by Regina Scott
“Danielle’s, ah, growing more accustomed to the work,” he whispered. “She tends the children well enough, if you don’t mind the shouting. Her bread might not taste like yours, but it’s better than mine. And she doesn’t argue when I pay her two livres.”
Her eyes drifted half closed. “Two livres for a loaf of bread in which you supply the ingredients. Foolish child.”
“I think her rather smart.”
Brigitte would have smiled, but a bout of shivers overtook her, and she burrowed deeper beneath the blanket.
“Are you cold? ’Tis summer and the air hot.”
“The fever still hasn’t left, though it fades. Perchance I’ll awake well on the morrow.”
“Let me help.” He leaned over and tucked the blanket around her, so tightly she had little hope of freeing her hands.
“Warmer?” Softness laced his usually gruff voice.
She nodded and huddled into a ball beneath the covers.
“Have you another blanket?” He looked around the bare cottage.
“Non.” She yawned, her eyelids drifting farther closed. “Danielle found this one somewhere. We brought none with us.”
“It’s my mare’s.”
She forced her eyes open at that. “Your what?”
He brushed a strand of hair back from her face, a wry twist to his lips. “Hush now. You need sleep.”
“But Danielle said she found this blanket.”
“Ah, yes, I think your eldest daughter uses the word found a bit loosely. But ’tis a matter for another time. Sleep first.”
She blinked, so tired and yet with so many duties left to tend. “The children are still outside. They’ve yet to eat and—”
A calloused hand clamped over her mouth. “Do you always fret so? I wonder not why you took fever.”
He was right, she’d probably brought the fever on herself with her business and worrying and lack of food.
He kept his hand firmly over his mouth. He was too close again, his body leaning over hers and his large, rough hands touching her face. But she’d hardly the strength to protest, so she closed her eyes as commanded.
The pallet beneath her faded away, along with the walls of the cottage and mess on the floor. Instead, she travelled to a soft place, a place where there was comfort and love, support and caring. A place where she didn’t have to work for Alphonse or fear he would come for her children. A place where she found solace in the arms of a good man.
What a shame such a place existed only in her dreams.
*
Jean Paul stared at Brigitte’s still form, her eyelashes fanned against her soft cheeks and her slender body curled up on the tick. He shifted his hand from her mouth where he’d been shushing her to stroke the side of her face. She turned into his touch.
If only he had true comfort to offer rather than horrid memories and nighttime terrors.
He’d not asked a single question he’d intended. He needed to know her story. Of all the places she could go for work, all the people she could seek for help, how had she come to his yard just over a week ago? Her presence here, in his life and in his forgotten hut, made no sense.
Unless God Himself had wrapped her up like a pretty package and dropped her under his nose. Someone to help. Someone to care for. Someone to love.
But he didn’t love Brigitte Moreau. He hardly knew her.
He stroked a strand of damp hair away from her face. Mayhap he didn’t love her, but he’d been caring for her needs since first they met. Even when he’d thought she had her own dwelling, he’d given her food and money.
How was that different than caring for a wife?
And with her children, God almost seemed to foist upon him the family he might have had if Corinne still lived.
But he didn’t deserve such a gift, not after the things he’d done. The Moreau family’s presence was probably some cruel type of jest, punishing him for his past deeds. God would give him Brigitte and the children for a time only to rip them away again.
It had happened with Corinne; it could happen again.
Jean Paul pulled his hand back from her face and stood.
Best to let Danielle take care of the woman and keep his distance. Best not to get any more involved than he already was.
He headed for the door, yanked it open then closed it tight behind him. Three children, caked head to toe with mud, stared back at him.
“What have you been doing?” He’d told them to play outside, not slather themselves in dirt and water.
Serge shrugged, the movement causing a blob of muck to slide down his cheek and land on the ground. “Victor threw some at me, so I threw some back.”
“Except he hit me instead.” Danielle’s face was murderous. Thick clumps of mud twined with her hair and stained the front of her dress and apron.
Propped on Danielle’s hip, Victor grinned. Mire covered his gown and coated his hands and feet. He reached one of those muddy little hands up and patted his sister’s cheek, leaving a nice, fresh smear.
Jean Paul rolled his eyes toward the heavens. Why him? Why these younglings? Why after a long day of working in the fields?
And why, more than anything, after he’d decided to leave Brigitte alone?
“Is dinner ready?” Serge asked.
“Ah…” Had he promised to prepare some food? He couldn’t quite remember, but then, he’d have likely told the children they could set fire to the farmstead if it would give him a couple minutes alone with Brigitte.
Or rather, that had been his thought before he’d decided to stay away from her.
“Where is it?” Serge patted his stomach. “I’m hungry.”
“Oh, be quiet, Serge.” Danielle shifted the babe higher on her hip. “You ought be asking after Maman, not dinner.”
“Your mother’s asleep,” Jean Paul muttered as he stared at the children. What was he going to do with them? He could hardly let the filthy hooligans tromp back inside and soil their house. Besides, they’d wake their mother.
Not that he cared. Because he didn’t. No. Not him. He definitely cared not whether Brigitte slept long enough to restore a creamy hue to her cheeks or put that glint of quiet determination back in her eyes.
And blast it all! What was he doing thinking about the woman’s hair and eyes when he’d just sworn off her?
“I want to see Maman.” Serge bolted for the door, but Jean Paul reached out an arm and snagged the boy by the waist.
“You’re too filthy to go inside, and your mother needs rest.”
“How else are we going to eat? Victor’s going to be hungry soon, and then he won’t stop crying until he gets food.” Danielle wiped the fresh smear of mud from her cheek. Or tried to. She only succeeded in spreading the glob down to her chin.
Was life with children always so trying? Perhaps it was good that he and Corinne hadn’t…
The thought stilled in his head. No. There was nothing good about what had happened with Corinne—and the man he had become in his grief. He’d give anything to have his own set of younglings one day, but no woman would want to marry him now.
“Let me go. I want to see Maman.” Serge sent him a look so belligerent he could only have learned it from his sister.
“You can’t. I…uh…” He scratched his head. What did one say to a boy who wanted his mother but couldn’t have her?
The babe squealed and smeared another blob of mud across Danielle’s face.
“I’m done with this.” Danielle plopped Victor down onto the ground. “He can crawl if he wants to go somewhere.”
Victor’s face bunched up into an angry little mask, and he let out an ear-piercing wail.
Brigitte would never be able to rest with all this commotion, and the children needed to get cleaned up before darkness descended. Then there was the matter of supper.
He had little choice but to take them home, wash them up and feed them. He stuck a finger in his collar and tugged. How was he going to manage all that when he couldn’t
even keep them quiet outside their mother’s window?
Chapter Eleven
Brigitte glanced out the window as she stacked plates into a pile on the table. Were she in the little house in the woods, she could see nothing but fir boughs through the windows. But with the position of Jean Paul’s house on its little knoll, the sun’s rays filtered through the window as the gilded orb dipped closer and closer toward the trees.
She wiped her forehead, where sweat beaded along her hairline, and carried the plates to the washtub. She should have served dinner earlier. She was going to be late if she didn’t hurry, and after missing last week’s rendezvous with the gendarme, she could hardly afford to compromise this one.
She only hoped he hadn’t sent word to Alphonse. If she missed this week’s appointment, as well, her father-in-law would likely send a battalion of men to Abbeville in search of her.
She picked up the first plate and scrubbed.
Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!
A thudding sounded at evenly spaced intervals from the yard.
She glanced toward the window again as she reached for another plate. She could well guess what the sound was, though she couldn’t see the activity from where she stood.
Thwack! Thwack!
She reached for the third plate. What had ever possessed Jean Paul to teach Danielle how to throw knives? The girl should be in here helping, not outside learning a man’s skill.
Then again, Danielle would have found some other way to avoid doing the dishes.
Thwack! Thwack!
Brigitte raised her eyes to the ceiling. She only hoped the skill proved useful to Danielle rather than serving as another means for trouble.
Muted voices replaced the thudding sounds, while Brigitte scrubbed furiously at the last plate. She need only wash the mugs and utensils, and then she could dash off to her meeting. Of course, making her excuses for leaving the farmstead would be rather challenging, but she didn’t have much choice.
The door opened, casting slanted beams of orange over her and the dishes, then closed as Jean Paul’s heavy footfalls thudded against the dirt floor. “Are you almost finished?”
She nodded and grabbed another cup.
“Good, the younglings want us to go fishing.”
“Fishing?” She dropped the mug. Why did they want to go fishing now of all times?
“I promised we’d take them once you were well.”
A soft warmth warred with the trembling fear inside her. Here stood this gruff man with a perpetual scowl on his face, yet he taught her daughter to throw knives and offered to take her children fishing. Henri had never done such things.
“Can we go tomorrow?”
Jean Paul ran his eyes sharply over her. “Why? Has your fever returned? Are you feeling poorly?”
“Non,” she blurted, then bit the inside of her lip.
He touched his hand to her forehead. “You look drawn, and your brow is warm. Go home and lie down. I’ll take the children myself.”
That might work, provided she could escape to her meeting with the gendarme and return before Jean Paul and the children finished fishing.
“And you’ll stay abed tomorrow. I won’t have you falling ill again.”
She jerked her gaze up to meet his. She wasn’t that ill. Her fever had broken nearly a week ago, yet she’d started working only yesterday. Being cooped up in that tiny hut and treated like an invalid again was about as appealing as being dunked in the Somme River in February.
Jean Paul shifted closer, his concerned eyes not leaving her face. “Oui. You must go home. Can you manage the walk alone?”
A sickening dread filled her stomach. She either proclaimed herself well and went fishing or condemned herself to bed again.
“I’m hot from being so near the hearth, not from fever.” She plunged her hands back into the wash water and grabbed the mug she’d dropped. “In fact, I’m feeling well enough I might take a trip into town on the morrow. I need thread for the shoulder on Danielle’s dress, and Serge’s trousers are a dozen centimeters too short.”
Plus if she went into town, she could find the gendarme, tell him why she’d missed the meeting two weeks in a row and explain that she was now in a better position to find information on Jean Paul.
Information that would prove his innocence, of course.
Jean Paul settled himself into the chair nearest her. “I don’t think you’re well enough to go to town.”
Of all the things for the man to be stubborn about. “I promise I’m fine.”
“Then I’ll take you when I make my vegetable delivery tomorrow afternoon, but I won’t have you making the trip alone. Mayhap you can find yourself material for a new dress while you’re there.”
Her cheeks heated, and she glanced down at the dress hanging loosely on her frame, the frayed material threadbare in places. Anyone would notice such an old gown.
So why did her entire body feel flushed, and her eyes refuse to meet his?
She fumbled about in the wash water for a handful of forks and started scrubbing. This conversation was not going as planned. Now she was not only stuck going fishing, but going to town with an escort, as well. ’Twould make speaking with the gendarme even more difficult than sneaking off to meet him tonight.
Jean Paul leaned back in his chair. “Perhaps we can also look for another post for you, one more suited than having you work here and live in a hovel.”
Her back snapped as straight as the wooden timbers in the walls. “Non. I’m quite happy with my position here.”
He cocked his head to the side. “I’ve not been able to put it together. If you needed to leave Calais, why come here, to me, for work?”
Silence hung thick in the air between them, and she licked her suddenly dry lips, her mind scrambling for something, anything to say. “I…I hadn’t much choice.”
“Did you hear stories of me? Of how I employed Pierre despite his loss of a hand, and how I gave food to widows?”
She opened her mouth to answer, but no sound came out for several moments. “I knew I needed help, and you were the only person who could give it.”
It wasn’t a lie. Not completely.
“Surely you have family somewhere. Calais perhaps? Could they not have helped?”
“I’ll never take help from the family in Calais.” The words shot from her mouth like arrows from a bow.
“And you’ve not family in another town?”
She pressed her eyes shut. Did he suspect…?
What? That she was a spy sent to determine whether he was a horrible murderer or an honest farmer? Because truly, the answer had no middle ground. And as much as she wanted to proclaim him a farmer, wipe her hands of this messy business and leave for Reims, she still lacked proof.
“I have family in Reims, yes, but they know naught of my current situation. I’m planning to travel to them shortly, after I have more funds.”
He stood and moved closer, then crouched down on the other side of the basin, making their eyes even and his gaze rather unavoidable. “And Abbeville is on the way?”
She nodded, praying he wouldn’t think too hard about her reasoning. Abbeville was indeed on the way from Calais to Reims, but ’twas hardly the most direct route.
“So what prevents you from going to Reims now, besides your need to recover from the fever? Need you more money?”
She probably had enough funds, what with the two livres per day Jean Paul had given her and then Danielle for bread. Now that she worked as his housekeeper, he gave her three livres and ten sous per day.
But though she had money enough to complete her journey, Alphonse would never let her run. “’Tis not the money so much as the journey itself and fear of losing my older boys. Reims is a long way from the coast. I’ve left missives for them with the navy, but what if they don’t receive them and can’t find me? Abbeville may not be Calais, but I’m still near the coast.”
She held her breath, waiting for his forehead to draw down into its f
amiliar grooves and more questions to come. Waiting for him to see through her flimsy excuse.
But instead, his eyes met hers over the washbasin, his gaze roaming from her forehead to her cheeks down to her lips.
Her mouth turned instantly dry.
“Brigitte…” He reached out and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “If you ever need any—”
The door flew open and crashed against the wall. Jean Paul spun toward the noise, that familiar scowl back on his face.
Serge danced inside the room. “Fishing! Fishing! We’re going fishing!”
“Are you coming, Maman?” Danielle asked from the doorway.
“I want to go now!”
Brigitte ducked her head as she washed the last of the knives and then dried her hands. Of course, they wanted to go and spend time with Jean Paul before the night grew too dark and they had to return to their cabin. Because her children were falling in love with this large, gruff man who treated them better than their father ever had.
If only she had the luxury of doing the same.
*
“Stay here. I’ll be but a moment.” Jean Paul pulled his wagon with its aging mare to a stop.
Jean Paul climbed down from the wagon, leaving Brigitte alone on the bench. To her left sat an old stone house that looked to have endured two centuries or more of use. The yard was thick with weeds, with the door hung precariously on its hinges. The drapes visible from where she waited seemed soiled and old, and the windows appeared as though they’d not been scrubbed in a good long while. One of the top panes of glass had even been shattered.
Brigitte glanced around the quaint street lined with similar, if better cared for, houses. Then the dilapidated door to the first house flew open and a boy of about Danielle’s age rushed down the steps. A girl—or perhaps she was a woman—sauntered behind the boy and batted her eyes at Jean Paul.
A woman, then. One who seemed barely old enough to look at a man. But that didn’t stop her from sidling closer to Jean Paul as he unloaded the wagon and giggling when he asked how she fared.