We stood at an impasse, a strait with no outlet that stretched heart beats. Fathoms. Leagues.

Timbers creaked around us. Footsteps groaned overhead. The rumbling of male laughter muffled the soft skittering of a nearby rat. And amid it all, the deep notes of Reynold’s voice commanded the crew to set sail.

A moment later, the thunder of the anchor’s great cable clanked through the hawseholes, and Jade heaved into motion.

Priest’s shapely mouth curved up at one edge.

I went for the compass.

The instant my fingers pushed past his waistband, I felt brass. He jerked back, but I held on, yanking the instrument free as he broke away.

With a triumphant shout, I tucked the treasure safely behind my back and darted around the desk, watching him as carefully as he watched me.

He didn’t chase. Didn’t so much as flinch in anger or grimace in defeat.

His inaction might have put me at ease if the guilt hadn’t remained in his expression. Remorse, apology, and again with the pity—it was all there in his luminous eyes.

Why was he looking at me like—?

Realization dumped ice water into my veins, and I swung the compass into view.

The instrument in my hand was the same size and shape as the one I cherished.

But this one wasn’t mine.

10

“No.” I shook my head and frantically scanned Priest’s rigid stance, even as I knew the compass wasn’t on him. “No, no, no—”

“Shhh.” He held up his hands and took a cautious step forward. “Bennett, listen…”

“Where is it?” A roaring started in my ears, and my heart cracked in my chest. “Tell me!”

“It took me two years to find you, and right now that compass is the only thing stopping you from putting more years between us. I can’t let you do that. You’ve given me no choice.”

Fear and rage burst from my lungs in an earsplitting scream. “What have you done?”

“I’m doing this for us.”

“You’re a dead man!” I hurled the brass impostor at his despicable head.

“Calm down.” He ducked, easily dodging it.

“Spineless dog!” I threw a porcelain platter, and it shattered on the wall behind him. “Heartless fiend!”

“Bennett…” He sidestepped another projectile plate, his reflexes like that of a serpent. Slippery. Venomous. Straight out of hell.

“Tell me where it is!” Blinding hysterics tunneled my vision, ravaging me from all corners and painting the room red. “Right now!”

“Can’t do that, my love.”

I grabbed a bottle of rum from the desk, preparing to fling it next. But as my fingers closed around the glass neck, I remembered my plan.

My breathing tightened with determination. My muscles hardened with focused fury. Where I had compassion for him before, now there was none. I needed him to hurt.