Miss Hattie's Reluctant Hero

A sweet regency romp filled with laughter and mistaken identities...

Miss Hattie has always longed for adventure, but she's typically found it in a good book. She never expects that she'll find a true adventure of her own—and a romance to boot—while sailing the seas to visit her sister abroad.

The sailor who seems to always be in her path is more than she'd ever imagined. He's perfect. Maybe...too perfect.

When pirates strike and Hattie's life is in danger, she discovers that the the charming man she thought she was falling for is so much more than he seemed.

And he'd been keeping close to her for a reason.

With her life on the line and her heart at stake, she'll have to decide. Is this rogue her worst enemy...or her knight in shining armor?

A ship was a ship, that was Ewan’s take on the matter. 

He tugged at his cuffs. He was working on a new ship, that was all. 

Even if he did feel ridiculous in this uniform.

That new ship he’d be sailing stood proud and tall behind him on this brisk, sunny day. The docks teemed with people, either crewmen loading trunks or passengers saying their farewells and preparing to board. 

He spotted Davy and Mick on the far end of the pier, just beyond the passengers of this ship bound for America.

They were laughing at him. And he wasn’t being paranoid. Those nitwits were actually pointing and laughing, no doubt amused by his uncomfortably crisp uniform with the high, stiff collar. 

But like he’d told Captain Jones when she’d asked the men for a volunteer to watch over her youngest daughter on her voyage—a ship was a ship. He didn’t mind that it wasn’t a pirate ship–or, a privateering ship. 

That was what Captain Jones and her crew were now. 

Ewan still hadn’t quite gotten used to the change. They were law-abiding, semi-respectable sailors now. And to be fair, it hadn’t been much of a change going from pirates to privateers. The day-to-day life onboard and here at the docks was largely the same. The only real difference was that they couldn’t be hung for it now because they were stealing from foreign ships and all in the name of the Crown.

God save Britain. 

Ewan smirked and shook his head when his friends continued to point at him with laughter. 

Let them laugh. He could handle their mockery because he was glad for the assignment. He’d wanted it, in all honesty. Hattie, the youngest of their female captain’s daughters, had been his charge for years now. He’d been watching over her this long, he didn’t like the thought of handing her fate over to someone else. 

His gaze caught on a crown of pale blonde hair in the midst of the crowd and he forgot all about his pirate cohorts and focused on his mission instead. His gaze narrowed as he found her in the crowd.

As always, he felt like he’d just suffered a blow to the ribs when he fully caught sight of her as she emerged from behind the taller woman blocking her.

An angel.

His angel. 

She just didn’t know it, that was all. And that was for the best. She wasn’t the type of lady a man like him could ever be close to, let alone call his own. But he thought of her as his very own angel from afar, nonetheless.

He glanced away, ducking his head slightly when she turned her head in his direction. It wouldn’t do to get caught gawking. Especially not now before they’d boarded the ship. There were people here who might recognize him. Namely, her sister Rebecca, a viscountess now, but she’d been a simple miss when he’d met her. 

She might not recognize him now after two years had passed, but he wasn’t willing to take that risk. If she did remember him as the pirate who’d knocked her now-husband unconscious and escorted her into her mother’s pirate den, she’d have questions if she saw him now. She’d no doubt balk at the fact that he was working on the same ship that was ferrying their youngest sister to visit their eldest in America.

His captain—their mother—had been in contact with them over the years. Especially once she’d been fitted with a new name and the new status of privateer. But that didn’t change the fact that they were supposed to be living in different worlds.

The naval captain’s dutiful daughters with their proper upstanding husbands...and the privateering captain who held power and status in her own right, though in far more morally ambiguous locales. 

He doubted anyone would fault their mother for assigning a crew member to accompany Hattie on the journey and keep her safe. They all wanted the same thing in that regard—Hattie safe and protected. 

But he didn’t exactly relish the thought of answering their questions, all the same. And after years of watching out for his charge, out of sight and in the shadows, he had no desire to step out into the light now.

No, his Hattie need never know that he was there. 

He glanced back in her direction and was startled to see that she was alone.

Well, alone in a crowd, but still. It seemed as though his little lamb had been separated from the fold.

Ewan frowned. That metaphor made him distinctly uncomfortable. He’d like to say he was the shepherd in that scenario, watching over the lamb, but he was fairly certain anyone with a hint of sense would take one look at him and see him for the wolf that he was. 

But he was no threat to Hattie—only to any man, woman, or pirate who thought to harm her. Anyone who might pose a threat to Hattie ought to fear his wrath.

Like a predator on the prowl, his gaze flicked over the crowd trying to sniff out danger. It had been an age since anyone had troubled the Jones girls, but between the captain’s newfound status as a privateer, plus all the fortuitous marriages of Hattie’s sisters...

Ewan’s instincts were on high alert. 

Why was she alone on the docks of London?

But a moment later his gaze landed on a familiar gray-hair lady with ramrod straight posture and the pursed lips of a high society snob. He knew her, all right. Hattie’s Aunt Lucinda. She was Hattie’s chaperone for this journey, and it seemed she’d fallen a little ways behind in the crush.

His gaze darted left and right. 

There was no sight of her father or her sisters watching over her.

But he was on guard. Always. So he was the first to notice when a sailor who’d passed her jostled the satchel she’d been holding, sending it to the ground at her feet.

One of the deckhands beside Ewan noticed as well and went to move into action to help her. As he ought. Helping passengers with their baggage was one of his duties. Not the work of the ship’s navigator.

But Ewan stopped the boy with a hand on his shoulder. “Leave it, lad. I’ll help the lady.”

The boy gaped at him, but he didn’t argue. 

Ewan rather wished he would. 

Somebody should stop him, because this was lunacy. But it was also an opening he couldn’t ignore. A temptation that was too sweet to pass up.

His heart thudded wildly in his chest as he approached her. What was he doing? 

This was madness. 

All these years of protecting her from afar, he’d never once dared to get so close. His heart beat louder with each step in her direction.

This is a bad idea. 

The voice in his head was clear, but his feet seemed to have a mind of their own. And then he was at her side, crouching at her feet to pick up the satchel just as she bent down to do the same.

They only just narrowly avoided knocking skulls. 

“Oh! How clumsy of me.” Her head was tipped down, reaching for the satchel that he already had in hand so he could not see her face. “You don’t have to do that.”

Her voice. The voice of an angel.

He could barely breathe, only stare. He’d never been this close before. He’d rarely heard her voice and never so clearly. “It’s no trouble, miss,” he managed once he found his voice. 

She straightened and he followed, the satchel heavy in his hand.

Very heavy, in fact. 

He looked down and a smile tugged at his lips. Of course it was heavy. It was no doubt filled with books. He should have known.

She reached a hand out with a tentative smile, a blush creeping into her cheeks.

His heart dipped and weaved as if it was out at sea while the rest of him stood firmly on shore. He’d seen that blush too, hundreds of times before, but never like this. Never while she looked at him. 

The feel of her eyes upon him was humbling after so much time in the shadows, literally and metaphorically. He wasn’t used to being seen, and her gaze right now...

Well, he suspected she saw everything.