The Devil's Temptress: The Curse of the Black Pearl || Jack Sparrow

XII. Storm

The air was cool after they had escaped the humid swell of the equator, heading south towards the American Islands. The cabin windows had been thrown open as wide as they could be, allowing a fresh breeze to drift through, entrancing the small flames to dance before ghostly caressing Nicolette's bare back.

Other than the slight creaking of the Pearl as she rocked on the waves, the room was silent. Even the light scratching of Jack's quill against parchment, as he scribbled what could be considered as nonsense, over. The needle with a life of it's own swept from left to right, from north to south, being pulled from the Pirate dock behind them to whatever lay ahead of them.

For hours, days if honest, it seemed Jack did not know what he wanted. He thought he did...was positive on some days of what he really wanted, but still the needle span until it pointed firmly to the same thing he had never realised he had wanted.

As east turned to north west, Jack's gaze lifted from his compass and over to the large bed half looking as if he was expecting a ghost, which in some ways he was. Each night Nicolette shared his bed Jack believed he was going to awake and find that the past three months had all been a dream; to find her presence had dissolved into thin air, leaving not even her fresh floral scent on his pillow.

The first night on the Pearl had been nothing but pure passion for the both of them. For Jack it had been a raw animalistic reclaim of what he demanded to be his and an intimate celebration of finally having it back. For Nicolette it was simply the need to feel everything and anything she had not been allowed to for a decade. From the tips of her fingers to ends of her toes she ached to be touched and to have it be by Jack; everything felt right as if all the pieces of a puzzle were being fit back into their rightful place.

She had studied every inch of him, taking her time to memorise each scar, each tattoo and every mark to distinguish the new from the old and she asked for the stories behind each one. It felt like no time had passed for both of them, the only difference Jack noticed was her confidence and how she now battled with him for dominance, something he did not detest. Each whimper, each moan, each mark Nicolette left on his back with her fingernails - Jack committed them all to memory as he wished he had done before she was taken from him.

But he soon found there had been no need for him to store Nicolette's sweet gasps and the whispers of his name just yet because a night he feared she would regret and run from turned out to be a one which ignited an addiction. Nicolette had not been able to get enough. The taste of the rum on his tongue, the wetness of his kisses against her throat, the friction created by his hand against her thigh. It was all sweeter than the richest wine and it hit deeper than the darkest ocean. Jack made her feel alive and Nicolette made Jack feel whole, as if there were nothing in the world which could get him or be taken from him, it one hundred percent utterly and completely satisfied him.

And so, they kept finding there way back to each other.

Whether it be a lingering figure in the doorway of the galley while the other ate, gesturing for them to hurry and follow, or a simple passing of each other on a lower deck which ended up with them pushed into one of the Pearl's dark corners. Something was burning and there was no sign of it being extinguished.

Watching her now, Jack could easily imaging waking up to the same sight over and over again until his days were no more. She wasn't like those other women but she never had been, that's what drew him in in the first place. Nicolette Barker could hold a conversation and she shared his passion for the sea, she also had one hell of a fiery spirit. Yet...he could not want that. Neither of them could want that. They were two free spirits, destined to be free. They could not ever be tied down to each other, it was just too dangerous.