It all started with wanting to write a vampire pirate story. I write Scottish inspired romance so I spent time searching for a Scottish / pirate connection. In the meantime, I began writing to get a feel for the characters. Robert, the hero of Sea Panther, balked at being a pirate. "Too honorable," he said. Can you imagine an honorable vampire?
Researching pirates was fun. During the research, I stumbled across The Republic of Pirates—Being the True and Surprising Story of the Caribbean Pirates and the Man Who Brought Them Down by Colin Woodard. Written within the pages I found the wee piece of history needed to set the stage for Sea Panther.
In August of 1714, Queen Anne of England died, childless. The crown would have passed to her half-brother, James Stuart, if not for a law passed in 1701 declaring no Catholic could sit upon the thrown of England. Instead, George Ludwig, a second cousin of Anne’s and a Protestant from Germany was brought to England and crowned King George I. Many were displeased having a German who didn’t care to learn the language as king. The Scots were especially unhappy, having lost their independence in 1707, but at least they had had a Stewart (the legitimate royal family of Scotland) on the thrown. Now, they had a king hostile to their cause.
The noble families of Scotland, along with many Englishmen, became determined to place James Stuart on the thrown. Thus was born the Jacobite movement.
Lord Archibald Hamilton, Governor of Jamaica, was a Jacobite. Although he later denied it, it is believed he gathered together and commissioned a fleet of private warships in Port Royal intended as a Jacobite navy.
Lucky for Robert, he got out of being a pirate in Sea Panther and joined the ranks of privateers commissioned by Lord Hamilton. Though many later called them pirates. Of course, at that point in the writing of Sea Panther, neither Robert nor I knew he’d be cursed and become a shape shifting vampire.
Can love mend a fractured soul?
After evading arrest for Jacobite activities, Scottish nobleman Robert MacLachlan turns privateer. A Caribbean Voodoo priestess curses him to an eternal existence as a vampire shifter torn between the dual natures of a Florida panther and an immortal blood-thirsting man. For centuries, he seeks to reverse the black magic whilst maintaining his honor. Cruising the twenty-first century Atlantic, he becomes shorthanded to sail his 90-foot yacht, Sea Panther. The last thing he wants is a female crewmember and the call of her blood.
Although she swore never to sail again after her father died in a sailing accident, Kimberly Scot answers the captain's crew wanted ad to escape a hit man. She's lost everything, her fiancé, her job, and most of her money, along with money belonging to her ex-clients. A taste of Kimberly's blood convinces Robert she is the one woman who can claim the panther's heart. To break the curse, they travel back in time to where it all began—Jamaica 1715.
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