Free Looking for a Hero by Patti Berg Page A

eyes and hair and innuendoes. Damn, but he unnerved her.
    â€œPlease, Mommy,” Casey begged, trying to tug out of Kate’s grasp. “Don’t leave him alone.”
    â€œHe’s crazy, Case. We don’t need someone like that in our lives.”
    â€œHe’s not crazy,” Casey said adamantly. “He’s a pirate. If Daddy was here, he’d ask him to go home with us.”
    â€œYour father invited home every homeless person he came in contact with. I didn’t mind it when he was around, but I don’t feel comfortable having strangers in the house when just you and I are there.”
    â€œHe won’t hurt us.”
    â€œWe don’t know that, Case. Please, let’s not talk about this anymore. We’ve got to get home. I’msure Evalena’s worried sick about us by now.”
    Casey stopped dead in her tracks, stubborn yet again, and Kate rapidly counted to ten. Patience wasn’t a virtue she possessed, and counting had been a habit since childhood.
    â€œI think he’s scared, Mommy,” Casey said, looking toward the marina.
    Kate didn’t want to look back, but she couldn’t help herself. Casey’s pirate stood like a stalwart statue at the edge of the docks, his arms folded mightily over his chest. He was wearing his blue velvet coat now, even though he’d expressed his desire that she keep it. “To protect your honor, madam,” he’d said. Ha! He sure knew how to play the gentleman, but he was anything but. That was obvious by the way he tucked his cutlass, his dagger, and his pistol under the wide leather belt he wore.
    â€œPlease, Mommy. Let’s go back and help him.”
    â€œHe’s a grown man, Case. I’m sure he can take care of himself.”
    The proof of her words stared her in the face. The usual throng of summer tourists flocked around him, flashing cameras, asking him questions, and he just stood there, as if he owned the world and was afraid of nothing.
    He ignored the people around him, interested in something else entirely, something a good distance away.
    Her .
    Across the heads of women, men, and children, over the occasional car that passed on the streetbetween them, he stared, and she could feel the radiating heat of his one azure eye.
    Her heart beat rapidly. A lump caught in her throat, and she found it difficult to breathe.
    What was he doing to her? Get away , she told herself. Leave. Fast, before his incredibly gifted skills as an actor fool you into believing there’s a nice guy under that scruffy beard and ugly scar .
    â€œCome on, Case,” she said, the tone of her voice offering no room for argument as she tugged Casey up the street. “We’re going home. Mr. Farrell will be perfectly fine now that he’s back in his element. He’s an actor, not a pirate, and right now he’s doing what he does best—entertaining the crowds.”
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    The whole lot of them were mad, inspecting his clothing, his hair, the patch on his eye and the scar down his face.
    â€œWhere’s your parrot, huh?” some nasty street urchin wearing short ragged trousers chortled. “Did you leave him on Treasure Island?”
    â€œLook over here,” a woman called out, as she stuck a black box in front of her face. “Smile.”
    Bloody hell! He would not smile, not for her, not for any of these people milling about. They were strangers, and he was in a world as unfamiliar to him as Queen Anne’s court.
    â€œBe gone, all of you,” he bellowed, but the men, women, and children only laughed, as if he were a jester there for their entertainment. An actor—that’s what Kate had called him. Well, he refusedto act or be the amusement for anyone. He was Morgan Farrell, and for the past six years he’d been commonly known as Black Heart—hero to some, enemy to many.
    He shouldered his way through the crowd, running now in an attempt to catch up with