Page 16 of Immortal Pirates

“A woman you know?” she forced herself to sound disinterested and cold, though her body thrummed with heat and desire even as she wondered why in the bloodyhellhe’d thought of another woman when he practically hadherplastered against the wall. And her cool, unemotional facade faded, her next words becoming more irritated than she’d intended. “What about thiswoman you know?”

Her tone drew his gaze back to hers, and what she saw there told her whoever this woman was, St. Albans wasn’t thinking about her.

Arial’s breath snagged as she drowned in the unleashed desire in his blazing eyes—blue for the moment, but an unreal hue that she’d never seen in nature. They glowed like cerulean fire: so bright and yet hot at the same time. His beautiful lips were parted, revealing the tips of his fangs, and the fingers that still pinched her feather shook slightly. His other elegant hand had curled around the back of her head and neck as the wind blustered through his mahogany hair.

She realized all at once that her own hands had settled on the front of his chest. His heat burned through the fine linen shirt that covered slabs of muscle so hard and well-defined she felt them through the fabric.

He lowered his head, pressing her back against the wall with his hip and murmured, “Arial…”

She lifted her face, heart galloping wildly—matching the same crazy thumping of his beneath her palms?—

Clang!

Clang! Clang!

She jolted back, slamming her head into the wall, then pushed him away. She knew that sound, dammit.

The sounds of running feet and shouts filled the air. More clanging, followed by the ringing of the warning bell. One of the lines had come loose from the sheets, and the windwas whipping the metal fasteners against the cargo chains, mizzenmast, and anywhere else in its path. The situation wasn’t a life or death matter, but it was urgent, for someone could get slammed by the heavy metal pieces, and the sail could tear. She’d seen a man get knocked overboard once when a furious gust of wind whipped a chain and loose sheet at him, sending him flying.

Arial barely noticed that St. Albans had managed to remain in the shadows when she extricated herself. She brushed past him, rushing toward the prow. Her crew would have the matter in hand, but of course she would check to make sure all was well. As she dodged a small pyramid of cannonballs and leapt over a coil of line, she berated herself for allowing herself such an intimate moment in full view of any crew member who might have come by.

For all they knew, Raine St. Albans was a violent murderer and had escaped from the brig. Finding him pressing their captain up against the wall would have caused no little alarm and most likely an ugly fight that would end with someone dead.

It took her and the crew nearly a half hour to subdue the wild lines, chains, and fasteners being buffeted by the rising wind. Fortunately, the sail in question remained intact, and there was little damage except to a small window in the dining room, which had been smashed.

By the time she was finished dealing with preparations for the coming storm—which had grown uglier and darker on the horizon in concert with the twisting, writhing winds—Arial had been occupied for nearly an hour. During that time, she’d seen neither hide nor hair of St. Albans, which wasn’t a surprise. But she did wonder whether he’d made it unscathed to her cabin or if he’d found another place to hide.

She started to make her way back to her private quarters, then hesitated. The wind was different, and it carried on it ascent that smelled forbidding. The back of her neck prickled as she stood on the high poopdeck, watching as the storm unrolled on the horizon to the west.

She knew theDevil’s Targetwas to the north. Once they reached it, St. Albans would join her crew—well, knowing him, he’d try toleadthem—in taking over the other ship. He was after something called the Svar Medallion, a mystical property that was somehow important to the Dracule.

Arial didn’t care about that. She wanted the spoils from theDevil’s Target—but more than those riches, she wanted revenge on the vampires who sailed on it in the name of Cezar Moldavi.

Moldavi was one of the most hated and feared of the Dracule, as well as those who sailed, traded, and even pirated on the seas. Though Arial hadn’t been to the Far East for over a year, she well knew the trouble and violence Moldavi wrought with all of his spice ships in that area of the world.

But it was when his men had taken over theBonny Lass, the ship her mother had left her, and set fire to it—burning not only the vessel, but all of her crew, with the exception of Bladsoe—that Arial vowed personal vengeance against the man.

Thus, despite her mixed feelings about St. Albans, Arial was more than willing to help him and his friends from London as they worked to destroy—or at least hamper—Cezar Moldavi. And if obtaining the Svar Medallion would disrupt Moldavi, she’d move heaven and earth to help Raine St. Albans do it. Even if it meant risking her peace of mind.

Which having him on board and in her bloody cabin would certainly do.

Arial watched the storm gathering for a moment—sniffing the air, feeling the texture and temperature on her skin, listening to the feel of the ocean below—then made her decision.

With a quick glance around to be certain she was alone and no one was in sight, Arial slipped to the shadowy side of the mizzenmast, closed her eyes, and transformed.

3

Raine didn’t know what possessed him to peek out the window of the captain’s cabin at that very moment, but he was thankful for whatever had caused him to do so.

He saw something that would forever be imprinted on his memory, and etched in his heart as a moment of wonder and awe.

One moment, Arial Bonny stood in a silent, quiet corner of the bow…and the next moment she changed: right before his eyes. The slender, graceful arms flowed into broad wings, feathered in the same array of colors of her hair: black, nut-brown, chestnut, amber, and flecked with bits of white. Her multi-colored braid sleeked into a sheen of feathers, her elegant facial features metamorphosed into a broad, dangerous beak and sharp, sharp dark eyes.

Her lithe body became a tight, powerful torso of muscle beneath more sleek feathers. And, as the night hawk shot from the ship’s bow up into the air, he caught a glimpse of dangerous talons.

But it was the wingspan, the broad, powerful range of those limbs, that made him catch his breath and go still with wonderment.

Graceful, powerful, controlled, feral. Wild.