Paid to the Pirate by Una Rohr

Chapter 29

Charlotte

Ifloated in a sea of rapture. Colt wrapped his arms around me as we lay naked together in his bed. Everything ached deliciously. Even my heart.

“Tell me true,” Colt whispered in my ear. His scruff scraped my cheek. “Don’t play the lady. For one moment, drop the act.”

My stomach fluttered at the vulnerability in Colt’s gravelly voice. It was strange coming from such a powerful man. Eyes so black, reputation so cruel. He didn’t have to do anything to intimidate anyone, he could merely appear and a person knew they were in the presence of someone to be reckoned with.

“I am begging you, Charlotte. Not as your captain, not as your punisher.”

I held my breath as I awaited his next words.

“But as a man who’s been longing for truth from you for years. As the man who’s been trying to get past your walls for ages,” Colt pled. “Do you forgive me for what I’ve done to you?”

My heart thumped in my breast. Forgive him? I didn’t know how to explain that not only did I forgive him his past treatment -- however many punishments I’d suffered under his hands -- I welcomed them now. I loved them. Even when I hated them. Whatever Colt saw in me all those years ago… he knew before I did.

“I more than forgive you,” I whispered. “I understand. I understand why you did what you did.”

Colt’s entire body relaxed, as if he’d been carrying the tension for a lifetime. Which might have been the case.

“Do you forgive me?” I asked, eyes wide. “For not understanding before?”

Colt’s arms tightened around me. “There’s nothing to forgive. Everything is as it should be. As it was meant to be.”

My heart thumped wildly at his words and I looked up into those black, bottomless eyes. Colt was wild and I must be wild as well, for what I was about to say.

“I love you,” I whispered, swallowing the lump in my throat. “I don’t know when I fell in love with you. But I know that I do.” I chewed my lip before continuing. “Do you think you could… love me, as well?”

Colt’s thumb swept my cheekbone. “Charlotte, I’ve been in love with you for years.”

My breath came out in a rush, along with tears of joy. “Since when?” I laughed.

Colt shook his head, laughing. “I don’t know. Maybe since I first saw you strung to the whipping mast and knew I could.”

Mention of a whipping mast made me shiver. I bore no marks. I hadn’t been whipped. At least, not enough to scar. So what had happened? I badly wanted to ask Colt about it, but every question I formed in my mind gave me away.

I knew that I was running out of time and that Colt would eventually insist I confess about my supposed thievery… and murder.

But the last thing I wanted to do when we’d just found each other was to push him away by admitting I’d been conducting a ruse since I’d stepped aboard this ship.

I just needed a little more time, I reasoned.

A few days, maybe a week.

Maybe some miracle would happen before then.