Below stairs, Jackson stood by the great bank of many-paned windows. Rain sluiced over the glass in sheets, leaking through a loose casement to puddle on the inside sill.
Still gripped in the throes of the nightmarish scene upstairs, torn by conflicting emotions, he barely noticed.
Navarre had taken a seat on the blue velvet settee upon entering the room and now sat with his long and elegant legs crossed at the knee, making inane conversation while Murphy lit the whale-oil lamps, for all the world as if nothing of import had taken place. Jackson marveled at his uncle’s capacity to shrug Emil off. It was a talent he himself had never mastered. Emil had always managed to strike at the most vulnerable part of him, to make him feel a Broussard in name, but not in truth, a disappointment, unable or unwilling to live up to his father’s lofty standards.
“Amos Teach, a breeder from Saint Charles, has a blooded two-year-old that shows a deal of promise. She’d be a fine addition to our stables, and if you’d like we could ride out tomorrow and take a look at her.”
Navarre’s chatter brought Jackson back to the present. “What? No. Not tomorrow. I shall be otherwise occupied tomorrow. Now, if you please, Uncle—explain.”
“I believe the physician—er—Nash is his name—proclaimed it an act of God, but I myself subscribe to the theory that it was a direct result of your father’s ill temper. With the way he carries on at your various escapades, it is a wonder it hasn’t happened long before this.”
Jackson bent a look upon him, and Navarre made a sound of impatience. “Very well, then. If you must have all the tedious details! He was stricken late in the evening, the day of Clayton’s death... the same evening he struck you with yonder sword and had you cast into the gutter.”
“He did not cast me anywhere,” Jackson said, chafing the scar, which, with the storm, had begun a deep, throbbing ache. “I went of my own accord.”
“As you like it,” Navarre replied pettishly. “Garrett found him upon rising the next morning. As to why I chose not to inform you, I should think that would be obvious. I was worried. The loss of blood you sustained from your injury was considerable. Those first few days you were weak and feverish, and I was at a loss as to what should be done.”
“You should have told me, Uncle,” Jackson said quietly. “It might have changed things.”
Changed things... But how? They still hated one another; Emil still blamed him for Clay’s death.
The frivolous air Navarre so loved to affect slipped a notch. His expression was somber. “The town was rife with gossip. Clayton had a number of powerful friends, nephew, and though your position in this community shielded you from the law, I could not be sure what they might take it upon themselves to do. I wanted you safe, and there seemed but one way to achieve that end. You may think my actions selfish, yet I would do it again without forethought or hesitation.” He spread his elegant beringed hands. “Now that I have answered your questions, perhaps you will humor me and provide a brief explanation as to how you are returned so soon, and with a slip of a girl—your ward—in tow. Given your reckless bent, I am surprised that you would take on such a”—he paused, searching for the word—“weighty responsibility.”
“It was not something I planned, I assure you,” Jackson replied, “and I would hardly call Reagan ‘a slip of a girl.’ At twenty, she’s of marriageable age. As for my recklessness, don’t let it concern you. I fully intend to do right by her.”
Navarre leaned forward slightly, and though he made a valiant effort, he couldn’t quite conceal his horror. “You do not intend to marry this girl?”
“Marriage has no place in my future,” Jackson said softly, “not to Reagan, not to anyone. Besides, I have other, more pressing concerns that require my attention.”
Navarre’s dark brows shot up. “You will be staying on, then?”
“I will remain in the city until my business is concluded,” Jackson said.
“What about your father? You will not attempt again to cast him bodily into the street?”
“He is welcome to stay for as long as he wishes. I could not put him out in his condition.” Neither can I forgive him.
The unspoken thought hung heavily in the air as Navarre rose and walked to the gilt baroque mirror that hung above the cherry sideboard to straighten his already immaculate cravat. “Well then, with that I shall take my leave. Bonne nuit, nephew.”
For a long while after Navarre had gone, Jackson remained by the windows, staring with unseeing eyes out at the darkened street and struggling to make sense of all that had happened.
He’d mounted the stairs with the worst of intentions—to sever all ties with his father—and then he’d stalked through the door of the master bedroom and Emil had once again sent his world reeling on its axis.
The indomitable old patriarch was gone, vanished, and in his place was a withered, stricken shell of a man who’d been robbed of everything except his great and considerable pride.
It was all he had left, that pride, and Jackson had shaken it to its foundations by confronting him when he should have just stayed away.
Yet he’d had no inkling... no inkling at all.
Navarre should have told him . . . despite his injury, despite everything. Emil was his father. He’d had a right to know.
Turning away from the window, he doused one lamp and was trimming the wick on the other when a soft scratching sounded on the door. “Come,” he called out, turning as the door creaked open and Bessie came into the room.
“Just wanted to tell you that Murphy’s drawin’ your tub, Mr. Jackson. A nice, hot soak’s good for what ails you.”
Jackson smiled wearily. “Somehow I doubt a bath will solve my problems, Bessie, but I thank you all the same, and I apologize if I caused you any duress by my sudden appearance this evening.”
“Now, son, you know I’m always glad to see you come home. No matter what you think, right here’s where you belong.”
Jackson said nothing, just kissed Bessie’s work-worn hand. “Where is the rest of the staff? James, Francois, and Malvina?”
“Gone, sir. Some went to work in other houses hereabouts... the rest, they just skedaddled. I expect with Mr. Clay’s passin’, and what came after, they felt uneasy ’bout stayin’. Then your daddy took sick, and one by one they drifted off. Now there’s only the four of us left out of twenty.”
Jackson sighed. “It would seem that everything has changed.”
“It ain’t the same, no, sir,” Bessie agreed. “But things’ll get better now that you’re home.”
It would have done no good to voice the doubts that crowded in around him. Bessie would stubbornly cling to her beliefs, so he said good night and went quietly up the stairs.
Outside Reagan’s door, he paused and, raising his hand, knocked lightly on the panel. Then, at her muffled reply, he edged the door open.
She was seated in the middle of the big bed, her voluminous night rail a gossamer cloud all around her. An angel, she appeared, her face scrubbed and glowing with health... that glorious dark mane wavy and damp from her bath.
Mother of God, how he longed to bury his face in its cool, sable mass... to press her back in the soft feather bed and feel those slim, strong arms come slowly around him....
Instead he feigned a puzzled look. “Kaintuck?” he said, then made a show of hesitating. “My pardon, mademoiselle. I must have the wrong room—”
She tossed a pillow at his head, and swore softly when he ducked. “Missouri jackass. Come in and close the door.”
“I must remember to thank Bessie,” he said approaching the bed. “She’s done a miraculous job.”
“ ’Twas just a little soap and water....” Reagan countered. “And this ...” She fingered the sleeve of the night rail, with its deep fall of Brussels lace. “I don’t know that I’ve ever seen anything half so fine. It sure was nice of Bessie to lend it to me.”
Jackson merely smiled. “Indeed, but it doesn’t belong to Bessie. Once, long ago
, it belonged to my mother, yet I am sure she would agree that you do it justice.”
She said nothing to that, but he could see that his words had pleased her. Watching her toy with her food, as the blush on her cheeks deepened to a becoming rose hue, Jackson let the silence stretch long between them. After a while, she raised her gaze again. “Have you eaten? I’ve plenty enough for two.” Josephine, stretched full-length on the foot of the bed, nudged Reagan’s bare foot with her nose, a not-so-subtle reminder that she was present and hungry. Chastened, Reagan added, “And Josephine, too.”
“Thank you, no,” Jackson said. “For some strange reason I seem to have lost my appetite.”
“Jackson?” she said softly, almost hesitantly.
“Hmmm?”
“I’m sorry about your pa.”
“No sorrier than I,” he said. “I’d come here hoping for a small retribution, but it would seem the devil has beaten me to it.”
She frowned. “That’s a hard stance to take, considering all that’s happened.”
“My father is a hard man.”
“I surmised as much.” She pushed the tray aside, close enough for Josephine to reach, then pinned him with her frank gray gaze. “Was it the truth you said back there? Was your pa the one who cut your face?”
“Aye.” His reply came hard, a mere whisper of sound, his stomach clenching on the single syllable. Mother of God, how he dreaded what would come after. He braced himself for it, yet was at a loss as how to reply to that single-word inquiry.
“Why?”
Sinking down on the edge of the bed, Jackson reached out and took her hand, staring down at her slim tan fingers... anything to avoid meeting her gaze. “It is... complicated. It has to do with my brother Clayton, and his death. Someday I shall endeavor to explain, just not tonight. The hour is late; you need your rest.”
She wanted to press him further, Jackson could feel it, yet something held her back, and he was strangely grateful for it. Torn between the urge to escape and the deep yearning to linger in her bright presence, he pressed a kiss upon her hand, then forced himself to rise. At the door she stopped him. “Jackson?”
“Yes, Reagan?”
“What’d you tell them—your folks and your servants—about how we met?”
She wanted reassurance, the one thing he could freely give. “Only that you are my ward, and I am intent upon looking out for your best interests.”
“You didn’t mention Luther or the auction?”
“No, cher,” he said. “Nor will I. Now get some sleep. We’ll talk tomorrow.” With a last, lingering glance, he stepped into the hallway, closing the door behind him and allowing the shadows to swallow him up.
Sometime later Jackson stood in the dust and the gloom that comprised the main warehouse of Broussard Furs. Navarre and the employees who worked in the old building had long since found their way home, and except for the ghosts of Jackson’s not-so-distant past, the building was silent and still.
Glancing around at the bales of fur stacked head-high along the clapboard walls, Jackson wondered what had drawn him to this place, the scene of his brother’s murder.
Was he looking for peace of mind? Absolution? A tangible link, a feeling of closeness to the family he had lost, a sense of belonging, perhaps?
If so, then he would not find it here.
“You will not find it anywhere,” he said aloud, “no peace, no absolution. Not for you. As for family...”
Closing his eyes against the persistent ache in the left side of his face, he lowered his guard, too weary now to keep the past at bay. Images flooded in, disembodied voices seeping through his mind like floodwaters through an earthen levee, distorted, nightmarish.
“Did you think for a moment that I would not discover your betrayal?” Clay had thundered. “Allegra told me how you came to her, half out of your mind with whiskey, how you tried to force your attentions upon her!”
“So that’s what she told you,” Jackson countered, unsurprised at Allegra’s deception. Allegra Santana had first come to his bed the previous summer, when she’d moved north from New Orleans. It hadn’t taken long for Jackson to discern that the dark-haired, dark-eyed young widow had a bottomless abyss where her soul should have been, a fact she’d taken great pains to keep hidden from Clay, who had recently become enamored of her. “And you believed her. Sometimes I think you are far too naive for your own good.”
“Do you deny it?” Clay shot back. He was caught in the grip of righteous anger, fairly trembling with it. All Jackson could think of was getting clear of the warehouse. He would give Clay time to cool down, and then they would talk.
But Clay would have none of it. He grabbed Jackson’s arm, his fingers crushing the nap of his velvet coat. “Do you deny it? I will have the truth, damn you!”
Something leaped to life inside of Jackson at that moment, a devil, dark and dangerous. It bade him to strike back, to hurt Clay the way he himself had been hurt countless times by Emil’s overweening preference for his firstborn and appalling neglect of his second. Jerking his arm from Clay’s grasp, Jackson straightened his coat with an angry jerk, giving the devil its head. “Very well, then. You’ll have your precious truth! I was with Allegra yesterday. I took her up against the wall in the parlor of the house she rents on Olive Street. It was half past three in the afternoon, broad daylight, and she did not bother to close the curtains. Despite her claims to the contrary, I did not force her. In fact, I was there at her implicit invitation. There’s no need to take my word for it, however. You can ask Kevin Murphy. He was there in the room when her footman delivered the note, and given his bent for gossip, he doubtless read the missive before I did. Allegra deceived you, not I.”
“Liar!” Jackson was unprepared for the blow. Fueled by his brother’s fury, it knocked him sprawling into the hundredweight bales of fur stacked along the easternmost wall. “You have abused and maligned my fiancée’s name for the last time! I demand satisfaction!”
The last thing Jackson remembered was turning and walking into the foggy night. When he awoke late the next afternoon at Kate Flannigan’s bordello, his head splitting from too much whiskey, his life had already started to disintegrate.
Clay was dead. The town was buzzing with speculation, and he was racked with cold remorse.
Jackson squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them again, struggling against the incessant throb in his cheek, the ghosts, and his memories.
He hadn’t known that Clay was planning to marry Allegra. He hadn’t deliberately set out to hurt anyone. He wished that he could change it all, bring Clay back.
It was impossible, beyond his power. He could only seek out the truth of what happened after he left Clay that fateful night, try to put the speculation to rest, learn to live with himself... for Reagan, if for no other reason.
She needed him, for stability’s sake. Somehow he would see that she had a steady, honest husband, someone upon whom she could depend. He, Jackson, needed her for the welcome distraction she provided—perhaps for the sake of his sanity.
Chapter Seven
Reagan stood in the glittering foyer downstairs, a resplendent Jackson standing by her side, and her heart thumping a nervous tattoo. She could not believe it was happening. In a moment Jackson Parrish Broussard, wealthy rake and adventurer, would stand up with her before Reverend Wells and declare his undying devotion. . . . Yet as the door opened, it was not the preacher who came into the pristine room, but a long line of suitors Jackson had sought out on her behalf. Then, as every gap-toothed, whiskey-soaked, sorry excuse for a man west of the Mississippi stepped to the fore, Jackson would whisper bawdy nothings in her ear, kiss her soundly, and, laughing in a dark, demented fashion, insist that she choose....
Instead Reagan ran up the long, winding staircase and flung herself into the first chamber she stumbled across, slamming the door, drawing the bolt... but the dregs of mankind streamed up the stairs after her, pounding on the door, pounding and pounding, and….
Shaking off the foggy clutches of the nightmare, Reagan pushed herself up against the pillows and lay blinking at the shaft of buttery sunlight shifting through the sparkling window panes, illuminating the delicate lace of the curtains and playing over the richly patterned rug... and for a moment, just a moment, she let herself imagine that she was more than just an interloper, an uninvited guest from a far-off and foreign place... a place where the riches Jackson took for granted were completely unheard-of.
It didn’t last. False hope and fanciful dreams always faded quickly in the bold, revealing light of day. It was only the nightmares and grim reality that lingered. She was thankful there was no time to dwell upon that thought before the door opened, and Jackson stepped into the room. Garbed in a pristine white shirt, dark gray trousers, claret-colored velvet coat, and knee-length boots, he looked every inch the gentleman. Reagan studied him hard, yet the only trace of Jack Seek-Um, mountain man, that she could see was the wicked glint in his deep green eyes and the vivid slash of the scar on his cheek. Reagan found his presence so unnerving that she instinctively drew the covers up to her chin. “Jesu, Jackson, don’t you ever knock?”
He slanted her a look, closing the door, leaning against it. “With all that we’ve shared, I wasn’t aware that we needed to stand on such ceremony. Did you sleep well? No howling dogs annoying you? No chasing fleas? No deep pangs due to our brief separation?”
“I didn’t miss your snorin’ none, if that’s what you were gettin’ at.”
Chuckling low, he pushed away from the door and made his way to the bed, where he stood smiling down at her. “ Snoring is a small price to pay for the pleasure of my company, eh? Besides, since it bothers you so much, I’ll be sure to select only soundless sleepers for your list of potential husbands.”
Bride of the Shining Mountains (The St. Claire Men) Page 11