Love, Come to Me(63)

“A shame that you have to leave Concord,” Lucas said abruptly. “Heath stopped by last night to tell me. But . . . possibly it’s better for you to have a new start.”

“Maybe it is. I don’t think anyone here will ever quite recover from my disgrace—Concordians have long memories, don’t they?” She turned and threw him a quick grin. “I can picture myself fifty years from now, walking down Main Street, and someone whispering as I pass by, ‘That’s Lucy Rayne—remember what she did in sixty-eight?’ By then I’ll be old enough to enjoy having a scandalous reputation.”

“It’s not appropriate to find humor in that.”

“Heath says I should learn to laugh at myself more.”

“You were brought up to be a thoughtful and serious—”

“I was brought up to think that a good wife should try to please her husband.” As she went to the cabinet and pulled out two sets of cups and saucers, she realized that the idea of leaving Concord wasn’t half as distasteful as she had first thought. Maybe Heath had been right. When it came right down to it, she wasn’t certain she wanted to live her whole life in one town.

“Lucy,” her father said with a severe frown, “I’ve done my best to raise you properly. I didn’t expect you to toss all those values away when you married this man . . . no matter how he treats you, even if he is taking you away from where you belong—”

“He treats me well,” she said swiftly, her amusement fading. The defense of her husband came quickly to her lips. “He does. And although I’m a little apprehensive about moving away from here, I married him, and . . . and that’s that. I belong with him, wherever he goes.” Lucy knew as she spoke that she was not simply mouthing a meaningless sentiment. She meant every word.

Lucas sighed, shaking his head as he looked at her. “I can hardly believe you’re going away. I always thought you’d stay in Concord.” A trace of accusation edged his voice as he added, “I always thought that you and Daniel would—”

“So did I,” Lucy interrupted, and her hand trembled as she poured the coffee. Her father’s disapproval would never fail to upset her. He had seen her betrayal of Daniel as a betrayal of himself as well, and he felt that she had gone against all the values he had tried to instill in her. She wondered if it would always stand between them. Yes, it was likely that he would never live down the fact that she had smudged the name and the reputation he had worked so hard to establish. “But maybe things worked out for the best,” she said softly.

“The best? You can’t tell me that instead of marrying into the Collier family and living in Concord, you would rather end up married to a . . . a . . .”

“There’s no use in thinking about that anymore. Why say anything against Heath now? His background certainly didn’t make a difference to you when you were trying to get me off of your hands—”

“I’ve never allowed you to talk back to me,” Lucas said, startled by her sharpness. “Married or not, I still won’t tolerate it from you.”

“I’m sorry.” Lucy met his eyes without flinching. “But I won’t listen to any criticism of him.”

“I didn’t say anything against him.”

“You implied that he is a step down from Daniel . . . which isn’t true at all. Why, I wouldn’t give two cents to be in Sally’s place, with Daniel as a husband and Abigail as a sister-in-law. I’d be miserable! Daniel never understood me, and he wouldn’t have—”

“It doesn’t matter,” her father said, looking glumly into his coffee. “It’s all water under the bridge.” It was obvious that he would have liked to put his foot down and lecture her, but for some reason he decided not to. “I’d say more, but it wouldn’t do any good.”

“No, Father,” she replied firmly. “What’s done is done . . . and we all have to stick with our decisions.”

With the help of the Flannerys, Lucy scoured the house for two days, packing clothes, dishes and various odds and ends that would make the residence on Beacon Hill seem like home. Most of the furniture was left behind to be sold with the house. As Heath had requested, Lucas helped pack the heaviest items and left his store in the hands of a newly employed assistant in order to take Lucy to Boston personally.

During the two nights that Heath was gone, Lucy slept on his side of the bed, burying her face in his pillow, and inhaling the masculine fragrance of it. She was surprised at how much she missed him, and she took her mind off his absence by giving all her attention to the considerable amount of work to be done. Clearing out the little house was even more difficult than she had expected. For the first time she was leaving the town she had grown up in, a town that, despite everything, she was still strongly attached to. She was heading towards a new home and a life that seemed frighteningly undefined, indistinct. The only thing she was certain of was that she wanted to be where Heath was. Without him, Concord seemed empty, and so did the house, and she spent all of her spare time wondering what he was doing.

Her father hired a closed carriage from the livery to take her to the city, and all the boxes and parcels were loaded into a wagon that one of the Hosmer boys was being paid a dollar to drive behind them. Lucy did not look back as they left Concord. Focusing on the tiny lace-trimmed handkerchief she held in her lap, she dabbed at her eyes occasionally, suppressing any tears that threatened to escape. She felt as if she were leaving her childhood behind, and she was heartsore as the wheels of the carriage turned round and round, taking her away from everything familiar.