She glanced down and nearly laughed aloud when she noticed that he was wearing his old boots. Even though they had been polished, they still looked worn.
“You’re smiling about my boots?”
“I couldn’t help but notice.”
“I told you I needed your help. None of the shoes at the house were big enough.” He shrugged without missing a beat. “I had to make do.”
“How did you get in here?”
He smiled down at her and squeezed her hand. “Glad to see me?”
“No,” she lied.
“Matt Van Buren brought me. He’s around somewhere.”
“You had your nerve, Mr. Harrington, duping me into staying at your home last night.” She assumed her iciest tone. “I can’t understand why you did it. What did you stand to gain?”
“I think that would be obvious.” The twinkle in his eye alluded to his meaning.
“How dare you!” She stopped moving without warning and his foot collided with hers.
“I suggest you keep dancing. You’re making a scene.”
Jade glanced past him and noticed that more than one couple was regarding them intently. They began dancing once again. “Babs berated me all the way home. I gave her all the same sorry excuses you gave me, and she reminded me that you probably had a stable full of carriages. Is that true?”
J.T. was taken by the furious gleam in her eyes and the color that anger added to her cheeks. He was only half-attentive to her words.
“Is what true?” he murmured.
Jade groaned. “That you have a stable full of carriages.”
Patiently, he smiled down at her as one might at a curious child. “Not completely full.”
She tried to pull away. He jerked her closer to his chest, off-balancing her so that she had to cling to him in order not to fall into the other dancers.
“Let me go!”
“Not until I’ve apologized.”
She sniffed. “It’s a little late for that.”
The music ended. They remained on the dance floor, intent upon each other as dancers around them exchanged partners and waited for the orchestra to begin again.
“I’m sorry, Jade. It was damn selfish of me to have kept you there last night.” His tone was a hushed whisper meant for her ears alone. “I realized that today when the reporter showed up at my door. I assumed”—he didn’t know how to say it without offending her—“I thought that you—”
“You thought I was a slut.” Jade used the word she had heard before but had never dared to utter. Her face was crimson. Unable to meet his gaze, she concentrated on his shirt front.
“You’ve got a way with words.”
Once again, she tried to break his hold. The music started. He pulled her closer.
“Dance,” he commanded.
“No.”
His punishing grip on her hand brooked no argument. “Do it.”
She followed his lead again.
“I’m not finished,” he said. “I knew you were innocent the moment I kissed you. From then on, I wanted to teach you a lesson. Never put yourself in such a vulnerable position again.”
“Your game might have ruined my reputation forever.”
“I realized that too late. And I’m sorry.”
Although her anger had slowly subsided, there was nothing more she wanted to say to him. She danced in silence.
J.T. tried to cajole her into a better humor. “Come on. You have to admit it wasn’t all that bad.”
“Sleeping on the floor soaked to the skin? Waking up looking like a wild woman, with a reporter on my heels?”
He laughed aloud. At the warm sound she found herself smiling.
“It was all so very wonderful,” she said sarcastically. But her eyes danced with merriment.
His good humor mellowed her. She realized that this was their second dance, and she could not even remember the first one ending. Jade let herself relax in his arms and flow to the lilting music of the waltz. It seemed impossible to stay angry with him. It was nice to put her problems behind her for a while and rely on someone else to take the lead. And it was heavenly to feel his arms around her.
All too soon, the waltz ended and Jade found herself staring up at Jason. When he smiled, she stepped out of his embrace, embarrassed to have been caught staring. The sun had tinted his skin a deep gold, just as it had lightened his brown hair with dancing highlights. His eyes were bright blue, mirroring his easy smile.
“Let’s take a walk,” he said, grasping her elbow and guiding her across the floor as easily as he had led her through the steps of the dance.
They moved past male guests sporting unrelieved black or navy military uniforms and women gowned in tarlatan, crepe, and silks. Crystal chandeliers set the room aglow, potted palms filled every corner and alcove, Haviland china graced the refreshment table, and rich carpeting covered all but the dance floor.
Before they reached the other side of the room, Jade felt Jason stiffen and followed his gaze.
“Who is that woman?” he asked, his voice low but charged with feeling.
“I don’t know,” she admitted, curious to see who had claimed his attention.
She tried to see over the moving crowd, and then caught a glimpse of the woman Jason was staring at so avidly. She was diminutive in height, blond, and dressed in a daringly low-cut ballgown of midnight silk. The shocking contrast of ivory skin and white blond hair against the unrelieved black created a stunning portrait. A diamond choker about her neck matched the teardrops that dangled in her ears. The woman was clinging to the arm of a portly, balding man with thick mutton-chop whiskers.
“Come on.” Jason pulled her along as he elbowed his way through the crowded room.
Jade immediately let go of his arm, and he stopped abruptly to look back. “You go ahead,” she said.
He took her by the hand and held on tight. “I want you to go with me.”
“Why?” She got no answer from him. He was already moving forward. When they reached the other couple, he drew her up alongside him and held her there, one hand around her waist.
“Jason,” she hissed, unwilling to make a scene.
He squeezed her waist.
She complied with a stony silence as she waited to see exactly what would come of his interest in the blonde. At closer range, Jade noted that although the woman was still beautiful, her complexion was hidden by thick powder, her cheeks rouged, her lips suspiciously red.
Jade was certain Babs would have immediately labeled the woman a tart. She held her opinion in reserve.
“Nettie?” Jason said, drawing the attention of the petite blonde and the man beside her.
For a moment Jade was certain the woman was not going to admit that she knew Jason, but there was no denying her flabbergasted look of recognition.
“Jason Harrington?” the woman squealed. “Jason Harrington, as I live and breathe I can’t believe that’s you standin’ right here in front of me after all these years!”
Her southern drawl was as thick as molasses on a cold day. Silent, Jade watched as the woman Jason called Nettie took command of the situation. The blonde quickly turned to the older man at her side.
“Winslow, this is Jason Harrington. He’s from back home in Georgia. I haven’t seen him for years now. We grew up neighbors in Athens. Jason, this is my very dear friend, Winslow Winters.”
Jason coldly shook hands with Winters, then remembered Jade. “Nettie, Winters, this is my very dear friend, Jade Douglas.” He smiled down at her.
Aware of his forced smile, Jade was tempted to drive her heel into his foot. She tried to wriggle out of Jason’s grasp. She didn’t know what he was up to, but she wanted no part of it. All the while, Nettie Parsons preened and batted her lashes at Jason. Jade s
tiffened. J.T. stood mute.
“Why, Jason, whatever are you doin’ in San Francisco? I thought you were still livin’ out in the desert someplace? Mexico, was it? Or Texas?”
“New Mexico.”
“That’s right. You moved there just before the war, didn’t you?” Then, with a smile that reminded Jade of a cat who had just been in the cream, Nettie pouted prettily and turned to Winters. “I never dreamed all the time we were growin’ up together that Jason would turn out to be afraid of fightin’. He didn’t serve in the war. On either side.”
Jade colored, embarrassed for Jason, quelling the urge to reach out and slap the woman herself. She wished there was something she could do to defend Jason, but was afraid he might be too proud to stand for that. Even though the War Between the States had ended nearly ten years before, feelings often ran high on both sides. It did not matter to Jade in the least that Jason had not taken sides and put on a uniform to kill his own countrymen. She could not imagine this man being a coward. Surely he had his own reasons for avoiding service. And those reasons were his alone.
Winters dismissed Nettie with a frown. “You’ll have to excuse Nettie. She does tend to speak her own mind. Nettie, Mr. Harrington here just inherited his father’s fortune. Coffee bean holdings, wasn’t it, Harrington? Quite extensive, I might add.”
“That’s right,” J.T. answered stiffly.
Nettie immediately tried to look contrite. She deftly snapped open the lace fan that dangled from her wrist. “Jason, I’m sorry if I spoke out of turn. I forget my good manners once in a while.”
Probably most of the time, Jade thought. Nettie’s obvious about-face when she learned that Jason had inherited a fortune disgusted Jade. She couldn’t help but notice that the woman was eyeing her closely, studying her gown while the men were occupied in conversation. She guessed Nettie was at least thirty, but it was hard to be certain with all the face powder the woman wore. She turned to see how Jason was faring and was surprised to note a change in him. Jade was thankful that the icy stare he concentrated on Nettie was not directed at her. Nothing about his current demeanor reminded her of the easygoing man he’d been a few moments ago. The look he gave the southern woman was one of utter distaste.
“How is it you find yourself in San Francisco?” Jade asked Nettie as she tried to fill the tense silence.
“Winslow insisted we see the Pacific. He works for the railroad, you see, and so we travel quite extensively.”
“You’re from the North then, Mr. Winters?” Jade wondered if Jason was going to say anything else or if she should make excuses for them both so that they might leave.
“Philadelphia.”
Jade immediately turned to Nettie. “With your feelings running so strong for the South, how is it you find yourself in a room full of Yankees? I would have thought it might be distasteful for you, after all you must have suffered during the war.”
Nettie Winters glared at Jade for a moment before she regained her composure. “Why, because I believe in letting bygones be bygones.”
“And I, like the Chinese,” Jade said slowly, “believe that we should let every man sweep the snow from his own doorstep and not trouble himself with the frost on his neighbor’s.” She turned to Jason and for Nettie Parsons’ sake, beamed up at him. “I would really like a glass of champagne, Jason.”
The hardness never left his eyes. Nor did the tight lines about his lips. “Of course.” He turned to the other couple and, with a courtly bow, bade them both good evening.
AS HE ESCORTED Jade across the room, Jason tried to calm down. Seeing Nettie after all these years, and so close on the heels of his dream of her, had been a shock. She had not aged well at all; there was a hard look about her, a callousness that no amount of beautiful clothes or face powder could hide. He felt like a fool. All this time he had imagined Nettie as the picture of southern womanhood—virtuous, long-suffering, probably widowed at an early age. Yet here she was on the arm of some Yankee entrepreneur after she had given Jason up because he refused to join the Confederate Army.
“Jason?”
He glanced down at the young woman beside him and smiled. Jade was like a breath of fresh air compared to Nettie.
He let the sight of her brush the cobwebs of the past from his mind.
Reaching for two champagne flutes from a forty-foot-long refreshment table, he handed one to Jade, and after a silent toast, drained his glass. He ordered a whiskey as Jade took a sip and enjoyed the effervescence of the bubbling wine.
“Tell me about her,” she said.
He had visibly relaxed as they carried the drinks to the open balcony doors. They stepped outside and, instead of finding themselves alone, became part of the stream of guests strolling along the balustraded walkway that rimmed the courtyard below. Gaslights flickered every few feet along the outer walls as Jason directed Jade toward the balcony railing and leaned back against it. He took another swig of whiskey and then looked at Jade. She was waiting expectantly for an explanation.
“Nettie lived on the neighboring plantation near Athens. I left Georgia when I was fifteen and never saw her again.” He finished his drink just as a waiter passed by bearing a tray laden with refills. Jason exchanged glasses with the man and stared down into his whiskey for a moment.
Seeing Nettie tonight on the arm of her traveling companion, a man who was not even her husband, had been a stunning revelation. He cursed the irony of it all. Who would have ever thought, after holding her memory sacred for all these years, that on his first trip out of New Mexico he would run into her and have his idyllic image shattered?
His noble visions were of Nettie standing behind the Confederacy, enduring hardships and suffering for the cause she had believed in so deeply that she had sacrificed the love they had for each other. How often had he wondered if she had married, only to lose her husband to the war? He was so convinced that she and her family were impoverished, that at one point after the war he considered going back to Georgia to find her. Only the thought that she would still consider him a traitor and reject him again kept him from going.
But it seemed his Nettie had faired quite well after all, if the diamonds she was wearing were any indication. Slowly his anger at Nettie turned inward as he found himself blaming her for not living up to the ideals he had attributed to her.
“You were in love with her, weren’t you?” Jade asked quietly.
Jason looked down at the woman beside him. Her upturned face mirrored her concern. Determined to lighten the mood, he shrugged. “I was. But that was a long time ago.”
She wondered how many others he had loved, how many women had loved him. Jade felt a disturbing sadness in her heart. “Then why were you hanging all over me like that in front of her, if not to make her jealous?”
He laughed aloud. “Was I that obvious?”
“Yes. And I don’t appreciate being used.”
He leaned down and whispered near her ear, “I will never do it again.”
A delicious shudder ran down her spine.
He wanted to put Nettie out of his mind. “Did I tell you how beautiful you look tonight?”
Jade almost protested his compliment. In her mind’s eye she would always be the awkward, gangly young girl who was too tall, whose hair was too curly to tame—the way she looked before she left San Francisco. Instead, she blushed—because she could not help it—and simply thanked him.
“It must be Babs’s dress,” she admitted.
“On the contrary. I think it’s what’s in the dress.”
“Watch your manners,” she warned.
“It suits you. So does smiling.”
His voice was low and warm and struck a chord in her somewhere near her heart. She felt herself being drawn toward him like a thirsty hummingbird drawn to nectar.
“I like your hair better when
you leave it hanging loose.”
Had he stepped closer, or had she? “I prefer wearing it that way, too, but it’s not socially acceptable for a woman my age.”
“And we know you always do what is socially acceptable.” He was teasing her now. She could hear it in his tone.
“Not always. My father often accused me of being too much of a bluestocking, an intellectual female who cares more for studies than anything else.”
“Are you?”
Jade nodded. “I’m afraid so.”
“You make it sound like a curse.”
She was twenty-three years old and had only received her first kiss yesterday, and had to agree with him. “Sometimes it is.”
Jason glanced down into the courtyard below. Carriages were still arriving and departing—the cobblestones rang loud with the sound of horses’ hooves, and carriage wheels mingled with the voices of the guests promenading on the seven tiers of balconies.
“What do you study?”
Jade was staring up at him so intently that for a moment she could not even formulate an answer. “China,” she finally blurted out. “Chinese culture and art.”
“Do you mind if I ask why?”
“Why what?”
“Why you study China.”
“Oh.”
No one had ever asked her before. Babs had always ignored her interest in things Chinese, for she found them embarrassing. The Chinese in California labored at the lowest tasks. Babs, like most Californians, could see nothing worthwhile at all about any facet of Chinese culture. Jade’s most eccentric habits had developed from her studies.
“I suppose because my grandfather was so dedicated to learning all he could about the Chinese. He was already here in forty-nine when the Chinese immigration began. At first, they immigrated to work the gold mines. Later they were hired to lay the transcontinental railroad lines. The first Chinese who arrived were ex-convicts, adventurers, or rebels who had fought against the Manchurian emperor.”
When she noticed he was trying to suppress a smile, she stopped. “I’m sorry I’m boring you.”
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