Prisoner Princess (Belles & Bullets Book 5) Read online

  PRISONER PRINCESS

  Caylen McQueen

  ©Copyright 2017 Caylen McQueen

  One

  “I'm Francis Doon, by the way. I'm sure you've already figured this out, but you're my prisoner now. Lucky you.”

  Julian flinched at the pirate's words. He'd never been a prisoner before, but he knew it meant the end of his charmed life and philandering ways. He tried to picture himself in a cell, but it was an impossible image to conjure. He didn't have the stomach to imagine it, let alone, live it.

  “Arrest anyone who survived,” Doon barked the order at Bryce as he turned away from Julian. “If anyone resists, you know what to do.”

  Before Doon could walk away, Lettie cried, “Wait!” She boldly seized his arm and tried to pull him back.

  Touching him was a mistake. In a flash, Doon's pistol was raised and pointed at her forehead. When he realized it was a young woman who grabbed him, he slowly lowered his gun. “What do you want?”

  Lettie winced at the hardness of his tone. As much as she hated to be stuck with Julian, she was already starting to wonder if Captain Doon would be worse. “Will you give me a chance to tell you my story? I don't belong here! Julian commandeered my airship and I was taken against my w--”

  “I'm not interested in stories,” Doon said, which won him a few chuckles from his crewmen. “If you want story time, talk to my first mate. She's a lot more patient than I am.”

  “Your first mate is a woman?” As a female captain herself, Lettie was intrigued by the idea of a woman in a position of power.

  “She is, although the title is mostly for show.” Leaning closer to Lettie, Doon lowered his voice and added, “And you mustn't tell her I said that, or I'll never hear the end of it.”

  Mae, who was standing next to Lettie, caught a couple of Doon's pirates gawking at her. She might have been flattered by their attention if not for their stifled chuckles. They were snickering at her, though they tried to hide it. As soon as Mae discovered the reason for their amusement, she gasped. The front of her dress had ripped wide open, and it was caught by a breeze. She assumed it tore when the airship crashed. Sneering at the pirates who mocked her, she grabbed both sides of the split dress and snapped it closed.

  “I'm not supposed to be here either!” Mae told Doon. “Julian was supposed to take me back to the capital, but instead he--”

  “Ladies!” Doon interrupted. “Did you not hear me the first time? I told you to speak to my first mate, Kitt. She'll have a lot more sympathy than me, I'm sure. It'll be her job to decide what to do with you. Right now, we need to focus on getting the prisoners off this airship and into my ga--”

  This time, Doon was interrupted. When he saw the dagger hurtling toward his face, he dodged, but barely. As he leaned backward, the blade lightly grazed his cheek. Before his attacker could strike again, Doon raised his pistol and fired.

  “Jolly!” Julian screamed when he saw his first mate go down. “Jolly... we'd surrendered! Why would you do that? Why?”

  His answer never came, because Jolly was already dead.

  Julian was already on his knees, so he crawled to Jolly's corpse and lifted his first mate's head into his arms. He never appreciated him enough. Julian knew he didn't. Jolly did everything he asked, and he always defended his captain without question. He would have followed Captain Featherstone to the ends of the earth and beyond.

  “The eye patch...” Julian whispered. With a sorrowful sigh, he removed Jolly's green eye patch and stored it in his pocket. He always wanted to ask his first mate if the eye patch had any practical purpose, or if it was merely an intriguing ornament. Now he would never know the truth.

  Julian's heart broke as he lowered Jolly's head to the deck. It was such a crushing loss. He would never find a man more loyal than Jonas “Jolly” St. John.

  As Doon wiped the blood from his cheek, Bryce grabbed Julian's arm and forced him to his feet. “You gotta go to the gaol now,” Bryce somberly told him. “Sorry.”

  Julian and his twelve remaining crewmen, including Wiggly Joe, were escorted to Doon's airship. When he realized how many—or rather, how few—of his men survived the encounter, Julian felt horrible. His greed had sent them to their graves.

  “Hands where I can see them!” yelled Wyatt, who was quickly becoming one of Doon's favorites. The man was short, but intimidating. “If y'all don't have your hands in the air in three seconds, someone's going to get shot!”

  Everyone in Julian's crew raised their arms at once. Wyatt roughly pressed his gun into Julian's spine as he led them to their new quarters: Doon's gaol.

  Captain Featherstone's airship would soon be destroyed by the raging fire that consumed it. There was no salvaging it, and looting would be dangerous, so Doon ordered his crew back to his airship. As soon as they boarded, Kitt rushed toward him.

  “Doon... your cheek! You're wounded!” Kitt gasped. “Are you okay? What happened? I was trying to watch through the spyglass, but I couldn't see everything.”

  His answer was unsurprisingly dismissive. “It's nothing.” When he tried to sidestep her, she jumped in his path.

  “I watched you kill a man.” Kitt didn't sound happy. In fact, her tone was accusatory. “Why do you have to kill so many people?”

  “I killed a man who tried to stab me, Kitt. What did you want me to do? Take him in my arms and thank him for slicing me?”

  Kitt's nose wrinkled at his sarcasm. “No... but did you have to kill him? Sometimes I think you kill too easily, Doon. You killed a lot of men during the attack, too. Don't you ever get tired of it? All the killing?”

  “When it's kill or be killed, it's an easy choice to make.” Doon suddenly raised Kitt's hand to his lips, kissing her palm. “Now... are you finished yelling at me? Because I would like to tend to my wound, if possible. I don't need another scar on my face.”

  “No, I'm not finished!” When Doon started to walk away, Kitt hovered right behind him. “What if these men you kill are actually nice people? What if they have friends? What if they have families? Do you ever stop to think about that?”

  “That's a bit difficult to think about when they're swinging their swords in my face, Kitten.” He thrust a thumb at Lettie and Mae. “These ladies wanted to talk. I told them I'd leave their fates up to you. Goodbye.”

  Doon lengthened his strides and doubled his speed, so unless she sprinted after him, she had to let him go. Sighing, Kitt faced the two women whose fates she was meant to decide. “I'm so sorry about him,” Kitt apologized on the captain's behalf. “To someone who doesn't know him, I'm sure our captain seems incredibly rude, but he's really not that bad.” Not that bad. She was describing the man she loved as not that bad. She felt a bit guilty for downplaying his worth, but at the moment, he didn't deserve a better description.

  “It was sad to see Jolly die...” Lettie's gaze dropped to her feet. “He was hardly my favorite person, and he didn't like me, but I wouldn't have wanted him to die. So I'm glad you stood up for him.”

  “Doon killed a man named Jolly?” Kitt asked with a groan. “That makes me feel even worse!”

  Lettie shrugged. “But he wasn't especially jolly, if it makes you feel any better. Quite the opposite, really. Still... to see someone die in front of me...”

  Kitt's eyes wandered to Mae, who had yet to say a word. When she realized the poor woman was trying to hold her dress together, she told her, “I'll get you some new clothes.”

  “Could you?” Mae chuckled nervously. “That would be great, thanks.” When the airship ascended, the wind was twice as furious. In her ripped dress, it was almost impossible for Mae to maintain her modesty.
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br />   “So...” Kitt's gaze shifted between Lettie and Mae. “Doon said you wanted to talk?”

  Words spilled from Mae's lips first. “I know it sounds crazy, but I was supposed to meet Prince Nico at a pub in the capital. I made the mistake of leaving with Captain Featherstone, and then I got stuck on his airship. Now this happened, and I'm not sure how to get back to the capital and back to the prince. Maybe Nico cares about me... or maybe he doesn't... but either way, I should probably find a way to return.”

  Kitt turned her attention to Lettie. “And you? What's your story?”

  Before she spoke, Lettie raised her chin and readjusted her cravat. “I'm Letitia Rose Jordan, Captain of the Baltmoor Aerial Militia. I was on an important mission when my airship was attacked and taken over by Captain Featherstone. Since then, I've tried to find ways to escape, but to no avail. I finally managed to convince him to give me back my airship... and then he decided to attack Captain Doon as well. And now I'm here.”

  Kitt's eyes narrowed as she studied the ladies' faces. There were parts of both stories that were impossible to believe. Prince Nico? A female captain? Still, Letitia and Mae looked panicked, so she wanted to believe them, if only to make them more comfortable.

  “I'll talk to Doon,” Kitt promised them. “I'll see if I can convince him to drop you off. In the meantime, you should be treated with respect and kindness. If anyone is rude to either of you, don't hesitate to tell me.” She directed her attention to Mae. “Now... if you would like to come with me, I'll get you some clothes.”

  After Kitt and Mae departed, Lettie tried to sort through her thoughts. Doon's first mate seemed kind enough, but was she really in a better place? Julian was supposed to return her airship, but was he telling the truth? If she wanted out of a terrible situation, Lettie could only rely on herself. She could only ever trust herself.

  No matter what, she had to get back to her family and fiance.

  When Lettie closed her eyes, she was haunted by an image of Captain Featherstone, cradling the deceased Jolly's head in his arms. She could see him with his hands in the air and a pistol at his back, on his way to Doon's prison. In some strange way, she felt bad for Julian.

  But not too bad.

  Two

  Julian scrubbed half the deck before his arms started to ache. When he dragged a hand through his messy brown locks, the sticky sweat on his forehead glued his hair to his scalp. It wouldn't have been such an unpleasant task if there was actually a breeze, but it was an uncommonly stifling day. Even on the aft of the airship, there was barely any wind.

  Julian had been tasked with cleaning the entire deck with nothing more than a sponge and bucket. He would have preferred a mop, but that wasn't demeaning enough. The sight of Captain Featherstone, hunched over on his hands and knees, must have been fascinating to Doon, who walked by every once in awhile to bask in Julian's misery.

  Back and forth, back and forth—the scrubbing was endless. At the end of the first hour, his sponge was tearing in the center, which made a difficult task even more challenging.

  “Scrub-scrub-scrubbity scrub...” Julian solemnly sang as he dragged the ripping sponge across the floor. “Wash-wash-wishidy-wash...” He thought a song might pass the time, but his heart wasn't in it. After losing Jolly and a large portion of his crew, Julian's spirits were crushed. And he had no one to blame but himself.

  After a scrubbing marathon, Julian sat up and stretched. When he didn't resume his scrubbing right away, it earned him a disapproving remark from Jared. “Why are you stopping? We haven't got all day, you know.”

  Julian turned around and sneered at the flame-haired youth. His former protege had been asked to guard him, which seemed like a cruel joke. Jared used to swab the deck for him, and now he was scrubbing the deck while Jared watched. Julian was mortified by the reversal of fortune.

  As he sat on his stool, high above Julian, Jared looked like a king—or perhaps a pompous prince. The pistol in his hand was aimed at his former captain, and he had no shame about it. He truly believed Captain Featherstone could benefit from the humbling experience. He needed to learn some humility.

  “Can I have a break?” Julian whimpered at his overlord. “Sweat is seeping into my eyes, my neck is sunburnt, my mouth is dry, my back itches, and my arms are really, really sore. Jared, please let me rest!”

  “I don't know, Captain. I think you should keep working.” Jared winced when he called him Captain. It was a habit he struggled to break. “You're only halfway done, and I already see evidence of a setting sun.” Jared pointed at the golden sky and the rose-colored clouds that dotted it. “I'd rather not be here after dark.”

  “Pleeeeeease, Jared!” Julian pleaded with the younger man. “If you ever had any shred of affection in your heart for me, you'll let me lay down my head for a moment!”

  Jared tapped his pistol against his knee as he considered Julian's request. With a roll of his eyes, he finally agreed, “Fine. But only for a few minutes.”

  “Thank god!” Julian exclaimed as his head dropped to the deck. “I've never been more tired in my life, Jared! Never! Never ever!”

  “That's because you've never experienced a hard day's work.”

  “True, Jared, true. I can't deny that.” Julian whimpered to himself. “If this is to be my life from now on, I don't know if I can bear it! I should probably leap over the side of the airship and end my misery now.”

  Jared shook his head and said, “You wouldn't do that.”

  “You're right, Jared. I wouldn't. I love myself far too much.” Sighing, Julian tossed aside his frayed, filthy sponge. “But if I was forced into this sort of labor every day, I would start to feel the temptation.”

  When Julian closed his eyes, a single word echoed in his mind: temptation. He tried to imagine himself in the arms of a buxom blonde or an exotic widow. Women were his life. How was he supposed to live without them? How many days would he be forced to survive without a lady's soft touch? Julian had been a prisoner for less than twenty-four hours, and he was already in agony.

  Jared allowed him a few minutes of self-pity before he barked at his former captain, “get up!”

  As soon as Julian's eyes opened, he gasped. He was staring directly at the nose of a ragged brown terrier. Alarmed by Julian's alarm, the dog yipped and scampered away.

  “That's Barnabus,” Jared informed him. “And he belongs to Kitt and Captain Doon, so you better be nice to him.”

  “Barnabuuuuus!” Julian opened his arms and tried to call the dog back to him. “Come here, you pwecious puppy! Come here to Julian! Come 'ere, you... come 'ere! Come on!” Barnabus took a few cautious steps in Julian's direction. The dog's gait was somewhat awkward, so Julian had to ask, “What's wrong with him?”

  Jared gave him a short response. “He's got a mechanical leg.”

  “Aww... poor baby.” When the dog was within grabbing range, Julian scooped the animal into his arms and cradled him like an infant. In a singsong voice, he said, “Who's the cutest puppy in the world, huh? You are! Yes... you are!” Julian tapped his nose against the canine's. “Seeing your scruffy wittle face is the best part of my day, little buddy! Of course, you haven't had much competition, but still...”

  “Capt—“ Jared stopped himself, “err... Julian. Will you please put down the dog and get back to work? At this rate, you won't be done with deck swabbing until the stars are out.”

  “Not if I help him.”

  A chorus of angels harmonizing in Julian's head would have been no more beautiful than the female voice he heard. As soon as he saw the lovely, ginger-haired woman standing over him, Julian released Barnabus and focused his attention on the new arrival. “And suddenly, this dog is no longer the highlight of my day. Hello there, beautiful.”

  “I see you found Barnabus.” Kitt reached down to scratch her dog's ears.

  “On the contrary, he found me,” Julian playfully corrected her. “And then you found me. This horrible day is getting better and better, I swea
r.”

  “I don't think we've been properly introduced.” Kitt tucked a mop under her arm as she extended a hand to Captain Featherstone. “I'm Kitt. Well... my name's Catherine Lake, but I prefer Kitt.”

  Julian's hands were filthy after a day of deck scrubbing. He assumed she wanted to shake his hand, but he didn't want to taint her beautiful skin with the muck on his fingers. He was already on his knees, so he awkwardly leaned forward and pressed his lips against her hand. “It's lovely to meet you. I'm Captain Julian Featherstone. And you, my dear, are gorgeous.”

  Kitt shyly twirled a finger around her short red locks. “Well... thank you.”

  “I would do anything for a moment of your company.” A wicked grin flickered across Julian's lips as he basked in the beauty in front of him. “After seeing your face, I suddenly feel a lot less terrible about the last two days. You're a goddess, Miss Lake. And... truth be told, I've always had a weakness for redheads.”

  Ignoring most of what he said, Kitt replied, “You're going to have more than a moment of my company, because I'm going to help you swab the deck. That sponge you're using is horrible. Here.” She thrust a mop at Julian. “Use this.”

  “Oh, darling, you're an angel!” Julian exclaimed, grabbing the mop before she changed her mind. As he rose to his feet, all the bones in his body were snapping and popping in unison. After being on his knees so long, it was a wonder he could stand at all. Julian leaned on the mop, using it for a crutch as he smirked at Kitt. “Now that I get to spend time with you, this is starting to feel like a reward, not a punishment.”

  Kitt's eyes widened. She didn't know how to respond to such excessive flattery. Without saying another word, she dunked her mop in the soapy bucket and proceeded to swab the deck, as she had done so many times before.

  Kitt had restored a fair amount of Julian's energy. As his lethargy faded, he soaked his mop and slapped it against the deck. While whistling merrily, Julian and his mop shuffled across the deck. He tried to stay behind Kitt, because it gave him a chance to secretly admire her derriere.