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The first time the three of them were together, Will was so drunk
that the next morning he could recall very little of what had gone on. He
collapsed insensate on the smithy floor and awoke suddenly sober, with only
snatches of memories of the previous night. The rain-sweet taste of
Elizabeth's skin. Jack's insistent kisses. And the drawn-out wail
Elizabeth had made, a noise unlike any Will had ever heard from her.
Jack was snoring in his ear, and Elizabeth was pliant and warm on his chest,
but he was too restless to lie there while the others slept. A shaft of
pale light reminded him that the curtains should be shut against prying
eyes. However, once he was at the window, Will forgot about the curtains
and could only look out at the empty street, trying to make sense of what
they'd just done, and how he felt about it. Before long, he felt a heavy
hand on his shoulder. Jack did not speak, but simply took the curtain from
Will's hand and pulled it shut.
When Will broke the silence, his words were unexpected even to himself.
"I'd never thought to do. . .that to Elizabeth."
Jack chuckled. "You like it well enough, don't you? Stands to reason she'd
like it as well."
*
Elizabeth snuck home (using backstreets, and pulling her hood down low over
her face) and locked herself in her bedchamber. Stripping off her ruined
dress and shift, she sat down heavily in the vanity chair and eyed her
reflection. She didn't look any different, regardless of having succumbed
to all her wicked desires and played the whore so wantonly. She should have
been penitent and ashamed, but she was awash in a kind of giddy joy. Her
thighs tightened involuntarily as she remembered that frisson, so
unlike anything she'd known.
In spite of the dour intimations her governess had made about wifely duties,
Elizabeth had found pleasure in Will's bed. And sometimes she'd felt like
she was on the verge of something more, as if she were striving for
something inexpressible and primitive, but she'd never quite understood what
that might be, until the previous night.
Curious as much as anything, she tentatively ran her hands down her body,
stirring a faint echo of what she'd felt the night before. Her memories
guided her hands and she adjusted her touch accordingly - feather light
here, more forceful there, mimicking the cadence of Jack and Will's hands.
At first it seemed ridiculously indecent, but then she remembered that she'd
already crossed the Rubicon; surely touching her own body could be no more
sinful than. . .What? Sharing Will with Jack? Allowing Will and Jack to
share her between them? Whatever it was, she was certain it wasn't what her
governess had meant when she'd told her to lie back and think of England.
Cupping a breast with her hand, she tweaked the nipple, imagining that it
was Will's hand there, as it had been just a few hours before. Her other
hand delved into the slick heat between her legs; she experimented with
different strokes until she found a flickering, fluttering rhythm that made
her nerves sing. She closed her eyes and imagined Jack on his knees before
her, his wild hair brushing her thighs and his mercurial eyes gleaming. Her
fingers sped up of their own accord. Soon, a delicious tension was building
in her stomach, and her breath was coming in short bursts. She clutched her
breast and rolled her nipple between her fingers, then bit her lip as that
sensation crashed over her again.
*
Will insisted on staying at the forge, although Jack made a valiant effort
to persuade him to close the shop for the day, pointing out that his stained
shirt and the strong scent of rum that permeated the air were unlikely to
inspire confidence in prospective customers. Still, the citizens of Port
Royal seemed accustomed to doing business with drunken blacksmiths, so
perhaps Will knew what he was about.
Meanwhile, Jack's business in Port Royal was decidedly not concluded. He'd
planned to spend the day corrupting the town's blacksmith, and he intended
to do just that. And if his luck held true (which it always did in the
end), Jack might have another opportunity to corrupt the blacksmith's wife
as well. And if those opportunities happened to coincide? That would be
the best fortune of all. Whistling merrily, he directed his feet toward the
Turners' backdoor.
He cut through a particularly notorious tavern and skulked through a few
alleys, and in short order found himself in Will and Elizabeth's back
garden. The rose trellis provided a handy means of entry; although the
thorns were nastier than Jack had anticipated, he was soon at eyelevel with
their bedchamber window, where he was greeted by a shocking, if not exactly
unwelcome, image.
Fast learner, he thought to himself, as he peered through the window box of
bedraggled marigolds to get a better look. The night before, Elizabeth had
seemed hardly more than a maid, for all that the technicalities had clearly
been performed. She'd had little knowledge of what sorts of things were
possible between a man and a woman, not to mention a man and a man. But now
she seemed to be discovering all manner of possibilities all on her onesies.
Loose hair spilled over her shoulders and into her face, partially obscuring
her look of fierce concentration. Entranced, Jack cocked his head as she
stiffened and caught her lip between her teeth then crumpled back into the
ornate chair, one hand still playing between her legs. Her ingenuity was
quite inspiring, Jack thought, adjusting his breeches.
The movement must have jostled the trellis in the exact wrong way, because
something under his feet snapped, throwing Jack off balance. He smacked
into the window box with a thud, startling Elizabeth from boneless
relaxation into sheer panic. She screamed, then grabbed her dressing gown
off the back of her chair and threw it over herself.
With a loud crack, the trellis teetered, pulled loose from the wall, and
crashed to the ground. Jack managed to catch himself on the window box
(yowling in a way that some might call undignified), but he could feel it
separating from the wall under his weight. His feet groped frantically for
a toehold. Elizabeth, perhaps realizing that he was perilously close to
falling into the mass of thorns below, ran to the window, trailing the
dressing gown behind her, and threw it open. Jack scrambled in, landing on
top of her.
"What in God's name were you doing out there?" she demanded breathlessly.
Even in his agitated state, Jack noted that her cheeks were flushed from her
earlier exertions and she gave off a heady odor of sweat and musk. Also,
although she was glaring up at him, she'd made no attempt to escape from his
arms.
All thought of his recent predicament forgotten, Jack gave her his sauciest
grin. "I was looking for a safe bolt-hole, seein' as how your husband
insisted on opening his shop for the day, and we agreed that his appointment
with Captain Gillette would be much less eventful if I vacated the
premises." Jack toyed with the sash from her dressing gown, running it
across Elizabeth's ribs teasingly. "The more interesting question, I
believe, is what were you doing?"
*
Gillette arrived for his appointment freshly shaved and looking
distinguished in his new uniform, and wrinkled his nose at the strong smell
of liquor in the air. Will smoothed his hair back and straightened his
coat, and belatedly remembered that he'd been storing Gillette's new sword
at the house, for fear of leaving something so valuable in the shop
overnight. He silently cursed Gillette and his sword, not to mention Jack
and his rum, and wished his head would leave off aching.
"I'd send my apprentice, Captain, but he's still recovering from his broken
leg. I'll have to fetch it myself. Would you like to wait in the-" Will
cut himself off as he remembered the state of the back room. "Here?"
Gillette snorted impatiently and said, "I have an appointment with the
Commodore in half an hour, Turner. I haven't the time for this nonsense.
I'll accompany you and we can settle up there." His lips turned upwards in
a thin smile. "I trust you'll be able to locate it in a timely fashion?"
Biting back a rude retort, Will nodded his assent and set off for home by
the shortest route possible.
*
As irritated as Elizabeth was by Jack's spying, she couldn't help but be
aroused by his presence, so soon after she'd been daydreaming about him.
The worn cloth of his coat was tantalizingly soft against her bare skin, and
when he coaxed her legs apart with his knee, she had to fight the urge to
twine her legs around his and rub herself against him.
"I was. . ." She faltered and tried again. "I've never. . .I wanted to. .
."
"You wanted to see if you could do that for yourself," he finished for her,
nuzzling her sticky hand. "And you’ve found you can, aye?" He paused to
suckle her fingers, watching her through half-lidded eyes. "But I assure
you it's still pleasant to have someone else do it for you." With a
pickpocket's legerdemain, his hand slipped between their bodies, as his
mouth descended upon hers.
His cock-sure attitude raised her hackles, and she resolved to give him a
taste of his own medicine. Inexperienced she might be, but she had learned
some tricks in her marriage bed. Grinding herself against him, she tangled
her fingers in his hair and raked her teeth across his ear lobe until he
groaned desperately. "Outfoxed," he conceded with a wry laugh. "Slow down
sweetheart, there's no need to rush through the preliminaries. . ." Heeding
his own advice, he sat up on his knees and took her foot in his hand,
kissing the arch and then mouthing her ankle, moving upwards with
excruciating slowness.
Her head was spinning and her senses were so overwhelmed that it took her
several minutes to realize that the sound she was hearing was Will calling
her name outside the window. Moving as if she were underwater, she
staggered to her feet and wrapped her dressing gown awkwardly around her.
At the window, she found Will looking up at her and holding a piece of the
broken trellis in his hand.
Standing beside him was Captain Gillette, barely concealing his smirk behind
a faux expression of concern. "Are you well, Mrs. Turner? What the
deuce happened to your trellis?"
Clearly, Gillette had added up Will's slept-in clothes, and Elizabeth's
disheveled appearance and come to a salacious (and admittedly not entirely
incorrect) conclusion. Meanwhile, Will was still blinking at the trellis in
confusion.
Elizabeth's eyes narrowed. She'd never liked Gillette much, and she had no
fondness for gossip and innuendo. "Good morning, Captain." For Jack's
benefit, she hit the title particularly hard. More than her reputation was
at stake here; if Gillette found Jack in her bedchamber, he would surely
hang. In response, Jack ran his boot up her calf in a particularly enticing
way. Contrary man! "I am. . .oh. . .indisposed this morning, I
fear." She kicked his foot away, only to find it replaced with Jack's hot
mouth, trailing wet kisses up to her knee. She gripped the windowsill
tightly, swallowed hard, and continued, "As to the trellis, a strong wind
blew it over. I'm afraid our poor roses are done for."
With a malicious gleam in his eye, Gillette exclaimed. "That's odd! Turner
was just saying that it was undamaged when he left for the forge, and
there's been no wind to speak of all morning. It must have been a very
localized storm. . ." As Gillette droned on about his mother's roses in
Surrey, Jack's tongue darted behind her knee and she shivered. Will's
perplexed look was replaced by one of alarm. "Elizabeth, are you ill?"
Nimble fingers were roaming up her thighs and between her legs, while Jack
continued to nip and lick his way up and down her calf. Elizabeth's poise
was rapidly disintegrating, leaving her weak and breathless. She
concentrated on keeping her face straight, and spoke slowly, praying that
her voice wouldn't betray her. "I have a bit of a chill. I'm afraid I may
be getting the ague." Jack's wet finger slipped backwards to a place
Will had most assuredly never ventured, and the unexpected touch made her
squeak. Will's eyes widened with realization, and he gave Gillette a
sidelong look of panic. Then his gaze returned to Elizabeth, and, to her
surprise, his eyes glittered with a reckless heat that made her pulse race.
As skilled as Jack was, this was lacking an essential component; Elizabeth
was struck with an abject longing for her husband. With the last of her
composure she gasped, "Will? I'm afraid I need you. . .Please hurry! My
apologies, Captain Gillette," and slammed the window shut.
*
The look on Elizabeth's face had opened the floodgates of Will's memory, and
with stunning clarity, he recalled everything that had happened the previous
night. The hair on the back of his neck prickled, and he felt his cock
growing hard. His headache was gone, subsumed in awakening lust. Will
wanted nothing more than to be rid of Gillette and to get his hands on
Elizabeth. Or Jack. Or both of them. He wasn’t picky. "My apologies,
Captain Gillette," he echoed. "I fear my wife is unwell. Let us conclude
this business as quickly as possible."
"Yes." There was an arch note in Gillette's voice that didn't sit well with
Will. "Indeed." He smiled, just a shade contemptuously. "I must be off to
my appointment as well."
Who was this prig to dictate how they ran their marriage? Between
Gillette's prudishness and Jack's licentiousness, Will had no doubt which he
would choose. He wanted nothing to do with this moral flummery. The
revelation was like a clean breath of air after spending too long in the
smoky heat of the forge, and, with a noncommittal noise, Will sloughed off
Gillette's insolence and hurried to find his damned sword.
Although Will's thoughts were on much more pleasant diversions - Jack's
teeth scraping across his jaw, Elizabeth's nails digging into his hips, that
sound she'd made. . .God help him, he had to stop thinking about it
before he embarrassed himself on the storeroom floor - he managed to locate
the sword. Distracted as he was, he was still capable of a passable
flourish when he pulled it from its case for Gillette's approval.
"Fine work. Thank you, Mr. Turner. I have the fee we agreed upon right
here." As Gillette reached for his purse, he said, "I'm sorry for your
troubles," not even bothering to feign sincerity.
Impatience and thwarted desire fueled Will's temper. "Have a care,
Captain-"
Gillette cut him off with a sardonic laugh. "I suppose you should have
expected no better from-" He stopped abruptly when the point of the sword
pricked his neck. A tiny dot of blood appeared and slowly oozed down to the
snowy white expanse of his cravat.
"I said, have a care. I would hate to prove the sword's worth on your
person. Choose your words cautiously."
Gillette's pale face flushed bright red and he tossed the purse at Will.
"You've made your bed, you fool, go lie in it!"
Too far gone to consider his words, Will said, "An excellent suggestion,
sir. Good day!" then shoved the sword at Gillette and shut the door in his
face.
*
By the time Will had managed to get rid of the interfering captain, Jack had
divested himself of boots and clothes and was lounging in the chair with a
lap-full of giggling, squirming girl. He had Elizabeth's hands pinned
behind her back and was nibbling on her lower lip when Will dashed in,
shedding his coat and toeing off his shoes.
"You two," he announced, pulling his shirt over his head, "Will be the death
of me, not to mention the ruin of my business."
Seeing that Will was having trouble unbuttoning his breeches (as would
anyone who was simultaneously trying to undress himself and kiss his wife
senseless), Jack hooked a finger in Will's waistband and began assisting him
with the buttons. "I see your conscience is no longer pricking you so hard.
. .Or perhaps it's merely that your prick is so hard?" This was a purely
rhetorical question, for Jack had sufficient proof at hand to verify the
answer.
Will acknowledged Jack's witticism with a slight roll of the eyes. "I've
decided that I want Elizabeth and I want you, and if you and Elizabeth want
each other, then that just makes it all come out even." He beamed at Jack
brilliantly, obviously pleased with his mathematical solution.
"Clever boy," Jack whispered against his mouth. Figuring a little hands-on
instruction wouldn't go amiss, he took Will's hand and placed it between
Elizabeth's legs, guiding his movements until she turned her head and
stifled a long, low moan against Jack's arm.
When she'd stopped shuddering, she looked up at Will through lowered lashes
and, utterly failing to hide the hoydenish smile teasing at the corners of
her mouth, asked quite demurely what he wanted. Jack couldn't decide if he
or Elizabeth was more shocked by Will's answer, but after a moment's pause,
she tumbled out of Jack's lap and genuflected as gracefully as a nun, which,
since Jack had in fact seen a nun genuflecting under very similar
circumstances, he could say with absolute assurance.
*
At first, Elizabeth was conscious of Will's eyes on her, avidly watching,
but soon she became entirely absorbed in the wet in-and-out slide of skin
against her tongue and lips. Her mouth was full almost to gagging, but Jack
was muttering instructions under his breath, crooning her name and pushing
her hair back away from her face, and somehow that made it easier. She
found if she flicked her tongue just so, the muscles in Jack's legs went
taut, and his voice grew strained. Then she found a fragile rhythm, but
when Will pressed his warmth against her back and thrust into her, she lost
it. Even so, the sloppier suckling kisses made Jack's hips twitch and his
eyes go wide and dark.
Usually, Will was quite silent during the act, but Jack's presence seemed to
have loosed his tongue, and he was using words she'd never heard from him
before -- cock and cunny and arse, fuck and bugger -- a lewd litany of words
she barely knew. The things he was whispering in her ear were scandalous
and thrilling, and suggested that he had given rather more thought to how
three bodies might fit together than Elizabeth might have guessed.
When her jaw began to ache, she pulled away and rested her head on Jack's
thigh. Will reached around and took up where she'd left off, giving Jack's
member long, steady strokes that spoke of familiarity and experience.
Briefly, she wondered how many times Will had been with Jack, but the
question was lost when Jack, his eyes locked behind her on Will, grasped her
shoulder and said, very quietly, "My God." His emission spattered
over her face and she licked her lip tentatively, to an appreciative chuckle
from Jack. "Little minx!" He dabbled his fingers through the liquid and
smoothed it into her skin. "Some women swear by it as a beauty treatment. .
."
He swiped his tongue across Will's hand, eliciting a guttural oath.
Elizabeth followed his example, drawing Will's fingers into her mouth one by
one and sucked them clean. In response, he gathered her in close and sped
up, soon finding his release.
Will laid his head on her back and murmured nearly unintelligible
endearments, squeezing Jack's hand tightly. Just when Elizabeth's knees
were beginning to get stiff and sore, Will seemed to get his second wind,
yanking Jack out of the chair and down on top of them.
Jack turned over onto his back and said, "What was that for?"
"I wanted you down here with us."
"There's a perfectly good bed not four feet from here, what say we retire
there in comfort?"
Will rolled onto Jack with a predatory growl. "I'm sure we'll make it to
the bed eventually. . ."
"Insatiable!" Jack declared, pulling Will down for a kiss.
*
They did eventually find the bed, although by that time they were good for
nothing but an early evening nap. When Will awoke, Jack was sitting on the
edge of the bed pulling on boots. The rain had returned and drummed a
dismal beat on the roof.
"Gone so soon, Jack?" Will asked, speaking softly to avoid waking Elizabeth.
"Aye, lad, the Pearl sails with the tide."
"When will we see you again?"
"I'll be in and out. You can send news care of the Faithful Bride."
Will hesitated. "Jack. . ."
As if he'd heard the unvoiced question, Jack kissed him hard, then, standing
and stamping his foot into his boot, leaned over and kissed Elizabeth's
forehead with surprising gentleness. "Until next time, love," he said
cheerily, then swung himself out the window and up onto the roof, where his
footsteps mingled with the rain and disappeared.
Coda
For the past month, Gillette had been driving himself mad trying to guess
who Mrs. Turner's paramour was. Captain Groves? Lieutenant Harris?
Gillette had even suspected the Commodore briefly, before deciding that he
could never have snuck out of the Turner's house and back to his own in time
for their appointment. Which was a pity, because Gillette would have loved
to have seen Norrington get his own back from the blacksmith.
It had become an idée fixe with him to discover Mrs. Turner's secret,
so it was with great delight that he noticed her missing from the Governor's
ball, along with Harris and Groves. Thanking heaven for his good luck,
Gillette began to search the likely trysting spots. There was no one on the
balcony, nor in the arbor, and when he approached the summerhouse, he
discovered Harris and Groves, locked in a tight clench. They sprang apart
with some shabby excuse about Harris having twisted his ankle. In shock,
Gillette stammered out his apologies and backed away, wishing fervently that
he could forget what he'd just seen. Any sailor knew such things went on,
but Gillette would rather not be burdened with the knowledge that Groves and
Harris were sodomites. And he certainly could have done without the image
of Harris' full lips, red and shining wetly from Groves' kiss, his pink
tongue flitting out. . .Gillette firmly squashed that thought and took
several calming breaths, before returning to the puzzle of Mrs. Turner and
her clandestine romance. The Commodore, he remembered, had also been absent
from the ballroom; clearly Gillette had been right about Norrington after
all.
He was about to abandon his search when he heard a woman's voice crying out
from the shrubbery-walk. It was a clear night, and Mrs. Turner's pale blue
dress gleamed unmistakably in the moonlight. The need to confirm his
suspicions was irresistible, and Gillette moved stealthily down the long
path, until he was standing directly behind Mrs. Turner. Her skirts were
pushed up indecently so that she could straddle her partner, whose face was
buried in her bosom. So intent were they on their wickedness, they never
heard him, and he stood there a moment, transfixed by the urgent sounds Mrs.
Turner was making.
". . .love you. . ." she moaned, and the sincerity in her voice took him
aback. With a delayed compunction, Gillette considered that exposing his
commanding officer was perhaps not the wisest move. But before he could
sneak away, Mrs. Turner screamed, "Oh, Will!" and threw her head back
so that Gillette had quite a clear view of Turner's face, his eyes closed in
an ecstatic expression.
At a loss to explain this development, Gillette turned heel and stalked back
toward the ballroom. At the entrance of the shrubbery-walk, he met
Norrington and the younger Miss Strand, walking arm and arm. Thoroughly
disgruntled, Gillette said, "You'll find it's occupied, as is the
summerhouse. If you truly can't contain yourselves, the arbor was vacant
when last I checked."
Norrington's mouth hung open and he stared at Gillette. "Captain, are you
quite well?"
"Yes, quite. I appear to be the only person in town who hasn't gone mad
with lust!" With that he stormed out of the garden and fairly ran back to
his lodgings.
The brandy he drank before bed did nothing to calm his temper, nor to quell
the disgraceful thoughts that Harris and Groves had put in his head. When
he finally slept, his slumber was troubled by dissolute dreams in which
Lieutenant Harris featured prominently, often wearing Mrs. Turner's blue
gown, which was a perfect match for his cerulean eyes. Upon waking,
Gillette resolved to stay as far away from both Harris and Mrs. Turner as
possible, and vowed that the sooner he could be at sea again, the better.
********
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