“You’re kidding with me,” she said. But Samuel looked dead serious. She knew he wasn’t kidding with her.
Samuel straightened. Looked back into her eyes.
“Vaughn is a time traveler.”
Ella stared blankly at Samuel. “What do you mean?”
He ran a hand through his hair. “I saw her once,” he said.
“No one else?”
He shook his head. “Not that I know of. I saw her one time when I was still young. And now you’ve seen her. I don’t know of anyone else who’s seen her.”
Ella forced herself to take a breath.
“What do you think this means?”
“I don’t know,” he said, shifting his gaze back toward the river. “Did she tell you anything?”
Ella hesitated. Vaughn had spoken to her of things that no one else knew.
No one else knew that she still loved Thomas. That she’d never really let him go.
She’d never told a single person.
She’d even dated other people, however briefly, but no one else had ever touched her heart.
She’d kept her heart firmly protected.
As long as she didn’t let anyone else in, she didn’t have to go through the pain of losing again.
“She didn’t really say anything,” she said. “Just sort of appeared and introduced herself.”
Samuel nodded. “That’s what she did with me.”
If she didn’t tell him what Vaughn had said, she wouldn’t have to talk about her past.
32
“Let’s take a walk,” Samuel said.
He was feeling antsy.
Like he needed to move around.
Ella put her hand in his and he pulled her to her feet.
He didn’t want to talk about Vaughn anymore. It had freaked him out at the time and he’d never told anyone about seeing her.
And now Ella had seen her.
He had no idea what it meant, but he was certain they’d seen the same person.
He didn’t want Ella to know that he’d not only seen Vaughn, but seeing her had drastically changed his life.
He’d gone from a young adult ready to lead a carefree bachelorhood moving into his garçonnière to a serious, reclusive young man. He was still a serious person.
And he was still reclusive.
He told himself he had responsibilities.
He’d thrown himself into learning everything about raising cotton and preparing himself to run his family’s plantation.
And somehow he’d fallen through the cracks and his parents hadn’t pressured him to marry.
Of course, part of that was the impending war.
Now that was something that Samuel could ask Ella about.
“In the future,” he said, the words feeling strange on his tongue. “you learned about history.”
She sent him a lopsided smile. “Of course. It’s one of the most important subjects in school.”
He breathed out a sigh of relief. At least that hadn’t changed.
“So…” Their hands brushed and he linked his fingers loosely with hers. He didn’t think about it. It just felt right.
“You have some knowledge about this time period.”
“Some,” she said. “Unfortunately…” She paused, watching the flight of a butterfly as it sat on one of the white gardenias and slowed its wings.
Then she stopped and turned to face him.
“In my opinion, it was the worst time in America’s history. Not only did Americans raise arms against each other, but brothers fought against brothers.”
Her eyes teared up.
“I always wondered just how many family members unknowingly killed each other over something that was so wrong to begin with.”
“What’s that?” he asked, though he had a feeling he already knew the answer.
“Slavery,” she said, spitting out the word as though it was bitter on her tongue.
“The war isn’t about slavery,” he said. “It’s about state’s rights.”
Frowning, she tilted her head and looked at him as though trying to figure out what he was talking about.
“The Civil War was… will be… about slavery,” she said.
Samuel shook his head. “Why would thousands of southern men who never owned a slave pick up their guns to fight about something that had nothing to do with them?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know,” she said.
The Becquerels had servants, but not slaves. They were free men who earned a fair wage along with a house and a small plot of land to plant their own crops.
Samuel thought about his brother John and John’s friends. Did they even know what the secession was about? Did they even care?
They were itching for a fight. All they wanted to do was to whup the Yankees.
They talked about states’ rights.
But according to Ella, a woman from the future, states’ rights or not, the thing that went down in history was slavery.
It made Samuel’s blood boil. How could historians get things so wrong?
Ella put a hand on his sleeve.
“It’s ok,” she said. “There’s nothing you can do about it.”
He looked into her lovely green eyes and his gaze dipped to her full pink lips.
He blew out a breath. She was right. There was nothing he could do about it.
And it didn’t really matter.
What mattered was that he somehow had the good fortune to have the most beautiful girl in the world standing right here in front of him.
33
“I’m not sure how much I should tell you,” Ella kicked at a pinecone, sending it skidding off the trail.
Samuel took her hand again. His hand was like a magnet for hers.
“Tell me everything,” he said.
She laughed. “I don’t know that much. I was a psychology major, not a history major.”
He looked at her sideways.
Right. Psychology wasn’t a thing yet.
Since he already knew she was from the future, would it really hurt for her to tell him things that she knew?
She’d given it a lot of thought and she could see it both ways.
She must be here for a reason. Maybe that reason was to somehow help Samuel or his family. She wouldn’t just be here for no reason.
Then Vaughn’s words came back to her.
The time travel brings together two people from two different time lines who are meant to be together. True love.
She looked over at Samuel walking along beside her. Tall and lean. A bit rugged. His hair brushed the top of his collar. Unlike yesterday, he was freshly shaved.
He was a serious man, but he had a quick smile. Not like his brother John who joked and smiled about just about anything.
Samuel used his smiles sparingly, making them seem all the more valuable.
“It started off well enough for the south,” she said. “Everyone thought it would end quickly.”
“It does,” he said, then looked at her questioningly. “Surely.”
Ella shook her head. “It lasted almost exactly four years. I only remember because my Dad’s birthday is April 9 – the day it ended.”
“Four years?” Samuel asked incredulously.
“It was fought almost entirely in the south. The northerners invaded the south.” She blinked and looked up at him. “They practically destroyed the south. Burning it to the ground. Killing—” She clamped her mouth shut.
She was saying too much. This was Samuel’s life.
Once she’d gotten started, she got carried away.
She was telling him that his world was about to be ripped apart.
“I said too much,” she said, looking away.
He stopped and cupped her chin with his hand.
“Please,” he said, searching her eyes. “I have to know. I have to be prepared to protect my family.”
She took a deep, ragged breath. He was right. That was exactly why she’d decided to tell him wha
t she did.
“The northerners marched into the south. Even here,” she swept a hand around them. “The Mississippi River was a key battle point.”
She bit her lip. Vicksburg was close to here. Did she tell him about the siege?
He nodded. “That makes sense. The river is our key trade route.”
“Most of the war was fought east of here. Tennessee. Virginia. But this part of the south was devastated.”
“It was fought on the home front,” Samuel said.
“Yes. Exactly. And that was worse than any battle on the field.”
“Women and children?” Samuel asked.
Ella shook her head and looked away. Remembering what she’d learned. Things she hadn’t really thought about since college classes.
“There were honorable soldiers. Most of them. But there were renegades, too. Men who were dishonorable. Who…” she swallowed and shook her head. She couldn’t bring herself to tell Samuel that even his mother and sister would be at risk.
He squeezed her hand.
“Thank you for telling me.”
She nodded.
But the look on his face made her sick to her stomach.
She shouldn’t have told him.
34
Samuel balanced a block of wood on the stump he used as a chopping block, raised his ax, and slammed it down, splitting the wood into 2 perfect pieces.
The sound of the ax slamming into the stump broke the morning quietness, sending a flock of birds fluttering into the sky.
It was a cool spring morning, perfect weather. A little swirl of mist hovered over the fields, soon to be burned off by the hot southern sun.
Chopping wood wasn’t giving him the calming effect it usually provided.
He couldn’t shake the feeling of doom that had settled over his shoulders since Ella had described what the next four years were about to hold for this country, the south in particular.
Samuel wasn’t all hyped up about the war like his brother and most of the other southern boys he knew.
First of all, war meant death. And if he had a good reason, Samuel wouldn’t hesitate to put his life on the line.
He wouldn’t tolerate any threats to his family. His mother. His sister.
Ella.
He picked up one of the smaller pieces of wood and split it again, making some kindling.
If what she said was true, and he had no reason to doubt her, they couldn’t win.
The men were all going to leave the womenfolk home alone. Leaving them alone to do everything. Planting. Harvesting.
Providing firewood.
But they would be left unprotected and vulnerable.
Vulnerable against other men who used the war as an excuse to rape and murder southern women.
Ella hadn’t said those words.
But Samuel knew. He knew that she was sugar-coating what she knew.
Besides, Samuel knew enough about history to know how war went.
Americans against Americans.
He slammed the ax into another piece of wood, sending an echo through the quiet morning.
Ludicrous.
And the worst part about it all was that he couldn’t do a damn thing about it.
No matter how much he knew. No matter how much Ella told him about what was to come, he couldn’t stop it. It was so much bigger than him.
He set the ax down and stared off across the fields.
He didn’t believe in secession. But it was already done.
And it was foregone that there was going to be a war.
The south was going to lose and lose badly.
He wanted nothing to do with that.
Maybe if he signed up to fight with the north, he could be one of the good ones. Maybe he could be a positive influence to mediate some of the damage that was about to be done to the south.
He could stomach fighting for state’s right, but slavery? Not so much.
Father had already decided to join the home guard, so he’d be around to protect Mother and Beatrice.
It was a different story with Ella.
Once Samuel left, she would have no one.
Maybe it would help if he married her.
The idea gave him warm shivers all over.
But then he’d still be leaving her unprotected.
Hell. She didn’t know how to survive in this time. Especially not with what was coming.
Famine. Hardship. Fighting on their doorstep.
She needed to go back to her own time.
The thought made him sick to his stomach.
But it was the only way to really keep her safe.
He had fallen in love with her the moment he first set eyes on her.
When he’d found her sitting on the veranda. Soaked to the bone on a clear night.
He pulled off his glove and ran a hand through his hair.
Samuel had always been a decisive man.
His current state of indecisiveness spoke to the gravity of this situation.
Nothing good could come out of this.
When Ella got up, he’d speak with her.
Get this thing straightened out.
35
“What is this place?” Ella asked as they reached the door to what looked like a cottage—a smaller version of the big house, but without the white columns.
Samuel inserted a key and turned the knob. “It’s a garçonnière.”
“A bachelor’s apartment,” she said.
He looked surprised. “You have those in your time?”
She shook her head. “Not by that name. I just remember learning it somewhere.”
Growing up in Mississippi, she’d taken things for granted, not even questioning where they came from. Such as calling a man’s apartment a garçonnière.
“Is this your apartment?” she asked as they stepped inside the cool, dark cottage.
Samuel was wearing a wool coat that covered his hips.
She was wearing a light blue dress with ruffles at the hem. At first, it had seemed a bit too frilly for her taste, but she was getting used to it. She rubbed her arms. Either way, she was chilly.
Samuel went to the nearest window and pulled back the curtains, letting light into the shadowed room. “No,” he said. “But it could have been. Was supposed to be.”
Without responding, she followed him over to the fireplace and sat on the sofa while he arranged kindling in the hearth and got a fire going to ward off some of the dampness in the cottage.
She pulled a blanket off the back of the sofa and, tucking her feet under her, snuggled beneath it.
He came to sit on the sofa next to her. But he kept his gaze on the fireplace.
“When I was a young man, all set to move in here, something happened that changed my life forever.”
“What happened?” She could imagine all sorts of things. But what had happened to Samuel that carried such significance?
“This is the first time I’ve set foot back in here since that night.”
He had her attention. “Can you talk about it?” she asked.
“I can tell you,” he said. “I’ve never told anyone else. You’re the only one who would understand.”
He was about to tell her something he hadn’t told others.
Something significant to him.
It warmed her heart.
And gave her hope that perhaps what she was starting to feel for him might be reciprocated.
Even if just a little.
She’d barely even thought about Thomas since she’d been here… in this time.
He still lived there. Firmly entrenched in the back of her mind, but Samuel had taken the front seat in her thoughts.
After all these years, that was significant.
“What happened?” she asked, pulling her attention back to Samuel.
He held out a hand and she placed hers in his.
“Vaughn,” he said. “Vaughn visited me.”
“I remember,” she said. “You told me that. Did she t
ell you something? Something you haven’t told me yet?”
“No,” he said, taking a deep breath. “But she left something behind.”
“What?” Ella asked, holding her breath.
Samuel reached into his coat pocket and pulled something out.
He locked his gaze on her and held out his closed fist to her.
Perplexed, she kept her eyes on his and held out her hand.
He dropped something cool into her hand.
She looked down.
Gasped.
And dropped it onto the sofa as though it had bit her.
She just stared at the Apple watch.
It was blank, of course, since it needed charging. But it had a rose gold rim and a pink and orange Velcro band.
“Do you know what this is?” she asked, the words barely audible.
Samuel watched her carefully. “It’s a pocket watch of some sort. It worked for a while. A couple of days. Then it just went blank and hasn’t worked since.”
She blinked and looked up at him. “It’s an Apple watch.”
He shrugged. It only worked when I touched it. Or lifted it. But it had some writing in it, too.” He frowned as though he’d been confused about it all these years.
“What did it say?” she asked.
“It just had the date and the words Memorial Day.”
Ella put a hand over her heart.
This was too much.
“What is Memorial Day?” Samuel asked.
“Um.” Ella took a moment to gather her thoughts. “It’s a holiday. A day set aside to honor those who died serving in our military.”
She stared at the watch. “I think it started after the Civil War. I think somewhere between half a million a million soldiers died in the Civil War.”
She picked up the watch and held it in her hand. She’d had an earlier version of the watch, but rarely wore it.
If the Velcro band was any indication, this one was one of the latest.
The watch was heavy in her hand.
Heavy and very real.
It erased any lingering doubt that he’d seen Vaughn. A living breathing person.
Not a ghost.
A time traveling person.
36
When the Moon Falls Page 7
