Jo Goodman (18 page)

The housekeeper blushed. "Go on with you, Mr. Sheridan." She gave the maid a little push to enter the room. "I knew you wouldn't mind if we tried her out on you," she said. "She's frightened, poor thing. And she doesn't speak a word."

Grant watched the girl's passage with more interest than Jonna. "Is she deaf?" he asked.

"No," Mrs. Davis said. "She hears everything, but it's as if she doesn't understand. And no one can get a word out of her. I think she's mute."

"What's her name?" he asked Jonna.

Jonna looked to Mrs. Davis for the answer.

"Rachael," the housekeeper said.

Rachael recognized her name and swiveled around to face the housekeeper. She looked at Mrs. Davis expectantly, her dark eyes large and apprehensive. The housekeeper made a number of motions with her hands, indicating Rachael should go on about her business and remove the tray. The girl picked up the service quickly, aware of the scrutiny of the housekeeper, her employer, and the guest. Her hands shook, and the silver and china rattled noisily. The more she tried to steady herself, the more awkward her positioning became.

Grant set down his brandy and came to her rescue. "Here," he said quietly. "Allow me to help."

The small dark face stared up at him. There was worry first, then gratitude, but both expressions were shaded by fear.

Grant took the tray to Mrs. Davis. "I think more practice is in order, but you can't fault her effort."

The housekeeper smiled gratefully at Grant's understanding. "You're right about that." She stepped aside, let the girl pass, then left herself. Grant shut the doors and turned on Jonna. "You're a fraud, Jonna Remington."

She noticed he sounded quite pleased about it. "I am? How so?"

"You have nothing good to say about the abolitionists, yet you have set up this house to help one poor young Negress after another."

"One has nothing to do with the other," she told him. "That child's freeborn. Mrs. Davis plucked her out of the colored orphanage and has made a cause of her. She thinks the girl is perfectly trainable, but I have my doubts."

"How old is she?"

"Seventeen... eighteen."

Both of Grant's sandy brows rose. "Really. I would have thought younger."

"Apparently the records indicate otherwise."

"What happened to her hand?" he asked.

Jonna had suspected he'd noticed the girl's maimed hand when he'd reached for the tray. "You're not thinking of taking her on as a cause yourself?" she asked. "I thought you and your abolitionist friends only wanted to free slaves."

"That's a narrow view," Grant said. "But I'm not surprised you entertain it." He couldn't resist adding, "You and every other Boston merchant with Southern interests."

"Be careful, Grant. You'll tar yourself with that same brush. What are you if not a Boston merchant?"

He chuckled, raising his glass in a small salute. "As a matter of fact, I
was
thinking of taking up that girl's cause. Even abolitionists need to be reminded that slavery is not merely a problem in the South."

Jonna sat up straighter. "That girl is not a slave in my home. She earns a wage and her room and board."

"Of course she does. But I wonder how much freer she is here in Boston than she would be below the Mason-Dixon line."

"Well, you're not going to put her on display at one of your meetings to ask that question."

He smiled at her protectiveness. "See, Jonna, you are a fraud." He saw her mouth flatten as she dismissed this observation. "Tell me about the girl's hand."

"A dog bite, I believe. Fairly recent. Mrs. Davis asked Dr. Hardy to treat it. Apparently there's nothing to be done. He can't repair what's left of the ball of her hand, but at least there is no infection. He thinks she will always have some numbness in her fingers."

He nodded slowly. "That explains that business with the tray. I thought she was going to upend it on you."

"I suspect she was nervous as well. This evening is the first time she has worked in front of company."

Grant considered that. "Is it because you haven't had any guests in my absence or because she's only been here a short time?"

"Both," Jonna said.

Setting aside the snifter, Grant leaned forward. His elbows rested on his knees, and his hands were folded together. "Not even Decker Thorne?"

Deception did not come easily to Jonna. On the occasions it was necessary it was something well thought out, and she practiced it with considerable effort. She could not deceive Grant now. His question had come too unexpectedly. Besides, she knew she had already, in one manner or another, given herself away. What bothered her more than this knowledge was the fact that she had wanted to lie. "Captain Thorne was here one evening," she said. "But I suspect you knew that."

He nodded. "I heard about the fight within a few hours of arriving in Boston," he said. "And naturally the same people wanted me to learn that you were responsible for his release from jail. Knowing you as I do, I was surprised that he only spent a single night here."

"That was his choice."

"I thought it might have been." Grant stood, but he didn't approach Jonna's chair. "I wonder at your interest in him. It was not so long ago that you dismissed Decker out of hand." His smile did not light his flat black eyes. "It always seemed to me that it was Colin Thorne you favored. Or is it just that you find Decker a more acceptable substitute for his brother than I?"

Jonna recoiled as if struck. Grant's accusation took her breath away. She came to her feet, hands curled at her sides, and forced herself to speak calmly. "Perhaps we cannot even be friends any longer."

Grant Sheridan had never found it easy to be contrite, but he knew how to make an apology. Clearly he had overstepped himself with Jonna. "I'm sorry," he said stiffly. "I suppose I was getting some of my own back. Did you think I wouldn't be hurt by what you've said tonight? I love you, Jonna."

It was the first time he had ever said the words. She was struck by the fact that they made no difference. "I'm sorry, too," she said quietly. "But I don't return your feelings."

Grant hesitated, wondering what he could say that would change her mind. It was with deep regret that he understood there were no words. He walked to the doors, opened them soundlessly, and made his exit. He was standing on the sidewalk in front of her house, well outside of her hearing if not her sight, when he finally swore softly to himself. "Nothing's changed." He recalled the kiss. His mouth against hers. The way she pushed at his shoulders and twisted in his arms. He remembered the texture of her skin under his lips. Cool and smooth. "You
will
be my wife."

Jonna stepped away from the salon's large window as Grant continued down the sidewalk. She let the velvet drapes fall back into place. Hugging herself, feeling chilled by this last glimpse of Grant, Jonna approached the fireplace. She knelt in front of it, raising her face and hands to the heat. What had he said, she wondered, just before he turned away from the house? It was too dark for her to make out the words, yet she had the distinct impression he meant for her to know them.

It wasn't fair, she thought, that she had never fallen in love with him. She had willed it to happen on any number of occasions. Once or twice she had even permitted herself to believe it was true.

Flames lighted Jonna's rueful smile and colored her complexion. She had never thought of herself as a particularly foolish person. Now she was revising that opinion. She mocked herself with soft laughter. She knew one or two people who would require no convincing.

* * *

Jonna spent Christmas Day alone. She gave presents to the staff, then dismissed those who wanted to spend time with their own families. The others she knew would gather in the kitchen and share a specially prepared feast in front of the hearth. She took her own meal in the afternoon, spending the rest of the day working in the library. There was the occasional interruption as Rachael brought tea and replaced wood in the fireplace, but save for these moments, Jonna was alone.

In other years she had accepted invitations. Most recently she had shared Christmas Day with Grant. She had no regrets about choosing solitude this Christmas, and she had none about Grant's absence. She told herself there was really no one she wanted to spend the day with, and for the better part of the afternoon and evening, she believed it.

It was only when she heard a pair of familiar voices singing cheerfully off-key that she knew herself to be a liar as well as a fool.

Jonna pushed her chair back from the desk and went to the window. Falling snow was illuminated by the lantern Decker held. Jack's lantern dangled from his fingertips, and the light it gave off swept the crusty, glistening ground cover. Their faces were raised above the lines of their scarves. The wind had flushed their cheeks with color, and Jack's nose looked dangerously close to frostbite. Jonna pressed her forehead to the cold pane of glass, peering down at them. She revised her opinion of Jack's nose as he shot her a broad, slightly loopy smile. More likely he had been drinking.

Jonna pointed to the front of the house and waved them inside. She knew her opinion of Jack's condition was correct when he leaned heavily on Decker. His lantern sprayed snow as it hit the ground every time his knees sagged.

She met them at the door. Jack stomped in noisily, shaking off flakes of snow from his coat and boots with the abandon of a wet mongrel. Jonna and Decker couldn't do a thing until he was finished.

"You take his coat and muffler," Decker said, sweeping off Jack's hat. "I'll keep him upright. Steady as you go there, Jack."

It was not a simple thing to accomplish. Jack bobbed and weaved as if he were fighting to keep his honor instead of his coat. Jonna found herself laughing helplessly.

"Now there's some sweet music," Jack said to Decker. "Can't say I've heard much of it lately."

Jonna saw Decker narrowly avoid being poked in the ribs. She sobered immediately. "I'll hold him," she said. "You get the muffler. Just put it all on the stairs."

"Where's Dorthea?" Jack asked. He craned his neck to look around the entrance hall.

It took Jonna a moment to realize he was talking about her housekeeper. "Mrs. Davis is visiting her children today."

Decker brushed snow off his shoulders before he tossed his coat on the newel post. More flakes clung to his dark hair. He raked it with his fingers, and the ends curled damply at his collar. "There's no one here at all?" he asked.

"A few servants with no family of their own," she said. "I don't want to bother them. Here, take Jack into the library. I'll put away your coats." Jonna joined them a few minutes later. She carried in a tray of cookies from the kitchen and a pot of hot tea. "There's liquor if you prefer," she told Jack when he eyed the pot suspiciously.

"You only have the good stuff here," he groused. "Never sets well after a few tankards of stale ale."

Jonna shook her head, affectionately exasperated, and set the tray down. Her gaze swept over Decker when he reached for a cookie. It was the first time she had seen him since he had been a guest in her home. He moved easily, without any stiffness from his injuries. She didn't think he could possibly be healed, yet he didn't seem troubled by his ribs. Then she remembered how quickly he had moved to avoid Jack's wayward elbow in the entrance hall. It was not outside all possibility that he was making an effort to appear more fit than he was.

Decker picked up a sand tart, held it to his lips, and glanced up at Jonna. "Assured yourself yet that I'm all of a piece?" he asked. He dropped casually back in the large wing chair and plopped most of the cookie in his mouth. His bright blue eyes were watching her, and they were laughing.

"You're not so far in your cups as Jack," Jonna said.

"True enough," he admitted. "But that's not why you were looking at me like that."

"Like what?"

Sharing a few pints of ale with Jack had transformed Decker's careless smile into a reckless one. "Like this," he said. Then his eyes narrowed a mere fraction and grazed Jonna slowly from head to toe.

She forgot about Jack's presence. For this moment there was only Decker, and that easy, reckless smile of his made her heart trip over its own beat. She had never looked at him the way he was looking at her now. She didn't know how to. She wouldn't have dared. This look was as substantial as a touch. Jonna could feel his fingers in her hair, at her nape, feel his thumb pass over the pulse in her throat.

She was wearing an emerald gown cut from glace silk. It shimmered when she stood perfectly still; when she drew a breath it glittered like green ice.

Jonna drew a breath now. Decker's gaze slid over her shoulders, her breasts, then down the length of her long legs. Jonna was so thoroughly undressed by his eyes that she had an urge to raise her hands to preserve her modesty. His expression never changed, never indicated approval or dislike until he raised his eyes to hers again. Then she saw his frank appreciation.

"You're looking well," he said casually. He reached for another cookie. "Are you going to sit?"

Jonna dropped like a stone into the chair behind her. She glanced at Jack. His head had lolled sideways onto his shoulder, and his eyes were closed. She hoped he had been sleeping throughout Decker's scrutiny. "I've never looked at you like that," she whispered heatedly.