Free Once Upon a Midnight Sea by Ava Bradley

enjoying it, he thought. But not aboard Lady Luck.
    "As I said before, I'll not be put off my own ship."
    He started over.
    "Stealing the Lady Luck does not make her yours in the eyes of the law," she said quickly. "So it does not in mine, either."
    He sighed and turned away. It was useless to argue, and pointless. Christian was allowing himself to be distracted from the true goal.
    "Why are we moving so slowly?" he asked with more irritation than he'd intended. The heiress riled him, to be sure. "I thought the Baltimore Clippers were the fastest ships ever made."
    "She is only as fast as the wind that fills her sails," Adriana snapped. "If you have a timetable, perhaps you should have stolen a steamer."
    "Had your father built one, perhaps I would have."
    She glanced at him fleetingly, as though she found looking at him unpleasant.
    He glanced up to see Ollie scrambling through the rigging, adjusting something here and another thing there in the incomprehensible tangle that made up the ship's mechanics.
    "Henri said you are to explain the rigging." Christian waited. When she ignored him, he stepped closer. He took a deep breath, searching for the right words. Adriana glanced at him fleetingly with raised eyebrows, as if she expected he would attack her. Her hands tightened on the spoke handles of the enormous wheel she used to steer the ship.
    "Perhaps Henri was right," he started. The words lodged in his throat, thick and bitter. "I have placed you in a difficult situation. I do not mean to make you uncomfortable. It is your father with whom I am at odds."
    She lifted her chin. "I embody everything he stands for. You said so yourself."
    Christian ground his teeth. "I was hasty." He grumbled a sigh. "I'll not deny that I despise your lifestyle. That you flourish while most around you suffer. You truly have no idea how hard life is for those who do not exist in your silver and fine china world, do you?"
    He didn't give her a chance to argue. "But my dispute is not with you. I would like to arrange a truce."
    "I shall enter no truce with the likes of you."
    "I guarantee, heiress, it shall be a miserable journey if we do not."
    She pursed her lips again, staring daggers at him. Her hands clenched the spoke handles until her knuckles turned white.
    "For the benefit of the others around us, if nothing else." He forced a charming smile, which went ignored. Seducing her would be harder than he'd anticipated, but the challenge only electrified him.
    Adriana turned her gaze out to sea and sighed. "Very well. I do not wish to upset the others any more than they have been already."
    He offered his hand. Adriana's eyes grew wide. She stared at him as if he possessed the devil's clawed paw. Resignedly she accepted. Her hand was soft and small in his grip, warm and gentle, yet capable of commanding this immense ship. As if she were a bolt of lightning, her touch made his entire body jolt.
    She jerked her hand away. "You must answer me one question. Why we make this journey? What awaits you in South America?"
    Christian crossed his arms over his chest. "Why, my father, of course."
    "I do not understand." Her brow furrowed. "Do you expect the French government will simply release him to you because you ask it?"
    "Of course not." The heiress was truly naive. "I intend to take him by force."
    She gasped and took a step back. "You are mad! No one has ever escaped from Devil's Island."
    "That is what the French authorities want you to believe," he growled. "Even if it were true, should I let that stop me from attempting to rescue my father? Tell me this–what would you do, heiress, if it were your father unjustly imprisoned?"
    Her mouth snapped shut and the cold anger returned to her expression. "First of all, my father would truly have to be the jewel thief you claim him to be, which he is not. That is why it is not he that is behind bars. Secondly, you have as much as admitted your father is the thief who stole India's Midnight. It sounds to