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  Clara was heavy with child, his child. His prince or princess, he thought happily. “Yes, let’s open it now,” he said, helping his wife up the wide veranda steps.

  The trunk was old, the makeshift lock older and made to last an eternity, Cato thought as he pounded at it with an iron bar. He looked at Amalie to see if there was any sign of recognition. She continued to stare ahead, her gaze unblinking. It took both Cato and Clara to lift the heavy lid.

  “My God!” Cato whispered as he stared down at a king’s ransom in jewels and gold coins. He filled his hands and offered them to Amalie. “It was all for nothing, Amalie,” he cried. “You were richer than any queen and you didn’t know it. You could be wearing these now, dressed in the finest gowns. You would truly be a queen. It was all for nothing.” His shoulders slumped when he remembered the back breaking months and years of work it took to bring all the pillaged booty from the caves back to Amalie’s kingdom.

  Amalie’s black eyes glittered malevolently as she stared at Cato’s hands. His head was bowed, his eyes downcast, when she brought both of her clenched fists down on his neck. He died instantly.

  Stunned, Clara could only stare at her husband’s body with fear-filled eyes. She never saw Amalie’s foot about to strike her in the throat until it was too late.

  Cato’s child was born within the hour, a handsome blond-haired male child.

  “You will be king,” Amalie proclaimed, her mad eyes devouring the child. “All these riches will be yours. I will be your queen!” Her shrill, evil laughter wafted through the trees, carrying to the four corners of her plantation.

  There was none who voiced an objection to her proclamation.

  “Long live the queen!” she cackled.

  If you enjoyed CAPTIVE SECRETS be sure not to miss

  CAPTIVE PASSIONS

  Read on for a special excerpt!

  An eKensington e-book exclusive on sale now.

  Prologue

  Java, A.D. 1623

  Tropical night breezes, fragrant with oleander and cloves, cooled by a gently ebbing sea, filtered through lacy, silk draperies into a softly lit bedroom of deep rose and pale beige. The candles in their brass sconces cast wavering shadows onto the low, wide bed. Pale pink satin coverlets rustled, the only sound in the hushed, sultry atmosphere.

  Gretchen trailed long, tapered fingers across his glistening, sun-bronzed skin. “Take me, Regan,” she breathed, as she raked her fingers across his chest, etching tiny red rivulets.

  He grabbed her, crushing her softness in his hands. She moaned with the sounds of his passion and dug her nails into the hard muscles of his back. The moistness of drawn blood quickened her breathing as she became a wild jungle animal in the instinctive, abandoned throes of passion.

  “Damn you, Regan,” she panted as she struggled to free her breasts from his imprisoning grasp. “Stop playing with me! Don’t make me wait any longer!” His answer was to slide his hands to her groin, never breaking the rhythm of his movements. He sought for and found the soft indentation where her thighs ended.

  Thrusting, the giant astride her brought his hands downwards, crushing her arched body flat against the bed. A wild shriek tore through the room as Gretchen moved against the pressure of the man atop her.

  Spent, Gretchen lay still, her breathing ragged. She spoke harshly: “I’ve seen you perform better, Regan. I’ve bedded schoolboys that could do what you just did. Where’s the expertise the Javanese women credit you with?” she asked mockingly.

  Regan van der Rhys leaned on one elbow and looked into her changeling, hazel eyes; at her splendiferous pale gold hair as smooth and glossy as the satin pillows. Her passion satisfied—for the moment—she resembled a sleepy-eyed tigress. “Javanese women don’t demand these . . . these little cruelties you like to inflict. There are other ways to satisfy passion.”

  His tone was light and easy, and Gretchen was chagrined that her sharp criticisms had little effect on him. He was so completely certain of his magnetism, so entirely confident of his prowess, he vexed her. Regan’s cool, phlegmatic composure constantly infuriated her. That he remained unaffected by her scathing remarks was testimony to his superficial feelings for her. It rankled that she meant so little to him. Her full, pouting lips curled in frustration, her chameleon-like eyes darkening to a hazy brown.

  “Bah! You men are all alike! Let it suffice to say you enjoyed it. Must we constantly play these games?” She smiled fetchingly, even teeth flashing against her reddened, kiss-bruised lips. “The women of Java know nothing of sensuous delights. Where is the passion? They lay like slugs for men like you; and men like you come to women like myself to satisfy what they really want. Why lie, Regan?” she taunted.

  “A bitch in heat,” Regan muttered coldly, his handsome features stony and enigmatic.

  “Bitch in heat, am I? How many times, Mynheer van der Rhys, have you mounted me when at the end we were both smeared with blood?” she asked derisively. “It was you who sought me! I’m your only release for whatever drives you! This inner burning, this intangible compulsion of yours! You come to me to exorcise yourself. But I don’t mind,” she said, stretching luxuriously, her eyes on the golden hair on Regan’s chest. “Tell me,” she coaxed, as her slender hands caressed her full, round breasts, “what would you do without me?”

  She moved so that her taut bosom touched his nakedness. Narrowing his eyes, Regan grasped the soft flesh of her haunches and twisted it, pinching viciously.

  Gretchen drew in her breath and writhed sensuously, her body glistening with a veil of perspiration. Pressing Regan back onto the mound of satin pillows, she straddled him. Clutching a handful of his hair, she shook his head wildly. “Love me, Regan, love me!”

  He reached behind her, seized her round, white buttocks, and savagely brought her to him.

  Lust blazed as their bodies sought to quench the flames engulfing them.

  Gretchen watched Regan as he dressed, enjoying his unhurried, fluid movements. He was masculinely graceful, like an athlete. Wide broad chest, muscular arms, proud leonine head—all tapering to a flat stomach and slim hips atop long, well-developed legs. His handsome, sun-darkened face; his piercing blue eyes, cold and aloof one moment, igniting to the sharp glare of a lynx the next. A sheaf of white-blond hair fell crisply over his wide and intelligent forehead. But it was his sinewy, muscular body that made her pulses throb.

  He swung about to face her as he finished buttoning his lawn shirt, his cold, chiseled features expressionless.

  “What are you thinking, Regan? I can never see behind your mask.”

  “I was wondering what you’ll do for diversion, Gretchen. Our being together won’t be so frequent after a certain ship arrives from Spain.”

  “Why not?” she pouted, eyes darkening, betraying her posed indifference.

  “I’ve a bride arriving,” he stated simply, enjoying the fleeting pain in her eyes.

  “Your humor is in poor taste, Regan. I don’t appreciate it!”

  “I’m speaking the truth. The wedding will take place shortly after Señorita Córdez arrives.” He flashed her a winning, boyish smile, mischievous but tinged with embarrassment. Seeing no trace of mockery behind it, Gretchen became alarmed. It was true!

  “Córdez? A Spaniard? A Dutchman marrying a Spaniard?” she laughed shrilly. “Don’t tease, Regan.”

  He saw she was verging on hysterics but ignored this. He had chosen tonight to tell her, so she wouldn’t do or say anything intentionally insulting when Señorita Córdez arrived. He hoped by that time Gretchen would be over the shock and at least try to act like a lady. Society, being quite limited here in Batavia, would soon throw her into company with the newly married couple.

  Gretchen Lindenreich, a widow now, had been brought to Java in 1606 by her husband, a German sea captain; she had been but twenty years old. The Hamburg mercantile company for which Captain Peter Lindenreich sailed had encouraged him to take his brash and amoral new wife out of Saxony, to where her devilt
ry and disconcerting behavior would not reflect on the trading organization. Lindenreich, in love and beguiled by young Gretchen’s beauty, readily agreed. And did more. He relinquished his German captaincy and accepted a new—and stationary—position with the recently formed Dutch East India Company, for he had long had friends in Holland. He was glad they were to be sent to the Spice Islands, for he too wanted his passionate wife away from the temptations of Hamburg society, and believed and hoped that in a more isolated environment she would settle into placidity and perhaps bless his old age with children.

  Gretchen had no choice but to accompany her sixtyish husband. But the renunciation of his captaincy greatly depleted his earnings. Captains received a healthy share of cargo profits, but as a D.E.I. official in Java Peter merely earned a yearly salary with a promise of pension. Five years later, having showered Gretchen with as many luxuries of the rich East Indian trade as he could afford, Peter Lindenreich died poor and childless. He never knew of the three times his wife had visited an old native crone who used witchcraft and herbs to abort her.

  Although free of Peter, Gretchen could not leave Java. She would receive her husband’s East India Company pension only if she stayed on the island. This she accepted in a conciliatory manner, for she had by then met Regan van der Rhys and meant one day to marry him, when he should be free.

  Regan had, unfortunately for Gretchen, cast his eyes on the youngest daughter of a Javanese tribal chief some three years following his arrival in the islands in 1607, and had married her. Tita’s soft, quiet manner and brown-skinned beauty had fully captured his fancy; and their marriage had been in addition a diplomatic coup for the Dutch in their rivalry with mercantile competitors—and predecessors—in the Spice Islands: the Portuguese and Spanish, united at the time under one crown, that of Philip III of Spain. The marriage had furthermore been a feather in the cap of Regan’s father, Vincent van der Rhys, D.E.I. Chief Pensioner since his coming to Java in 1603.

  “I’m not teasing, Gretchen. It’s been arranged and I’m going through with it. I’m marrying Señorita Córdez!”

  “I stood by once before and watched you marry that mincing tribal virgin! If she were still alive she’d be fat and toothless by now!”

  Gretchen gasped as she saw Regan stiffen. The words had burst from her and now she realized she must suffer the consequences.

  Their eyes locked, cold chills danced up her spine. She almost wished he would strike her—anything instead of this frigid fury.

  “Whatever her appearance, she would have remained a good and faithful wife, a loving mother to my son. Now she’ll always be beautiful and young in my memory.” His eyes bored into Gretchen’s. “How old are you, my dear? Thirty-six? Thirty-seven? It won’t be many years before I see you become a toothless hag.”

  “I’m no such age, Regan, and you know it. I’m years younger than you—” He turned his back on her, cutting her words off as with the sharp edge of a knife. Goaded by frustration, she attacked again. “And just where did you meet this Spaniard? On a pirate ship? In Spanish prison? In a Lisbon or Cádiz brothel?”

  “No,” he answered, his back still turned. “My father arranged the marriage a little more than three years ago, before my return. I’ve, well, not set eyes on her.”

  “Now I know you’re lying! No father makes a marriage contract for a grown son, and one that’s a widower besides! Do you take me for a complete fool?”

  “Think what you like! It was a condition of my release from Spain—and one you doubtless did not know!” A shadow crossed Regan’s eyes at the thought of this unwanted marriage, and his brows drew downwards like thick, golden hoods.

  “I find it hard to believe your father would have been so presumptuous as to arrange this,” Gretchen persisted angrily. “I won’t stand by and let you do this! When you married Tita, Peter was still alive. We’re both free now. There’s been nothing to stop us, these past three years. You’ve led me to believe we would eventually be mar—”

  “Married?” he finished for her coldly. “There was never a mention of marriage. And, I won’t betray my father’s honor, though he has been dead these twelve months and more. When Señorita Córdez arrives in Batavia our wedding will take place.” The serious, scolding tone of his voice lifted, and he mocked, “You will come, won’t you?” His eyes slid over the expanse of her creamy skin.

  “I’ll kill you!” Gretchen shrieked as she sprang from the bed, heedless of her nakedness. She raised her clenched fists and pounded his chest, her breasts heaving with outrage.

  Savagely, Regan seized her to him and brought his mouth cruelly down upon hers. Her anger melted and she moaned in renewed desire. Brutally, he shoved her backwards onto the satin pillows. She sprawled grotesquely, hair spilling across her face.

  “Bitch in heat!” Regan snarled.

  Her initial shock abated, Gretchen straightened herself on the silken coverlet and slightly parted her legs. She had never met a man with a greater capacity for brutality than this one. It always caused her some surprise, for she knew he wasn’t that way with the Javanese women, nor had he been with Tita, his native wife. Only with Gretchen, and she loved it! She shivered—but not with fear.

  She smiled, vulture-like. “We shall see, Mynheer van der Rhys, if you come back to me after a few nights with the Spaniard. I understand they say a rosary during lovemaking.” Sensuously moving her legs on the coverlet, her quivering breasts small mountains of white cream, she stretched her arms above her head.

  Regan moved to the elegantly appointed bed with its silken hangings and threw down a pouch of gold coins. Gretchen eyed the pouch and spat on it. “There isn’t enough gold to buy me, Regan. But then you aren’t buying me, are you? You’re paying me off! Bring me her rosary, that will be all the payment I need!” she laughed as he quietly left the room, softly closing the door behind him.

  Gretchen sprawled over onto her stomach, the pouch of gold held tightly in her hand. Regan belonged to her and no Spanish slut would take him away! After all the planning and . . . She would have to speak to Chaezar. Did he know of Regan’s little Spanish bride? Not likely; Chaezar told her everything. When he discovered what an adept pupil she was in the use of the whip, she had been able to glean any and all kinds of information from him—confidences that were soon forgotten in the throes of his passion.

  Chaezar would help her as he had before. Her eyes turned murky as she remembered. If Regan ever discovered ... he would kill her!

  But first, she knew, he would see her suffer.

  Regan mounted his horse and rode out of the cobblestoned courtyard. He was troubled. Gretchen had accepted the gold and given in too easily. She would play fast and loose and the Devil take all! He almost felt sorry for Señorita Córdez. Señorita Córdez . . . He didn’t even know her first name. He recalled the terms of the marriage agreement: “. . . that Regan van der Rhys, widowed these several years, shall take to wife, on my death or when she shall reach twenty years of age, my eldest daughter.”

  The contract itself had puzzled him, these three years since his return to Batavia. Why should Don Antonio Córdez y Savar, of Cádiz, have wished to marry his daughter not only to a Dutchman but to a Protestant—and a man he had never seen—as the condition for obtaining Regan’s release from the Spanish prison? She was probably a snaggle-toothed, pock-marked shrew.

  He wanted this marriage even less than Gretchen did—if that was possible. He had never had much use for the Spanish. Furthermore, Gretchen’s words now came back to taunt him. He too had heard of the piety of Spanish women, that they hung a rosary about their necks and prayed constantly to God to see them through their wifely “duty.” Would this one do that? Then perhaps it would be just as well if she were as homely as he suspected. She would doubtless smell of an unwashed body beneath her many layers of clothing and more than likely reek of garlic. Perhaps her father had merely wanted her out of his sight . . .

  As his horse cantered along toward home, Regan turned his thought
s to the Javanese women he found so entrancing. Their comely looks, the clean and fresh scent of the sea hanging about them like an aura . . . They at least appreciated a man. They sought his favors and actually thanked him for “honoring” them.

  Ha. He knew that it was mainly because they felt it to be good luck to sleep with a white man; nevertheless, they were so uncomplicated . . so refreshing . . .

  Like Tita . . .

  He decided he would not bed the Spanish woman if he didn’t like her looks. He would lock her away in the chapel and forget about her. Then it immediately dawned upon him that he did not have a chapel. He must see that one was built immediately!

  What a far cry from Gretchen Señorita Córdez was sure to be. Brutal, fiery Gretchen, who had long wanted to marry him. As if he would marry her! She amused him, pleasured him, but he would never take her to wife. She was useful when his pent-up frustrations and hatreds began to get the better of him. Gretchen could take it, and could mete out some furies of her own! He laughed at himself as his horse quickened its pace, instinctively knowing it was nearing home.

  He ought to pack off Señorita Córdez to Chaezar Alvarez, he thought. To that damned Spaniard!

  Chaezar Alvarez held much the same position for the Spanish-Portuguese Crown in the Indies as Vincent van der Rhys had once held for the Dutch East India Company. Now Regan occupied that position. Based in Batavia, both men were responsible for the trade of their respective nations among the vast archipelago—Sumatra, Celebes, Borneo, Timor, Bali, New Guinea, and thousands of smaller islands, as well as Java—sometimes called the Spice Islands. Theirs were positions of great responsibility: charting courses, warehousing cargoes, cataloging every yard of silk and pound of spice . . . in addition to keeping diplomatic channels open with the many inland chiefs and sultans.