Captives' Charade (39 page)

With a hearty laugh, Stewart took a step toward her. “Do you have any idea how you look?” he grinned, enjoying the vision of her tousled hair falling past her shoulders, the long limbs peaking from beneath the fabric she held clutched in her hands, and the teasing glimpse of other places.

“Y-you startled me,” Sarah gasped, overwhelmed by a sense of modesty. Last night was one thing, but here in broad daylight, and she being the only one disrobed, was quite another. “Let me dress. I will be but a minute.”

Stewart advanced again. “A minute is too long, and perhaps I don’t want you dressed,” he said leeringly, amused by her shyness.

“Have a care, Stewart,” Sarah cried, receding into the wardrobe as he moved closer. “I’m cold.” In truth she was frightened that he would find her misshapen body distasteful in the light of day. And after last night, it was something she could not bear to suffer.

“What a fickle wench you are,” he teased, lifting a lock of her chestnut hair and rubbing it against his jaw. “You allow me to worship your body all night, yet in the morn I find that the temple is closed? I think not ... ” he murmured, skillfully snaking a hand around the materials she held against her, as his eyes locked hers in a heated gaze.

Timidly,sheduckedherhead,holding herself rigid beneath his gentle but purposeful touch. Pulling her away from the meager shelter of her hanging clothes, his soft mutterings brought a tingling to her earlobe. “Who’s this stranger I hold in my arms? Where is the woman who tortured me to the brink of madness only hours ago?” His mouth found hers unwilling, but under his practiced movements, her lips became pliant and soon she was straining closer, wanting the intimacy his touch promised. He caressed her supple roundness with burning fingers as he trailed warm lips along the column of her throat. She sighed at the rough tingling sensuousness of his clothes against her nakedness, wanting again to drown herself in his pervasive virility.

“God,”hewhisperedunevenly,“youaremore a temptation than ever. It will be my undying pleasure to keep you with child, if only I can withstand this torture.” To hear him speak of the future pleased her reluctantly accepted With a sigh, he held her away from his body, noticing the attractive blush of her pale skin. “Get dressed, you wanton,” he teased, “before we both forget the wisdom of our sacrifice.” After one last abrupt, fiercely possessive kiss, Stewart released her suddenly and departed, almost as swiftly as he’d entered. Sarah was left staring at the door until a reactive trembling shook her body into action. But whether it was from the heat of his passion or the chill of the room, she did not pause to ponder.
immensely, even as she

his suddenly cooled ardor.

“The road is a mess, and the bridge is awash,” Stewart was saying between bites of the late morning repast Sarah had prepared for them. “I got only as far as the Weeks’ farm before turning back. I’m afraid there’s no point in summoning the parson today ... or even tomorrow perhaps. Until the river crests, traveling is out of the question.”

Disappointment was written in Sarah’s wide blue eyes, but she attempted to hide it by saying, “I expect the weather would have kept the Weeks away, too.”

“Oh, they o ffered to make the journey, even in this deluge,” Stewart replied, reaching for a slice of the fresh bread Sarah had warmed for them, adding, with a gleam in his eyes, “but I think we’ll manage, don’t you?”

Sarah blushed ridiculously, to Stewart’s considerable amusement. He chuckled, “I have exhausted my imagination to make you a woman of experience, and yet you still color like a virgin. Look at you,” he chortled, rising to place a kiss on her bowed head. Using a long finger to tilt her pointed chin upward, he spoke in gentler tones, “Come now, my sweet innocent. See me off. I’m going to bring in more firewood, and then we’re going to barricade ourselves against this depressing storm.”

As the day passed, Sarah experienced an increasing restlessness that had little to do with the steady rain outside. She knew its cause but was hard-pressed for a solution. Despite Stewart’s seemingly complete commitment to marriage and family, there were still too many questions battering about in her mind.

Why had he remained in Charleston while she, accompanied only by her broken heart, had traveled to Boston? Why had he then stayed away so long? And despite the confession he had made about missing her, Sarah did not truly believe he’d come here to await her return from the fabricated trip to Philadelphia.

With each passing hour, she was more convinced that Stewart had found himself trapped into a situation with but one honorable solution – and she did not want marriage for that reason alone.

Oh, at first she had. Seeing him again after all those lonely months, feeling his intoxicating nearness, experiencing the joys that only his touch had ever provoked – those reawakened desires had proved powerful persuaders.

But where was the love? And how long could the marriage survive without it? Pretending to be his wife had been one thing, but the charade had been successful only because of the threat inherent in a poor performance. What were their chances under the present circumstances?

Could he be faithful to her? She doubted that very much. There was Felicia, of course, but what of the others she did not even know about? Stewart was a traveler, and there was no indication that the marriage would alter that fact. Could she stand the separations even if fidelity were not a concern? Their parting had nearly destroyed her once. It would be no less demolishing a second time.

As horribly di fficult as it was going to be, knowing it would irrevocably splinter her heart, Sarah made a decision. The weather was cooperating, as if God himself was forcing her to make a choice. The parson could not come to sanctify the marriage, for there was no marriage to bless. And there wouldn’t be.

Making the decision was one thing, Sarah knew. Carrying it out would be something much more challenging. But then something happened to change the course of events forever.
CHAPTER 39

It was nightfall when Sarah realized that the occasional contractions she’d been feeling during the course of the day were no longer sporadic or benign. Curiously fearful of alarming Stewart, she kept her condition to herself, as if sharing would make real what she did not want to be. It was too early, she chided herself; the pains would go away.

Finishing up a pure white muslin baby gown, she feigned absolute concentration over her work whenever her rounded belly tightened, praying that Stewart, who sat near her in the glow of the lantern, would not notice that she held her breath or creased her brow.

Fortunately, he seemed engrossed in reading Johann Kemper’s journal which told of the success of the farm. It was hard to tell that there was so much unspoken between the two; they appeared perfectly, silently, in tune.

Immediately after the latest pain, Sarah decided that she must seek isolation for it was becoming nearly impossible to keep from gasping. “Stewart,” she began nonchalantly, “I think I will retire now, if you don’t mind.”

“Is anything wrong,” he responded, closing the ledger as he moved forward in his chair to look at her more closely.

“Of course not,” she dismissed him lightly. “It’s just that my eyes are tired from this stitchery, and I thought I’d go to bed, rather than take a rest. I can finish it tomorrow.” Seeing that he was about to rise, she gestured hastily, “Oh please, don’t trouble yourself. There’s no reason you need to retire so early.”

“Afraid that I may ravish you again?” he crooned teasingly, lifting himself effortlessly from the chair.

Ducking her head to hide her fear, she rejoined negligently, “Of course not! I’d given you credit for some sensitivity, if only because your efforts are ultimately fruitless. You know we can’t ....”

He refused to be bated. “I was merely going to offer you a hand, my sweet, and tuck you in. You seem to have a bit of trouble moving around today.” Had he noticed after all, she wondered.

“Please do not coddle me,” Sarah retorted, even though she took his proffered hand. “Were I not perfectly capable of negotiating, I’d not have been left to fend for myself ... Oh my God!”

Sarah stood riveted to the floor as a gush of warm liquid trailed beneath her pantaloons. Clutching Stewart’s fingers, she stared wide-eyed, her mouth shaped in an exaggerated O, her senses reeling.

“What is it, Sarah,” he asked intently, his hands rising to her shoulders to steady her.

“I-I ... I don’t ... I’m all ....” she struggled, and it was only because she cast her indigo eyes downward over her stomach that Stewart had any idea what she was referring to.

A faint suspicion developed as he lifted her skirts just enough to see her dampened pantaloons and drops of liquid on the braided rug beneath her. “The baby,” he whispered, more to himself than to her. A flash of insight prompted his next words. “’Tis all right, Sarah. It’s not unusual. It simply means that we’re going to be parents a bit sooner than we’d expected.”

“No!” she cried out, instinctively clutching the front of his shirt with both fists. “The baby’s not due for three more months! Can’t we stop it?”

Realizing Sarah was panic-stricken forced Stewart to maintain an aura of calm, despite his own unease. Rubbing her arms, he said quietly, “What we can do is get you into some dry clothes ... and then we’re going to have our baby,” he cajoled with soft, confident words. “Come on now. Put your arms around my neck.”

Too stunned to do anything but follow his orders, Sarah let herself be carried into the master bedroom, down a small hallway between her own and the Kempers’. It featured a huge four-poster bed, and a stone fireplace that took up one entire wall. It was Stewart’s room, of course, and had he not been carrying her, she still would have felt his presence here by the way the room was sparsely yet exquisitely furnished. Standing her on the plush Aubusson carpeting of browns and blues, he immediately pulled back the thick, downy comforter, ordering her to begin removing her clothes. “I’ll get you a gown and some linens,” he told her, and then proceeded to stir up a fire in the grate.

“Stewart,” she whispered unsurely, as her fingers fumbled to open the row of tiny buttons on the bodice of her gown, “are you certain ... I mean, could it be a false alarm? Suddenly she gasped for another pain had begun, and this time she had not the warning to disguise its effects.

He was at her side at once, supporting her as the contraction expanded and diminished, noting the beads of perspiration on her temple despite the room’s chill. When it had passed, he took over the task of unbuttoning her. “That was not your first pain,” he said, his eyes fixed sternly on her downcast lashes.

It was definitely not a question. He seemed to know much more about childbirth than she, and for once she found his greater knowledge quite comforting, though she was loathe to admit it to him. “How long have you been in labor?” he demanded as he helped her step out of her gown.

“This afternoon,” she answered quietly, “but I didn’t realize it until a short while ago.”

“Then I think, madam, that you’ve answered your own question,” Stewart replied as the folds of Sarah’s undergarments loosed beneath his fingers. “This is no false alarm.”

Shivering from his touch as much as the room’s chill, Sarah was grateful for the quilt he threw round her shoulders before he turned to get her bedclothes. “You’ll have to get Dr. Claremont then,” she told him somberly. “He lives ....”

“I know where Dr. Claremont lives, Sarah. In the same town as Reverend Rushing who cannot possibly pay us a visit for at least a week. Get ready, dearest,” he leveled at her from the doorway. “We’re going to be on our own.”

Stewart returned in moments to find tears coursing silently down Sarah’s flushed cheeks. She was standing exactly where he had left her, huddled beneath the heavy quilt. “Another pain, Sarah?” he asked softly, throwing the linens on the bed beside her, before taking her arms.

“No,”shechoked,leaningheavilyagainst him as if she had not the strength to stand alone.

“What is it, then?” he coaxed, brushing the tears aside as he cradled her head against his wide chest, his heart contracting painfully as he felt her distress.

“I-I am so frightened,” she cried, her shaking voice muffled by his nearness. “I don’t know anything about having a baby. Elsa was going to bring Lydia’s scientific journal so I could read it when the Kempers returned. I thought I would have time. But now, and without a doctor ....” Her words broke off in an agonizing sob.

“Shhh,”hewhispered,ashecurvedher swollen body to his length, “you have nothing to fear. I told you a long time ago that I had developed some medical knowledge over the years. And it just so happens that birthing babies is one of my specialties.”

“The truth?” she returned, her huge blue eyes fixing him with a gaze of undisguised hope.

 

“The truth,” Stewart assured her, “including my own nephew, Ethan.”

 

“You delivered Peggy’s baby?” Her eyes filled with wonder at the thought.

“Her second son is named Stewart Ethan after me,” Stewart smiled proudly. “Peggy was overwhelmed with gratitude,” he added arrogantly, though his eyes expressed the teasing nature of his remark.

“Howeverdid...?”shebegan,curiousnow.

“It’s a very long and rather odd story – in hindsight, of course – and I promise to tell you all about it, but not right now. I think a matter of more pressing urgency is the need to get you into your bedclothes.” Immediately Stewart pulled the quilt from her shoulders, reaching for the white brushed cotton gown he had tossed on the bed. Shyly she submitted to his ministrations, her heart nearly bursting with love for this man who was so gently and confidently taking over her life once again. As he tied the satin bows in the front, she was all too aware of his knuckles grazing her breasts, and she allowed herself a moment of pretending that he loved her and that they were married. It could be so good ....

Another contraction was forming and she winced in anticipation. Sensing her tension, Stewart took her hands, which she grasped tightly. “Relax now, Sarah. Loosen your grip and take deep breaths,” he ordered. “Do you want to lie down?” She shook her head negatively, her eyes fastened shut, her lips a tight line. “Good girl,” he said gently, “it’s better if you don’t, for now at least.” His thumbs made soothing motions on the back of her hands for the duration of the pain, and when it was over, he placed warm lips on her fevered brow. “You’re doing fine, just fine,” he murmured, though it pained him to see her suffering. “Come over to the fireplace with me. And I’ll try to warm up this place a bit.”