Her Pirate Master (Entwined Fates) Read online

  Entwined Fates:

  HER PIRATE MASTER

  Trista Ann Michaels

  www.loose-id.com

  Entwined Fates: Her Pirate Master

  Copyright © April 2013 by Trista Ann Michaels

  All rights reserved. This copy is intended for the original purchaser of this e-book ONLY. No part of this e-book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without prior written permission from Loose Id LLC. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author's rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  eISBN 9781623003364

  Editor: Jana Armstrong

  Cover Artist: Anne Cain

  Published in the United States of America

  Loose Id LLC

  PO Box 809

  San Francisco CA 94104-0809

  www.loose-id.com

  This e-book is a work of fiction. While reference might be made to actual historical events or existing locations, the names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Warning

  This e-book contains sexually explicit scenes and adult language and may be considered offensive to some readers. Loose Id LLC’s e-books are for sale to adults ONLY, as defined by the laws of the country in which you made your purchase. Please store your files wisely, where they cannot be accessed by under-aged readers.

  * * * *

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  Chapter One

  “Damn it!” Haydrien shouted as he threw the cup against the wall.

  The sound as it shattered and fell to the floor did little to lessen the anger coursing through his veins. His people needed that medicine. He couldn’t afford to keep losing it, nor could he afford to keep losing ships.

  His chest ached for those crew members on that ship. He’d lost enough this way; he hated losing more.

  “Who?” Haydrien asked. His voice cracked under the strain, and he cleared his throat as he turned to face his advisor, Corbin Ness. “Who did it? Who destroyed my ship?”

  Corbin jumped at the sound of Haydrien’s roar, and Haydrien felt a slight twinge of regret for scaring the old man. Corbin had been his father’s advisor. When his father died, Haydrien had been left with a dying people and a faltering economy. The war had done a number on all of them.

  “Captain Jack Marcone,” Corbin replied.

  Haydrien swore under his breath as he began to pace the room. “That captain is becoming a thorn in my side. It’s time I took care of him.”

  “He’s a Marcone, my lord. Surely you’re not thinking—”

  Haydrien scowled at Corbin over his shoulder. He truly did understand Corbin’s concern, but losing shipments like this couldn’t continue. His people were sick. Haydrien couldn’t afford the meds, so he’d reverted to stealing them. He didn’t have a choice, just like he didn’t have a choice when it came to food. The only reason his people hadn’t starved was because he’d stolen everything they needed to stay alive.

  Closing his eyes, Haydrien rotated his head, loosening the kinks in his neck. “I understand your concern, Corbin.”

  “Do you?” Corbin walked around so they faced each other. “Haydrien, going after him is suicide. The Marcone family is more powerful than the senate regent. Don’t be foolish. Approach the senate, beg for assistance—”

  “We tried that route, remember? It didn’t work. The wait was too long, and the sympathy practically nonexistent. We brought it on ourselves. That’s what they said. That war should’ve never gone on as long as it did, and if Father hadn’t died of old age, the damn thing would still be going on.”

  Corbin nodded sadly. “I agree that your father took this too far, but surely there’s something else that can be done. Prowl another sector of the galaxy. Stay away from the main shipping lanes. Avoid Marcone at all costs.”

  “What we need is in the main shipping lanes, Corbin. I can’t prowl, as you put it, anywhere else.”

  Corbin gave him a stern look Haydrien remembered well from his youth. “Then you will run across him, and heaven help you when you do.”

  “I hope to run across him.”

  The door to his sparse suite of offices opened, and his first officer, Lear, walked in. “Am I interrupting something?” he asked.

  Haydrien shook his head. “No. What is it?”

  “The shipment of meds we need has left Rhinari and should be in our area of the shipping lanes within two days. They tried to alter the manifest, but I got a copy of the correct one. There’s more than enough on this shipment to make up for losing the other two. I also used our connections to sabotage the engines. With a ship that size, cunning is more the course here as opposed to brute force.”

  Haydrien nodded. “I agree. Now if we can just keep Marcone from raiding our ships and taking it back.”

  “Well…” Lear said as he shifted. “That shouldn’t be a problem this time. Seems the captain is piloting the shipment himself.”

  Haydrien rubbed his hands together. “Perfect.”

  * * * *

  “Would you please explain to me why we’re taking over this bucket of bolts?”

  Jack Marcone finished tightening the screw that held the computer panel closed before scooting along the floor and sticking her head out from under the panel.

  “Because I want to go home for a little while, and what better way to do that than to agree to take over a shipment of goods to Tilarus? What’s going on, Agnus? You’ve been acting strange all day.”

  Agnus ran a hand down his face in what Jack knew to be a show of frustration. He was one of her grandfather’s oldest friends. Jack considered him like a grandfather as well, but sometimes he could be a little overly dramatic.

  “I have a bad feeling about this,” he said. “I think we should request an escort before we reach the Lingaran sector.”

  “Come on, Agnus. We don’t need an escort,” she said as she climbed from under the counter and set the screwdriver back in the box of tools. “Did you whine this much when my dad and Uncle Sid were working undercover with the rebellion?”

  “They were—”

  Jack scowled. “Don’t you dare tell me they were boys.” Agnus started to say something, but Jack held up her hand. “I mean it. I’ll send you back to Rhinari, and you can find your own way home.”

  “I wasn’t going to say that.”

  With a sigh, Jack leaned her hips against the counter and crossed her arms over her chest. “All right. What?”

  “I’ve heard things about this pirate. You know, the one who was responsible for the theft of the last two shipments you rescued.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “Rescued?”

  “They stole it, and you took it back. From what I understand, it wouldn’t bode well for you if we were captured. He has very…unusual sexual appetites.”

  Jack’s lips twitched. “Don’t most men?”

  But then so did she. She’d fantasized for a long time about being dominated, spanked, punished…ever since she’d gone with a friend to a secret BDSM club a couple of years ago. Some of the things she’d seen had left her hot for weeks. God, if Agnus knew that, it would put him in his grave.

  “What does the dear captain’s sexual app
etites have to do with anything anyway?”

  Agnus growled in agitation as he paced a circle around her. “You’re not taking this seriously.”

  “What on earth makes you think he’s even after me?”

  “I heard some men talking in the bar the night before we left Rhinari. It seems the good pirate is looking for you.”

  Jack shrugged. “So?”

  Agnus sighed. “You can’t seriously be that flippant about this. What if he finds out you’re on this ship?”

  “What would he want with it? The manifest was altered to list things he’s not interested in. Plus my name was left off, leaving the original captain as the one in charge. He would have no reason to even look twice. And if he did, we would handle him.”

  “What we, Jack? There’re a grand total of four of us on this ship.”

  Jack frowned as she watched Agnus pace back and forth. This rumor really had him upset. Was that why he’d asked to come along? Why he’d left Rhinari days earlier than he’d intended?

  “I’m an old man, Jack. I was an old man when I followed your uncle Sidious onto the Prime Minister’s destroyer when he joined the militia. I lied to your grandfather and kept your uncle’s secret of being a mole for the rebellion for years. And I don’t even want to talk about how old your father’s antics made me, breaking into all those damn military complexes to get supplies for the rebels. Now you’re going to finish me off!”

  Reaching out, Jack stopped Agnus in his tracks. He was old. Well over two hundred years, but he still had several decades left. She knew he liked to grumble about the men in her family, but she also knew he loved them all. He didn’t have any children. To him, her father and two uncles were his children, and her grandfather, Damon Marcone, his brother.

  Agnus pulled away and scowled. “Don’t even.” He pointed a finger at her, and Jack had to suppress a grin. “That smile and doe-eyed look might work with all the other men in your family, but damn it, it will not work with me. I’m serious. We have less than a skeleton crew, flying a ship full of supplies that has no weapons to speak of—”

  “It’s a transport ship. It has the bare minimum when it comes to weapons, but we both know that pirate’s ships are old and would be no match even against this relic, and that’s if he attacks. I’m not concerned, and you shouldn’t be either.”

  “This pirate doesn’t use brute force. He uses cunning, and that’s the most dangerous kind. He’ll attack when we least expect it. Then what?”

  “Then we think on our feet.”

  Agnus rolled his eyes and walked away. “Think on our feet, she says,” he grumbled. “I swear I don’t know how her father deals with this. She makes me crazy.”

  Jack chuckled as Agnus continued his tirade most of the way down the hall. Agnus was a great guy but could be incredibly overprotective, especially with the girls in the family. He’d traveled to Rhinari to see her cousin Miya sing with the Rhinarian opera. Miya’s parents, Mikayla and Sid, had decided to stay behind a few days and visit with her, so Agnus had caught a ride home with Jack. In exchange, he’d agreed to act as her first officer so she could give her real first officer some time off.

  She was headed home anyway, so it seemed like a good idea at the time. Now she wasn’t so sure. Agnus was way too worried about this pirate. Had he heard something other than what he was telling her? Sighing, she pushed away from the counter and grabbed the box of tools.

  She’d worked hard to prove she was just as good as the men in her family. She’d even adopted her nickname, Jack, instead of using her birth name, Jacquelyn. Jack was better and sounded more like a guy’s. Matter of fact, a lot of people thought she was a guy until they met her in person.

  Smiling, she remembered the time she’d had to prove she was who she claimed to be. They’d been so excited to learn they were flying with Captain Jack Marcone, only to be disappointed when they realized that Jack was actually a woman. But she’d shown herself worthy and earned the respect of her crew.

  Agnus would learn, just like they had, that she could handle herself.

  Chapter Two

  Jack struggled to decipher the error codes for the now silent engines. This wasn’t good. Floating through space with no power was never a good thing. The temperature inside the ship had already dropped ten degrees. They had maybe three days’ worth of oxygen on board before they all suffocated. Despite being in the main shipping lanes, it could be days before someone ran across them.

  She needed to get this fixed. Without the engine running, they didn’t even have power to open a communication channel. Why the hell didn’t this ship have a backup power supply? What the hell were they thinking?

  Grasping the end of the flashlight between her teeth, Jack loosened the panel covering the engine components. The problem had to be in here somewhere.

  “Jack?” Agnus called.

  She glanced around the panel she was working on toward the beam of light coming from the other end of the room.

  “I’m over here,” she replied around the flashlight and resumed working on the wire connections, making sure they were all secure.

  “Found the problem yet?” he asked as he came closer.

  He reached out and took the flashlight from her mouth and pointed it at the panel.

  “Not yet, but I’ve narrowed it down to something electrical.” She sighed and dropped her hands. “I’m afraid I’m not a mechanic, so I’m just grasping at straws here.”

  “What if we evacuate?”

  She shook her head sadly. “Without power we can’t open the bay doors to get the shuttle out.”

  “What if we blow it up?” Agnus asked.

  “No. There’s too many hydrogen tanks stored down there. The explosion would spread to those tanks, then take us with them.”

  “So we die here slowly or die quickly in a massive explosion?”

  She pursed her lips and nodded. “That about sums it up. Take your pick.”

  “This is ridiculous,” he growled. “Why would they not have a backup?”

  Jack shrugged as she began to again dig through the wires. “I’ve been asking myself that same question for the last ten minutes. Stupidity, funding shortcuts. Who knows?”

  Agnus narrowed his eyes at her. “How can you be so calm?”

  “What am I supposed to do? Go running through the halls like a girl, crying my eyes out that I don’t want to die? How’s that going to get the engines fixed?”

  Agnus sighed. “Point taken.”

  Jack rolled her eyes and tightened the clip holding her hair back. “You just hate the fact I’m not running to you for advice. Admit it.”

  “Yeah, okay. I’ve known you since you were a child.” He adjusted the light so she could continue to check wire connections. “I can’t help it if I still see you as that little twelve-year-old with braids and a penchant for climbing trees.”

  With a smile, Jack tightened a connection and silently prayed that had been the problem. Unfortunately, she doubted it would be that simple. She checked a few more, then tried to reboot the computer.

  Jack sighed when the screen remained blank. Nothing.

  A bang startled them from several feet down the long, dark corridor. Jack and Agnus stared at each other, then looked toward the hall. “Where’s the others?” Jack asked.

  “Morse was in the kitchen, and Kyle in his quarters. I told them to stay there for now till we get this worked out.”

  A light flashed against the hall wall, and Jack frowned. “Looks like they didn’t pay attention to you. We’re in here, guys,” she called out.

  When no one answered, Agnus handed her the flashlight back. “I’ll go see what the hell they’re doing. You keep working on the computer.”

  Jack nodded and returned to troubleshooting the engines. Several seconds passed without a sound. She glanced around the panel toward the hallway that Agnus had walked down. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end, and a shiver of apprehension worked its way up her spine.

&nbs
p; Something was wrong. She could feel it in every nerve of her body. A thud sounded from the dark hallway, then a curse from Agnus. Jack smiled slightly at how foulmouthed Agnus could be when agitated. She started to call out to him, but the second she spotted the strange shadow, she quickly shut her mouth and turned off her flashlight.

  She knew the men on her ship, and the figure standing farther down the hall wasn’t one of her crew. While they were bobbing helpless, someone had boarded them.

  “Who the hell are you?” Agnus demanded as he and the two other crew members were shoved through the opening and into engineering.

  Jack stepped farther into the shadows, cautiously watching. She needed to find out how many there were before foolishly rushing in. Unfortunately the beams of light from their flashlights blinded her.

  She needed to get around them, come in from behind. Was this all of them, or were there more somewhere else in the ship? Jack backed up slowly, working her way through the columns that ran floor to ceiling. Water pipes, exhaust vents, wiring filled these panels, running from the exterior to the engine room, one floor up.

  “Where is he? Where’s Marcone?”

  Jack froze. Why were they looking for her? Was this the pirate that Agnus had been so worried about? Someone stepped from the shadows and into the stream of light. He was tall, probably close to her brother Jonah’s height of six feet four. He had broad shoulders, a trim waist, short dark brown hair that just barely reached his collar, and a carriage that spoke of confidence and power.

  Jack tilted her head to better see around the column in front of her.

  “Haydrien,” someone said.

  The man turned toward her location. She gasped and jerked back behind the column. Her heart raced wildly as she waited to see if he saw her. She could’ve sworn he looked right at her. In her current hiding spot, she wasn’t completely in the dark. It was possible the beam of light illuminated her enough to be seen.

  Damn, damn, damn.

  They blocked her only exit from the room.