His grip dug into her shoulder, and she couldn’t reach the knife. His other hand caught in her hair, twisting her head painfully as he forced her to look at him.
“It’s dead, Edward. I’ll bear no bastard of yours, ever.” She spat in his face.
He backhanded her hard. Pain shot through her jaw, and she stumbled against the table. Blood trickled into her mouth, and she stared in dazed surprise as Edward advanced upon the cradle.
“Then we’ll even the score, Alicia. A babe for a babe. Why should his brat live if mine does not?”
Alicia screamed, but free again, she reached for the knife.
Lord Royster glanced up with mixed annoyance and affection as his son’s long strides grew more rapid the closer they came to the townhouse. “Have pity on an old man, Max, and slow down. We should have hired a carriage.”
Travis slowed his steps. “I’m sorry. My mind was elsewhere. Alicia will be delighted to hear Scott has arrived safely, but I’m not certain the rest of your surprise will be greeted with the same enthusiasm. For a woman with her upbringing, she seems supremely oblivious to class distinctions.”
Royster grunted in disbelief. “I know her mother’s family too well. Snobs to a first degree. When we let it be known that your wife is descendant to both the Neville and Clarendon lines, she will be accepted by royalty. American, indeed! It is all folly. Her parents were British citizens when they were born, and so is she. It is time somebody informed her of it. I don’t give a groat for most of the hobble-de-hoy who call themselves Americans, but I daresay nearly every last one of them have British blood in them. This talk of war is ridiculous. We can’t have it. Like brother fighting brother. Family squabble, that.”
Travis let his father ramble on and listened with amusement. Perhaps the earl had enough power to put an end to British blockades and navy impressments, but his lordship knew nothing of the American mind. They wanted revenge, and they would have it. Right or wrong, war was nearly inevitable.
When his father rambled to a halt, Travis merely shrugged his shoulders. “Nevertheless, Father, Alicia married an Indian keelboat captain, not a viscount. The fact that she is a scion of two noble houses will not impress her, as Scott seems to believe it ought.”
The earl stared with disbelief. “Keelboat captain! You had the audacity to pass yourself off as a keelboat captain and still court a lady like Alicia Stanford? Are you out of your mind?”
“That’s what I was—a keelboat captain. A damned good one, I might add. This title you would force on me means so little here that Chester Stanford didn’t see fit to inform Alicia of it. Probably for very good reason. When she saw it on the marriage documents, she very nearly murdered me. The British don’t have a savory reputation in these parts.”
Travis stopped a strolling flower vendor and bought a bouquet of early daffodils. Alicia had been thrilled at the March ones in St. Louis. Wait until she saw these. They would excite her more than news of her trunks or her ancestry.
“Title I force on you?” his father said in horror. “That title has a long and venerable heritage. Your ancestors fought hard to give you the freedoms you shrug off so lightly. That title gives you honor and wealth and a position in society because of what they did for you. Have you no respect?”
They turned the corner and the townhouse came in sight. “You forget my other ancestors, sir,” he answered, his gaze focusing on the house ahead. “They fought nobly and with honor, too, but I am scorned for that heritage. I prefer to earn my own wealth and honor, but I will be satisfied to have won Alicia. Just do not press me too hard on the subject of respect—”
A scream rose and echoed down the street. Travis broke into a run. He should have seen that the door was ajar. He was getting soft already.
When he burst into the kitchen, Alicia held a knife clasped in front of her, holding Edward in abeyance. Behind her the infant wailed in the cradle, while Edward tried to shove past her to get at it. A chill went down Travis’s spine at the threat to both his wife and child.
His roar diverted Alicia’s attention, and in that moment, Edward dived for the knife.
She stepped backward just as Edward lunged. Caught off balance, he fell into her. The knife glanced off his collarbone and into his throat.
Alicia screamed and Travis yanked her from the man crumpling at her feet, his blood spurting across her gown and floor. She clung to the knife and continued to scream until Travis slapped the weapon from her hand.
His father stood frozen, obviously scandalized by the scene, but Travis was more concerned with the woman shaking in his arms.
She allowed him to half carry her from the room. The tremors shook her so violently that Travis wrapped his coat around her as he led her up the stairs. Travis murmured soothing words and held her tight, guiding her into a room full of sunlight.
She hiccupped and gulped for air, trying to retrieve rationality and forget what had just happened. Absurdly, Travis still held a bouquet of brilliant yellow flowers, and Alicia focused on the loving gesture and beauty. “They’re beautiful,” she said, touching her finger to the velvety texture of one petal.
Brow wrinkled in worry, Travis handed her the bouquet and began to strip his coat and the bloodied apron from her shoulders. “Daffodils. For you,” he replied.
“I killed him, didn’t I?”
The wail of an infant drifted from the kitchen.
“Let me get Dale for you,” he said, avoiding the question.
When he returned with their son, Alicia was arranging the flowers in a vase on the vanity. Her gown lay in a heap upon the floor, but she wore her chemise. She swung around at Travis’s entrance, the panic still in her eyes, but she reached for the crying child. “He is hungry. I must feed him.”
“Fine. Climb into bed where you will be warm, and I will give him to you.”
Travis watched warily as she obeyed him. Once he saw her tucked beneath the covers, he handed her the soggy infant. Alicia gazed at him reproachfully and pointed to the diapers on the dresser.
With the infant dry and nursing contentedly, Travis sat on the bed and began to remove his boots. Alicia watched him with curiosity.
“What are you doing?”
“Joining you.” Not bothering to remove his clothes, Travis climbed into bed, enclosing her in his arms while the babe suckled.
He could feel her tension, feel the shivers rocking through her, and forced himself to remember the first time he had killed a man. He had been younger than she, but he had also been drunk. He had vomited all over the floor afterward. Alicia did not have that advantage. She said nothing as he pulled her head down on his shoulder and made a cushion of his chest.
“It was an accident,” he said.
“I killed him.” The words came out cold and unemotional. “He was going to hurt Dale and I killed him.”
That sent a ripple of shock through Travis. The bruise on her face had spoken of self- defense. It had never occurred to him that the bastard would threaten a child.
He stroked her hair. He had no gift for explaining. What could he say to take away the pain? “You were defending the one you loved. You could not have done less.”
“I killed him,” she insisted.
“He is dead, yes,” Travis agreed, “but you did not kill him. It was an accident. But if he had not died, I would have killed him. Can you understand that, Alicia?”
Alicia shook her head, not negatively, but trying to comprehend. “I am trying, Travis, but it’s too horrible.” She glanced down at the warm, fat, healthy babe in her arms. “I couldn’t let him kill Dale.”
“No. Nor could I let him harm you. It is not something you think about, Alicia. It is something you do. It happens without thought. The instinct is there. Stronger in some than others, perhaps, but there. If you love someone, they are a part of you, and you will fight to protect them.”
A wary light rose to Alicia’s eyes. “The time in the tavern with Edward, you were protecting me?”
; Travis sighed and kissed her eyelids, closing her accusing eyes. “Yes, I was protecting you, just as I tried to protect you from those rogues on the river. Although if you had questioned me then, I would have been too blind and hard-headed to admit I did it out of love. If Edward had been in that cabin with us when you lost the child, I would have killed him then. As it was, he made the mistake of coming after you. I knew what it would do to you, and I tried to stop him. I had not realized then that love is not ruled by reason.”
“Do not try to pacify me with lies, Travis. Edward is dead because I killed him. He would have been just as dead if you killed him, but it would not have been out of love. If you had loved me, you never would have left me.”
Travis heard the sob in her voice and clenched her tighter. She had not cried since he had come home. Everything was kept bundled up tight and hard somewhere in the cellars of her soul. It was not natural, but he had not known how to touch her, how to free her from the heavy weight she insisted on carrying.
“I left you because I loved you and could not bear to harm you. I thought you would be happier without me. I thought it would be easy. I thought I could just walk away and never return and everyone would be the better for it. My God, Alicia, you don’t know what a fool I am. Even when I could not touch another woman for wanting you, I would not admit your hold on me. I’ve walked away from family and home before, but I could not stay away from you. I heard of gold in Mexico and thought I would try that for a while, but I didn’t want gold. I wanted you. I had to trick myself into returning, tell myself it was the possibility of a child that made me go back, not my need for you. But when I found you and thought I had lost you forever . . .”
Travis’s voice broke, unable to find the words to describe his despair that horrifying night. His arms reached out to circle both mother and child, clasping them as if he would never let go. A tear slid down a bronzed cheek, coming to rest on Alicia’s hair. She had to understand.
It was then he noticed the sobs shaking her shoulders, the desperate struggle to hold back tears. Removing the sleeping infant from her arms, he placed Dale safely in the bed’s center, then cradled Alicia against his chest.
“Cry, Alicia. It is nothing to be ashamed of. Cry and let the grief out. Hit me, if you like. Curse me, for I deserve it. But then, let me kiss you and let us start anew.”
She cried. She cried until her voice shook and her breath came in short bursts and she could cry no longer. She cried until all the tragedy, all the misery, all the festering madness that had been stored inside her since that long ago day in Philadelphia escaped, and the abscessed wound began to heal. And then she lay against Travis’s strong chest and slept.
Chapter 44
Alicia heard angry voices, and sleepily she sat up in bed. The last rays of daylight played along the walls, and she frowned, not understanding why she was in bed.
Sharp words caught her attention again, and she reached for a robe. The absence of the infant returned memory with a jolt, and Alicia’s stomach lurched. The urge to give in to the nausea was overcome by her panic for Dale.
Jerking on the robe, she ran in stockinged feet to the door. The voices rose clearer in the hall: Travis and Lord Royster. Glancing in the nursery, she spied Anne-Marie rocking the babe, and she sighed in relief. She continued on down the hall.
“The scandal will be impossible to control!” Royster raged. “I have done all I can, but too many people know of it. I can keep her from being arrested, but I can’t keep people from talking. It won’t do, I tell you!”
“Don’t you understand anything? She’s my wife, damn it, and I don’t care if she murders a dozen bastards like that one! I would have done it myself if I had arrived sooner.”
“That would have been easier to deal with. A man is expected to defend his family, but ladies do not wield knives with deadly intent. No one will understand.”
“You expected her to faint, perhaps?” The sarcasm traveled clearly up the stairs. “This isn’t London, Father. Women who faint don’t last long out here.”
“I’m simply asking you to let the scandal die down some. Come back with me and leave Alicia here for a while. Once society grows accustomed—”
Alicia’s appearance on the stairway halted the conversation. With the pins loosened, her hair hung in disheveled strands. She clasped the velvet robe at the neck, but she wore very little beneath it.
Gathering her fury, she spoke with an authority that brooked no argument. “I killed a man to save your grandson, sir. If that makes me a murderer, then I am a murderer, and I will have to live with it for the rest of my life. But I don’t have to live with the whispers and the lies and the innuendos of an arrogant, antiquated society. I want to teach. I want to feel like I create my own destiny. I’m tired of fulfilling the destiny society assigns to me. I’m returning to St. Louis and my home, where I belong. I’ll sign any documents you wish granting Travis an annulment.”
Without even looking back to see how Travis accepted this decision, Alicia raised her chin and swung around to go back up the stairs. Travis had told her some people acted on instinct more than others. She might as well finish the day as it had begun, without thought.
Below, a wicked grin played at the corners of Travis’s mouth. Alicia’s words had filled him with relief and a great sense of freedom. His father, however, registered only shock. There was no time like the present to clear the air.
“I have no intention of annulling my marriage for you or for anyone else, you realize,” Travis stated.
Lord Royster’s gaze swung back to his son. Before he could reply, Travis handed him the final blow. “The only reason I consented to return to England was because I thought that was what Alicia wanted. You will have other sons. This one belongs here.”
Travis started for the stairs, but his father grabbed his shoulder. “You can’t do this! You can’t be so cruel as to allow your sisters to go homeless should I die. They need you, if you will not consider my needs.”
“That time could be many years from now. Name me your heir in the event no other son is born if you wish. I’ll not neglect my duties, but I’ll not neglect my wife or son either. My address will be St. Louis should you need me.”
Travis ran up the stairs in pursuit of Alicia.
He found her in the nursery, holding Dale. When he burst through the door, she raised startled eyes to his.
“We’re going home, Alicia. That south field still needs clearing, and I know where I can get one hell of a stallion for stud duty this spring. You reckon Becky’s forgotten how to make those jam cakes yet?”
“No, I reckon she hasn’t.” Mocking his slang and ignoring the ten thousand questions and objections she should raise, Alicia read the happiness in Travis’s eyes and stepped into his welcoming embrace.
They were going home, at last.
Epilogue
Homasinee smiled as her eldest toddled after his father into the woods.
Travis glanced down into her serene brown face and asked, “Are you happy?”
She smiled away his anxiety. “There is war all around us, but there is peace in my heart. And you?”
Travis stared after his cousin, not really seeing him as he put together the words. “I cannot fight my brothers or my countrymen, and I cannot join them. The war is over different ways of living, and I am content with mine as it is. I will defend my right to live as I am, if I must, but I will not attack others for theirs. Someday men must learn to stop fighting to settle quarrels.”
A sly smile touched Homasinee’s lips. “Lonetree speaks with tongue of happy man. Only the discontented fight.”
Travis laughed at this homily, and with the mail crackling in his jacket pocket, loped back toward home.
Roses still bloomed along the trellis Alicia had planted in the spring. Where the chickens had once hunted and pecked in the yard, a neat kitchen garden grew. Inside, he was greeted with the smell of a fresh apple pie, but he avoided the temptation of sneaking a bite. He co
uld hear Becky scolding her rambunctious young one as the little demon demolished the kitchen. The pie would wait.
The letter in his pocket would not. He took the steps two at a time, following the sounds of Alicia’s happy humming.
He found her grading papers from her first class of students. They had progressed from alphabets to essays, and Travis still felt a shock when he discovered some of his men arguing over an article in the newspaper. True, they read it more often to discover who had stabbed whom in the latest tavern brawl, but that was progress of a sort. Once it would have been their names on the list of brawlers.
His wife looked up at his early arrival, and set the papers aside to run into his arms and welcome him with a kiss. Travis closed his eyes and drank in the heavenly scent of gardenias and the sweet taste of her lips as he crushed her closer. Never would he get enough of the weight of her supple curves in his arms, the press of full breasts against his chest, and the joy that spread through him each time she offered herself in this way. It had been a long battle to reach this point, he would not yield it ever.
His hand sought her breast, his thumb searching for the hardening crest surging against the thin cotton. Alicia gasped and melted against him as he stroked her breast, then rode his hand downward, over the narrow line of her waist to the slight bulge of her abdomen beneath the high-waisted bodice.
“I’ll not miss a day of this one’s growth,” Travis murmured against her hair as he covered the small mound of her belly with his broad palm. “I want to feel him when he starts to move.”
Alicia laughed low in her throat. “I will gladly give him to you when that time comes if he is anything like your firstborn. I thought I was possessed by a devil.”
“And so you were,” Travis agreed, glancing over her shoulder to where his son casually wrecked the wooden wagon he had made for him. “Do all children destroy everything they own?”
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