Looking down into his mother’s face, seeing how peaceful and good she appeared, Grey closed his eyes, willing strength into his body and an end to this day’s terror. “Mother, why?” came a keening cry that he only dimly realized was his own. “Why? What could be worth all this?”
Suddenly, miraculously to him, she stirred in his arms and groaned, crying out with the mewling sound of a small, sick animal. Grey tensed, noting her spastic waking movements. He lowered her to the grass and smoothed her hair off her brow. Her poor bruised face. She was like a battered child. Grey’s heart ached terribly. He tried not to cry. “Shh. Don’t move, Mother. You’ve been hurt.”
She grimaced, but from the pain or because of his words? Grey had no way of knowing. She seemed to be fighting for a consciousness that kept eluding her. Grey feared she would lapse into a coma. Attending her as best he could … arranging her limbs when she moved them, talking in a low voice to her … Grey nevertheless looked at her through the eyes of shock. Never before had his mother looked so old to him, so haggard. Sagging muscles in her face and her lined skin were amplified by the day’s bright sunlight.
Then suddenly her expression cleared … and she spoke with a weak, thin voice. “What … happened?”
Relief coursed through Grey. Her words were halting, but she was coherent, not babbling. “You … had a knock on the head, Mother. But you’re going to be all right. Just don’t move.”
With a restraining hand to her shoulder, with fear and urgency tearing through him, Grey looked all around for help and saw none. “Damn.” He looked down at the helpless figure of his mother. He couldn’t leave her like this, and there was no one else about to help him. And while he loved his mother, no matter her sins, he was also painfully, terrifyingly aware that Taylor also needed him right now … at this moment. What to do? He feared hurting his mother worse by moving her.
“My head. It hurts.”
Grey looked down at his formerly imperious and cold and calculating mother. She was an old woman now, a child who was whimpering. “It’s OK,” he assured her, his voice breaking. “You’ll be fine. I promise.”
“Someone hit me,” she said, her eyelids fluttering. “Why would he do that?”
“It doesn’t matter anymore, Mother. He’s gone. And he won’t be back.” Hatred tensed Grey’s jaw. Not if I have anything to say about it. That decided it for Grey. He had to risk picking her up and getting her back to the house. With any luck the servants, wherever they were, would appear, and he could turn her over to them and a doctor. Only then could he race back to Taylor’s side. God alone knew what she was going through even at this moment.
With his plan in order, Grey scooped his mother up—she cried out in pain. Standing with her slight burden in his arms, Grey gritted his teeth, steeling himself against the knowledge that his actions could be worsening her injuries. “It’s OK, Mother. You’re going to be fine,” he kept telling her.
He wondered if it was true, though. Would she be fine? Tears filled Grey’s eyes. He sniffed back the emotion and started walking toward the house.
“Who are you?”
His mother’s words shocked Grey into stopping. A sudden weakness leached the stiffness from his bones. “What do you mean? I’m your son. Greyson.”
“I don’t have children,” she said with assurance if not strength. Then her head lolled against his shoulder and her eyes closed.
Grey looked down at her. She’d passed out. Oh, God, Grey begged. Not this. Her memory is gone.
Just then, a movement caught Grey’s eye. He tensed … then relaxed. Coming toward them at a run now, from the house, were Caldwell and several of the Talbott maids. Their mouths were opened in grimaces and their coattails and apron strings flew out behind them. Had they been locked up somewhere and just now managed to free themselves? Grey didn’t care. They were here now. Grey said a silent prayer of thanks for their appearance and started toward them. He wanted to run but couldn’t. It was absolutely maddening, having to move so slowly now when he needed to make all haste to be away.
Taylor. Her name, that one word, was all he could think. Fear for her would not allow him to think further of her and what could be happening to her even now.
Chapter Twenty
As word got out of Camilla James’s death, Taylor supposed, distant family and close friends would begin to arrive. But Camilla James had passed away less than an hour ago. So the only ones here now were those who’d been here earlier. From the upstairs bedroom window … her mother’s bedroom window … Taylor stood watching events below in the circular gravel driveway.
A little earlier, a boy of about fourteen and on horseback had cantered his mount up the driveway and ahead of a black buggy. Taylor had assumed this young man to be the same messenger who’d come to Grey’s this morning, only to be dispatched by him to the doctor’s. Sure enough, the man in the buggy had proven to be the doctor Grey had also sent Calvin after. Taylor recognized him as the same man who had tended Grey’s head wound.
Dr. Meade had rushed inside and had been escorted up to Camilla James’s room by Betsy. But there had been nothing he could do. He’d next wished to see Amanda and to administer a sedative to her, to calm her. But she wouldn’t allow it. And so, he’d gone downstairs to await the others who would soon be arriving.
And here they were. A fancy enclosed carriage was pulling up in front of the house. For a tense, hopeful second Taylor wondered if this was Grey returning. Then she saw Calvin behind the vehicle. He rode Red Sky bareback as had she. Disappointment wilted her posture. If Calvin was with this carriage, then it had to be that of … Sure enough, the door to the conveyance opened and out stepped two men. Her father and Grey’s younger brother, Franklin. So they were finally here.
You are too late, my father. Numbed to the point of being dispassionate, Taylor looked behind her … to the body reclining in the bed, even now being arranged by Betsy. The older woman was crying softly. Taylor wasn’t. She couldn’t. She had no more tears. Her emotions right now were a raw wound. To do anything at all was to rub salt into the exposed wound in her soul.
She pivoted until she once again looked out the window to watch the scene below. Along with the doctor, Henry the butler—This man is Betsy’s husband, Taylor repeated this detail to herself, as if she needed assurance that at least her rote memory survived—had come outside and was now speaking to the men. With the window closed, Taylor couldn’t hear them. But she didn’t have to hear to know what was being said. The doctor was telling the men that Camilla James had died. She knew this because her father suddenly buckled. Taylor tensed, stiffening her knees as she watched Henry and Franklin make a grab for him.
Finally, the men had him buttressed between them, an arm each around her father’s back and a grip on each of his arms. Just then, Charles James threw his head back, his expression a distorted mask of abject sorrow. His mouth was open. Perhaps, Taylor thought, he was crying out as she had done earlier. The men moved forward and then disappeared into the house.
Taylor’s first thought was that she needed to leave the room. She knew her father would want to be alone with Camilla James. But beyond that realization, her motivation was perhaps selfish. Right now, she simply did not want to see her father. Yes, he was the only one left now with the answers to the questions she had. Yes, he was the only one who could verify everything Aunt Camil—no, her mother—had told her. But right now, Taylor did not want to see him. She had no idea what to say to him.
So he could tell her the truth. So what? What need had she of his words to verify a truth? The truth needed no help. It just and simply was. Lies needed elaborate stories, she knew. And they had been told … among them, that she was dead and that Amanda was dead. Other lies were that she was Cherokee and that Tennie Nell Christie was her mother. Lies. All of them. But the truth? No, it needed nothing and no one.
Neither did she. I don’t? Then why am I standing here waiting for Grey? She was, and she knew it. A grimace of misery clutch
ed at Taylor’s features, tried to break through her control. She tensed, fisting her hands. No, she would not think further about Grey. To do so might melt the ice she had encased her heart in. Right now she did not want to speak. She did not want to feel. And she did not want to be touched. She didn’t even want to breathe or to live.
But stubbornly her heart insisted on beating and her lungs continued to draw air in and push it out, almost independent of her own will. It was the oddest thing, life. One moment you possessed it … she turned slowly again to stare at Camilla James … and the next, you didn’t. One moment you were Cherokee, one of The People—and the next, you weren’t. You were white, a thing you had hated all your life. And you weren’t alone in the world. You had a half-sister, a father, and a man you loved … and one mother who was dead and another mother so many miles away who lived, yet wasn’t your mother at all. But had loved you as only one could.
Tennie Nell Christie. She had sent Taylor here to learn these truths. And she had. But now she wanted to go home. The Cherokee Nation. No matter the truth of her white blood, in her heart she was Cherokee. And she wanted to go home. Now. Today. It was quiet there. Peaceful. She loved her Cherokee mother … and so she would go. She would leave before Grey got here. Taylor frowned, not able to recall at first why he’d left and where he’d been going. Then it came to her. His mother’s. He was going to his mother’s to stop Stanley James and to find out if she had a hand in killing Taylor’s mother.
Taylor chuckled, a self-deprecating sound. So many mothers.
“Are you OK, Miss James?”
Taylor jumped and turned around. There stood Betsy. Taylor had forgotten the woman was in the room. Apparently she had finished her ministrations to Camilla James and was now standing at the foot of the bed. “I’m fine,” Taylor said abruptly. “My father and Mr. Franklin Talbott have arrived.”
Looking weary and sad, her eyes swollen, her cheeks splotchy with color, the older woman nodded. “I’ll leave you now with your aunt for a few minutes of privacy. I’m so sorry for your loss, miss.”
“Thank you,” Taylor managed to say, seeing no need to correct the housekeeper. What difference did it make if Betsy continued to believe Camilla James had been Taylor’s aunt? In silence, she waited while Betsy left the room, gently closing the door behind her. Taylor didn’t intend to be here when her father came upstairs, as he no doubt was doing at this very moment. That being so, Taylor knew she needed to tell her mother good-bye now.
Slowly, stiffly, she walked over to the bed and looked down at her … mother. Betsy had done wonders. Camilla James was again beautiful. She could be asleep, nothing more. Taylor fought back a sudden sob that tore at her heart. She gritted her teeth and stared through the blurring haze of her sorrow. She reached out and tenderly stroked her mother’s hair … so long and soft and black like hers. From this woman she had got her hair, the shape of her face, her nose and mouth. This woman. Not Tennie Nell Christie. But this woman. Taylor touched Camilla’s cheek. A tear splashed onto the woman’s forehead. Without acknowledging to herself that it was her own tear, Taylor gently rubbed it away, feeling the cool, soft skin under her fingers.
“I love you, Mother,” she whispered. “And I forgive you. I will always honor your memory. And I will try to bring honor to this life you have given me.” Then she bent over and softly kissed her mother’s cheek.
* * *
In the next moment—and wishing fervently she had found the courage to say those things to Camilla while she yet lived—Taylor straightened up and turned away. She would now leave the room and avoid her father. But she was too late. The door opened. Her father stood there, alone, his hand on the doorknob. Taylor’s gaze locked with his. She didn’t speak. Neither did he. But in his blue eyes—the same color as hers—was the truth and his recognition that Taylor now knew it, too. She now knew that this man, whose grief made him appear old, and the dead woman in the bed were her true parents. And they had left her behind, at the end of the war, in the Cherokee Nation with a woman whom she dearly loved but who was no relation to her. Cowards.
Bitterness welled up inside Taylor. She looked from him to her mother. She then took a deep, ragged breath and turned again to her father. “I’ll leave you alone with her.”
What she didn’t say was that, to her, this was how he and Camilla had evidently always wanted it … that they would be together without her.
Shaking his head, Charles held a hand out to her in supplication. “Please don’t leave, Taylor. Stay. I want you to stay.”
Silence again ruled the distance between them. A functioning part of Taylor’s brain registered that she was hearing knocking on a door down the hall and the sound of Franklin Talbott’s voice as he called out beseechingly to Amanda to please open the door and let him and the doctor in.
Again her father spoke. “Please. Stay. I … I don’t have any right to say this, Taylor … but I need you.”
Taylor’s chin came up. She remained dry-eyed and hated herself for wanting to believe his words. In his presence she felt young, like a small girl who was uncertain of herself but more uncertain of being loved. Resentment flooded Taylor. He expected her to act the obedient child. Well, she was a woman now and did not behave as a young one would. Denying him his comfort, refusing to absolve him, Taylor looked down and away, purposely unresponsive.
After long moments of sustained silence, though, Taylor dared another glance her father’s way. He no longer stood in the doorway. She looked around and found him beside the bed. His prostrating grief was too much for Taylor to bear and to witness. Now was her chance to leave. But instead, and not asking herself why, she whipped around, returning to the window where she’d stood before. She looked out on the peace and beauty of the day … and watched and waited. From behind her, not one sound issued forth. Her father’s grief must be too deep, was Taylor’s conclusion. For the briefest of seconds, she allowed herself to care and to hurt for him.
Retreating back into her hardened shell, Taylor allowed time simply to pass. To her, the seconds, the minutes, seemed to drag by as slowly as if they had been dipped in molasses and could not pull free of its sticky, syrupy hold. Her back and legs ached from remaining so still. Her eyes felt dry and scratchy, yet her vision remained clear and sharp. She watched the street and marked the passing carriages, her breath catching, then disappointment eating at her, each time one slowed down in front of the open gate to the James property but didn’t turn in. Each time she would think, Is that Grey? Is he back? What happened at his mother’s? Is she alive? Is Uncle Stanley? Why would he want to kill Grey’s mother? Weren’t they in on this poisoning together? So many questions and no one to answer them for her.
But those weren’t the only reasons she wished and prayed for the first sight of Grey’s carriage. She admitted it now. She admitted that she needed to know, with every breath she took, every beat of her heart, that he was unharmed, that he lived. If he didn’t, then there was no need for her to do so. But how could she find out? What could she do? As if it had been waiting in the wings of her mind, waiting only for her to ask, the answer burst brightly into her consciousness. She could go after Grey herself.
Despite her father’s wish to the contrary, she did not have to remain here. Meaning, Calvin was back with her horse. Of course. She could get Red Sky from Calvin, have him tell her where Grey’s mother lived, and then ride there to help him. This was what she would do. But before she could turn away from the window, a black brougham did slow down at the gate and turn in. Rapidly the horses came, their hooves and the carriage’s wheels churning up a cloud of dust and gravel on the long driveway. In less than a minute, the conveyance would be stopping out front.
Taylor tensed, frowning, her hands fisting. No. It couldn’t be. She couldn’t be seeing what she was seeing. Something was wrong. Her wondering gaze fell on Edward, the driver. He was using the whip. But that wasn’t what concerned her. She shook her head, tried to clear her vision … but it persisted. A great
dark and hovering bird of prey seemed to engulf the carriage, seemed to devour it … to become it. The omen. Grey. It took him, not me. Taylor’s nails dug into her palms. “No!” she cried out, jerking around, already running for the bedroom’s closed door.
From beside the bed, her father looked up, standing now. “Taylor! What is it?”
She didn’t stop; she was at the door, wrenching it open. “Grey. His carriage. He has returned. And something is wrong.”
“Oh, dear God, no. What else can happen today? Wait for me, Taylor.”
“I cannot.” She was out in the hall, running, her booted steps thudding heavily with each charging step she took. Grey, oh God, Grey, oh God, Grey, oh God. The litany repeated itself … over and over.
A door to her right jerked open. Startled, Taylor glanced its way. Franklin stood there. Amanda was at his shoulder, wide-eyed and wild-eyed. Behind her, in the room, was the doctor. But it was Amanda who called out. “Taylor, what’s wrong? Why are you running?”
“It is Grey. Something is wrong with Grey.” She heard their shocked protestations but had already flown by them and was at the stairs. “His carriage. It has returned!” she called out over her shoulder, aware that Amanda and Franklin were behind her now, as were probably her father and, she hoped, the doctor. Taylor attacked the stairs, all but falling down them in her haste.
Downstairs now, with no servants in sight—no doubt Henry the butler had gone to console his wife, Betsy—Taylor jerked open the door and ran outside, startling Calvin and Red Sky. Off to one side, in front of her father’s carriage and talking with his driver, Calvin called out, “Whoa, Miss James! What’s wrong?”
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