Wild, Beautiful, and Free(67)

“Don’t laugh. How did you come to love me? I must ask. If I don’t understand it, it will be hard for me to trust it.”

“You don’t trust me?”

“No, I do. Right now I do. But if I don’t understand why you love me, I’ll question it. Thoughts will come to me as time goes on, and they might make me doubt you. And you’ll be off fighting. You won’t be able to reassure me then.”

He ran his hand over my hair, and the rough curls came loose from their clasp and fell to my shoulders. I let them stay that way. “You seemed so open, so self-possessed. That night when we spoke in the library, drunk as I was, I could tell that you knew your own mind. You weren’t easily influenced by others.”

“I was different from what you’d known before?”

He kissed me on the forehead. “In the past I have been fond of women with the same intelligence. But I never had the confidence to pursue them. You, on the other hand . . .”

“I encouraged you?”

“No, not directly anyway. But you made me think better of myself. The way you listened to me, challenged me.” He laughed. “Even scolded me! But strangely you made me feel I could be a different person. I could come to not care about certain things.”

“You said last night that you didn’t think you were worthy of love. Why? You’ve never loved before? You are a man of means, Christian. It seems so strange that you’ve never been attached to someone. Not even before Miss Chamberlain.”

“I am not as confident as I might seem. And I have loved only to realize later that a beloved’s beauty did not always match up with what was within. I’ve been disappointed by Miss Chamberlain, for example. I was once fond of her. In fact, it took me a while to learn what you seem to have gathered after only a few hours of observing her.”

I was glad he mentioned this, because I had a deep curiosity about what had happened.

“I feel badly for her,” I said. “It doesn’t seem fair that I should gain what she’s lost. I know what I felt when I thought I couldn’t have you. I wouldn’t wish those feelings on her.”

He stretched himself out on the blanket, leaned back on his elbows, and laughed. “Believe me, she is not feeling what you would have felt. I overheard her talking about what would happen if I were killed in battle. She was worried for herself—what money she would have, whether all my possessions would be left to her. Hell, she even declared she’d have a lawyer look into it once we were married and I had gone away.”

I shook my head.

“Now, I will confess, this is the one wicked thing I did: I created a rumor that I had arranged for my estate to be sold and the funds donated to a charitable institution upon my death. My widow would receive only a modest living. You can see for yourself how the scheme worked out. You haven’t seen her lately, have you? She is absent of her own accord.”

I tilted my head toward him. “So she will not join you in battle after all, sir?”

“Sarcasm? From you, Jeannette?” He laughed, and I couldn’t help but laugh myself.

“Perhaps she’ll go with her next conquest,” I said. “The Union needs eager soldiers.”

We laughed a good deal more and enjoyed the bread, cold meat, and fruit he’d brought for us. I pushed aside my doubts and was determined to hold on to this frail bubble of happiness. Our days after that continued in the same vein. We feasted on joy, and for the first time in my life, I felt full.

In the back of my mind, though, I still thought of what Missus Livingston had said. And I did consider whether it would be better for me to keep Christian at arm’s length until the wedding. But I had a strong sense that our time was short. I wanted to store up kisses and caresses, as many as I could, enough to carry me through the long and unknowable time we would be separated.

I gloried in his attention. He became my sole focus, my whole world. For those short, sweet days I didn’t pray because I thought all my prayers had been answered. He was at once my hope and my heaven. The grounds around Fortitude became our Eden.

Too quickly the days of courtship slipped by. I laid out the elegant brown silk dress that Aunt Nancy Lynne had made for me so long ago. It might not be fashionable, but it seemed right to wear it now when I was about to step into a world where I felt truly free. Mr. Colchester insisted on one gift, which I accepted: a small but exquisite lace veil sewn in the fashion of the calottes, the veils that New Orleans women wore to church. It represented our connection to Louisiana and made me hopeful that, even if we never returned there, I would have some memory of the land in him, and he would have the same in me. The next day I would pull on the silk, drape the lace over my head, and walk hand in hand with him into my new life as Missus Colchester.

When I went to bed that night, I had nothing to trouble me. A full moon illuminated slivers of cloud floating through a serene sky. I was determined to sleep and not dream of strange children or unfulfilled longing. I would dream of union and of my husband in his dark-blue uniform coming home from the battlefield whole and fit.

Only I didn’t dream at all. I dropped into sleep as though I’d fallen off a cliff into a dark cavern. My sleep was deep but not refreshing. When I awoke, it was as though I had a rope looped around my chest and hands were pulling on it, drawing me out of the depths. The sensation was so powerful I felt the rope tugged me to sit straight up from my pillows. I awoke and opened my eyes to see Founder, sitting at the foot of the bed, staring at me like she would burn a hole into my soul.