Kiss of a Traitor (30 page)

When she came this time, her strong spasms and clenching inner muscles nearly wrung the semen from him. He jerked out at the last second, dropped her legs to the bed, and fell forward onto her chest. Once again his seed pulsed out across her skin, though the precaution was akin to closing the barn door after the proverbial horse had fled.

Ford caught his breath, and his galloping heart resumed a normal rhythm. He lifted his head and slid forward, aided by the sheen of sweat gilding their bodies and the thick pool of semen beneath his belly. Willa panted, her eyes closed, mouth parted. He held her head between his palms and scattered gentle kisses along the curves of her lips. She sighed, her breath sweet and stirring against his face.

Something warm and tender twisted inside his chest, a craving that urged him to claim this little wildcat before she was lost to him forever. The war divided them, and the very real possibility of death hung over him like an executioner’s axe. Even should they manage to survive the madness, there remained the lie, hidden beneath the leaves like a hunter’s snare. A sin Willa might never forgive. Should he bind her to him now, before she uncovered his treachery, they would have the chance to work on forgiveness later.

“Willa,” he said softly.

She opened her eyes and looked into his face, her brown eyes languid in the aftermath of lovemaking. They recalled the comfort of warm brandy on a bitter night. They suited her, not startling, haughty, or pretentious, but warm and kindly, glinting with intelligence and sparking with mischief. Willa was no simpering, aristocratic belle-of-the-ball, but a down-to-earth, honest-to-God, real woman. Strong, courageous, and stubborn as a mule in traces. With astonishing clarity, a light glimmered in the black void of his heart. All of a sudden, he realized he was falling in love with her.

“When we return to Willowbend,” he said with a catch in his throat, “I wish to marry you as soon as I can arrange to post the banns. Will you marry me, Willa?”

Her eyes clouded over, and her chest shifted against his in a deep inhalation. “Most certainly not,” she said, a world of pain in her words. “I shall not, not then … nor ever.”

They fought throughout their last week in the cabin, a continual, endless battle of wills that sapped their strength and hardened the mortar in the walls separating them. Walls that had begun to crumble mere weeks before became insurmountable barriers.

Each night when the sun sank behind the trees, the barriers opened a breech and allowed them to come together in passion, if not in love. Their stormy encounters shook the cabin rafters, setting the wood rats to scurrying. Willa gave Aidan her love and took all he was willing to bestow, including his seed, with which he flooded her womb each time as though to force her to his position. But she remained true to her words. Even should she discover she carried his child, she would not marry him. And amongst all the words passing between them in the velvet night, she kept that decision to herself.

He should know without my having to tell him.
She refused to have her love reduced to a sacrifice hoisted on the petard of his conscience. He could take his conscience and honor right back to England without her. There he would meet a woman who inspired his love, a beautiful, aristocratic lady, one such as Marlene.

The day at last arrived when they were ready to depart. Aidan’s features were as frosty as the air, his movements stiff as he saddled the horses and secured the saddlebags. Willa was as cold inside as a winter storm. When they mounted their horses and turned away from the cabin, she took one last look back and, for a heartbeat, her mask cracked. Tears swelled in her throat and tightened a band around her chest. She felt as if she were leaving something invaluable behind, something she would never find again. Before the tears could expose her, she blinked them back, faced forward once again with a jerk of her shoulders, and directed Cherokee to follow the tracks of Aidan’s horse.

Willa and Ford rode into the yard at Willowbend three days later. This time Ford had plotted a path for the plantation as quickly as the horses could move and the terrain would allow. Ice had taken up permanent residence in his veins, and his mind was naught but chaos as he glared at Willa’s back. He wanted to shake her until her bones rattled. He had offered her his name, asked her to share his future. His worldly possessions might be paltry compared with what Lord Montford could have bestowed upon her, but they were all he had, and he had laid them at her feet. Were he in any disposition for laughter, he would have found the situation amusing. She still assumed he was Lord Montford, his lately deceased brother. She labored under the misapprehension she was rejecting a title and fortune when, in truth, she would have reaped only a hard life on a horse farm in Virginia.

Dark waves crashed against his mind, leaving a bitter, salty taste in his throat. Willa was as crazy as a tail-pulled panther. How dare she break their betrothal. He was obliged to remind himself they were not truly betrothed. His brother’s specter rose from the mist, blurring his thoughts. Though Aidan’s body lay cold and moldering in an unmarked grave beside the swamp, how Ford envied him even now.

He consoled himself with the fact that Willa still desired him even as she spurned him. Her eager passion kindled coals he had thought cold forever. She imbued him with an unfamiliar obsession. And she sparked a flame of love in his hard heart, a heart he had believed would never catch fire.

He contemplated the possibility of his leaving her with child, and his mouth hardened with self-loathing. He had deposited his seed inside her in desperation, convincing himself she would yield to his proposal. His thoughtlessness marked merely one stupid act in an endless succession of miscalculations. When she failed to yield, they dropped the subject of marriage, though Ford’s ill-conceived proposal remained between them like a stinking corpse they forever stumbled over in their efforts to avoid one another.

She would learn the truth about him before long: He was an imposter. He was of ignoble birth—a bastard. He had killed his brother—her betrothed. Then she would despise him, and he had no cause to blame her, no way to hold her … unless she was with child. He swore on all he held sacred, on America’s freedom and the rights of man, that should she give birth to his child, she would marry him. She might be of a mind to withhold love and respect, but she could not keep his child from him. They would wed should he have no alternative but to cart her to the parson with her hands bound and a gag across her mouth.

The horses stopped in front of the mansion. Plato ran from the stables, his mouth agape and arms waving. “Miss Willa! Miss Willa!” He stopped, tipped his hat to Ford, and came about to Willa. “Where you been? The whole damn world be fallin’ apart here. We been lookin’ fer you fer weeks. Miss Marlene, she be sayin’ you dead. Jwana, Quinn, an’ I, we knew better.”

Ford reined his horse around to face Willa. “Are you in need of my assistance, to lend a hand with your explanation?”

She shook her head and motioned with a hand to shush Plato. “That will not be necessary, Lord Montford. I can manage without your help.” She paused and sent him a look he could not decipher. “I appreciate your bringing me home safely. ‘Twas exceedingly kind of you.”

The muscles in his face tightened. “'Twas the least a gentleman could do, Miss Bellingham.”
I love you,
he said silently. He saw no answering admission in her eyes. With a curt nod, he wheeled his horse around on its hocks and flew down the drive as though the devil were chasing him.

He did not see Willa watching his retreat or her lips mouth the words:
I love you, Aidan.

When Ford arrived at the Georgetown garrison, he expected to be taken up on charges as a deserter. After all, he had disappeared without a word for over five weeks. His mouth went slack when he discovered the garrison commander had no inkling of Major Sinclair even going missing. His transfer orders had never arrived. And in fact, the commander effusively welcomed the major’s addition to a garrison short on officers. But another shock eclipsed Ford’s unexpected reception. The week before, Continental Army General Daniel Morgan defeated Banastre Tarleton at Cowpens in the northwestern edge of the state near King’s Mountain.

Once Ford checked into his quarters, he sought out Ronald McFee, a Georgetown tavern keeper and American sympathizer. McFee drew two mugs of ale and guided him to a corner table inside the “Mare’s Tail.” The odors of spilled ale and cooking mutton filled his nostrils as he took his seat. A complaining stomach betrayed him to McFee, who flashed a signal to a nearby barmaid.

“You heard?” McFee asked as he seated himself opposite Ford. “Word in the general’s camp is you’d taken off with a certain young lady and dropped out of sight.” McFee winked and swigged his ale.

“My betrothed.” That information was all Ford was willing to impart.

McFee drank from his mug again and wiped his bearded mouth with a beefy arm. “Well, I suppose you’ll want to know what happened to your friend, Bloody Ban.”

Ford sent him a wry smile. “I did not come here solely for the ale, Ron, though I must admit ‘tis better than any I have had in a while.”

McFee smiled, leaned across the table, and lowered his voice. “It displeased General Marion to have missed the action. He regretted losing the chance to pull the Butcher’s tail. I reminded him he was occupied elsewhere at the time.”

Ford nodded and took a deep draught of ale.

“General Gates summoned Daniel Morgan south about the time you and your little lady disappeared,” McFee said. “Morgan left Charlotte in December with six hundred men. General Andrew Pickens joined him with sixty men and a North Carolina militia force numbering one hundred and twenty.”

McFee fell silent as a young, work-worn girl slid plates of mutton saddle and brown bread onto the table in front of them. He smiled at her. “Thank you, Bessie. That’ll be all.” She bobbed a curtsy and walked away.

While Ford tucked into the mutton, McFee took up his story. “Well, ol’ Cornwallis was fit to bust at Morgan’s threat. His lordship worried Morgan would fall upon his rear or flank, so he ordered Tarleton to pursue the patriot army. Tarleton set out with infantry and cavalry as well as Fraser’s Scottish Highlanders and Royal Artillerymen.

“After checking his intelligence, Tarleton learned Morgan wasn’t heading toward Ninety-Six as Cornwallis had said. When he discovered Morgan’s army was larger than his, he threw a tantrum and whined to Cornwallis, requesting additional arms and men. Cornwallis granted him sufficient cavalry and infantry until Tarleton’s force became the larger of the two. Fortified with his new troops and as cocky as a barnyard rooster, Tarleton took off in pursuit of Morgan.”

Ford listened intently as he tore apart the bread and slathered it with salted lard. Salt, in any form, was a luxury he had seen too little of lately.

“Tarleton found the going rough,” McFee said. “You’ve not been in Carolina long enough to experience one of our wet winters. You could sink a troop of cavalry in the muddy roads and not leave a bump on the surface. With the constant freeze and thaw in the mountains, the rivers and creeks run with snowmelt, becoming swollen and impossible to cross.”

“I know,” Ford interjected. “I discovered that fact firsthand. I encountered similar conditions on my way down from North Carolina.”

“Then you can see how Morgan’s men, used to coping with the changeable Carolina conditions, stayed far out of Tarleton’s reach. But in the end, ‘tis a small state, and Morgan declined to retreat across the state line.

“Knowing he’d have to face Tarleton sooner or later, Morgan decided to make his stand at the Cowpens. When one of Pickens’s patrols came across Tarleton’s advancing army, they sped back to inform Morgan, who organized his defenses. You know Daniel, he’s a wise man and takes into account the opinions of his field officers.”

Ford nodded. He had heard of Daniel Morgan’s judicious application of battlefield strategy and his willingness to accept the counsel of those with more experience than he in a particular terrain.