Free The Wayward One (The De Montforte Brothers Book 5) by Danelle Harmon Page B

most audacious, foolish, and downright reckless captain in your so-called Navy.”
    He simply shrugged and raised a brow, still wearing that faint little smile. He was ignoring her barb and refusing to give it a response. Waiting. Patient in his persistence.
    Damn him.
    She sighed, her gaze on the distant horizon. “I was just thinking about someone I miss,” she said, her pride losing out to the fact that she wanted his attention back after she’d so recently thrown it away. That she wanted him to care. Or that maybe she just needed to talk, to share a bit of her still-healing heart with someone who had pretended to care. Because of course, he didn’t care. He didn’t even know her.
    He leaned down and rested his elbows atop the rail beside her, his hands dangling over the bow-wake as the brig pushed through the seas. He stood closer than she would have liked, but to step away would give him the satisfaction of knowing he was rattling her. She would not give him that.
    He glanced over at her. “Did ye love him?”
    “For a long time.” She smeared her fingers, her delightfully bare fingers, through the fresh droplets of seawater dotting the varnished rail, quelling the urge to touch them to her mouth just to taste the salt. “But what does it matter, now? In the end, some people are not worth the time and heartache we put into even thinking about them, are they, Captain O’ Devir?”
    He remained looking out over the sea. “Indeed not.”
    “I don’t even know why I’m telling you this. I vowed not to speak to you, and here we are conversing like old friends. I am determined to dislike you, no matter how charming you endeavor to be. You abducted me, for heaven’s sake.”
    “If it’s any consolation, it wasn’t in my original plans.”
    “No?”
    “I was actually plannin’ to abduct yer brother. The inventor one who made this innovative new explosive. But I tend to think on me feet and when ye fell, well… I figured ye were the far more advantageous hostage.”
    “You are very naive if you think that.”
    “And you are very naive if ye think otherwise. If yer family loves ye as much as ye claim, yer brother will give me the explosive with no questions asked if only to get ye back safe and sound. If he were here instead, he’d have no reason to. He could hold out as long as he felt like it. But rest assured, Sunshine, I’ll have ye back t’ yer family just as soon as my demands are met. The sooner I get what I crossed an ocean for, the sooner we both can get on with our lives.”
    “Your life won’t be worth living once my brother the duke catches up to you.” She relished the idea of that sweet eventuality. Or told herself she did. “That is, if there’s anything left of you.”
    “Ehm, right.” His lips were twitching. “The one who’s going to strangle me with me own entrails.”
    “I can’t believe you’re not taking me seriously.”
    “Is he a sailor, this fearsome brother of yours, with a ship able to catch this one?”
    “You think it’s funny, do you?”
    “Hilarious, actually.”
    “You won’t be laughing when you’re facing him from the sharp end of a sword. Lucien does not tolerate—”
    There was a sudden cry from above. Turning and looking up, Nerissa sank her fingers into Captain O’ Devir’s arm in horror. One of the men working so high aloft had lost his footing and was now tumbling, down, down, down toward the sea, screaming as he fell.
    “Man overboard!” cried the lookout, high above.
    Before the sailor even landed with a splash in the cresting blue swells, Captain O’ Devir was running to the side. “All men to stations! Hard down! ” he roared.
    The floundering man, helpless, quickly fell astern. The captain grabbed a hammock lashed under the rail and flung it overboard, obviously intending it to float down on the drowning man.
    Chaos erupted as the crew rushed aft, anxious to help the man in the water.
    Captain O’ Devir’s voice pierced the