“Why, actually, sir, there is. My throat is parched, and the poor children have been standing for ages. You see, I’m trying to reach my father right now. He’s quite ill, I’m afraid. We’ve taken a loathsome journey in a wagon, what with the railroads being so dangerous, to be with him. And now—well, we’re famished, and exhausted, and …”
She allowed her hand to flutter in the air and a tear to moisten her eye.
Jacob looked at her with a cocked brow.
Niles Norman was immediately at her service.
They didn’t have to wait a moment longer. Niles knew someone in the right place, and soon they were sitting. A few minutes later, a beautiful rack of lamb sat before them with mint jelly and sweet potatoes and green pole beans dripping with sweet-cream butter.
Kiernan didn’t think that food had ever tasted quite so good.
Niles Norman remained with them, chatting about the war. The Yankees were breathing right down their necks in Richmond, but they weren’t afraid, not a bit. General Lee would keep them out.
Kiernan smiled sweetly. “Then we shouldn’t have any problem getting through down on the peninsula, should we?”
Niles Norman frowned. “Now, Mrs. Miller, it just doesn’t seem to be the right time—”
“But it has to be, Mr. Norman. I must get through!”
She brought her handkerchief to her eyes. In seconds Norman was assuring her that he would get her a pass; after all, she was part owner of Miller Firearms, and where might confederate boys be without those arms?
Jacob continued to stare at her with questioning eyes. She kicked him beneath the table, and Niles Norman fluttered nervously about her.
She gave him a sweet and dazzling smile.
Although accommodations in the city were extremely scarce, Niles Norman found them two rooms, with space for Tyne and Janey too. When Niles said good night to Kiernan, he cleared his throat several times, then told her that he would love to see her again. Surely, the time wasn’t right, but …
“Mister,” Jacob snorted, “you just don’t know how wrong the time is!” he proclaimed.
“Jacob!” Kiernan protested warningly.
It was Jacob’s turn for a sweet and innocent smile. “Sorry, Mr. Norman, sir. But trust me. Kiernan is not ready for anything at the moment.”
“What in God’s name did you think you were doing?”
Kiernan demanded furiously of Jacob after Niles Norman left them at last.
Jacob planted his hands on his waist, staring her down. “You were flirting!”
“I had to flirt!” she responded, astonished. “How else were we going to get anything done?”
“Seven months gone with another man’s child—”
“Jacob!” Kiernan gasped. She was suddenly so furious that she could hardly stand it. She almost slapped him. Tears threatened at the back of her eyes, and she clenched her fingers tightly and stepped back rather than take a chance of striking Jacob.
“Even you are defending Jesse!” she whispered. “Dammit!” She was so weary, and the baby was so heavy, and as much as she loved the life building within her, her pregnancy was a strain. She couldn’t help resenting Jesse at that moment. “You’re defending him, and he’s a Yankee! The Yankee who took over your house!”
“He’s the father of your child,” Jacob reminded her. “And I know that it would matter very much to him that you flirted. I—I know it, because I know him!” After his first faltering, Jacob was now firm in his conviction. “I know him, and so—well, you just haven’t got any right to flirt like that!”
She hadn’t any right to flirt—because of Jesse? Oh, if it weren’t for Jesse—if it weren’t for the foolish fact that she loved him despite all odds—she wouldn’t be in this predicament now.
No, no—she wanted her baby.
“You’ve no right—no right at all, young Mr. Miller—to tell me what I can and cannot do,” she snapped to Jacob. She was wrong to fight with him, but she was too tense and weary to try to explain. And she was frightfully close to tears. She couldn’t fall apart now. She was too close to home.
“Oh, please! Stop it, both of you!” Patricia implored.
Kiernan swung around to look at Patricia, startled by her words.
“Jacob is—” Patricia hesitated, not quite as bold as her brother. “Jacob is only standing up for Captain Cameron. And Kiernan, you do love the captain, don’t you?”
Kiernan swallowed hard, then nodded. “I have loved him a very long time,” she admitted in a soft whisper. “Long before the war. If the war hadn’t come along when it did, I probably would have married him. But you must understand about Anthony.”
“We do understand,” Jacob interrupted her with quiet dignity, and offered her a crooked smile. “You have been a very good widow to him. You would have been a good wife.”
He kissed her cheek and went on into the bedroom where he would sleep. Kiernan looked after him, and then Patricia slipped an arm around her. And then the tears did slip down her cheek.
“Kiernan!” Patricia whispered with alarm. “What—?”
“I love you. I love you both,” she said, and quickly wiped away her tears, bringing Patricia into the bedroom they would share.
They set off in the morning.
Tyne snapped the reins over the horses’ backs, and the wagon moved down the pike. They had barely left behind the city with its fine red-brick row houses when they were stopped by a sentry. Kiernan produced the Confederate pass that Niles Norman had procured for her, and the soldier scratched his head.
“Mrs. Miller, with all due respect, ma’am, there’s fighting out there.”
“The fighting is out past Williamsburg, isn’t it?” she asked.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Then that’s the way I’m going,” she said sweetly.
Reluctantly, the soldier agreed to let them pass. A quarter-mile down the road, though, Kiernan asked Tyne to pull in on the reins. The wagon rolled to a stop, and she turned back to talk to the twins.
“I’ve no right to bring you both through this. I’ll take you back to Richmond, then I’ll come through myself.”
“We can’t take the time,” Jacob said stubbornly. “What if your father …” He let the words trail away meaningfully.
“My father may already be dead, Jacob. And it won’t help him to endanger you.” If John were dead, she thought, she wouldn’t be able to bear it.
But she would have to bear it. No matter what happened, she must survive it, and she must make herself be strong—for Jacob, for Patricia, and for the baby.
“We’re going with you,” Patricia said. “We’re not afraid of Yankees. We’ve already lived with them, remember?”
“Yes, I remember.”
“You should,” Jacob said softly. He was grinning. He seemed to have become Jesse’s champion—and to enjoy taunting her about her transgressions.
“How nice of you to remind me,” she said sweetly, gritting her teeth. “Tyne, let’s go forward.”
Down the road, they met another Confederate sentry. They were given another warning.
An hour later, they moved past a scene of utter devastation. Fighting had just preceded them. Patricia cried out at the sight of a body on the road before them, and Kiernan quickly forced the little girl to lay her head against her shoulder and close her eyes. She had to grit her teeth herself as they moved onward.
“Come on, good Lord Jesus!” Tyne prayed. Kiernan looked from Patricia’s blond head to the road. There were more sentries up ahead, dressed in blue. Troops, scores of them, marched along the road. Tyne pulled in on the reins, and Kiernan felt her heart beat furiously.
“We’re going to be all right!” she assured Tyne and the children. But she was shaking. She’d seen Yankees before. As Jacob had been kind enough to remind her, she’d seen them rather close.
But she’d never seen so many.
“Halt!” A voice commanded.
Tyne pulled in on the reins, and a footsol
dier strode over to the wagon. A young man looked up to Kiernan. “Lady, where do you think you’re going?”
“Home,” she told him. “I’m trying to go home. And you’re in my way.”
“There’s been fighting all around here, ma’am, and all down the peninsula.”
Her heart slammed hard against her chest. She prayed that she still had a home to go to.
“You have to let me by.”
“I’m sorry, ma’am. I can’t do that.”
“But why?”
“Darkie,” the soldier said, addressing Tyne, “draw that wagon over there. Lady, I’m afraid that you and the children will have to come with me to see the general. Come right along.”
There was no choice. She stepped down from the wagon, helping Patricia. She reached for Jacob, but he eluded her touch.
“You must behave here,” she warned him.
He arched a brow at her.
“Jacob—”
“Lady, you must follow me now,” the soldier told her.
“Lead onward, sir. I’m following.”
She pulled her hood farther down over her forehead, more as a cover against the stares directed their way than against the coolness of the rain-dampened morning. The soldier led them past rows and rows of marching men—tired men, wounded men, men who marched covered in mud and bandages. Some limped along, using their rifles as crutches.
“Burial detail, halt!” an officer commanded.
They moved past the soldiers performing the weary task of laying their own to rest on foreign soil. They passed by men who seemed to be at leisure. Some were in the grass with their mess kits, gnawing on hardtack, lying back and chewing blades of grass. A number of men had bandaged heads, and feet, and arms—and some had bandages where there should have been limbs.
Kiernan’s heart hammered hard, her muscles contracted. Deep within her womb, the baby suddenly moved, violently, swiftly—as if it, too, had seen the ravages of battle and turned against them.
The men watched her walk along with Jacob and Patricia. Some smiled and tipped their hats. Some were appreciative, some were curious, and some were just weary.
And some looked at her as if she were the enemy as much as any gray-clad man they faced in battle.
Kiernan hurried along, putting an arm around Patricia’s shoulder. Suddenly, the soldier leading her came to a stop outside a large tent.
“You wait here, ma’am,” he told her, and left her standing with Patricia and Jacob. Jacob stared across the road to where a number of injured Yanks sat on their coats in the field.
“Jacob, please be careful here. I know you hate them, but we’ve got to get by them.”
Jacob arched a brow at her, indicating a fellow on the ground who was missing his left calf and foot and his right hand.
“It’s hard to hate a man who looks like that, Kiernan,” he said softly.
“Kiernan, how long will we have to be here?” Patricia asked urgently.
“I don’t know,” she answered honestly.
The Yanks were being rather rude, she decided, leaving her standing out here. Her back was killing her. The cape she was wearing grew warm as the sun rose high in the sky, but if she removed it, her condition would become very apparent. She wondered if it mattered, if any of these men cared one way or another that she was carrying a child, in or out of proper wedlock.
Minutes passed by. The sun grew hotter, and her back began to hurt badly.
“Excuse me,” she told the children.
“Kiernan,” Jacob began, but before he could stop her, she had turned around and burst into the officers’ field tent.
A group of officers were huddled around a table covered with maps. She stared straight at the Yankee faces, framed by their fine plumed hats.
“Excuse me. But you gentlemen are not simply the enemy—invading my home, my state, my land—you are excruciatingly rude!”
Dead silence followed her arrival, then one of the men attempted to hide the maps. A gray-haired gentleman stepped forward. “Your pardon, madam. We have been excruciatingly rude. Why wasn’t I informed of this lady’s presence?” he demanded.
The soldier she had first met stepped forward, saluting sharply. “General, sir, the colonel said I was not to interrupt.”
“Madam, just what is it that I can do for you? I’m General Jensen, and I wish to be at your disposal.”
“I want to go home, General, and your troops are preventing me from doing so.”
“Is it urgent that you get home?”
“My father is ill, sir.”
A snort suddenly rang out, and a man stepped forward. Kiernan’s eyes widened as she recognized Captain Hugh Norris, the cavalryman who had been so eager to burn down Montemarte.
“Norris, I demand a reason for your behavior!” General Jensen said sharply.
“She’s a Miller, General.”
“Meaning, sir?”
“That should be answer enough, General. Miller Firearms. She’s part owner of the company.”
“I see,” the general murmured, stroking his chin as he surveyed Kiernan.
“And beyond that,” Hugh Norris went on, “a number of men are convinced she was spying in Harpers Ferry. The Rebs over there eluded us any number of times.”
“Those Rebs eluded you, sir, because they are far smarter than you,” Kiernan told him sweetly.
For the moment she thought Norris was going to assault her. General Jensen, however, stood between them. Norris clearly hated her, and it was obvious the man wanted her blood.
She stared at the older officer. “General Jensen, I swear to you that I am not spying. My father is ill. I am desperate to reach him.”
“Mrs. Miller,” Jensen said with a weary sigh, “I will have to ask you to wait outside for a few minutes while I straighten a few things out. Private Riker, bring the lady a chair, and see if she’d like some coffee.”
Kiernan’s heart sank. Hugh Norris would have plenty to say to the major.
Riker, who was the soldier who had escorted her to the tent in the first place, took her arm to escort her back out. She knew she had to appear as sweet and innocent and harmless as she could for the moment.
“Please, sir,” she told the general, looking back over her shoulder as Riker led her away, “I just want to get home.”
“And where is home?”
“An hour’s ride from Williamsburg,” she told him.
“Give me a minute, madam,” he said.
Having little choice, she lowered her head and allowed Riker to lead her out. Jacob seemed oddly exuberant—she had expected him to be at some Yank’s throat by now.
She cast him a frown while Riker dragged out a folding field chair. Jacob looked like a cat who had swallowed a canary.
She wanted to demand what was going on with him, but Private Riker wouldn’t leave them. She asked for coffee, but the Coffee was right there, just beyond them at a fire. He stayed with them.
A soldier suddenly came running by them. “Message for the general, Private! Make way!”
The private stepped aside, and the soldier went in. Still, they waited.
An officer came out of the tent, and Kiernan leaped to her feet. “Sir—”
“I am sorry, ma’am,” the man said. “The colonel’s insisting that you stay.”
“The colonel?” she said, wondering what colonel he meant.
“Have a seat. He’ll be right with you.”
She had just taken her seat again when she heard the clip of horses’ hooves coming at them quickly. She leaped up, certain that animal was about to run her down.
Her eyes widened in amazement as she recognized the horseman.
Jesse.
He was the colonel who had demanded she be held!
He reined Pegasus in abruptly and leaped down. Before she knew it, he was before her, looking wilder than she’d seen him since Harpers Ferry.
But this was a different kind of wildness. He seemed to be absolutely furious.
&n
bsp; His hair was totally disheveled, his black locks falling over his stormy eyes. He was hatless, and his high black boots were covered with the mud that had splashed him on his way here. His fingers, closing harshly around her arms, were hard and taut, almost brutal.
But his whisper, brief, desperate, was intended for her ears only. “Help me, Kiernan. Play along with me.”
Instantly his manner changed. His words and his tone of voice matched the fever and fury of his touch. “Kiernan!” He spoke so harshly and so loudly that his voice carried into the tent. The general suddenly threw open a flap, came out, and stood before them. Jesse, incensed, seemed not to see him. “Yes, I heard of your condition, Mrs. Miller. But it never occurred to me that you would hunt me down across a warring countryside! Yes, I’ll ask for leave to take you home, madam, but don’t expect any more from me! I’ll not marry you to save your honor! Who knows what you were up to with those Rebel friends of yours, coming in and out at all hours!”
Play along with me! Had she imagined the words, or had they been real? What was he doing to her? Everyone could hear his voice as he made a horrible mockery of her and everything that had passed between them. Her cheeks were surely bloodred, and despite his whisper, she was hurt and furious.
“What are you talking about!” she demanded.
“I won’t marry you, Kiernan. I won’t do it!”
She gasped, stunned. What could be bringing about this kind of behavior in Jesse? “I don’t need to be taken home, and you’re the last man I’d ever marry!” she cried, out, shaken and enraged. Dear God, this couldn’t be Jesse, with his eyes on fire, his hold so brutal, doing this to her in front of all these people—making a fool of her, and a bastard of himself!
Play along with me! he had said. Well, she hoped she was playing along as he wanted. She was confused and furious and miserable, and she wanted desperately to be away from him and every Yankee there.
“Let go of me!” she demanded. Wildly, she tried to kick him. He wrenched her hard against him, and she struggled more desperately. “Jesse, you bluebelly fool! I’m not in any condition—”
“Liar!” he charged.
In a minute he would hold her too close, and he would feel her abdomen, and he would know her condition for certain.
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