Chapter Text
If Stede had learned anything from life, it was that small pleasures made it worth living. Anything could happen at any time, all kinds of misery, but if one could find the little spaces of luxury and joy, then nearly anything could be borne. The indulgent iced coffee currently clutched in his hand as he scurried across the square was a nod to that philosophy. He’d just finished his health routine of a brisk walk and limbering stretches and liked to have a nice cool drink to relax with while he finished transforming into Stede Bonnet, purveyor of rare books.
Currently, he was attired in a white tank top patterned with swirls of aqua and coral, paired with aqua shorts. He dressed lightly for his constitutionals. The late April mornings trended cooler, but he still heated up as his muscles got warm. He liked the air flow, and it didn’t hurt that the ensemble was quite flattering, showing his naturally big biceps to their best advantage. Again, small pleasures.
The morning sun pleasantly lit the square, light refracting off the water of the central fountain and dappling through the trees. Stede took in the space as he strode across it, noting that about the usual number of people were sitting on benches or strolling around with shopping bags. He saw Roach rounding the corner toward his bakery and waved a hand in his direction before he disappeared through the door. Stede cut across the space diagonally, wending past a woman and her dog, and skirted the fountain.
He didn’t think he could imagine a more ordinary day, so entirely representative of any other day of life on the square. Then he saw him.
The man was stretched out on the bench directly south of the fountain, basking in the sun. His long legs were gleaming in the sunshine, tawny and shining with a smoothness that spoke of recent waxing. They were practically glowing with an inner light and were so entirely shapely that Stede couldn’t look away. Glorious, beautiful, enchanting legs.
He shinned himself directly on the raised planters they’d added last fall as an enhancement to the local beauty. He lost his footing and tipped right over the corner edge, landing on his back, winded, with his favorite iced coffee splattered all over his top. The planters were solidly constructed of brick, and he was sure that the throbbing pain matched with a distinct stinging sensation meant that he would be suffering both bruises and abrasions. Not his most graceful moment, really. He kept his eyes closed and sucked air through his teeth.
“You okay, mate?” asked a warm voice with a familiar accent. Home. He heard fast steps coming his way then, “Oh, shit,” a gasp, and then “OH, SHIT!” as well as some kind of wet squeaking. Then his breath was knocked out of him a second time, this time—he assumed—on account of the entire adult human who had just landed on top of him.
“Oooof-ggguh,” Stede said and opened his eyes. So close that he was nearly having trouble focusing on them were two huge brown eyes filled with concern.
[Image Description: Digital art of Ed and Stede's first meeting. Stede is on his back on golden yellow pavers. He's dressed in a white tank top with peach and aqua swirls, teal shorts, and a gray fanny pack. His hair is in loose waves. Ed is dressed in a white tank top and white shorts with green piping. Ed's hair is half up, and the visible part of his leg is waxed. He has recently landed on Stede, and they both have spilled iced coffee on their shirts. They're staring into each other's eyes.]
“Ah, sorry, mate.” The man eased off of him, resting next to him on the pavers.
Stede moaned in response, slowly reinflating his lungs. From beside him came a low, continuous grumble that took him a moment to parse into words.
“Ow, fuck, better not have fucked my knee. This fucking timing.” The man rolled up to sitting, presumably to check his knee.
The change in his position gave Stede his first real look at the man, who had very pretty black hair streaked with silver, a lovely jawline covered by a short beard, and the same gorgeous tawny skin that belonged to the legs. Because, of course. Stede braced himself to shift up from flat on the ground.
That brought the man’s attention back to him. He swept his eyes down Stede, landing on his damaged shins before traveling back up to his face. He gave a tentative smile and then held out a hand. “Sorry about smashing you. Ed Teach.”
Usually Stede would offer some polite dismissal, but as he was still a tad winded and very much in pain, it seemed dishonest. He only held out his hand in return, taking Ed’s. “Stede Bonnet.”
They shook hands, holding on for a moment, and then releasing, and Stede finally scanned the rest of Ed, realizing that the white shorts with green piping that had so beautifully displayed those legs was paired with a simple white tank, which was now equally stained with spilled iced coffee.
Stede couldn’t stop himself from grimacing. “Seems like I shared my drink with you,” he said, gesturing to indicate Ed’s front.
Ed looked down. “Yeah, kinda did. Not usually how I’d ask people to coffee, but points for creativity.”
“Now then, really, you did land on me.” Stede felt driven to clarify.
“Yeah, I did, but I was coming to check on you. Looked like a pretty bad spill.”
The words brought Stede’s attention back to the throbbing in his shins, and he looked down to confirm that each had a red impact line that would certainly bruise, and that the right which he’d hit harder was bleeding. “Fuck,” he said quietly, then, “Ouch.”
“Do you need help?” asked a person, out of view to his right, since he was still staring at Ed Teach, who looked familiar for some reason he couldn’t place.
Stede turned his head in that direction and found the woman with the dog, a little rat terrier with a fiercely wagging tail. “No, I’m okay, I think, and I live just over there,” he said, nodding vaguely toward his bookstore. “You?” he asked Ed.
“I’m good, just sitting down here for a minute before I get up.” His gaze shifted from Stede back to the woman, who was stepping closer. Ed added gruffly, “Don’t need any help.”
The woman continued, undeterred, “Aren’t you—”
“Jeff, the accountant, and me and my client just ran into each other before our meeting. We better get going.” Ed pushed to his feet with a groan and then held a hand down to Stede.
Stede took it, ignoring the protest from his legs, rear, and back as he stood. “Yeah, Jeff. Let’s go get our business taken care of.” He released a long sigh, and bent back over to collect the crushed plastic cup. On him, really, to not have remembered his reusable one. He tossed it into a trash receptacle before beginning to limp toward the bookstore. Ed shifted uneasily next to him, and Stede looked over at him.
“Does your place have a back entrance?" Ed asked, glancing back at the woman with the dog.
“Uh, yes, it does. We’ll need to go the long way around.”
“Think that’s for the best,” Ed said softly.
Stede nodded and walked past the entrance of the shop, rounding the side of the building and leading Ed to the delivery entrance. He fished in the gray fanny pack at his waist, pulling out the key.
Ed’s eyebrows went up. “Fucking useful.”
Stede shrugged. “Good way to keep up with my keys and wallet.” He unlocked the door, gestured Ed ahead of him, and then closed and locked it behind him. “Just as well, the stairs are back here anyway,” he said. He followed it with a huff of annoyance because he could feel blood trickling down his right leg. If he didn’t clean it up, it would make a mess. “Need to stop by the bathroom down here first to clean up.”
Ed looked down, winced, and said, “I’ve got it.”
The employee bathroom was clearly labeled, and Ed nipped into it and came back out with a few paper towels which he pressed under the wound before dabbing it down Stede’s leg. “Think that’ll get us to where we’re going. Unless you live in another building?”
“No, this is it,” Stede confirmed, guiding Ed to the stairs that ran alongside the storeroom and led up to his living space. He was still considering the woman with the dog, curious to know why she’d set Ed off. But Stede didn’t ask directly, not wanting to pry into Ed’s business.
He opened the apartment door and walked in, knowing he’d left the space in good order earlier. He wouldn’t need to rush about, whisking things out of sight. He gestured Ed inside and secured the door. Stede turned around to tell Ed that he was going to retrieve his medical supplies but found him wholly absorbed in looking around the living room, his eyes huge.
“All this is yours?” he asked with what sounded like wonder.
Stede glanced around, trying to remember what it might look like to someone else. He rarely had anyone up here, and the last person had been his ex-wife Mary. “Afraid so, lifetime worth of collecting, crushed into a rather smaller space then I imagined—”
“It’s fucking fascinating.” Ed had already taken several steps to the nearest bookcase, peering closely at the objects littering the shelves. “All sorts of knick-knacks and trinkets.” Ed giggled and prodded a bronze whale paperweight with a finger. “Incredible.”
“Oh, well, that’s...Thank you. I’m just going to go get my first aid kit. Were you injured anywhere?”
“Nah, mate, you sort of cushioned my fall, but I’m hoping I didn’t set off an old injury. Be a pain to have a flare up right now.” Ed moved back toward Stede with a dismissive head tilt. “Didn’t complain more than usual coming up the stairs, so I think I’ve got it. Can I help you?”
“I can manage,” Stede said.
“Hmm,” Ed replied, choosing to trail him toward the bathroom.
Stede opened the cabinet and took out the oversized first aid kit Mary had insisted on, should the children be over, not that they’d shown any interest in doing so. Stede suppressed a frown at the thought and lifted the kit to the counter. He popped open the top and began digging for the antiseptic rinse.
“Come on. I’ve got you.” Ed edged around him, closed the top of the kit, and scooped it under his arm to carry back into the living room.
Given that Ed had looted all of Stede’s medical supplies, he had no choice but to follow him. Ed placed the kit on the coffee table and gestured for Stede to sit before he reached in and easily found the spray.
He knelt in front of Stede and placed one hand to the inside of his right leg, pulling it toward him to examine the wound. “Good news. Looks like you left your skin on the brick instead of collecting brick in your skin. Hell of a knock, though. What happened?”
Stede had been so entirely focused on this sequence of events—get to the first aid kit, get them both patched up, and offer Ed a clean shirt—that he hadn’t been thinking about, well, Ed. Or he was, but more in a background “Did I just invite this entirely beautiful man up to my apartment?” way. He wasn’t going to admit the truth, the “I was staring at your legs and forgot we added planters last fall.”
Ed laughed. “Oh, that’s uh…unfortunate.”
And shit, Ed had been gently cleaning Stede’s scrape, his fingers caressing so carefully over the wound, and Stede had said that fucking aloud. Great. He could feel warmth blooming at his throat and knew his cheeks would be visibly heating, and if he could just not do this, this one time, in front of this very cool man, that would be awesome.
But he couldn’t take the words back now, so he continued, “Then I caught the edge, lost my balance, and landed on my back, with the coffee.” Stede gestured to his tank which could perhaps still be saved if he took it off and rinsed it this minute. “Do you mind if I take off my shirt? I think it may be salvageable, you know, with the performance fabric, if I don’t let it set.”
“Hm, let me just…” Ed placed a bandage on Stede’s right leg, where he’d hit the sharp corner of the planter, and then stood up, bringing back into Stede’s line of sight the very legs that had started this disaster. “Mine too,” Ed said, stripping off his shirt.
There were abs. Fucking abs, like a six-pack. Stede stared; Ed glanced down and laughed. “Shit. Forgot I had those, don’t get used to them. About to fire my trainer.”
“You have a trainer?” asked Stede as he stood and pulled off his own shirt, trying to not feel self-conscious about his own relatively soft belly, but Ed wasn’t looking at it. His eyes seemed to be laser-focused on Stede’s chest.
“It’s normal in my line of business…accounting, that is.” Ed's lips curved into a grin as he handed his shirt to Stede, who carried both to the kitchen sink to rinse out the coffee.
Stede started with the water cool, slowly running the fabric under the faucet. “So accounting. What kind of accounting do you do?”
“Mostly for my fucking behavior.” Ed leaned a hip against Stede’s counter, angling to meet his eyes. “This isn’t an act, is it?”
“Are you asking if I’m really silly enough to trip over a flower planter?” Stede frowned. “Because clearly I am.” The stain seemed to have lifted from his tank, so he shifted to Ed’s shirt. He suspected that if it had any cotton at all, which it appeared to, that it might be a goner.
Ed scoffed. “Nah, I’m not an accountant.”
Stede shut off the faucet and began squeezing the excess water out of the fabric, wondering if a stain remover would help. “Then what do you do?” he asked patiently, not understanding what Ed was getting at.
“I’m Blackbeard,” Ed said.
“But you don’t…Oh.” Stede could feel his eyes going huge. He’d thought Ed looked vaguely familiar, but he’d, of course, been famous for his big, fluffy beard…now very much absent.
“Yeah, that.” Ed sighed. “Can we skip the beard for now? I’m not really…I just wanted to make sure that you weren’t playing some kind of weird head game. Gotta be a little careful with people, you know? Like what if you’re a really intense fan?”
“Oh, I am,” Stede said. “I’ve got posters of you all over my bedroom. Love your big knife. It’s why I recognized you immediately and trapped you here by cleverly busting my leg.” Stede grinned. “I just, I’m sorry, you haven’t really been visible since…”
“Yeah, yeah. Okay. So you genuinely didn’t recognize me.”
“No, but to be fair, as we’ve already established, I wasn’t looking at your face.” He flashed Ed a flirty grin and then took both the wrung out shirts to his washing machine, locating and using the strain treatment before tossing them into a wash cycle. “Did you want to borrow a shirt, or are you hoping I’ll walk into a bookcase next?”
“Yeah, about that. I’ve got a secret,” Ed said. “Wanna hear it?”
“I’d love to.” Stede had to admit that this was the best, maybe most fascinating thing that had ever happened to him. Did he want to know Ed Teach’s secrets? Yes, he very much did.
###
Ed Teach, fucking beloved star of television and film, had game. Had it in spades, even. His ability to charm had served him at least as well as his skill as an actor. But Ed had never felt so entirely disarmed. Stede Bonnet, with his golden blond hair, warm smile, and slutty bare chest, was flirting with Ed while confidently standing in a living room filled with the most amazing shit, like a museum had fucked a junk shop, but only produced beautiful children. He’d put Ed on the wrong foot entirely, which was why Ed felt compelled to confess.
He smiled broadly, met the pretty hazel eyes of his host, and said, “I slipped because I was looking at your fantastic legs instead of the puddle of coffee on the ground. Put my foot right in it and lost my balance. I was coming to help you and crushed you instead. So…yeah, we may both need to work on watching where we’re going.”
Stede looked incredulous. “But you…” He shook his head and a little smile curled onto his lips. “Oh.”
Ed let the smile on his face be all flirtation. “They’re great legs, mate.” He paused, gauging if and I want them around me was too far. He had time, would clear his schedule if he didn't, and basically no one had seen him come up here. Except that blasted too-nosy dog woman had definitely recognized him. The day’s peace would depend on whether or not she decided to post his location. It wouldn’t hurt to have a shirt ready to go, even if he didn’t immediately put it on. “I could use a shirt.”
“Come with me.” Stede led him through a door into a large bedroom, or perhaps it would be considered large, if it weren’t every bit as stuffed as the living room they’d just exited. The space was filled with a bed, nightstands, two armoires flanking each side of the closet, and a dresser on one wall.
Ed experienced a sensation he found it difficult to name...glee or perhaps delight. He fucking tittered, but he couldn’t contain the sudden rush of emotion. “They’re full, aren’t they?” he asked, needing Stede to say yes for reasons he couldn’t he couldn't begin to comprehend.
Stede looked flustered. “They’re full. I'm a bit of a clotheshorse.”
“Fucking fabulous,” Ed said. “Think you’ll be able to part with one?”
“An armoire?” Stede asked, apparently following Ed’s eyes.
Ed’s brain flashed an image, imagining this as a room he shared, one of the armoires his, belonging to him in a way his cold, professionally designed house never really had. He grabbed that thought and stuffed it in a mental box, tied it around with two ropes, and sat on it, saying, “Thought maybe we could just start with a single shirt.”
Stede grinned. “Yeah, right, I—” He shook his head. “Let’s see, did it need to be white? I recall black being your signature color?”
“I’m rehabbing my image,” Ed murmured, accidentally letting some of the misery of that creep into his voice. “Turning over a new leaf.”
“Ohh, poison into positivity! Well, I assure you that your white shorts are still entirely eye-catching. One might even say dangerously so.” Stede winked.
The fuck. Ed was going to swoon, right onto Stede’s bed. Which, actually, wasn’t such a bad idea as he would very much not mind landing there. He took a step back toward it, just in case he felt faint. “I could maybe wear another color. Any old thing could do.”
“Hmm,” Stede said thoughtfully, pulling open the door to his closet.
Ed had assumed, based on the rest of the furniture, that it would be relatively small. It was not. The doors opened into a space both wider and deeper than Ed had guessed but still stuffed to the gills with clothing.
Stede strode into it and called back. “Did you want another T-shirt or did you fancy a bit of experimentation?”
Ed’s knees went wobbly with anticipation. “What did you have in mind?”
“Perhaps you’d like to join me?” Stede asked, voice muffled by clothing.
Ed thought Stede’s tone was maybe seductive, or maybe he was indulging in wishful thinking. He should probably go in there just to make sure. “Yeah, love that.” He stepped into the closet moving toward Stede who examined him carefully.
“I don’t think I knew you had so many tattoos. They’re beautiful. I thought they were Blackbeard’s.”
And fuck if Stede wasn’t hitting right to the core of it, immediately. Some of them were Blackbeard’s tattoos. He had thought it would be fun to get some of them for real in the first couple of years. The move shortened his time in the makeup chair, and Ed liked playing with the people’s expectations for him as an actor. He had no idea that they would come to feel different in time, blending him in people’s minds with the character, just like the fucking beard did. But that at least, he could cut away.
“Yeah, some of them are,” he said softly, “some are just me.” He wasn’t sure how to say it, but Stede was waiting patiently, and his eyes seemed so kind. Ed admitted, “I kind of forgot for a while which was him and which was me, until I couldn’t breathe anymore, couldn’t go on like that…then the beard.”
The remainder of Ed’s beard was now a low bristle covering his face, a kind of attractive level of scruff, but nothing like the one he’d worn for the endless years of Crawling Corpses. He’d initially grown and kept the beard out of sheer annoyance with the fake ones. Then at some point it had become his whole personality, his fucking trademark—the actor and the character almost indistinguishable. Until they weren’t anymore because he had done the fucking thing.
Stede smiled, the smallest curve of his lips. “Now that I’ve lured you into my bedroom, I’m sure you’ve realized that I am not actually a superfan. I can’t say I ever really cared about the beard. Your face, though, is lovely without it. I don’t think I mind the lack of grime either. Is that all makeup?”
Ed groaned and then laughed. “Never read an interview either then. Method actor, mate, I don’t shower for weeks. My co-stars complain endlessly about my unique bouquet.”
Stede giggled. “Makeup, then?”
Ed nodded. “Makeup. Getting cleaned off at the end of the day is the best fucking feeling in the world.”
“So you’re not irrevocably tied to the whole aesthetic? Willing to branch out?”
“Absolutely,” Ed agreed.
“Marvelous,” Stede said. “What do you have on the schedule today?”
Ed had something. Dinner or a meeting or a dinner meeting, and in this fucking instance, he didn’t care. He’d intended to spend his partial day to himself relaxing, reclaiming a little time for just Ed. He couldn’t see a world where doing whatever Stede wanted to do wasn’t exactly that. “What’s on your schedule today?”
“Hmm, I’m supposed to have showered and been to work fifteen minutes ago, but the boss is rather flexible. I should message Buttons if I’m going to be much longer though.”
“And your business?”
“Antiquarian books,” Stede said, his eyes meeting Ed’s.
“Mm-hmm, great. I’m working in a bookstore today.” Ed could feel himself beaming, delighted to embrace this particular mischievous impulse.
“Oh!” Stede’s voice sounded bright, happy. “Well, I was expecting a visit from my accountant Jeff today. Would you say Jeff is more staid or edgy?”
“Definitely edgy, mate, went to one of those hardcore schools of accounting.”
“Excellent, how do you feel about a skirt?” Stede asked, stepping over to a rack.
“Could it be kind of a long one? Maybe I don’t want the tattoos showing.” Ed could hear the doubt in his own voice. He very much didn’t want anyone to even think of Blackbeard when they saw him today. “Something so I could just…not.”
“I’ve got the perfect thing. Give me a moment.” Stede moved around the closet, humming to himself, and selecting items to drape over his arm, pausing for a long minute at a collection of scarves and pulling a few out and adding them to the pile.
When he was done he gestured Ed out of the closet and set the items on the bed. “The skirt is really what we’re building everything else from, so you can try that first.” Stede lifted a long flowing skirt in a deep purple.
Ed took it from Stede, feeling how soft the material was and loving the way it cascaded over his hands. He slipped off his sandals and then drew his shorts off while keeping ahold of the skirt. The motion was a little awkward, but he didn’t want to give the skirt up, even for a moment. Ed had guessed that Stede would look away as he undressed, something about his gentle nature. Stede didn’t, but his eyes didn’t drift from Ed’s face, and Ed realized that he might need to make his next invitation verbal. Once his legs were free of the shorts, he stepped into the skirt pulling it up to his waist.
“Not quite yet,” Stede said, when he moved to fasten it. “I think we’re going to put you in this long-sleeve shirt to cover your arms, and we’ll want it tucked into the skirt. May I?”
“Yeah, sure.” Ed said, taking a white button shirt and slipping his arms into it. He did a few of the lower buttons, and Stede helped him smooth it in and close the skirt.
“Hmm, good line. Okay, now, for the scarf.” He held up three options before choosing one to loop around Ed’s throat and loosely knotting it. “I think a pair of glasses and your hair up, and you should be ready for your day, Jeff.”
Stede walked over to the dresser, and picked up a pair of gold-rimmed glasses, whispering theatrically, “They’re for show,” before handing them to Ed.
Ed slipped them onto his nose, twisted up his hair, and then went to the mirror that Stede had indicated to take in the whole look. He giggled. It was sort of like movie magic. The shirt and skirt were nothing that Blackbeard would ever wear and with the majority of the tattoos covered, and the pretty scarf, the glasses, and his hair in a bun—he was transformed, no hint of the character in sight.
He spent a few minutes perfecting his hair while Stede excused himself to clean up. Ed kept watching himself in the mirror, turning his head to view the angles. He wasn’t that vain, not really, but he couldn’t look away. Stede had seen him, the real him, and had made it so that Ed could finally see himself too.
Stede came out of the bathroom a few minutes later dressed in his own button-down shirt with a vest and a pair of trousers in a lively peacock tweed. He smiled when he saw Ed still at the mirror. “I don’t know if you noticed, but the scarf has a subtle butterfly pattern. If you’d like, I have a couple of matching butterfly hairpins we could use to accent your updo.”
“Yeah, might be nice,” Ed said, wanting them very much.
Stede searched the top of the dresser before picking up two delicate gold hairpins, tipped in purple butterflies. He moved to Ed’s side. “This okay?” he asked, and when Ed nodded, Stede placed them in Ed’s bun and then gave him a hand mirror to view them.
They were perfect, and Ed was in love…with Ed, of course, or Jeff, but not the man who had just given him Jeff, because that would be weird. But, assuming a person were feeling fluttery little stirrings in the region of their heart, did it mean they couldn't kiss someone as a simple thank you?
“I wanna kiss you,” is what Ed said, being a fucking master strategist.
Stede was apparently used to such complex stratagems because he said, “Yeah, I’d like that,” and then moved closer to Ed. Stede reached out and slipped his hand into Ed’s, a motion so tender and strange that Ed couldn’t make sense of it. Then Stede gave the gentlest of tugs, urging Ed in, and their lips met, brushed, parted.
“Hmm,” Stede said before tipping in again. This time he took Ed’s lips, his other hand coming to a rest at Ed’s waist, all warm pressure, but still soft, like Ed was something precious he was determined to handle with care.
Ed let himself savor it for a moment before breaking away to say, “You don’t have to be so…gentle.” It was the right word, and yet it felt wrong to say he didn’t want it when he did. He just wasn't used to it.
“Maybe I want to be. Isn’t every day a beautiful man lands on me while thirsting over my legs. I intend to treasure you during your time with me.” Stede said, like it was an entirely normal thing to say, and then he kissed Ed again.
Well, okay, get fucking treasured, Edward Teach. No one had ever kissed him like this, soft and longing, and his entire chest felt all warm and glowy, and he could bask in this. Stede shifted the hand at Ed’s waist, moving it to brace Ed’s upper back, and fuck, was he getting dipped?
Yep, tipped back like a fucking romance heroine, Ed clinging on with an arm around Stede’s neck while feeling like he might swoon for the third time today. Stede tugged Ed back to standing, and Ed knew that he had to be wild-eyed—awestruck and enchanted.
Stede looked a little wowed himself, his breath coming faster. “We don’t have to go down to my bookstore,” he said after a moment. “We could just…do you want to stay?”
“I have another secret,” Ed said, feeling laughter—joy—bubbling through him.
“Yeah?” Stede asked.
“You have to promise not to laugh.” Ed laughed.
“I can’t. I’ll definitely laugh.” Stede shook his head, his eyes lit up.
“Okay, here we go.” Ed looked around like he was about to impart the deepest of truths. “The smell of old books is so fucking sexy. You would not believe how many inappropriate boners I’ve popped at used bookstores. Bane of my existence really. We can go try it out and see how long I last.”
“I really need more professional comportment from you, Jeff, that’s not how I imagined you doing my books,” Stede said, his grin huge.
“It’s not the books, mate, it’s the bookseller.”
“In that case, let me show you my shop.”
Stede slipped on a pair of shoes and walked over to the mirror, pulling accessories off the top of the dresser one after the other to finish his outfit. Then he turned, and somehow the effect was even more stunning than when he’d been out in the square in a tank top and shorts, bathed in sunlight. Stede Bonnet carried his own glow, a confidence that Ed wanted to drink in. He couldn’t wait to see what Stede would do next.