Redeeming the Pirate - A Pirates and Petticoats Novel by Chloe Flowers Book Tour and Giveaway :)
Redeeming the Pirate
A
Pirates and Petticoats Novel
by
Chloe Flowers
Genre:
Women's
Action & Adventure Historical Romance
15%
PROFITS FUND BREAST CANCER FUNDING @NBCF
He
steals for the French crown.She heals for the Catholic church
He will heal her heart.She will steal his.
French
Privateer, Captain Drago
Gamponetti is
given one final mission from his employer, the king of France:
reclaim religious relics from a New Orleans cathedral and bring them
back. Trouble begins when he's forced by a mysterious, veiled,
novitiate nun to swear on the Bible to protect the very items he was
instructed to steal.
Worse,
60 British warships have amassed in Negril Bay, Jamaica, preparing to
attack New Orleans. He must retrieve the sacred relics before the
British arrive and seize the city.
Novitiate
nun and healer, Eva
Trudeau has
secrets, and hides more than her face behind the veil. The convent
has been her safe haven since she crawled, beaten and bloody, to its
door nine years ago. When an old enemy re-surfaces and threatens to
drag her back into the dark underworld from where she’d escaped,
both she and her dark pirate captain stand to lose everything they’ve
fought so hard to protect...including each other.
Either
commit treason or betray the woman he secretly loves. Betraying one
sends him to the guillotine, the other straight to hell.
This
series is about spirited, independent women and rakish bad boy
pirates, wrapped up in women's action and adventure sea stories. If
you enjoy romantic action and adventure, action and action and
adventure romance fiction, historical romance or women's fiction,
you'll love the Pirates & Petticoats series.
He
shifted. The angle of his head gave her a full view of both narrowed
silver eyes. “Why are you so eager to return?”
Before
she could answer, the captain’s shoulders tensed and his
attention whipped around to focus to the right of the trail
ahead. Broad leafy shadows crossed the moonlit path. Nothing moved,
no sounds.
No
noises at all.
No
beetles buzzing, no night creatures rustling in the underbrush, no
chirping tree frogs. Her lungs tightened. Jamaica wasn’t without
its dangerous beasts, both human and animal.
“What
is it?” she whispered, gripping the edge of the cart seat,
staring wildly into the dense flora.
“We’re
being watched.” Easing a pistol from his belt with one hand,
he pulled the reins with the other. The mule’s ears twitched; he
stopped abruptly, attention forward, listening. The captain spoke in
a low voice. “Easy.”
A
lone figure stood on the trail a few yards ahead of them. “Why you
be travelin’ dis time o’ night, Sistah Eva? You gots troubles?”
She
slumped with relief. Miss Kalia. Next to her, the captain
froze, his hands gripping the reins as if they kept him from falling
into a burning pit of lava.
“I’m
taking a sick child to the caves.”
“Girl-child
then. Who wit you?”
She
swallowed. The premonition. “Capitaine Gamponetti.”
Kalia
grinned then cackled a short laugh. “Ah, yes, yes. Last
time him saw I, him come from da red house.
Long night wit da rum. Bad day next, eh Drago?”
The
captain turned to granite beside her, likely embarrassed (as well he
should be) that Miss Kalia had seen him leaving a brothel. Eva chewed
her lip. Maybe she misread the man. Allowed desperation to dictate
her impressions.
The
old woman approached the wagon, swaying like seaweed with the tide,
perhaps due to aching joints, but on a night like this, it was
bewitching and unnerving, like an adder mesmerizing prey. The
moonlight subdued her brightly patched skirt into shades of
grayish-reds, greens, blues, and yellows. Colorful feathers poked out
in every direction from the silver hair piled high on her head. A
streak of white paint trailed from one ear, ran along her jawline,
across her chin, ending at her other ear like a gruesome grin. Eva
fought the strong desire to squirm closer to the pirate for
protection. That would give her as much reassurance as jumping from
an alligator’s jaws to a lion’s mouth.
Kalia
hummed as she peered over the side at Jacqueline. “T’ought so.
Eva, see I in a vision just now. Surrounded by thunder and
frost, perched next to a jaguar black as night. Woke I wide up.”
Before she could respond, the woman scampered up into the
wagon bed bringing with her a strong tang of wood smoke.
Julian
didn’t take his eyes from her but still leaned away as she bent
over his sister. She placed her palm against the girl’s cheek, her
brown hand contrasting sharply with the pale skin, even though it was
still flushed with fever. She tilted Jacqueline’s head back,
pressed her chin down to open her mouth. Sniffed her breath.
Unsure
what to say or do, Eva dragged her gaze from the old woman to the
captain. How long had those two known each other? His storm
gray eyes followed the crone’s every move.
Miss
Kalia hopped down and slipped to Eva’s side. The old woman grasped
her hand and pressed a cluster of herbs against her clammy palm. “Her
need dis. It make best tea for dee girl. Him,”
she nodded toward Captain Gamponetti and lowered her voice
until it was barely there. “Him must to drink
dis.” She caught her gaze and held it, as she slid a small
flask under the herbs. “Den dat what you want by him,
you get.”
Eva
shoved them into her bag, afraid to refuse them, and unsure of what
else to do or say.
The
old Jamaican woman stepped back from the wagon and lifted both hands
in farewell. Or some sort of blessing?
Maybe
a curse?
A
white witch. A “good” witch, if there was such a thing.
Sister Beatrice would say there was not. But Eva had seen
too many things to denounce anything outright. There was no
telling what spell Kalia incanted or bestowed upon them. The pirate
slapped the reins and clucked the mule forward, none too soon.
As
they passed, Kalia spoke again, but this time to him, her voice both
smoky and chiseled, eyes black and white. “Change in de wind,
Drago. Time come near for you to make a choice. Choose wrong way
and die. Before de tree flowers bloom, you betray an ally and aide a
foe…break a vow. Light beckons you, but de dark always a
seductress.” Her wild stare locked with Eva’s. “Which voice
will him follow? Him heart or him head?”
Tension
radiated from the captain in waves of heat. Kalia had managed to
slither past his, steely, rugged aura to poke the tiniest gap between
courage and unease. The muscles in his jaw tightened, but he did not
look at the old woman as they passed.
“I…I
don’t know how to answer her question.” Eva looked over
her shoulder, but the witch had disappeared. An awkward silence
followed. The jungle remained paralyzed for several minutes.
He could have
taken Jacqueline to Kalia, but he didn’t. Most island people would
have sought the Obeah healer first. She peered at him again,
understanding now why he hadn’t. A rigidity thrummed through his
broad shoulders; he had a flare in his nostrils, a fierce glint in
his eyes.
Then it hit
her; she terrified him. Her curiosity flared. “Have you been
acquainted with her long?”
The
captain released a long breath. “Everyone knows Kalia.
And Kalia knows everyone.” A wry smile seeped up to his
eyes. The edges crinkled and a dimple settled in his cheek, giving
him a roguish, but more pleasing look. Much like an unapologetic
child holding a stolen cake. “In truth, I found there’s no
way to avoid her even when it’s your intense desire.”
She
learned much the same. A strange sense of balance lodged between
them. Kalia unnerved him as much as he unnerved her. The
vulnerability the old woman raked out of him made him less
threatening. “The people here have great respect for Miss
Kalia. It would be foolish to dismiss her or her methods.
To do so would also betray the islander’s trust.”
The
captain slapped the reins again and muttered, “Kalia’s black
medicine attracts too much attention, especially from the white man.
They do not understand it. White men fear what they don’t
understand.”
“It’s not
black medicine.” She corrected him. “Obeah is a very ancient
healing practice.” Trying to ignore the twinge of foreboding they
sent through her chest, she shifted the tea and the tonic to the
bottom of her sack.
“Call it what
you will, the white settlers and plantation owners fear it,”
he rumbled.
How
should she approach the last premonition? He had to be familiar with
the old woman’s visions if indeed he knew who she was.
How would he react? Surprise? Disbelief? She plunged ahead anyway.
“Miss
Kalia stopped me at the market two days ago and told me a man would
come to the abbey with a sick girl-child,” she blurted it out
before she could stop herself. He would think her a ninny.
Talking about an old woman’s premonitions as if they were gospel,
which they were not.
Yet,
a flicker of surprise shot across the captain’s face. “She did?”
So
he was familiar with Kalia’s visions. “Yes, and here you are.”
“Indeed.”
His brows dropped in thought, or perhaps concern.
She
couldn’t, wouldn’t confide what Miss Kalia had said
next. That was something she dared not repeat.
“Him
not what him seem to be,” the old woman had whispered.
“But den, so not are you.”
~Award-Winning
Author~ Chloe Flowers writes historical women’s action and
adventure romance novels about scoundrels, pirates, and spunky,
independent heroines. She likes to challenge her characters by
tossing them the middle of actual historical events, or with real
historical characters.
Chloe
is a member of the Romance Writers of America, Northeast Ohio Romance
Writers and The Beau Monde Romance Writers group, where she serves as
secretary. In 2011, she formed the Sunshine Critique Group so that
she and other aspiring authors could motivate and challenge each
other to become better writers. Six members have been published. She
has given workshops and presentations on creating a critique group,
how to provide effective critiques, story structure, and
self-publishing lessons to writers groups, library patrons and
children. In 2014, she started her own small publishing company,
Flowers & Fullerton. Currently, she’s the publisher of record
for authors Sheridan Jeane, H.O. Knight as well as herself.
Whether
it’s dancing naked in a downpour at 3AM, zip-lining in a
rainforest, or racing ponies, Chloe’s always looking for the next
adventure. Her pets have always been named after favorite characters
or action heroes: Indiana, Luke, Gimli, Thelma, Rocket, Forrest, Al
Giordino, Severus, Mushu, Mérida, Gibbs, Jack…Dead Pool (he’s a
goldfish).
Chloe’s
biggest fault is her apparent inability to say “no” whether it’s
in response to a call for aid or a double-dog-dare to hike home
through 30 acres of a snow-covered forest at midnight…during a full
moon. It was early morning during said adventure when she came upon a
group of sheriff’s deputies searching for a lost girl. So, of
course she offered to help. Turns out, they were searching for
her.
In
addition to her addiction to adrenaline, she has a weakness for good
red wine, dark chocolate and brown-eyed guys with beards, which is
probably why she digs pirates and treasure hunters and writes about
action and adventure, pirates and romance (which is the greatest
adventure of all).
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