ANY DUKE IN A STORM

Lust at first sight?

A/N
Welcome to my second chapter! Sorry for the wait! While you read please if you see any mistakes, errors, or something confusing, let me know so I can fix it, so you can have more enjoyable reading experience! With more to come please enjoy

JACK SQUINTED AT THE SHIP'S GRIM QUARTERMASTER who kept looking back toward the wharf as if expecting trouble and wondered if he'd made yet another terrible mistake.

The fact that the second under the ship's captain was a woman had made him falter, but in his unpopular opinion, female smugglers were more than capable of being just as merciless as their male counterparts. Perhaps even more so.

This one had a cutlass and two pistols strapped to her hips, and eyes that were sharp and hard. It had made him worry just a bit. He'd have better odds with a man who could be more easily fooled. Women tended to be more discerning.

Fortuitously or not, she'd hired him-thank you,
charm and false confidence-but only after making him sweat with pointed questions about his experience reading charts and navigational skills.

He was proficient in seafaring but had his own sailing masters on his ships, which meant he was out of practice. Since the only way off this godforsaken island was to board a vessel exiting the harbor in short order, which meant this ship, he'd had no choice but to obfuscate. Jack hadn't even looked at the name of the ship. Then again, that didn't matter.

The only thing that mattered was the fact that it
was leaving. It helped that he was familiar with this particular in let as well as the surrounding seas, at least enough to be hired as a passably competent sailing artist, as the pirates of old
called it. In truth, he did not like navigating in the dead of night there were too many things that could go wrong in the darkness-but a storm was brewing in the winds. He could smell it. Besides, he'd rather be out on the open seas with a chance to outrun a squall than stuck here on a very small island with his uncle who wanted him dead. Pitch was the only one who knew about Jack as ties to Tobago and that from time to time, he dropped off money and supplies to his relatives who lived on the island.

Unfortunately, he hadn't counted on a mutiny...or being thrown into irons the second they'd put into port. He let out a growl. When he got his hands on his treacherous uncle, Jack was going to throttle the man and feed his body to the sharks! He could have boarded either of the two ships at the far end of the harbor-both of which were part of his merchant fleet and belonged to him-but sailing required a capable, and clearly loyal, crew. And the truth was he did not have the time to gather up enough new sailors he could trust to get them safely to sea...at least not here. They were probably all Clayton's men, and by default, his uncle's. Raphael would rather not be tricked and incarcerated again, thank you very much. Live to see another day and all that.

"Merida!"

He frowned as the faint cry reached his ears. Was that a bellow from the dock or the rising wind? A storm was definitely brewing, which made him want to make haste even faster, despite the late hour. He did not want to be stranded because the ship could not leave the inlet due to a reef made
more dangerous by the incoming tide and rougher seas.

"Damn it, Merida, you soulless witch, ease up!"

He frowned. Dieu, that was a voice, not in fact the sound of the billowing wind, and it sounded much closer now. Wasn't the quartermaster called Merida? He strode to the stern where the gangway had been pulled aside and peered into the darkness toward the docks. Though he could barely differentiate between the shadows, one of them seemed to be thicker than the others. Thicker and getting bigger. And person-sized.

What the devil?

Jack barely had time to think before what
looked like a small boy launched himself from the end of the wharf in his direction over six feet of open space. His lips twitched in admiration at the lad's sheer ballocks. Jumping that distance in the dark was no mean feat of courage. Well, it was either courage or madness.