Now that he realized Bushnell was the reason for her flight. And that she was going to lose her job because of his preying on her? Well, he could only believe it was a matter of divine intervention that had brought him and Bushnell once again to the same place at the same time.
It was wrong to be feeling what he did, he knew. Wrong to be looking forward to extracting vengeance.
Why, God? he asked as he started back down the narrow passageway wallpapered with busy designs and adorned with rather uninteresting charcoal drawings of plants and animals. Why have you decided to bring us all together again?
Ethan hadn’t thought of Colonel Daniel Bushnell in years. Ethan had been one of the many men who’d served under him. Frankly, if Ethan had spared him a thought, he would have assumed Bushnell had gone back to his mistress and his wife and continued to manipulate and use as many people as possible for his own selfish gains. After all, that was what he’d been so very good at.
But maybe he had been just as human as the rest of them. A lot of men had problems adjusting to life after the war and months in a prison camp. That was one of the reasons he, Captain Monroe, Lieutenant Truax, and Baker had vowed to look out for each other. A new lawlessness existed in men’s hearts after the war. It was as if they were unable to give up their worst influences.
Many couldn’t. After returning home and finding either their plantations or homes ruined or in pieces of rubble, they’d been at a loss for what to do. Then had come the punishment the union waged during Reconstruction. It ate upon their souls.
But now that he realized a man he loathed had accosted Miss Barclay here in the hotel, Ethan knew he owed it to her to warn him to stay away from her in the future. He hadn’t been able to do anything except hurt her when he and his men had shown up at her house that day. Now, at last, he could make amends. He was determined to be her hero, even though it made no sense. He wanted retribution, and he was eager to get it. At any cost.
Situations like this—such that it was—were why he missed the army so much. In the army, there was a distinct order. His rank mattered. His disapproval mattered. Furthermore, dozens—if not scores—of men had been all too willing to do what he desired.
But this? Trying to help a gentlewoman like Miss Lizbeth Barclay? Well, that was dangerous.
Women like her made him yearn for things he’d already come to terms with never having. Like goodness and a home. Those were what he’d dreamed of and planned to have with Faye, his longtime sweetheart. But she’d grown lonely during the war and found someone else while he was in that prison camp. It seemed even majors lost some of their shine when they were reduced to mere prisoners.
That was yet another reason he yearned to do some kind of physical harm to an intangible object.
Glad he’d made Aileen Howard tell him the room number, he strode down the hall and rapped twice on Bushnell’s door. He felt a pleased appreciation when it swung open immediately.
It took only seconds, but that was long enough for Bushnell to erase the shock that appeared on his face when he recognized him. “Kelly.”
Ethan was thrust back in time. Back to his captivity on Johnson’s Island. To Bushnell’s arrival after Ethan had already been living on the premises for two months. To the man interfering with most everything Captain Monroe had put into place.
Time had not been kind to the other man. The small pox scars on his cheeks had turned red and become more pronounced. The skin on his face and neck seemed loose, whether from hard living or some kind of sickness. He also seemed to have shrunk in size. Ethan wondered if that was indeed true, or if he’d merely shrunk in importance to him.
It was obvious that Ethan’s appearance caught him off guard, but he recovered quickly. “Is it really you?”
“It was Major Kelly last time we saw each other.”
“The war is over. Like in the camp, appellations don’t matter much now.” He raised one eyebrow. “Or do they?”
“They mattered at one time. Maybe more than I realized.”
Bushnell shook his head. “It was men like me who saved the high and mighty generals from getting their hands dirty. Even your friend General McCoy.”
“I never heard wind of you after we were released.”
“I did what you did, I reckon. I attempted to put my life back together. I went back to Boerne.”
“Ah. Yes. You had a ladybird there.” Bushnell had often bragged of her beauty.
“Julianne? I did have her for a time, even after the war ended.” He grunted. “But then I got rid of her, of course. I couldn’t chance my wife’s family discovering her, you know. After I paid her off, I went home to Fredericksburg.”
“Where your wife and children live.”
“Well, they did.” He frowned. “My wife and son have since died, and my daughter married a blasted Yankee and moved up to Philadelphia.”
“That’s a pity.”
“Indeed, it is.” He cleared his throat. “Is there a reason we are standing here in the Menger Hotel reviewing my life? As you must surmise, I am finding it rather tiresome.”
And just like that, all the patience Ethan had hoped to adopt after meeting the Sandlers dissipated like a morning fog. He loathed this man, loathed everything about him—including the fact he had preyed on a woman who had already been through far too much.
“There is a reason,” he said softly. “But I wanted to know what had become of you before I say my piece.”
“I doubt I will care to hear anything you have to say.”
“While that is probably true, what you want matters little to me.”
“You sound so sanctimonious. Don’t tell me you’re going to start casting stones. You might act like you are a self-made man, but we both know you built yourself around the comfort of your circumstances. Few men can boast of such privilege.”
Bushnell’s words were harsh, but they were also true. Ethan was from a wealthy, old, well-connected family. Their influence was far-reaching, and their holdings were substantial. He’d never been ashamed of that. But at the beginning of the war, his relationships with his family had been strained. His father had wanted him to dodge the war. To stay back and let other men put their lives on the line for their homes and convictions. His brother, Phillip, had agreed, convinced some of the young men were needed at home to protect the women and help manage family holdings. But Ethan had refused. On the night before he left, both he and his father had said a great many things they later regretted.
But as the war wore on, as he witnessed far too many good men suffer painful deaths, Ethan was privately glad both his father and his brother were safe at home. And in their letters, both his parents shared how proud they were of him. Their letters, so full of hope and home, had helped him survive his life on Johnson’s Island.
Bushnell cleared his throat, bringing Ethan back to the present. “So, say your piece, Kelly. Do it quickly now, before I slam my door in your face.”
“All right, then. It has come to my attention that you accosted a woman just minutes ago.”
“Is that right?” He looked amused. Leaving Ethan still standing in the hallway, he walked to a pack on his desk, pulled out a cigar, and lazily lit it with a match. As he puffed, smoke plumed from his mouth, spiraling toward the high ceiling in a lazy motion.
With another man, Ethan might have been irritated. But this small action showed that Bushnell, for all his bluster, was thrown. During the war, the man had always lit his tobacco whenever he was worried or uneasy.
Leaning against the doorframe, Ethan said, “We aren’t going to play this game, are we? You know what I’m talking about.”
“Do I?” Bushnell said around a smoke-filled exhale. “At the moment I don’t know which woman you are referring to.”
Only with the greatest effort did Ethan resist pummeling the man’s face. “I am speaking of the maid you were dallying with. The maid with the dark curly hair.”
He chuckled. “Ah, yes. I remember now. What of her? She is on
ly a maid. No one of importance. Certainly no one to concern yourself about.”
Bushnell’s haughty manner was almost believable. Almost. His eyes gave his real thoughts away, however. They were lit with a new light that said volumes about his character. He enjoyed the game. He enjoyed both toying with helpless women like Miss Barclay and matching wits with men like him.
“Don’t push me.”
“Don’t accuse me of things I didn’t do.”
Stepping into the room uninvited and striding across it, Ethan finally did what he’d been itching to do from the moment Bushnell opened the door. He grabbed him by the collar. “You attempted to violate her.”
“She might have believed that. However, I did not.”
“Don’t lie, Daniel,” he said, tightening his hold on the man’s collar, nearly choking him.
To Ethan’s dismay, Bushnell started laughing. “Now I understand. You aren’t upset that I was dabbling with a maid, are you? You are concerned because you have feelings for her! For a maid! What is your family going to say, Kelly? Surely even they don’t believe you’ve fallen this far from society.”
“Leave my family out of this.”
“You want to pretend you’re suddenly just like the rest of us, bowing and scraping to get what we want and need? Well, so be it. If you want to lower yourself to fawn over a chambermaid, it ain’t no business of mine.” He smirked. “Just let me know when you tire of her. She might be scarred, but that won’t hardly matter in the dark.”
Finally, the moment he had been hoping for. He slammed his fist into the man’s jaw and felt a glimmer of satisfaction rip through him as Bushnell fell to the ground with a thump.
Standing over him, Ethan stared at the man’s face. When his eyes opened, Ethan bent slightly forward. “She is now under my protection. Do you understand?”
Bushnell’s eyes narrowed and a look of extreme distaste passed through his expression before he spoke. “I understand perfectly.”
Ethan was still shaking with fury when he slammed the door behind him and stood rooted in the hall.
He’d just made more of an enemy out of Bushnell. If he knew anything, it was that Bushnell wasn’t going to take Ethan’s assault and threat lightly. He would retaliate.
And though Ethan would have been happy never to see that man again, he now knew that wasn’t an option. He would take out his retaliation on Miss Barclay because he knew hurting her would hurt Ethan too.
He needed to protect her. He also needed to discover everything Bushnell had done since the war and ascertain what his plans were for the future. He could use that to his advantage and hold it over the man. Only then would he be able to keep Lizbeth safe.
He had some choices. He could investigate him alone. He could also reach out to his brother and father. They would help him if he asked.
Or he could rely on his band of brothers, the men he knew best and knew would always have his back, no matter what the cost.
In the end, it wasn’t really much of a decision. He needed to be available to Lizbeth, so he couldn’t leave her alone for long periods of time. His family, while influential and powerful, would expect him to finally move back home and help run the family ranch and assorted holdings. He’d been planning to visit them in a few days to face that reality, but he wasn’t going to return for good.
He’d been putting off the inevitable since he’d returned from Johnson’s Island. He hadn’t been in any shape to be around people in polite society. Instead, he’d been hovering on the fringes of that society. The easy laughter and high-stakes gambling he’d found in numerous establishments around the state had been far easier to deal with. All anyone had wanted there was his money.
But he’d also been able to help the friends with whom he’d been imprisoned when they called, and now he was the one who needed help.
He decided to ride out to visit Captain Devin Monroe as soon as he could. Devin was a man of honor, thoughtful and clear-headed. He also would understand Ethan’s feelings about owing such a debt.
Looking around him in the empty hallway of the second floor of the Menger Hotel, Ethan realized his own head felt clearer than it had in months.
Maybe even years.
At last, justice would be served.
5
He was too old for this.
Standing outside Julianne Van Fleet’s plain but neat and well-tended home, Devin Monroe felt as though his shirt was too tight, his feet were too big, and his bearing was too hard. Nothing about him was kind or relaxed. Nothing about him was comfortable or easy.
This was a problem.
He didn’t know the first thing about courting a gentlewoman like Miss Van Fleet. Actually, he didn’t know much about courting women at all. He’d spent the majority of his life in the company of rough soldiers. During most of the war, he’d been a captain, and that rank had fit him like a glove.
He knew how to take orders, and he knew how to manage enlisted men. He knew what to say to push men onward and what to do when he needed them to come to heel. He had been comfortable in the army. He’d instinctively known when to speak and when to stay silent. He’d been respected. Confident. Content.
But he knew next to nothing about talking with women, and even less when it came to knocking on the door of a lady’s home. Chances were better than good that he would offend Miss Van Fleet within ten minutes of stepping foot in her parlor.
Turning away from her front door, he studied the other ten or so houses on her street. Each was one story, constructed of limestone and wood, and boasted wide front porches. The yards were carefully tended, and the gravel drives were neatly edged. It was a pretty place. Quiet. Perfect for a lady like her, but confusing for a man who was still getting used to a life out of the military.
Unease crept along his spine. He shouldn’t have come. Why had he, anyway?
He knew the answer as sure as if he’d been leading a regiment of soldiers across a war-torn battlefield and his lieutenant wasn’t sure whether to surge forward or retreat.
He was on Julianne Van Fleet’s front porch because she was the first woman in his memory whom he’d wanted to know. Even after growing up the prized oldest son of two very ordinary people and living next to another ranch where a young lady had made no secret of her desire to be his wife. Despite his mother introducing him to every one of her friends’ daughters by the time he was seventeen.
Even after all the cotillions and dances and officers’ balls he’d attended, where lines of lovely women in white dresses had looked at his chest of medals with stars in their eyes. He had appreciated their beauty, but not a one had made a lasting impression.
Neither had the women he’d spent time with after his release from Johnson’s Island.
He’d begun to think love and romance weren’t meant for men like him. He’d killed and hurt and bled too much to even know how to be suitable company for a gently bred woman.
Then one day Miss Van Fleet appeared in his life unexpectedly. He first spied her when he was traveling to San Antonio to visit his friend and former comrade Ethan Kelly. Devin had stopped to water his horse in Boerne, and then decided to take a stroll around the sleepy little town to grab something to eat and give his horse a rest.
The action had been nothing out of the ordinary. He’d done much the same thing more times than he could count. But on that day, in that moment, everything changed.
After hitching his gelding, he walked through the town square, intending to get a dish at the local boarding house, assessing the area, as was his habit. He’d seen the courthouse. The saloon. Mercantile. A couple of men about his age lounging against the side of the bank, smoking. A mother with her brood of children. And one lady walking by herself just across the way.
She was striking. Wearing a well-fitted navy-blue gown that accentuated a nipped-in waist and an hourglass figure. Her features revealed she was likely close to his age of thirty. She was at least five feet seven and had been blessed with auburn hair and a heart-sh
aped face. She wasn’t merely pretty. She was beautiful.
But he’d seen many beautiful women before.
Then she looked up. And he? Well, he’d been caught in that gaze.
Later he would recall other details about her. She’d worn an attractive hat festooned with ribbons. She’d been walking a dog. A book was in her other hand, and a patterned shawl was draped around her slim shoulders.
She’d been so quiet and gentle-looking. Sweet. Peaceful.
He hadn’t been able to look away. She was everything he ever envisioned when he laid in too-small cots during the war. There was something about her that he wanted to get to know, if only for a little while.
He’d realized it was time. Time to stop living alone, living only for others. For most of his life, he’d done that. From his days with the Texas Rangers to the years in battle and the months in prison camp, he’d survived by putting his needs last. After what God wanted him to do. After what the Confederacy ordered him to do. After what his men needed him to do. It was time to be selfish and concentrate on his own wants, needs, and hopes.
And even though he wasn’t altogether sure what all those things were, he’d acted on his impulse.
In short order, he crossed the street and somehow managed to introduce himself and strike up a conversation with her outside the mercantile. They had talked about nothing, really. Her dog. The weather. She’d been a little shy, easing his own nervousness.
But every word she said had imprinted on his brain. And her voice, her sweetly melodic voice—it rang in his ears like church bells. She laughed at her dog’s antics and looked directly at him when he spoke. She didn’t simper or flirt or giggle.
He’d been charmed.
Knowing she most likely didn’t want to stand talking to him outside the mercantile long, and because he still had obligations to attend to, he said good-bye to her and Boerne and went on his way. But from the moment he left her side he felt her loss. Before he was even halfway to San Antonio, he was making plans to see her again.
Love Held Captive Page 4
