Captured by Love (Michigan Brides #3)(21)

Angelique stretched her collar higher. “After mother died, Ebenezer got tired of dealing with Therese. She was too spirited, too independent for him. He warned her if she didn’t stop disobeying, he’d marry her off in the spring.”

Pierre frowned at the thought of Ebenezer’s treatment of Angelique and her sister, the control he’d exerted over them, the harshness, the lack of kindness. He supposed that was why his own maman had opened her home to Angelique. Maman had encouraged Jean and him to include Angelique, even though she’d been just a girl. Maman had tried to reach out to Therese too, but the girl was older and uninterested in fishing or building forts or racing along the island trails.

Angelique started toward the edge of the pond. “I guess Therese wasn’t strong enough to make it out in the wilderness.”

“The rapids are dangerous for even the toughest voyageur.”

She stopped. Her eyes were sad but direct. “She didn’t fall out, Pierre.”

He nodded, sensing the despair that lay below the surface of Angelique’s sadness. Even though she could put on a calm fa?ade, as he’d seen her do many times around her stepfather, she was a passionate girl with a tempest of feelings. He’d always liked that about her. She was genuine and honest.

“Every trader that came in last fall said Therese threw herself out of the canoe. On purpose.” Her eyes begged him to contradict her.

But Pierre had heard the same rumor too—the news that Therese had been so miserably unhappy that she’d decided to kill herself rather than live as a fur trader’s wife.

“I’m sorry, Angelique.” He wished he had better news for her. But the truth was the fur-trading life was not suited to any woman, except maybe an Indian woman.

Pierre shoved his foot into his other boot. After all the problems he’d experienced firsthand over the past five years in the wilderness, he could completely understand why Papa had opposed his decision to follow in his footsteps and enter the fur-trading business. There were long stretches away from home. Even when Papa had come home, he’d been too busy with the farm to have much time for his sons and wife. Not to mention he’d been consumed with drinking and had often let his anger get the best of him.

Pierre couldn’t blame Papa for wanting him to go to school in Detroit, for forbidding him to become a voyageur. He’d only wanted to prevent Pierre from making the same mistakes.

He could see Papa’s wisdom now. If only he’d realized it at the time he’d left the island. Maybe if he’d understood that Papa had only loved him and wanted to protect him . . .

It might not have changed the fact that he’d become a fur trader. The wilderness and fur trading were in his blood. But maybe he wouldn’t have left home spewing such hateful words. Maybe he wouldn’t have made so many sinful mistakes.

Angelique bent toward the water. “I’ve got a couple of fish for Miriam if you’d like to take them back to her.”

He whistled under his breath as she lifted a stringful of trout from a shallow pool of water between boulders. “Looks like you’ve become quite the fisherman.”

“I’m all right.”

“You better be all right considering you had the best fisherman on the island teach you everything you know.”

“Best fisherman?” She smiled. “I doubt he’d be the best anymore.”

“Is that a challenge?” He returned her smile, glad to put the serious conversation and thoughts behind them.

“You wouldn’t want to challenge me.” She took three fish off the string and held them out to him. “Because I’d most certainly beat you.”

“Tomorrow at dawn. Meet me at the west shore and we’ll see who’s best.”

Her smile stretched into her eyes. “I already know who’s best.”

“Are you afraid to lose?” He couldn’t resist teasing her back.

“Not at all.” She pushed the fish at him. “Here. Take these to Miriam.”

He took them from her. They were prime-size trout. Their scales glistened in the sunlight, and his stomach growled, reminding him of why he was out in the first place.

She picked up the rest of her fish.

“Maman was asking about you this morning,” he said, not ready for their time together to be at an end. “When you didn’t come before daylight, she got worried about you.”

“Ebenezer detained me.” A shadow flitted across her face. “But I knew you’d be there to take care of her.”

Take care of her. The words made him squirm.

“I want you to know,” he said, “how grateful I am for all you did for Maman this past year.”

She started to shake her head. “It was nothing—”

“It was everything. She told me about all you did, coming every morning to bring her food and wood, to start her fire, to cook her fish.”

“I only wish I could have done more.”

“She said you often gave her your own portion and went hungry.”

“We were all hungry.” She glanced at the fish she’d given him, and her face pinched with hunger. “If only we hadn’t been blockaded. And if only the British hadn’t insisted on buying up all our food.”

“Stealing sounds like a more accurate way to describe what they did.” Pierre spat the words, his frustration with the British mounting more each day that went by. Since arriving he’d learned that when the British supply ships had been cut off from the island by the Americans, the commander had decided to purchase the necessary winter supplies from the locals both on the island and mainland.