And his own voice.
I’ll keep him covered.
As if someone else spoke the words. Calm. Collected. He’d pulled the gurgling man—boy really, but Simon and he’d been the same age, so in his mind they’d been men—behind the cannon, even as the enemy advanced. Some of the Mainers used their dead and wounded as shields. Not that anyone could blame them.
He’d rushed behind the cannon, working it alone while taking breaks to calm the shivering man at his feet. Who grew weaker and weaker.
Finally, a tall, slender, dark-skinned goy he’d never spoken to came to assist. I’ll load and you light. But they kept coming. General Warren spit and pounded his thighs like a madman, his voice hoarse from screaming.
Fucking gates of Hell. Hazlett, make your men work.
Darkness descended, cooling the air as the smoke settled and they retreated, sobs and moans replacing the screams and whoops.
Christ, it’s cold. The nurse, who’d shoved her way between him and the other man, was as bad as their commander.
Simon. Oh god, Simon, speak to me. Come on. Please. Thad was on the ground too, sobbing.
“I didn’t know what to do or say to him.” He choked the words. “Simon was my friend, my best friend in this country, but he was Thad’s brother. Your brother.”
Amalia laid her head against his shoulder. “You knew he was gone.”
Everything about Simon, his voice, his breathing, even his tremors stilled.
“So did Will. And Meg. It took Thad a little longer. And then he wouldn’t leave the body.” David swallowed. “Thad...it near killed Thad.”
We have to bury him. The sun’s setting and tomorrow’s Friday and we have to or it’ll be too late and we won’t at all. We can’t leave him like this. We have to bury him. We can’t wait. You know we can’t wait.
He’d clung to David’s shirt. Meg almost needed to chloroform him to keep him from doing something wild, like deserting or worse, marching into the enemy’s camp.
With his free hand, David pulled off his spectacles and wiped his eyes against his sleeve. “With Hazlett dead and Rittenhouse overwhelmed, I had to ask General Warren.”
I don’t fucking care, private. Bury, don’t bury, but you better be damned awake when the rebels come at us again.
She wrapped his arm around her waist, her fingers still laced in his.
David stared at the endless fields and rocks, once so filled with terror and bodies and now so empty. He enlisted Will to help strip Simon. No metal, no adornment—ashes to ashes, dust to dust. He wrapped the younger Truitt in his tzitzis, the closest thing they had to a tallis.
“Where?” The word on Amalia’s lips was strangled and his heart bled. Her body supported his as much as his supported hers.
“Back up the hill, in the woods.” He gestured a little with his outer hand, as she leaned her head against his, their cheeks brushing. “We must have passed it.”
She pulled back a little, her eyes glistening as a breeze lifted strands of hair from her crown. “Will you...”
“Yes.” He forced himself to breathe, to not flinch, to be strong for another Truitt. “Yes, of course.”
Amalia bent down and palmed two small rocks. She slid one in his hand, the edge smooth and soft from rain and time, cool beneath his fingers. Real. She grasped his hand again and he led her back from whence they came. The woods had changed. The ghosts had returned. A near forlorn mist covered the ferns and leaves on the forest floor. New growth but the contours were the same as eight years ago. The three trees and the disturbed ground and the angle and...
“Here.”
“Here?” Her eyes darkened so every haunted, painful tear flickered and glimmered.
“Here.” He clenched and unclenched his fingers, his mind fighting his body’s need to touch her and hold her and fix the unfixable. “Do you need to be alone—”
Her hold on his fingers tightened, as his memories swirled.
Him and Will digging, Thad on his knees, needing to be held back from jumping inside the too-shallow hole.
The sun rose higher in the sky, the shadows growing, except for Amalia’s face which was still bathed in light.
“Should I say something? I mean he’s not there I know, but he was so silly and kind and—Thad is so smart and Ro so sweet, and they are both wonderful and I love them, but Simon was special. He was mine. He used to play pranks on me. Animals in my closet—live ones, like baby bunnies, who are most certainly not house-trained. Same with birds.” Eyes wide, she searched his face, as if he could do something, fix it, but his tongue stuck to the top of his mouth.
“You know Ethan reminded me of him?” She twisted her arm around his, her silk intertwined with his cotton.
David gulped. Ethan? Her first husband reminded her of her own brother? She closed her eyes, her head so near his that the tips of her lashes fluttered against his cheek.
“Not really. Not in personality. But they both had light hair and he was eighteen, like me, the age Simon had been when he left. Ethan was so happy and his family was like ours.”
“And you wanted to marry him?” The breath in David’s chest was like an ever expanding stone against his ribs.
“No. He was available.” Amalia drew back from him, leaving his skin empty without the connection to hers. “I wanted to be married. Badly.” Her shoulders sagged. “I missed Simon so much and, well, everything. Knowing what I was supposed to do and supposed to be and how life would go—I wanted that back. I wanted the life I’d been promised. The world in which I was supposed to live, where I understood the rules.”
He toed at the moss, each word a punch or stab or searing bullet hole in every single one of his vital organs. Because he was the exact opposite of what a younger Amalia would’ve envisioned.
A breeze rippled through the canopy, ruffling enough feathers that chirps became caws and squawks above them. He shivered, but Amalia didn’t move.
“Except, remember that story in Sunday school about Lot, when his wife turned back and changed into salt? And then Lot was stuck and couldn’t move, couldn’t go back, but also couldn’t move forward?” She let go of his hand and covered her face.
What should he do? What was appropriate? His heart lurched. It didn’t matter. What mattered was her. He scooted closer, rubbing her back.
“I never loved either of them. Barely knew them. I mean, with Ethan, we’d only met a few times before we married.” She shook her head. “But, after the war, we both wanted something normal.”
Tears drew tracks through the dust on Amalia’s cheeks. “Anyway, I woke one morning and he was gone. Left a note. Went out west for a while. Went to think, to figure things out. Without me.”
“What did you do?” he asked as he stroked her hair.
“I ran to Thad’s house because our parents were in England—Disraeli and all—and he told me about Indianapolis. And he—I didn’t know then, didn’t understand until later when I came across some documents—but he made sure I kept the house, the one on Delancey Street that was supposed to be...” She glanced up at David, her eyes red and smudged with soot and dirt and almost confused. “Simon’s.”
She moved her stone back and forth from hand to hand. “Until that moment I had no idea what the real cost of divorce was. I mean, I was never supposed to have one of the properties. None of us women were because once we marry, they become our husband’s. Most are in the trust, except a select few. Thad is to have the Centerville house and Ro’s eldest son gets grandpa Judah’s, but the Philadelphia one was to be Simon’s and, normally, it would’ve gone back to my parents, but he had a will. Cousin Rachel’s companion’s family is crawling with lawyers.”
Amalia finally glanced at him again and the almost-smile near broke him into pieces. “We were only able to protect it because I was lucky, I had lawyers and a family who helped. Most women aren’
t. Most women don’t have access to funds to even hire a lawyer. And I suppose you know what risks you take when there’s no civil marriage, when it’s only under Jewish law.”
But I wanted more.
She didn’t need to say it. It was there, beneath the words, clear as day. She still wanted more. Even if it wasn’t what she believed it would be at eighteen.
But he couldn’t give her more. That one moment, all those years ago when he’d almost convinced himself it could be different, he could be different...
He pulled her into his body and rocked her in his arms as she sobbed. The cicadas sang when she finally lifted her head again, the pink sky beyond them streaked with purple and navy. She reached up and wiped his cheek.
Wet too.
Amalia nudged his side with her hip. “Come on. We should find a cave for the night.”
“A hotel. We’re less than an hour’s walk from town.” He bumped her right back. “Good news, remember?”
She straightened her spine and shook her shoulders, before striding over to the crudely marked grave. Without a pause, Amalia brought her stone to her lips and laid it on Simon. He knelt and laid his beside hers, the edges touching.
I’m sorry, Simon. But I promise, I won’t let you down again. I’ll make it right.
Somehow. Because Amalia did deserve more. If only he could give it to her.
Rocking back on his feet, he rose and kissed the back of her hand, before leading her through the ghosts, towards a bed and a bath and hopefully, a way to sleep.
Chapter Twenty-One
The hotel room was warm, and comfortable, and Amalia finally got a good night’s sleep, before boarding the B & O bound for Wilmington. One couldn’t argue with David’s plan. Not one ounce of danger followed them on either the train or the cab from the station, only melancholy, as it would all be over soon.
The bris and accompanying party were that evening and afterwards he’d probably return to Philadelphia to reap his reward. And achieve his goal of running an entire office and be entirely too busy for her. Which was probably the best outcome.
Amalia glanced at David and sighed. Why couldn’t he see that he could be a real partner, marriage or not? He was afraid of more, so would always hold back. Which she could live with for a time, but forever?
At least she had her charity and her column—or a column. She’d dictated the thing to him the prior night and they’d mailed it to Philadelphia before they boarded. A solid piece. And he’d given her plenty of material for the next few as well, provided she didn’t disappoint her readers anymore.
“Thank god.” Her father’s voice met them before they even stepped through the threshold of the Centerville house. He raced in, his silver-brown hair flopping on his face. He gripped her into a tight embrace before standing back, inspecting. “Are you all right? You aren’t hurt, are you?”
“Well...” She shifted on her feet. She was the worst liar, especially where her father was concerned. He could always see through her, particularly when she was trying to protect him. After all, he’d been the one to come out to Bedford, unprompted, to collect her and take her back to Indianapolis. She’d been planning on giving it a few more months just to be sure everything appeared real, but somehow, her father knew how miserable she was and swooped in. Glared a whole bunch at Elias too.
“She was injured in Pittsburgh, sir, and it was aggravated during the train accident at Hunterdon,” David answered, his eyes on her father, his back straight, not even a flinch, despite a near growl coming from her father’s lips.
Good lord, so much overprotectiveness.
Amalia stepped between the two. “I’ve healed. My hand should be as good as new in a few days.” Her words didn’t change the murderous glint in her father’s eyes.
“I thought you Pinkertons are supposed to be the best.” Her father brushed around her, and wagged a finger in David’s face.
“We are, father.” A weary Thad entered from the adjoining parlor, followed by Will. He leaned against the gold and cream wallpaper. “They did an excellent job. Imagine what would’ve happened if they hadn’t been there. She’s safe in Delaware. And on time for the bris.”
“I wouldn’t have missed it for anything.” Amalia fluffed her hair as if a bounce of her curls could distract everyone into forgetting about the entire matter. She moved towards her brother out of habit, even as a voice in the back of her head screamed to stay with David, to cuddle against his body. “I have a new dress, after all. I’m excited to finally look lovely again.”
“You always look lovely.” Her father and David said the lie at the exact same time.
Another growl from her father.
“She does.” Thad’s voice was loud, even for him. “Though the hour is growing late and if you want a full bath, Amalia, you should probably start now.”
A little obvious, but at least her brother thought on his feet, and was on her side.
“Excellent idea.” And he had a point. She could use a good soak. She stank from all the travel. On the stairs, she had to grip the banister. Who knew she’d be so sore and stiff?
“Meanwhile, the rest of us should meet,” Will said.
Amalia paused, a foot hovering above the third step. She turned to face the men again, her blood pounding in her ears. “Are you going to discuss the threats? Because if you do, I think I should stay.”
How dare they? After all she’d been through. Would she ever be out of bunting in her family’s eyes? And Will? Was she just a charge for him too?
“Amalia.” There was a warning note in her father’s voice.
“I’m not a child, father.” She marched back down the stairs. “Tell me whatever news you all have.” She glanced to David, willing him to support her.
He swallowed. “Amalia has full knowledge of the investigation, or at least knows as much as I do, and can offer insight so I don’t see any reason not to keep her apprised.”
Lukewarm, but better than nothing. She scowled.
David must have noticed because he cleared his throat and continued after glancing at her. “And she adjusts quickly—very quickly, so really, in many ways, she’s an asset. She’ll be much safer if she is informed of any and all plans.”
Her heart tingled. Better, much better. And his voice never wavered. Oh, she’d find a way to sneak into his bedroom and show him how much she appreciated that little boost in front of her father. Maybe on her knees again. She might have licked her lips.
“Well, the Chicago office has joined the investigation to add more resources.” Thad gave her a dubious stare before crossing in front to address the group, though really more their father. “I’m having Meg be our communication liaison with them and the folks in Pittsburgh. They have a suspect and are questioning him. And the agents who were in Indianapolis yielded some interesting discoveries related to the case.”
Her brother inclined his head towards David and something flickered between the two of them. They both nodded again.
“Perfect.” David cleared his throat, including Will in his now three-way glance. “We can review all the information and make any security changes necessary, alert everyone to any descriptions of potential suspects. Right now, act as if anyone who isn’t family could be a potential threat. No one is to be trusted and she’s always to be guarded.”
Reasonable, though being guarded at all times...it better be by David. At least if she had any say. She cleared her throat. “Well, you need more resources for that. Especially when I return to the Philadelphia house.”
All the men turned to her.
“You plan to go there?” her father asked.
Yes, no, maybe? If David was going to be in that city...though she couldn’t exactly say that to her father, could she? Amalia shrugged and willed her voice nonchalant. “I do own it. And Isaac, and Rachel, and Lydia are all getting on in years and aren’t they
going to be my responsibility? Isn’t that what spinsters do?” She grimaced. A bit harsh, but hopefully distracting enough that neither Truitt male would have an inkling of her real motives.
“You’re not a spinster, you’re a divorcee.” David had moved towards her and gave her a playful wink.
Her heart fluttered, before sinking. Unfulfillable wish. But until the clock struck midnight...
“Same difference.” Her lip twitched and David ducked his head.
The other three men exchanged bewildered and suspicious glances.
Fiddlesticks. She was being a bit obvious, wasn’t she?
“I think your mother was hoping you’d stay on here until this business is settled and for a little while afterwards so we could discuss the future.” Her father coughed into his hand.
“Or rather your plans for my future.” She crossed her arms over her chest. Because of course they had plans for her. Plans that didn’t involve consulting her and certainly did not involve her charity and column and lots of time alone with David.
Ugh, not a battle she wanted, especially as she already needed to convince them to provide the funds despite...well...everything. Maybe the agents in Chicago would prove the threats had nothing to do with the charity after all? Wouldn’t that be something?
She sniffed a little. She never had that sort of luck.
“We’re here to help you, Amalia. To prevent disaster. Make sure you’re happy.” Her father interrupted her thoughts, his voice earnest. “We want to make certain everything goes right for you this time.”
Her heart panged. He meant well. As did her mother. And they’d both lost so much and had so many responsibilities. How did she expect them to see her and listen if they were being pulled in a million directions? How could she expect them to delve too deeply into who she was or what she wanted when she didn’t entirely know herself half the time?
She turned and gave her father a peck on the cheek. “Don’t fret, Father, things will go fine. I promise. You won’t have to worry about me anymore.” And he wouldn’t, because she had no intention of making him.
Dalliances & Devotion Page 20