by Beth White
He looked up at that silent, bloodless half orb sailing near the eastern horizon. Despair threatened to overcome his determination to do the right thing. But it seemed God wasn’t finished with Charlie Kincaid, and he mustn’t give in.
He’d ridden perhaps another quarter hour when he noticed a shifting in the horse’s gait, a slight favoring of the right fetlock. He’d been about to stop to rest the animal anyway, so he reined in, slowing Washington to a walk. The trail had taken him into a thick woods, mostly oak and pine, dripping overhead with Spanish moss and filled in below with scrubby underbrush. He’d earlier splashed through standing water here and there, and he should come across a creek or spring before long. Dismounting, he listened for running water as he walked along leading Washington, boots and hooves crunching on the sandy road.
Before long he heard water and turned off the path into a small clearing, obviously a well-used stopping place. While Washington drank from the creek, Charlie pulled flint and candle from the saddlebag he’d taken along with the tack. Lighting the candle, he crouched to examine the horse’s legs and feet. He could see nothing amiss on either fetlock, but when he picked up the right one and bent it, Washington flinched. The lower joint was swollen and overly warm.
Charlie sat on his heels, muttering imprecations under his breath. How could he be so careless as to take a lame horse? He could just as easily have taken Bonnie, but he’d thought he would make better time on the bigger, stronger stallion. Fiona would no doubt laugh at his chagrin, if she could see him now—after she got over her initial anger, that was. Guiltily his thumb found the bare spot on his finger where the signet ring had been. At least he’d had something of value to trade for the horse. He wouldn’t have horse theft on his conscience.
More to the point, what was he going to do now? Walking all the way to Pensacola would take days, and since the Laniers would guess the direction he’d taken, he had no time to lose.
He needed another horse, but where was he going to get one? His major disadvantage was unfamiliarity with the region. If he were in New Orleans, he’d have known where to go for a new mount. Resisting the urge to kick a tree in frustration, he cupped his hands for a drink of the icy water, then stood and pulled Washington back to the road. Wishing he’d had the forethought to grab some of the food Sehoy had brought to him before he locked her in the tack room and took off, he and his growling stomach led the horse toward Pensacola. If he remembered correctly from a map he’d studied while in New Orleans, he should be about halfway to Perdido Pass, which was halfway between Mobile and Pensacola.
In other words, the middle of nowhere.
He kept walking and praying. This business of trusting God in the middle of severe trial was turning out to be quite an enlightening experience.
The sun was well up when Fiona stopped to rest Bonnie at a creek where she and her brothers had used to camp while on hunting trips. If Charlie was any kind of outdoorsman—and she knew he was—he would have stopped here as well, for the trail clearly took a side path into the brush, and the water could be heard burbling counterpoint to the sound of tree frogs and other wildlife moving through the woods. She reined Bonnie in, dismounted, and examined the ground for tracks in the mud. Since dawn, she’d been following Washington’s hoofprints wherever they moved off the shell paving. It looked like he’d been favoring that right fetlock for some time, and she wondered how long it took Charlie to notice.
Emotions pinging from righteous anger to worry about her horse to reluctant admiration for Charlie’s ingenuity and back again, she watered Bonnie, then climbed into the saddle and set out again. She prayed her quarry would have the sense not to ride a lame horse. The sooner she caught him, the better chance poor Washington would have of recovery.
To her relief, it looked like Charlie was now leading the horse. The tracks and horse manure were fresh enough that she knew she would catch up to him soon, maybe by noon. She pushed Bonnie a little harder than she would have liked, but her mount seemed just as keen to run as Fiona. Overwhelming love and appreciation for the hardy little buckskin washed over her. If Charlie had elected to take Bonnie instead of Washington, this would be a completely different situation.
The woods thinned and opened to marsh, and she was forced to ride at a northeast angle for several miles to get around it. It seemed natural to pray as she rode. For a person who had always leaned on her Christian upbringing, the last few months had been something of a conundrum. She’d been taught not to expect God to answer her every request with a “yes,” but at least she’d never had reason to doubt his presence in her life. Even her parents’ death and Sullivan’s capture had oddly strengthened her awareness of God’s surrounding and comforting love.
But since the arrival of Charlie Kincaid, she’d had trouble discerning the simplest things like right and wrong. Loving the enemy became treason; patriotism turned into cutting out half her heart.
And what on earth was she going to say to him when she—
All of a sudden, there he was.
She rounded a bend of the marsh and caught a flash of black, far in the distance, disappearing behind a stand of cypress. Reining Bonnie in, she tried to decide if Charlie would have heard her coming. Of course he would; Bonnie had been cantering and he’d been walking. There would be no sneaking up on him. So she pulled the rifle from its scabbard and checked to make sure it was loaded and ready to fire.
She assumed Charlie didn’t have a gun, but what if he’d bought or found one somewhere? Would he fire on her?
God, I don’t know what I’m doing. Help me.
Leaning forward, she goosed Bonnie’s sides and loosened the reins. “Let’s go, girl.”
Bonnie surged into a gallop. Moments later she caught sight of Charlie and Washington again. Charlie wore Sullivan’s hat and coat—she’d forgotten he still had them. Washington was running, his beautiful smooth stride marred by a distinct limp.
“Charlie! Stop!” she shouted, but of course he didn’t. He must know Washington couldn’t outrun Bonnie, but he would be desperate enough to try. Washington would go down with a broken leg, and she’d have to put him down.
Enraged at Charlie’s stupidity and selfishness, she urged Bonnie on. The gap between the horses narrowed. Now she could see the whiteness of Charlie’s face when he glanced over his shoulder.
Closer, closer. Twenty feet away. If she got right up on him, she would never be strong enough to overpower him, so she was going to have to disable him first. Clenching her teeth, she held the knotted reins in her left hand, bracing the forestock of the gun, her right hand on its neck, finger on the trigger. One shot. That was all she had, so she’d best make it good.
She wanted to hit his shoulder. Bonnie’s silky stride and the flat terrain made the shot possible at ten feet or less. But she was going to have to be very, very lucky.
Fifteen feet. She held Bonnie with her knees, aiming low because the gun would jerk. Took a deep breath, let it halfway out and held it to steady her body. Ten feet. Now—
The gun roared as she pulled the trigger.
Charlie flinched. Blood bloomed on his right thigh as, to her horror, Washington reared, screaming and throwing Charlie. Had she hit the horse too?
She was upon them in seconds. Tossing the rifle, she reined Bonnie to a skidding halt, flung herself out of the saddle, and grabbed for Washington’s reins. He would trample Charlie if she couldn’t—
Oh, God, my God, help me!
Maybe she said it aloud. Washington calmed to a prancing, frantic circle but somehow avoided Charlie. Doubting he’d run off, she turned him loose.
In two strides she was standing over Charlie, fists clenched in helpless rage. Words would not come.
He lay on his side, his face pale, tight with pain, his fingers trying to stanch the flow of blood on his thigh. “You shot me!”
“I didn’t have any choice.” She felt as if she might choke.
“You had lots of choices! Are you insane?”
&n
bsp; “You’re the crazy person! Running a lame horse into the ground!”
“Who taught you to shoot like that?”
“I’m embarrassed, I was aiming for your head.”
He stared at her. After a moment his mouth curled, and he was laughing. He lay back flat, pulling his hat down over his face. “Only in America.”
11
Charlie was going to have trouble explaining to his commanding officers how he’d come to be captured by a girl.
He sat on the cold, damp ground, trying not to cry out as Fiona used her hunting knife to cut the leg off his breeches. He couldn’t help thinking of the time she’d nursed him after the battle of Fort Bowyer, when she’d been so tender and efficient (not to mention willing to kiss him). Now, her expression was grim—eyes narrowed, those sweet lips clamped together, jaw tight—as she cleaned his wound with water from the bladder she’d produced from her saddlebag.
“You could at least look the other way,” he said, going for a smile.
Ignoring the joke, she examined the blackened gash running from his upper thigh almost to the knee. “I’ve seen a man’s leg before. This is going to hurt like the dickens, but you’ll survive. Take off your coat and give me your shirt.”
“Miss Lanier! My modesty—”
“Oh, stuff it. I don’t have anything else to make bandages out of.” She sat back on her heels. “If I’d had on a skirt—”
“You wouldn’t have caught me.”
“I assure you I would.” She gave him a steely blue stare that would have cowed a braver man than Charlie. “The shirt, Lieutenant Kincaid.”
He sighed and shrugged out of the coat, then pulled the shirt off over his head. Teeth chattering, he handed it to her. “So now I’m to die of exposure?”
“Put the coat back on and stop being such a birdwit.” She tore the edge of the shirt with her teeth, then efficiently stripped it into a long bandage. With little apparent consideration for his pain, she began to wrap the bandage tightly about his leg. “We’re going to have to hurry to get you to a doctor. I don’t have any whiskey to dull the pain or wash this with. If we had time, I’d cauterize it, but . . .” She shrugged and gave him a resentful look. “I’m not putting you on Washington. We’ll have to ride double like we did before, and lead him.”
“I didn’t know he was lame when I took him.”
“You shouldn’t have taken him to begin with! You—you horse thief!”
“I left you my ring!”
“How can you possibly justify not only taking my source of income but depriving me of my only way to get my brother back?”
If she’d shrieked at him, he might have felt some measure of justification, but the exaggerated control of her tone told him how much he had hurt her.
He grabbed her cold, gloveless hands, still stained from his blood. Her dainty fingers folded under the warmth of his. “Fiona, I would give anything if things were different between us. I meant what I said that night. I know you remember—”
“I choose not to remember.”
That was a lie, and he knew it. He pulled her toward him, cupped his hand behind her head. “I’m going to kiss you, Fiona. Fair warning.”
She didn’t resist, but the moment he touched her lips with his, he tasted the brine from her tears. He let her go.
She sat back, lips trembling. “I hate you, Charlie.”
“No you don’t.”
“I have to.”
He sighed. “I’ll go back with you, even though you can’t make me.”
“I could leave you here to die. Or shoot you again.”
“You’re not going to shoot me,” he said wearily.
“You thought I wouldn’t before. I’m just as smart as you, and you can’t manipulate me.”
“Nobody thinks you’re stupid, Fiona! And I’m not trying to manipulate you!” It took all his willpower not to seize her and kiss her senseless. Stubborn little beautiful— “Don’t you see how you and your family have changed me? I’m not that callow, selfish teenager I was when you first knew me. But I am an officer with responsibilities that I don’t take lightly. You’ll have to forgive me if I do everything in my power to fulfill them.”
“At whatever the cost to people you love.”
“At whatever the cost—up to the point of disobeying God again. That I won’t do.”
“What do you mean?”
He’d gotten her attention at last. “I left England because I didn’t even want to think about surrendering to the church. Not because it was the wrong thing to do, but because I didn’t want to give up control of my life. So I joined the navy!” He laughed. “How’s that for irony? My every move controlled by His Majesty’s Admiralty. Well, until I discharge that commission, I’m stuck where I am. Just know here and now that when that’s at an end, and my life is my own again, I will be coming back for you, and I’ll show you a man who can be what you deserve. Whether you want it or not, that ring is my promise.”
Her face was pale, her nose pink, her eyes a heartbreaking clear blue under the ugly hat. But when she bit her lip, he knew he’d gotten through. And he’d have to be satisfied with that. For now.
He would not shut up.
All the way back to Mobile, Charlie talked about his adventures at sea—contracting malaria while serving in the Scheldt, designing a lifeboat after a friend washed overboard in a storm, helping devise a system of flag signals while serving in Bermuda. And perhaps most maddening, he talked about some young lady to whom he’d been betrothed as a child.
If Charlie was to be believed, the girl had sent him a letter breaking the engagement while he was at sea. She had attracted the notice of a much richer man, also possessed of a title, and of course Charlie must understand her predicament? After all, Charlie was only third in line to a Scottish earldom, with two perfectly healthy, married older brothers with growing families.
This cheerful monologue must be carried out with his arms wrapped tightly about her from behind, and punctuated by grunts of pain every time Bonnie jarred his injured leg. His voice rumbling into her ear, his breath warm against her cheek—exquisite torture.
To his credit, he had to be starving—she certainly was—but he’d made not a word of complaint since they headed west three hours ago. She wished he would complain about something. She could feel her self-righteous anger dissipating with every mile, and she wanted—needed—to hang on to it. Otherwise, how was she going to bear it when she had to commit his sorry hide to prison again?
She managed to maintain a dignified silence until he said, “And that’s why it took me so long to give in and kiss you.”
“So long? Give in?”
He nodded, bumping his whiskery chin against her shoulder. “I could tell early on where this was going.”
“How do you know I didn’t have another attachment as well?”
“Fiona.” He tsked. “You live down here in the wilderness with nobody but your relatives. Well, unless you count those roughnecks at the shipyard—”
“That is outrag—”
“In any case, you were clearly sending out lures, but I couldn’t take the risk that there was somebody waiting for me—”
“I was not sending out lures!”
“Oh, you most definitely were. ‘Charlie, help me hold Dusty while I check his fetlock.’ And then you bend over just enough that—”
“I did not! Well, I did, but I didn’t mean to—” A laugh bubbled out. “You were looking?”
“Of course I was looking. Do you think I’m made of cast iron? And you have this way of twisting your hair ’round your finger . . . A stronger man than me would have come undone.” His cheek was close to hers, and if she turned her head just a little . . .
She kept her gaze rigidly on the road ahead. “You smell like a goat.”
“That’s right, deflect the obvious. Nice tactic.”
“There is no tactic, Charlie. There’s the truth. I’m ashamed that I let myself start to . . . you know.”
“You’re doing it again. Trying to make me give up my principles. I won’t.”
He sighed. Mercifully he was silent for nearly another slow mile. Then, “Why do you think God allowed us to meet again after all those years? I mean, if I’d washed up even another hundred yards down the beach . . . Or if you hadn’t gone riding that morning. Don’t you think there’s something just a bit . . . ordained about us?”
Almost, she didn’t answer him. But she’d been thinking about that very question, ever since the ball at Uncle Rémy’s house, where the truth had all come out. “My mother once told me that God allows us free will, to choose him or not—but that he sometimes intervenes to shape us for his glory and our good. There’s no guarantee that events and circumstances will be pleasant. But I have to believe that one day I’ll look back and see—even though this is one of the hardest, most painful things I’ve ever had to do—that it’s been a blessing. I’m trying to grow up, Charlie—just like you are, as much as you pretend otherwise.” She did turn her head then, stopping Bonnie, and found his face so close she could have counted the striations in his splotched eye. “I can see why you have done the things you’ve done. I just don’t see any way that we can overcome this—this wall between us. Did you know that my mother was British? Her father was the commander of Fort Charlotte during the Revolution. She came to believe that freedom was more important than loyalty to some king she’d never met. If you can do that, then we might have a chance.”
He stared at her, lips parted. Through both their coats, she could feel his heart thumping against her back. Finally he swallowed. “Freedom. From what?”
“Not from what. To what. Freedom to speak and worship the way we choose without fear of imprisonment. Freedom to elect those who make decisions for government. Freedom to choose a mate and build a family without consideration of social strata. Freedom to own property and make a living, using the creativity of our minds and the hard work of our hands, and in the process build a prosperous community. That’s what America is, Charlie, and I’m not giving that up.”