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“We’re all villains in Nassau. Don’t think because you’re new you’re any different.”
Jack hated how Woodes Rogers had simply quirked an eyebrow and turned on his heel, dismissing the notion entirely.
The governor’s knuckles had rapped on the door and a man in English colors unbolted it from the outside. Daylight filtered in around the man’s silhouette and Jack had turned his attention to the only other source of light. The window above him, bright with the sun glinting off of Nassau’s beaches, was a spotlight on the cold, damp floor around him.
Now, it was sundown. Two candles burned. Hours passed. He couldn’t keep track of it in this place— lightheaded, parched. The mice endured his speeches.
Footsteps in the hallway stirred him from his restless attempt to catch some shut-eye. It was futile anyway. The heavy lock on his door scraped its inner mechanisms until the final clang. The rusty hinges squealed as it swung, revealing torchlight from the corridor.
Max’s silhouette was a different shape now than months ago, but she was unmistakable. Her hair was pinned back, rather than flowing, and her skirt was longer, fuller. When he first saw this new version of her, that eventful morning in the governor’s office, he could hardly tear his eyes away from her perfect chameleon skin of civilization.
The door fell shut behind her.
“I need to speak with you.”
“Taking turns now?” It was too much effort to dull the blade of his tone. “Spare me your insight. Your governor has given me more than enough to chew on today.”
The set line of her mouth did not budge. Her hands, clasped in front of her, parted only to lift the hem of her skirt as she stepped forward. “The governor’s terms have been altered. You will not be exchanged for the gold, but they will retrieve it.”
“Sorry?” Jack was entirely awake now. “Given the slim chance that Anne would even exchange the cache, the governor’s brilliant new plan is to deceive her?”
“I am as displeased as you are, but—” Another thought started and stopped on her tongue. “The decision has been made. That is all I can say.”
Jack stared at her, cold and steady. “Really? That’s all you can say?”
“Yes.”
“Well, that’s just splendid.” He rubbed his eye again. “And you’re relaying this news to me because…?”
Her jaw clenched. A cold front carried her voice. “Today’s events could have been avoided had you chosen differently. Had your message been genuine and we arranged this transaction sooner, I may have found a way to return you to her.”
His single, joyless laugh echoed. “Ah, so it's my fault? Right. Scold me. I’d nearly forgotten: the governor is Christ and I am merely a vessel for all unholy temptations.” He nodded expectantly. “I suppose, it must be second nature to blame me for every setback, what with all of the practice you’ve had.”
“You think today was easy for me?” Rage burned in her steadily raising voice. “You broke what could have easily been fixed. I saw Anne’s face as she learned of your punishment. Now she will assign this betrayal to me. You put me in that position—”
“You told her?” Jack’s eyes found her solidly, jostling his restraints. “Just—one moment. Just so I have this straight: the words, ‘they’re torturing poor Jack— oh, please, Anne, do betray him,’ came from your mouth?” His head thunked back against the wall. “God must have a sense of humor.”
“Jack,” Max said, low but sharp. “You want to believe I am villainous for what I have done, fine, but I am allowed to do the same. You would see all of the work I have put into this place burned, just to satisfy your selfish needs.” Her voice didn’t shake but a light of something unsteady flickered in her eye. “You saw what I grew from this dead husk of a place. You would let it die again?”
“Awfully familiar.” His voice rang with insincere marvel. “Your work? The growth of this place? Darling, if I wanted to speak with Eleanor Guthrie, I’d send for her.”
Max did not wince like he’d hoped she would.
“You had Anne,” she began, “you had the cache, and yet you returned, because even that was not enough. You sit here and pray for horror upon Nassau to embolden your name, and you think Woodes Rogers is the plague of this place?”
“You’re damn right I do.”
Their eyes held. A mouse chittered as it darted from the corner of the room.
“You betrayed Nassau.”
“You betrayed Anne,” he snapped.
Just like that, all that lingered of the day’s warmth vanished through cracks in the stone. Max swallowed and the hard line of her mouth remained.
Jack leaned forward, his fist resting on his knee.
“I was there, you know. I remember what it was like to watch her disappear into your room and learn something about herself. I remember her asking me to watch her back with you—whatever the fuck that means—and thinking, well, this is going to bite me in arse. But she grew. Who cares fuck-all about Nassau? She was more herself than she’d ever been. Not my wife, sure, but I felt like I could finally reach her.” He closed his eyes tight for a moment. “Stupidly, blinded by hubris perhaps, I thought I could reach you.” They opened again. “You may resent it now, but we became something, the three of us. Partners. More.”
His pause dared her to speak, to deny him. She only stared back.
The chain from his wrist rattled when he moved. “Whatever it was, it was something, until, lo and behold, the perpetual thorns in my fucking side!” He sank back, gesturing upward, to the outside world. “It is always the fucking gold and the fucking Guthries. If I had a Spanish warship for every time they’ve fucked me…” He blew out a gust of expressive air. “Darling, I’d have a Goddamn navy. It is truly a marvel that Nassau still employs a brothel.”
Unsteadily, Max began, “Eleanor—”
“Eleanor had you crawling back as if your name was Charles Vane.” He sat back against the hard stone. Some of the malice left his voice and all that remained was stern certainty. “Anne trusted you— found herself in you, and you… spat in her face. You chose the side that would deceive and degrade her.” He shook his head. “Whatever trust you may have built with her will be gone by sunrise, if it isn’t gone already, and let me be the first to tell you: it would take one hell of a grovel to even begin to earn it back.”
Droplets of water slid down the jagged walls. The mice were quiet, watching from the shadows. Jack could almost hear Max’s breath as she stood across the cell, stiff in the candle light.
Her voice cut through, purposefully toneless. “What makes you think I want it back?”
The sound Jack made was too quiet to be a laugh, too harsh a breath, too empty. “You know that won't work on me.”
A strand of Max’s hair came loose from her pins, straying as a single coil across her cheek. She didn’t brush it aside. Her forming tears caught flickers of candlelight, but she blinked them away.
“I did not come to scold you,” she resigned. “We will get the cache. She will lose you. She will blame me. I am preparing myself because I know it is inevitable.” Her eyes flicked away, up to the window. “You ask why I am here? I believed you could try to understand my actions today. I believed, perhaps, the mind we once shared may not be gone entirely.” He watched her hitch her skirt. “I will not make that mistake again.”
The rough grip of Jack’s chains made him wince.
“She’ll never give you the cache,” he called out as she knocked on the door. “A bit of advice for your governor: once she knows it’s a trick, he’ll need an army to take it from her.” His glare followed her. “Surely, you knew that already. Didn’t you?”
The door swung shut. Its heavy locks set into place and, in the span of a moment, Jack’s darkened cell was quieter than the eye of a storm.