Before I knew it, he was wrapping things up and asking if I had any questions even as he pushed back from his desk. “No, I think I’m good,” I said, scrambling for the handle of my bag, which had fallen sideways on the floor at my feet.
By the time I stood up, he had come all the way around the desk and was standing directly in front of me. Rising to my full height plus today’s three-inch closed-toe wedges, I still had to look upward to see into his eyes.
“Oh, my,” he said, locking his gaze on mine. “I do like a tall woman.”
“Really? What’s her name?”
He laughed. “Ah, and a funny one too.”
Were we actually flirting with each other?
Almost as if remembering himself, he took a step back and replaced the sexy grin with a more professional demeanor. “Bottom line, Maddee, you sister’s prognosis is good as long as she’s diligent with the physical therapy.”
“Thank you. That’s great to hear.” I reached to shake his hand goodbye, but he held on to it for a few seconds too long before letting go.
“She’s blessed to have someone like you in her life,” he said.
My cheeks grew warm again. “I’m blessed she’s in mine.”
Another long pause, our eyes still locked together. “Listen, before you go, stop at the front desk and make sure we have your contact information on file. If we need to reach you, it would help to be able to call directly.”
My pulse surged. If we need to reach you. Was there an extra layer to that request?
“Will do. Thanks, Dr. Hill.”
“Austin. Please,” he said, swinging open the door. “Considering you’re not the patient here, I think first names are in order.”
“Austin,” I replied with a smile and a nod, message received.
Then I turned and walked away, unsure how I managed to get anywhere while floating three feet off the ground.
Somehow I focused on my work and got through the rest of the day. Tonight was reserved for shopping, but I had to run home first to switch out the bike for my car.
The sun had already set by the time I got there, which meant I was already behind schedule. I ran inside to drop off my things and grab the car keys, but when I flipped on the light, I gasped, startled at the sight in front of me.
The bed. Of course. How had I forgotten? There in the middle of my living room, rolled up against the couch, were Nicole’s hospital bed and tray table. A small thrill ran through me. My baby sister would be here tomorrow.
As I walked around the bed, observing its knobs and buttons, trying to figure out how it worked, the thrill began to subside. This wouldn’t be a weekend sleepover with games and candy and bonding. Nicole was a recovering addict. She could have died in that car accident. We’d barely interacted with each other in years, at least not beyond a superficial level. This experience was going to be unpredictable and unnerving. How we would learn to trust each other again, I didn’t know. The old family letters Nana had told me about came to mind, and I wondered if those two Talbot sisters had ever faced anything like this.
Growing suddenly somber, I sat on the vinyl mattress and reminded myself that nothing here was under my control. Only God could take this crazy situation and turn it into something good for both Nicole and me. I closed my eyes and prayed for help and guidance and strength, surprised when tears filled my eyes at the end. Blinking them away, I rose and busied myself gathering purse, keys, phone, and lists. I headed for the door and then turned to give the room one last look. The bed was here. Tomorrow, Nicole would be here.
For better or worse, this was actually going to happen.
CHAPTER FIVE
Celeste
1704
Deep in steerage on the Royal Mary, Celeste Talbot pressed her palm against the ruby ring tucked inside her skirt, launching a new wave of guilt. For the hundredth time she wondered how Maman and Papa had reacted to her note about leaving for the New World. She wondered if they realized when they read it that their other daughter, Berta, was gone too. And the ring. How long before they discovered that it was also missing?
The bunk she shared with her sister creaked with the rocking of the ship, which was now more like the gentle rocking of a cradle than the fury they had endured for the last week. Berta groaned, and Celeste put her hand to the girl’s forehead.
The fever had returned. Celeste dropped to the filthy floor, knowing her sister desperately needed to see the doctor.
But how would they ever pay for it? Besides Berta and the ring, all Celeste had left was a simple porcelain brooch from Jonathan that wasn’t worth anything, a pittance of money, and one wool blanket. Everything else had been stolen several days into the voyage by some fellow passenger. Celeste had been trying to be a Good Samaritan, tending to those who were sick as best she could, when she realized one of the sickest—a young woman tucked away in a bunk on the far side of steerage—was her own sister. In her shock and the rearranging that followed, Celeste had neglected her belongings and someone had snatched them.
Now it was time to sell the ruby. There were plenty of first-class passengers who might be interested in such a purchase, and she could use some of the money to obtain food and another consultation with the surgeon.
Berta shifted in the bunk, and Celeste raised her eyes to meet Spenser Rawling’s. He was a kind young man who had stayed near their sides since Celeste first discovered her sister. He’d jumped in to help right away, carrying the ailing Berta over to Celeste’s bunk, and then soon after when Celeste realized that in all the confusion she’d been robbed. In the dim light neither Spenser nor she could find who had taken her property, and though they complained to the first mate—a big, burly man by the name of Hayes—he blamed her for not taking better care of her things.
Since then, Spenser’s cheekbones had grown as hollow as hers and Berta’s, but his square jaw helped give the impression that he wasn’t as famished. And his confidence that they would all survive had given her an inkling of hope even as her internal storms, as powerful as the gales that had threatened to tear the Royal Mary apart, battered her soul.
Celeste didn’t know what she and Berta would have done without Spenser during the long crossing. The voyage had taken three weeks more than the anticipated seven. In steerage, men, women, and families were all mixed together, and Spenser bunked within sight of Berta and Celeste, ready to come to their aid as needed. Throughout the voyage he’d protected them from harm, and when Celeste couldn’t get to the food line, Spenser went for her. What the ship provided was horrid—stale biscuits, thin porridge, and meat with maggots—but it kept them alive, even the little bit Berta could keep down. When the steerage kitchen ran out of food during the last storm, Spenser shared the hardtack he’d brought from home. Celeste usually gnawed it dry as he did, but she softened it in water for Berta, getting it down her sister as best she could.
The thought of the first-class passengers above, enjoying decent meals, tormented Celeste. She’d done this to Berta.
When Celeste had decided to sneak away from home and sail to America on the Royal Mary, she’d had no idea nearly two hundred humans would be packed in worse than cattle, with little sanitation, water, or food, and rarely any fresh air. Though her family could have well afforded a first-class ticket, she hadn’t much money of her own and had been forced to sign an indentured servant contract in exchange for a place in steerage. At least she’d had Spenser’s help, thanks be to God. He wasn’t the sort of person she would have given a second thought to back home, but she was grateful for him now.
Spenser stood, pulling his brown hair back in a leather tie. “I’ll go get water.” He’d had to steal it from the first deck the last few times. Perhaps the storm had filled the barrels—though whether he would be allowed access to them or not was another matter.
“Thank you,” Celeste said. “When you get back, I’ll buy food.” There were rumors of passengers on the upper decks who would sell some of their leftovers to the starving wretc
hes below.
Spenser raised his brows, and his hazel eyes questioned her. He knew she was nearly out of money. She’d been holding on to the little she had left for when they docked, to provide for her and Berta until they reached Jonathan. But if she could find a first-class passenger to give her at least a portion of what the ruby ring was worth, she’d have more than enough for food and medical care.
The ring had belonged to her great-grandmother, a French noblewoman, who had passed it on twenty years ago to Celeste’s mother, Catherine. The way the story went, Catherine had married quickly, just before fleeing France, and forgot to tell the pastor ahead of time that they had no ring. But when that part of the ceremony came, her groom surprised her by pulling one from his pouch. Catherine’s grandmother had slipped it to him in secret prior to the ceremony so he could give it to his new bride.
Catherine had always promised that ring to Celeste, her oldest daughter, who dreamed of Jonathan sliding it onto her finger during their wedding. Her heart thumped at the thought of him. If only he were with her now instead of in Williamsburg, awaiting her arrival.
As Spenser headed toward the ladder, carrying the water bucket they shared between the three of them, Celeste leaned closer to her sister and whispered, “Berta, I’ll get you the help you need. I promise.”
Celeste had boarded the ship on the Thames of her own free will, signing on with the captain as an indentured servant with a four-year contract to cover her passage to the New World. The captain would be selling all of the contracts when they reached Virginia—but Jonathan would buy hers as soon as she got to Williamsburg, where he was stationed as a lieutenant in the British Army. They had gone over the plan in detail before he’d left London early last February.
Berta, however, had not boarded the ship by choice. She said she’d spotted Celeste sneaking away from home and followed her down to the docks, where she’d been abducted and forced on board, her signature forged on an indentured servitude contract. Celeste wasn’t sorry for having embarked on this journey herself, but she was sorry, terribly sorry, for the consequences of that action. If she hadn’t gone down to the docks that day, Berta wouldn’t have followed her, and if Berta hadn’t followed her, then she wouldn’t have been kidnapped. It was that simple. Berta’s current misery was primarily Celeste’s fault, and she would feel guilty about that forever.
Due to the darkness of steerage and the number of people crammed from one end to the other, Celeste hadn’t even known her sister was here until they had been at sea for several days. By then it was too late to do anything, and poor Berta was so seasick that she could barely speak.
Spenser had seen Celeste struggling to move Berta and had scooped the girl up, carrying her down the narrow aisle, holding her close to his chest to protect her as Celeste directed him to her bunk. His tenderness and dedication to Berta were evident as he offered her herbs for nausea that he’d brought from home. They seemed to help—a little, anyway—but then Berta had developed a fever, one that came and went through the last weeks of travel. The surgeon claimed it was all part of the seasickness and that Berta would recover once the ship docked, but Celeste was sure it was something much worse. True, she believed her sister suffered greatly from the motion of the sea, but something else was wrong.
Celeste shivered at the thought of the danger Berta was in. Jonathan would have to buy her sister’s contract as well. She hoped he had enough money for both of them. The crossing had nearly killed Berta. The girl would most likely never be able to return home because that trip could prove fatal.
If only she hadn’t followed Celeste that day! Celeste couldn’t imagine the anguish their parents felt at having both of their daughters disappear. Shouts startled her. As several men from steerage stumbled to the ladder, Spenser came bounding down from the deck.
“Land!” he yelled.
Celeste struggled to her feet, bumping her head on the bunk above.
Spenser, the empty bucket swinging from his hand, jumped over two men on the floor. “Celeste! Berta! Land!” Both his strength and litheness surprised her, considering all they had gone through.
Celeste stood and then swayed as she reached out her arm. Spenser grabbed it and pulled her into an embrace. Tears filled her eyes. He was nearly starving, but his arms were strong as he held her tight. For a moment she relaxed against him. Berta would live. Celeste would find Jonathan. All would be well.
A tear escaped. She leaned in closer and laid her head against his chest as a sob burst from her throat. All these weeks she’d stayed as stoic as she could, focusing on her sister. But now that safety was in sight, tears poured down her face.
“Everything will be all right.” Spenser held her until she gained control. Then he wiped away her tears. At his touch, she stepped back, alarmed that she’d let down her guard. He’d been nothing but honorable, but she didn’t want to give him any ideas.
Surely sensing her awkwardness, he turned his attention to the bunk and stepped past her to kneel beside it. “Did you hear, Berta?” Speaking softly, he reached out to brush a lock of hair from her face. “We made it. You’ll be off this ship and on solid ground before you know it.” It had been obvious since that first time Spenser held Berta and carried her across steerage that he’d been captivated by her beauty. Hugging Celeste meant nothing. She’d been foolish to fear he might think otherwise.
“I’m going to go summon the surgeon again,” Celeste said to Berta, thinking of the many who had died—from disease or dysentery or who knew what else—during the trip. What if Berta were near death now when they were so close to land?
Spenser cleared his throat. “I’d hang on to your money and give it a day or two first. If the seasickness is the worst of Berta’s problems, she’ll recover once she’s on land. If the fever continues, hopefully you can find a better physician than the ship’s surgeon. I wouldn’t waste any more money on him.”
Spenser wouldn’t risk Berta’s life. Celeste couldn’t help but think his advice seemed sound. She would wait. She needed to save every penny she could—and especially the ring, if possible.
“I’ll go back up,” he added, “to get water and see if there’s anything else I can find out.” Celeste watched him go. He had a job waiting for him with a carpenter just outside of Williamsburg, which was exactly where Celeste and Berta needed to land as well.
Before Jonathan had come to Celeste’s parents’ inn outside of London, Celeste had never given thought to emigrating to the American colonies. Some in their congregation of Huguenots—French Protestants who had found refuge in England—had chosen to relocate to Virginia, but Celeste’s parents hadn’t been interested. Papa was a printer by trade, though he’d had to sell his share of the family business in Lyon twenty years earlier before fleeing from France. Once in London, his intention had been to open a new print shop there, but that hadn’t worked out thanks to the English government’s strict restrictions on the owning of printing presses. Instead, he was forced to find some other type of business in which to invest. In the end, he’d done as many of his fellow Huguenots had and opened an inn. Once it was up and running and fully functional, Celeste’s mother had moved to the helm, freeing Papa to take a job as a printer for the London Gazette.
When other Huguenots began heading to Virginia, Celeste’s brother, Emmanuel, tried hard to convince their father that they should go too, saying he could open his own print shop there. As the oldest son, much of the family’s future rested on him.
“And what would we print on?” Papa had replied. “There are no paper mills in Virginia.”
“So let’s open a paper mill instead,” Emmanuel insisted. He was three years younger than Celeste but quick on his feet and always full of ideas.
“Why would we do that? There’s no need for paper because there aren’t any printers in Virginia.” Celeste giggled. Papa had taken his son’s logic and twisted it back on itself.
“So we do both,” Emmanuel cried, ignoring their father’s teasing. “I
know that would be twice as expensive, but what about Uncle Jules?” Their uncle, a successful businessman, had remained in France. “I’m sure he would invest as well if need be.”
Papa shook his head. “I’m sorry, son, but it can’t work. The population there isn’t large enough to produce the quantity of rags we would need for making paper. No paper, no printer. We’re staying in England.”
Celeste knew that Papa had other reasons for not emigrating, including the fact that there was no freedom of religion in Virginia. “We’d all have to become Anglican,” he had explained over dinner one night. There was also the matter of the African people who were being kidnapped and enslaved, he’d added. The colony was quickly becoming dependent on their labor. “I’m afraid the Huguenots who are already there—if they stay—will end up becoming entwined with that miserable business. The mulberry seedlings they took with them in hopes of producing silk aren’t growing. They’ll soon have no choice but to grow tobacco, but it takes so much labor to produce the crop that a profit can’t be earned unless one uses enslaved humans to do the work.”
Berta let out a soft moan, tearing Celeste away from her thoughts and back to her sister. She brushed Berta’s dark hair from her face and then dabbed at her hot forehead with a cloth. Once the moaning ceased, her mind again went to home.
After their father made it clear that none of them would be going to Virginia, Celeste hadn’t given the colony another thought. She would soon marry George Barré, a young man in their congregation of Huguenots. They had known each other since childhood, and it had always been assumed they would wed. He was good and kind and helped out at the inn when needed. Although his father was a weaver, George would probably work at the inn once they were married. Weaving didn’t pay what her family’s business could provide.
Celeste would continue helping her mother, both in the inn and attending to her younger brothers—Alexander, Frederick, and William. She’d been like a mother to them their whole lives, and she wanted nothing more than have her own brood of children someday. Celeste had had no concerns back then. She was content, unlike Berta, who had been restless her entire life.
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