A/N Sorry I haven't posted for over a week, I've been really ill, and stressed with all my coursework. Anyway enough of me rambling on. . .I just have one thing to say before this next chapter.

To anonymous: - Thanks for your point, yeah, I thought Annamaria was acting a little childish, but I'm going to blame it on her upbringing. Hopefully in this chapter she will be more like the thirteen year old of the time period. Thanks for reviewing.

Anyway hope you all like this chapter. Please review.

Chapter Thirteen.

Annamaria had nothing else to do but return home. She dreaded the 'yelling at' she would get from Tobias, after all she had been out all night. But when she pushed open the front door she was greeted by an empty house, just how it suited her.

She tried to forget what had happened, but the knowledge she had accumulated that night wouldn't leave, and the pure horror of the robbery chilled her insides. Not that she had anything against stealing.

"Stealings wrong Anna, but if there's something you need bad, and you can't pay for it, it's okay to take a loaner, what they call an exception to the rule." Harriet told her once.

No, sometimes there was no other choice. But stealing from the reverend was different; he was her only friend in this darkness, and she'd betrayed him. She was rather ashamed of the way she had acted with Jack, what a child, what a girl he must have thought her.

And lying on her bed, she sobbed herself to sleep.

She was roughly shook awake Milly, the girl who came in every morning to clean, and attend to Tobias's needs, including making breakfast.

"Milly?" Annamaria gasped.

She smiled softly. "Mr Richards asked me to wake you, he requires your presence in the study."

Annamaria jumped up and began to pull her dress from the drawer, Milly came to her aid.

"What is it about, Milly?" She demanded.

"It's the church, 'twas burgled last night."

"Burgled?" Annamaria repeated, trying to stop my face blushing.

She nodded.

"Where was the reverend?"

"Now there is the funny thing. The reverend was arrested for harbouring a criminal. He's been realised of course, said he was doing his duty to God. Those who confess in his box do it in confidence. It seemed a young boy escaping from the navy took cover in the Church."

Annamaria couldn't reply, she was concentrating on hiding her fear from Milly. Not just fear, anger as well. She was angry against Jack Sparrow, that boy that had come from nowhere and wrecked everything. First he interrupted her story, stole from the church, got the reverend arrested, and got her in trouble with Tobias.

When she was dressed she walked slowly, and elegantly down the stairs. In truth she was stalling for time, trying desperately to compose herself. She swallowed back her emotions, and knocked quietly on the study door.

When she walked in, at Tobias's bidding, she gasped, and almost ran back out again. For sitting across from Tobias was the Governor of Wake Town.

"Annamaria." He glowered.

She curtsied at Tobias, but her eyes did not leave the face of the Governor. "What's going on?" She asked.

"I doubt Milly has left you in the dark." He remarked slowly. It was clear he despised the girl, but no other would put up with him. She was too full of life for his tastes.

Annamaria sat down.

"The beautiful jewels donated by none other then your mother's family have been callously taken from God's house." Annamaria looked up in surprise. The artefacts belonged to her family, or had at one point. But Jack had said they were stolen. . .

She stared in to the Governor's face. He was a stern, middle aged man with firm principles concerning right and wrong. Most of his family had died from the pox, and he was certainly a lonely person. The illness had scarred his face, as well as his life.

After a few seconds of eye-contact, her gaze fell down to her shoes.

"What has this to do with me?" She asked eventually.

"You never came home last night, where were you?" Tobias hissed.

Annamaria shrugged. "By the sea."

"Who with?"

"Jac. . .I was on my own, sir."

"Really?" Tobias asked, his eyebrows raised.

"Oh this nonsense, Richards, of course the girl has nothing to do with it. It's just she was with the reverend, and I wanted to know what she thought of him."

"He is a very kind man, he was generous enough to share a bit of my past with me." Annamaria told them. "He planted a Rosemary plant on Harri. . .on my mother's grave."

"Fancy plants will not bring her back." Tobias sneered.

"Excuse my contradiction, sir. Plants won't bring her back, but there is no harm in telling she is not forgotten. And never will be." Annamaria replied. "Except by her killer perhaps." She said, coldly.

"I never loved Harriet, but nor did I kill her!" He called after her.

The front door slammed shut as she stormed from the house, and down the pathway. She didn't think, letting her feet guide her where they would.

She ended up going to the graveyard. She stood by Harriet's grave, where the plant was growing well. She knelt down and tore it's very roots from the ground, and throwing them up into the air. With her right foot she kicked the grave fiercely.

She was bitterly angry, as she stared down at the grey stone. "You're nothing but a liar Harriet Richards." She mumbled, shaking her head.

"Who's there?" A voice called suddenly.

She peered out from behind the cross, to see the reverend walking around a few yards away. She fought the impulse to run to him, but then without knowing why, she turned in the other direction and ran as fast as she could.

Once out of the gates, she sat down on the ground, leaning against a tall palm tree, and closed her eyes, letting the anger course, like blood, through her veins. She fell asleep with the Caribbean sun, licking her cold face, dreaming of Harriet.

The dream brought back unpleasant memories, her hand clasped around the gold pendant, that swung from her neck. Her fingers caressed the grooves of the missing stones. Missing stones? She jumped up in alarm. The second and final stone had fallen from her necklace.