“Why are we standing out here? I hear a bottle of whisky calling my name,” Jack said, leading the way into the parlor.
“Hold on a second. Before y’all get too drunk, you need to tell me everything. Please. I’m dying to know what happened,” she said.
Braham poured a round of drinks, and they all found a seat. She scooted in between Jack and Braham on the sofa.
“There were a couple of tense moments,” Braham said.
“For me, not for him,” Cullen said. “Braham pulled Excalibur from the stone. He was in the…what’s the expression Kit uses?”
“Zone?” Braham said.
Cullen snapped his fingers. “Yes. That’s it. We’d rehearsed the questions and anticipated Henly’s responses, but reducing his laudanum to keep him on edge”—Cullen paused and gave a small head bow to David—“was brilliant.”
David nodded. “Thank ye, but the credit goes to Gaylord. He’d already been inside Henly’s house. He knew where the medication was kept and the location of every weapon Henly owned. Once we diluted the laudanum and put blanks in all the guns, it was just a matter of babysitting until he reached the prison.”
“Wait, wait. Time out,” Charlotte said, making a T with her hands. “I’m missing something. Who did you think Gordon was going to shoot?”
Cullen, David, and Gaylord turned their heads slowly in Braham’s direction.
She gasped, glaring up at Braham, open-mouthed. “You set yourself up to get shot in order to prove Henly’s guilt? You’re insane. All of you. What if he’d used another weapon?”
Braham’s mouth quirked wryly as he met her eyes. Then he pounded on his chest with his fists. “Bulletproof vest.”
She ran her fingers through Braham’s hair, gripped a few strands, and shook his head. “It doesn’t protect your head. Did David forget to mention such an important detail?” A muscle twitched by Braham’s mouth, and she shot him a sharp glance tinged with amusement.
Cullen chuckled. “Stubbornness would protect his head.”
Gaylord cleared his throat and smiled. “David promised he’d give me the vest to keep. So hand it over.” There had never been a hint of a smile from Gaylord. His grin now widened, revealing straight white teeth.
Ignorance was truly bliss. A host of illegal activities had taken place over the last couple of weeks. The illegality had never bothered her. It was the danger the men had risked which would feed her nightmares.
“Have you talked to Stanton?” she asked.
“Before they would release Jack, I had a sit-down with Generals Holt and Hunter and Secretary Stanton. They wanted to know the name of the informant who passed me confidential information. I told them there was no security leak. When they pressed me for specifics, I told them once ye and Jack were safely away from Washington, I would divulge my source.”
“What will you tell them?”
Cullen rolled his eyes toward her dramatically. “He’s throwing Gaylord under the cart.”
“What? You’re not. Not after all he’s done for us.” She ran her hand gently over her face, trying to adjust to this information.
Gaylord was the first of the men to howl with laughter. “Don’t worry, Miss Charlotte. I worked for the colonel in California, and came to Washington with him. When General Grant found my skills useful I adopted the code name Gaylord. Tomorrow I’ll head back to California and reclaim my identity. The colonel can throw me under the cart. Stanton will never find me unless I want to be found. Like you, ma’am, I have several disguises.”
“Will you tell me your real name?” she asked.
“Henry Bayford.”
She gave him a worried frown. “What about the men who were promised jobs?”
Gaylord lifted one shoulder in a slight shrug. “There were no guarantees. They’ll get a bonus.”
“So it’s all over?” she asked.
Jack stooped forward as if he bore a terrific weight. The indirect lighting in the room exaggerated the hollows of his drawn face, and there was a haunting behind his eyes. He nodded, squeezing her hand. “This part of it is. We’ll talk about the changes in our lives later.” His voice thickened, and he fell silent.
Time stopped for a heartbeat, and she looked at him through tears flooding her eyes. “Did Braham tell you about our memories?”
Jack took a shuddering, sighing breath. “He explained it on the way home. I’m so sorry, sis.”
She hugged him and held him as tightly as she could. “We’ll adjust to whatever we find when we get home. We have each other and nothing else matters.”
Memories of their ordeals would linger, but they would have each other, whether Jack lived in the two-hundred-year-old mansion from his memories or the chrome and glass condo from hers.
An expression came over Braham’s features she had never seen before—a look of sorrow, regret, and weariness mingled with relief. The war, his suffering, and the trial had worn him down and changed him irrevocably. It was time for him to go home, too. Time to rest, nurture his vines, and recover. With his war record and courtroom victory, his future was guaranteed. Although he was raised in Scotland, he was born in America. He could run for president of the United States.
She swallowed painfully. The two men she loved most in the world were hurting, and she was powerless to help them. All she could do was love them.
She opened the brass-mounted mahogany humidor on the table in front of the sofa. “Break out the cheroots, boys, and pour me another drink. We’ve got some celebrating to do.”
93
Washington City, 1865
Charlotte and Braham lay snuggled in each other’s arms. His heart was beating fast. She could feel it as though it pulsed in her hand, and she took comfort in the warm familiarity of his body. They had made love in a slow, erotic, and passionate tango.
Later, he had teased her playfully, and she had expressed her pleasure in moans loud enough for the entire household to hear. She didn’t care. This was their last night, and they were the only two people in her world. Their bond, forged in trust, was an incredible aphrodisiac. He had awakened her at least twice more, pulling her to him with urgency, his hunger for her insatiable.
The room was dark, although a slice of the moon showed thought the split in the curtain. She scooted closer to him, and he spooned against her back, his arm around her. The gentle rise and fall of his breath blew softly across her shoulder until at last they slept.
Now the bedcovers were askew, and she shivered slightly in the early morning chill. Braham must have sensed her need for warmth. He snugged her closer to his side, and she drifted back to sleep. She woke again as the sun crept through the partially open drapes. Braham was gone, and his side of the bed no longer held the heat from his body.
She would not stay abed without him. Quickly, she bathed, mourning the loss of his musky scent on her skin. After dressing in a traveling gown, she packed her medical kit. She needed nothing else. The rest of the beautiful dresses would stay and could be given to the staff or sold. She wouldn’t need them. Her reenacting days were over. But she did want her grandmother’s cameo she had previously left behind.
The open knitting basket sat on the table by the window. She dug through the contents looking for the brooch, and gasped when she found the piece of jewelry. The pin on the back of the cameo linked itself with the pin on the back of…the sapphire brooch. How on earth?
She collapsed in the chair, holding the jewelry in her hands. It could have stayed lost for all she cared. If she didn’t want it, what was she going to do with it, besides keep it away from Jack? If she confessed now that she’d found it, then she, Jack, and David, could return to the present from Washington instead of traveling back to Kentucky.
Jack knocked and opened her door. “Hey, Char, you ready?”
She slipped the brooch into her pocket. “Almost. Give me a couple more minutes. I’ll see you downstairs.”
Braham came to the door and said to Jack, “We’ll be down in a wee bit.�
�� He entered the room, closed the door behind him, and leaned against it. “Have ye ever been to Napa during the harvest?”
She leaned forward in the chair, studying his face. His brow was furrowed, and he looked tight-lipped and pale. Was his heart breaking as much as hers? “I’ve been to Napa, but never in the fall.”
He came farther into the room and stopped when he reached the table with her medical bag. He fiddled with the handle. “During the harvest, thousands of grapes are picked. The grapevines covering acres of undulating landscape begin to go dormant and the leaves turn bright red and gold.” He turned to look at her, his eyes glistening. “The land smells fresh with the aroma of fermenting wine. Ye wake up before sunrise when the air is cool and crisp, and the scent of wine hits yer face. It’s the most beautiful and exciting place I’ve ever been.”
He ran his hand over the smooth leather of the case. “I want to take ye there, Charlotte. I want to wake up with ye and hold ye and smell the grapes. I want to make love to ye under the vines in the moonlight. Come with me. Let’s put the war and the trial…” His voice broke, and he breathed haltingly through his nose. After a moment, he began again. “Let’s put all this behind us. Come with me. If we leave now, we could be at my winery before the harvest begins.”
She jumped up and ran to him, and they held each other. “I can’t go with you. Jack and David are ready to go, and I have to return to my medical practice. Come with us.”
His body quivered against hers. “I can’t leave. Not now. I need…I need the land, Charlotte. I need to put my hands in the soil and prepare the earth for new growth in the spring. I need to find myself again. If I go with ye, I’ll be running away. This war has taken my soul. I’ve spent the last few years lying and cheating. We even broke the law to win Jack’s freedom. I’m not sure what’s right and wrong anymore. I have to find my way back to the person I was.”
“I’ll wait for you.” The words didn’t catch in her throat. She was saying she would wait for the rest of her life.
“No, ye mustn’t do it. Ye have to make a life for yerself. Find a man who will love ye and give ye children.”
His words were like a cold wind blowing through holes in her heart. “I don’t want another man. I want you.”
“Ye can’t spend the rest of yer life waiting for me. Promise me ye won’t.”
“I can’t promise.”
“Ye have to. Ye have to let me go.”
She gazed into his eyes, and what she saw there broke her heart. She had to tell him what he wanted to hear, even if her own heart knew it was lie. “I’ll let you go, but only if I find someone I love more.”
“I want ye to be happy.”
“How can I be happy without you?”
“I’m broken, Charlotte. My bones ache with every move I make. Ye deserve a man who can give all of himself. I can’t do that. Not right now.”
“I’ll help you find your way back. There are doctors—”
He covered her mouth with his, murmuring, “I have to love ye once more.” He carried her to the bed, lifted her skirts and petticoats, and took her. It wasn’t lovemaking. It was possession. And when it was over, he kissed her softly, brushing his lips across her face as if memorizing with his lips the contours of cheekbone and brow, of lips and chin, seeking to know her mind and spirit and the heart beating beneath his hand.
She looked away and breathed in and out slowly to keep her composure, because looking into his eyes was like looking into the night sky and watching the stars burn out one by one, until only infinite darkness remained. “I have to go.”
He held her close one last time, his heart pounding against her cheek. Finally, his arms relaxed. She disentangled herself and straightened her clothes, his seed warm inside her.
“Good-bye, Braham. I’ll always love you.”
She hurried from the room with her knitting basket and traveling bag and went downstairs where David, Cullen, and Jack were waiting in the parlor. When David saw her, he picked up his bags and hoisted one over each shoulder.
“I don’t look forward to the train ride back to Kentucky. It’s long, hot, and crowded,” he said.
“We don’t have to worry about going back to Kentucky, because look what I found.” She held up the sapphire brooch.
Jack gasped, clearly shocked. “Where’d you find it?”
She held up the basket, shrugging as if the answer was obvious. “When you tossed it toward the window, I guess it bounced in here.”
David’s face split into a huge grin. “Great.” He handed the ruby brooch to Cullen, placing it in his palm with a slight smack. “Will ye return this to Sean with our thanks?”
Cullen squeezed his shoulder. “I’ll be glad to. I’ll also tell Kit about yer books. I know she’ll be happy about yer publishing success.”
Charlotte gave Cullen a hug. “I’m so glad I met you. Meredith will be envious. Kit’s a very lucky woman.”
Unable to see through the tears, Charlotte fumbled with the tweezers until David took them from her hand and opened the brooch’s clasp. She didn’t glance back up the stairs. Instead, she steadied herself, laced arms with Jack and David, and spoke the Gaelic incantation for the last time.
Part Four
“Every man’s happiness is his own responsibility.”
—Abraham Lincoln
94
Mallory Plantation, Richmond, Virginia, Months Later
Charlotte sat in her rocking chair in a room on the second floor of Mallory Plantation, which had been recently painted in soothing muted colors. The sunlit room had been used as a nursery for more than two hundred years. Jack told her they had both slept there as babies. She had no memory of it, though. Instead of grieving the loss of shared memories, they had decided to focus on making new ones. And in a matter of hours, a brand-spanking new one would arrive.
When she reached her eighth month of pregnancy, she had decided to move into the mansion. She wanted Jack to be a part of her baby’s life, and with his busy schedule, living with him was the only way to be sure that would happen.
Contractions had begun in her back several hours earlier. She hadn’t told him until daybreak, but she called Meredith to let her know the baby was coming a few days earlier than expected. She and Elliott should arrive by late morning. Knowing Meredith would be with her during labor and delivery had help reduce Charlotte’s anxiety.
“Charley,” David called from the hall. “Where are ye?”
“In the nursery,” she said, rubbing her tummy while she rocked.
He entered the room carrying what looked like a banana smoothie, came to a hurried stop, and studied her face. “From yer expression, the contractions must be stronger.”
“A little bit, but they’re not bad yet.” She held out her hand. “Did you make me a smoothie? Thank you.”
He put his hand on her belly and pressed gently. Around week thirty, he had belly-mapped the baby and drawn a beautiful picture on her stomach of the baby, cord, and placenta, all floating in blue-rippled water. He knew the exact location of head and butt, and palpated her belly regularly to be sure it didn’t move out of the birth position. The picture had washed off, but its image had settled nicely in her brain.
David prepared for the birth the same way he prepared for everything else in his life. He read every childbirth book written within the last five years. He interviewed doctors and midwives. He studied childbirth videos. He planned for contingencies. He drove her nuts.
And she was grateful for every moment he’d spent with her.
“I put a little peanut butter in the drink, too. Thought it would give ye an energy burst. It’s going to be hard work to push the laddie out.”
She gave him a teasing smile. “Both you and Jack insist it’s a boy. I hope y’all aren’t disappointed when it comes out a girl.”
“I insist because I know,” David said.
“No, you don’t. Not unless you bribed the doctor.” She took the milkshake-like drink and stirred it wi
th the straw. “You’re so sweet. Where’d the bananas come from? I thought I ate the last one.”
“Jack went to the store.”
“You’ve got to be kidding. He stopped working on his manuscript for five whole minutes just to go out and get a banana?”
David nodded, looking somewhat bemused. “He said he could run errands, but it was about all he could do for ye right now.”
“He can’t deal with me in pain. If he can’t fix me, he’s useless.” She took a sip of the cool, refreshing drink. “Yum. You’ll have to give me your secret recipe.”
Jack entered the room carrying a cup of coffee and the newspaper. “I’m useless at what?”
“A few things, but I was talking about how you can’t handle seeing me in pain,” she said.
He settled on the settee next to the baby’s crib, one brow lifted in a question. “I did okay in Richmond the night of the fire, didn’t I?”
“I wasn’t hurt then. I was in shock and exhausted, but I wasn’t bleeding.”
“I beg to differ. I wish I had a picture of you. You were bleeding in several places on your head and arms. But you’re right. If you’d been seriously injured, I probably would have fallen apart at the seams.”
David kissed the top of her head. “I’ve got a telephone conference in five minutes. It’ll probably take a half hour, but I can cut it short if we need to hurry to the hospital. I’ll be downstairs. Call if ye need anything.”
“Thanks, sweetie.” She patted her belly. “I think the two of us will be okay.”
Jack stretched out his legs and sipped his coffee. “So how long do you think it’ll take before he or she decides to…you know…pop out?”
She rolled her eyes dramatically. “A baby doesn’t simply pop out. It’s going to take a while. Probably the rest of the day.”
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