“I’d thought perhaps several of your Cherokee guests might have joined us for dinner tonight?” Caroline wasn’t sure why she was being so bold. But she could tell her questions weren’t endearing her to the governor. However, when she slipped a look across the table, Wolf seemed amused.
But this time when the governor changed the subject, Caroline let him. He obviously wasn’t going to tell her anything of import about the Cherokee problem.
“Do you plan to return to England?” Governor Lyttelton asked. “Raff has told me something of your circumstances. Allow me to offer you my sincerest condolences on the loss of your husband.”
“Thank you.” Caroline lowered her lashes. “He died rather tragically.” She looked up, meeting first Wolf’s dark eyes, then the rummy ones of the governor. “But I intend to stay in the Americas... at Seven Pines.”
“Really?” The governor sounded surprised, and Caroline imagined Wolf had given him to believe otherwise.
“Yes. As it happens, I intend to write my brother as soon as it’s safe and have him come also.”
“Your brother?” Wolf’s voice was deep and low. “That would be the next Earl?”
“That would be Edward... Ned, actually, and I think he would like it very much here.” Actually she wasn’t certain how her brother would view the colony. But she wished to let Wolf know that she was serious about staying.
The rest of the meal—the best Caroline had had in some time—passed with little consequence. By the time dessert was served, the conversation centered upon plays the young officers had seen in London, and how primitive they thought the frontier.
Caroline said little. She’d seen no plays, and she was becoming very fond of the land that was now her home. But she concluded that more than anything else, the officers were homesick. It mattered naught what she said, as long as she offered an English ear... a feminine English ear.
When the governor’s personal servant brought a bottle of cognac on a silver platter, Caroline decided to take her leave. She was tired, and she’d been spelling Mary when Colleen woke in the night. Since it was but a short walk across the parade grounds to Mistress Quinn’s cabin, Caroline saw no need for an escort and courteously declined when Governor Lyttelton offered one.
It was more difficult to say no to Wolf.
For one thing, he didn’t politely request. He told her he’d be accompanying her to the cabin. And though her impulse was to resist, Caroline decided it best to simply let him have his way rather than to argue the point in front of the governor and officers. Wolf was, after all, the son of her dead husband. Though the family connection was no more than a thin veneer as far as society was concerned, it was there.
“You seemed quite at ease in the governor’s presence, Lady Caroline.”
He waited only till the door was shut behind them and they were barely out of earshot before his low, sardonic voice broke the silence. Caroline glanced at him through her lashes, though the occasional smoky brand that lit the fort’s interior was not enough to see him clearly. But she could imagine the expression on his dark, handsome face. She’d seen the sarcastic turn of his lips, the intense fire of his obsidian eyes often enough.
Partly because she didn’t think any comment by her was needed, and partly because she didn’t wish to prolong this encounter, Caroline said nothing, and kept her pace brisk.
“Of course, it was nothing more than I expected,” he continued. “However, I was a bit surprised by your referring to the Headmen as prisoners. Governor Lyttelton did not seem pleased.”
Caroline paused then, forgetting her vow to take her leave of his onerous company as soon as possible. “If I recall, hostages was the term I used. And shocking you was not my goal.”
He’d stopped, too. They stood in the lee of a storage shed, partially hidden from the view of anyone who might pass their way. Raff loomed over her, and Caroline wished she’d kept walking. But she refused to retreat, even when he took a step forward.
“I never thought it was,” he responded. “But it surprised me all the same. You sounded almost as if you cared about the Cherokee.”
She did. Because of Sadayi and Walini and most of the others she’d met and learned to like. And because of Raff, a small voice whispered in her ear, but she tried to ignore it. And him. He smelled faintly of the brandy he drank before he insisted upon accompanying her. For the briefest moment, Caroline allowed herself to wonder what the smooth liquor would taste like on his tongue.
Then reason and the stupidity of her thoughts whisked her back to reality. “I care about returning to my home,” Caroline said, her tone as firm as she could make it.
“Ah, the motherland. Where exactly in England are you from?”
“Gloucester, but I wasn’t referring to England as you well know. ’Tis Seven Pines that I call home.”
Even in the dim light that flickered from a nearby torch, she noticed the narrowing of his eyes. “I don’t suppose now is the time to discuss which of us owns Seven Pines, especially with Logan off in the wilds of Pennsylvania?”
Again Caroline said nothing. Regardless of her anger with him, she couldn’t bring herself to profess to carrying his father’s child. There would be time enough for that later, she assured herself.
“What’s the matter, Your Ladyship, have you nothing to say to your stepson?”
Apparently he’d drunk more than she thought, or he just felt like being a bore. He normally didn’t push her this way. No, he was usually more taciturn. Seduce and leave. He seemed to have the sequence down to an art. But tonight he was more interested in taunting her, and Caroline was quickly tiring of it.
But escaping him would not be easy. Somehow he’d backed her into a corner, with his large body blocking her into the V of log walls. She could scream, but then that would appear melodramatic considering he’d done nothing but talk. So she decided she would simply make known her wishes to leave.
She lifted her hand to push him aside and immediately realized her mistake. His large hand covered hers, pressing it firmly against his chest. She could feel the steady pounding of his heart, the warmth of his skin through the homespun shirt. Did he notice how her breathing quickened?
“I wish to return to Mistress Quinn’s cabin.” Caroline kept her voice level with difficulty.
“Do you?”
She could almost hear the disbelief in his tone and wondered how much of it came from his ability to read her thoughts. “I should think you would want to return to the governor anyway,” Caroline said, deciding that to attack was her best weapon. “Now that you’ve chosen to side with the English, it wouldn’t do to let them make decisions without you.”
Caroline felt the sudden stiffening of his body and almost smiled. But he didn’t release her hand. If anything, his fingers tightened.
“I believe Your Ladyship has a mistaken notion of where my loyalties lie.”
“Do I?” Caroline decided the ability to sound aristocratic must be inborn. She certainly had no practice with it until she met Raff MacQuaid. Now she used it so often and so convincingly, she almost fooled herself. “It didn’t appear that way when you rode into the fort by the governor’s side. Nor tonight when you were included as a guest for his intimate dinner.”
She’d thought to make him angry which was why his reaction—throwing back his head and laughing—was all the more disturbing.
“Are you trying to bait me, Caroline?”
“No. I simply wonder why all other members of the peace delegation that went to Charles Town are held hostage and you walk about free.”
“First of all, I am not the only one given their freedom. Two of the Headmen have already left for the Middle Towns. Secondly, I presume no one considers me important enough to keep. I am not one of the Headmen.”
“But you’re listened to by the Cherokee... trusted.”
“Listened to, perhaps. Though I fear my link to the Little Carpenter’s ear has been sorely strained by the governor’s acts. But I have nev
er been truly trusted, Caroline. My father saw to that.”
Caroline didn’t know what to say so she kept quiet, which is the only reason she heard his next softly murmured words. “My legacy from the man who sired me.”
She was doing it again. Seeing him as a person. Caring about him even though that caring wasn’t reciprocated. Caroline did her best to harden her heart. She concentrated on the seduction. But when that began to stir longings best left buried, she forced herself to remember the morning he left her... left her to his father’s bullying.
And all the time he held her hand against his chest, and the frosty winter evening surrounded them.
“Perhaps I should return you to Mistress Quinn’s.”
His words interrupted her musings, and Caroline tugged at her hand. He let it go without a struggle, and she wondered if she might have done the same as soon as he captured her hand. He stepped aside, and Caroline proceeded him across the parade grounds.
When they reached the rough-hewn door with the drawstring left out for her, he asked about Mary and the baby.
Regardless of her feelings for him, Caroline knew he cared for his brother’s wife and wished she could tell him something more positive. “She isn’t getting any worse. Some days she seems almost well. Then...” Caroline sighed. “She should be regaining her strength by now,” Caroline said of Mary. “And the baby is so small. Is there any way to get word to Logan?”
Wolf took a deep breath. She could see the expansion of his chest in the moonlight. “I’ve sent a letter. But the war has made communication between the colonies slow, so...” He let the rest of his words trail off. “I don’t know if Logan would be able to come even if he knew.”
“Wouldn’t be able to... or wouldn’t bother to?”
“What do you mean by that? Mary is his wife.”
A soldier ambled by with his arm around the daughter of one of Mistress Quinn’s friends. The girl giggled up at her companion, obviously smitten by him. Caroline wanted to call after her to beware of a handsome face. Instead she turned her attention back to the man who taught her the hard-earned lesson.
“I don’t mean anything I suppose. It just seems odd to me that Logan would leave his wife and go off to fight when she was in danger herself.”
“Has Mary been talking to you about this?”
Caroline turned her face away, not wishing to lie, yet unwilling to betray a confidence from her friend.
“She was not in danger when he left for one thing.” Wolf apparently decided she considered his question rhetorical. “And our father made it impossible for him to stay any longer.”
“Because of their disagreement over trading with the Cherokee?”
“I see she has been talking.” Wolf leaned against the wall. “Logan planned to save his money and come back for her, I believe. In the meanwhile, Robert treated her fairly well.”
“It’s difficult not to like her.”
He agreed with a nod of his head before continuing. “Logan did not know she was with child when he left... at least he did not mention it to me.”
“And would he?”
“If you mean did we confide in one another, the answer is, yes, at times. Still, there was plenty to separate us.”
“Your Cherokee blood?” Caroline was beginning to wonder if Wolf didn’t make more of that than he should. Mary had indicated her husband was very fond of his brother.
“For one thing. Circumstances of birth for another. Logan and his brother were born on the right side of the sheet. A difference hard to ignore.”
Caroline turned toward the door. “I think I should go in.” She’d tarried much longer than she planned as it was. But before she could reach for the drawstring, Wolf’s hand circled her arm. She slowly twisted her head to stare at him, hoping her expression revealed nothing of the desire his touch sparked.
“Are you all right, Caroline?”
“Yes. Why do you ask?”
“I am not sure.” His dark eyes narrowed. “You seem...” He shook his head. “Stay away from the soldiers. Actually it would be better if you and Mary kept to yourselves. Measles have broken out, and Lyttelton fears the smallpox might spread from Keowee.”
“I’ve seen the fires as they burn their houses.”
“It is Lyttelton’s idea. He thinks it may curb the epidemic.”
“And what do you think?”
His eyes met hers. “I think I was a fool to bring you to the frontier in the first place.”
Caroline’s chin notched higher. “But then it wasn’t your decision, was it?” His fingers still gripped her arm, and Caroline felt them tighten, felt herself being drawn toward him.
“Very few things have been under my control since I met you, Lady Caroline. And those that have...”
Caroline never discovered what he planned to say. Leaving his words unspoken, Wolf lowered his mouth until it touched hers. The kiss did not last long, as he used his tongue to but briefly wet the closed seam of Caroline’s lips, yet the contact still left her breathless. She managed to pull away and enter the cabin before her knees gave out, but long into the sleepless night she thought about him and what he’d left unsaid.
December seemed endless.
A cold spell froze the ground and brought the first swirling snowstorm. The fort was abuzz with gossip each time a new delegation of Cherokee met with Governor Lyttelton. And that seemed to be an ongoing occurrence.
December tenth brought word that the Little Carpenter would arrive soon with word from the Overhill Towns. Rumor had it that they desired peace with the British, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief.
Everyone except Wolf, who seemed as skeptical as ever. He sat in front of the fire holding Colleen in the crook of his arm while Mary stitched a tear in one of his shirts. He hadn’t asked Caroline to do it, and she tried to convince herself she was just as glad. Why should she wish to perform wifely duties for him?
But she couldn’t help watching him out of the corner of her eye as she sliced bread for the evening meal. And she couldn’t help thinking of him holding the baby that now rested beneath her heart.
“The English have named him emperor of the Cherokee,” Wolf said of Little Carpenter. “Though he is powerful among my people, it is a title that means nothing.”
“Do you mean he doesn’t speak for them?” Anticipation over his arrival at Fort Prince George was discussed with such enthusiasm, Caroline hated to think it was for naught.
“Some of them, yes.” Wolf’s gaze met Caroline’s, and she quickly glanced away. “He is mighty among the Middle Settlements. But he does not carry the talk stick for the council.”
That seemed to make no difference to the governor, who greeted the Little Carpenter on the nineteenth with all the pomp he could muster. A warm breeze freshened the air, and Caroline and Mary decided to walk outside to hear the band play and watch the Cherokee arrive. Mistress Quinn, who declared she’d seen enough Indians to last a lifetime agreed to stay with Colleen who slept in her basket.
The weather and the possibility of a break in the boredom of fort life caused most of the inhabitants to think as Caroline and Mary had. It was difficult to find a spot from which to view the welcome. When they finally managed to wriggle their way through the crowd, Caroline wasn’t surprised to see Wolf standing between Governor Lyttelton and the Little Carpenter, and the other Headmen who just arrived, Ocayula of Choata, and Ucanokeach.
“Is that what I think it is?” Mary asked, and Caroline nodded as the British-proclaimed head of the Cherokee people handed the governor eight scalps. He also held out a string of beads, and the women watched as the governor removed the three black beads which stood out on the otherwise white belt.
“That’s to symbolize that the governor is no longer displeased with the Cherokee.” When Caroline glanced over at her, Mary continued. “Raff told me.”
“I didn’t realize you talked to him so much.” Caroline stretched onto her tiptoes to see over the head of a tall matron in fron
t of her.
“Yes, you do. You just always have some excuse to be out of the cabin when he comes by. Why is that, I wonder?”
Caroline shot her friend a scowl, then inched to her right. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t you? I’m not the only one to notice how you avoid him. Raff commented upon it.”
“Did he now? Since when am I the subject of your conversation with him?”
“Since he asks about you all the time, and since you leave the moment he arrives.” Mary wrapped her shawl more tightly about her shoulders. “Do you know what I think?”
“I haven’t a clue.”
“I think you two care about each other.”
Caroline said nothing for a moment, just stared at Mary. Then she closed her mouth and shook her head. “That’s ridiculous. I think we should be getting back to the cabin.” She suddenly lost her desire to see the ceremony.
“You love him, don’t you?”
Caroline stopped short, then grabbed her friend’s hand and pulled her to the side of the parade ground. “Where did you ever get such a preposterous notion?”
Mary just stared at her in a way that made Caroline know all the denying in the world wouldn’t convince her. “Mary, there are things you don’t know about. Things I can’t tell even you. Please never bring this up again.”
And she didn’t. Caroline was grateful for that. That wasn’t the only thing that made Caroline thankful during the following weeks. Negotiations seemed to be progressing. Wolf was still pessimistic, but Caroline was beginning to convince herself that was his nature. Not that she didn’t agree with most everything he said when he stopped by the cabin—she’d decided it looked less like she cared for him if she stayed when he visited. But it was so much easier to believe the feelings of optimism that permeated the fort.
The governor released two of the “guests” that he held. When Tistoe of Keowee and Sheroweh of Estatoe crossed the river to the Indian town, an English flag rose above the town house. The following day two warriors, Young Twin and Slave Catcher, were delivered to the fort. They had taken part in the Cherokee raid on Virginia settlers. Caroline watched their arrival with sadness in her heart despite the fact that their surrender was a vital step toward peace.
My Savage Heart (The MacQuaid Brothers) Page 23
