A man never spoke ill of his captain, pirate or no, unless he was prepared to back his words with the might of the crew.

She mussed her red hair with her fingers and flashed a whimsical grin. “We’ve all heard stories about her. What girl doesn’t want to be Kate Lindsay for a little while?

Thinking ahead was too frightening to consider. Is this what it means to be a pirate? she wondered as her gaze swept over a deck full of them.
But she had never truly been one of them. She was their treasure, not their equal. The meaning of her value differed from captor to captor. Griffith saw a wife. Hornigold saw a map to his fortune. Vane saw a hostage to be exchanged.

No matter,” he assured her. “If it’s a concern, you may take me in your mouth.”
Her smile did not falter. “Anything you put in my mouth will not stop short of my stomach.”
“No doubt,” he boasted.
“You miss my meaning.

A very old man once told me a pirate is always chasing after the horizon, fooling himself into believing he can reach it. It might be gold, it might be freedom, it might even be a girl he’s looking to impress. Always it beckons, beautiful and glorious, but no matter how hard a pirate pushes his ship, it remains just out of grasp. The woman who has stolen my cabin, I wager she was Jonathan Griffith’s horizon.

Reassured that we all have balls, gents?” the captain quipped.
Livingston glanced indicatively at the unconscious girl in the shade. “Not so reassured, captain.