As they strode along the main street, he saw the place hadn’t changed much since he was last there. Ramshackle wooden shops stood side by side, with the odd two-story brothel, whores adorning their balconies. Sweaty, tanned men strutted in groups—uniformed in black leather vests, and knee breeches of all sorts. They scowled, the skin around their eyes etched from years of squinting in the blistering sun. Every varlet walked with his shoulders back, resting his hand on the hilt of a cutlass or the handle of a flintlock pistol.

A woman held up a coconut as they passed her stall. “God’s nectar, this is. Only cost ye two pennies.”

Kennan ignored her while Divana tapped his elbow. “What are those?”

“Coconuts.”

“Have ye tried them?”

“Aye.”

“I sure am thirsty.”

He shot her a look. “Wheesht. Remember what I said.”

As they passed stalls with silks, sizzling sticks of pork, and necklaces made from shells, the lass whimpered. But she didn’t speak until a whore called down from a second-story window. “Two shags for the price of one, gov’ner.”

“What’s this? Fresh meat?” said another with a howling laugh.

“Are those jezebels?” Divana asked.

“Pay them no mind,” he grumbled under his breath, wagering every last one of them carried the pox.

“Saint Columba,” she whispered, hastening her step. “We’re certainly nay in Scotland anymore, are we?”

“Are you sorry you came?”

“Och, nay—’tis fascinating.”

After they’d passed through the market, the houses became a tad more respectable looking. But most showed signs of disrepair, even after the year or so since he’d last walked these dirt roads, made white by the sand. He spotted Helen Evans’s house up the hill, not far from the governor’s mansion at the top, which stood in ruins with black soot around its hollow windows.

Kennan’s gut turned over. He didn’t relish a meeting with Helen. They hadn’t parted on good terms after their affair had gone on for too long. He never should have bedded the woman. He’d been heading for Scotland a wealthy man—and she didn’t care to have him leave—or for the fact that he’d earned his fortune. She’d wanted him to join her fleet—become another notch in her bedpost. Fifteen years his senior, the woman preferred men who needed her money, and she expected her lovers to make their home ports in Nassau. Over time Kennan had discovered her affinity for well-bred younger men—and they were in short supply on this godforsaken island.

As Kennan and Divana ascended the wooden steps to the portico, the door opened and they were met with an enormous grin from Helen’s butler. “Hi-hi, boss.” He wore a red coat with gold trim, topped by a crisp linen neckcloth.

“Msizi!” Kennan shook the old African warrior’s weathered hand. “I ought to have known you’d still be here.”