The Seduction of Shay Devereaux

by Carolyn Davidson

  “You’re all done playing hooky?” he asked, his gaze hungry as she lifted her arms to smooth her hair into place. Her bonnet hung down her back, removed while she ate, and now she pulled it into place, tying the strings with a practiced movement. She was feminine in all that she did, with an innate quality of womanhood, of graceful movements of hands and fingers.

  Her body swayed when she walked, her hips moving in rhythm, drawing his eye. The color of her hair was lighter with exposure to the sun, glistening with copper streaks when she took her bonnet off and shook out the simple snood she wore. He savored the moment each day when she brushed the fiery length, bending forward, allowing it to fall unimpeded to touch the floor.

  Now, his manhood gave him no rest as he watched her turn away, walking back toward the scattered workers bent low over the cotton plants, and he deliberately turned his mind from her.

  Rags bound his fingers and he pulled at them, tearing them from his hands and stuffing them in his pockets. Noah said it would come to this. That he would grin and bear it, growing the calluses, allowing his hands to become hard and rough. It was time.

  Barely an hour passed before Jenny left the field again, stopping for a moment to tip a water jar to her mouth, before she disappeared into the thicket. His frown noted the frequence, and a thought nudged at his mind. She wasn’t acting her normal self these days.

  This morning, she’d reached for a dry crust of bread on the table beside the bed before she’d put her feet on the floor, and coming back into the room to get his gloves, he’d found her chewing slowly. She’d glanced in his direction and her eyes had widened at the sight of him in the doorway.

  “What are you doing?” He’d been puzzled by her actions, and the stealth in her movements as she rose from the bed.

  “I’m hungry.” Her words were abrupt and, turning her back, she’d shed her gown and slipped into her dress. Leaving off her petticoat, she’d stepped into drawers and tied them at her waist, then picked up her shoes.

  Now the incident took on new significance. His mind searched the past weeks, seeking a clue, some small evidence to support his suspicions. A smile nudged as he dredged up memories, hours and nights spent in Jenny’s arms, surely enough to ensure the creation of life within her woman’s body.

  And if anything guaranteed his presence here, that fact alone would tilt the scale. A child, his child. His and Jenny’s. Exhilaration such as he’d never known transformed him, his heart pumping rapidly, a thrill of discovery bringing him to full alert.

  He watched for Jenny’s return, glancing up from his task each time he stuffed cotton into the sack, careless with the bolls that stabbed and tore at his flesh, uncaring of anything but the woman he awaited. She walked from the stand of trees to where he worked and his gaze scanned her slender form.

  “Are you all right?” Even to his own ears his voice was gruff, and she looked up at him quickly.

  “Yes, of course.” She bent to pick up her sack and slung it over her left shoulder, lifting it easily. “Why wouldn’t I be?” Her gaze was on the plant before her, her fingers careful as she grasped the white fibers and tugged them from the boll. Then she flinched as the razor-sharp, dried edge sliced into her finger.

  The injured digit went into her mouth, and she closed her eyes for a moment. Shay felt a twinge at the base of his spine, knowing, recognizing the quick sting of pain. “Jen, I don’t want you out here.” The words were angry sounding and he watched as her eyes opened wide, then focused on him.

  “This is my cotton field, Shay Devereaux. You don’t have the right to forbid…”

  “Love, honor and obey,” he quoted softly, his words reminding her of vows she’d made only weeks ago.

  “This is my cotton field,” she repeated stubbornly.

  “You married me.” He prodded her quietly, nudging her memory. “Legally, Jenny…” The words were unsaid, but her stunned expression told him she’d understood the implicit warning. He could claim the property, should he choose. A woman’s right expended only as far as the marriage certificate. Beyond that piece of paper, she was owned, bag and baggage, by the man she married.

  Tears filled her eyes, and he was overcome by the pain shimmering in them. That he had purposely hurt her did not set well, and yet, if his suspicions were on target, she had no business toiling beneath a hot sun.

  “I thought better of you,” she said, her voice trembling. Yet she stood her ground, facing him across a row of cotton plants, her fingers stained with dried blood, the newest cut still oozing, her face pale beneath the brim of her bonnet.

  He slid from the bag he had come to think of as a permanent appendage, allowing it to lay in the dirt at his feet. Marshall’s voice called out from fifty feet away, and Shay was aware of the boy’s constant observance.

  “I’ll get your bag, Papa.” Moving carefully between the plants, Marshall was there in moments, picking up the sack, weighing it with a perplexed frown. “There’s not much in it.”

  “I’m going for a walk with your mother,” Shay told him. “Empty both of our bags, Marsh. I’ll be back in just a little while.” From several rows over, Isabelle caught his eye, nodded briefly, then returned to work, and Shay’s mouth thinned at the unspoken message.

  “Come with me,” he told Jenny.

  She dropped her bag, as he had, and walked to the end of the row, a short distance separating them as he followed her apace. She halted there, beneath the shade, stripping her bonnet from her head, and inspecting the latest scratch on her finger.

  Shay stood beside her, and his hand enveloped hers, lifting it to his mouth, touching the sore spot with his tongue. He met her gaze, watching as fresh tears filled her eyes, and his voice was tender. “I’m sorry, Jen. I’d never do anything to hurt you. I’ll never try to take your property from you.”

  “That’s not what I heard coming from your mouth.” Her eyes accused him and he nodded.

  “I know. I just had to get your attention.” He kept her hand in his grasp and led her toward the wagon. “I want you to go back to the house, and stay there.”

  “Why?” The single word was a challenge, even as she eyed him warily.

  “Do you want to tell me? Or shall I tell you?” he asked curtly.

  “Tell you?” Her cheeks burned as his meaning penetrated, and she looked away from his gaze. “I only just figured it out myself,” she murmured.

  “Then why didn’t you say something?” He’d had to solve the puzzle alone, and he ached that she had not confided in him. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  She lifted one shoulder in a silent reply.

  “You knew I’d keep you from the fields, didn’t you?” The tone was gentle, his eyes filling with the rare beauty of this woman. She carried his child. As surely as he knew his name, he recognized that the fullness of her breasts was even more pronounced, and her skin bloomed with a radiance beyond its former beauty. Most telling of all, she’d missed more than one monthly, and he cursed himself silently for not recognizing that most prominent sign. A need to protect her rose within him, a dual need, one that included his child. But most of all, Jenny. If something should happen to her…He brushed the thought aside, unwilling to consider that possibility.

  “I’m fine, Shay, really I am.” Tilting her head back, she looked up at him with a faint smile curving her lips. “You’re worried, aren’t you?”

  “I didn’t mean to scold you in front of the others,” he said, his apology not coming easy. “I was angry for a moment, that you would work so hard when you knew you should be taking it easy.” His mouth tightened. “You sent Zora to the house, remember? Do you think I would care less about you? That I would let you risk yourself for a field of cotton?”

  “Isabelle said the same thing,” she confessed, glancing to the field where her friend stood watching.

  With a quick wave of her hand, Isabelle went back to work, and Shay lifted Jenny to the wagon seat. “Take the wagon back and help Zora. We’ll need more water soon. Ma
ybe she’d like to bring it back to us while you rest.” His hands gripped her thigh through the fabric of her dress, sliding restlessly against her skin. “I want you to stretch out on the bed for a half hour.”

  “A half hour?” she asked, her words teasing.

  “There’s no point in asking for more than that,” he admitted. “And eat something, you hear?”

  “Yessir,” she said politely, bending to touch his mouth with hers. “For today, I’ll do as you say. At least we’re making Isabelle happy.”

  He stepped back from the wagon and nodded, watching as she turned the mules around and started the trek back toward the house. “Me, too,” he murmured beneath his breath. It had been easier than expected, and that thought bothered him. She’d given in almost too easily.

  He threatened her independence. He was bossy and overprotective. On top of that, he’d reminded her of her vow to obey. And vows were important, not to be taken lightly. Jenny stood at the stove and cut an onion into the kettle of green beans. Sweating in the kitchen was easier than bending over cotton plants in the hot sun, she decided. All in all, she could not fault the man.

  The long spoon turned the beans in the pot, and she inhaled the seductive aroma of bacon, onions and fresh beans from the garden. It wouldn’t have been nearly so tempting upon awakening this morning, she decided, remembering the quick surge of nausea she’d suffered. The crust of bread on her table solved the problem neatly. And then Shay’s appearance in the doorway, watching as she subdued her early-morning problem, had been the first of small circumstances throughout the morning.

  He knew. Whether he was pleased with the news or not was still a moot question. He was for sure not pleased with his wife’s dithering.

  Jenny turned from the stove, lifting plates from the shelf as she set about preparing for supper. With dinner consisting of leftover meat and bread, the men would be ready for a hot meal when the day was over. If things were laid out in the kitchen, they could all lend a hand and carry the entire meal to the side yard, where the big table waited for use.

  Zora had carried water out and not returned. She was probably still in the field with the others, watching, maybe helping empty bags. It was good to be alone, a circumstance Jenny had not found herself in for days. Always with the workers, or caring for Marshall, she hugged these hours close.

  The sound of a wagon alerted her. “It must be Zora coming back,” she murmured, pumping water to cover the peeled potatoes. But it wasn’t.

  A tall form blocked the sunlight, filling the open doorway, and Eli stood just outside the screen door, his hat held before him. His face in the shade, he was an unknown situation, ready-made for disaster, Jenny thought. Wiping her hands on a towel, she approached him, glancing up at the gun over the door. She shook her head. It would not do to approach a visitor with her finger on the trigger. Although Shay might dispute that idea.

  “Hello, Eli.” No tremor marred the even tone of her voice. “I didn’t expect to see you here today.”

  “No, ma’am, I don’t ’spect you did. I come to talk.” Stepping back from the door, he waited, and Jenny hesitated only a moment before she walked out onto the porch.

  “Won’t you sit down?” she asked, waving a hand at the two chairs where she and Isabelle usually perched on while they peeled or shucked or sorted.

  “I’ll sit on the step,” Eli said, and lowered his long form, his feet on the ground.

  Jenny recognized his attitude, one she’d taken for granted in the years before the conflict, during which men like Eli had gained a freedom they’d only dreamed of. And for a lot of them it amounted to naught. Eli had thought to be free of Pennington Plantation, and she’d watched him leave with his family. Only to find that the freedom he sought meant little when he still was beholden to another man for every bite of food he put into his children’s mouths.

  “Did you come to see Zora?”

  “Kinda, ma’am.” His long fingers clutched his knees and he bent his head. “My woman’s missin’ her girl.”

  “Zora’s married now, Eli. Caleb built her a cabin and she’s worked hard to fix it up. I think she’s happy with him.”

  “My woman’s not.” His tone was quiet and the eyes he turned in her direction were dull, as if he’d fought a good fight but was willing to admit defeat. “I got three fine boys, Miss Jenny, but Zora’s mama’s real partial to her girl.”

  “I remember your boys, Eli. They were just little tads when you left here.”

  “They’re growin’ good,” he said, a note of pride lifting his voice. “They been a big help with the crops.” He stood and turned to face her, his hat held protectively against his stomach, his long fingers rolling the brim in a nervous gesture. “Ma’am, Miss Jenny…I’m wonderin’ if you’d like for us to come back here to live. We could fix up the old cabin we used to have, and maybe work shares with you, like you offered before.”

  Jenny frowned, her mind sorting out the reasons Eli would have for such a request. “Is Doc Gibson not treating you well?” she asked quietly, and then bit at her lip. It was not seemly to suggest that her neighbor was being unfair to the people who worked his land.

  “He don’t measure out shares real well, ma’am,” Eli said hesitantly. “Seems like I always come out on the short end of the stick. I can’t afford to work for less than what’s right.”

  “Have you talked to him about it?” she ventured.

  Eli nodded his head. “He seems to think we don’t have any choice. He said you wouldn’t let me come back here, what with the way I left.” He lifted his head and looked at her squarely. “I was wrong to come carrying on the way I did about Zora. Caleb’s a good man, and he married her for good reason.”

  Jenny looked out toward the cotton fields, wondering how long it would be until the men quit for the day. “I can’t say one way or the other,” she told him. “Not until I talk to Shay.” She met Eli’s gaze, unwilling to make a promise she could not keep.

  “Is he still ready to skin me?” Eli asked. “I made him mighty mad, that day I showed up here.”

  “I don’t think he’s angry with you,” Jenny reassured him, hoping she was right in her assessment of Shay’s feelings. “Why don’t you ride your mule on down to the field and talk to him?”

  “You think it would go over better, if you spoke first?” Eli asked. He looked toward the kitchen door. “Is my girl here? Maybe she’d talk to me?”

  Jenny shook her head. “No, she went to the field with water. I think she stayed on for a while to bring the load of cotton back to the shed. It’s almost time for them to quit anyway.”

  Eli tugged his trousers up around his waist, and clapped his hat on his head. “I’ll go take a look. Maybe give a hand if they let me.” He walked to the hitching post and untied his mule’s bridle, then mounted with an easy movement. Jenny watched him go, staying on the porch until his figure was swallowed by the shady lane leading back to the cotton fields. Beneath the overhanging trees, he was but a shadow as the mule turned the bend and disappeared from sight.

  “Be kind, Shay,” she murmured, turning back to the kitchen. Eli seemed contrite, and she tried to recall the man from the early years she’d been here. She could only recall a big man, whose smaller wife was soft-spoken and pretty, seeming too young to have four half-grown children. If they should return, she would deed them a five-acre piece, and let Eli work shares.

  One of the old cabins could be repaired and made livable easily enough, she supposed. With everyone pitching in, it wouldn’t take long, perhaps a day or so. And Zora would be delighted to have her mother close by. Jenny’s mind worked rapidly as she sliced tomatoes and cucumbers for supper. The oven held a smoked ham, the meat almost falling from the bone, and she lifted it carefully to the stove top.

  She ended up cutting chunks, the ham being too done to slice neatly, and she filled a platter with the tender meat. The pan of potatoes cooked down until there was only a bit of water left in the bottom, and she added cream with a g
enerous hand, and then a chunk of butter and a heaping tablespoon of flour to thicken it. A dish of leftover peas from the garden was tossed in and she stirred it gently, then put the kettle on the back of the stove.

  Silverware was next, and she scooped up the knives and forks, putting them into a loaf pan. Everything was about ready, she decided, and then as she picked up the plates to carry them into the yard, she heard voices from the barn. The wagon, pulled in from the big back door, stood in the middle of the wide aisle. Men swarmed around it, two of them unhitching the mules, another putting tools up on the wall. Shay was on his way to the house, Marshall still exuberant, running beside him.

  “Shay?” Jenny stepped onto the porch. “Did Eli find you?”

  He nodded curtly. “Yeah. I talked to him. I sent him on home for now.”

  Her hopes sank. Shay was more than tired, his clothing damp with sweat, and he halted at the watering trough, gesturing at Marshall to pump fresh water. The boy pumped with a will and Shay bent his head, catching water in both hands and dousing himself liberally. Behind him, Joseph led the team to the water, and they dipped their noses deeply into the trough, then tossed their heads, spraying Marshall.

  He laughed and bent his head to wash his face, following Shay’s every move. “I’ll bring out a pan of warm water and soap,” Jenny told them, hurrying to the sink for the basin, then to the stove for warm water. A towel over her arm, she went back out to the porch, lowering the pan for Shay’s use.

  “Thanks,” he said. “We’re all pretty grimy.”

  Within ten minutes, the men had all washed and waited beneath the trees, where the long benches offered a welcome seat in the shade. Jenny and Zora carried out bowls of food, Isabelle toting the heavier plates and kettles. Bread sliced fresh from yesterday’s baking filled a basket, and Shay’s eyes lit as he surveyed the meal Jenny had prepared.