New York Times bestselling author Karen Robards deliciously mixes adventure and romance in her beloved tale of a buccaneer and a convent girl--a romance so magnificent it will make your pulse pound and your heart rejoice. Orphaned heiress Lady Amanda Rose Culver wanted to run from the injured man she found on the rocky shore near her convent school. But his hard-muscled hand stopped her even before she saw the pain and longing in his eyes. And she trembled, not with fear, but with a desire to believe in his story, his innocence, his passion. New World privateer Matt Grayson, unjustly accused of murder by the British Crown, has narrowly escaped hanging. Now his freedom depends on winning this beautiful girl's co-operation so he can sail back to New Orleans. He never meant to hold her captive on his ship. He never meant to fall in love. . . .
Chapter One
It was a perfect day for everything except dying.
Matthew Grayson lifted his face to the bright April sunshine and sniffed
the sweetness of the air, an automatic gesture born of years spent at
sea at the helm of his own ship. In those days -- were they only a few
months ago? -- he had thrived on storms and dangers and challenges of
every sort, thrived on pitting his courage and skill against anything
that sea or sky or man -- or woman -- could throw at them. Grappling
with death had always exhilarated him, making his blood sing with the
sheer joy of being alive. Only now, when death was a grim reality and
not a faceless chimera, had the singing abruptly stopped.
His eyes flickered once in his otherwise carefully expressionless face
as he thought briefly, longingly, of happier days. The first time his
men had seen him laughing at death -- he had been hurling mocking
defiance in the teeth of a killer hurricane that had sunk a hundred
ships from one end of the Atlantic to the other -- they had looked at
one another in quaking disbelief, silently questioning his sanity. Then,
when their own ship, the Lucie Belle, had emerged from the
tempest unscathed, the more superstitious among them had stared
fearfully at their black-haired, swarthy-skinned captain. His teeth were
flashing white in an exultant grin as he worked with unflagging energy
while the crew was ready to drop from the exhaustion of more than
forty-eight hours spent battling the storm. And, one by one, they had
crossed themselves. It was then that the whispers began: Matt Grayson
had made a pact with the devil, had bartered his soul for his own and
his ship's safety. The Lucie Belle was blessed or cursed,
depending on the speaker's point of view.
It was a rumor that Matt did nothing to encourage, but he didn't
discourage it, either, because from then on men lined up in droves to
sail on his ship whenever she docked in her home port of New Orleans.
For every vacancy there were twenty applicants, and Matt liked being
able to pick and choose. He prided himself on having the best crew
afloat, and, in turn, the men prided themselves on their captain's
invincibility. It seemed that nothing could touch Matt Grayson -- not
storms, not bullets, not knives, not even the occasional jealous
husband. Nothing, until the devil was ready to claim his own.
The less superstitious among his crew had another, simpler explanation
for their captain's uncanny ability to bring them safely through the
worst the sea could throw at them. "Those born to be hanged will never
drown" was what they said of him when the ocean rose up in fury and
threatened to crush the LucieBelle's hull like a giant, angry
fist holding an eggshell, only to set her down again safely in calmer
waters some hours later. The saying kept his men from despairing when
the waves were thirty feet high and the sea and the sky met and seethed
like a briny mixture from hell's blackest caldron. Matt, hearing the
words passed like a talisman from man to man, would throw back his head
and laugh in incredulous amazement that grown men, and hardened sea dogs
at that, could take comfort in something so ridiculous.
But he was not laughing today -- had not been laughing for some time
now -- because it looked as if he would, after all, meet the fate the
men had prophesied for him.
A sexy historical classic from Karen Robards--a well-loved writer of contemporary and historical romance.
"Karen [Robards] is one of those writers I buy without needing to read a review."
"By far Ms. Robards's best novel and one that readers will remember for a long time."
Karen lives with her family in Louisville, KY.
