April 18, 1767

Land.

Vanessa gazed at it from the prow of the ship, longingly. They were closing in on the colonies and were going through inlets and island waterways that they were not going to actually land on. Though she though it would be wise, considering the black clouds above them. She felt his presecence at her side and she sighed.

He squeezed her right buttocks in the midst of a mock stretch.

"Cute." Vanessa muttered.

"What?" Stephen feigned innocence and she snorted.Innocence and Stephen Bonnet went together as well as water and oil.

"You see this enormous storm that is about to burst open above our heads?"

"Aye."

"Why are we sailing through it instead of going on land?"

"Because these islands are good for unloading smuggled goods, sure, but I have no business with them as of the moment."

"What about your cannon?"

"I stole that for myself."

"Why?"

"It made me feel more…. " he trailed off in search of an appropriate word.

Vanessa smiled. "Manly? Compensating for something…Captain?"

Stephen turned his head in her directing with his mouth hanging open slightly, a look of mild reproach crossing his features. "You of all people should know I need not to…"

"Well you do like to be super quick an all."

"Hey, cannons have to be slowly prepped and reloaded before firing off again. Don't makeme show you how much moreefficient I am than a cannon." He sneered at her, though still in good spirits.

"You would have to escape your first mate and bosun first. They are headed this way as we speak."

Stephen looked over his other shoulder to see Alec and Stewart headed towards them. Damn. He thought to himself. Those two were getting on his nerves. He would make them sorry for doing so, only they were right. He had been acting like a sorry captain since he wed Vanessa. He had spent so much time in their cabin with her, and leaving the crew on it's own. He had always thrived on the thought that his men saw him as a good Captain, and that this view was becoming tarnished by a streak of infatuation with a woman was indeed a problem.

Stephen Bonnet was torn. He wanted nothing more but to retire to his cabin with his wife and bed her. He had gone to her the night prior after almost a week of barely touching her. He had entered the cabin to find her completely naked and standing in front of the window, gazing at the stars that glimmered over head. She hadn't heard him approach and was startled to feel his arms draw around her. He had taken her right there, pressed against the window with the stars as their private audience. He had felt some strange sensation course through his blood that he had never experienced before. He was still uncertain of what it was. A fierce protectiveness of Vanessa, perhaps, but ultimately something more. Something new.

As he opened his mouth to speak to his first mate, the storm cloud seemed to have imitated Vanessa's imagination, and burst open to soak all of them as a clap of thunder sounded so loudly that his ears actually rang from it.