The Vow

by Lindsay Chase

  “How can you marry a woman you don’t love, who doesn’t love you in return?” Hannah cried in frustration.

  “I want to manufacture silk, Miss Whitby,” he said, looking back at his mill with obvious pride. “It’s been my dream for years. I’ll do anything to make that dream a reality.”

  Hannah felt her eyes fill with tears.

  Shaw said gently, “You are still very young and may not realize that there are advantages to being married to me.” When Hannah looked at him quizzically, he added, “I plan to be a wealthy man someday. As my wife, you would want for nothing.”

  “Except my husband’s love.”

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  His gaze fell. “I can’t promise that, though perhaps in time…”

  Even as she appreciated his honesty, a small part of her wished he would lie.

  Shaw grasped her by the shoulders and forced her to face him. “I know you don’t want to marry me, Hannah, and I’d much rather have a willing wife than an unwilling one. But I promise that if you make the best of it, you will have a good life with me.”

  She looked deeply into his eyes, took the man’s measure, and knew he spoke the truth. Reiver Shaw wasn’t cold like her uncle or crude like Naomi’s boys. He was a fair man, honorable and good. She could do worse.

  Hannah sighed in surrender, not feeling much like a virago at all. “I will do my best to be a good wife to you.”

  His grin was like the sun breaking through a heavy morning fog. Before Hannah could stop him, he grabbed her hand and pressed his lips into her palm with an ardor that surprised her. She pulled away, disconcerted by his touch.

  “I—I should be getting back. I have chores to do.”

  Shaw nodded. “I’ll call on your uncle this afternoon to discuss our wedding.”

  “And when shall that be?”

  “As soon as possible.”

  Whenever Reiver went to Hartford, he always paused to watch the flatboats float down the Connecticut River with their cargoes of lumber and brine-soaked beef and pork from the northern New England states. Once the railroads were established, the flatboats with their square sails would bow to the superiority of steam and a way of life would be lost forever.

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  Cecelia’s home on Main Street was only a short ride from the bridge spanning the Connecticut River, and when Reiver arrived, he dismounted and tied his horse to the hitching post out front. He hesitated on the second step of the house that Cecelia had lived in ever since her sea captain husband had been lost in the Pacific three years ago. In the summer’s slowly dwindling twilight, the sprawling house looked dark and empty.

  Suddenly a light appeared in the downstairs parlor window, and Reiver watched as Cecelia, oblivious to his presence, lit an oil lamp. The light bathed her in golden warmth, reminding him of the night five years ago when he had first seen her.

  He had come to her father’s house hoping that the wealthy sea captain—one of Hartford’s “River Gods” with a fleet of tall-masted ships sailing out of New London for the West Indies—would hire a poor boy from Coldwater. Just as he climbed the front stairs he caught a glimpse of the captain’s lovely young daughter gracefully lighting an oil lamp. She symbolized all of Reiver’s aspirations, and he fell in love with her right then and there.

  Since Reiver had been too proud to use the back door that night, Cecelia’s contemptuous father didn’t hire him, and his daughter later married someone more suitable. But Reiver never forgot his desire for her. After Cecelia became a widow at the age of twenty-two, and Reiver became more prosperous, he wangled an introduction, and later they became lovers.

  He watched as Cecelia replaced the lamp’s glass chimney and moved away from the window with unselfconscious grace. Then he walked up the rest of the steps and knocked on the front door.

  When Cecelia answered it, her huge brown eyes danced with a mixture of pleasure at seeing him and confusion that he had come so late in the day. Still, her radiant smile was like a balm on turbulent waters.

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  “Reiver!” she murmured in her soft, melodious voice that he had ached for days to hear. “I’m so glad to see you.” She took his hat, then drew him into the shadowed foyer.

  He closed the door behind him and swept her petite form into his arms, reaching hungrily for her mouth with his own. Cecelia stood on tiptoes for his kiss.

  Reiver groaned against her mouth, letting the delicious heat radiate from his groin. When it nearly consumed him, he set her away from him, held her at arm’s length, and studied her. “I’ve never seen a woman with such a tiny waist.

  That dress makes it look even smaller.”

  “Reiver Shaw, you’re the only man I know who pays attention to what a lady wears.”

  He grinned. “Or doesn’t wear.”

  Cecelia slapped his hand playfully. “Come into the parlor. We’ll have some elderberry wine and you can tell me all the latest news about your mill.”

  Reiver loved Cecelia Layton not for her amatory prowess as his mistress, but because she ministered so tenderly to his spirit. No matter how much time passed between Reiver’s visits, Cecelia never admonished him for neglecting her, never pressed to see him more often. When he was with her, he felt the worries of the world slide from his shoulders like an old skin and peace envelop him.

  He sat down on the settee and she glided over to the sideboard to pour two glasses of elderberry wine. Then she handed him one and sat down beside him, her wide skirt brushing his knee.

  She raised her glass. “To Shaw Silks.”

  He toasted the mill, took a sip, then set down his glass. He was about to hurt her cruelly, and if she never wanted to see him again, he wanted it over and done with.

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  Her face clouded as she divined his mood with her usual perceptiveness, and she placed her hand on his. “Reiver, what’s wrong?”

  He knew no painless way to tell her. “I’m getting married.”

  Cecelia grew very still and the color drained from her face, leaching all the sweetness and joy with it, until she was as pale as a death mask.

  Reiver waited for her to scream, sob, claw his face to ribbons, or at least swoon, but all she did was stare wordlessly out of glazed brown eyes.

  He squeezed her lifeless hand. “Say something. Please.”

  Cecelia’s lips moved, but no sound came out. She finally croaked, “Do you love her?”

  He hadn’t expected that. He dangled his arms across his knees and bowed his head in shame. “No. I love you and I always will. I’m only marrying her for the land I need to expand the mill someday.”

  And while Cecelia listened, Reiver told her about Ezra Bickford’s offer and why he had agreed to marry Hannah Whitby.

  He stared at the worn Turkish carpet, unable to look at the woman who deserved so much better for her love and loyalty. “I wish I had married you before this, but the mill has been struggling, and I wanted to be on more solid financial ground so I’d be worthy of you.”

  “Oh, Reiver, that wouldn’t have made any difference to me.”

  “I know that now, but it’s too late.” He sighed dismally. “I wouldn’t blame you if you told me to leave this house and never come back.”

  He heard Cecelia sigh, then felt her small gentle hands rest soothingly on his bent shoulders. She said, “I couldn’t bear not seeing you again.”

  Reiver sat up and looked at her. “Did you hear what I said? I’m going to marry someone else.”

  “I heard you.”

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  “And you want to go on seeing me?”

  She nodded slowly. “If you’ll still have me. You may fall in love with your wife and
not want me.”

  “Not want you?” He shook his head. “I’ve wanted you from the first moment I saw you in your father’s house, and I’ll always want you.”

  “I love you, Reiver,” she whispered. “When you love someone, you want them to be happy. Shaw Silks is your dream. And if you need that land to make your dream come true…”

  He buried his face in her silken chestnut hair that smelled faintly of sweet heliotrope. “I don’t deserve you, Cecelia Layton. I don’t deserve you.”

  “Let me be the judge of that.”

  “You’re too understanding.”

  “And you’re my life.”

  Later, after Reiver left, Cecelia lay in her dark bedchamber and stared at the ceiling. Her bed was still warm from her lover’s body and the tousled sheets smelled strongly of their shared passion.

  Reiver Shaw was not going to marry her after all. That realization was like winter ice encasing her heart.

  Cecelia knew she should have told him that their liaison was over, but the thought of never seeing him again, of never having him share her bed, hurt more than her shattered pride. But then, she had no pride where Reiver was concerned. She would accept whatever crumbs of his life he deigned to share with her, and accept them gladly.

  But his betrayal still hurt.

  She buried her face in her pillow and sobbed until she had no tears left to shed.

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  Hannah refused to shed any tears on her wedding day. She had to marry Reiver Shaw whether she wanted to or not, and crying wasn’t going to change anything.

  Her wedding was a hasty, indifferent affair, of no importance to anyone but the bride. The Bickfords kept their niece working right up until the day they would lose her services, trying to eke as much as they could out of her. The groom was too busy with his silkworms to call on his intended bride. Only his handsome artist brother stopped by one day on his way to Hartford to introduce himself and wish Hannah well.

  The ceremony itself on that cool, cloudy Monday morning seemed an afterthought more than an auspicious beginning. Only Ezra’s family, the Shaws, and several of their employees occupied the church’s empty pews.

  At least Reiver smiled reassuringly when Hannah met him at the altar, and whispered how pretty she looked in her best summer dress of pale lavender dimity, with matching chip bonnet. She thought he looked quite handsome in his bottle-green coat, tie, and tall silk hat. But Hannah felt only a sense of doom as Reiver slipped the narrow gold band on her finger and the Reverend Crane pronounced them man and wife.

  When it was over, the Bickfords and Naomi’s boys mumbled halfhearted good wishes before rushing back home. There had been no gifts from her Bickford relations, nor would they part with a penny to host the wedding breakfast. That was left to the Shaws.

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  “This is your home now,” Reiver said, handing Hannah from the carriage.

  “Mrs. Hardy may be the housekeeper, but you’re the mistress of the house and your word is law here.”

  Mistress of the house…

  Looking at the white farmhouse—her new home—Hannah felt her spirits lift. She was mistress of this house. There was no Aunt Naomi to rail at her, no Nate to torment her. Being a wife conferred an exhilarating power.

  She smiled at her husband for the first time today. “It looks very cozy.”

  Reiver smiled back. “With my brothers living with us, I’m afraid it will be that. Cozy and noisy.”

  The second carriage pulled up behind them, and the other Shaw brothers jumped down to join them.

  “I never thought I’d see the day,” Samuel said with a shake of his head as he pounded his brother on the back.

  Hannah had always found the perfection of handsome men intimidating, and Samuel Shaw was no exception. His curly, dark brown hair fell just so, and thick black lashes a woman would envy framed eyes of such a pale blue they appeared ghostly. Hannah couldn’t fault his thin, aristocratic nose, or his even white teeth. His shoulders weren’t as broad as Reiver’s, or his body as lanky as James’s, and he moved with just the right amount of sensuous masculine grace.

  The only quality that rescued him from such relentless perfection was his utter lack of conceit.

  Samuel turned and kissed Hannah on the cheek. “Welcome to the family, Hannah. Even though you haven’t come to us under the best of circumstances, you’re our sister now, and you’ll be proud to be a Shaw one day.”

  His sincere words touched her deeply and her feeling of intimidation vanished.

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  James stepped forward shyly and added, “Welcome to the family.”

  “Before we go inside to meet Mrs. Hardy,” Reiver said, “I’ve got to warn you. She’s a crotchety old lady who speaks her mind no matter who takes offense.”

  “And she sometimes uses rather, er—impolite language,” Samuel added.

  “You have to excuse her,” James said. “We all do.”

  Mrs. Hardy, who was in her late fifties, with a crown of silver hair and matching sharp silver-gray eyes, was awaiting their arrival with a lavish spread in the small downstairs dining room.

  “It’s about time,” she muttered, those eyes scouring Hannah as if searching crystal for flaws. “I hope you’ve got a thick hide, otherwise you’ll never last.

  Reiver will just have to take you back where you came from.”

  Hannah smiled. “I’ve got a very thick hide.”

  “Good. Now let’s eat before everything gets cold.”

  If Hannah had any thoughts of lingering over her wedding breakfast, they were dispelled the moment her new husband finished wolfing down a slice of iced currant cake.

  He rose. “As much as I’d like to tarry, there’s work to be done. I have to get back to the worms.”

  Mrs. Hardy gave a ribald chuckle. “I thought you’d want to show your new bride your bedchamber.”

  “Martha…” Reiver chided her.

  Hannah, however, welcomed the opportunity for some solitude. “Mrs.

  Hardy, why don’t you show me the house? The sooner I assume my new duties, the better.”

  Reiver beamed at her. “I can see that I’ve wedded a woman who understands the value of hard work.”

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  Hannah rose as well. She hoped that hard work would help her adjust to her new life as Mrs. Reiver Shaw.

  By the middle of the afternoon, Mrs. Hardy had shown Hannah the household’s routine, and the two women relaxed together over a cup of tea.

  “How long have you been with the family?” Hannah asked, pouring herself a cup from the brown crockery pot.

  “Seems like a lifetime,” the housekeeper replied, pushing a plate of raisin cakes at Hannah. “I came from a neighboring farm to take care of the house when the boys’ mother died. Their father was the town drunk, useless, but as handsome as sin.” She winked at Hannah. “His name was Remy Shaw, but everyone called him Rummy because West Indian rum ran through his veins instead of blood.”

  Was this what Uncle Ezra meant when he referred to Reiver’s father as a no-account?

  Hannah shook her head. “That must have been hard on the boys.”

  “If it hadn’t been for them, this family would’ve starved.” Mrs. Hardy snorted in derision. “Rummy was always too drunk to see straight, never mind work. Oh, he always had plans. High-as-the-sky plans. But they were all smoke.

  A real dreamer he was. But his boys…now they’re a horse of another color.”

  “I can see they’re very fond of you.”

  The housekeeper chuckled at that. “If they don’t listen to me, they don’t get clean clothes and they don’t get fed.” She paused. “I want to see my boys married, with children of their own. It’s too soon to tell about
you, but I think you’ll make Reiver a good wife. I don’t know about Sam and James. Sam is too 44

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  busy painting beautiful women to court one, and poor Jimmy is so shy, his tongue sticks to the roof of his mouth when one even looks at him.”

  “He does seem more comfortable with his machines.”

  Mrs. Hardy drained her cup and smacked her lips. “I’ll tell you right now, it’s not going to be easy being Reiver’s wife. He doesn’t like anyone telling him what to do. Never did. If you need to know how to handle him, you just come to old Martha here.”

  Hannah couldn’t resist the invitation. She stared into her cup. “I want to be a good wife, but I’m not sure how. We’re strangers.”

  The housekeeper put her elbows on the table and leaned forward, her silvery eyes shining. “That’s easy. Give him whatever he wants in bed, and show an interest in his mill.”

  Hannah blushed and ignored the first bit of advice, asking, “Why does he want to manufacture silk?”

  “Because he’s got to prove to himself that he’s not worthless like his father.

  He wants to make a fortune, and he thinks silk will do it. He says if American women could buy silks made in their own country, they would.”

  Hannah sipped her tea and recalled her own mother’s extensive wardrobe of fine silk dresses and her father’s good-natured complaints about their cost. Even the frugal Aunt Naomi had one best black silk dress reserved for special occasions and mourning.

  Hannah dabbed her lips with her napkin and rose. “I think I shall see this silk mill for myself.”

  Mrs. Hardy beamed, delighted that Reiver’s new bride was going to take her advice.