A Hope Divided

by Alyssa Cole

  “Why are you telling me this?” she asked. His gaze was trained on her face, despite her state of undress. Her heart was beating wildly, and she wished she could breathe properly but she seemed to have forgotten how.

  Her anger and sadness weren’t forgotten, but something sweet and warm was pushing its way to the fore, crowding out all her anger and suspicion. Something that made her want to press a kiss to the freckles on the bridge of his nose. Something that didn’t care that they were both in various states of undress, but was very much aware of what could pass between two willing adults in such a state. She was suddenly feeling quite willful.

  “I don’t know,” he said, his voice strained. “I must admit, I haven’t quite been myself since I met you.”

  “Likewise,” Marlie said, and was surprised to find herself smiling. “To be certain, I hadn’t made a habit of kissing strange men, no matter how handsome I found them.”

  Now Ewan was smiling, too, a harsh upturn of the corners of his mouth that spoke to something more than amusement.

  “And I’m not in the habit of taking liberties with beautiful women, no matter how competent I find them.”

  “Liberties?”

  Ewan’s only answer was to take a step forward, cup her face in his calloused hands, and press his mouth against hers. Marlie made a noise of surprise, Ewan groaned, and the sound of both noises together thoroughly scandalized her. Marlie already knew he was more than proficient at kissing, but when his tongue curled into her mouth it sent a stab of pleasure through her core.

  His knee bumped against hers and she realized he was walking her back across the small space.

  “What are you doing, Ewan?”

  “Straying far, far from my ship,” he replied as the hard-packed earth hit her back. His hands moved down from her face, his thumbs leaving trails of sensation on her neck as they traveled down to brush over her nipples as he cupped her breasts.

  Marlie had touched herself before—had even imagined Ewan touching her while doing so—but perhaps her creativity only lent itself to matters of science. She could never have imagined the brazen insistence of his calloused thumb against the taut tips of her breasts, nor the way the friction of his fingertip and the fabric of her chemise against her sensitive skin would multiply by a hundredfold, a thousandfold, the pleasure that trembled between her legs and in her womb and then spread everywhere in her body. His tongue lashed hers as his hands worked her breasts, and she moaned and sighed like a wanton woman.

  One hand slid down and squeezed her at her hip as something hard and hot pressed against her belly. That was Ewan. All of that.

  “May I touch you?” he asked.

  “You are touching me,” she said through the haze of pleasure.

  “May I touch you between your legs? Please?”

  Marlie let out a shocked laugh into his mouth. Trust it to Ewan to manage to be both polite and forward in the same sentence.

  “Yes, you may,” she whispered.

  His hand stayed at her waist but his fingers began to stretch and curl, stretch and curl, pulling the fabric of the chemise upward, gathering it. When his fingertips pressed into the bare skin of her waist, her hips thrust forward of their own accord. She closed her eyes in embarrassment.

  “I don’t have much experience,” she said. “And by much, I mean any.”

  A gentle kiss brushed over one eyelid and then the other. She opened them to find him staring. “Well, I don’t have much, either, but I’m hoping my ingenuity suffices, as ever.”

  Marlie’s gaze swept over his face; he was a beautiful man.

  “But you’re so . . .”

  “Easy to get along with?” he ventured as his hands worked the tie of her drawers. “Friendly? Nonjudgmental?”

  Marlie laughed but that was short-lived. Ewan’s long fingers were stroking the hair at her mound, petting her, sliding down farther with each stroke. Her breath came fast and heat sparked through her, but however wonderful his touch was, it wasn’t enough.

  “You’ve pleasured yourself before?” he asked.

  She nodded, and then his teeth were nipping at her ear, his tongue tracing the shell of it. His hand cupped her and stopped moving. “Show me how to please you.”

  Her hand left her side and covered his to find that she wasn’t the only one shaking. She pressed down on his fingers, showing him the right amount of pressure. She gasped and bucked a bit, tantalized by the difference in size and strength in the feel of his hand and hers. She moved her fingers in a circle, keeping up the pressure, and he took up the motion. Then Marlie’s hands fell away and her head dropped back because, of course, Ewan was touching her exactly right.

  “Oh, yes,” she whispered.

  His head dropped to her breast and his teeth grazed at her nipple through the material as he changed the pressure of his fingers just a bit, pushing harder at her slick center, circling relentlessly as pleasure built in her toes and fingers, slowly wending its way through her body to the source of her bliss.

  “Ewan.” She reached out and caressed the length of him through his pants with her fingertips and he groaned. She didn’t know what compelled her to do it, other than a curiosity to see if she could have the same effect on him that he did on her. Apparently, her hypothesis was correct. He shuddered and his hips bucked forward. His free hand fumbled at the fasts of his pants and then instead of rubbing the rough fabric of his trousers, she had the hard, hot length of him under the loose curve of her fingers. Her bandaged hands wouldn’t allow for more.

  Marlie’s eyes squeezed shut against the sensation building in her, and then she opened them to meet his gaze. “I’ve imagined touching you,” she admitted.

  “Oh.”

  “I want . . . to do that. Touch you. How you’re touching me. But my hands . . .”

  “Oh.”

  Marlie had expected more of a reaction, but then he stepped closer to her. His hand moved from between her legs and the length of him slid between her folds. Marlie froze for a second and then realized he hadn’t penetrated her, that he wasn’t even trying to.

  “I have found some useful things in all of those dusty old Greek books,” he said. “Is this all right?”

  He was thrusting his hips slowly, the angle as they stood meaning the rigid length of him slid up and against her sensitive nub as he moved. The moisture of her own pleasure coated his penis, easing his path. The pressure was even more intense, more erotic, than his hand had been.

  “Yes. That’s perfect, Socrates.”

  “Ewan,” he said roughly.

  “Ewan,” she repeated, on a moan.

  He kept thrusting. His mouth covered hers again but his eyes stayed open and she followed suit. She pressed her thighs together harder and he huffed against her lips, dropping his forehead to hers.

  “God, Marlie, I—I—” He shook his head then and kissed her instead. His thrusts were rough now, uncontrolled, and his eyes slammed shut as his body shook with need. Marlie’s entire body throbbed on the precipice of release, and seeing the ever-reserved Ewan falling to pieces . . .

  Lightning or some other natural phenomenon struck Marlie then. Her back arched, her hands clutched Ewan’s arms, and she bit into his shoulder to muffle her cries. Then his back hunched, his hips jerked, and warmth slid down her thighs.

  They both stood shaking in the aftermath, Ewan’s weight pressing Marlie into the earthen wall.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  “Quite,” she answered, but she was definitively not.

  She pressed her face into his chest for just a moment, listened to his heart thudding heavily, and reminded herself that he had just rendered her a service—a pleasurable one, but one that he’d benefited from as well.

  “Taking is different from loving. Problem is, it feels a lot like loving ’til you find out otherwise.”

  She moved away from him, toward the water warming near the fire. She reached into her bag for the soap she had shoved in with her other belongi
ngs, holding it between her fingertips for a moment as she stared into the flames.

  Yes, best to remember. Service was all it was, and all it could be, with Ewan McCall.

  CHAPTER 20

  Ewan had made a grave error. He’d realized this as soon as he felt Marlie’s thighs squeeze around his member, as he felt the warmth of her sex encompass him and the friction of the hair between her legs. More so, he’d known when he looked into her eyes.

  Ewan’s previous experiences with women had been distant. Impersonal. He was fine with that—had ensured that it stayed that way. No amount of ribbing from fellow soldiers on their way to brothels had changed that. To Ewan, sex lacking emotion had been pointless, and sex with emotion had been something he wouldn’t allow himself. He’d been a fool to think he could come away from such an interaction with Marlie with his principles intact.

  He’d felt something give way in him as she’d cried out in his embrace, like a retaining wall had crumbled down and every pent-up emotion he held for her had come rushing in, engulfing him. Now he was drowning and Marlie seemed content to stand on the riverbank and watch.

  “Are you sure you know where we’re going?” he asked as they tramped through the underbrush. The question was peevish, but Marlie hadn’t spoken to him in three hours. She had retreated into herself, and Ewan had let her be—he was sure their encounter was as emotionally taxing for her as it was for him, and she was still dealing with the shocking news she’d received. Before they’d set out, he’d worked on retranslating the pages of the memoir that Melody had taken, this time paying attention to every word; it had taken all of his principle to translate faithfully and to the best of his ability.

  Stephen Lynch had appeared to love Marlie’s mother, if a man could truly love a woman he owned. He had told her he would free her, and when she became pregnant, that he would start a life with her. That they would be a family. When his father caught wind of the plan, he sent the heavily pregnant Vivienne away. She was given her freedom, and Stephen had told her he would join her soon.

  Ewan had handed Marlie the pages and watched her read them, squinting in the firelight. He’d expected her to have some reaction, but she had rolled onto her side, her back to him. She’d remained silent after getting up, and remained so as they marched through the night, seemingly without purpose and definitively without connection.

  Marlie stopped and looked at him. “Aren’t you the expert at escape? You can lead the way, if you know better than me.”

  “I was simply trying to ascertain—”

  “You were simply trying to tell me that I’m wrong,” she said. “Well, I know I’m wrong. I know that! I may have been good enough to scratch your itch, but you shouldn’t expect anything else of me. I don’t know where we are or where we’re going and . . .”

  To his horror, her eyes filled with tears.

  “Oh, I’m useless,” she muttered, angrily wiping at her face.

  Ewan was poleaxed. Marlie was sheltered, for certain, but she had never seemed to lack self-assurance. But now she was crying, great heaving sobs that triggered a sort of panic in Ewan as he scrambled to make things right.

  “Marlie,” he said, reaching for her in the shadowy darkness of the forest and getting a hold of her arm. “Don’t cry. You’re far from useless.”

  “Yes, of course you don’t find me useless,” she said. “Men like you will always have a use for women like me.”

  “Men like me?”

  “Never mind.” She pulled her arm away. “We must keep moving.”

  She looked up at the cloudy night sky as if it would point her in the right direction.

  “We do, but if I’ve done something to hurt you, you need to tell me right now.” Ewan felt the first throbs of a headache pulse between his eyes.

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” she said quietly. She no longer pulled against his grip—her arm had gone limp in his hold.

  “How can I make things right?” he asked.

  “You can let go of me right now, and never touch me again,” she said. Her voice trembled, but that didn’t dull its edge.

  “What?” Ewan had not been expecting quite so definitive a statement. In fact, he’d thought perhaps he could just kiss her. That’s what women wanted when they were upset, he’d been told. That’s what she had wanted from him before. He was out of his depths.

  “I am asking you to relinquish your hold on me. For the remainder of our trip, I ask that you make no assumptions about what passed between us and to not touch me so boldly again.”

  Ewan let go of her, the headache flaring to life in his skull. “May I ask why?” There was no logic to her behavior, or if there was, it was lost to him.

  “Because if I learned one thing from what I read today, it’s that I cannot trust you, or myself.” Her voice shook a little but she kept her head high.

  “It’s not fair of you to punish me for your father’s cowardice,” he said. He didn’t know why he debated. He didn’t want anything more. Wasn’t that the case?

  “And it is not fair of you to ask me not to,” she retorted. “My entire life has been based on one lie after another, and those from people who knew and cared for me. And I should expect more from you, who I barely know? Surely you know that when we reach Tennessee you will go back to your life and I will have to start mine from scratch. There is nothing to be gained from pretending anything can come of . . . this, and I am too tired to pretend otherwise.”

  “But—”

  “But what?” She stepped toward him in challenge, the moonlight reflected in her eyes.

  She stared at him, and none of his words came to him. She was correct; he had spent the last several weeks reminding himself that his feelings for her were something to be repressed and ignored. Even if the thought of parting from her made him feel hollowed out, he was not the kind of man she needed or deserved. Best to cauterize whatever feelings he had now, before she discovered who he really was.

  For another will not hurt you unless you please. You will be hurt only if you think you are hurt. Epictetus’s words didn’t explain the numbness that fell over him, because it wasn’t a numbness in which one felt nothing. It was the burning, impotent pain of a limb that has been slept upon and then called into quick usage.

  “Well?” Her voice was both hard and fragile, an eggshell containing emotions that would remain a mystery to Ewan unless he applied enough pressure to crack it.

  “Nothing,” he said stiffly. “I’m a stranger to you, and you do not owe me anything. I will refrain from further contact for the duration of our journey.”

  “Of course you will,” she bit out, and then spun on her heel and stormed off. Ewan was completely confused. He had conceded to her wish and yet that seemed to make her more angry. He had a mind to catch up to her, to demand what exactly she was playing at, but what would that gain him? Or her, for that matter?

  Instead, he kept a few yards behind her, following the sounds of her footsteps. The night wore on, and she was stumbling more than walking after a certain point, but Ewan fought the urge to go to her. Eventually the stumbling stopped, and he realized it was because they were walking on a well-worn path. He jogged to catch up to her, and she didn’t turn even when he was at her side.

  “Do you think it wise to follow this path?” he asked.

  “Do you think it wise not to?” she retorted. “We must find a place to hide ourselves. Listen.”

  Ewan strained and heard nothing for a moment, and then a low murmur carried on the early morning wind. The sun had not yet risen, but he heard the low sound of singing, as if a church service was going on. They headed toward it, walking for a few moments before they came upon a small clearing, where a circle of people were standing around a fire. They were gathering up their things, as if making ready to leave.

  Ewan looked over the group: their dark skin and ragged clothing. For a moment he took them for runaways; then he saw the large metal pots on the ground—he’d heard they were held up dur
ing secret gatherings to prevent sound from traveling. The group turned to them, one woman’s eyes large with fear, several faces creased with confusion when they saw both Marlie and Ewan and realized they were together.

  “Hello,” Marlie said calmly, as if they were all gathered in front of the general store and not in the middle of the woods.

  “ ’Lo,” one of the men replied, and several others echoed him.

  “Do you know any place around here we could take shelter until nightfall?” she asked. “We’re heading to Tennessee.”

  The group shared another look, one that involved raised brows and pensive frowns.

  “Ya’ll can come with me,” an older woman said with a sigh.

  “There’s space in the hayloft, and massa don’t never go up there. I hid a few Yanks up there week before last and it was fine.”

  “You sure, Sallie?” one of the men asked. “There’s that empty house down by the plantation, too.”

  “Naw, that place ain’t safe. Slave catchers been lying in, waiting to catch folks. Man met his wife there for some private time and got the lash ’cause they said he was trying to ’scape.”

  An older man with his hands shoved in his pockets piped up. “I would take them, but massa got suspicious after the last Yanks what came through ran off with one of his pigs. He checks the grounds every night, and been keeping an eye on me.”

  He looked pointedly at Ewan.

  “I won’t steal any livestock.”

  The man continued to stare at him.

  “Or anything else,” Ewan said. “I wouldn’t take advantage of kindness bestowed upon me in that way.”

  He pointedly didn’t look at Marlie; he wasn’t sure she’d vouch for that as a statement of fact. He felt a pressure in his skull as he recalled what she had said to him, but there was nothing further to discuss. He wanted her, he couldn’t have her, and trying to convince her of the former while knowing the latter would have been as unkind as she suspected him of being.