His Lover from Long Ago: A Time Travel Romance Read online

  A trap.

  They should’ve brought more than two men to catch him. In an instant, Griffin twisted the neck cloth again, and gave Tobias a hard kick when he made a half-hearted attempt to intervene. Tobias doubled over, wheezing and clutching his groin.

  “Who sent you?” Griffin demanded, but he’d incapacitated his traitorous crewman too much to get an answer. He turned his attention to the courier, twisting the cloth again. “Who sent you?”

  “Lady Vivien,” the man gasped. “She said it was good news.”

  “You lie.” Griffin held him the few seconds that it took for the man to pass out, then dropped him to the floor to lie with the patrons who had passed out from the night’s drinking.

  There were surely more conspirators lying in wait outside the door, ready for a signal that it was time to close in on their prey. Griffin looked at the faces of the sleeping men around him, but none were from his own crew, none were men he could rouse to fight by his side.

  Well, then, if Griffin couldn’t find any of his own men to fight beside him, he’d have all the men in the tavern fight each other.

  “Wake up, you dogs.” Griffin headed for the window, placing judicious kicks on the hindquarters of every man he passed. “Awake. Awake. He took your money.” He knocked over a table, sending its pewter mugs crashing onto the men passed out below. “He stole your girl. You sorry dogs, wake up.”

  By the time Griffin made it to the window, men were flailing about, trying to get their bearings—and throwing punches at anyone else who moved just to be safe. As chaos grew, Griffin eased out the window, dropped to the cobblestones below, and ran for the skiff.

  He had to get back to his ship. That had been no attempted kidnapping. It was known that he had no family to pay a ransom. They’d only thought to delay him, perhaps celebrate a phony marriage with too much drink. Tobias must have been paid handsomely to get Griffin off the ship and out of someone’s way, someone who was aboard his ship right this very second.

  Kayna!

  The captain’s quarters always held the most prized valuables. Someone had wanted Griffin out of the way while he ransacked the cabin. When that man found Kayna...

  The familiar rush of victory from winning a fight plummeted into a sick feeling in his stomach, the fear so strong it nearly doubled him over to retch.

  He could not stop, only barely slowed to hammer his fist on the shutters of every tavern and brothel he passed, calling for his crew. “Redemption! To the Redemption, men. To arms!” He heard the pounding of feet behind him, and prayed they were his own men’s.

  He didn’t dare slow to find out. He jumped into the first skiff he came to and began rowing, urgency overriding his fear. He’d left only a few men on board to stand watch. He had to get to Kayna.

  The Redemption sat at anchor, too quiet. He glided the last feet to its bow, and scaled the anchor chain silently. The first man he encountered was a lookout, dressed all in black. This was a well-planned robbery, then, relying on trickery in the tavern, relying on stealth to invade the ship. Griffin preferred the openness of battle. Most pirates did.

  These were not pirates; these were thieves. Griffin captured the man from behind and bent him backwards over the railing. “Where are my men?”

  “Below, sir. Bound and gagged. I didn’t kill no one. Those were me orders.”

  “Whose orders? Who sent you?”

  “A lady. That’s all I know. Mercy, sir, I pray you.”

  Griffin threw the man over the side without slitting his throat first, which was all the mercy he could spare as he ran for his cabin. The door was locked, the sturdiest bloody door on the ship, and Kayna was locked behind it with a thief. It had been his fear from the first night, that he wouldn’t be able to get to her if she needed him. Like hell, I wouldn’t, he’d thought so arrogantly, I’d tear the door down myself.

  He did now, grabbing a musket and pummeling the latch, chipping away at the surrounding wood until he could kick the door in. With an explosion of splinters, he stumbled into his own cabin.

  “One more step, I’ll shoot her dead.” The man in black had a pistol pointed directly at Kayna.

  Kayna stood by the screen, resplendent in red, her arm pointing straight at the thief, a pistol in her own hand. “No, I shoot you dead.”

  The thief sighed. “My, what a feisty little thing you’ve been keeping in your cabin, Griffin dear.”

  Good God. It was no man, but a woman in breeches. The courier in the tavern hadn’t lied. “Vivien. By the saints, lower your weapon.”

  “Oh, I don’t think I will. Your paramour seems quite willing to shoot me if I give her the chance.”

  The stand-off continued for an eternal second longer, and then Griffin did the only thing he could think to do. He raised his hands in surrender, and stepped squarely between the two women.

  Immediately, Kayna lowered her pistol, unwilling to point a gun at him. Vivien had no such qualms.

  Kayna stood tall in that regal way she had and inclined her head ever so slightly to address Vivien. “You shoot him, I shoot you.”

  “Understood. We’d be at an impasse now, except for one thing.” Vivien reached into her belt and pulled out another pistol. She aimed it at Kayna. “I can shoot you both at the same time. Now, I really must be going. I’ve got nearly everything I came for, except for a certain ruby my dear fiancé described in such detail in his proposal.”

  “You came for the jewels?” Griffin was stunned. “They are already legally yours. You didn’t have to steal them. They’ll hang you for this.”

  “Only if they catch me.”

  “Why risk it?” He risked taking a step closer to her, to keep himself between her pistols and Kayna. “I’ll be in London within days, and I’ll deliver the jewels to you there myself.”

  “And then what? We get married and live happily ever after? Will you be my loving husband, and I your wife?”

  He heard Kayna move behind him. Vivien stepped to one side to keep her in her sights. “Is that news to you, princess? Don’t worry. I won’t marry him. I refuse to marry him.” Her sharp gaze darted from Kayna back to him, too alert for Griffin to make a move. Yet.

  He kept talking, waiting for his opening. “I was not aware you had changed your mind, madam.”

  “I didn’t change it. I’ve never wanted to marry you. I answered you every time with an impossible requirement, but you were too thick-headed to take the hint.”

  “Then it’s fortunate that proxy was a fake.”

  She smiled with false sweetness. “I just wanted you to spend a pleasant evening thinking you’d gotten what you wanted, while I came here to take what I wanted. Now, where is that ruby?”

  Vivien had already tossed the cabin thoroughly. Every drawer and cabinet hung open. His books were scattered on the floor, and she’d dumped his maps out of their cases. But most significantly, the barrel they’d been using as a chair had been split apart. The chest of jewels that had been hidden inside now sat open, its contents gone. No doubt they filled the black sack she wore strapped to her back.

  “I’d say you got more than enough.” He took a step closer, willing Kayna not to follow.

  “I need that ruby, damn it. I found the silver stag you described, but I need its ruby.”

  The furs and pillows had all been tossed to the floor. If she hadn’t found the ruby, then that meant only one thing: Kayna had it. It was probably in the pocket of her robe. There was nowhere else for it to be.

  He could not let a thief search Kayna at the point of a loaded and unreliable flintlock. He took another step toward Vivien.

  “I don’t want to shoot you, Griffin. Please.” The plea sounded genuine, the first crack in her devil-may-care tone, but her aim did not waiver.

  He tried to sound as if he were far more sympathetic than he could possibly feel toward a woman threatening to kill Kayna. “We can work this out without anyone getting shot—or hung from an executioner’s noose. You’ll be happy to know I was comi
ng to London to break the engagement.”

  “You were?” She blinked—but her pistols stayed steady.

  He sketched her a brief bow. “Entirely my fault. My heart belongs to another woman, as you can see. My jewels, however, will still be given to you. By law. I have no intention of spending a year or more on land to drag this through the London courts. They would decide in your favor, and rightfully so. Put down the gun, so we can congratulate each other on both getting what we wanted tonight.”

  He’d shocked her. She clearly had not considered this possibility. He pressed his advantage. “Come, I will escort you and your jewels back to your father.”

  She pointed both pistols at him. “You stupid, stupid man. You cannot force me to return. This is my escape.”

  He looked over the barrels of both guns to see the desperation in her eyes. “Your escape from what?”

  “You don’t know my father. No one does. I could not sit and wait for my fate any longer. I could not be locked away for the rest of my life. I had to do something. This is my chance, my only chance. I need that ruby.”

  “I don’t understand.” Griffin took another step, to the side this time, so the pistols that were trained on him would be pointing farther from Kayna.

  Vivien cocked both pistols. “Do you understand this?”

  “Stop that.” Kayna commanded their attention. She held up the ruby between finger and thumb, letting the lightning and moonlight illuminate its red depths. “This is the ruby.”

  Vivien’s eyes went wide, her attention diverted for that split second Griffin had been waiting for. He swung his forearm up to knock the pistols away from his face. One fired into the ceiling. Through sulfur and smoke, he grabbed Vivien’s wrists and twisted her arms up behind her back, the sack of gold and jewels making a metallic sound between her back and his chest as she writhed to break his hold.

  “Let go of me,” she cried, but a woman who’d spent her life sitting in parlors was no match for him.

  His ears were ringing from the shot, but he heard not-too-distant shouts through the open door. The crewmen he’d managed to rouse in town must have borrowed or stolen a longboat and were drawing near. Good men.

  “Everything is all right,” Kayna said.

  God, yes, and Griffin felt the rush of relief. Vivien had not shot the love of his life before his eyes—but God knew she could have, and Griffin hardened his heart against her desperate attempts to twist free.

  “Everything is all right,” Kayna repeated gently, and she laid her hand on Vivien’s shoulder.

  Vivien went still with surprise. Griffin was equally shocked at Kayna’s comforting gesture.

  “The jewels are on a quest?” Kayna asked.

  “What?” Vivien asked, breathless.

  “You said, ‘I could not be locked away for the rest of my life. I had to do something.’ A quest?”

  “There are no quests today,” Griffin said to Kayna, as gently as he could. “This is not like Camelot. Vivien is no knight.”

  Kayna considered his words, and Griffin could have kissed the wrinkle in her forehead that meant she was concentrating on saying everything correctly. Thank God she was alive.

  “I am no knight,” she said, “yet on a quest I was sent.”

  They heard the distinct sound of wood bumping against wood, a longboat’s oars tapping the side of the ship. Sailors called for the boarding ladders to be lowered. There was no answer—Griffin’s watch was bound and gagged—but the crew would soon row to the anchor chains and scale them as he had.

  Vivien twisted to look up at him, and the expression on her face was one of animal terror, as if she were facing her death.

  She was. The law would convict and execute her for thievery. Griffin swallowed down his own bile at her fate; she’d had a loaded pistol pointed at Kayna just minutes ago.

  “Let me go. I did not kill anyone.”

  “You had a gun at my lady’s head.”

  “But I didn’t kill her. I could have, and I didn’t. At least let my men go.”

  “How many of my men did they kill?”

  “None. How many of my men did you kill?”

  “Did the one who was on watch at the anchor know how to swim?”

  “Y-yes. I think so.”

  “Then I killed none.” He shifted his grip on her wrists. Even now, he could not find it in him to inflict more pain on her than was necessary. “If your men have not already abandoned ship, they have no sense. I would not worry about them, if I were you.”

  She stood quietly a moment. “They’ll hang me, Griffin.”

  He’d survived as a sailor and pirate too many years to flinch outwardly, but inside, he recoiled at the idea of a woman he’d once touched being hung. It was not a pretty death, but it was the risk she’d had to have known she was taking when she’d made her plans to rob him blind.

  “I’m begging you, let me go. I’ll give you all your jewels back.”

  “How generous of you.”

  “Only let me keep the ruby. Give me the ruby and let me go, and you’ll never hear from me again.”

  With her quiet voice, Kayna commanded her attention again. “Why the ruby?”

  “It will buy me a ship.”

  Griffin shook his head sharply at Kayna. “It will not. ’Tis not so precious as that.”

  “It is to someone,” Vivien insisted. “My father has connections everywhere. He wasted no time in sending out your jewel descriptions. An old gentleman from Rome has a ship to trade, but only for this particular ruby. Very interessante, no? I paid a call on the Maestro, flattered the lecherous old fool over a cup of tea, and convinced him that it did not matter who gave him the ruby, just as long as he got it.”

  Griffin grimaced inwardly at the knowledge that he’d once been as susceptible to her flattery as the old man. “What do you want with a ship?”

  “I’m going to become a pirate. There’s room for one more along the Spanish Main, because some fool gave up his freedom for letters of marque to win a lady’s title. Don’t try to convince me it was to win my heart. And I know there are female pirates, so don’t bother telling me I can’t command a ship.”

  “You know nothing about sailing. You’ll be lost at sea. You’ll drown.”

  “I’ll hang if you don’t let me go.”

  Kayna stepped back and lifted her chin. “Let her go.”

  That Queen Guinevere thing Kayna did made him feel instinctively that he should not question her. Besides, it might damn his soul to let a criminal go unpunished, but he didn’t have the stomach to see Vivien twist at the end of an executioner’s rope. Griffin kicked the pistols under the bed, and let her go.

  She rubbed her wrists, then held out her palm in demand. “The ruby.”

  Griffin saw red. “You go too far. You’re lucky to leave with your life.”

  “Maestro Merlini wants that ruby. I want that ship.”

  Merlini.

  Kayna’s smile was as brilliant as a flash of lightning. She kissed the ruby, and held it out. Vivien hesitated, perhaps stunned that her reckless plan was about to become reality, but Kayna picked up her hand and pressed the ruby into it.

  “A gift of love. Go on your quest.”

  Vivien very nearly curtsied.

  Griffin could hear his men coming aboard. The first were over the side. Ladders were being thrown down.

  “You have perhaps ten seconds,” Griffin said. “Do you swim?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then I suggest you dive off the starboard side.” As Vivien bolted for the door, Griffin offered his arm to Kayna. She took his elbow with a smile, and together they stepped over the broken door and onto the deck.

  The splash of a woman diving into the water was music to Griffin’s ears. He was a free man.

  “Man overboard!” a sailor called.

  Griffin countermanded the crewman’s cry before anyone could run from port to starboard. “Avast, mates. That’s one person who does not want to be rescued. Besides, we�
�ve already fished our mermaid from the sea.” He bowed over Kayna’s hand, a proper courtesy to the daughter of Sir Kay.

  He felt buoyant, like he could float in the night sky. Legally, he was free from the proposal he’d so foolishly made, but it was more than that. He was free to pursue the life he wanted instead of the life others had planned for him years ago. He did not want a title and he did not want an estate, but he did want to have a family again, one that would begin with the woman of his choice.

  Since the only woman he would ever choose was standing right beside him, he saw no need to delay happiness. Within seconds of being freed from an engagement to the wrong woman, he dropped down on bended knee to bind himself in an engagement to the right one.

  His quest was over. It was time to begin living happily ever after.

  Epilogue

  Kayna knew her future was bright.

  The storm had passed. The door to the cabin had been patched well enough for the night. The old watch had been released from their ropes and gags, and a new watch of twice as many men now patrolled the decks. The sea was as smooth as glass, and the ship herself sat drowsily at anchor. Kayna felt perfectly safe as she lay in the bed with her cheek resting on Griffin’s strong chest.

  The cabin was still a mess, but Kayna had returned all the maps to their cases. One of the books had been damaged, pages torn completely away by the heel of a boot. It was lucky for Vivien that Kayna had not realized it earlier, or she might not have been so forgiving of the woman who could have taken away her future with a squeeze of a trigger.

  Griffin was her future—and her pillow. Kayna lay quietly and listened to his heart beat.

  He drew a lazy pattern on her bare shoulder with his fingers. “I warned Terrence that if he apologized again tomorrow for failing to single-handedly defend the ship against a band of thieves, I would leave him in Portsmouth.”