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And was that…no…it couldn’t be.
The entire room tilted to the side.
She scrambled onto all fours on the bed, crawling to the windows.
Water.
Water filling everything along the horizon.
Not the bloody sea.
She blinked hard and rubbed the window with the butt of her fist.
No.
But yes.
Nothing but water.
How in the blasted world did she end up on a ship?
The last she could remember, she was at the docks and then she was suddenly surrounded. Surrounded on all sides by the filthiest brutes. Grabbing her. Shoving her.
And then nothing.
Nothing until she was here, retching into a boot.
She flipped herself over to sit on her backside, her legs stretching out long in front of her on the bed. Her boots and stockings were gone. Just her bare toes peeking out from under her skirts.
Someone had removed her boots, her stockings.
She swallowed hard and heat crept upward along her neck, setting her scalp to tingle.
Someone had seen her scars. If they had removed her stockings, the monstrosity of her legs would have been impossible to miss.
The short door to the room pushed open and a head popped in just under the top of the frame.
Bloody hell, no.
No. No. No.
She scampered backward on the bed and her shoulders hit the ledge just below the windows, stopping her retreat.
“You’ve roused.” He stooped as he stepped in past the low doorway and then stood straight, closing the door behind him. The dark hair, too long. The height of him, even with bare feet. The breadth of his shoulders in his deep blue coat that swallowed the space in the room. The black scruff of whiskers that sent a shadow onto his tanned face.
The grey eyes that held the devil’s flames in them.
His gaze swept over her, his look almost apologetic. “You’ve been asleep for a day.” His head inclined to her. “That lump on your head did not do you well. Does it pain?”
No. Impossible.
Who was this man that thought he could walk in on her and speak to her with calm nonchalance when he was one of the bastards that had taken her family from her?
Talking to her as though they were casual acquaintances—old friends.
“No.” The word seethed from her chest, barely audible. But she felt it from deep in her bones, deep in her gut. No to his question. No to everything she had just woken up to.
She could not be trapped at the mercy of this cutthroat.
