The Pursuit of Tamsen Littlejohn (15 page)

He was watching her, looking as though he, too, debated saying something more.

“Aye,” he said. “I do wonder. Some nights I lie awake trying to grub up those memories. Anything that came before …” He didn’t finish but dropped his gaze.

“Before Cade?” she asked, thinking she knew why he’d faltered. He looked up, surprised by her question. Maybe even chagrined.

“He’s been good to me, has Cade. He told me once … something out of the Bible. Goes along the lines of ‘The L
ORD
is my inheritance’ or maybe ‘my portion.’
Therefore will I hope in him
.”

It was a consoling thought. Even so, he’d admitted to wondering after all these years.

“How long ago was it,” she asked, “when you stopped being Shawnee?”

“Lenawe nilla,”
he said, his golden eyes fixing her across the fire. “I never said I stopped being Shawnee.”

She stared, thinking he jested. He held her gaze, letting her see he didn’t.

“It’s going on thirteen years since we left them. More’n half my life ago.”

He was only three and twenty. She’d thought him older.

“Why didn’t—,” she began, but Mr. Bird cut her off.

“Let the past bide. Now you’re dry and fed, there’s a talk more pressing we need to have.”

“He’s saying you
abducted
me?”

“Does it surprise you all that much?”

The blood had drained from Tamsen’s face, hearing what Mr. Bird had learned from his foster father, detained in Morganton with their settler party long enough to be questioned by her stepfather and Ambrose Kincaid. She was pursued, but at least Mr. Parrish hadn’t learned Mr. Bird’s identity—only what had been told him by the trapper who’d given them the deerskin.

Mr. Bird was watching her across their little fire while she absorbed the news.

“What must we do?” she asked, feeling the dark press in with more malevolence than moments ago.

“I take it you still don’t want to be found?”

As if there could be any doubt. “Not by either of them.”

“Then there’s two things we can do,” he said, so readily she knew he’d been thinking hard on the subject. “Make for our place, mine and Cade’s. It’s off the beaten way. We’d be safe there for a time, at least. Or we can stay in these mountains, hide out, let the snow seal us in somewhere. It’ll be rough, but I’d look after you, keep you warm, fed.”

“Would it be just the two of us?”

“Aye. Like as not. Unless Cade finds us.”

Tamsen drew her knees up, hugging them close, sobered by the realization of how much Mr. Bird had risked in aiding her. That he’d offered his help before she’d thought to seek it didn’t ease the sense of obligation rising up through her grief and fear.

“Back in Morganton … why did you help me?”

“You needed me.” His reply came quick enough, but not before she caught something guarded sliding across his eyes. She waited, but that seemed all he meant to say on the matter.

Did he see himself a knight to her rescue? A knight in greasy buckskins? The price he could pay for his chivalry must be a mite higher than he’d bargained for.

“We’re not going anywhere till morning,” he said. “Let’s see what wisdom the sun brings. You be praying on it, all right?”

He would be, his expression told her plain.

Wrapped in her cloak and a blanket sent by Cade, Tamsen lay curled on her side beneath the pine shelter, still damp around the edges from the rain. Mr. Bird stayed by the fire. For a time she watched him through half-lidded eyes. The shirt she wore smelled of him, and his horse. She turned her face into the arm cradling her head, cheek against the rough sleeve, and stared at the strip of starry sky visible above distant peaks.

Somewhere far off, a wolf howled. Closer by, an owl screeched. Neither gave her more than a start. Not when Mr. Bird didn’t flinch or even lift his head as the fire sank to embers at his feet. She felt safe with him, in a way she hadn’t under the shingled roof of her stepfather’s house in Charlotte Town. It was long since she’d trusted in a man, but she hadn’t forgotten what that felt like.

Did she trust Mr. Bird, upon so brief an acquaintance? He’d snatched her out of a horrifying situation, risking his own well-being. He’d guided her across mountains, fed her, comforted her, saved her from drowning, and at every turn given her the thing she’d longed for since her stepfather first mentioned the name of Ambrose Kincaid in the same breath as marriage—freedom to choose the shape her future would take. Or as much freedom as circumstances allowed.

Yet still … there lay the problem. Long before she’d understood the purpose, she’d been shaped with one aim in mind: marrying above her
station in order to improve Hezekiah Parrish’s lot. In the dark above the draw where her life had nearly ended, she lay thinking that, if not for Mr. Bird, she’d have died without ever truly knowing herself, what she was capable of becoming. She felt a stirring at the core of her being. What it was exactly she couldn’t yet say. It was fragile, still encompassed by grief. But it was there, taking root inside her like the tiniest of promising seeds. Maybe it was hope.

And there was another stirring. One of obligation, tinged with guilt. Willing or no, Mr. Bird had been dragged into her sorrows. The threat of an abduction charge overshadowed him now. In her choosing which way they went from there, could she do anything to help him in return?

Opening her eyes a last time before sleep claimed her, she saw him by the firelight, still sitting. Maybe still praying.

I do trust him
.

Perhaps it was this revelation coming on the edge of sleep that sparked the notion, which in turned kindled a plan. A plan that—if Mr. Bird could be made to agree to it—might save them both from the pursuit she feared was bound eventually to overtake them.

Tamsen Littlejohn was silent through breakfast. She was silent when she went into the trees to don her clothing while he dismantled the shelter and covered all trace of their camp. Though the day promised fair, she came back swathed in her cloak, returning his shirt and breeches. Still she said not a word.

When the horse was loaded and there was no more to do but put her in the saddle and start out, Jesse handed her box into her keeping. “You decide what you want to do?”

“I have.” She licked her lips and raised her chin, dark eyes wide and direct. “But first I need to ask you a question or two.”

“All right,” he said cautiously.

She pulled in a breath, then asked, “Are you given to hard drinking, Mr. Bird?”

He raised a brow. “No ma’am. Cade don’t touch the stuff, and I rarely do.”

She gave a nod, as if his answer satisfied. “Have you ever hit a woman?”

Both brows soared. “Never in my life. And never mean to.”

“Good,” she said, leaving him mystified as she plowed ahead. “One thing more. You’ve quoted Scripture and told me Indian legends. Does that make you a Christian or a heathen?”

“I know for a truth it don’t make me either one. A man can be a Christian and tell the stories of another people. Or a heathen and quote Scripture, for that matter.”

She considered that, her full bottom lip drawn between pretty teeth. “But are you a Christian?”

“With all my heart, soul, and strength,” he said. “Now how ’bout you answering my question? What have you decided?”

She raised her chin a fraction higher. It gladdened him to see her spirit emerging from the shock and grief that had wrapped her like a mountain mist since Morganton, but she had him flummoxed if he could guess what the next words out of her mouth would be. Would she choose west to Sycamore Shoals? North into—

“I’ve decided I want you to marry me—if you would, that is. If you think it would help matters for the both of us.”

Good thing he’d already handed her the box, else he’d have dropped it where he stood. “You …” He sucked in air, having forgotten to breathe. “What?”

Her cheeks bloomed, but her tone held firm. “You can’t be charged with abducting me if I’m your wife—by my consent.”

“But we don’t … I never thought …” Words failed him. The plain truth of it was he had thought—someday, God willing. But he’d imagined
himself doing the proposing on that someday. While he admired her gumption and plain speaking, she fair made his head whirl. There she stood like a storm’s calm center, while the mountains and their future and his heart spun ’round her. And he hadn’t even brought up the murder charge. Maybe she didn’t need to know about that. Not if the thought of him branded a kidnapper had brought her to this.

The spinning stopped, leaving his heart thumping out an eager beat like the call of drum and fire. He closed his eyes for a ten count, gathering his wits.

“Can I ask you something afore I give an answer? Why didn’t you want to marry that planter?”

Her brows flicked in surprise. “He reminded me too much of Mr. Parrish.”

“In what way?” Jesse’s mind darkened with suspicion. “He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

“He struck a slave in front of me. Struck him for seeking his aid to help another of his slaves, one who’d been badly harmed.” She opened her mouth to say more, then closed it and looked aside at the horse, raising a hand to stroke its flank.

“Your stepfather owns slaves,” Jesse said. “I saw ’em.”

“Dell and Sim. They ran away.”

“Still running, to Cade’s knowing.” He saw her satisfaction at the news, a bright flicker amidst the shadow of more troubling thoughts. “Is it the violence you objected to or the slavery?”

“Both. You don’t own slaves, do you?” She narrowed her eyes, as if to shield them from his scrutiny. He couldn’t guess what she might be holding back on the subject of slaves, but he sensed there was more.

“I don’t. Wager you’d reckon me a poor man.”

“There is worse than being poor, Mr. Bird.” She drew nearer, close enough that he could have touched her had he dared. “Is there a church or courthouse west of these mountains?”

“Several of both,” he said, feeling the spinning start again. “Then I’ll stand in whichever you wish and say that marrying you is my choice.”

She pressed her lips tight. Her fists curled at her sides. Jesse drew a steadying breath. He wanted to take her in his arms and show her in no uncertain terms the choice his heart had made in Morganton, seconds after meeting her gaze. But there was nothing intimate in this for her. Every resolute inch of her warned him to not presume otherwise. Even so, how was he to say no to this? Ought he to say no? Or was this the Almighty’s doing, bringing them together this way?

He liked that last thought. Liked it with all his might.

“All right, then. My answer’s aye. I’ll marry you.”

His heart gave a heady thump as relief flooded her face, and all he could do for a moment was suck the air into his chest, and look at her, and marvel that she’d come up with such a plan, and hope the feelings she’d stirred in him weren’t showing on his face. She started to speak, but he raised a hand to stop her.

“We’ll do this, but it ain’t going to be a simple undertaking.”

Her chin stayed raised. “Simple or not, it’s what I choose.”

Still stunned as a bear clubbed in its den, Jesse held the stirrup for her and gave her what he hoped was a reassuring smile. “Reckon, then, you and me are headed for Jonesborough.”