Wild Innocence (5 page)

A well of misery, Rachel stared down at their joined fingers, then gazed at her friend with a pleading look.

“Rachel called off the engagement and escaped,” Miranda said quietly.

Amelia appeared confused. “I don't understand.” She studied her sister. “You're not married? You didn't come with your husband.”

“No.” Rachel's voice sounded hoarse. “Miranda's uncle brought me.”

“Her fiancé was a jealous madman,” Miranda said. “Rachel learned this before it was too late. She called off the wedding, but Jordan—Jordan Sinclair—was persistent.” She paused to pat Rachel's arm. “He was more than persistent. He threatened her! She feared for her own life, and Aunt Bess's.” The young woman placed an arm around her friend's shoulders. “So she left ... we left, and, well, here we are.”

“Oh, Rachel,” Amelia whispered. “I'm so sorry you had to go through that.”

Rachel's tears were real. The mention of Jordan's name had brought back the pain.

“I'm sorry, Rach,” Miranda said softly.

She nodded. “I'm all right.”

“So this Jordan Sinclair fellow was bothering you,” Daniel said.

Rachel looked at him. “Yes.” She didn't blink. It was the truth. Jordan Sinclair bothered her still. He had stolen her heart, then trampled it to pieces when he'd run away with his widow.

Daniel continued to study her. “And your aunt?”

“Oh, Aunt Bess is fine,” Rachel replied. “She has George to protect her.”

Amelia smiled. “Has she married him?”

“Not yet,” Rachel replied, “but soon, I think. Right before I left, I sensed that she was weakening.”

“Good for George!” Seeing her husband's puzzled look, Amelia explained, “George Bentley is a kindly gentleman who is in love with my aunt. He's been trying to marry her for years. I think she loves him, but she refuses to admit it. Look how long it took before she'd allow George to court her.”

“I hope she marries him soon,” Rachel said. George Bentley was one of the few males left in the world that Rachel trusted. He was perfect for Aunt Bess. Rachel's experience with Jordan had made her leery of all men. She transferred her gaze to her sister's husband, who had moved to stand near his wife.

“How's Father?” Rachel asked.

“You haven't seen him?” Amelia said.

Rachel shook her head. “We arrived yesterday afternoon.” She blushed and avoided Daniel's glance. “I lay down for a nap at the hotel, and I was so tired that I slept through supper.”

“Father's been away,” her sister told her. “Daniel will find out for you if he's returned.” She lovingly caressed her husband's shoulder. “Won't you, darling?”

His expression, which had been grim, softened as he studied his wife. “Whatever you want, love.”

He dislikes me,
Rachel thought, knowing that it was true. She decided to pretend otherwise. “I appreciate it, Daniel. You're a good brother-in-law and a true gentleman,” she said with just a hint of mockery.

His blue eyes flashed with anger as he met her gaze. She nodded, smiling, then turned her attention back to her sister.

“You'll stay with us, of course,” Amelia said without expecting an answer. “We have plenty of room. You can go to the mission later. I think, though, you'll find it quite comfortable here.”

Rachel saw Daniel's look of dismay. “She might like it better at the mission,” he said carefully.

Amelia looked at him with surprise. “You don't mean that! Rachel will like it here well enough.”

“Amelia,” Rachel said softly, “I don't plan to return to Baltimore. My home is here now. I can't live with you. It's not right—”

“Yes, Amelia, she—” Daniel began.

“Why not?” Amelia asked.

“No!” Daniel and Rachel said simultaneously.

“It would be awkward for Rachel,” Daniel added.

Rachel softened toward her brother-in-law. “Amelia, Daniel is right,” she said. “You two, well, you're married. You certainly don't need me around.”

Amelia scowled at them. She narrowed her gaze at her husband. “I don't understand why you're behaving this way, Daniel. One would think you didn't like my sister.”

Rachel looked at him with amusement. “Of course, he does,” she said. “Don't you, Daniel?”

Her good humor faded when Daniel glared at her.

“Rachel is only thinking of the two of you, Amelia,” Miranda said. “You do not need your sister living with you.”

Looking relieved at the explanation, Amelia waved that notion aside. “But we would love having you.”

Rachel bit her lip to keep from replying. Daniel Trahern did not want her living in the same house. Why couldn't her sister see or understand this?

“I'll stay, but only for a short time. Once Father returns, I'll go to the mission,” Rachel said. “Amelia, it was only by chance that we stopped here and learned that this was your home.”

“Uncle Rupert needed supplies,” Miranda explained.

“Rupert?” Daniel said. “Rupert Clark?”

“Yes. He's my uncle,” Miranda said. “Why? Do you know him?”

Daniel grinned. “I've met him. How is the old coot?”

“He's fine.”

“You traveled with Rupert Clark?” he asked Rachel. She saw a look in his eyes that could only be disbelief.

Rachel stiffened her spine. She knew that he thought her a snob, and that she had surprised him by journeying in the woodsman's company.

She managed a smile. “Mr. Clark was extremely accommodating during our journey,” she said. “I thoroughly enjoyed being with him.”

Miranda grinned. “He gave her lessons in using a rifle,” she joked.

It was a teasing reminder of the night she'd thought she'd seen the Indian in the forest. “Miranda,” Rachel warned.

“Come, Rachel,” Daniel urged. “Do you have a tale to tell? It sounds like you know an interesting story.”

Rachel's jaw tightened. “There's nothing to tell.”

“Daniel,” his wife said, “there'll be plenty of time for stories later.” She rose from her chair. “Rachel, you'll be in the second bedroom. Miranda, you can take the one to the right.”

“I can stay at the hotel,” Miranda said, “with my uncle.”

“I have a comfortable room there as well—” Rachel began.

“Miranda, are you sure you won't change your mind?” Amelia asked. She turned toward her sister. “Rachel, you are staying here, and I want no arguments.”

“She hasn't changed, I see,” Rachel said to Daniel without thought. “She still likes to order people around.”

Daniel started to smile, but then it vanished as he realized that he was talking with Rachel. “She loves you,” he said.

Everyone rose from the table. “Believe it or not, Daniel,” Rachel said quietly, for Daniel's ears alone, as she came up from behind him, “I love my sister also very much.”

He looked back at her, startled. He studied her with a frown until Amelia got his attention. Rachel had no idea how her words had affected him.

It wasn't until much later that Rachel had some time alone with her sister. Miranda had gone back to the hotel. She had been adamant about remaining there. Amelia had been equally adamant that Rachel stay at the cabin.

Daniel disappeared. Rachel wondered if he'd escaped to the smithy, but she didn't hear the sound of hammer on metal from next door. Had her father returned? Had Daniel gone to check to see if John Dempsey was at home?

The door to the right of the great room and next to the stove led to the kitchen. There was no dining area here. It was strictly a workroom with cabinets, a worktable, and a food pantry. Rachel offered to help prepare for the next meal. She and Amelia began to snap the fresh beans that Daniel had picked from a small vegetable garden earlier that day.

It had turned into a particularly warm evening. Amelia seemed to be feeling the heat, as there were tiny beads of perspiration on her forehead. Rachel felt the heat, too, but she didn't think it was too bad. She was surprised to see how much it affected her sister.

“Imagine how surprised I was to learn that you were married,” Rachel said with a hint of accusation in her tone. She studied Amelia as she snapped a bean. “How long?”

Amelia looked at her. “How long have I been married?”

Rachel nodded.

“A little over a year.”

“Over a year?” Rachel asked in a hoarse voice.

“I wrote Aunt Bess.”

“She never got your letter.” Rachel became thoughtful. “Unless ... no,” she muttered. “Why wouldn't she tell me if she'd known?” Her gaze sharpened as she studied her sister carefully. “Is he good to you?” she asked. She hesitated. “Do you love him?”

“The answer to both of your questions is yes,” Amelia said with a soft smile. “He's wonderful. When we first met, we didn't see eye-to-eye on matters, but we realized later that we share the same basic ideas ... the same hopes and dreams.”

Rachel noted how radiant her sister looked whenever she spoke of her husband. She wished she could be assured that Daniel Trahern was the best thing for Amelia.

“What kind of things did you disagree on?” Rachel asked with genuine curiosity.

“Oh, about the Ojibwa mostly.”

“The Ojibwa? You mean Indians?”

“Yes. Daniel has been doing work for the Indians for years now.” She broke the ends off a bean and threw it into a clay bowl. “Did you know that the U.S. government promised the services of a blacksmith to the Ojibwa Indians in their last treaty with them?”

Rachel admitted that she hadn't known.

“Daniel came here with the intention of honoring the promise to the Indians, but then he realized that the government was bent on changing them. He saw that the whites, most particularly the missionaries and the soldiers in the area, were trying to civilize the Ojibwa by trying to make them live as we whites do.”

Amelia reached for a linen towel and wiped her forehead with it. She swayed a bit on her feet, which made Rachel eye her worriedly.

“Amelia—”

She waved her concern aside. “I'm fine—really.” She moved the bowl aside as she reached toward the pile of vegetables.

Rachel shifted the pile closer for her sister. She studied Amelia a moment to make sure that her sister was, in fact, all right before she grabbed some of the vegetables. “You were saying something about the Ojibwa? Do you know any of them personally?”

Amelia smiled. “We just came from an Ojibwa village. Black Hawk is one of Daniel's closest friends.”

Black-Hawk-Who-Hunts-at-Dawn?
she wondered.
No, tell me I'm dreaming.

Her gaze narrowed as she studied her sister further. “Amelia, are you with child?”

Her sister looked startled. “How did you know?”

The Indian from my dream told me,
she thought, recalling their encounter outside her sister's home. But she couldn't tell her sister that.

“So you are expecting a babe?” Rachel asked, shaken. Perhaps it hadn't been a dream. Perhaps it had actually happened ... her waking up in the middle of the night. Her encounter with the Indian, Black Hawk, Daniel's friend.

“Yes, I'm carrying a child,” Amelia said, her voice soft. Her face lit up with pleasure. “We're very excited about it.”

Rachel put down a bean and embraced her sister. “Congratulations. You'll make a wonderful mother.”

The two sisters regarded each other with tears in their eyes as both of them remembered their motherless childhood. They knew they were lucky because they had Aunt Bess. Still, it would have been wonderful if they'd had more time with the woman who had given them birth.

“Are you scared?” Rachel asked as she glanced down at Amelia's belly.

“No. Well, maybe a little, but I'll have Daniel with me—and now you. And Father, of course, will be there as my physician.”

Rachel thought her sister was brave. “It's just as well that I shall never have children,” she said without thought.

Amelia looked at her. “What do you mean you'll never have children? How do you know this? Have you already made up your mind?”

“I cannot have children without a husband,” Rachel said sadly. She was suddenly engulfed in her sister's arms.

“It must have been terribly disappointing to realize that your betrothed was not the man you thought,” Amelia said.

Rachel blinked back tears. “It was,” she murmured. She had certainly misjudged Jordan. She had loved and trusted him, when he hadn't deserved either her love or her trust.

“I'm sorry,” Amelia said.

Rachel smiled and waved a hand. She didn't want to talk about Jordan anymore. She didn't want to think of him.

A sudden commotion in the great room had both women putting aside their kitchen work to see who had come in.

Rachel entered the great room first. She froze at the sight of one of the men. Dressed in a shirt, loincloth, and leggings, he looked as at ease in the cabin as he would in the forest.

“Black Hawk!” Amelia exclaimed. “I thought you'd left!”

“Without saying good-bye?” The Indian smiled at his friend's wife before fastening his gaze on Rachel. “Who is this woman?” he asked softly.

Rachel's gaze went to her brother-in-law.

Daniel eyed her mockingly. “What's wrong?” he asked. “Never seen an Indian before?”