“The policemen will not bother you,” Josiah said with a voice of calm certainty. “Apparently young Thibodeaux has made a serious nuisance of himself in town. They’re glad to have a criminal charge to make against him.”
Pegeen’s eyes widened. “You mean they’re going to arrest a white man for attacking a slave?”
Josiah settled on the edge of the bed, careful not to touch her again. “No, my little firebrand, things are changing, but not that much. They’re charging him with assault on William, who is a freeman, and attempted theft of valuable property. They’ll make sure he doesn’t bother us or anyone else for a long, long time.”
One worry fell away from Pegeen, but it hadn’t been the worst one. Josiah hadn’t said anything about what he was going to do. “And I’m the valuable property?” When Josiah nodded, she took all her courage in her hands and asked, “Am I still valuable to you?”
Gently, Josiah brushed back a tangled lock of her hair. “You are very valuable to me.”
Pegeen smiled with a radiance that made her almost beautiful. “So everything is all right, then. You’ve had a trying day… let me rub your back… and perhaps your front?”
Josiah laughed. “You amaze me, Pegeen. You’ve been assaulted and protected yourself with great courage, and now you want to spoil me?”
“I want to please you,” she said huskily. “Don’t you want me?”
It was a silly question. The bulge in the front of his trousers was answer enough, but Pegeen was astonished when he shook his head. “You’re hurt. I don’t want to strain or hurt you.”
“You won’t.”
“Now how am I supposed to pleasure you without pressing on these?” he asked, his grin forced as he gently touched the nipple of one of her bruised breasts. The distended front of his trousers almost appeared to shiver with desire.
The touch of his fingers made Pegeen tingle as if they had been dipped in cold water. She wanted him, wanted him with a physical passion that she had never known before. Instead of merely pleasing, she wanted to share, to experience, to blend and become one with this strange, dark man as she absorbed him into her body. It was a feeling she had never had before.
Tentatively she reached out her hand and laid it across the bulge in his trousers, gratified at how it pulsed at her touch. She rubbed it, this time a little harder, feeling the hardness of him reaching for her. He moaned deeply in his throat and closed his eyes, clenching his fists to keep from grabbing her.
“Better stop that, or it’ll be all over…” he murmured.
Pegeen smiled. “Undress for me. Let me watch.”
Josiah chuckled and skinned out of his shirt. He kicked off his shoes and with some difficulty unbuttoned his trousers, which were stretched taut by his excitement.
Though his body was now familiar to Pegeen, she still got a rush of unexpected feeling when his trousers were undone and the great dark log of his erection leapt out like a separate entity bent on tracking her down. Distended and hungry-looking, it looked longer and thicker than ever, while that movable and fascinating sack containing his balls hugged so close to his body it appeared that it was hiding.
Rising on her knees and leaning forward, Pegeen took the monster into her mouth, enjoying the fullness of it and even the man-taste of the tiny drop of liquid that oozed out of the tip. She licked, sucked, and teased the little tip of loose flesh at the end until Josiah groaned and shuddered…
And withdrew.
“No,” Pegeen moaned involuntarily.
“I’ll finish,” Josiah said through gritted teeth. “You don’t like…”
“I want you in me,” Pegeen said. “Please.”
He looked at her, his dark eyes warm. “I want to be in you, but I’ll hurt you.”
“Backwards,” cried Pegeen, kneeling on all fours and raising her rump.
Desire flared in Josiah’s strained face, then was brought under control. “Are you ready?”
Somewhat to Pegeen’s surprise she was. Between her legs she could feel herself getting puffy and moist with wanting him. She nodded sharply, made urgent by her own need, and smiled with satisfaction as he climbed on the bed behind her.
There was no teasing, no hesitating, no finesse. Josiah’s arousal was too great. With a single great shove he entered her, stretching her, filling her, hurting just a little but it felt so good she didn’t care. Bruises and strains forgotten, Pegeen matched him thrust for thrust with animal intensity, feeling him go deeper within her than anyone had ever gone before. It was as sexual a moment as she had ever known and the only bad part was that she could not see him, see his face as he shuddered and shouted and filled her with warm, sticky liquid.
Chapter Eight
Josiah had occasionally had a woman in this position and had not really cared for it. Until now. He could feel himself swelling more and more with every thrust, plunging into her until it felt as if they might meld into one. Just the sight of her unmarked white back, now nicely smooth and no longer scrawny, stretched out before him and his dark hands holding tightly to her hips as he dove ever deeper into the softness of her depths was as arousing an image as he could ever hope to see.
He exploded with a release so profound that it threatened to deprive him of consciousness, but he managed yet one more thrust and it rewarded him with the surprisingly physical spasm of her climax. She cried out wordlessly, her soft inner cavern tightening about him like a closing fist. He grasped her hips even harder, pulling her fast against him as she arced and writhed through a shuddering orgasm.
Even in his semi-conscious state Josiah was careful of her bruises as he lay down and pulled her into his arms. They lay quietly, spent and gasping, her head on his shoulder. Twisted and tangled, her hair spread over the pillow. In the gaudy glare of the setting sun’s light it looked, Josiah noted vaguely just before he slept, almost like a lake of flame.
The sleep of satiation didn’t last long; there were still vestiges of twilight in the sky when Josiah awoke and the room was a dim symphony of blacks and pale greys. The evening light had even leached the color from Pegeen’s red hair, making her look more like a carving in alabaster than a living woman.
“Are you awake?” she whispered, her voice hardly more than a breath against his skin.
“Yes. Why are you?”
Pegeen blinked. Her eyes were still green in the poor light, the soft green of new spring grass. “Because I’m not asleep,” she answered in some confusion, then surprisingly giggled. “Because I feel too good.”
“This isn’t the first time you’ve come.”
She shook her head. “No. But it was the best. You’re the only man who’s ever made me feel like that. Is it that good for you every time?”
Josiah stretched and resettled Pegeen on his shoulder, pulling her closer until her tangled locks brushed against him, the silky red catching and mingling with his short coarse hair.
“If you mean do I come every time, yes.”
“Is it that good for all men?”
Josiah chuckled. “It isn’t a general topic of conversation, but I suppose so.”
“Now I can understand why you men like poking so much. Women aren’t even supposed to enjoy it.”
“That’s ridiculous.” Gently Josiah brushed back the hair from her face. The light had gone so much that now she was nothing but a pale blur. Even the color of her eyes was no longer visible. “Why shouldn’t women enjoy sex?”
“Because men don’t want them to,” Pegeen said simply, snuggling into his shoulder. “They’re probably afraid their women might go looking for something better if they don’t like what they’ve got at home. Men do it all the time, but they don’t want their women doing it.”
Like today, Josiah thought, his mind returning to his bleak ruminations of the afternoon. Pegeen was nothing but a thing to that bastard, a thing to use and forget.
“We’ve got to think about your future.”
Pegeen had been dreading this moment. “Must we?” she
asked in a small voice. “I’m sleepy.”
For someone who was sleepy she sounded remarkably alert to Josiah’s ears, but he let it pass. He wanted to think things through.
“Go to sleep then.” His muscles protested as he heaved himself out of bed and groped in the dark for his clothes.
“You aren’t going to stay?”
“Your bed is too small for two. Besides, I have some work to do. Do you want me to send Old Ellen up with some supper?”
She shook her head. “No. I’m not hungry.”
“Sleep well, then,” Josiah said as he softly closed the door.
He walked to his room naked and pulled on the lightweight cotton dressing gown he favored, then sent for Old Ellen. Pegeen might not be hungry, but he was ravenous.
The old woman knew her master well, for when she came up the steps she bore a tray of cold meats and some salad.
“T’was all I could save from that good dinner you let go to waste,” she grumbled with the freedom of an old and valued servant.
Knowing it was probably all that had been prepared and that the old woman was exhausted, Josiah said nothing as she laid the tray on his desk, save “How is William?”
“Right, miserable. Gave him some of my juju drink. Kills the pain and heals ‘em fast, but it’s going to be a while until he feels good again.”
“I’ll find you some maids tomorrow, I promise.”
Old Ellen eyed him suspiciously. “Seems like that was what you was a-doin’ last week when you came home with that red-haired daughter of Satan. I’d rather keep on doing all the work myself than have you bring home another troublemaker like that.”
“I didn’t realize you thought she was a troublemaker.”
The old face softened as she turned at the door. “Oh, she’s not a bad girl, not in herself. Helpful, and a good worker, but she can’t help being what she is, and she’s a right magnet for trouble.”
There was no way Josiah could argue with that. It had been his thought exactly.
I must have been mad to buy her, he thought as he tucked into his dinner. It’s just that she reminded me so much…
He stopped, startled to find that it was the first time he had thought of Marianne all day. He couldn’t even remember if she had passed his mind the day before. Marianne, the red-headed witch who had haunted him for years.
Which was interesting, but did not solve the problem of what to do with Pegeen. If he kept her here, things could only get worse. The planters and the businessmen were polite to him, but he held no illusions that they were his friends. He was respected because he was wealthy and had the power wealth brings, but respect was neither tolerance nor friendship. He had never been invited to any of the white people’s homes, had never been introduced to white wives or daughters, and knew he never would be.
There were many who would resent his owning a white woman. That sniveling rat Thibodeaux had only acted on what probably a great number of Charleston men were thinking.
So what was he to do about it? Keeping her could incur difficulties, perhaps not among the more genteel strata of society, but there was a large, ignorant underbelly of the city where men fought first and thought afterwards. To laborers too poor to own even one slave the thought of a darkie owning a white woman, using a white woman sexually could be incitement to riot.
What was I thinking? He put his head in his hands and groaned.
The door opened slowly with a slight creak. Josiah tensed until he saw the pale face, the fall of red hair.
“What are you still doing up?”
“I saw your light,” Pegeen answered, evading the question, “so I knew you were still awake. I thought you might be feeling poorly and would like me to rub your back or something.”
“Girl, you were damn near killed today! You should be asleep.”
“I’m all right.”
“Then come here and sit down.” When she sat opposite him at the small desk, he looked at her so intently that she shivered. She looked so uncomfortable and so frightened and yet so determined to hide it that it made him feel like an ogre. Worse yet, he wanted her. Again. In spite of having had her just a short time before. He could feel the desire rising in his blood and his mind, but his traitorous body ignored it and stayed flaccid.
“The question is, what are we to do with you?” he said more to himself than to her and was totally unprepared for the flash of panic in her eyes.
“Are you going to sell me?”
Of course, that had been his first thought, sell her, get her out of his house, and forget about the whole thing.
Of course, he couldn’t. He would not only be putting her in danger, he would be breaking his own most sacred vow.
“I’ve never sold a slave.”
The fear in her face abated a little, but didn’t vanish altogether. “There’s always a first time.”
“Not for that, not for you.”
It wasn’t, Josiah told himself, because of the pleasure this strange girl gave him. He could only imagine the future of a white female slave, especially a pretty white female slave, after she had been in a Negro’s bed. No respectable household would have her, and as for a non-respectable owner… No, he couldn’t live with that.
“You know what you’d be facing, don’t you?”
Pegeen nodded, her face carefully averted.
“I couldn’t do that to you. I never should have bought you in the first place…”
Her head popped up, green eyes pleading. “Please don’t say that! Your buying me was the best thing that’s ever happened to me! I – I … You make me feel like a person,” she stammered at last.
“You are a person, Pegeen, and that’s why I’ve decided to set you free.” The words surprised Josiah even as he said them, but he knew instantly it was his only choice. He would take a terrible financial loss, for in his madness he had spent a veritable fortune for the girl, but there was no other solution.
“Free?” The fear in her eyes came back. “But I would have to go, then. What will become of me? What will I do?”
Another problem. She did not have the drive, nor the acumen to make the transition from slave to free woman easily.
“That’s something I’m going to have to think on,” he said slowly. She would need schooling, of course, and she couldn’t stay here or anywhere around here where someone might know of her story. He would have to send her North, where she could start a new life. Of course he’d have to support her for a while… The prospect was daunting.
“Don’t, please!” she cried, her face distorted with distress. “I’ll be a good girl. I’ll clean and I’ll help Old Ellen more and I’ll do whatever you want me to. Don’t send me away.”
There were tears in those big green eyes, Josiah was disturbed to notice. Of course the girl was afraid. This would be a big transition for her, more so than just being sold from master to master. From the moment of her manumission on she would have to be responsible for herself in the free world, something she was completely incapable of now.
“It’s not going to happen tonight.” Josiah forced a smile.
“Don’t I please you?”
“You please me more than any woman ever has,” he said in all truth. “But you must see that this situation can’t go on. I did a great wrong in buying you, and I will do what is necessary to make it right.”
The tears rose and then fell, sliding down her pale cheeks and glinting like stars in the candlelight. “But what can I do? All I know is housework and how to please a man.”
“School of some sort… millinery, perhaps?” Josiah didn’t even believe himself. Women had a hard time supporting themselves. What little Pegeen needed was someone to look after her, a husband, but what kind of decent man would marry an ex-slave, especially one who had been used as she had?
“And who would come to me?”
“You’d have to leave Charleston, and probably the South.” Josiah hardened his heart against the stricken look in her eyes. “Perhaps up North s
omewhere? Give yourself a new history and a new name…”
Josiah noted the rigid impassivity of her face and how hard she tried not to cry. There was a strength of character there, a kind of power held by very few. Who knew what unplumbed depths hid in this slave? What a woman she was; what a woman she could become! If only he could keep her!
“You should be happy.”
She looked anything but. “You’ve never been a slave,” she said in a small voice that sounded almost like breaking glass. “You have control over your life.”
“You’re wrong,” Josiah replied on impulse. His story was known to very few, and none in Charleston, not even his own people. “I was born a slave.”
“But that’s not possible! You’re rich. You own slaves. How?” Amazement filled her face.
“It’s a long story, and I’m tired. I just want to sleep now.”
“Then come to bed and let me rub your back.”
Josiah knew that if he let her come to his bed probably there would be more than his back rubbed, but the prospect was too pleasant to pass by. If he were going to have to rid himself of this tempting witch, he might as well enjoy her while he had her.
Peeling away his lightweight dressing gown he lay face down on the bed, as much to hide his lack of physical arousal as for comfort. She had seen him fully erect; somehow he had a reluctance to let her see him shrunken and soft.
The bed shifted as she crawled in beside him after shedding her simple shift. Sitting cross-legged beside him, her knees barely touching his side, she began to run her hands up and down the dark expanse of his muscular back.
“Did you get those when you were a slave?” she asked, her fingers pausing on the silvery webwork of his scarred shoulders. It was a brave act; slaves did not generally question their owners about anything.
“Yes.”
“What for?”
“Curious, aren’t you?” There was a hint of a chuckle in Josiah’s voice. She was a spunky little thing, he had to give her that.
“Yes. I’m sorry. I just can’t help but be curious about you. You’re a Negro, but you’re rich. You used to be a slave, but now you own slaves yourself. I’m sorry.”
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