Innocent Deceptions

by Gwyneth Atlee

  For the hundredth time, she cursed herself for the note that she had sent him. How could he believe her foolish declaration? How could any sane man credit words of love from her? She tormented herself by envisioning him passing her note around the parlor in the evening, by listening to the imagined hilarity as the officers amused themselves with the idea that she was trying the same trick again. Even more painful was the thought that they believed her words and howled with mirth to think she’d been impaled on her own sword.

  Which was, of course, exactly what had happened.

  She heard the click of a key turning at the lock that sealed off the upper floor, and her gaze darted toward the doorway. As the sound of footsteps swelled in the stairwell, she wondered that Tillie was returning Alexander so soon. But a quick glance through the open window assured her that both the woman and the child remained outside.

  Charlotte barely had time to wonder if Ben had at last decided to come when Jonathan Snyder stepped into the room, a large basket in his hands. Charlotte felt her muscles tense and her pulse quicken, not only because of his warnings the last time he had come, but because Tillie had told her that he’d been ordered not to come again. His gaze roamed over her body without apology. It reminded her of the time she’d caught him leering at the downstairs statuary, but in this case, she suspected he meant only to intimidate her as he had before.

  “You may set the basket down right here,” she told him quickly and gave the secretary’s writing surface a hurried pat. Perhaps he only meant to drop it off and leave. But the way he continued to look at her battered at that hope. If she’d felt uncomfortable with Colonel Williams’ lecherous gazes, she felt increasingly unnerved by the sandy-haired lieutenant’s. She tried to suppress the thought that, with his height and build, he resembled Edgar Martin. Why hadn’t she marked the similarity before?

  “What is it?” she demanded, trying to disguise her growing nervousness. “Have you come to threaten me again?”

  His smile appeared pleasant, but his eyes were chips of ice. “Why, Charlotte. I’m surprised at you.”

  When he took a step nearer, she forced herself not to back away. He’d already shown himself to be a bully. She mustn’t allow him to see her fear and use it as a weapon.

  But like all bullies, he appeared to be aware of his effect. He closed on her, over six feet of well-conditioned muscle – and a man who had every reason to desire her silence.

  “As your betrothed,” he said, allowing irony to frost the pretty word, “it’s only natural that I feel concern about your welfare.”

  “If you must know, my throat is quite sore,” she lied quickly. “I doubt that it could bare the strain of . . . testifying.”

  When he reached toward her, she flinched. He shook his head, then gently touched her throat. Her breath came shuddering out between her parted lips.

  Only a bully, she reassured herself. If I don’t react, he’ll leave.

  His huge hand spanned her neck as he stared into her eyes. “It seems a pity that I never had the chance to kiss you, Charlotte. I think you owe me that at least, after all you’ve put me through. Don’t you?”

  Charlotte jerked away and glared at him, though her heart was hammering its way out of her chest. Her senses filled with nightmare glimpses of Edgar’s face above hers, the hot puffs of his breath against her cheek while he had – No, she couldn’t think about that, couldn’t allow herself to believe that Jonathan Snyder might be suggesting such a thing. Even so, she felt her mind retreating, withdrawing to a place outside herself.

  The sense of detachment was so complete that the steel of her own voice startled her. “Touch me, and I swear I’ll see you dead.”

  As their gazes locked, Charlotte imbued hers with every fiber of determination in her being. The frightened child inside her slipped back into the shadows, and she knew that she had meant her threat. She had not only the will but the means, in the very testimony he meant to prevent her from delivering. She could minimize or magnify his role with words, a weapon that they both knew she had mastered.

  She saw the change in Jonathan’s expression as he realized how his own threat had turned against him and as his mind redrew the line he dared not cross. The hand that had touched her neck dropped to his side.

  “I’ve never been so wrong about a woman,” he told her.

  She thought his words must mean concession, but, like him, she was not immune to error.

  As her son’s distant laughter floated through the open window, Jonathan Snyder’s head jerked toward the sound. He turned back more slowly to look into her eyes.

  “Little boys,” he said with the slightest suggestion of a smile, “are magnets for accidents of every sort. It’s clear enough that, in your present circumstances, you can’t watch him every minute. Even after all of this is over, after Williams, McMahon, and I are gone . . . or dead, you’ll still have to trust to strangers to help you watch over him. Yankee strangers, Charlotte. And Yankees have the longest memories.”

  Just like that, her hard-won composure shattered. Ripples expanded outward in increasing circles as this new threat went deep. And Charlotte knew that, even if General Armsworthy sent Alexander to be raised by strangers, she must remain as mute as stone.

  o0o

  Ben cursed the architect of this house, who had seen fit to put in so many stairs. Or perhaps he ought to curse instead the late Franklin Randolph, who had no doubt insisted that his mansion tower over all the others in the neighborhood. Ben thought with satisfaction of his own no-nonsense home. Though it sprawled with a couple of additions the family had added, there was nary a step in the whole house, nor any of the fussy details that dripped from every nook and cranny of this monstrosity.

  Maybe it was the pain in his left leg, but he missed home now more than ever. The last few weeks, he’d spent more and more time wondering what he was doing here in Memphis while his brother struggled single-handedly to hold onto the ranch. Though he understood Grant’s rationale for placing him here to watch over the old general, Ben sometimes felt that his function as a spy, watching for General Branard to sink beyond the last hope of redemption, was no nobler than the part Charlotte had played. Ben knew that his actions, as he sought to nullify Branard’s condition and capitalize on the remnants of his genius, skirted not only the edges of General Grant’s orders but catastrophe as well. Sooner or later, he suspected the entire situation would erupt into disaster.

  He wondered at the fact that he had found the door to the third story unlocked. How had Tillie been so certain he would go see Charlotte now? But before he’d climbed half the steps, voices floated down the open stairwell from the floor above. One of the two speakers was definitely male.

  Cursing his bad luck, he turned around. The last thing he needed was Branard questioning him about why he had decided to come here. But before he could take another step, he realized it was not the general he heard speaking. But what other man would be upstairs with Charlotte?

  Ben resumed his climb, this time biting back his pain to move as quickly as possible. By the time he reached the top, he recognized the voice of Charlotte’s visitor, Jonathan Snyder.

  With the realization, something fisted inside Ben’s belly. Had he been right in his suspicion that she had written other notes confessing both her regret and her true love? Of course she’d chosen Snyder, Ben thought, forgetting the weeks he had ignored her plea. A woman like Charlotte would want an ambitious, handsome man, as well as a strong and whole one.

  Ben swore under his breath. He’d been a damned fool coming up here, burning with the need to tell her how he’d missed her presence, how he would do almost anything to talk to her, to touch her . . .

  Though suspicion churned under that idea, still he hesitated, thinking that there was something he was missing. There. Though he could not make out the words, he heard the unmistakable thread of malice woven through the quiet conversation.

  His jealousy, he realized, had nearly overwhelmed his sense. As he mo
unted the last steps, he heard Charlotte’s normal eloquence shift into words that shocked him: “All right, you son of a bitch. You’ve won.”

  Every ache forgotten, Ben rushed through the nursery door, where he saw Snyder standing face to face with her. Ben was not prepared for the jolt of emotion he felt at the sight of Charlotte, tears streaming down her face.

  “What the hell is going on here, Snyder?” he demanded, raising his cane as if he meant to strike.

  Jonathan backed out of range. “Chandler? I thought you were still in bed . . . recovering from your latest war wounds.”

  Ben heard the scorn in the man’s voice, the clear reminder that he was younger, several inches taller, and in possession of both legs. But the Ohio-born lieutenant hadn’t grown up wrestling calves for branding or pulling rank steers out of river mud.

  “I want a straight answer, Lieutenant,” Ben said, lowering the cane, “or by God, I promise I’ll prove to you that I only need one foot to kick your ass.”

  Another glance at Charlotte’s pale face and Ben silently begged the man to give him some excuse to do just that.

  “What do you care about what happens up here?” Snyder belatedly challenged. “Unless the general was wrong about the two of you.”

  When Ben said nothing, Snyder smirked. “That’s what I’ve been saying. She might not have named you, but you’re no better than the rest of us. Maybe worse, since you’re still clearly panting after her.”

  “Last chance, Snyder,” Ben said.

  “It – it was nothing,” Charlotte stammered. “The lieutenant was only bringing me my mail.”

  “That’s exactly right, Captain. And I apologize if you took my remarks as disrespect.” A pleasant smile lifted the lieutenant’s mustache, but his eyes looked wary.

  Disturbed by Charlotte’s unexpected denial, Ben asked her, “Why did you swear at him, then?” Certainly, he’d never heard her use such language in the past.

  She colored, and he could almost hear her nimble mind as it cast about for some excuse. He counted it as proof of her distress that no lie came to her rescue.

  Jonathan chose one for her. “She was angry that I turned her down. You see, Miss Randolph offered me certain favors if I would help in her escape.”

  Shock and fury washed over her features as swiftly as a summer squall. Her mouth dropped open, and Ben waited for her onslaught, but at a look from Snyder, she clamped her jaw again.

  Ben was growing more impatient by the moment. “I don’t know what’s going on here, Lieutenant, but I’m damned well going to find out. Starting with why you came here in the first place, contrary to the general’s orders.”

  “Tillie was busy, so the general asked me to take care of the mail this time,” Snyder said.

  “I intend to check that story.”

  Snyder shrugged. “Suit yourself. But you know as well as I do that the old man only remembers about half of what he says.”

  “Just get out of here,” Ben told him, “and rest assured, I’ll deal with you downstairs.”

  “I’ll be waiting, Captain.” Snyder glanced one last time at Charlotte before leaving the room.

  The moment Ben heard the door close at the bottom of the stairs, he became conscious that for the first time in weeks, he was alone with Charlotte. And everything he’d felt for her came rushing back at him: from the old desire to protect her to the ease he’d felt in talking with her while they’d watched her child play and, nearly overpowering in its intensity, a need to touch her and to taste her, to feel her moving beneath him. But every bit of it was tainted by what she had done, and by the lies she’d told to do so.

  A sense of loss scraped him raw, as painful as the moment he’d realized the surgeon meant to take his lower leg. It was all he could do to form words.

  “You can tell me now,” he said, though his words rang hollow. “Snyder’s gone. Did he harm you in any way?”

  She shook her head. “I’m fine . . . except – except I’ve missed you, Ben. I thought you’d never come.”

  The way she looked at him set a deep ache throbbing. If he wasn’t careful, he would fall under her spell again. He could not afford that; he must have answers first.

  “Did he threaten you?” Ben asked.

  Disappointment filled her face, but she masked it in a moment. “He’s angry that I made a fool of him, and he’s hoping I won’t be persuaded to share details . . . as if I’d want to. I’ve ruined enough lives already. It’s finished now.”

  “You’d risk losing your son?”

  “I risked him from the moment I began this madness,” she explained, her gaze drifting toward the window. “Perhaps Armsworthy’s right. Perhaps I don’t deserve to raise him. It seems unfair to keep a child imprisoned for my crimes.”

  Ben would bet his other foot that there was something else at work. It was inconceivable that Charlotte would let her child be taken from her without a fight. What the hell had Snyder done to her?

  Before he could demand an answer, Charlotte changed the subject by saying, “Tell me, why did you come up here?”

  He sat down on the bed and stretched his left leg before him. She surprised him by sitting beside him. They were so close that either of them could easily reach out to touch the other. Yet a wall of lies divided them as surely as the strictest chaperon.

  “Your note,” Ben admitted. “I’ve been thinking on it quite a while, wondering if you’d written three more copies.”

  He saw fresh tears well in her eyes, though none fell, and he felt ashamed of his own cruelty. Even though she’d hurt him, he hated the idea that he’d stooped to petty abuse to salve his wounds.

  “What do you believe now?” she dared to ask.

  “Maybe you should answer that same question first. Maybe then, I’ll know what to think. Because right now, I feel damned dizzy, like I’ve been chasing my own tail. Everything I stood for, everything that used to make such sense has spun around so much that --” He shook his head, frustrated by the task of putting what he’d felt these past weeks into words.

  “I know,” she told him. “As much as I would like to, I can’t hold on to the way the world once was – or at least the way that I believed it. I was so certain I was right – that my family and the South were completely correct in the matter of secession and, of course, in our ‘peculiar institution.’”

  “And now?” he prompted.

  “Now I realize that every idea has its shadows; every privilege has its price. And slavery is proving more expensive than I ever would have guessed. I’ve been so worried about Ida April in particular. Tillie couldn’t tell me anything.”

  “The laundress, Mrs. Perkins, slipped away from town while awaiting trial. We haven’t found a trace of her. As for the ‘contraband,’ we traced her to her owners here in town, and returned Ida April to their custody. Then all of them were ordered out of Federal territory.”

  Charlotte closed her eyes. “Thank God. Sometimes . . . sometimes justice is so much harder on the Negro. I’ve been having nightmares she’d be whipped or murdered.”

  “Tillie was right about you. She said that you were changing.”

  Charlotte shrugged. “I wouldn’t say I’m ready to ride the abolitionist bandwagon and knit socks for Yankee soldiers. And I won’t say it hasn’t been painful, or that I haven’t wondered what my father --” Her voice hitched, but she fought to control it. “— what my father would have said.”

  “It does hurt,” Ben admitted, “looking at our loyalties, wondering which are right. It’s almost as hard as fighting my feelings for you.”

  Charlotte breached the unseen wall, reached through to lay her hand on his. He stood again, and their brief contact slid away.

  “What is it that scares you?” she asked quickly.

  He looked at her a long time, and he thought of walking out of there, of never seeing her again. “You do,” he finally answered. “Or maybe I should say ‘we do’ instead.”

  She stood again. “There’s nothing
here to be afraid of.”

  “Isn’t there?” Again, he tried to change the subject, to remind himself of all the reasons he’d be better off if he walked out and never came back to this room. “Was there ever really a Timothy or an angry uncle?”

  She shook her head. “Timothy never existed, and my uncle’s off somewhere fighting for the Confederacy.”

  “What about the cut and bruise?” He gestured toward her cheekbone, now long healed.

  “That night I ran down the stairs, I’d left Alexander on the porch roof in the rain. I fell as I tried to retrieve him. The injury proved . . . convenient.”

  “Who sent you?” Ben asked, sensing that she would never have attempted such a dangerous act and risked her child without someone compelling her to do so. “Was it your brother?”

  “I told you, I’m finished hurting others. And it’s not important anyway.”

  “If I knew that information and if I knew exactly what the lieutenants and the colonel gave you, I could make certain no one else died because of what you did.”

  She crossed her arms over her stomach. “No Yankees, you mean. But can you honestly tell me that my testimony would not be used to ambush Southern men? Or to capture Confederate spies?”

  When he did not immediately answer, she continued. “One of the things I’ve come to love about you is your honesty, no matter what the cost.”

  “I wish I could say the same for you.”

  Her shoulders sagged, and she nodded. “I understand why you would say that. But I am being honest now.”

  He couldn’t help but smile.

  “All right. I admit it. I’ve claimed something of the sort before.” She threw up her hands. “But don’t you understand, I’ve lost.”

  “I wouldn’t want to bet on that just yet.”

  Her brows knit in obvious irritation. “What? Do you truly believe what Snyder told you? That I mean to seduce my way out of this trouble?”