Free Caution to the Wind by Mary Jean Adams

makeshift operating room, the captain grabbed Amanda by the front of her shirt. Luckily, Neil had helped her find a solitary corner that morning in which to rebind herself or the captain might have grabbed more than he bargained for. Amanda almost giggled at the thought, but the hard look in his eyes stopped her.
    “Do you know what the penalty is for abandoning your post?” he roared, his face just inches from hers.
    Anger radiated from him like waves of heat from the galley stove. Even though he had pulled her up so that the tips of her toes scarcely brushed his leather boots, she still had to peer up at him to meet his gaze. She wanted to look away but, like looking into the eyes of a wild animal, it seemed more dangerous to take her eyes off him than to meet his golden glare.
    A thin layer of soot covered the angles of his face, and his hair, damp with sweat, curled about his ears. He had discarded both neck stock and coat during the battle, and his shirt lay open to the middle of his breastbone revealing the thick mat of dark hair that covered more hard angles.
    He smelled wonderful, Amanda thought, surprising herself with the inappropriate reflection. She had been around enough sweat-soaked farm hands to know that men didn’t always smell great after working hard, but his scent held an intoxicating mix of spice and sea air. She inhaled deeply, letting his essence sink into her.
    When she tried to refocus her attention, a dark slash of soot over the planes of one cheek captured her attention. She reached up to wipe the smudge away with her thumb.
    The captain jerked his head away when the soft pad of her thumb made the briefest of contact with the day’s worth of stubble on his cheek. Amanda yanked her hand back, knowing in an instant that she had given herself away. Her eyes shut and fingers curled into a ball against her chest, she waited for him to condemn her actions.
    Several long, silent moments passed.
    Amanda cracked open one eye, then the other. Something in the captain had changed. His brows were still dark slashes, but the rest of his face had softened into something that more closely resembled confusion. He no longer stared at her eyes, but at her lips.
    Was something amiss with her lips? Amanda licked the dry chapped skin. The captain’s gold eyes followed the sweep of her tongue, and he pulled her closer, as though to inspect her thoroughness.
    “Captain, please don’t be angry.” Simon’s voice was a jolting reminder that they had an audience, and both Amanda and the captain swung their heads to look at him.
    “Please don’t be angry,” Simon said again, casting a quick glance at Amanda, “at the boy. He was fixing me up while the Doc was helpin’ them fellas who was hurt worse than me.”
    “Fixing you up?” The captain eyed Simon, but didn’t release Amanda.
    After a quick scan of the sailor’s stitched wound, he set her feet back on the floor. Amanda wobbled, thankful he still held her in his grip. It would be a moment before her knees would support her.
    “Yes, sir. After Doc removed the splinter and cleaned me up, the boy did the stitchin’. I have to say, I’ve gotten stitches from near on a dozen doctors. They all hurt worse than this. He was real…delicate.”
    Delicate ? Amanda cringed at the feminine description of her work that she would have taken to be a compliment only a few weeks ago. The captain released her, and she tugged her shirt back in place. No boy should ever be called delicate.
    The doctor and the captain leaned over the man’s leg. The doctor peered through his spectacles, and the captain glared at the stitches as though he could unravel them with his gaze and prove their unworthiness.
    Finally, the doctor straightened up and gave her a thoughtful appraisal. “You learned to sew from your mother?”
    “Yes, sir. She wanted a girl and…”
    The captain raised one dark eyebrow, ending her story. Amanda had the distinct impression he did not care to hear the