A Most Unusual Interest

A Most Unusual Interest (NC-17)




A Most Unusual Interest Chapter Nine (NC-17)

Disclaimers Apply

 

A/N Foxfeather is a goddess in any universe, LOL. And still a Hamster Witch, Uberbeta and
Prophetic Muse. Readers: Thus begins the sexy bits…

 

 

 



Jack
watched Myrtle sleep with a vague interest.
She was not a bad looking sort… farm thm the first stare of beauty, to
be sure, but not a monkey faced witch either.
She stirred in her unconscious stupor and he twitched, not sure if he
even wanted her awake yet. He needed
time to think, to ponder her very existence.
She was a puzzle, certainly. “A
fine lady such as yerself wantin’ to be a pirate such as myself… Interesting.” His voice slurred softly in the quiet room, the only other sounds
the lap of water against the side of the ship and the men coming and going in
their duties. They had bailed the hold
and patched the hole, but the mast would take more work. Until then, they were virtually dead in the
water. “Where’s this gold of yours, I
wonder?” he mused as he pulled his chair closer to the bunk and peered down at
her. Faint, old scars lined her arms as
if she had once tangled with a rose bush, and a tiny pink one marked the corner
of her left eye. Myrtle had a round
face, pale and golden from time spent genteely in the sun, not dark tan like
Jack’s less protected skin. Her hair
tumbled out of her braid in a dark auburn cloud, red in some lights and
chocolate brown in others. He reached
out and touched her cheek with one finger, unable to stop himself. “Never have touched a fine lady. ‘Lizabeth
doesn’t seem to count somehow.”

Myrtle did
not open her eyes but asked muzzily, “Does Will know?”

Jack fell
backwards out of his chair as he tried to sit up, righting himself with a
modicum of grace. “Not nice to be
surprisin’ a man like that, dove.”

She opened
one pale eye and sighed. “Not nice to
be pawing a lady like that, either.”

Jack
cracked a smile. “Weren’t pawin’, was
it? It was touchin’.”

“I didn’t
give you permission,” she pointed out, opening her other eye. “Where am I?”

“My cabin,
seein’ as yours is no longer fit fer habitation.” He bowed in his seat, his hand over his heart.

“Ah.” She closed her eyes again for a moment and
exhaled noisily. “Yes.”

Jack
frowned slightly. He had been expecting
some outcry of feminine modesty, not calm acceptance. He was almost insulted. “My
cabin,” he repeated.

“Yes, I
understood that. How long have I been
asleep?”

Jack’s
frown became more pronounced. “Hour or
more. Not payin’ much mind to the time
here.”

“Mmm.” She tried to sit up but winced. “What happened? Did I hit my head?”

“Seems you’re
sore from all yer work aboard ship,” he grinned, gently pushing her back down against
the pillow. “You passed out an’ fell
asleep.”

“Right… oh!” She did sit up then, bolt upright, swaying
slightly from the effort. “The man!”

“We be
callin’ him Goliath, on ‘count of his size,” Jack mused, reaching for and not
finding his flask. It was on the table,
across the cabin, but for some reason he was loathe to get up and get it.

Myrtle
followed the direction of his gaze and sighed.
“I’m not going anywhere.”

“Pardon?”

“Your
rum. You want it. Go ahead.”

“You’re not
thinkin’ it’s the devil’s drink then?”

“I think
the devil drinks gin.”

“Gin?” Jack
laughed unexpectedly, rocking back in his chair. “Why gin?”

“I’ve got
my reasons,” she said coolly. “I need
to get up.”

“No, ya don’t,
dove,” he pushed her back again as he spoke, this time holding her down. She was shorter than he but he could feel
the play of unexpected muscles under her thin shirt. “I’m thinkin’ I’m overdue some answers from you.”

“I’m
thinking you know all you need to.”

“What is it
about Goliath that got you all scared?
Other than the obvious, that is.”

Myrtle
stared up at Jack defiantly, her eyes fixed on his dark, kohl-rimmed ones. She inhaled slowly, breathing in the scent
of rum and coconut and sweat and oakum and the very faint tang of salty skin. Her hear skipped unbidden, making her blush
slightly. “Nothing.”

“Liar,” he
said softly, smiling. Her eyes gave her
away, the pale green shifting from his own brown as she tried to look
innocent. “Tell me the truth. You damn near got my ship sunk. I deserve a few ars, rs, dove.”

Myrtle
pressed her lips together and turned her face away. “I can’t explain it. It
must be a dream.”

“Explain
what?” His fingers flexed on her arms
as he shifted his weight, kneeling next to her on the narrow bunk to get more
comfortable.

Myrtle
licked her lips, suddenly aware she seemed to be wearing little more than a man’s
shirt and a rough blanket. Jack was
leaning closer and she became aware of something else, too… She had never
thought much of the fact she was a woman before, mainly because it seemed only
to cause her problems, but with Jack so close, and a pirate at that, the object
of so much interest and dreaming since she was a little girl, she became
painfully, acutely aware that she was female.
“Captain?”

“Call me
Jack,” he murmured, leaning closer. She
was a woman, he reasoned, even if she was a bit of a different kind of
mysterious than she was used to.

“Jack…”

“Yes, dove?”

“I can’t
feel my arms.”

He paused
and then sighed, raising up a bit and slackening his grasp. “Sorry.”

“No, it’s
okay,” she breathed, unable to find a clear thought in her mind other than Jack…Pirate…Close…Closer… Her sister’s voices were faint echoes
chiding her and she held them at bay. Mine, she hissed inwardly. My pirate.

“Myrtle…”

“Yes?”

“What was
it that made you faint?”

She sighed
and closed her eyes. “I can’t say. It would damn an innocent man.”

“No man,”
he murmured, leaning forward again, this time tracing small circles with this
thumbs on her upper arms, “is innocent.”

“Nor are
women.”

“I think
you are very innocent,” he whispered, his mouth close to her ear.

She
shivered, unwilling to open her eyes and see him so close, afraid things were moving
far to fast for her to understand. “Then
you would be very wrong.”

“Somehow, I
doubt that,” he smiled, brushing his lips against the shell of her ear. A strange pang of guilt shot through his
stomach but he brushed it away, calling it indigestion from too much
hardtack.

Myrtle
swallowed a whimper, Jack’s bristles doing nothing to help the fine tickling
sensation his lips produced against her flesh.
“Why do you think me innocent?”

“A fine
lady, playing at pirate…”

“Not all
ladies are fine, Jack, nor are all women ladies.” She opened her eyes to find him staring down at her and her body
moved of it’s own accord. Her fingers
came up and twined in his locks, pulling his face down to hers. Her lips pressed against his fervently and
she could feel his surprise, hear it in the grunt that escaped his throat as
his own lips parted and his tongue darted out to lave her lower lip. Myrtle was out of her depth but she was not
going to let on, if she could help it.

Jack felt
her inexperience in her embrace, the tentative answer to his tongue’s gentle
probing, the tremor in her hands as they came to rest on his face. He told himself to stop for now, to come
back to her later and give her a proper kissing, to show her how to do things
that would please any man but especially him, but he could not bring a halt to
the activities. She shifted beneath him, tilting her head to deepen the kiss
inexpertly. He slid his hand from her
face to her neck, feeling the pulse jumping there, then further, resting on the
slope of her small breast. She made a
startled noise through the kiss but did not push him away or anything else he
expected a lady to do. Rather she arched against him, asking silently for
more. He cupped her, feeling her
hardening nipple against his palm and the warm melting body beneath him. Jack finally broke the kiss, gasping softly
for air. “Myrtle…”

She blinked
up at him, pressing her hand over his, willing him not to move away. “It was Richard.”