Now, back home, he savored the brandy in remembrance and stared up at the hot blue sky. The day his daughter died, he had been making Cecelia his mistress and planning more trips to New York. He couldn’t help himself. He loved her. It was going to take more than distance and her whey-faced husband to keep them apart.
He rubbed the place where Amos had shot him and took another deep swallow of brandy. This time no one would find out.
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Chapter Ten
“Mary, why are you crying?”
Hannah stopped on her way to the mill’s small library when she noticed the tears streaming down Mary Geer’s plump face.
“It’s my brother Jake, Mrs. Shaw,” Mary replied, keeping her eyes on the looms’ spinning bobbins even as she cried.
“What’s happened to him? Is he ill?”
“No, ma’am. He’s run off to California.” She sniffed. “To find gold.”
Ever since gold had been discovered at Sutter’s Mill last year, the trickle of people heading out to California dreaming of striking it rich had turned into a virtual flood. Every person Hannah spoke to knew someone who had joined the
“forty-niners”—the blacksmith’s son, Benjamin’s teacher, the miller on the other side of town. Even Nate’s brother Zeb had deserted tobacco farming at the prospect of such wealth, breaking Aunt Naomi’s heart.
Mary added, “We’re all so worried about my brother. He’s taking a ship around South America. I’ve heard the storms down there are worse than hurricanes.” She took a deep shuddering breath. “And even if he gets to San Francisco, what if he finds gold and some claim jumper kills him for it?”
Hannah patted her shoulder. “Don’t worry, Mary. I’m sure Jake will be fine.
He’s young and resourceful,” was all she could think of to say.
After delivering new books to the library, Hannah left the mill, relieved that her sons were too young to succumb to gold fever. She pulled her black shawl more closely about her against the chilly October morning and walked Lindsay Chase
resolutely, stopping only to pick a spray of bright orange bittersweet growing in wild profusion against a split-rail fence. When she arrived at the cemetery, she lay the bittersweet down on Abigail’s grave.
I still miss you, she thought, tears sliding down her cheeks. You weren’t perfect, but you were a child of my body and blood, and I love you.
She thought of Reiver and how she could never forgive him for repudiating Abigail. He hadn’t shed a single tear for his child; perhaps if he had, Hannah wouldn’t have felt so alone and bereft.
But I’m not alone, she amended. I have Samuel. And Reiver doesn’t know.
For the first time her betrayal of Reiver gladdened rather than shamed her, the thought of it bringing an overwhelming desire to pay him back, to hurt him as much as he had hurt her by rejecting their daughter.
Smiling, Hannah touched Abigail’s tombstone in farewell and left.
Hannah stared out of the parlor window at the first snowstorm of the season, watching the raw, blustery November wind drive the large flakes through the air like a flock of wooly sheep. In the hall Reiver put on his coat, then wound his blue knit scarf several times around his neck.
Hannah watched him tug on his leather gloves. “Are you sure you want to go to Hartford today? This snowstorm could get worse.”
“James needs those parts right away, and if someone doesn’t go after them, three looms will be down. We can’t afford that.” He settled his broad-brimmed hat on firmly. “If I get snowed in and the stage doesn’t run, I’ll stay in Hartford overnight.” He smiled. “You needn’t worry about me.”
Hannah went into the hall to see him off. “I won’t.”
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Reiver kissed her perfunctorily on the cheek, then lifted his scarf over his mouth and nose until only his eyes showed. He opened the front door, letting in an icy blast of air that swirled around Hannah’s wide skirts and made her shiver.
She waved goodbye, then closed the door quickly and returned to the warm parlor, where she stood at the window and watched Reiver trudge down to Hartford Road until the slanting snow blurred his dark, shapeless form into nothingness.
She waited until the stage pulled up, then drove away.
She stood at the window and kept waiting. Minutes later a dark form materialized out of the swirling snow, hatted head bowed and shoulders leaning into the wind, his open mouth emitting clouds of gray vapor.
Hannah smiled and hurried to the front door. This time when she opened it, she didn’t feel the cold at all, just the sweet warmth of anticipation.
“Hurry,” she said to Samuel. He climbed the front steps, stomping his feet to shake the snow clinging to his boots.
The moment the door closed behind him, they flew into each other’s arms.
Hannah pressed her warm lips to Samuel’s cold, stiff mouth, then sought to heat it with her tongue. His arms tightened about her in response and she could feel his arousal through his heavy layers of clothing.
When they finally parted, she warmed his cold face with her hands. “He’s gone. He won’t be back until late this afternoon, unless he decides to stay in Hartford for the night.”
“And Mrs. Hardy is still tending her sick friend?” His eyes roamed over her face.
Hannah nodded. “The boys are at school, and James is down at the mill.”
Samuel grinned. “We’re alone and we have the house all to ourselves.
Perfect.”
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She entwined her arms around his neck and kissed him fervently again.
“Perfect.”
They hurried upstairs, both impatient to undress and enjoy another sweet, illicit union, for they hadn’t been able to meet secretly for weeks.
When Hannah entered the bedroom she shared with Reiver, Samuel balked on the threshold, his jubilant mood sobering. “Why this room?”
“Because I need to make love to you in my husband’s bed,” she replied. “I need to repay him for not loving Abigail, and for betraying me with Cecelia Tuttle.”
Samuel removed his hat and peeled off his gloves. “But Reiver will never know that we used his bed.”
“I’ll know.”
He raised his brows. “Just when I think I know you, you surprise me.”
“Why? Because I’m capable of wanting revenge?”
“It’s just that I’ve never seen such a…calculating side to you before.”
“I’m not a saint, Samuel,” she said defiantly, plucking the pins from her hair and shaking out her chignon.
He watched her thick brown tresses fall down past her shoulders like a glossy spun-silk waterfall. “Oh, I know that, especially when you’re in my bed.”
She stared at him intently, as if measuring his mettle. “Will you do this for me, Samuel?”
He stepped across the threshold.
Later, when they lay naked beneath the covers, Samuel warmed himself against Hannah’s smooth, pliant body and kissed the pulse in her neck. The familiar surge of excitement made his blood sing, though the idea of loving his brother’s wife in his brother’s bed filled him with a strange sense of unease.
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He cast his reservations aside. Hannah needed him to do this. He had seen the desperate pleading in her eyes when she led him to this room. She had to repay Reiver in her mind to satisfy some inner demons, even if he never knew.
Samuel would do anything to lay her demons to rest.
And Reiver would never know.
Shivering uncontrollably, Reiver swore under his breath and shuffled through the snow. Over an hour ago and two miles back, the stage had glided off the slippery road into the gutter and broken a rear wheel, panicking the passengers and effectively canceling h
is plans to get to Hartford today.
Now he could see the dim outline of his house silhouetted against the fiat gray sky, its white clapboards almost annihilated by the thick, shifting curtain of falling snow. He smiled when he thought of dry stockings, a roaring fire in the parlor, and a cup of hot apple brandy to warm his insides.
Wouldn’t Hannah be surprised to see him walk through the door…
But when he entered the foyer, no Hannah came to greet him.
He listened. No light footsteps, no telltale swishing skirts heralded her arrival.
She must be in the kitchen, he thought, quickly shedding his hat, gloves, scarf, and coat and hanging them on the coatrack by the door. Then he removed his wet boots.
“Hannah?” he called.
Upstairs, Hannah froze and stilled Samuel’s exploring hand. “What was that?” When he frowned in puzzlement, she whispered, “I thought I heard someone call my name.”
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Samuel listened, then smiled. “It’s only the wind. Reiver’s halfway to Hartford by now.”
Downstairs, when Reiver didn’t find Hannah in the kitchen, he went upstairs, his stockinged feet making no sound on the carpeted stairs.
In the upstairs hall, he was just about to call Hannah’s name again when he heard soft voices.
Reiver crept down the hall toward his bedchamber, the floorboards silent beneath each careful, calculated step. The sounds continued, deep, masculine groans this time. The door was ajar, so Reiver peeked inside the bedchamber and wished he hadn’t.
Hannah lay in bed with another man, his dark head outlined against her bare white breast.
Reiver stood there, unable to believe his own eyes.
His wife and his own brother were lovers, just as he suspected.
Suddenly Reiver burned with blinding, white-hot rage. He flung open the door so hard that it ricocheted against the wall with a resounding crash.
Hannah’s eyes flew open and she stared at the doorway in disbelief. No, it couldn’t be.
“Reiver!” This was a Reiver that she had never seen before, a stranger with the livid face of doom and murder in his eyes.
“Bastard!” He was on them in three strides, his clawing hands whipping the coverlet away, then dragging Samuel off her and flinging him out of the bed. “I ought to kill the both of you!”
Samuel scrambled to regain his balance, then faced his brother fearlessly, unmindful of his own nakedness and vulnerability. “You touch her and I’ll kill you!”
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Without warning, Reiver swung at Samuel, sending his fist into his brother’s jaw with a sickening crack. Samuel’s head snapped back as he recoiled from the blow, crumpling to the floor, where he lay limp and motionless.
“Dear God! Samuel!“ Hannah screamed, bounding out of bed. She nearly reached his prostrate form when she felt her shoulder gripped in painful, punishing fingers, and Reiver flung her back onto the bed.
She lay there, trembling on her back, waiting to feel Reiver’s hands on her throat, but he merely let his scornful gaze rove up and down her body as if she were no better than a whore.
“Get dressed,” he snapped, “and get my brother on his feet. If you’re not down in my study in five minutes, I’ll throw the both of you out just as you are.”
Then he strode out of the room.
Hannah went to Samuel, kneeling beside him and lifting his head off the hard floor, crooning his name over and over again as she begged him to wake up. Finally he groaned and struggled to sit up, his pale eyes glazed with pain and blood trickling from the corner of his mouth.
“Are you all right?” she whispered, her eyes bright with tears. “Did he hurt you badly?”
He shook his head. “What about you?” The words were forced and slurred, as if talking pained him.
“Terrified.” Hannah trembled with the fear and shame of discovery. “What’s going to happen to us now? I’ve never seen Reiver so—so furious.” She closed her eyes against fresh tears. “I never should have asked you to meet me here. I’ve ruined everything. I’ll never forgive myself. I—”
“Hush.” Samuel stroked her cheek. “You’re not to blame. The fault is mine.”
“What’s going to happen to us?”
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“I honestly don’t know. Perhaps he’ll cast us out and we can go to Europe together. Perhaps he’ll forgive and forget, just as he expected you to forgive his transgression with Cecelia. But I won’t let him hurt you, Hannah. You know that.”
“Dear God, I feel as though the end of the world is coming and there’s nothing I can do about it.”
He brushed his bruised mouth lightly across hers and winced. “No, Hannah.
It’s not the end of the world for us. You’ll see.”
Reiver stood at his study window, his hands clasped tightly behind his back, when Hannah and Samuel came into the room. Hannah appeared suitably guilt-ridden and subdued, her eyes downcast, but Samuel held his brother’s gaze with infuriating defiance.
Reiver glared at them. “How could you? My wife and my own brother…”
Hannah’s head snapped up and the subdued wife disappeared. “How dare you stand there looking so self-righteous, Reiver Shaw! Need I remind you of Cecelia Tuttle?”
“Is that why you’ve betrayed me with my own brother, to get back at me for Cecelia? Such petty vindictiveness is beneath you, Hannah. At least I thought it was.”
She reached for Samuel’s hand. “I turned to Samuel because I felt lonely and unloved.”
“And you’re the one who made her feel that way,” Samuel said.
Reiver’s arms fell to his sides. “So I’m to blame for what you two have done, is that it?”
“No one is to blame,” Hannah said.
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“Does that assuage your guilt, Hannah?”
Her gaze slid away, and a blush stained her cheeks, “No.” She looked over at Samuel and drew strength from him. “I wish this had never happened, Reiver, but it has and there’s nothing any of us can do about it.”
He raised his brows. “Oh, but there is.”
Fear crept into Hannah’s eyes. “What do you mean?”
“You certainly don’t expect me to look the other way, to go on as if nothing has happened.”
She stiffened. “You expected me to act as though you had never had an affair with Cecelia Tuttle.”
“It’s not the same, Hannah. The world is willing to overlook a married man’s desires, but a mother must be above reproach.”
Samuel’s expression hardened. “Why, you damned, sanctimonious hypocrite!”
Hannah knotted her fingers together. “Our marriage is a sham, Reiver, and has been since the day I had to marry you. Samuel and I intend to go away together, and we’re taking the children with us.”
“Oh, no, Hannah,” Reiver said. “You’ll be going alone. I’ll not give up my sons.”
“I’m their mother!” Her voice rose in panic. “You wouldn’t separate children from their mother.”
“They’re also my sons, and the heirs to Shaw Silks.”
Samuel wiped fresh blood from his mouth with the back of his hand. “That’s all you’ve ever cared about, your precious silk mills.”
Reiver’s eyes narrowed. “Hannah may choose to stay. But I want you out.”
“Out? What do you mean?”
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“You’re no longer welcome here. You’re going to leave and never come back.
I don’t care where in the world you go, just as long as I never see your face again.”
Samuel looked as though he had been struck by lightning. “You can’t be serious. This is my ho
me.”
“Not anymore. You’re forgetting that Father left me this land and the homestead because I’m the oldest. You and James have been living here through my generosity.” Reiver’s jaw clenched. “But you’ve betrayed me. And I don’t reward betrayal.”
Samuel turned white. “And what of all the times I gave you money to keep your precious silk mill afloat?”
Reiver shrugged. “You’ll always have my profound gratitude.”
“Who in the hell do you think you are, trying to banish me like some angry monarch?” Samuel said, eyes flashing. “I’m staying right here in Coldwater, whether you like it or not.”
“Then you can take Hannah with you, and explain to this town’s good citizens why you’re living in sin with your sister- in-law.”
Hannah stared at him, aghast. “You wouldn’t!”
“I will, if Samuel doesn’t agree to my terms.”
“Please, Reiver.” Hannah went to him and placed a beseeching hand on his arm. “Don’t do this. I’ll do anything you ask. I—”
“Don’t waste your breath pleading with him, Hannah,” Samuel said. “My brother always gets what he wants, and he never changes his mind once it’s made up.”
“You know me too well.” Reiver paused. “You have one week. I trust that will give you enough time to pack your bags and get out. Consider yourself lucky that I’m letting you off so easy.”
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Hannah didn’t hear Samuel’s reply. She focused her attention on the soft, silent snow falling outside the window, blanketing the land like a fluffy down comforter. She wanted its purity to embrace her, enfold her, drift over her, bury her.
Voices faded. The room slid away. Snow smothered the pain.
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