To her respectable neighbors in the Cornish town of Moontide, beautiful fiery-haired Kate Penhallow was nothing but an uncouth innkeeper, as free with her favors as with her tongue. To the rough-and-ready crew of brigands who manned her ship The Gilded Lady, she was the queen of smugglers, a pirate princess with steel in her soul.

But to Beau d'Auberge, gambler, duellist and adventurer, Kate was only a woman - and he was determined to win her, come hell or high water. ''A Lusty Heroine! A Dashing Scoundrel! A Romance as Tempestuous as the Sea!