It was assumed that the battle was over, and no one, including Increase himself, who was now sitting up, was prepared for what happened next.
Walter Davis produced a small handgun from his coat pocket and, seeing this, Jamie thrust Bliss roughly behind him, acting as a barrier. Everyone was stricken to silence, except for the captain, who said calmly, “Give me the gun, lad.”
Walter didn’t seem to hear—or to see anyone but Increase, who was whimpering now, as he’d hoped to make Jamie do. “Hateful—vicious—” Walter seemed to be reciting the words or reading them from a book. “You made her scream. I can still hear her screaming—I will always hear her—screaming, screaming—”
The gun went off, a wispy puff of white smoke billowing from the barrel, and a bright red bead of blood appeared in the middle of Increase’s forehead. He fell over, a look of bafflement marking his face for eternity.
Bliss had had enough. She clasped one hand over her mouth and fled, and she didn’t get far before she was violently ill. The sound of a scuffle and a second shot brought on a fresh spate of retching.
“There now,” Jamie told her, in that dear, musical brogue of his, “and everything will be all right now, Duchess.” He had found water somewhere, cool, clean water, and lifted the canteen to her lips so that she could rinse her mouth and then drink. When she’d had her nil, he helped her into a man’s shirt, fastening the buttons with slow, awkward fingers.
“That second shot,” she managed to get out, after long, difficult moments of struggle.
Jamie shook his head and drew her close. “Not now, love,” he said. “Not now.”
But Bliss guessed what had happened—Walter, in his despair and his horrible remorse, had shot himself after killing Pipher. “He wanted to help us,” she said sadly, her head resting against Jamie’s shoulder, “but he was too afraid.”
“It’s over now, Duchess,” Jamie said, and she felt his lips brush her temple.
She was weary clear through to her soul, was Bliss McKenna, but she felt a surge of gratitude that she and Jamie were safe, with the rest of their lives before them. That knowledge sustained her until they were back at Seven Sisters again, many hours later.
Bliss helped Jamie with his bath, being careful of his many wounds. She was quiet, still seeing that haunted look in his eyes. She feared that it would never fade away.
That night, he made love to her with a violence of need, as though certain that if his passion were consuming enough, all the terrors of the day would be overshadowed. He lay exhausted and gasping, his head resting on Bliss’s breast, when it was over, and fell into a troubled sleep. She felt the warmth of his tears against her flesh as he dreamed.
Her own deep, tender satisfaction made the motion of her hand languid as she lifted it to caress Jamie’s rumpled hair. At the same time, she stroked his shoulder, feeling the flesh and muscle quake beneath her palm as Jamie awakened and struggled to contain his grief.
Bliss said nothing, for there were no words that could, or should, spare him the mourning that he had to do. Peony had been his closest friend. He had loved her, he had seen her die, and now he had to face his own feelings.
Bliss loved Jamie enough to allow him that process, painful as it was for her, and she was sensible enough to know that it could take a very long time.
Three weeks later, Jamie and Bliss said good-bye to Maggie and Reeve in Brisbane and set sail for Auckland. Peony had been buried at Seven Sisters, but there was business to attend to concerning her estate, and Jamie threw himself into the task with ferocity. Bliss, wandering like a lost urchin through the elegant rooms of the grand house he’d bought for her, barely saw him for days at a time.
At night, he loved her hungrily, fiercely, but there was a distance between them for all that, that broke Bliss’s heart. She began to wonder if Jamie had lost the true love of his life in that hellish camp in Queensland—perhaps she herself was only a substitute for Peony Ryan.
Bliss found this possibility so unbearable that she couldn’t voice it—not to Jamie, anyway. But she did seek him out, in Peony’s offices in downtown Auckland, to say good-bye.
He looked up from the papers he’d been going over with a frown. “What the ’ell do you mean, ’good-bye’?” he snapped.
Bliss’s heart splintered. She couldn’t remember the last time he’d called her Duchess, or laughed with her, or really made love to her, instead of just using her to vent the powerful emotions he was grappling with.
She lifted her chin. “What does good-bye usually mean, Mr. McKenna?” she countered. “I’m leaving you.”
Jamie muttered an oath, shoved back his chair, and shot out of it. “And goin’ where?” he demanded.
Bliss didn’t retreat, cower, or avert her eyes. “Maybe I’ll fall asleep in some other man’s barn and see what comes of it,” she said.
Jamie’s eyes went as wide as she’d ever seen them, and his Adam’s apple moved the length of his throat. “By God, Duchess, you’ll never do that as long as I’m still breathin’!” he roared. “You’ll lie in no other barn—or bed—than mine!”
So he did care. That hard shell he’d surrounded himself with was beginning to thaw and fall away. Bliss could not have been more pleased, though she was careful to hide her feeling behind a saintly expression and a sigh. “In that case, I’ll have to content myself with going back to the country. I want to take up cooking again, and see Cutter and Dog, and find out if that old rooster is still on the straight and narrow path.” She paused, rising on tiptoes to kiss Jamie’s cheek. “Good-bye.”
He caught her shoulders in his hands, his blue eyes searching her face. “Don’t you dare go,” he bit out. “I need you.”
“What for?” Bliss asked sweetly, batting her eyelashes.
Jamie stared at her for a moment, and then he laughed, and the sound was wonderful to hear. He shoved a hand through his hair. “You’re right,” he marveled, as though that were a very unusual thing. Then he pulled Bliss close to him, subjecting her to a most intimate, and delicious, contact. “You didn’t need to go quite so far as to threaten me with your cookin’, though,” he added, sounding hurt.
Bliss’s eyes brimmed with happy tears. “My Jamie,” she whispered. “I missed you terribly.”
He kissed her much too lightly and much too briefly, then pushed her toward the door, reaching for the tailored suitcoat he’d been wearing of late, and the smart gentleman’s hat.
To Bliss’s enormous relief, he had second thoughts and left both items behind. When they boarded the train, just over an hour later, he was wearing the familiar leather hat that had seen better days. He watched her with a mischievous blue heat in his eyes, and Bliss was squirming in her seat before they’d even gotten past the outer perimeters of Auckland.
“Are you going to hire a wagon?” she asked, hours later, when they left the train in the little town of Halifras. Jamie had his own name for the place, Bliss remembered: Harassed.
Jamie chuckled and resettled his hat. “Right now, I’m more interested in ’irin’ a room, Duchess.”
Bliss blushed, even though she knew he couldn’t possibly be any more interested than she was, and kept her eyes averted all the while Jamie was signing for their room and chatting with the hotel’s proprietor. She felt as shy as a bride.
In the privacy of the little room tucked away in the right rear corner of the second floor, Jamie made a slow, tender ritual of removing Bliss’s clothes, garment by garment, kissing selected places as he bared them.
Bliss trembled in the foreshadow of ecstasy when he finally knelt before her. He’d aroused her so skillfully that release was upon her with the first teasing flicks of his tongue. He kissed her smooth stomach as she clung to his shoulders with her hands, unable to stand alone.
After a few moments, however, he drew back, looked up at her curiously, and laid one tentative hand to the curve of her abdomen. It was new, that gentle rounding, and Bliss smiled as Jamie came awkwardly to his feet, his eyes p
uzzled.
“Yes,” Bliss said softly, laying her hand over his. “You’ll be a father in June, Jamie. It’ll be a boy and we’ll call him Reeve.”
He looked down at her stomach, as though he expected to be able to see his child through skin and muscle, and the expression of wonder on his face was more precious to Bliss than anything she possessed. “Aye,” he finally replied, and then he swallowed.
Bliss stood on her toes to kiss him, catching the musky scent of herself on his skin. His hand rose, with a clumsy caution that further endeared him to her, to caress her breast as they kissed.
That night, their lovemaking was a celebration.
Bliss stirred the contents of the kettle industriously, Dog at her heels. “Have a taste,” she offered, plopping some of the mixture into a bowl and setting it on the kitchen floor.
Dog whimpered and skulked away, to lie under the table.
“Fine friend you are,” Bliss said, laying one hand to her protruding stomach. “This is perfectly good lamb stew, you know.”
Just then, Jamie came in, grinning. Some of the chill of the winter day followed along. After giving Bliss a lingering kiss, he stood behind her and splayed his fingers over her stomach, something he loved to do. “I’ve got a surprise for you, Duchess. Cutter’s gone to town to fetch ’er—I mean, it.”
Bliss turned awkwardly in his arms, her jealousy flaring. “You said ’her,’ Jamie McKenna!” she accused.
He gave her a kiss, which she found anything but soothing, and shrugged. “So I did, love. ’Er name’s Ella, and she’s a cook.”
Bliss was infuriated. She’d been trying so hard to learn, studying her cookbooks hour after hour and testing new recipes on Dog. “You could have a little patience!” she cried.
Jamie’s hands moved tenderly up and down her back. “That kind of patience involves starvin’ to death,” he reasoned. He went to kiss her again, but she pushed him away and, after grabbing her heavy cloak, stormed out the door.
Jamie followed her, keeping pace easily as she hurried down the rear path.
“I don’t want a cook!” she yelled, wrenching open the door to one of the sheds.
“I know,” Jamie answered, beginning to look insulted now because Bliss was having the temerity to throw his gift back in his face—figuratively speaking, that is. “But then, nothin’ spoils your appetite, does it, Duchess?”
Bliss came out of the shed carrying a washtub and looked about for a rock. When she had one in her hand, she advanced on Jamie, who prudently backtracked toward the house.
“What the devil are you doin’?” he demanded.
Bliss smiled, still closing in, and answered, “It worked with the chicken!”
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Angelfire Page 34