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Authors: Emilie Richards

Tags: #Fiction, #Romance, #General

Whiskey Island (58 page)

BOOK: Whiskey Island
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“It will be Terence’s child. That’s all anyone has to know, Father.”

“And Terence?”

“It could be his. He would never think otherwise.”

“It’s a small enough city. Simeon will hear the story from someone.”

“And why should he care? He already got what he wanted, didn’t he? He’ll want no child off a poor Irish servant.”

Father McSweeney looked troubled. “This is a man who scrawls his insignia on everything he touches. Double
S
’s everywhere a man looks, and always finding new places to put them.”

“He won’t be scrawling anything on my baby!” She rested her hands on her hips. “And should he ever ask, I’ll tell him the child belongs to me and to my husband, that
he
had nothing to do with it.”

“He can count, Lena, and add.”

She had never considered that Simeon would be interested in knowing he might have a child by his cook. She had assumed that, like all men of his rank, this would be something to chuckle over and be done with.

“Then I’ll tell him the truth, that on the night the babe was conceived, I lay with my husband after he raped me. Will he want a child who might not be his? An Irish child through and through?”

The priest continued to look troubled. “You must not draw attention to yourself, Lena. Keep the baby a secret as long as you’re able, even if you have to stop coming here. He’s not a man who’s at all predictable. You’ve enough to be worried about, I know, but worry about this, as well. Stay as far from Simeon as you can.”

“I don’t need that particular warning, thank you, Father. I hope never to see the man’s face again. Not here…” she paused, and her voice dropped “…and not staring back at me from the cradle.”

“You’ll be in my prayers until the day the baby is born.”

She managed a tremulous smile. “Father, I’m already in your prayers.”

He continued to look troubled. “I’m not above saying an extra prayer or two every day.”

 

Each evening Terence met Lena at the bottom of the hill. He had graduated from crutches to one crutch and a cane, and his gait was slow and uneven. But he could make the journey across Whiskey Island to the street leading up the hill. Even if he couldn’t yet climb it, he could watch and wait, and he did so every evening until Lena appeared. When she joined him, they walked slowly home together.

Father McSweeney could have sent her home in his carriage, but they had agreed that the exercise was good for Terence. Instead the priest usually walked with her as far as the hilltop, leaving her to climb down and be met by her husband. If Father McSweeney couldn’t go, he sent someone else with her for protection, although there was little need. The sky was light until late each night, and there were always people about. She was safe without an escort, but she let the men fuss a little, knowing what it meant to each of them.

A week after Lena told Terence about the baby, she finished serving a lavish dinner to the priest and a small gathering of businessmen from the diocese who were there as his guests. Father McSweeney planned to ask them for a good deal of money to help expand St. Brigid’s school. He had wanted a special meal, so she had outdone herself.

Terence knew she would be late, but now, as she looked at the clock in the rectory hallway, she realized that she had to hurry, or he would be left waiting. The sky was dark with clouds, and thunder rumbled. The young man who was to escort her hadn’t yet appeared, and Father McSweeney was deep in conversation about classrooms and schoolbooks.

She had come and gone so long on her own that now she chafed at waiting. If the storm hit soon, Terence would be soaked to the skin, and she would be caught out in the open, as well. She decided to set out on her own, leaving word with the young woman who had been hired to help serve and scrub the kitchen.

Lightning streaked across the sky as she set off along the sidewalk. Most of the area’s residents had shown common sense and gone inside for the night. She called to a group of children playing stickball in the street and warned them to follow suit, but they ignored her. Moments later, someone’s mother marched out of a corner house and dragged her unwilling son inside by the earlobe. The other boys grumbled loudly, then, one by one, drifted away.

“Now didn’t I tell you?” Lena said as she passed the last lonely boy.

“Ah, you ain’t my mam.”

No, but she would be someone’s mam before too long. Lena considered that as she continued down the street. Her body seemed to grow and change every day. She could not block out the reality of what was happening to her. Soon the child would stir and make itself known.

No matter whose seed had started this baby on its life journey, the child had no responsibility for the way it had been created. He or she had not asked a man to father it, a woman to nurture it. Whether Terence or Simeon himself was the father, the child would need love, guidance, training. Lena would feed it at her breast, nurse it through fever and disease, laugh at its mischief.

At first she had prayed that the child was Terence’s, but what was done was done, and there was no changing it. Now she prayed that she could love it as her own, brown hair or black, blond hair or red. The child would emerge from her body. The child would be hers.

Deep in thought, she was approaching the street leading down to Whiskey Island when she noticed a carriage parked well beyond it, a familiar carriage with a monogram that would forever renew hatred in her heart. From this distance she couldn’t see if anyone waited inside, but she knew better than to draw any closer.

With her heart speeding wildly, she looked around for a place to hide. Surely once the storm broke Simeon would leave. If he was waiting for her—and what other explanation could there be?—then he would assume she hadn’t left the rectory, that she was waiting until the rain stopped.

Father McSweeney and Terence had been right to insist on escorting her.

The houses here were built into the hillside, and many of them rested on pillars, leaving a sheltering overhang. She headed for one, even as the sky grew darker and the wind more menacing. She could huddle beneath the house until the carriage withdrew; then, when it was safe, she could hurry down the hillside to Terence.

She was almost to the house when a man stepped out from behind a huge elm and clamped his fingers over her arm.

She drew a breath to scream, but he covered her mouth and pulled her hard against him, his hand roaming her hips and belly through her skirt. “You won’t like what happens if you shriek, Lena.”

Her back was to his chest, but she recognized James Simeon’s voice in her ear. She struggled for a moment, but clearly he was the stronger. His fingers bit into her arm, bruising her flesh.

“We’re walking to my carriage now,” he said, when the struggle ended. “If you try to run away, I’ll think nothing of breaking your neck.”

She didn’t believe him, but she had just enough doubt to obey.

“Nod if you plan to cooperate,” he said.

She nodded.

He removed his hand from her mouth, waited a moment to be sure she hadn’t lied, then dragged her in the direction of his carriage. Unceremoniously he boosted her inside and stepped in after her, closing the door.

With the carriage closed off against the rain, the heat inside was oppressive. She sat across from him, mute and too enraged to feel afraid.

“Have you no greeting, Lena? We’ve been apart awhile, you and I.”

“You’ve no right to handle me that way.”

“Don’t I? I’ve handled you before, a number of ways. You were paid well for it.”

“You forced yourself on me.”

“You did nothing to stop me.”

“You had my life in your hands! You arranged it that way. You gave me no choice.”

He smiled. “Is that what you tell yourself, Lena? Is that how you absolve yourself of guilt? I took you as often as I wanted, and you whined a bit, but you never said no. You pulled up your skirts as pretty as you please and let me have my way. It was a little excitement in a life filled with drudgery. I bet you’d never hoped to feel a man between your legs again.”

“There was no man between my legs when you had your way with me. There was no man in the room!”

He silently applauded. “I’ve missed your spunk, dear. I’ve missed you. Do you enjoy your new position? The priest is the only one in the city who would have dared to hire you. It was clever of you to find a way out of my house, more clever than I’d expected. Do you perform all the same jobs for him that you did for me?”

“You’re a horrible, hateful man, and you’ll rot in hell for it.”

“I suppose that means no. Pity. He has no idea what he’s missing.”

“If you think to rape me again, I’ll claw out your eyes before I let you. You have no hold over me now.”


Tsk. Tsk.
I only came to tell you that you’re forgiven. You can come back to work in my kitchen at double the pay.”

She knew there was more to this. He was taunting her because he enjoyed it. But grabbing her in public was taking too great a risk for simple pleasure. He’d made no move to touch her since he’d hauled her against him under the tree.

She realized she had been playing into his hands. He liked her spirit. Passivity enraged him. She stared at him and schooled herself to sound calm. “I won’t be coming back for any pay. Is that all?”

“Tell me about your husband, dear. How is the poor injured man?”

“Improving.”

He smiled. “In every way?”

“Yes. In every way.”

“Freshen my memory. Was he blinded by the accident?”

“He was not.”

“Were his wits addled?”

“No.”

“Then whose child does he think you carry? Or hasn’t he guessed the truth?”

Her breath caught.

He smiled. “I’ve had you watched, dear. You’ve been wonderfully cautious. It wasn’t until today that I saw I’d have a chance to be alone with you and ask.”

“What makes you think I’m with child?”

“A small examination back there under the tree, among other things.”

She remembered his hand on her belly, her hips.

“Your breasts are larger,” he continued. “If your husband doesn’t see that, he is truly a fool.”

“My husband is waiting for me to meet him at the bottom of the hill. If I don’t meet him soon, he’ll begin the climb.”

“I think not. If he’s that foolish, my groom will put a stop to it. Almost a pity, really. What would the man say if he stumbled all this way just to find us together?”

She pictured Terence trying to climb the hill to find her. What
would
he say if he found her with Simeon?

“The child is his.” She lifted her chin. “Conceived after I left your employment.”

“I could tell him otherwise.”

Her heart slammed against her rib cage. “I would tell him you are lying. Of the two of us, I’m the one he trusts.”

“Do you think it would be that simple? When the seed of doubt is planted, it flourishes forever. He will count the months—”

“And know it’s his child.” She slid over to open the door and, surprisingly, he didn’t stop her. “If you thought to blackmail me to return as your cook and whore, you miscalculated. You can tell Terence anything you please, but he won’t believe you. He knows what kind of man you are.”

“But not, apparently, what kind of woman he married.”

She flinched. “What I did with you, I did out of fear for those I love. Since you love no one, you could never understand. But even if Terence did believe you, he would forgive me. Because he loves me. If that’s too simple for you to be grasping, so be it.”

“Just tell me this. How will he feel when he looks on this child every day and sees my eyes staring back at him?” He laughed lightly. “My eyes or my nose or my lips? Will he remember then that he loves you?”

She faced him, one hand on the door. “You’ve done your worst, James Simeon. It can’t be topped. Tell Terry whatever you think you must. But I won’t be coming back to work for you. Not now. Not ever. You might have a bit of trouble finding another woman as desperate and trapped by fate as I was. But knowing the things you’re capable of, I’m sure you’ll be managing.”

“A brave little speech. You never cease to amaze me.”

“I’ve ceased being amazed by you.”

“Good luck getting home before the storm, dear. You must take care of yourself now that you’re with child. We can’t have another sickly little Irish bastard on the streets of Whiskey Island.”

She opened the door, expecting him to grab her the moment she stepped outside, but he let her go.

“Say hello to your husband for me, won’t you?” he called after her. “He and I will have a chat one of these days. Tell him it’s a promise.”

37

T
erence grew uneasy as the storm drew closer. He didn’t mind getting wet, but lightning was another matter. He pictured Lena trying to reach him, scurrying along storm-darkened lanes, then down the steep road that would grow slippery and dangerous when the clouds burst. He wished they had talked about this possibility, that he had warned her to stay at the rectory if a storm threatened. If she knew he was safe at home, she would not risk going outside, but without that assurance, she would brave nearly anything to reach him.

Silently he debated trying to make his way up the hill to see if he could spot her. If he made the entire climb, they could go back to the rectory together and wait until the storm ended. Then Father McSweeney would send them home in his carriage.

Whether he could make the climb or not was another matter. His gait was still uneven, and his strength hadn’t fully returned. Perhaps one day he might be down to one cane, but now he needed a crutch, too, one to balance his weight as the other edged him forward. If he propped the crutch under his injured arm and threaded his wrist through the crosspiece Rowan had added, he had just enough control to swing it forward. He was proud he had come this far and anxious to go farther. But the climb might still be too much for him.

If he could do it, though, how proud Lena would be, and how much better he would feel knowing she was safe.

He decided to start and see how it went. He passed a neighbor scurrying home before the storm, and they exchanged greetings. He nodded to another man who passed, but once he had gone, the road up the hill was empty.

BOOK: Whiskey Island
5.54Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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