Damon clenched and unclenched his fists to control his rage. He hated the scheming witch, but until he could get the child from her, he’d be forced to put up with her. And then there was Eden. What would she say when she learned Tessa and the boy would be staying on? Dread filled him because he already sensed what her answer would be. And now he must convince her not to leave him.
“Somehow, some way, I’m going to be free of you. Forever free of you, even if I must pay a king’s ransom to earn my freedom.”
A satisfied smile ringed her red, painted mouth. “Ah, me darlin’, you always did say the sweetest things to me.”
Damon strode from the parlor, nearly bumping into his housekeeper and the child in his haste to find Eden.
“I rode the pony,” squealed Collin to his mother.
“It was fun then?”
He nodded in reply.
“Then you want to stay on here? You can ride the pony every day.”
Collin laughed in delight, and took his mother’s hand. The Maori housekeeper coolly assessed Tessa, who appeared nonplussed by the scrutiny. “You’re called Lanu?” Tessa asked, and the woman grunted. “I’m Mrs. Alexander. I’d like me bags which are on the porch brought inside and placed in the master suite, seeing that me husband didn’t think to do it. And I’d like a nice warm bath for me and me son. Traveling is dirty business.”
“But Miss Eden sleeps in the master’s room,” Lanu protested.
“Not anymore she don’t,” Tessa archly replied. “I’m Mr. Alexander’s legal wife and will be treated like the mistress here. I doubt my husband’s whore will be stayin’ on much longer.”
Tessa thought the little woman was about to refuse her command, but minutes later, the bags were in Damon’s bedroom. She found herself lying on the softest and largest bed she’d ever sampled. From down the hallway, she heard Collin playing in another room. Despite the scene in the parlor with Damon and his whore, Tessa was certain everything would work out for her. In time Damon would accept Collin and then turn to her. All she had to do was get the Flynn woman out of Damon’s life, and if she knew anything about properly bred women, Eden Flynn would be gone before morning.
She laughed out loud, heady with her own sense of accomplishment. Life was going to be good for her. She was certain of it.
~~~
Eden lifted her head from the sweetly scented grass, aware of Damon’s presence before he dared whisper her name. Falling to his knees, he protectively wrapped his arms around her trembling shoulders. His stubbled cheek grazed hers, his lips kissed away her tears. “Eden, forgive me.” His voice was a hoarse croak in her ear. “I should have told you the truth about Tessa.”
Damon tilted her face so he could see into her eyes, but what he saw gave him no solace. The shimmering orbs, so much like precious greenstone when she gazed at him with trust and desire, laughter and anger, now regarded him without any trace of emotion. He was losing Eden, and above all things, he couldn’t allow that to happen. Without Eden, he was half a man. She must understand, and had to understand why he’d lied about Tessa.
“I know you’re hurt,” he continued, and felt inane for even saying it. Certainly, she was hurt. What had he expected? “But I need for you to listen to me. I’ve got to tell you how it was after Tessa left me.” Damon expected some reaction from her. He got none, but decided her shocked state might be for the best. As long as she allowed him to hold her, he could be certain she wouldn’t run away. He could tell her the truth.
“I’m a proud man, Eden. You know that. I won’t lie to you and tell you I didn’t love Tessa when I married her. I did love her, I was mad for her. And Jock Sutherland wanted her, too, which made winning her all the more rewarding.” A sigh ripped through his chest. “But I should have let Sutherland have the bitch, for she caused nothing but misery. She’d married me believing me to be the wealthiest man in the area, and aye, I admit I had money, but not as much as she thought I did. You see, Shamus was the one who controlled the purse strings for a long time. It was only as Shamus grew older and Tessa was gone that he gave me more responsibility in running Thunder Mine. Shortly after Tessa left the Otago with her rich businessman, Shamus admitted he’d purposely withheld most of the mine’s wealth from me because he’d always disliked Tessa and thought she was a conniving witch who was after anything she could get.”
“Shamus was a better judge of character than you,” Eden unemotionally observed, fidgeting in Damon’s embrace.
“Aye, you’re right,” Damon sadly admitted, stroking her hair. “He loved you, sent you here to me, but I wanted to believe the worst about you rather than trust Shamus’s judgment in marrying you. You see, it hurt to know Tessa had fooled me but Shamus had seen through her. My pride suffered when she left me for an older man. I figured she’d rejected me as a man, and afterward I began spending time with women who weren’t decent. I didn’t want to marry again, and I convinced everyone Tessa was dead, even going so far as to believe it myself. To me, she was dead. I was dead until I met you.”
“Oh, Damon, don’t!” A sob spilled from Eden’s mouth and she pushed at him. “I don’t want to hear any of this. Not now!”
Damon held her fast against him. “But I want you to hear, Eden. You have to know how much I love you. I love you so much, my darling, that for the first time in years I wanted a wife—you. I contacted Mr. MacKenzie to have Tessa found and petition her for divorce. I prayed she’d be dead, or so guilty over what she’d done that she’d consent without a fuss. I never expected her to turn up here. I hoped we could be married soon. If I’d have known Tessa would brazenly walk into Castlegate and claim her rights, I wouldn’t have bothered trying to find her, I’d have gone ahead and married you—”
“Married me when you had another wife! And a child! Haven’t you humiliated me enough without adding bigamy to the list? I can’t bear to hear you say another word. Let me alone, let me be!” She struggled out of his grasp when Damon voluntarily loosened his grip. There was no point in holding on to her. Eden was lost to him. He knew that now.
He stood up when she did. The moonlight illuminated her, and he allowed his eyes to roam across her tousled hair with the grass clinging within its golden-red depths, to memorize every line of her tear-stained face. Even with her eyes red and swollen from crying, Eden was heartbreakingly beautiful, but no longer his to cherish and love. She was going to leave him, and nothing he could say would stop her. But he would try one last time.
“I’m going to divorce Tessa. I’ll make her give me a divorce. Then, Eden, we can be married.” Damon made one final attempt to hold her against him. He ached to feel her body melt into his, to know she still loved him. But she jabbed at his chest with tightly balled fists.
“I don’t want to marry you!” she shouted. “I want to be free of you, and wish to God I’d never met you. I’m leaving here tonight and hope never to lay eyes upon you again.”
“Eden, please, don’t be leaving me.” He held her fast, refusing to give in to her struggles by releasing her. “Tell me you still love me. I know you love me.”
Suddenly she grew very still. Her heaving bosom was the only indication of her anger. “Let me go, Damon. I won’t take you from your son.” Her words, spoken softly and with chilling solemnity, sent a painful chill through him. She broke away and turned her back to him as she started back to Castlegate.
“Eden,” he called, uncertain as he did so what he could say to convince her to stay.
Without looking at him, he heard her voice. “Don’t come after me. I want nothing to do with Thunder Mine or you ever again.” And those were the last words she spoke to him. When he returned to the house hours later, he sensed a loneliness and knew Eden was gone. Lanu padded quietly into the parlor where he stood and handed him a piece of faded parchment.
“Miss Eden said to give you this, Mr. Damon.” Lanu’s face expressed her sadness and she choked back a sob as she fled from the room.
Damon read the missive, not the
least surprised to discover he held Eden’s deed to Thunder Mine. His heart gave a jolt when he saw her finely scripted signature finalizing that she had turned over her portion of the mine to him. If this had been a few months ago, he’d have been ecstatic to have Eden Flynn out of his life. Now he felt such pain he didn’t believe he could tolerate it. She was gone, and the ache which consumed his entire body was a hundred times greater than when Tessa had left him.
He went to the bedroom, hoping against hope that this was all a nightmare, that he’d open the door and there would be his Eden, waiting for him in the big bed and holding out her arms to him. And when he entered the bedroom, he could see a woman’s figure on Eden’s side of the bed. Hope filled him. She hadn’t left after all. Perhaps things could still work out for them—
Damon froze in his tracks, his eyes wide and viciously blue as he gazed down at the woman who slept so peacefully. It wasn’t Eden at all.
It was Tessa.
Chapter 19
Kia Ora was beautiful when the sun rose above the mountains and gilded the peaks with golden fingers of sunshine. Eden couldn’t help noticing how the inside of the Carruthers’ house glowed now, too, since Marjorie had employed a carpenter to rebuild the stairs and carpet them in an attractive peach-and-green floral pattern. The heavy, ominous paneling was gone, replaced by a white-and-peach striped wallpaper on the parlor walls. Elegant mahogany furnishings replaced their spartan predecessors in every room of the house.
Under Marjorie’s expert eye, Kia Ora was slowly coming into its own.
Eden sipped an iced lime drink which was prepared for her by Marjorie’s new housekeeper, an Englishwoman named Bonnie Day, who Marjorie had hired in town. In fact, Kia Ora bustled with servants, which was as it should be, but Eden was to discover that each day of the last seven since Eden arrived during the dark of night and begged Marjorie’s hospitality, Marjorie lifted herself onto a horse’s strong back and rode into the open countryside. “I must tend to my flock,” she’d say to Eden and grin from ear to ear as she rode off with her long brown braid flying in the breeze to join Tiku on the plains.
It was clear that Marjorie was happy, and since Tiku joined the household, her plain face beamed until she no longer looked anything but pretty. Marjorie was in love with Tiku, Eden could see that, any fool could tell. And it was just as obvious to Eden that Tiku returned that love. His eyes constantly followed her, seeming to drink in her every movement, seeming to know what she wanted before she asked for it.
However, Eden doubted Tiku would act on his desires. From her conversation with him, he felt he was beneath most people, and she realized this included Marjorie. Thus, he held himself away from her—which was regretful. These two people loved each other but couldn’t openly admit that love because of society’s rules.
And here was Eden Flynn, a woman in love with a married man, a woman having that man’s child. She wondered what would be said about her when she bore Damon’s child. She wondered what Damon would say. A chilling fear suffused her body and she shivered. She must leave the Otago area before her condition became too apparent. Damon mustn’t know about the baby or he’d find some way to keep her here. Never would she stay and bear a baby out of wedlock, never would she allow her child to become a victim of cruel remarks and treatment. Soon she’d leave. Maybe Tiku could escort her back to Queenstown and then she’d return to America and make a new life for herself and her baby. She’d simply tell people the truth about her widowhood. No one would know the child wasn’t her husband’s. Her wealth allowed her to give her baby everything, to make a decent life for them both.
But a lump formed painfully in her throat. A new life meant she’d be without Damon, and not all the wealth in the world could alleviate her suffering. Today was the day she’d start her new life. She was going to see Mr. MacKenzie and officially receive her money for her share of Thunder Mine from Damon.
Today she’d sever all ties with Damon Alexander— except for the smallest but most significant one growing in her womb.
A knock at the door barely intruded into her thoughts until Bonnie appeared in the doorway. “You have a guest, ma’am. Mr. Sutherland is here to see you.”
Eden instantly rose to her feet as Jock approached her and Bonnie departed. Dressed in a dark suit of clothes with a snowy white shirt, Jock looked every bit the gentleman, but it was the sympathetic smile on his handsome face which caused a sob to escape from her. Jock must have come because he knew about Tessa. Eden alternately felt affection for him but also humiliation. If Jock knew, then everyone else in the area must know Tessa had returned.
Clasping her hands between his large, warm ones, Jock gave her a brotherly peck on the cheek. “I heard about what happened. I’ve been worried about you.”
Eden managed to smile. “Thank you, Jock. You’re a good friend to visit me.”
“You’re looking a bit pale,” he noted worriedly. “Have you been outside the house since your arrival?”
“No, I haven’t felt like leaving my room until this morning. Marjorie has been such a gracious hostess, such a wonderful friend to me.” She glanced around the room. “Don’t you like the changes she’s made in the house?”
“We’re not discussing my sister, so don’t try and steer from the subject, Eden.”
“And what might the subject be?” she asked.
“You, and you know it. Now, why have you buried yourself inside? Wait, don’t tell me. I’ll tell you. You’re afraid you’re going to run into someone who knows about the return of Damon’s prodigal wife and child.”
Eden bit down upon her lower lip. Just to hear Damon’s name hurt. “Jock, please don’t go on.” She broke away from him and went to stand by the window. The early-morning light touched her face in a golden haze. “The last week hasn’t been easy for me.”
He was behind her, placing his hands upon her shoulders and turning her toward him. “I can imagine what you’ve been going through, my darling. But now that you know what sort of a person Alexander truly is, you can forget him. No one blames you for his lie. You can’t hide yourself away from people forever, Eden. One day you’ll have to confront them with your head held high like the aristocrat you are.”
“I’m aware of that, but—Damon isn’t a bad person, Jock. I can understand why he lied to everyone. What that woman did to him was unforgivable.”
“Can you forgive him for lying to you?” Jock ground out from between his finely chiseled lips.
Jock hit at the heart of the matter. She’d considered the circumstances of Damon’s marriage, even going so far as to think she could forget Tessa ever existed if he divorced the woman. Damon had shown up at Kia Ora the day after her arrival, but Eden had told Marjorie to tell him she wouldn’t see him, that he had nothing to say which might change her mind. Instead, he’d given Marjorie a note for her, and Eden still kept it. Damon had told her that he loved her, and he’d somehow free himself of Tessa, to please wait for him, that he was anxious to hear from her.
She hadn’t replied. She couldn’t because she didn’t know what to tell him now that she knew he had a son who needed him. But she couldn’t write to him or forgive him. He’d lied to her.
Jock cupped her chin. “I’m sorry for causing you more distress. I can see the subject is a painful one. I came to offer you a ride into town. Today is the day you see Mr. MacKenzie?”
“Yes. How did you know about that?”
Jock gave her a mysterious smile. “There’s very little in the Otago that I don’t know, Eden. Just say I have my way of discovering things. Allow me to escort you into town.”
Eden couldn’t think of a reason to refuse Jock’s request, and why should she? He’d more than proved he was her friend by always coming to her aid, and he’d granted Thunder Mine the water rights to please her. She couldn’t forget his kindnesses and was deeply indebted to him. “I’ll be ready to leave shortly,” she told him and started out of the room but stopped and shot him a grateful smile. “You’ve been
my champion, Jock. Thank you for caring about me.”
Jock bowed low to her, and Eden felt as if she’d been transported into her parents’ drawing room on the night of a large ball when young gallants danced attendance upon her. As she went to her room in search of her parasol, she willed herself not to think about Damon, the man she loved. He wasn’t a gentleman like Jock, he’d never treated her like the true lady she was until he’d discovered she was a virgin. But Jock always had. And she was grateful to Jock Sutherland because not once had he rubbed salt in her wounds by telling her “I told you so. I told you Alexander wasn’t a gentleman.” He’d always been supremely patient and kind.
He was the sort of man who would be a good husband to her and father to her child.
“No,” Eden mumbled out loud and grabbed for the yellow-and-white parasol matching her gown. “I don’t want to marry anyone—not Damon or Jock.” But the seeds of a marriage were planted, and she wasn’t quite certain how.
~~~
The silence in Mr. MacKenzie’s office was oppressive. There was no need for Damon’s presence since he’d already signed the necessary papers, buying out her share of Thunder Mine. But there he sat across from her, his long, booted legs thrust out in front of him. He hadn’t had the courtesy to wear a formal suit on such a serious occasion as this, but wore a light-blue shirt, unbuttoned at the neck, and a pair of tightly fitted, brown corded pants. It was almost as if he intended to flaunt his physique at her, to watch her beneath those hooded blue eyes until she squirmed in her seat. She couldn’t help but think how different he was from Jock, who was always a gentleman; Damon could be so very uncouth in manners and dress. What he’d chosen to wear today proved he didn’t give a damn about what anybody thought.
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