His to Hold (Regency Scoundrels Book 1) Read Online Free

way toward his head.
    “Christ’s teeth, woman, you are pushing me toward the brink!” She stilled for just a moment, and then resumed her struggling.
    “Well, that’s bloody good for me, then!” Her voice was laced with hard-edged malice, and he nearly dropped her at the intensity of it. To think that she was the same tame and timid creature, he had fallen in love with at Lady Belmont’s Ball. Apparently, she acted much differently when under the watchful eyes of her aunt.
    “I wouldn’t be saying that. In case you still haven’t figured out who I am, then you will be discovering one of my identities in due course. And, I will not be surprised if you faint dead away.”
    “I have a strong constitution, sir. I do not faint like so many of my sister women.”
    “Aye, and I’m a bloody saint!” he snorted, and then grunted when her elbow slammed into his gut. He stepped onto the plank leading up to The Valiant , and caught the perceptive eye of his cook. His men were singing shanties while they went about their work.
    “Welcome aboard, Captain,” his cook said, eyeing Elizabeth with inquiring eyes. He puffed on the pipe he held in his heads, and silently sized Elizabeth up. “I take it, that she’s the booty we came for?” Seamus Riley’s Limerick accent was thick, and sometimes hard to understand, but this time Mallory understood him completely.
    “Aye,” he answered, earning a reprieve from Elizabeth’s magnificent struggles, when she stopped to inspect Seamus.
    “You are an Irishman,” she declared, seemingly perplexed.
    “Aye, an’ you are an uppity young miss,” Seamus rebutted, “Captain, you’re going to have a time of it with this one, she looks like trouble,” he said, chuckling as he left the deck to go down into the galley.
    “Do you always speak so eloquently?” Mallory asked, as one of his men handed him some rope.
    He placed Elizabeth down on her feet, and pulled her hands out in front of her. Her reticule still hung around her wrist. He slipped it off her wrist, and tied her hands together.
    She was nearly spitting molten fire now, and he was enjoying every moment of it. He dragged her down to her cabin. Pushing her into it, he slammed the door, and locked it. Tucking the key back into his pocket, he opened the reticule, and peered inside.
    Hells Bells, but the woman confounded him. Nestled safely inside of her reticule was a small pistol, the sort that was made just for a lady.
     

Chapter Two
     
    Elizabeth paced the cabin restlessly. By the looks of things, her blond Adonis’s men had already filled Captain Treacher’s cabin with their captain’s belongings.
    Blast the man!
    She had to find out what his Christian name was. Either that or she had to continue searching her tired brain for his identity. She knew she’d met him at some previous time, and it was not as one of her father’s employees. All that she had to do was hit the nail on the head.
    You must think, Elizabeth. Just think!
    Searching her mind, she turned around to walk the length of the cabin. She was pacing, a sure sign that he had affected her deeply. She chewed on her lower lip, and glanced down at the rope that was tied around her wrists.
    Arching her eyebrow, she tried to fight against the bonds. She let out a shocked gasp, when the ropes slithered away from her wrist, at the teeniest of tugs.
    “Well, I’ll be damned!” Pitching the rope across the cabin, she stalked toward the door.
    This time when she placed her hands on him, she’d make sure that some bodily damage was done. She stopped mid-step, and reached out with her extraordinarily perceptive hearing.
    Voices murmured right outside of the cabin. She recognized the one voice as her bloody kidnapper. The other voice, however, was one she did not recognize.
    “I hope she’s worth it, Captain,” The foreign voice said in a barely audible tone.
    “Oh, she’s well worth it,” Rafe answered.
    So that was her captor’s name.
    “Rafe.” She