Now she knew.

Lying on her back, her body warm with satisfaction, she pressed down on the panic. She had ruined herself. The virtue she had guarded closely for years was now gone forever. She could not retrieve it.

She had tried to remain unmoved when he touched her. She hadn’t wanted to fight him off, only to live for a moment of madness not in the distant, hazy past or the uncertain future, but in the present. She thought she could let herself feel pleasure for that moment.

Instead, she lost control. She had let him into her.

Was this how her mother had begun, with one man? One act? One moment of madness?

What had she done?

“No payment, hm?” he said.

He sat away from her with his back to a tree. In the bluish hue of starlight she could see that he had unbuttoned his waistcoat and untied his neck cloth, and his elbows rested upon his knees. His broad shoulders were rigid.

“That was not intended as payment,” she said. Only the need to experience a moment of danger that had nothing to do with violence or force, but with her need and her desire. “I told you the truth.”

“You might have told me the entire truth.” He was silent a moment. “Why didn’t you stop me?”

She pushed up to sit, combed her hair with her fingers to free it of sand, and began the long process of braiding it again. She could not quite look at him. “I did not want you to stop,” she said to the length of hair in her hands. “I wanted to feel what it would be like.” With him. Something inside her had panicked that she would never see him again and must have something of him to carry with her into the uncertain future. “After tonight and those men . . .” Not only those men. Plenty before. “What happened frightened me.”

“You said I frightened you.” His quiet words were almost lost in the sound of the surf.

“I wanted it to be on my terms.” Her fingers worked the hair swiftly, twisting, binding. “By my choice.”

“I ought to feel used, but in such a noble cause I suppose I cannot.”

“Don’t mock me.”

“Forgive me.”

“You are foolish.”

He came to her and wrapped his palm around the side of her face. His touch was warmer than the night and he brought with him the scents of sea and danger and intoxication. She didn’t need brandy. He made her drunk simply by coming near.

“I am not in the habit of deflowering governesses.”

“I am not in the habit of being deflowered by pirates. Shall we consider it a draw?”

But he did not laugh as she intended. His grip tightened. Where his collar gaped, she saw a man’s body, bone and muscle and skin so unlike hers. Even after everything, the mere sight of him made her feel shaky.

“I must braid my hair now,” she made herself say. “Release me.”

His hand slipped from her and he sat back on his heels. Arabella’s fingers shook but she hid them in her activity.

“Tonight I have done this,” she said, “but tomorrow—”

“Tomorrow is another world,” he said gravely.

She knew his gaze remained on her while she bound her hair securely. The evening air touched her damp neck. The cool and control felt safe and familiar.

“I have not been honest with you,” he said.

She stood, grabbed up her cloak and pulled it about her. “I may have quite recently been a virgin, Captain, but I am not entirely naïve. Men are never honest with women they wish to bed.”

“There is something I must tell—”

“No.” She backed away, her heels sinking in the sand. “You claimed to have no wish to know more about me and I share that sentiment in reverse. Good night, Captain.”

The moon had disappeared, the only light now from the stars and the lamp at the inn’s door. He did not follow her; she knew he would not. He commanded dozens of men and the respect and friendship of naval captains and lords of the realm, but he had never forced her to do what she did not wish to do.

Except sleep in his bed without him.

She strode toward the inn swiftly, pressing down on the rising panic inside her. When she heard the captain’s oath behind her, she imagined he uttered it because of her flight. Then she heard the other men’s voices and knew he had not.

HE HAD NO time to defend himself. His sword and pistol lay in the sand yards away.

But the dagger was in his boot.

It didn’t matter. Just as the crash of the waves had obscured their approach, the darkness obscured sight of them. His thorough bemusement, and simple exhaustion from the beating he’d taken earlier and more recent exertions, ensured his fate. They were upon him before he could react. Two of them seized his arms from behind while the third sprang from the trees to his right. His bruised shoulder lodged an agonizing protest.

A glittering flash of steel cut through the starlight.

The pain was not immediate, only the shock and ice in his gut. He wrenched an arm free and swung out. His fist snapped against a jaw.

Then the pain came, complete and crippling. He doubled over, grappling for his dagger. His fingers grasped it and yanked it free.

Blindly he swiveled, thrust with the dagger, and met flesh. Someone howled. He prayed it wasn’t him.

A woman screamed. His attacker fell back.

Luc struck again.

A boot slammed into his leg. His injured shoulder hit the ground. He could only groan.

The ice slid free of his gut, and his attackers spoke to each other in furtive whispers. Italian.

Then they were gone.

Were they? The darkness enveloped him. The surf lulled. He panted for breath. He tried to move.

Ohh, God.

Right. Stillness was better. Stillness was in fact superb.

He curled around the hole in his belly, pressing inward hard with his knuckles, cursing. He mustn’t bleed to death now, not after all the other injuries and horrors he had sustained and yet survived. To die now would be idiotic.

But after a moment, as the strength went out of his arms and he could no longer even stanch the wound sufficiently, so he found himself bleeding through his fingers, a quick death seemed a perfectly reasonable option.

ARABELLA WAS CLOSE enough to see the men run and to see one of them stumble not far beyond the tent and fall. He did not rise.

She ran forward and threw herself to her knees beside Luc. His face was contorted.

“No.” She grabbed for his arm and drew it back from his waist. He did not resist. His waistcoat and shirt were soaked in blood. No. “No no no.”

She had nothing to halt the bleeding. She pulled his coat aside and searched for a kerchief.

“Now you use your hands on me?” he whispered. “Poor timing.”

“I didn’t know I might not have another opportunity.” Her words caught in her throat. She found his kerchief and pressed it to the darkest patch of blood.

“Not—” His jaw was like a rock. “Not what I had in mind.”

“Be still.” What could she do? The man on the ground beyond the treeline had not moved. But the others might still be close. “You mustn’t speak.”

“Bedwyr,” he said on a tight breath.

“No. Those men will return. I cannot leave you. Where is your sword?”

“Go.”

Biting back on her fear, she ran.

The earl opened the door to his bedchamber bleary-eyed, his shirttail hanging over his breeches and feet bare.

“He is hurt. Badly. You must hurry.”

He went into his chamber and came forth with his boots and a pistol. Pulling on his boots, he gestured down the corridor. “Wake Masinter and Stewart.”

Captain Masinter swung the door open, sword in hand. “Wh-What?” His eyes went wide. “Good God.”

Dr. Stewart’s eyes were shot with red but instantly alert. He grabbed his medical bag off the floor.

They went swiftly and quietly out of the inn along the path to the beach.

Luc lay as she had left him, motionless. But now his face was slack.

“No!” She leaped forward.