Chapter 19 – Stealing a Heart
March 17, 1660

Entering the party alone, I drifted through the crowd of captains and majors getting many an appreciative nod as I passed. I was also able to sneak up on Rapunzel and Eugene who were conversing with their sons and what I presumed was their dates. The large chested Maximus wore a major's uniform while his little brother was in a captain's uniform, their dates clinging onto their arms as if clinging on to the last bottle of water in a long desert trip.

"Ah, Colonel Hunt," Eugene said as he noticed me standing a bit back. "Might I introduce my sons, Maximus and Pascal along with their dates, Anastasia and Drisella."

"Ladies," I said as I bowed in turn to both.

"Another privateer, governor?" an older woman said as she sidled closer.

"Colonel Hunt is going after Hook on the morrow," Rapunzel said cheerily as if I were merely bringing a friend home.

"A last fling, perhaps?" she said but it felt like salt in an open wound the amount of vitriol I heard in her words.

"For Hook, maybe," I said giving her a bit of her own vitriol. "I walk bravely where angels fear to tread."

"There's reason angels fear to tread near Hook," she countered. "I've lost two husbands and their ships to that foul pirate."

"May he burn in hell," one of the young ladies spat.

"I think we should start the ball, dear," Rapunzel said as she curtailed the fight by redirecting our energies.

"Too right," Eugene said as he latched on to the one thing he could in the moment and began to clap his hands together. Rapunzel looped her arm in mine and dragged me out to the center of the ballroom floor flanked on either side by her sons and their dates.

"Ladies and gentlemen!" Eugene said from the side. "My apologies for the late date of the Spring Gala this year, but as you can see I'm down a leg. My wife, however, will still be leading the dance as always with the help of Colonel Hunt who, at Christmas Eve Ball this past year, played two wonderful piece on the harpsichord and has agreed to do so again tonight."

I received a large round of applause at that, most of the assembled likely having listened to my last performance as Rapunzel beamed up at me before taking our proper positions. The band began to play some string piece and I followed Rapunzel's lead as she surreptitiously gave me directions on what to do as Megara had done, but what surprised me next was that she caught my timing was slow and gave me advanced notice of half a beat so that soon we were definitely the couple to watch. I also saw that Maximus's date Anastasia was prone to tripping over her feet, the poor woman finally falling after a spin and having to be helped up by Maximus who then had to carry his injured date from the floor.

"Very nice," Rapunzel said as she giggled and sidled closer once the band quit playing. "You are quite the charmer."

"I aim to please," I said as I gave her a warm smile. "Once more?"

"Definitely," Rapunzel said as she took her spot once the crowd had thinned itself some more as those who couldn't dance left the floor. The band then began to play again, this time the steps more intricate than before but I was able to present myself well with Rapunzel's help to make the woman giddy as the night wore on.

Eugene disappeared somewhere during the second dance which I attributed to his bad leg but I doubted anyone noticed as most eyes were on Rapunzel and I as we led two more dances into the night. It was only after the fifth dance and we were one of the last couples dancing that the harpsichord was again brought out for me to play.

"Can you play that one piece you started with last time?" Rapunzel asked me specifically as she pressed herself to my back since Eugene still wasn't around for her to be with.

"Sure," I said as I again played Pachabel's Canon in C. At the first notes the crowd fell into captive silence as I again played and allowed the song to build to its crescendo. I had a feeling Rapunzel would be spamming this song on replay if she had but the technology but was content for the moment to listen intently to the song until its final note faded. The crowd again burst into applause and calls for an encore quickly filled the room.

Slightly panicked, I thought for a second for a song to play, then feeling inspired by Rapunzel's presence and her peck on my cheek, began playing a song from a movie I caught once at Jubitz Truckstop, the only truckstop I knew that had a cinema inside it. The song was Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah using the cover version of the music by Rufus Wainwright to transfer the song from guitars to the keyboard and then after the intro began to sing.

The song I finally ended up singing was more of a mash between the Cohen's version and Wainwright's version, adding the extra verses to the song without pause or problem and even the crowd joined in singing the Hallelujah lines in the chorus with me after the second verse which really elevated the performance but in the silence that followed, before the deafening applause I thought I heard crying.

"Bravo," Rapunzel said as I finished the song and stood which seemed to be the cue for the party to break up as everyone filed for the exits in high spirits. Being her own home, Rapunzel led me out the back door and into the moonlit night, giggling as she hummed the melody as we walked along.

"You always impress," Rapunzel said as she led me into the garden whose large hedges blocked the light from the house leaving only the moon overhead to illuminate our path.

"I wouldn't know what to do otherwise," I told her as she pressed herself against me and leaned her head onto my chest. We paused for a moment next to a rippling stream where we stopped and she looked up at me, then kissed me. I returned the kiss, looking briefly into her eyes as she pulled away and had a thousand reasons to turn and run.

I knew she was married, that she was slightly off kilter and had three able men who'd kill me for impugning her honor like this. But in the soft moonlight glistening in her eyes, the thought that beat them all back was that on the morrow I sailed to capture a known terrorist and that though the battle would likely be won, I could easily die in the fighting and it wouldn't matter.

Leaning down, I kissed her again and took her into my arms and lifted her slightly off her feet as I moved to lay her down, Rapunzel offering no resistance as I laid her out on the soft grass growing there. Taking things to the next level, I began to hike her skirt up as we made out, even spreading her legs to allow me room to get between her legs where I then began to relieve her of her undergarments to get to the good part while she undid her top. Soon I had her bare from the waist down and quickly unbuttoned my pants and got my own meaty rod out of its cloth prison where I slid it home inside her moist meat prison.

"Yes," she panted as I entered her and taking that as a cue began to piston in and out of her tight twat with reckless abandon with my hands on her now free breasts. The only sound of our lovemaking was her panting and the sound of my pistoning in and out of her which quickly brought her to orgasm, but I wasn't even close.

"On your knees," I told her and she looked elated at the order as I allowed her up and she got on her knees. She paused for a moment to yank her dress off by pulling it over her head and tossing it aside to leave her fully nude before I pushed her onto all fours. She looked back as I slid myself back inside her slick hole and went deep again as my cock throbbed at being slid back in her tight hole. I began pounding away at her cunt, Rapunzel bowing low as she took my cock and began to pant as she enjoyed the feel of my rod inside her.

With my own cock getting ready to blow its creamy load, I moved my hands from her butt up her back before grabbing her fleshy mounds in my hand, Rapunzel letting out a high moan as I pinched her little nipples. Her spasming hole eventually brought me off where she let out one last high pitched squeal as I shot my load deep inside her belly, holding myself deep in her as she shivered in the slight breeze.

"That was wonderful," she said finally as I pulled her back to a sitting position by her breasts, my cock still deep inside her. She turned her head to me and I kissed her again, pushing my tongue into her mouth were she quickly did the same. We stayed that way for a long moment before we broke apart and she laid her head on my shoulder as she looked up at the stars.

"We better get cleaned up before Eugene sends the guards after us," she finally said once my softening rod finally fell out of her hole.

"Eugene?" I said quizzically, my own habit of absorbing the habits and names of people around me throwing me for a moment. "You mean Flynn?"

"Oh," she said quickly and it dawned on me.

"You're faking being crazy?"

"Please," she said as she stood and turned to face me. "He can't know."

"Why the hell not?" I demanded as I stood myself, almost ready to charge back to the house and oust her when she turned away and collapsed, her shoulders heaving as she began to sob.

"Do you know what happened?" she finally got out, not even looking back at me as she held herself.

"They hung him," I told her. "Your fiance, Flynn, he was hung by the pirates. Eugene found you and stabbed the bastard in the back before taking you home."

"That's not all of it," she got out. "There's so much more."

"Then tell me," I asked her, and she turned her tear filled eyes to me.

"Okay."