Summary
A porcelain-pale aristocrat, Jocelyn Leigh, flees the ironclad betrothal to Lord Carnal—an English predator whose very name tastes of carrion—by secreting herself aboard a bride-ship, a creaking womb of dowries and desperation, bound for the tobacco-scabbed shores of seventeenth-century Virginia; there, amid the spit-slick docks and malaria-bloated rivers, she barters her titled shell for the salt-stained protection of Captain Ralph Percy, a privateer whose eyes already carry the horizon’s bruise. What begins as parchment contract soon smolders into slow-burn devotion, until Carnal—sleek as a rapier and twice as cruel—tracks his runaway prize across the Atlantic, has Percy clapped in irons, and drags Jocelyn toward a waiting galleon. A squall of mythic wrath smashes their hull, marooning the triangle of desire amid a pirate fiefdom where rum is currency and skin is barter; Percy’s blade and nerve win them escape, yet London’s fog reclaims them, flinging the captain back into Newgate’s maw while Carnal parleys for Jocelyn’s forced vow. From Tyburn’s shadow to Buckingham’s whispers, Percy slips his shackles, crosses steel with Carnal under torchlight in a courtyard that smells of rain on cobblestone, and reclaims both his name and the woman who has ceased to be merely collateral.
Synopsis
Trying to escape marriage to the hateful Lord Carnal, Jocelyn Leigh joins her maid on a "bride ship" bound for the American colonies. She is shocked by the conditions she finds in Virginia, and decides to marry Capt. Ralph Percy for her protection, eventually she comes to love him. Meanwhile, Carnal finds Jocelyn and has Percy imprisoned. Percy escapes and rescues Jocelyn from Carnal's departing ship but takes Carnal along in their small boat. The three run into a violent storm and are driven to a pirates' camp. Through Percy's courage they escape but are taken to England, where Carnal again causes Percy's imprisonment and is promised Jocelyn's hand. Percy escapes with the help of Lord Buckingham, defeats Carnal in a duel, and is reunited with Jocelyn.
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