Love Inspired Historical April 2014 Bundle: The Husband Campaign\The Preacher's Bride Claim\The Soldier's Secrets\Wyoming Promises (61 page)

Chapter Seventeen

“A
nswer my question.” Danielle tromped to where Brigitte slumped on the dirt floor, her back braced against the cottage's single chair. “How could you?”

“I hadn't a choice.” She kept her gaze pinned on her hands, the very hands that had been running over Jean Paul's hidden National Guard uniform a mere hour ago.

“You lie. Everyone has a choice not to play traitor.”

“You heard that man. He would have harmed you or your brothers.”

Danielle's nostrils flared. “He only said it so you would comply.”

She let out a short, bitter laugh. “Your lives are not something I'm willing to risk.”

“Is that how you explain betraying Citizen Belanger?” Danielle tightened her fists into white-knuckled little balls at her sides.

Brigitte stared blankly at the packed dirt floor. 'Twas little point in hiding her doings now that the gendarme had appeared. “I've been on a mission for your grandfather, if you must know. He demanded I fulfill a task for him before we move to Reims.”

“What kind of mission?”

Brigitte looked away. Admitting her misdeeds wasn't supposed to be so difficult, especially not to a girl of three and ten. But then, none of this was supposed to be difficult. Because when she first arrived at the farmstead two weeks ago, she should have found a hardened murderer, not a kind man with a gruff exterior. Not a man who gave them lodging and work. Not a man who cared for her children when she'd fallen ill and fed half of Abbeville's widows. Not a man the town loved and respected and might well elect to be their next mayor.

She pushed herself off the floor and moved to where her night dress sat on the shelf. “'Tis not important. It's nearly done, anyway, and then we'll leave.”

Danielle stepped in front of her, the girl's back rigid in the dim glow of the lantern's light. “You just betrayed Citizen Belanger. I heard you! Is
Grand-père
why we're here? Why you asked Citizen Belanger for a post when he'd never sought a housekeeper?”

Brigitte pressed a hand to her pounding temple. “I told you not to worry yourself, and I meant it. No more questions.”

“
Grand-père
wants Citizen Belanger because he thinks Citizen Belanger killed
Papa,
doesn't he?”

“'Tis complicated, Danielle. You wouldn't understand.”

“I wouldn't?” Desperation crept into the girl's young voice. “What is
Grand-père
going to do? I want answers.”

“And you're in no place to get them,” she snapped, then reached around Danielle to grab her flimsy night rail off the shelf. “Now mind yourself, daughter. I'll not tolerate disrespect.”

“
Non.
And you won't need to.” Danielle reached up and yanked her own dress down. “Because I'm not going to stay here and help a mother who's decided to hurt a man like Citizen Belanger.”

Before Brigitte could reply, Danielle turned and rushed out the door into the night.

* * *

Thump. Thump. Thump.

Jean Paul groaned and rolled over in his bed, then settled back into slumber.

Thump. Thump.

The annoying sound resonated through the house yet again.

He pried an eyelid open, glimpsed the gray light seeping in around the shutters then slammed his eye shut. Whatever the noise was, it could wait. He'd been up half the night, more than half the night, pondering what to do with Brigitte. Praying and praying only to have his words fall back around him like dried corn husks, useless and dead. He needed some sleep if he was going to face the fields in another hour or so.

If he was going to face Brigitte.

Thump. Thump. Thump.
“Jean Paul?”

Brigitte. His eyes shot open and he propped himself up on his elbows. She alone could manage to say his name in that tone of voice. He'd half expected her to return and demand her old post back, but why was she here at this hour? The sky was barely light.

“Jean Paul!” The familiar voice shouted again, more panicked this time.

He jumped from the bed and yanked on his trousers.

“Just a moment.” He left the bedchamber and padded to the front door, then pulled it open. “I'm glad you came. I was worried after I sent you...”

His mouth ceased working as he ran his eyes down her disheveled form. A jagged tear marred the hem of her dress and mud coated her skirts. No mobcap sat upon her head, and half her hair tumbled haphazardly down her back while the other half looked about to fall from where it had been pinned up. She pressed a sleeping Victor to her chest and blinked at him through eyes rimmed with red and smudged with shadows. Serge, just as weary and dirty as his mother, had plopped himself onto the ground, closed his eyes and was leaning his back against the outer wall of the house.

Had he done this to her? Had sending her away last night transformed her from a woman with soft smiles and kind words into the distraught person standing before him now? “Brigitte, I'm sor—”

“You have to help.” She clasped his arm with her free hand. “Danielle ran off, and I can't find her.”

Danielle had run off? The daughter who wanted to learn knife handling so she had a means of protecting her family had suddenly decided to desert them? “When?”

Brigitte's chin quivered. “Last night.”

He reached out and took her hand between both of his, rubbing his thumb over her knuckles. “You've been wandering around in the dark looking for her?”

“What if she ran into trouble? What if someone found her and tried to...tried to...” Her eyes filled with tears, and the trembling returned to her chin.

“Come here.” He opened his arms and gathered her close. She felt right there, curled into his arms with her body snug against his. Even the sleeping babe fit easily between the two of them.

Her sobs came in little waves, and she buried her face in his shoulder.

He stroked her hair. “Everything will be all right. I'll go search for her shortly. Just calm yourself first.”

But she only cried harder. He kissed the top of her tangled hair and tilted her chin up until her moist eyes met his.

“Y-you'd do that for me? After last night, I...”

“Hush.” He laid his finger over her cracked lips. “I was a fool last night. Forgive me.”

“But...”

“I told you to hush. Here now, come inside and rest a spell.” He led her to the rocker, and when she sank into the worn wooden chair, he pried the babe from her arms.

“It's my fault, all my fault. I drove her off, and now I can't find her.” She shuddered before sniffing back another bout of tears. “She might be hurt or captured. She's probably scared and cold and hungry...”

He laid Victor on the bed nearest the door, then returned. “She's a bright girl with more than a bit of determination in her blood. No one's got reason to hurt or capture her. She's probably lost, is all.” And she was hardly going to be cold with the heat they'd been having. But it seemed best to let Brigitte figure that out herself.

She stared straight ahead at the empty fireplace. “Of course.”

“Let me lay Serge abed, then I'll head out. I know these woods, Brigitte. I'll find her within an hour or so.”

She didn't look at him or smile at his reassurance, but merely kept rocking methodically back and forth, back and forth, and staring at the cold, gray hearth.

* * *

It took little more than an hour before he spotted the small curl of smoke against the spotless blue sky. 'Twas only a few minutes later when he strolled up to the crude campsite.

Danielle sat with her back to him, her hair long and free and matted like her mother's, but a dark, shiny ebony rather than the russet-and-red shades of Brigitte's tresses.

“Guessed you'd come as soon as I started the fire.” Danielle didn't turn to face him. “I was hungry.”

“Looks like a good meal.” He squatted beside her. A skinned squirrel lay impaled on a makeshift spit over the flames.

“It'll do.”

“You get the squirrel with the knife I gave you?”

She nodded toward where the bloody blade lay on a rock. “
Oui.
I aimed between the eyes like you showed me, but I caught the tail instead. I got 'em between the eyes with my second knife, though.”

“You've been practicing.” Something thick and foreign swelled in his chest. Pride, mayhap? Or satisfaction? Hitting a moving animal was no small feat, and he'd taught the girl to throw. “You did good, Danielle. After you eat the critter, we can head—”

“I'm not going back, so don't waste your breath asking.”

She wasn't going back? He shifted to better glimpse her profile. Fool that he was, he'd assumed finding the girl would be the hard part, not bringing her home.

Of course, he could always sling her over his shoulders and haul her away by force.

But then nothing would prevent her from running off the next time her mother turned her back. “Why won't you return home?”

“She didn't tell you, did she?” Danielle's blazing eyes flew to his, full of fire and vehemence. “Should have figured as much. She's going to bring you trouble, Citizen Belanger. Best to kick her off your land and wash your hands of her.”

Kick Brigitte out? Had the girl gone daft? He couldn't send away a woman who bore the responsibility of housing and feeding three children. Let alone a woman who looked at him as though he had something to offer the world, as though he was somehow more than a murderer. “Whatever's going on between you and your mother, forcing her to leave won't solve anything.”

And he wasn't about to announce that he'd already told Brigitte to leave. Last night. Right after he kissed her.

“You're wrong.” Danielle toyed idly with a blade of grass at her side. “It would have solved everything. It's probably too late now, but you should still send her on.”

“To Reims, you mean?”

Her shoulders rose and fell listlessly. “Doesn't matter. Wherever you send her, she's got trouble coming.”

“Which makes me want to keep her close and help her.”

“You'll end up dead.”

A chill travelled up his back as he stared into Danielle's flat blue eyes. Was she serious about him ending up dead? What kind of trouble had Brigitte gotten herself into? “I'm a hard man to kill. Remember how I taught you to use that knife? Those types of skills are helpful if a man is attacked.”

She pushed off the ground and paced before him. “I don't understand how she could do this to us. To you! What was she thinking? You're the kindest man we've ever met. You've given us food and shelter, care and—”

“Enough.” He shoved a hand through his hair. He couldn't bear to hear such untruths. Not from Danielle. Not from the practical, sensible daughter of the woman he was coming to love. A man with his past deserved no compliments.

Danielle stopped pacing to stare at him, the familiar scowl etched back across her face. “My words are true, regardless of whether you like them.”

“You don't know everything about me. Your mother might have her secrets, but I have mine, as well. And in this instance, you're wrong. Very, very wrong. I'm not kind. I'm the furthest a man can ever be from kind. Come now, let's eat this squirrel and get you back to the house.”

She dug her heel into the dirt. “I told you I'm not going.”

“
Non?
And what happens if I take your advice and send your mother on her way to Reims? Do you stay here and live off my land? Never to see your brothers or mother again, even after you've calmed? Even after you're ready to apologize? I know not why you're so angry with your mother, but are you willing to lose your family? If not, then you oughtn't say such things.”

Her slender shoulders fell and she stared at the tips of her worn shoes. “I love them. I don't want to lose them like that,
non.
”

“Your mother was beside herself with worry when she sought me this morning. Did you know she woke the boys and spent the entire night looking for you?”

Danielle shook her head, her free mane of hair wild in the gentle breeze. “I just curled up and went to sleep in the woods. I wasn't even far from the cottage. She should have stayed and gone to bed, not taken the boys out and searched for me.”

He stood and laid a hand on her shoulder. “She loves you and was worried you might have gotten hurt or met someone with ill intent. How could she not look for you?”

Danielle sniffled and swiped at her cheek with the back of her hand.

“Let's go show her you're well.”

“All right.” Danielle blinked up at him. “But you ought not trust her so easily.”

“I'll not tolerate any more disrespect for your mother. If I have questions, I'll ask myself.” And he would. Though she'd already given him answers about why she was in Abbeville and had approached him about a post. And he could hardly condemn Brigitte for any secrets she might be hiding in light of how he'd likely killed her husband.

* * *

Brigitte rolled her neck from side to side against the back of the rocker and yawned. She must have fallen asleep while waiting, and now she likely wouldn't be able to move her sore neck for the rest of the day.

She gazed wearily around the room, the soft light of morning filtering through the windows. Dawn had come and gone, but how long ago? How long had Jean Paul been out looking for her daughter? She stood and stretched, then checked on her boys. Both slept peacefully in the bed where Jean Paul had placed them, and both would likely be hungry when they woke. She should get some bread baking and head to the chicken coop for eggs. The least she could do was keep busy until—

The door to the house creaked open and she jerked her head up. One glance at the slim body with ebony tresses and she flew forward.