Rescued by the Buccaneer Read Online Free Page B

haze of morning. She trudged back to the tiny room that served as her cell and quietly opened the door, moonbeams spotlighting Humphrey’s round face. In that light he appeared almost kind, slumber softening his rough features, and she smiled to herself. With that silvery beard, he looked more like Father Christmas than the marauding devil that he was.
    She closed the door and lay down next to his slumbering frame on her pallet. Sleep overtook her the instant her head hit the hard ground.

Chapter Four
     
     
    He opened his eyes, the sluicing of the ocean against his legs reminding the man where he was. He floated along in the ocean on a small raft he’d constructed from remnants of the rudder that had once belonged to his beloved ship, the Ocean’s Knave . The raft was large enough to keep him afloat but small enough that some parts of his body hung over into the water. He stretched his arms above his head and thought about how lucky he was not to be dead.
    The day before, he and his men had engaged in a sea battle in which the Ocean’s Knave had been damaged. During the skirmish he had been forced to jump in the water to avoid canon fire, and in the midst of a battle, his crew had been unable to rescue him. While he’d hoped the Ocean’s Knave would search for him, he knew it was unlikely to occur as her steering would be impaired after losing her rudder. Gregarious by nature, he despised being alone and came to the realization that for him, the lack of companionship was the worst part of his predicament.
    He’d grown accustomed to the ache in his belly, the hunger sending him into a strangely peaceful place. It was the wound in his arm that gnawed at him. During the battle that had separated him from his ship, the naval officer had sliced him up pretty good along the left bicep. The entry point still seeped blood, and while it might not have initially been a mortal strike, if the lesion started to fester, it could mean trouble.
    The only possessions he had with him were a bottle of rum, his weapons, a compass, a handful of tools, and the clothes on his back. Had the rum been plentiful, he’d have cleaned the wound with it. Instead he decided to drink it; thirst would do him in before blood poisoning had the chance.
    Gaston Galette wrapped his lips around the bottle of rum and felt them crack. He was tempted to lick them, but he knew better. Shaking the bottle, he concluded only two, maybe three slugs remained. Once that was gone, he’d be out of drink entirely and the unremitting, all-consuming thirst would set in. That’s when being surrounded by undrinkable water would become pure torture. He had endured that earthly hell before, and barring death by shark, he’d endure it again and soon.
    When the sun went down that night, the sea breeze blew over his skin, covering his forearms with gooseflesh. Nights on shark watch were always the longest, his heart alternating between racing and threatening to stop whenever his fear gripped him the tightest. His perpetually flexed muscles poised on the edge of his makeshift raft, his well-honed fight or flight instinct was controlled by an itchy hair trigger, ready to go off at any moment.
    In the morning when the demons slunk back to the deep, he collapsed from exhaustion. His body felt like it was made of rubber, his eyelids heavy as anvils. If he didn’t know he was close to the Jamaican isles, he’d have been more nervous, but he’d reviewed the charts two days prior. Years of navigation experience told him that he was drifting in some of the most well-traveled sea lanes in the Caribbean, and he was optimistic another ship would happen by.
    He prayed it would be the right ship and that they would find him before the sharks got him. The night before he’d shivered all night as the creatures with the dead eyes danced gracefully around him, their protruding fins shining in the moonlight.
    The sun’s rays had burned his flesh that first day, so he tried to cover the