Page 24 of Hooked by a Hero (Tales from the Brotherhood #4)
“Ruby will be pleased to know she’s still a wealthy heiress,” Caspian commented to Brunning once their groups met up again and prepared to return to the island with several casks of fresh water.
Brunning’s eyebrows shot up. “Mr. Ferrars’s treasure is still aboard?”
Caspian nodded. “Should we bring it to Ruby?”
“God, no!” Brunning shouted, then jerked his head this way and that to see who else might have heard him.
“That treasure needs to stay where it is and be forgotten for as long as possible.” When Caspian frowned at him in confusion, Brunning went on with, “If there’s even a lick of a chance that Tumbrill and Dick and their cronies survived the storm and made it to the island, they’ll come back looking for it.
That man’s fortune will spell trouble for whoever possesses it. ”
Caspian hummed, uncertain whether he agreed or not. He would concede that the treasure would be a lure to Dick and Tumbrill, but it belonged to Ruby, and she had a right to choose what to do with it.
He held on to that thought, intending to share it with Elias, and perhaps Hunt and Ruby herself, once they returned to the island.
Their group loaded as much of the most essential supplies they could find onto the boat and arranged the rest to be easily fetched by another trip out once they’d taken their first salvage to the island.
Caspian’s thoughts were so filled with how they might bring everything useful from the Fortune to the island, not to mention with the possibility that a group of very bad men was somewhere else on the island, that he almost didn’t notice the way Elias left what he was doing to run out into the shallows to greet their return.
“I’ve been so worried about you,” Elias said breathlessly, helping Caspian climb over the side of the boat and step down, then using that as an excuse to embrace him quickly. “Every time you disappear, I worry about you,” he whispered, resting his hand on the side of Caspian’s face for a moment.
Caspian smiled and quickly stole a kiss in return while the others were distracted with bringing the boat farther up onto the beach. “I will always return to you,” he said, gazing fondly into Elias’s eyes. “Never you worry about that.”
“Oh, but I do worry,” Elias said. In his expression, Caspian could see traces of their earlier conversation and the things that remained unsaid between them.
Once again, Caspian brushed off the truths that needed to be spoken and the revelations that needed to be made. There were too many people around them, and now was not the time.
“We brought back casks of fresh water and a few crates of foodstuffs that weren’t spoiled with salt water,” he said, stepping back and joining the others in lifting things out of the boat.
“The lower decks of the ship are flooded, but any of the cargo that is currently underwater could still be good as long as its containers are properly sealed, or so I’ve been told. ”
“It’s true,” the sailor who had informed Caspian of as much earlier repeated for the cluster of survivors that gathered around to help unload the boat. “We should be able to recover a lot of the cargo, as long as we do it quickly.”
That came as welcome news to the survivors.
Even though they were only halfway into their first day on the island, many of them already looked dirty, disheveled, and disheartened.
The women had been able to light their fire at some point while Caspian and the others had been exploring the Fortune , but they only had a few small fish set on spits over the embers as of yet.
The hungry survivors were grateful to have a meal of hardtack, boiled peas, and salted pork, as unsavory as Caspian found all those things, once the boat was unloaded and the supplies handed out.
“We will have to be judicious with the supplies we have,” Hunt said once a meager meal was prepared and all of the survivors sat in the shade of the palm trees at the edge of their patch of beach to eat together.
“Mr. Archer proved himself surprisingly adept at catching those fish earlier, and I’m certain we’ll be able to catch many more with supplies salvaged from the wreck, but we must all remember that food will not be as easy to come by as we are used to. ”
“Surely, we will not starve now,” Miss Winters said as she poked some of the embers of the fire she seemed intent on tending.
“I do not believe we will,” Hunt went on. “But in order to keep ourselves alive, we will all need to do our part, particularly when it comes to fetching water from the spring.”
“A team set out into the jungle to find the spring Brunning located again while you were on the Fortune ,” Elias murmured to Caspian as Hunt continued to speak about the tasks that they would all need to do daily.
“It isn’t very far from here, and already, there has been talk about building a settlement there instead of here, on the beach. ”
“A settlement?” Caspian said, his brow lifting and his smile widening. “So you Englishmen are intent on colonizing this little island, too, are you?”
Fortunately, Elias took the teasing well and laughed gently. “Colonizing things is what we Englishmen were designed for,” he teased in return, bumping his arm against Caspian’s.
Caspian nudged him in return, keeping his arm flush against Elias’s as he did. If not for the two dozen other people surrounding them, he would have entwined his hand with Elias’s and tugged him close for a long kiss.
“We brought some of the ship’s carpenter’s tools back with us,” Brunning spoke up, snagging Caspian’s attention just when he could have spent hours gazing into Elias’s eyes and losing himself in the swell of affection between the two of them. “They should be helpful in building shelters.”
“It is a shame Mr. Felton was killed in the mutiny,” Hunt sighed, lamenting the ship’s carpenter. “We could have used his expertise not only to remake the Fortune , but to build huts.”
“I know carpentry,” one of the survivors spoke up, raising his hand. “I can lead a team in constructing huts out of the materials we find on the island.”
“Excellent. Thank you, Mr. Salisbury,” Hunt said. “What other hidden skills and talents do we all have?” he asked.
Mr. Cartwright laughed and said, “Clearly, you have the skill of leadership.”
“Hear, hear!” one of the middle-aged passengers called out. “I nominate Mr. Hunt to be our leader whilst on this island.”
“Agreed!” Elias called out, sending his friend a smile.
Hunt grinned back at him. “I would not wish to do the job entirely on my own. I will need the council of wise men to assist me. I will listen to anyone who has suggestions for how we might survive as efficiently and comfortably as possible.”
“Yet another reason why you will make the best leader among us,” Caspian said.
Everyone else seemed to agree. Hunt accepted the role of leader graciously, and by the time the meal was done, he had improved the spirits of the survivors to such an extent that they were all enthusiastic about foraging or fishing for that night’s meal, marching back to the spring to collect more water in the casks that had been quickly emptied by the thirsty encampment, or collecting materials that could be used to build shelters.
“You see?” Caspian teased as the two of them joined Hunt near the fire. “We will be quite happy here, I think. You will never want to leave.”
Elias laughed. “I do not know about that,” he said. The strange, thoughtful look he had whenever contemplating Caspian pinched his face. “Something tells me you truly would be happy to live the rest of your life somewhere such as this.”
Caspian shrugged, making light of Elias’s curiosity. “I would be happy to make my life wherever you are,” he said. And the sooner the two of them could find a moment alone so that he might confess everything, the sooner that could come to be.