture of her thighs.
What he wouldn’t give to trail his lips over the soft flesh. To peel back those stockings and…
“Captain Drake!” she shouted, shoving the hem of the dress down over his hand and forcing him to withdraw it. Her cheeks were flaming red. “Release me.”
“I believe you are the one holding me down, Miss James.”
Not that he minded. With Serenity lying atop him, he was tangled in her skirts and enjoying the press of her breasts against his chest as she struggled to right herself, all the while choking on indignation.
His grin widened. Oh, her outrage was delightful. He knew his smile infuriated her, which amused him all the more.
With one sharp elbow in his side, she pushed herself to her feet. “You are the devil!” she snapped, turning about in a huff.
Morgan’s laugh rumbled deep in his throat as he rose to his own feet and watched her head for the main deck. “You’re wrong, Serenity James,” he whispered. “Were I the devil, you wouldn’t have gotten away so easily.”
Serenity didn’t slow her pace until she saw Barney shouting orders up to a crewman in the crow’s nest.
“Excuse me, Mister…” she paused as she realized she didn’t know his last name, and calling him “Barney” seemed just a little too forward.
“Pitkern,” he supplied for her. “They call me Mr. Pitkern, lass. Now what can I do for you?”
It was then that she noticed the crewmen had all stopped their labors and were now staring straight at her. The two men behind Barney had stopped scrubbing the railings and water dripped from their sponges. Even their bawdy singing had ceased.
The ship was as silent as the dead of night, and only the snapping of the rigging and cries of birds broke the sudden stillness.
The hair on the back of her neck raised. This was not good. Not good at all!
Morgan paused at the top of the deck and noted the reactions of his men as they became aware of her presence. It didn’t bode particularly well. A woman on board a ship was exactly what Serenity had said, a recipe for disaster.
With purposeful strides, he crossed the deck to where she stood.
“Men,” he called, shifting their attention away from her pale form. “We have a guest for our trip. Miss James is a lady of decent temperament and is to be accorded respect. Any man who fails to show her anything less will have me to deal with.”
“Aye, Captain.”
He turned to face her. “I should have dressed
you like a powder monkey,” Morgan said in a low tone, his voice strained.
“I beg your pardon?” she asked.
“He means like one of the boys in charge of fetching powder for the cannons during a fight, Miss James,” Barney explained for her.
Serenity thanked the man before she looked back at Morgan. “Need I remind you, Captain. Iwasdressed like a powder monkey.”
“And you still managed to get into trouble.”
By the look on her face, he could tell she longed to argue, but she knew he was right, and that alone must have been what kept her silent.
Morgan rubbed his rib cage. “Now tell me what was so important that you almost punctured my lung with your foot to come out here?”
