Peeking through the crack between the panels of the screen, she watched the last girl Alex had danced with mimic a heaving bosom to her friends. She pouted her lips and lifted her nose in an offensively superior attitude.
The others laughed and threw out comments of their own.
They were making fun of Miranda. She knew it without understanding a word they said. And they were crowing because they all knew Alex wanted nothing to do with her.
Miranda and her sisters had always been the targets of such scorn from women, and she wouldn’t have stayed there hiding for all the world. This attitude was the one that had propelled Charlotte to want to reclaim their heritage.
She stepped out from behind the privacy screen, making her presence known. The room immediately fell quiet. She smiled at the six women in the room before walking over to the mirror where Alex’s dance partner still stood. Making it a point to stand close to the woman, Miranda reached for the pitcher of lemon-scented water to pour into the basin.
She moved with deliberate grace, conscious that they watched her closely. Good. Let them be the ones to feel uncomfortable.
However, as she poured water into the basin, Alex’s dancing partner hit Miranda’s elbow with her hip. Water spilled outside the basin and onto Miranda’s dress.
Miranda looked up in surprise.
“Perdão,” the young woman threw out, her sneer belying any apology in the word. Her friends giggled behind her. One of them opened the door, and they all fell over themselves hurrying out into the hall where they could really laugh.
Taking a towel, Miranda blotted her skirt dry, irritated at the pettiness of some women. This was why she and her sisters relied on one another. Even in the valley, where there were five men to every woman, there had been jealousy and gossip. Their neighbor Laurel Wakefield had been married seven years and borne four children. Still, Laurel would never let anyone forget the scandal Miranda had caused with Alex, and for no other reason than she just didn’t like the way Miranda looked.
Her gossip had done the trick. It had marked Miranda and, consequently, Charlotte and Constance. Their father had become even more strict and oppressive.
Miranda had not minded his heavy-handedness or the rumors and innuendoes. After all, she’d earned them. However, it had been unfair to Charlotte and Constance.
Setting the towel aside, she took a deep breath. Her head hurt from the strain of the evening, and not for the first time, she wondered what would have happened if she’d never met Alex. Would she be like Laurel and married with children? Or would there have been another reason for the women in the valley to turn against her and her sisters?
The thought made her angry.
It wasn’t her fault God had made her pretty. She’d had nothing to do with it, but if men were going to go silly and women spiteful around her—well, she should use what she’d been given. Fighting angry, she left the retiring room.
The hallway was empty. Music drifted from the garden. Miranda paused, debating if she should walk out there now, or wait until the music had ended and make an entrance, much as Alex had—
An awareness that she wasn’t alone tickled her mind.
She glanced over her shoulder. The hall was empty…but there was one door open. She studied it a moment, uncertain what was wrong, and then Alex took a step out of it.
For a long moment, their gazes held, and then he turned and disappeared into the room, a signal for her to follow.
Miranda remembered the game well. Ten years ago, it was one they’d played in the forest. She would be on an errand or performing some chore, and she’d have a sense he was there, watching her. Sometimes the sign would be as simple as a feather in a tree. Or she’d hear the sound of his soft laughter or catch the quickest glimpse of him.
And then she would leave whatever she’d been doing and move deeper into the woods, knowing he’d be there waiting for her.
The past became present in her mind. She even imagined she heard him whisper her name. Her pulse quickened. Her feet began moving toward him.
Six
The dark room opened onto a deserted area of the terrace that had been set up for privacy. There was no light save for the moon.
Large pots of conical junipers, gardenias, and tiny trailing flowers shaped like white stars lined the edge of the lattice wall that separated this part of the terrace from the rest of the house. Red roses climbed up the trellis against the support columns. Their heady scent mixed with those of the gardenias.
Beyond the lattice came the music and conversation and laughter from the party. No one would hear them here.
It was the perfect spot for what Alex had in mind.
He could feel her coming. She walked quietly, but he could hear her kid leather dancing slippers move quietly on the tile floor. He stepped into the shadows and waited.
Miranda came out onto the terrace. Moonlight turned her hair to silver and her skin to alabaster. Her eyes were wide and dark. She looked around the terrace, her gaze stopping when she saw him.
Alex stepped forward into the moonlight. “Having a good time this evening leading all those men around by their noses, Miranda?”
Veral Cameron’s daughter took a step back before pulling herself up as regal as a princess. “Is that why you wanted me out here? Is that what you wished to say?”
Oh no, there were questions he wanted answered, and this time there was no one with a horsewhip to protect her.
“Men must come across as fools to you,” he continued conversationally.
“You don’t.” She took another step back. She should be afraid.
“I should,” he said, answering his own question, letting her hear his anger in the depth of his voice. “I was the biggest fool of all.”
Almost defiantly, her face pale, she demanded, “What do you want, Alex? An apology? Would one erase what happened between us?”
No, nothing could do that.
And it made him angry that even now, after all these years, the sound of her voice made his heart skip a funny beat. She had no right to still have control over him. He should leave.
Instead he walked toward her.
She took a step for the door, but then stopped as if rooting herself in place. Miranda was many things, but she was no coward
How much he had once loved her…
He stopped in front of her. With a will of its own, his hand came up to rest on the trimness of her waist. Time might have passed, but some things had not changed. Memories rushed though him.
Alex went hard with a force he’d not experienced since last they’d met. He caught the scent of her hair. “You smell of the forest and of the spring wind in the valley,” he whispered. “I’d forgotten how sweet it was.”
He hated having her in his blood. She was a curse, a weakness that had almost destroyed him, and he’d best remember it—
Miranda leaned toward him, her shoulder against his chest. Her lips formed his name.
Pulling her closer, he let her feel how aroused he was. Her lashes dropped seductively over her eyes. Her nipples hardened…
But the innocence they’d once shared with each other was lost. He brushed his lips against her ear as he said, “And I think you are a pert tart to be dangling for a husband, when the man you married is standing right here next to you.”
Miranda’s eyes flashed. She pushed away, trying to free herself from his hold at her waist, but he kept her close. She attempted to strike out with her other hand. He captured her wrist in an iron grip. She had always been a fighter—in all matters save confronting her father.
She lashed out with words. “We were never married.”
Alex gave her a little shake before pulling her closer. “Why?” he demanded. “Because you don’t believe promises between yourself and an Indian carry weight?”
Her breasts pushed against his chest. “There was no church, no preacher—”
“There was us, Miranda,” Alex was all too conscious that her curves had grown more
womanly over the years. Their bodies fit together well. He focused on his anger. “We were all that mattered back then, or have you forgotten? Do you not remember that night? How we stood beside the river and followed the Shawnee way? Do you remember what I whispered to you?”
She shook her head, refusing to look at him. She tried to wrest her wrist free, but he held fast.
“You are lying,” he accused quietly. “You can’t forget.”
“How do you know?” she threw back at him.
Alex smiled. “Because I can’t,” he admitted sadly.
The music seemed to disappear, and instead, in his mind, he could hear the sounds of that one special night. He could hear the lapping of the water along the Ohio’s banks, the calls of an owl, the music of crickets and frogs.
A magic night.
He began swaying. She resisted. “No, Alex.”
“Then don’t,” he answered, his hand on the small of her back. He rocked back ever so slightly.
This time, she followed.
In the Shawnee ceremony, couples stood in a circle, male in front of female, the tribal elders their witnesses. The couples didn’t touch, but, to the accompaniment of chanting and drums, spoke in low, private voices what was in their hearts. They praised the strength and wisdom of their chosen. They whispered promises that were repeated to each other until finally they had to join, they must go off together, man and wife.
That night there had been no witnesses save for the two of them and the stars in the sky. Their love had been forbidden, their meetings clandestine.
He spoke. “Your eyes reflect the sky. They tell me the truth in your soul.” He said the words first in Shawnee and then repeated them in English, but she knew what he’d said. These were the exact words he’d spoken to her ten years ago.
Miranda shut her eyes, not speaking, her breathing shallow.
“Your hair has captured the sun,” he whispered. “Even in darkness it radiates light.”
She raised her eyes to him. He continued to sway. She remained stiff.
With a touch of irony, he said in Shawnee, “Your body is strong and yet supple,” and then repeated it again in English before adding, “You will bear many children. Brave children who will grow strong in the light of your days.”
At last, something flickered in her eyes. They grew suspiciously shiny, but she didn’t speak.
Stubbornly, Alex continued, “Your voice calls all to you. Even the birds stop their singing to listen to what you say.”
Her lips twisted into a rueful smile.
He raised an eyebrow. “Your voice is like the caw of the crow?” he suggested, wanting her to react to him here and now. “They stop singing because you are so loud?”
The sense of humor that he had once known about her emerged. She laughed in spite of herself, a sound touched with sadness. “Those weren’t the words you used that night.”
“Then you do remember.”
Her smile turned bittersweet. “I could never forget.”
That was what he’d wanted to hear. What he’d known from the moment they’d met on the pier in Ponta Delgada. She could not deny him. He would not let her.
Alex began swaying, and this time she followed, their hips fitting together. “The sound of your laughter is the only music that stirs me.” It was true. He was very stirred right now.
“No brave is stronger than you,” she said, her voice quiet and intent. “You are the hawk. No prey escapes you.”
That was true. He always caught his quarry, and right now, he wanted her. “You are beautiful.”
She blushed, the color in her cheeks making her more becoming. “You have strong teeth,” she whispered,
He couldn’t help but grin. His teeth had been a joke between them. A good number of the trappers who had come to her father’s trading post had lost theirs. “You move with the grace of a doe.”
“You are a mountain lion. Swift and strong.”
“You are my—” He suddenly broke off, coming to a complete halt. He’d been about to say she was his love.
But she wasn’t.
She knew what he’d almost admitted. It was what he’d said to her that night. Gently she pulled away from him.
He let her go.
Miranda walked to the terrace balustrade and rubbed her arms as if suddenly cold. She broke the silence between them. “That was a long time ago, Alex. We were both too young to know what we were doing.”
“It was real to me. I thought of myself as married.”
She pressed her lips together and then gave a small shake of her head before saying, “We never consummated it. Even the Shawnee don’t recognize a marriage unless it is consummated.”
“And promises mean nothing?” he demanded, practically growling the words. His temper was rising. He reached for it. It gave him more control over himself than his lust did.
Miranda lowered her arms, her hands clenching into fists. “I wanted to give myself to you that night. I would have. You refused.”
“Aye, the English part of me insisted on that formality. I wanted all, Miranda. I was tired of hiding with you. I wanted to do what was right.”
A short, angry laugh escaped her. “More fool you, then. Everyone knew Father cheated Indians. I told you he hated them.”
“If I had not faced him, I would have been less than a man.”
Her eyes hardened. “Yes, a foolish one who was almost killed.”
“While you stood and watched,” he flashed back.
“What would you have me do?” she cried. “You appeared in front of him dressed as a Shawnee and asked for my hand in marriage. He hated the Shawnee. Ever since Mother and Ben were killed. You knew that—”
“I refused to be afraid of him.”
“Good!” she said, slicing the air with her hand. “I’m glad you have your pride, but don’t blame me for the outcome. You sound as if you believe I had any control over him. I didn’t. I had to stand and watch while he and his friends tied you to that tree and horsewhipped you. They left you to die. My sisters and I cut you down. Do you remember, Alex? Can you recall any of it at all? I saved your life.”
In truth, Alex remembered very little. The beating had wiped the memories from his mind.
“Father and his friends had decided to go get something to drink at the fort,” she continued quietly. “They talked about giving you Shawnee justice. About burning you at the stake as some members of your tribe had done to a trapper only the month before. They were angry men, Alex.”
That, he remembered.
“I was afraid.” She clasped her hands together tightly, her body stiff. “The violence. I will never forget the violence. I couldn’t let you die that way. When he left, Charlotte helped me free you. We dragged you down by the river. I hoped one of your friends would be close. When we returned the next morning, you were gone.”
Alex had woken in his mother’s wigwam. She’d had harsh words about her son’s foolishness.
“What did your father say when he found me missing?”
“We told him that your friends cut you down while we hid in the house. By then he was too drunk to be coherent. He believed us and let it go.”
Alex rocked back a step, having to adjust his thinking about that day and not liking it. For too long, he’d thought her in the wrong. He thought by some method he had escaped on his own, even though he now realized he couldn’t have.
“I came back for you,” he said. “Why didn’t you tell me this?”
Miranda crossed her arms against her chest. “Would it have made a difference? Alex, there was no future for us.”
“There would have been if you had come with me.”
“I couldn’t,” she said. “I realized that while watching what they were doing to you. I hate the violence, Alex. It comes too easily out there. And I realized I was from a different world. One I couldn’t leave. I didn’t want to be Shawnee. I didn’t want that for my children. I didn’t want to leave my sisters and have them ashamed of
me.”
Her confession turned his blood to ice. “I don’t live in any one world,” he said. “I am my own man.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “An outsider. You relish the role. But I’m not as strong as you are. I learned that then, Alex. I couldn’t leave my family.”
“You were willing to do so before I was beaten,” he replied stonily.
“Because I didn’t know the price my family would have to pay.” Her voice pleaded with him for understanding. “Alex, we cost them so much. Charlotte was being courted by Thomas Grimshaw. He refused to even talk to her after we were found out. Neither she nor Constance has been courted by men since. We’d not been invited to any social gatherings, not even a dance at the fort—”
“What of you?” he couldn’t help demanding. “Did men ignore you, too?” He hated the jealousy in his voice.
If Miranda heard it, she gave no sign. Instead she leaned against the balustrade. “After what happened with us, I wanted to be left alone, which was fine with Father. He kept everyone away. He wasn’t always right in the head, Alex. After Mother and Ben were murdered, he lost himself in drink, but he grew much worse after the beating. He felt I had betrayed him.”
Alex looked at her costly dress and at the shoes and silk stockings that had replaced her bare feet. “You don’t look as if you’ve been suffering.”
She glanced down at her attire as if just now noticing it. “This is a costume,” she said. “I was very much as you’d left me until several months ago when Father died.”
“How did he die?” Cameron had cheated many men, not just Indians. Alex wouldn’t have been surprised to hear he’d received a knife in the back.
Miranda smiled grimly as if reading his thoughts. “It wasn’t like you think,” she said. “He just fell over dead one afternoon. Maybe drink got to him. Maybe something else.”
“Like his conscience?”
“He was my father, Alex. I can remember him when he was happier.”
“I can’t. However, it’s obvious he didn’t leave you destitute.”
“We thought he had,” she countered. “It was by chance we discovered a secret drawer where money had been hidden. We don’t know if he had been the one hiding it or if the money had once been Mother’s. But it gave us the chance to leave the valley.”
The Price of Indiscretion Page 7