Chapter 16
THE EARLY MORNING SUN BEAT DOWN ON THE LIGHTLY crusted snow and flashed back into Clay’s red eyes. The pain in his eyes went directly to his head where everything vile that had ever been created seemed to exist. His body seemed to weigh a thousand pounds, and each movement was an ordeal, even as he picked up another handful of snow and pressed it to his dry, swollen tongue.
Worse than his raging headache and his churning stomach was the memory of this morning. He woke beside Bianca. At first, he’d been able to do nothing but stare because his body hurt too much to be able to think.
Opening her eyes quickly, Bianca’d gasped when she saw him. She sat up, pulling the sheet to her neck. “You animal!” she said through clenched teeth. “You dirty, filthy animal!”
As she told him that he’d dragged her to his bed and raped her, Clay couldn’t speak.
When she’d finished, he laughed because he didn’t believe he could ever have gotten that drunk.
But when Bianca’d stepped from the bed, there’d been blood on the sheets, blood on her nightgown. Before Clay could reply, Bianca had begun telling him that she was a lady, that she wouldn’t be treated like his whore, that if she had a child Clay would have to marry her.
Clay hadn’t bothered to reply as he’d stepped from the bed and begun to dress quickly. He’d wanted to be as far away from Bianca as possible.
Now, sitting in the clearing he had built with James and Beth, he kept remembering things. Maybe he’d been so drunk that he had made love to Bianca. This morning, he couldn’t remember anything after he’d left Nicole’s.
Nicole was the one who worried him. What if Bianca did become pregnant? He pushed the thought out of his mind.
“Clay?” Nicole called. “Are you here?”
Smiling, he stood up to greet her as she came into the clearing.
“You didn’t say what time. Oh, Clay! You look awful! Do your eyes feel as bad as they look?”
“Worse,” he said hoarsely as he held out his arms to her.
Nicole got within two feet of him, then stopped, her eyes blinking rapidly. “You smell as bad as you look.”
He grimaced. “Didn’t I hear that love was blind?”
“Even blind people can smell. Sit down and rest or build a fire in the cave. I brought some food with me. You didn’t eat much last night.”
He groaned. “Don’t mention last night.”
It was an hour later, when they’d eaten breakfast and the little cave was warm, that Nicole was ready to talk as she leaned against the stone wall of the cave, a blanket across her legs. She wasn’t yet ready to sit easily in Clay’s arms. “I didn’t sleep much last night,” she began. “All night, I kept thinking about what you’d told me about Bianca and her relatives. I want to believe you…but it’s difficult. All I can see is that I am your wife, yet she lives with you. It’s almost as if you want both of us.”
“Do you really believe that?”
“I try not to. But I know Beth had a strong hold over you. Maybe you don’t realize how close you are to your home. Last night you talked of just walking away and leaving this place. Yet at one time you were willing to kidnap a woman merely because she looked like someone who belonged here.”
“You mean more to me than the plantation.”
“Do I?” she asked. Her eyes were wide, dark, liquid. “I hope I do,” she whispered. “I hope I mean that much to you.”
“But you doubt me,” he said flatly. Through his mind was going the vision of Bianca in his bed, Bianca’s virgin blood on the sheets. Was Nicole right not to trust him? Turning to the little niche that held the unicorn set in glass, he stood and held it in his hands. “We made vows on this,” he said. “I know we were children and had a lot to learn about life, but we never broke the vows.”
“Sometimes innocent pledges are the most sincere,” she smiled.
Clay held the glass in his hand. “I love you, Nicole, and I vow that I will love you until the day I die.”
Nicole stood before him and put her hand over his. There was something that bothered her. Beth, James, and Clay had touched the little unicorn, then Beth had had it sealed in glass so no one else could ever touch it. It was a silly thing, really, but Nicole couldn’t help remembering Beth’s portrait, so very like Bianca. A swift thought ran across her mind. When would she be worthy to touch what Beth had touched?
“Yes, Clay, I love you,” she whispered. “I always have, and I always will.”
Carefully, he set the glass unicorn back into the wall, unaware of Nicole’s frown. He turned and pulled her close to him. “We can go west in the spring. There are always wagon trains being organized. We’ll leave at different times so no one will know we’ve gone together.”
Clay went on, but Nicole wasn’t listening. Spring was months away. Spring was the time when the earth came alive again, when the crops were to be planted. Would Clay be able to walk away, to leave all the people who depended on him?
“You’re shivering,” he said quietly. “Are you cold?”
“I think I’m frightened,” she said honestly.
“There’s no reason to be afraid. We’ve been through the worst of it now.”
“Have we, Clay?”
“Hush!” he commanded, and lowered his mouth to hers.
It had been a long time since they’d been together, not since the party at the Backes’s. Whatever sensible reasons Nicole had for her fears, they fled when Clay kissed her. Her arms went around his neck and pulled his face closer to hers as his hand turned her head and slanted her mouth so that her lips parted. He was hungry for her, starved for the sweet nectar of her that would wash away the filth of the night with Bianca—a night confused with visions of Beth, a pink silk gown, and flecks of blood on a white sheet.
“Clay!” Nicole gasped. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Just too much to drink last night. Don’t go away,” he whispered as he pulled her tightly against him. “I need you so much. You are warm and alive, and I am so haunted by people.” He kissed her neck. “Make me forget.”
“Yes,” she whispered. “Yes.”
Clay pulled her down with him to the floor of the cave on top of a quilt. It was warm and sweet-smelling inside the little room. Nicole wanted him urgently, but Clay wanted to take his time. Slowly, he unbuttoned the front of her soft wool dress and put his hand inside, cupping her breast, his thumb teasing the soft crest.
“How I’ve missed you!” he whispered, his mouth following his hand.
Nicole arched beside him, her mind a whirl of flashing colors. As she fumbled with the buttons of his vest, she was unable to remember what she was doing, since his mouth and hands seemed to make her incapable of performing even a simple task.
Smiling at her ineptitude, Clay pulled back. Her eyes were closed, her lashes a thick, lush curve against her cheek. As he caressed her cheek, ran his finger along her lips, his reverie changed from sweetness to passion. His hands quickly unfastened the buttons of his vest, his shirt, boots, and trousers following.
Nicole lay on her back, her head propped on her arm, watching the firelight in the little cave play deliciously with the skin over his muscles, dancing from one indentation to a mound of strength. She ran her finger up his back.
He turned, nude, all golden skin and bronze.
“You’re beautiful,” she whispered, and he smiled at her before he kissed her again, his hand easily slipping her dress from her shoulders, running over her smooth, firm body, exploring it slowly, as if it weren’t very familiar to him. When he pulled her on top of him, she lifted her hips and guided him into their lovemaking.
“Clay!” she gasped as he moved her hips, slowly at first, building rapidly until she clung to him, her hands clutching at him hungrily. She collapsed on top of him, weak, throbbing, satiated.
“Let me get this straight, lady,” the burly young man said, spitting a thick stream of tobacco juice near her feet. “You want me to give you a baby? Not give you
one of mine what’s already born but to plant one in you?”
Bianca stood rigid, her gaze level. It had taken very few questions to find Oliver Hawthorne, a man who was willing to do something for a price and keep his mouth shut. Her first thought had been to pay him to return Nicole to France, but the Hawthornes didn’t have the reputation of dishonesty that the Simmons did.
After the failed attempt to get Clay to impregnate her, she realized something had to be done or all her future dreams would collapse. It wouldn’t be long before Clay realized she had no power over him. She must get herself with child, no matter what she had to do!
“Yes, Mr. Hawthorne. I want to have a child. I’ve investigated your family, and you seem to be especially prolific.”
“Investigated, huh?” He smiled at the woman, appraising her. He didn’t mind her plumpness, since he liked big women with strong backs, eager, energetic women in bed, but he did mind her look of never having worked in her life. “I reckon you mean that the Hawthornes can make babies even when they can’t get their tobacco to grow.”
She nodded curtly. The less she had to talk to the man, the better she liked it. “This is, of course, to be kept confidential. In public, I will not acknowledge that I have ever met you, and I expect the same treatment.”
Oliver’s eyes twinkled. He was a short, heavyset man with a broken front tooth, and he had a feeling the whole situation was a dream and he was going to wake up very soon. Here was a woman offering to pay him for giving her a tumble, or as many as it took to impregnate her. It made him feel like a horse put out to stud, and he rather liked the idea. “Sure, lady, whatever you say. I’ll act like I never saw you or the kid before, though I warn you that my six kids all look like me.”
It would serve Clay right to claim a child as his when it obviously looked like another man, she thought. The child would be short and sturdy, so unlike Clay’s tall, slim grace. “That’s all right,” she said, the dimple appearing in her left cheek. “Can you meet me tomorrow at three o’clock behind the tannery on the Armstrong plantation?”
“Armstrong, huh? Clay havin’ trouble makin’ his own babies?”
Bianca stiffened. “I don’t plan to answer any questions, and I’d prefer you don’t ask them.”
“Sure,” Oliver said, then looked around them cautiously. They were on a road four miles from the Armstrong plantation, a place she’d chosen in her message to him. As he reached out and touched her arm, she jumped backward as if she’d been burned.
“Don’t touch me!” she said through clenched teeth.
Frowning in puzzlement, he watched her turn and angrily walk down the road toward the driver who waited for her around a bend. She was an odd one, he thought. She didn’t want him to touch her, yet she wanted him to make her pregnant. She sneered at him as if he repulsed her, but she wanted to meet him in the afternoon to make love. In broad daylight! The thought of that made Oliver’s skin glow, and he reached inside his trousers to readjust himself more comfortably. He wasn’t one to look a gift horse in the mouth. Maybe more of those la-de-da ladies would need him to make up for their weak men. Maybe Oliver could make a living at this, and to hell with tobacco.
He straightened his shoulders and began to walk home.
For the next month, Nicole felt she was content, if not happy. Clay and she met often in the clearing beside the river. They were joyous meetings, full of love and plans for the trek west. They were like children, talking of what they’d take, how many bedrooms their house would have, how many children they’d have, the names they’d give them. They spoke of when they’d tell the twins and Janie of their plans, for of course they would go with them.
One evening in late February, the sky darkened menacingly and lightning threatened to split the little house in half.
“Why are you so jumpy?” Janie asked. “It’s just a storm comin’ up.”
Nicole put her knitting into the basket on the floor, since it was no use trying to continue. Every storm took her back to that night when her grandfather was taken.
“Are you upset because you can’t meet Clay?”
Astonishment showed on Nicole’s face.
Janie chuckled. “You don’t have to tell me what’s been going on. I can read your face. I always figured you’d tell me when you were ready.”
Nicole sat on the floor before the fire. “You’re so good and patient with me.”
“You’re the one who’s patient,” Janie sniffed. “There isn’t another woman alive who’d put up with what Clayton is giving you.”
“There are reasons—” Nicole began.
“Men always have reasons when it comes to women.” She stopped suddenly. “I shouldn’t be saying these things. There’s more to this than I know, I’m sure. Maybe there’s a reason Clay is meeting his wife like some city woman.”
Eyes twinkling, Nicole smiled. “City woman, is it? Maybe, someday, when I’m living with him and see him every day, I’ll look back fondly at this time when I was so adored.”
“You don’t believe that any more than I do. You should be in Arundel Hall now, supervising the place, instead of that fat—”
As a sharp slash of lightning cut off her words, Nicole gave a little scream of fright and clutched at her heart.
“Nicole!” Janie said, jumping up, her mending falling to the floor. “Something is wrong.” Putting her arm around Nicole’s shoulders, she led her back to her chair. “I want you to sit down and relax. I’ll make us some tea, and yours is going to have some brandy in it.”
Nicole sat down, but she didn’t relax. The branches of a tree slapped against the roof, and the wind whistled in through the windows, blowing the curtains. The night outside was black and, to Nicole, horrible-looking.
“Here,” Janie said, thrusting a steaming cup of tea into her hands. “Drink this, and then you’re going to bed.”
Trying to calm herself as she drank the tea, she could feel the brandy warming her, but her nerves were too on edge to relax.
At the first pounding on the door, she jumped so high that half the tea spilled down the front of her dress.
“That has to be Clay,” Janie smiled, grabbing a towel. “He knows about you and storms, and he’s come to sit with you. Now, dry yourself and put on a pretty smile for him.”
With shaking hands, Nicole patted at the tea-stained wool and tried to smile as she anticipated Clay’s appearance.
As Janie threw open the front door, a welcome and a lecture for Clay were already taking form. She was going to let him know what she thought of his neglect of his wife.
But the man standing there wasn’t Clay. He was a short man, slightly built, with thin blond hair that straggled over the collar of his green velvet coat. About his throat was a white silk scarf that was tied so it covered the lower edge of his chin. He had small eyes, a knife blade of a nose, and a small, thick-lipped mouth.
“Is this the house of Nicole Courtalain?” he asked, his head tilted backward, as if he were trying to look down on Janie, which was impossible since she was several inches taller.
His voice was so thickly accented that Janie had difficulty understanding what sounded to her like, “Ees thees thee ouse of—” The name was one Janie had never heard before.
“Woman!” the small man commanded. “Have you no tongue or no brains?”
“Janie,” Nicole said quietly, “I am Nicole Courtalain Armstrong.”
Obviously appraising her, he spoke less angrily. “Oui. You are her daughter.” He turned on his heel and walked back into the night.
“Who is he?” Janie demanded. “I couldn’t even understand him. Is he a friend of yours?”
“I never saw him before. Janie! There’s a woman with him.”
The two women rushed out into the night. Nicole put her arm around one side of the woman, the man on the other side, as Janie grabbed a suitcase from the ground and followed them.
Inside the house, they led the woman to a chair before the fire, and Janie poured tea and b
randy while Nicole went to a chest to get a quilt. It was when Janie had the tea ready and handed it to the exhausted woman that she had time to get a good look at her. It was like looking at an older version of Nicole. The woman’s skin was unlined, clear, and perfect, her mouth exactly like Nicole’s, a combination of innocence and sexuality. The eyes, though like Nicole’s, were vacant, lifeless.
“There now,” Nicole said, tucking the quilt around the woman’s legs before she glanced up and saw the odd look on Janie’s face. Nicole looked up at the woman from where she was kneeling on the floor, her hands still on the quilt. As she looked at the familiar features, her eyes filled with tears, then slowly, softly, they ran down her cheeks. “Mama,” she whispered. “Mama.” She bent forward and buried her face in the woman’s lap.
Janie saw that the older woman made no response to Nicole’s gesture or words.
“I had hoped—” the man beside her said. “I had hoped that seeing her daughter again would bring her back.”
The man’s words made Janie understand the woman’s vacant eyes; they were the eyes of someone who wanted to see nothing more in life.
“Can we get her to bed?” the man asked.
“Yes, of course,” Janie said firmly, kneeling beside her friend. “Nicole, your mother is very tired. Let’s take her upstairs and put her to bed.”
Silently, Nicole rose. Tears made her face damp, and her eyes never left her mother’s face. Half in a daze, she helped her mother upstairs, helped Janie undress her, unaware that her mother never spoke.
Downstairs, Janie made more tea and brandy, then sliced ham and cheese for sandwiches for the young man.
“I thought both my parents were killed,” Nicole said quietly.
The man ate quickly, obviously very hungry. “Your father was. I saw him guillotined.” He seemed oblivious to Nicole’s wince of pain. “My father and I went to see the guillotining, as almost everyone else did. It was the only sport left in Paris, and it helped to make up for the fact that we had no bread. But my father is—how do you say?—a romantic. Every day, he’d come home to his cobbler’s shop and talk to my mother and me about the waste of all the beautiful women. He said it was a shame to see the lovely heads roll into the basket.”