Despite knowing it was coming, the cannonade made Charlie jump. They were up against a British warship. It brought back all the memories of the day her father was killed.
“Charlie!” Benjy shouted from his position next to one of the cannons. “Do you recognize her?”
Charlie almost asked who before she realized he meant the ship. Was she the same ship? Charlie had been so concerned with running the Arcadia three years ago, she had not taken much time to put to memory the details of the warship that attacked them and killed her father. But she looked more intently at her now. She took the spyglass from Jaxon to get a closer look at the men aboard the warship. She focused in on the quarterdeck. As if she willed it, the man she trained the telescope on, turned toward The Dragon’s Lair. It was him; the man who boarded her ship, only he bore the uniform of captain now as he shouted orders at his crew.
Charlie scanned the deck and found Hugh McNamara tamping a load of gun powder into a cannon. She ran for the boatswain’s locker. A minute later, she emerged with a large megaphone.
“Hugh McNamara!” she shouted at the other ship. “Stop firing at us. We’ve come to rescue you.”
Hugh turned and shielded his eyes from the sun as he searched for the person shouting his name in the midst of a battle.
“It’s me, Charlie Bl—Charlie Sinclair.” Charlie waved one arm wildly to draw his attention to her.
A moment later, Hugh wrested a torch from his crewmate and threw it in the ocean. Within minutes, the crew of the warship was in chaos as they fought each other for control of their ship.
Jaxon gave orders to close the gap between the ships. As soon as they were close enough, the boarding party swung from the yardarms of The Dragon’s Lair to the warship; no small feat considering the size difference between the ships.
Charlie saw the hated captain draw his musketoon and fire into the air and knowing the next shot could be fired at the man who began the melee, Charlie dropped the megaphone and grabbed a rope as it swung back to their ship.
“No!” Jaxon shouted as he realized his wife intended to join the boarding party.
Morty heard the panic in Jaxon’s cry and immediately began to look for Charlie. She swung across to the other ship and she had miscalculated the length of rope needed. Barely able to reach the bottom of the railing Charlie’s hold on the other ship was precarious.
“She can’t swim,” Morty shouted to Jaxon.
Charlie let go of the rope as she struggled to keep her grip and to find footing. She hung by her arms and slowly began pulling herself up until she could get her foot onto the rails’ opening. That was all it took. In seconds, she hefted herself over the rail and onto the deck.
She never boarded an enemy ship before and working her way past the fighting men to the quarterdeck proved difficult. She knew Jaxon would be furious with her, but she felt a burning hatred in the pit of her stomach compelling her toward the man she blamed for her father’s death. She ran up the companionway two steps at a time until she was face to face with the man who had impressed her shipmates. He looked up from reloading his gun when Charlie kicked it out of his hands. Suddenly, she found herself in hand to hand combat with him. His strength was no defense against her speed and technique. She ended his resistance with one last kick to the face that knocked him to the deck.
“Do you remember me?” she shouted at him. “Do you remember me? You killed my father and told me I was all mouth and no trousers!”
The Englishman looked at her face for the first time and nodded. His breath came in pants. “You promised to kill the captain and me if we took you.”
Charlie smiled. He did remember her. “Well, who has no trousers now?”
“You were just a boy. I had no interest in having a boy who still needed his mama to wipe his arse.”
Charlie’s lips curled into a sneer and she laughed. “How does it feel to know a woman just swabbed the deck with your Limey arse?”
She carefully watched the expression on the man’s face as what she said penetrated his brain.
“Charlie!” Jax pushed a man out of the way in his quest to reach her and Morty barreled through a crush of British sailors a few paces behind him. “Thank God, you’re all right. I thought we had an agreement about fighting.” He pulled her into his embrace even as he chastised her.
The fighting died down all over the ship. The Dragon’s Lair had triumphed with the assistance of the men shanghaied from other ship.
“I’m sorry, Jax. I couldn’t help myself. These are the bastards who attacked us.”
Jaxon sighed and shook his head. “Don’t ever scare me like that again,” he said holding her away from him so he could look her in the eyes.