Patricia Rice (43 page)

He had thought it would be different once they reached Mobile, but General Jackson had chosen a gathering place that was little better than a frontier and the women there held no appeal. He kept looking for an ebony cloud of hair, and when he found one, he waited for the flash of emerald eyes, the lilt of Irish laughter to ease his heart, but he had found none to compare to the woman he had left behind.

It should have been easy to replace one mistress with another. Women came easily to him. He had a fondness for women that they sensed. The ones in Mobile hadn't been any different. But he was.

Morosely, Nicholas pulled on the oars and watched the shallow river for snags. This last encounter had left him wondering if he would ever see Jeannette again. He tried not to think of the woman who would be holding her, but the man he was traveling with served as a constant reminder. Scowling, he tried to ignore Michael's dire predictions.

"I've had my fill of these swamps. You can have your pirates. I want to see New Orleans again. Do you think Belle will see me if I call on her? Does she like flowers or should I bring her candy?"

"Leave Belle alone, you scoundrel," Nicholas growled. Night was coming fast and they needed to find a place to camp. Every bone in his body ached for rest, but he didn't want to stop. They were close now. Just a few miles more and they would be nearly home. He longed for just a glimpse of it. "She's not meant for the likes of you."

"And what is she meant for? Alligator bait? Or do you fancy sending off to France for a fresh marquis for her?"

This was an old argument. Michael had wormed every piece of information out of Nicholas that he would give on the topic of Belle. Nicholas wondered if he ought to tell him that Belle hadn't been a virgin since she was a child, that she had done things that Michael's proper Catholic upbringing would shudder to acknowledge, but those were secrets that weren't his to divulge. Belle was a survivor. She would tell Michael what she wanted.

"Belle chooses her own life, but she deserves better than some murdering Irishman who will pack up and go to Texas when things get too hot for him here. Just deliver your message to Claiborne and go back to the plantation and wait for me. Jackson isn't that far behind us."

Michael helped secure the pirogue to a tree when Nicholas found a place to land. "And my sister deserves better than a lying Frenchman who beds her and weds another. It's not a topic we'll be agreeing on anytime soon. Give me the hatchet. I'll find some wood."

Instead of handing him the pack, Nicholas sat where he was and stared at the man he had lived with practically every day these last months. "She can't have children, O'Flannery. Can't you get that through your thick Irish skull? Eavin needs to marry someone with children of his own. I can't give her that."

Giving his partner a look of disgust, Michael bent over and grabbed the pack for himself. "And you'd take away her chances of finding it for herself. That's not love, Saint-Just, that's pig-headed selfishness. If she were mine, I'd give her what it took to make her happy, even if it killed me. I think your sister will be in better hands than mine is."

Michael removed the hatchet and walked off into the trees. Nicholas dragged their gear up the bank and put together a hook and line to catch their supper. He didn't want to consider Michael's words, but they hung in the air, unseen and unheard but present just the same.

Love wasn't an emotion Nicholas gave any priority to. He had never known it and didn't particularly believe in its existence. He craved Eavin's company, yes. She was intelligent and spirited, and he enjoyed the give and take of their conversation. She was passionate in bed. What man wouldn't crave her company? And Jeannette needed her. He couldn't send Eavin away and deprive the child of the only mother she had ever known.

But remembering the pale woman he had taken for wife, the one who would bear his children and sleep in his bed and be his companion for life, Nicholas felt a gaping chasm in his soul. What was the lack of children when compared to a life like that? His wife had the graceful airs and languid temperament suited to society, but they didn't suit him. Why in hell had he thought they would? Because he thought Francine would and that was what Francine was like?
 

From this perspective, with an absence of months to distance himself, Nicholas could see that Francine would never have suited him as much as Eavin did. Francine had been the one lovely thing in his life, and he had placed her on a pedestal and worshiped her. He had never loved her. He hadn't even been able to talk to her. At least with Eavin there was no lack of words.

It seemed a gross betrayal of all Nicholas had held dear to admit it, but Eavin was the woman he should have married all along. To hell with society and his mother and the wretched title that it had been drummed into his head to uphold. He had thumbed his nose often enough at them before. Why had he balked when it came to choosing a wife?

But it was too late now. He had married Gabriella, and unless she chose to call it off, there would be no backing out. And while he may have given up any thought of being a faithful husband, Eavin had made it plain that she wouldn’t play the part of adulteress.

He was going to have to let Eavin go. The thought hit Nicholas with the impact of a tomahawk. It would have been easier if the Indians had killed him. He would have to let her free, let her marry another man. The idea shouldn't twist in his guts as it did. Nicholas doubled over, bringing his forehead to rest on his knees as he fought the sickness welling up inside of him. He was going to lose her.

When Michael returned to the place where they had made camp, Nicholas was gone. Brush for a fire was gathered, their supply of provisions sat neatly on their bedrolls, a string of fish wriggled on the line in the water, but there was no sign of Nicholas. Or the pirogue.

Staring at the empty bank, Michael cursed, but he wasn't surprised. Nicholas had been a man in torment for months, and the source of that torment wasn't far from the end of this stream. Glancing westward, Michael was thankful that he wouldn't be there when Nicholas reached the plantation.

* * *

She could be gone already. He had to prepare himself for that. Nicholas pulled at the oars until all the muscles in his back and shoulders felt as if they would disintegrate.

At least his father's propensity for cruelty had been blatant. A blow could be seen coming and avoided. What Nicholas had done to Eavin had been much more subtle. He had set her in her place and locked her there for the condemnation of everyone.
 

Mon dieu
, how could he have done that to the woman who had given him Jeannette, who had done nothing but offer herself and asked nothing in return? She had never spoken of love, that was true, but how could she? He would not have let her. He had taken everything she had to give and returned it with pretty lingerie and offers of houses. She should have killed him.

It was too late now to explain. Nicholas wasn't certain that he could if he tried. In his society, women were commodities to be bought and sold, chosen with care, and treated with respect, perhaps, but no more than that. It had never once occurred to him that Eavin would feel otherwise.
 

Only Michael had begun to teach him a lesson he would rather never have known. He didn't understand the point just yet, but it hurt like the very devil. He had to cut out all thought of it, exorcise it if he must, for those fine Irish notions had no part in the life he was doomed to live.

He didn't even deserve Gabriella. He would probably kill her if left alone with her for any length of time. And he certainly didn't deserve Jeannette. That thought made Nicholas paddle harder. He would give Jeannette to Eavin. Perhaps that would somehow assuage the wound he had inflicted. He would help them find a better life far from here.

Some of the pain lifted as he thought of Eavin's reaction to that news. She would be relieved. He would take the burden off her back. Nicholas knew the only reason she remained at all—if she remained at all—was because of Jeannette. She had far more consideration than he had ever shown her. She wouldn't take the child away from him, even when it meant ruin for herself. But he would set her free.

He didn't think it was possible that a sassy Irish maid could teach him what years of life and society had not, but he was beginning to suspect that Eavin knew more about love than he would ever know. If love meant this gut-wrenching pain at the thought of giving someone up, he was better off not knowing it.

But the memories of magical nights, soothing hands, lilting laughter, made a liar out of him. Without Eavin, the plantation would become just a house again, not the haven Nicholas had found since she had arrived. He had thought it was the house that held him. He was not only a monster, but just as stupid as Belle had said.

When he reached the end of the stream and had to set out on foot, Nicholas wished for the horse he had left with Jackson's army. But he was close now, just miles from home. He tried to plan what he would say, but he couldn't. There wasn't enough time in the world to say everything that needed to be said, and he didn't have any time at all. He needed to travel to Lafitte, warn him, guide him so he didn't turn on New Orleans in a fit of pique when Jackson marched in and refused his offer also. He only had time for a few hours' sleep and to let Eavin know that he would take care of her.

Damn, but he loved her. How could he not? She was everything that he had never had, that he had never believed existed, that he had never deserved.

Freed at last, that knowledge buoyed Nicholas the remainder of the way home. He loved her enough to do what was right for her. He wasn't completely heartless, after all. It would hurt. He would have to send her where he couldn't follow, somewhere he could never find her, for it would be much too easy to go after her.
 

Only honor kept him pinned to the plantation and Gabriella, and honor was a commodity easily sacrificed in the face of a life without Eavin. He could remain strong only if he knew he was doing what was best for her.

Exhausted, so weary he wasn't certain he could make it down the lane to the house, Nicholas trudged past the spreading oaks and the hillock where he had made love to Eavin. He had wanted to build her a house there, overlooking the river and the land that he had carved out as his own. He hadn't realized that he would be building a cage for her, a setting where he could keep her while he let all the world admire what he possessed.

Nicholas reached the
garçonnière
before he reached the house. Casting a look at the darkened windows, he decided it behooved him to get a few hours' rest before disrupting the household. He glanced toward the attic windows of the mansion in the distance where Eavin and Jeannette were sleeping. All was dark there, too. He wouldn't let his selfish eagerness to see them disturb their slumber. Better to stop here for what remained of the night and come to them fresh in the morning.

Nicholas let himself into the empty bachelors' quarters. The place smelled of furniture polish and wax rather than neglect, but he was so accustomed to the stench of the bayou that it only served to remind him of his own stench. He went back outside to douse himself from the rain barrel. If he meant to sleep on sheets for the first time in weeks, he would do it in the relative comfort of cleanliness.

Stripped to his trousers, Nicholas strode into the downstairs parlor in bare feet, his hair soaked from the drenching of his bath. The cold water hadn't exactly invigorated him, but he would sprawl out in the comforts of a feather bed and rest until it was time for Eavin to go to breakfast. With luck he would be gone again before Gabriella rose.

That was a cruel thought. He would have to stay and politely inquire into his wife's health, then leave. He wouldn't let Gabriella bring out this streak of viciousness in him. But it would be so easy to do.

Sighing, Nicholas headed for the upstairs bed chambers. There were half a dozen to choose from, but instinct and the lingering scent of Eavin's perfume drew him to the one she had lived in those few days before he had left. As long as he was going to make his life a living hell, it might as well begin with sleeping on the pillows she had used not so many months before.

Nicholas knew his mistake the instant he entered the darkened chamber. He was not so weary that he didn't know someone was in the room. Perhaps he could be excused for not knowing who it was, but he never would have stepped forward and closed the door behind him had he suspected it was anyone else. He was drawn in by a force he couldn't describe. Eavin lying peacefully in that bed just within inches of his fingers was beyond the ability of any mortal man to resist. And he was feeling very mortal right now.

Perhaps if he just took the chair beside the bed so he could be there when she woke. But Eavin was awake before Nicholas could put words into action. Lying on her stomach, she turned her head to watch him, and she made no attempt to escape when he sat down beside her.

Her hair tumbled in rich waves over her shoulders and down her back. Nicholas gently stroked the fine strands. He realized she wore nothing when his fingers grazed the silken warmth of her skin. He shuddered in longing, but still he would have done nothing had she not turned and reached for him. Her soft hand caressed his chest, drawing him down, and Nicholas was beside her before he could stop himself, pouring all his longing into the kisses with which he showered her.

Succumbing to the dream, Eavin threw her arms around Nicholas's shoulders and crushed him to her breasts. In the morning she might wake aching with emptiness as she had so many times before, but tonight she couldn't resist.