“Because the war is over. Really over,” Jeremy said, and he threaded his fingers through hers, lacing them together.
She sighed, leaning her weight against him. “But there’s still so much that isn’t healed!” she said. “Carpetbaggers and riffraff are still half of the ruling force. Daniel’s had to ask another pardon—and it doesn’t sit well with him, I assure you! The schism had remained.”
“Yes, in a way,” Jeremy agreed. He smoothed back her hair. “Christa, you can’t take something as agonizing and devastating as the War of Rebellion—”
“The Civil War,” she corrected.
“We Yanks do call it a War of Rebellion,” he continued patiently, “and think that it can be over because the firing has ended. Christa, it may take years, it may take decades. Our country is just a pup when you compare it with others. The war has come and gone, and we’ve made it as a union! Maybe you can’t see it yet. But it’s time for growth again. Men and women are looking to the West, they’re looking to the cities, they’re searching for opportunities—searching for ways to live, and in living we’ll heal the breach. In little ways, first. Like we’ve healed the breach here!” he said very softly. “We’ve found our peace. Others will find theirs. And a hundred years from now, maybe the Camerons living here will know that the war had to be fought, and had to be lost, for the whole country to be strong.”
She looked up at him, smiling, her blue eyes radiant. She stroked his cheek. “I love you, Jeremy.”
He caught her fingers and kissed them. He cleared his throat. “I love you, too, Christa. More than I could ever say. And I’ve, lain awake nights lately, thinking about it.”
She arched a brow. “I thought that love made you sleep well. When Josey isn’t busy waking us up, that is.”
He smiled. “Yes, but I’ve been thinking.”
“Oh, dear! Yanks are so dangerous when they think!” she teased.
He ran a finger down her nose. “I’m going to tell you what I’ve been thinking despite that comment, Mrs. McCauley!” He paused just a second, then continued. “Jesse wrote me while we were still at Fort Jacobson—”
“Jesse wrote you?”
“Yes, your brother wrote me privately!” he teased, then sobered. “He wanted me to know that your father had left him instructions about a certain parcel of land. It was to be yours if you ever wanted it, once you were married and settled. I imagine Jesse was afraid it might cause a dispute if you had wanted to come home, and I had wanted to stay in the West.”
“The two of us? Have a dispute?” she said, wide-eyed.
He grinned. Since the day he had taken her from Buffalo Run’s encampment, neither of them had ever denied the depths of their love or would ever do so again. But they had learned that not even love curbed hot tempers completely, and that the making up from their inevitable disagreements was a wonderful thing.
“Well, my love, Jesse did grow up with you. He knows, of course, all about your temper.”
“My temper!”
“Errant Rebs seem to come with them,” he teased. She smiled, but then her smile faded. “Oh, Jeremy! I was so grateful for the way that you handled things last night!”
She had made him promise that they would never tell Jesse that John Weland had been seeking revenge against him. The danger was all over, but Jesse, being Jesse, would hound himself about it endlessly.
At dinner they had been talking about traveling, and Jesse had cleared his throat and commented that he was still afraid of being away from home too long—since someone had nearly succeeded in burning down the place just a year ago.
Jeremy had apologized profusely for not having told Jesse earlier that he had come in contact with a man who told him that he knew who had been after the Cameron estate, and that it had been a deranged major who had, since that time, passed away.
Jesse would never know the truth.
And they would all breathe more easily feeling that Cameron Hall was safe.
“You were wonderful!” Christa told him. She kissed his lips, then lay back in his arms, studying him. “You were always wonderful. Even when I was being incredibly rotten, you were considerate of my family.”
He brushed a kiss onto her brow.
“You were quite good to my sister when she came here, too, you know,” he reminded her.
“I loved her right away. Even for a Yankee, she was a sweetheart.”
“Well, I admit, I was partial to your brothers from the start.”
“Even the Reb?”
“Especially the Reb.”
She smiled, leaning against him again, luxuriating in the quiet time and the rare solitude they were enjoying.
“Well?” he said softly.
She opened her eyes wide. “Well?”
“Christa—” he said, then he paused, swallowing. “Christa, when I married you, I dragged you away from here. I took you from everything that you loved, from your family, from your home. I forced you out west, to hardship, to danger. I had no right—”
“You had every right!” she corrected him. “I forced you to marry me, remember?”
“If I hadn’t been willing, no one could have forced me,” he said softly.
“And no one could have forced me west!” she replied.
He disentangled himself from her for a moment, pacing before the fire. Christa, watching him, hugged her knees more tightly and felt a rush of warmth sweep through her. He was naked, and very comfortable and natural that way.
And excessively handsome and alluring, too, so tall, so tautly muscled and sleek, so bronze, touched by the fire that took the chill from the air.
She swallowed and watched his eyes, reminding herself primly that he was trying to talk to her.
He came back to her, a foot upon the window seat, and he stared down at her. “Christa—”
“Out there,” she interrupted him, “in the graveyard, are many of my Cameron ancestors.”
“I know, Christa. That’s the point—”
“The first Camerons to come here were Jassy and Jamie. He was a lord. She married him—”
“I’ve heard this story from Jesse,” Jeremy warned her. “Jassy was a bit of a tart who married Jamie for his house and holdings in England. But he brought her here—”
“Precisely!” Christa whispered softly. “She was a bit of a tart! But she was strong-willed and determined, and she built this home with Jamie and stayed with him here. Because she fell in love with him, you see. And do you know what else?”
“What else?”
“He had to rescue her from Indians too. They were the Pamunkeys, I believe. And they roamed all this land. They’re mostly all gone now.” She flashed him a rueful smile. “Except, upon occasion, you meet a tall blue-eyed, very blond man or woman who happens to be a descendant of Pocahontas and John Smith! Is that what will happen out west, do you think?” she asked him.
He shook his head. “I don’t know. But we do seem to be a gluttonous people. The railroads will go farther soon. We’ll continue to call them savages while we kill their food supplies and steal their land. Maybe one day there will be a peace. I’m afraid that there will be tremendous loss with it. But there’s so much only time will tell.”
She smiled, watching him, feeling a warmth sweep around her. She loved him so much, yet it seemed that she loved him more daily.
She touched his russet hair, marveling at the color and the thick rich feel of it. “The point of this story,” she told him, “is that Jassy gave up what she thought she wanted so much—”
“It was my understanding that he told her she was coming or he would see to it that she did so by force.”
Christa waved a hand in the air. “The point is that she discovered that she loved him with her whole heart. And they came to love this land together, and they built their home here.”
He took both of her hands. “So we will build a home here,” he said.
She shook her head. “You’re not paying attention to me. It doesn’t mat
ter where, Jeremy,” she said.
“There’s still tremendous danger in the West,” he told her. “The Indian problems will not be solved for years!”
“There’s danger, yes, but tremendous excitement and beauty too!”
“There’s beauty here.”
“There’s so much to explore and build in the West,” she argued.
“And there’s so incredibly much to rebuild here, in Virginia,” he said. “I—I brought you from your home. But then discovered how much I loved you. Christa, you and Josiah are my life. And love is far stronger than any need for honor or glory in the West! You hold my heart in your hands. Carry it tenderly, my love. But carry it with you wherever you would go. The future is yours to decide.”
Her eyes widened upon his as she realized just how serious he was.
“But you’re up for promotion again—”
“Christa, there’s a great deal I could do here too.”
She started to tremble. She threaded her fingers through his hair. “Oh, my God, Jeremy!” she whispered. “I love you!”
He caught her hand and kissed her palm tenderly. “Christa—”
“Oh, Jeremy! How strange, and how very sad and curious! That’s one thing that John Weland told me once.”
“Weland!”
She nodded. “He told me that home was where the heart was. And it’s very true. Don’t you see, it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter where we are at all. In your arms, I’m home.”
He rose, and lifted her into his arms. She stared at the glittering silver in his eyes.
“So?” she whispered.
“So …” he said. He whirled around with her and lowered them both before the fire and onto the fur. He came upon his knees and drew her up likewise against him, entwining their fingers together.
“So?”
“So …” He paused and kissed her. Kissed her long and leisurely, savoring the taste and touch and feel of her lips, the brush of their bodies just barely touching one another.
“So?” she repeated one last time.
He smiled, his mouth just a breath away from hers. “So we will worry about it later. As wonderful as Josiah’s aunts are, he will want his supper, and soon. And for now—though I would deprive my son of nothing—I’m afraid I want his mother too. And so I must take my time now.”
“And the future?”
“It will come tomorrow. It always does.”
She smiled. And then her smile was captured in the heat of his next kiss.
The fire raged high and golden around them. The summer cottage enveloped them, a haven for their love, providing them sweet secrecy and enchantment.
Somewhere nearby, the river drifted ever onward. The breeze stirred over the James. Timelessly.
Life went on.
The war was over, Christa reflected. Wherever she was, the war had ended.
They might ride westwardly once again. There was so much to be done in the years to come, the expansion would be tremendous. The frontier was opening as it never had before. There were so many ready for war with the Indians in the West, ready to decimate them. Men like Jeremy—men of peace and strength—would be needed.
They might build here. There was so much needed in the South too. A lot had been done. The land itself was beginning to cover over some of the scars of war. But so much more would be necessary. And yes, it would take years. Decades, maybe. But like a phoenix rising from the ashes, a new South would form. Different. They would be entering an age of progress, of learning, of growth. The South needed good men and women too.
Which would it be for them?
She didn’t know. They needed time. To think, to dream, to talk.
And, she thought, meeting the silver of his gaze and smiling slowly in the comfort of his arms, it didn’t matter.
Just as she held Jeremy’s heart in her hands, he held hers within the tender grasp of his own.
He stirred, holding her close, kissing her forehead.
She smiled within his embrace. It had been a long, long road. A long time since she had stood by the gates of the family cemetery, feeling that she was being torn from her roots, from all that she loved. From all that Jassy and Jamie had built.
But she knew now that Jassy and Jamie would most certainly understand.
Truly, it didn’t matter where she was.
She had finally come home.
Dedication
This one is dedicated to some of the heroes in my own life.
In memory of my father, Ellsworth D. “Dan” Graham, who gave me wings with which to dream and fly. As long as I live, I will cherish his memory.
For my father-in-law, Alphonse Pozzessere, for being the kindest, sweetest man in the world, and having been there for us, so consistently, all these years.
For my stepfather, William Sherman, a gentleman beyond measure. Mom, you got lucky twice!
For my husband, Dennis, for keeping the love, the passion—and the conflict!—so fresh throughout all the boundaries of time. The years just make things better!
And for my three sons, Jason, Shayne, and Derek. I cannot imagine life without them.
Books by Heather Graham from Dell
SWEET SAVAGE EDEN
A PIRATE’S PLEASURE
LOVE NOT A REBEL
DEVIL’S MISTRESS
EVERY TIME I LOVE YOU
GOLDEN SURRENDER
THE VIKING’S WOMAN
ONE WORE BLUE
AND ONE WORE GREY
AND ONE ROAD WEST
LORD OF THE WOLVES
RUNAWAY
SPIRIT OF THE SEASON
About the Author
Heather Graham lives in Florida with her husband and five children. Formerly a professional model, she has written thirteen bestselling historical romances, including the New York Times bestseller And One Rode West.
And One Rode West Page 41