Collision of The Heart (14 page)

“No, it’s not.”

It was what he’d tried to tell her a year and a half earlier when she accused him of wanting her to throw away her education for a life with no future. Her future was to have been with him, his helpmeet, his wife, the mother to his children, an intellectual equal who could keep his thinking clear and his mental faculties sharpened, no matter what he did.

And what she wanted to do didn’t matter because it was all for him.

What a selfish, thoughtless man he’d been. Eighteen months earlier, he had cast a die he had weighted to land in his favor because he wanted to stay.

Feeling as though someone had stacked upon his shoulders all the wood he’d chopped, he rose. “I’d like to read your article about the college, if you’ll let me.”

“Of course.” She smiled at him, not quite the heart-melting smile that tilted up the corners of her eyes but not the frosty, polite one she’d been giving him all week. “I only say nice things about the youngest history professor.”

“Will you still say nice things after our fencing match tomorrow?”

“Only if I win.” The smile warmed a degree or two.

“We’ll leave here at eight o’clock, then.” He reached out his hand. They shook on the bargain, and he left the room looking forward to fencing with Mia on Thursday morning far more than making an offer of marriage to Charmaine on Friday.

Chapter Thirteen

E
n guard. Prêt. Allez.”
One of Ayden’s male students gave the call.

Mia and Ayden saluted one another with their blades, then engaged. Ayden’s right foot came down heel to toe, and his blade shot forward in a lunge, as Mia knew it would. Smiling, she feinted, then raised her blade in
quarte
, as though she intended to protect the upper left part of her torso. A second before the foil of his blade touched hers, she countered, circling her rapier to the right and down.

“Nice
octave
.” Ayden smiled back. “A pity you’re too slow.” His blade tip caught the forte of Mia’s blade near the hilt, knocking her rapier out of position.

She disengaged and retreated, then lunged fast enough to tap her buttoned tip on his chest. The student spectators gasped.

Mia laughed. “Too slow, am I?”

She attacked in
sixte
. Ayden was ready for her with his blade in quarte. The foils rang together. A
remise
of parries and repostes, lunges, and retreats began. Their blades flashed like silver lightning. The foil ends rang together like chimes. The forte ends near the hilt crashed like cymbals. It was a game of speed and endurance Mia doubted she could win. Her right arm ached. Her breath rasped in her throat, and she was forming a most unladylike dew on her brow.

“Ready to give up?” Ayden taunted.

“No.” Even if she was.

“City’s made you weak.”

“Being a professor has made you boorish.”

The students laughed. Ayden’s gaze flicked their way for a second. Only a second. Enough time. Mia sent her blade singing down Ayden’s in a
glissade
, caught her forte on his, and with an upward jerk of her arm, sent his rapier spinning through the air.

The students applauded.

Ayden’s empty right hand dropped to his side. His lips parted, then he shook his head. “I can’t remember the last time anyone disarmed me.”

“August 10, 1854.” Mia smiled, though her heart constricted.

She had been happy then, certain the world was hers to conquer and own with Ayden at her side.

“You might be right.” He retrieved his blade and glared at his students. “Not a word out of any of you.”

“No, sir,” they chorused like reciting children in a grammar school.

Then they dispersed, snickering behind their hands.

“I’m undone.” Ayden grinned. “That little move of yours will be all over the campus before I get to class.”

“You should have remembered it. I remembered all yours.” She switched her borrowed rapier to her left hand and held out her right. “It was only because I have fenced with you so often I got anywhere near under your guard.”

Ayden took her hand, shook it, and kept holding it. “You’ve gotten under my guard, all right.”

The way he held her gaze along with her hand told Mia he meant far more than her trick with the blade. In a moment, he would have gotten under her guard, and she would be undone to her soul.

She drew her hand free. “I have interviews to conduct, and you have a class to attend. But thank you for the match. I haven’t fenced in about six months, not since that article I wrote about a ladies’ fencing group. They made me have a bout with one of their champions before they would agree to be interviewed.”

“Did you win?”

“I got the story.”

“And an invitation to join?”

Mia snorted. “I said lady fencers. I am not considered much of a lady. I earn my living.”

“Euphemia Roper, you could scrub floors for a living and still be a lady.” Abruptly Ayden turned away and snatched up his coat. “I’d better get these blades locked up and get to class.” He kept his back to her. “And since you humiliated me in front of my students, I think you should pay me back by returning here and helping Miss Judd with her essay.”

In truth, she should interview the students, then leave the campus. She wouldn’t see him the rest of the day. The next time she was likely to see him, he would be engaged to Charmaine Finney—a decision made to, once again, choose his career over her.

As she had done to him.

“What time?” she asked.

He told her. She sought for an excuse to say no. Nothing truthful came to mind.

“All right.” She gathered up her coat and headed upstairs to meet the students.

Two young women had turned into four ladies and a half dozen young men, two of whom she had met through Genevieve earlier, one of whom had been her partner in their ill-fated sledding race.

Time sped by as she took notes, asked questions, and answered even more. They carried her off to eat lunch with them, and when she returned to the lobby, Ayden stood in the middle of the room, talking to Mr. Divine and Miss Judd.

He waved to Mia. “Just in time. Gerrett and I are going to help Miss Judd by giving her a match. Unless you’ll allow me to get my revenge.” He grinned. His blue eyes sparkled.

And Mia’s heart broke free of its protective shell and tumbled at his feet.

Her feet half-frozen from tramping through slush, her cheeks stiff from the dried tears on her face, Mia trudged up to the Goswell house. If she was fortunate, Mrs. Goswell would be somewhere other than the kitchen—like shopping—and she could avoid her. She could avoid everyone until the trains started running, and she could escape from Hillsdale and all its memories, both old and new.

Instinct had warned her to run the moment she realized she was still desperately in love with Ayden. Instead, she had stayed, helped Miss Judd with her understanding of the art of fencing, and been far more honest with her than their short acquaintance allowed.

Mia pushed open the kitchen door and found Mrs. Goswell applying strawberry jam in the shape of a heart to the center of a cake.

“Fresh strawberries would be much nicer, but none of the hothouse variety got through this year with the trains not running.”

“It’s very pretty just the same.” Mia spoke the truth without enthusiasm. “Is that for Rosalie and Deputy Lambert? Or is it for you and Mr. Goswell?”

Mrs. Goswell laughed. “It’s for everyone. It’s a spice cake, and I prefer brown sugar icing with it, but that doesn’t look as pretty with the white sugar icing with the red.”

“It smells wonderful.” Which was true. The medley of nutmeg and cinnamon blending with a roast in the oven tantalized even Mia’s knotted stomach.

“Let’s hope it tastes as wonderful as it smells.” Mrs. Goswell set down her knife. “Now, did you have anything to—dear me, what’s wrong?”

“Wrong?” Mia kept her face averted. “I’m tired and cold.”

“I’m sure that’s true, but you have also been crying. Why?”

Mia compressed her lips in an effort to keep them from quivering. Her eyes filled, and she squeezed them shut to stop tears from spilling out. Instead, the action sent them sliding down her cheeks atop their dried companions.

She dashed them away with her gloves. “Excuse me.” She tried to glide past Ayden’s mother.

Mrs. Goswell blocked her way. “I was the closest thing to a mother you had for six years. I fed you into looking like a female instead of a beanpole. I taught you how to cook and dress right and talk like a lady. I even told my son letting you go was the stupidest thing he ever did. I think that gives me the right to know why you are so unhappy.”

“A week ago, I would have told you that nothing I do is any of your business. But that was before I was back here and remembered that people here care about me.” Mia dropped onto a kitchen chair and laid her head onto her folded arms. “I disarmed him this morning in front of his students.”

“You’re crying about that?” Mrs. Goswell laughed. “It’s about time someone got the best of him. You’ll be a legend here.”

“I tried to help one of his female students with an assignment.”

“Miss Short or Miss Judd?”

“Miss Judd. She gives up too easily, and I told her she was a coward who wouldn’t even fight for love.”

“Hmm.” Mrs. Goswell drew out the other chair and sat. “Do you have reason to know this?”

Mia lifted her head. “It’s embarrassingly obvious she’s in love with Mr. Divine.”

“I noticed that at church on Sunday. But why did that make you cry?”

“I told her she was just like Ayden, afraid to fight even for love.”

A gleam brightened Mrs. Goswell’s light-blue eyes. “Did he hear you?”

“I’m certain he did.” Mia dug in her pocket for a handkerchief and wiped her eyes. “But I was wrong. At least, I was the pot calling the kettle black. I was the one who wasn’t willing to fight for my love. And I still love him, and now it’s too late.” The last emerged as a wail, one like she hadn’t uttered in front of another person since she was a child, if she had ever done it then.

And Mrs. Goswell just smiled. “It’s about time you admitted it.”

“It doesn’t matter if I am. He’s going to marry Charmaine Finney so he can stay here forever.”

“Has he offered for her yet?”

“No, but he will because if he doesn’t, his position at the college will end with the quarter.”

“As if my brilliant son couldn’t get work elsewhere.”

“He doesn’t want to go elsewhere. He wants to stay where people love him and respect him and he can do things professors aren’t supposed to do, like muck out stalls and chop wood.” Mia wrinkled her nose. “And my work is in Boston. Nothing has changed in a year and a half.”

“Apparently not.” Mrs. Goswell stood and resumed decorating the cake. “You prefer your career to love and community, and he prefers his career to love and true companionship. And have either of you ever wondered if your roads are the best ones for you?”

Mia curled her fingers around the edge of the table and gnawed on the inside of her lower lip. Finally, she shook her head. “I thought it was. I mean, of course this is the right road. Everything fell into place for me in Boston.”

“Except that position didn’t last, did it? And now you worry every day about getting the next sale or if you will starve for lack of work.”

“I can always find work, and if this all works out, I will have a permanent position again.”

“Nothing earthly is permanent, my dear. And even if you found work until your old age, do your pencils and portfolio keep you warm on winter nights?”

Mia shivered, remembering how many nights in her boardinghouse she had longed for warm, strong arms to hold her.

But Mrs. Goswell lifted her knife and gazed at Mia, her lips curved into a shrewd half smile.

“You don’t have much time to get him back, you know.”

“I don’t want him back. Losing him hurt too much.”

“Getting him back won’t be easy.” Mrs. Goswell spoke as though Mia had not. “You have to make up your mind now. Tonight.”

Mia rose. “Considering how to get Ayden back is useless if he is determined to marry Charmaine to ensure his future position at the college.”

“Mia, I will do what I can to help, and the rest is up to you and Ayden and the Lord.” Mrs. Goswell squeezed Mia’s hand. “Now go put on that pretty blue dress you wore to church, and my husband will take you up to the social.”

“No, thank you. I’d rather stay here and finish my articles.”

“All right, then. Put on that pretty blue dress for supper. Everyone will be here. And that means Ayden.”

She couldn’t avoid dinner with the family. That would be unforgivably rude after Mrs. Goswell went through so much trouble. She would wear the one formal dress she had brought with her and perhaps wear her hair in a less severe style. Somehow, she would get through an evening with Ayden across the table from her. Meanwhile, she would lose herself in her work and not think about Ayden. It had gotten her through those first months alone in the city. It would get her through more painful months ahead . . . and the rest of her life.

She washed her face, accepted a cup of coffee from Mrs. Goswell, and escaped into the sitting room. Her manuscript lay undisturbed beneath the stack of books she’d set atop it, and she began to rewrite the entire article, rephrasing and moving one paragraph to another page, removing a few lines and adding others. By the time Mrs. Goswell knocked on the door to remind her to get herself ready for dinner, the article about women at college was finished, and she had begun the story of the abducted little boy ending up on one of the wrecked trains. If anything would make her famous, this article would. Even when the story became public and other journalists wrote about it, none of them possessed the inside information she did as the reporter who had carried him from the train.

If only she knew where the sheriff had taken him. With the boy spirited away, she didn’t know how to end the story except, presumably, Jamie would be returned to his family once the trains were running again or the snow melted enough to clear the roads. She must figure out the answer to the boy’s rescue, but not tonight.

Back and fingers stiff from working too long without replenishing the fire, Mia tucked her partially written manuscript beneath the stack of books and climbed to the room she shared with Rosalie.

“There you are.” Rosalie grasped Mia’s hands and all but dragged her to the dressing table. “Sit. I will do your hair.”

Mia balked. “Don’t you want to take the time to make yourself prettier?”