“There has to be something here that I will remember,” he whispered under his breath. “There has to be.”
He was desperate to find the truth. Even if his past was tainted with sinister deeds, he had to face them. He had to be a man and help his family. He had to keep them safe. It was all that mattered to him now. Damn his pride and his worry over what kind of man he might have been. He was of little consequence, but Linese and his grandfather were.
Chase got on his knees and arranged the old newspapers in order of date, beginning with the issues just before his wedding announcement, in June of 1862. After a few minutes of quick reading, he leaned closer and squinted at the print. He had finally noticed something.
“What the devil?” He changed them around and rearranged to Gazettes in three rows.
The first row of editorials, dating from March 1861, had a strong, opinionated style. It was bold and uncompromising, called for the people to make a stand. Chase assumed those were the ones he wrote before he went to war.
The next row, from May through June of 1862, was different. It was short, clipped, factual and concise. The style was another person’s voice entirely. There was no emotion in the words, just dry facts without flavor or opinion.
The third row, starting in September of 1862 and ending around the time he returned, was the one that captured his interest. Intrigued, he read the editorials several times.
Each editorial was eloquent, impassioned, almost lyrical in its plea for sanity amidst the conflict of Unionist against secessionist. For every account of butchery and violence in the neighboring counties, the Gazette editorial provided balance and reason in a world gone mad with politics and war.
Chase leaned closer and focused on the words. Without a doubt, the editorials were the best he had ever read, and they were most certainly not Hezikiah Hershner’s. They couldn’t have been his—so just who had written them? He stared at the pages and pondered the question, focusing all his concentration on the new, unfolding mystery.
Linese eased open the library door and peered in. The thin weight of Melissa’s nightgown did little to block out the chill that crept over her, when she realized what Chase was doing.
His long legs were stretched out on the old rug in front of the cold fireplace. Three neat rows of the Gazette back issues were on the floor in front of him. She could see he had them folded open to the editorial page. Her stomach tightened into a ball. He was so deep in concentration he had no idea she was watching him.
She could not go on this way. She had to tell him the truth and remove at least one barrier from their path. If she couldn’t find the courage to tell him the truth, how on earth could she be brave enough to see her reckless plan through to the end? Besides, if she was no longer the same timid girl he married, he deserved to know it. If he could not reconcile her new liberated thoughts and actions, then she should know it now before she ensnared him with the tricks Melissa had taught her.
Linese gulped down her dread and padded forward on bare feet. Chase continued reading, he never heard her, never looked up. Perhaps, she thought, it would be easier to get the words out if he were not looking at her. She took a deep breath and forced herself to find her voice.
“I wrote them, Chase.”
His head snapped around. He looked up at her and his eyebrows pinched together while the truth registered on every plane of his austere face. Her nerve nearly faltered then, but she summoned the strength to face his disappointment at the kind of woman she had become.
“Hezikiah needed help, Chase. I could not stand by and watch your family business fail like so many others.”
He still had not spoken, so she knelt beside him on the old rug and tried to explain.
“I remember what you said, about women with opinions in their head, but Chase, the war made it so hard to remain that simple, sheltered girl you married.” She peered into his gunmetal gray eyes and prayed he would not hate her. “I didn’t plan it, Chase, but I’m glad it happened.
Linese sighed and felt a great weight ease from her shoulders. She had admitted the truth. She liked working at the Gazette even if it was unladylike and not proper. Now she would have to face Chase’s wrath and disillusionment.
“With the war and all, the Gazette was nearly going under financially. Hezikiah had not been paid for months. He needed someone to help so he could get circulation up again. We wouldn’t have made it at all, but the Businessman’s Association suddenly came forward and loaned us some money, until we got on our feet. We managed to show a small profit and got them paid back, right before you came home.”
Chase narrowed his eyes at that information. The mayor and his friends had been tightening the grip on Chase’s family even in his absence. If he had not returned when he did, or if Hezikiah had failed to repay the loan, what would their next move have been? Fury boiled inside him to know his family had been used—even subtly—while he was not here to shield them from the malignancy of Kerney and his greedy philosophy.
“Chase, say something. Are you disappointed in me?”
Chase stared at her for a few long minutes. Watching Linese’s face in the uneven glow of the light had done strange things to his insides. Hearing her parrot the words he had so carelessly flung at her about how a woman should behave and think shamed him. It was more than he could withstand.
He reached out and pulled her closer to him. He turned her away from him, so he didn’t have to fight the lure of her eyes. When her back was pressed hard against his chest, he wrapped his arms around her waist and held her there, tight against him. The soft, warm weight of her breasts on his forearms sent a shiver of desire through him. Chase knew what he was doing was madness, but he did it anyway.
“I could never be disappointed in you. Not in anything you do or say.”
With a sigh of prickly contentment, he rested his chin on the top of her head and held her. The silky hairs tickled his throat. He needed to hold her. He needed to feel her strength of spirit against his body while he gave her a small portion of the comfort and approval she so richly deserved.
“That was why you wore gloves in this ungodly heat, wasn’t it? You were trying to cover the ink stains on your hands.” He kissed the top of her head and hated the man who had left her to go to war. “I left you with a great responsibility when I went away.”
Chase decided he must have run away, been a coward and gone to war, rather than face the threat Kerney and his allies held over him. How could he have been so stupid? Nothing was worth leaving this remarkable woman.
“Taking care of Grandfather, and the Gazette. You did a fine job, Linese. I’m proud of you, and I’m sorry I left you with such a burden. Can you ever forgive me?”
Linese blinked rapidly to thwart the tears, but a hot, hard lump lodged in her throat. She didn’t want to cry and was determined not to cry. “Forgive you?” her voice trembled.
He heard the harsh rasp of pent-up feeling in her voice and emotion bubbled through him. “You did what needed doing. If I had been more of a man, stayed here and taken responsibility, then you wouldn’t have been faced with the task.” Chase’s voice was hard with self-recrimination.
Linese pulled out of his arms and swiveled around to look at his face. She saw his eyebrows pinched together, but they no longer seemed to be an expression of disapproval. She saw a crack in his hard shell, and what she saw beneath brought a river of love spilling forth.
“Chase, I understood why you had to go. I’ve never regretted your decision.”
He looked into her clear blue eyes and saw love and forgiveness written there. He didn’t deserve this woman, but he was damned glad he had her. Even the tiny bit of her he could allow himself was more than worth the price not having all of her was exacting upon his soul.
“How can you say you understand what I did?” he asked.
“On our wedding day, when you told me that one more man fighting for the Union could turn the tide, I understood. You have always felt strongly about your co
nvictions. It’s one of the things I love about you.”
She lowered her lashes and her cheeks flushed. The need to taste her lips was so strong he could not ignore it. Chase placed his thumb under her chin and tipped her head up. He leaned forward and. brushed his mouth across her lips.
They were soft and warm.
A harsh groan escaped his chest. He knew he was courting disaster, but the lure of her goodness reeled him in like a hapless trout. Chase crushed her to him and heard the soft sigh of satisfaction from her mouth.
When her arms wrapped around his neck and she pressed her breasts against the bare flesh exposed between the unbuttoned section of his shirt, an inferno ignited inside him.
Dear God in heaven. He loved her. It wasn’t just the poignant, bittersweet need to remember loving her. It was real and immediate.
It had happened. After all the warnings he had given himself, he had allowed it to happen. He had fallen hopelessly in love with Linese.
Chase felt the power of his devotion roll over him in a huge, all-consuming wave. He could no more disregard the longing he felt for her than he could stop the sun from rising. It was a need, a hunger, that made him tremble inside from the force of it.
“Oh, Chase, I was afraid you would be angry with me.”
“I could never be angry with you, sweet.”
Chase cupped her slender throat in his palm and looked at her beautiful face. Her lips were red and dewy from his voracious kiss. He smiled at the sheer wonder of holding her.
“Linese, how did I ever win such a prize as you?” he asked softly.
She smiled and touched the side of his face with her fingertips. “By sheer strength of will. How could I do anything but fall in love, when you all but dared me not to?”
Impulsively he kissed her again. His tongue traced the outline of her teeth and, in a weakening moment, Chase allowed his hands to roam freely over her form, cherishing the way her flesh felt beneath the thin layer of cloth. He committed to memory every soft nuance of her body, telling himself he would have this one precious memory to hold.
He rubbed his thumb over the hard peak of one nipple and cupped his hand beneath the weight of her breast. His flattened palm sculpted over the smooth valley of her waist. His fingers sought the warm skin of her inner thigh.
“Oh, Linese,” he moaned while his desire unraveled the thread of his reason ever further.
His lips moved over her chin and down her throat. She tasted richer than aged brandy, sweeter than sugarcane. He twined his free hand in her hair and savored the feel of it. It was like holding a skein of the finest silk. She closed her eyes and leaned into him.
She was his wife. He loved her. His body ached to know all of her mystery.
“Chase?”
He heard the longing question in her voice. Every nerve in his body cried out to say yes.
But could he? Could he actually allow himself a small ration of ecstasy in her arms and remain strong enough to prevent doing anything that would show himself for the fraud he was?
He would have to try. He could no longer neglect the famine inside him. If he did not taste some of her goodness, he would surely die. Chase eased her back down to the rough texture of the rug. Her eyes were wide and luminous.
“Linese”
Fists banging on the door brought Chase to his feet in an heart-pounding leap. Linese made a startled sound of surprise. He looked down her and saw her gown shoved up to her thighs. Her alabaster flesh looked smooth as satin in the lamplight.
Shame at what he was about to do swept over him. He adjusted his clothes and tried to ease the aching in his groin. Chase grabbed the lamp and strode out of the library doors. He reached the big front door of Cordellane just as his grandfather appeared at his side. Light winked off the barrel of a pistol the old ranger had concealed in the folds of his nightshirt.
“Anyone out at this hour of the night is bound to be trouble,” Captain Cordell commented dryly.
Chase nodded in agreement at his grandfather’s lucid observation and unbolted the door. Sheriff Rancy Thompson was standing outside, blinking against the glare of the lamp Chase held in his face.
“Sheriff?” Chase said. “What brings you to Cordellane in the middle of the night?”
The man shuffled his feet. It was obvious he was not happy to be standing on the veranda of Cordellane, regardless the reason. Chase sensed Linese standing behind him in the shadows by the library door.
“I’m real sorry about this, Major Cordell.” Rancy grimaced. He took a deep breath and then his explanation spilled out in a rush. “Dang it, I’ve come to arrest the Captain.”
Chapter Thirteen
“Arrest him? Why?” The hair on the back of Chase’s neck prickled.
“I don’t take any pleasure in this, Major, but there has been—well, I got some new evidence brought to my attention about an old case.” It was plain Mayor Kerney had set the wheels of political machinery turning, just as he had promised he would.
“What kind of evidence?” Chase swallowed the sick feeling. He was walking on quicksand again. He didn’t even know what the crime was, and now there was evidence. If this new evidence was anything solid, and he could not remember his past and what part he had played in keeping his grandfather safe, then the old man was surely doomed this time.
“Some anonymous statements place your grandfather in the area of a murder, in Ferrin County. The whole thing happened about two years ago. I had almost forgotten all about it. One of the few cases I was never able to solve.”
Impotent rage began to simmer inside Chase. If only he could remember something—anything—about that time, but at least now he had a reference point from which to begin, and a crime.
Murder.
“Well, Sheriff, can I put on my britches first?” Captain Cordell’s voice made Chase start. When he turned around, he was shocked to see his grandfather grinning broadly.
The old soul didn’t realize his life was in peril. It made Chase even more furious to know that the mayor and his friends would victimize someone who wasn’t mentally competent, in their quest to get their point across.
“Sure, Captain. You go get dressed,” Sheriff Thompson allowed patiently.
For the first time Chase saw his grandfather’s affliction as a twisted blessing. At least he was oblivious to the danger he was in. It was hollow comfort to Chase while he watched the old man turn and walk away with the pistol still secreted in his striped nightshirt.
Chase was waiting outside the jail when dawn broke. Rancy didn’t seem to be in the least bit surprised. He silently unlocked the front door and stepped aside. He motioned Chase toward a door at the back of the office.
He found his grandfather sitting on a crude iron cot with his manacled leg attached to a chain and ring in the center of the rough mortar floor. It sickened him to see the gentle soul in such dire circumstances.
“Can I be alone with him?” Chase asked Thompson.
“Sure, I can’t see no harm in letting you talk with him alone for a few minutes. He never said a word all the way in last night. Hope he hasn’t slipped further—well, you know—further away.” The sheriff cast a sympathetic look at Captain Cordell before he turned and walked to the outer office and closed the door behind him.
The minute Thompson was gone, the Captain rose from the cot and stepped as close to the iron bars as his leg chain would allow. He gestured for Chase to come near while he leaned far enough to wrap his fingers around the vertical iron bars.
“It’s about time you got here, Chase. I was beginning to wonder.”
Chase was taken aback. In all the time he had been home, his grandfather had never acknowledged his identity by using his given name. He put his face against the bars and listened intently.
“These fools have got some trumped-up charges about that Ferrin County killing a couple of years back. I heard Thompson talking to the mayor and some of those other idiots that call themselves the Businessman’s Association, last night
after he put me in here.”
“What?” Chase was having a hard time absorbing the lucid way in which his grandfather was speaking. The vacant, out-of-focus look in his eyes had evaporated like dew on a hot morning the moment the outer door had slammed shut.
“I had never planned for you to learn the truth this way.” The old man grinned sheepishly. He ran his fingers along the silver mustache that hung beside his mouth. “But I guess there never would’ve been any good time to tell you. I ain’t quite as touched as everyone thinks. I never wanted to bring you in on this, but it looks like I got no choice.”
“You—you’re—not mad?”
“Not any crazier than any other fool that settled this country. Hell, we had to be a little insane to come to a place where we had to fight Santa Anna, Comanche, and the weather all at once.” The Captain’s grin widened.
Chase felt the color drain from his face. He tightened his grip on the bars when his knees went liquid.
“Well, don’t look so damned happy about having a sane relative instead of a crazy one, boy.”
Chase shook his head and blinked. “Sorry, it’s not that. Of course, I’m glad you are sane.”
A million thoughts swam through his head at once. He could not manage to grasp one single idea and sort it from all the others in the face of this information.
“You’ve never been crazy?” he asked in a doubtful whisper. “Not even a little?”
His grandfather sighed and shook his head slowly. “I buried your grandma, your ma, your father, and my sweet Marjorie in the ground behind Cordellane. That is enough to make anybody a little crazy. There was a time when grief made me… odd. Gossip and human nature, being what it is, just kept building it up, making it worse, until finally I was known as ‘crazy Captain Cordell.’”
The Captain looked away and continued to speak. “Parents were never intended to outlive their children, Chase. It’s an unnatural thing, something I hope you never have to go through. No sadder thing on God’s earth, than for a parent to put his child in the ground. For a time I couldn’t accept what happened, especially to Marjorie. Then, as things turned out, it became a blessing in disguise. People ignored me. I was able to come and go, do certain things without having to explain.”
Linda Castle Page 14
