Chapter 71

The crowded taproom of the wharf-side tavern mocked Flint as he strolled across the floor and set his hat down on the scratched surface of the bar. A good crowd stood round the fire. Older men, fisher folks mainly, but no faces he recognized. It suited his purpose. The last thing he felt was amiable, and people here had been kind.

He'd had some tough times in his life. When his ma started taking up with men on account of his no-good daddy walking out on her years before. When he lost the Calypso and stood at that slave auction, grinning temptingly, in the hope some old buffer matron might buy him. When he got flayed by Malmesbury because he sure as hell wasn't accustomed to spitting on shoe buckles.

But writing that letter to Lady Margaret, then getting Benito to take it to Ravenhurst, was the hardest thing Flint had ever done in his whole, entire life.

His daughter. His daughters. Plural. His. Just as Fury was his woman. And he'd given them up.