Prize of My Heart

Brogan nodded, hoping he had finally caught her ear. “The schooner Black Eagle, with a crew of forty-two and guns of two six-pounders and three twelves, all waiting to sail. One half of the net proceeds from her prizes goes to the vessel’s owner. The other half belongs to the crew. Of that, I shall receive twenty-two shares. That’s very generous. This venture could prove quite prosperous. For all of us.”


Her bitter laugh slashed through his pain with the sting of a whiplash. “Don’t be a fool, Brogan. We are ‘us’ no longer. You shall not see the boy again. And don’t mistake me for ignorant, because I assure you—I am not. Your missions grow more dangerous each time you sail. In truth, there is no prosperity in your future. I hold little hope of my husband returning with his life. Besides, money had nothing to do with my decision. I parted with the brat because I couldn’t bear the sight of him any longer. The foul stench of his soiled napkins and those infernal cries waking me in the middle of the night. His birth is a mishap I am well rid of.”

Brogan advanced on her. Her pupils widened, reflecting her sudden fear and the fire blazing from his own eyes. In one swift movement he reached for the front of her dressing gown and pulled her to her feet. She shrieked while somewhere on the garment a rip sounded.

“You are still my wife and you will do as I say. Give me the name of the man who has Benjamin.” He bellowed the demand in her face, then clasped her by the shoulders while from beneath clenched teeth he threatened, “Tell me or I swear I shall—”

“You shall what?” Her eyes challenged him to execute the deed in his thoughts.

Once he had loved this woman for the child she gave him. Now he despised her for taking him away. Still, she was Benjamin’s mother.

His hands fell from her body. Abigail smiled in victory. They both knew he would never harm a woman.

“Why are you doing this, Abigail?” She had him between wind and water, a vulnerable position if he ever hoped to see his son again. “Have mercy. Your own flesh and blood. He’s an innocent child. How can you speak such evil?” He breathed deeply, ignoring her insults and fighting for control as he prayed against hope he’d find the right words to inspire some compassion. “Justify your actions as you see fit, but I cannot abandon my own son. I will not. He’s all I have. If you care nothing for Ben yourself, then why deny him a father who loves him?”

Why indeed?

Today he had come hailing the greatest news of his career, but all his accomplishments and success meant nothing without Benjamin. Twenty-three years of age and he had been advanced to captain . . . captain . . . captain . . .

“Captain. Captain, wake up!”

Brogan’s eyes flashed open with a start. He lay frozen and disoriented, while above him a woman’s features penetrated his drowsy fog. Abigail?

He bolted upright, heart lurching, his chest heaving. At the foot of his bed a shadowy figure held a lantern aloft, blinding him with its golden glare. “Tell me where he is,” Brogan rasped. “Where’s Benjamin?”

“I am here,” returned a child’s sweet voice.

“Ben,” he whispered as relief eased his racing heart.

Brogan felt a woman’s touch on his arm. “Captain, are you ill? He’s warm and his nightshirt is soaked with sweat,” she said, brushing the hair from his forehead. “Warrick, fetch him a tumbler of water.”

Eyes heavy with sleep, Brogan blinked, fighting off the stupor until he’d oriented himself to his surroundings. He took a deep breath and realized he sat within the large box-framed bed of his cabin. Moonlight shone between the damask curtains like a pearl, spreading the faintest illumination across Lorena’s—not Abigail’s—features as she stood beside the bed, eyeing him. Slowly he roused to the smells of new wood, clean linens, and tallow from the lantern’s candle. A lantern held by his chief mate, Jabez Smith.

The sea rolled in a long, low swell, lifting the Yankee Heart, then carefully easing her down again. As his eyes adjusted, Brogan looked with annoyance at the gawking faces about him and suffered no small measure of self-consciousness.

Reaching down, he clutched the sheets snug about his waist.

“Mr. Smith, for what reason are you gathered in my sleeping cabin at such an hour?”

“You were moaning and cried out in your sleep,” Lorena was quick to explain. “We all heard you, didn’t we, Mr. Smith?”

Brogan’s heart thumped wildly as Lorena’s gaze found the jagged raised scar on his right shoulder. His nightshirt had twisted around him and slipped off one shoulder, he realized. He quickly covered himself, but not before he caught her pitiful wince.

As her eyes found his, she suffered embarrassment over her scrutiny and promptly retreated to stand alongside Drew, as though suddenly aware of the intimacy. In the lantern’s light, her springy ginger-brown curls reflected subtle tints of auburn and gilt. They fell loose about her small face and down across her shoulders as she stared back at him, disarmed.

Brogan quickly diverted his attention to Jabez. “There was no need to come running. I am not a child.”

“And yet ye have little trouble screaming like one.”

His young steward Warrick let slip a snicker.

Lorena gave him a sharp look. “The water, please, Warrick.”

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