Wicked Angel (Blackthorne Trilogy) (48 page)

      
"You are salivating, Rupert. Do contrive to contain your perverse lust," Cybill said nastily. "Why, she looks a perfect cow, lumbering and ungainly. I cannot imagine what you can find attractive in that."

      
He turned to look at the coldly perfect face of his wife. Her voluptuous curves were revealed in a low-cut violet silk gown that accentuated both the color of her eyes and the whiteness of her skin. Not a hair on her perfectly coifed ebony head was out of place. Somehow she even contrived to stay cool and unmussed after sex.

      
Reaching out he pressed his palm against the flat surface of her stomach. "Can you not imagine what it would be like to carry my child, pet?" he asked, knowing the answer. "A man can find such fertility most appealing...even erotic."

      
"Pah! The brat isn't even yours," she sneered, somewhat surprised at the direction of his thought.

      
"Are you volunteering to give me a child, Cybill?" he purred.

      
"Do not even consider it in jest. I've gotten rid of several already—yours...and others. I'd not hesitate to do so again if necessary. I shall never shamble about with a swollen belly," she said with loathing.

      
He shrugged and turned back to watch Joss as she strolled serenely across the grass, stopping to pluck several jonquils and inhale their fragrance. He did not see the expression on Cybill's face as she, too, stared down on the tawny-haired woman below with slitted eyes turned from violet to black with hate.

* * * *

      
Tensions simmered and violence erupted along the Georgia frontier in the spring of 1813. Using Coweta as a base, Alex rode with a force known as the Law Menders under William Mcintosh, a mixed-blood planter from a prominent white family. Attempting to stop Red Sticks' depredations across the frontier, Alex threw himself into the heat of battle like a man possessed. He risked his life again and again on the front lines, volunteering for the most dangerous reconnaissance, leading wild charges and seeming to court death at every opportunity.

      
"His grief robs him of judgment," Charity said to Devon when a group of Law Menders rode in and dismounted from their spent horses. Alex had led them into the interior to an Upper Creek town and brought back numerous Red Stick prisoners.

      
Poc, catching sight of his long absent master, ran to greet him barking a furious welcome. After Joss's disappearance the little terrier had nearly grieved himself to death while Alex was in Savannah. Upon his return to Coweta the dog had attached his fierce devotion to him.

      
"I had hoped this fight would be his salvation, but it has only given him a better way to die than drinking himself to death," Devon replied grimly. "Thank God the fighting is almost over."

      
"You have done everything you can to keep our people from joining the Red Sticks."

      
"We'll salvage what we can. Quint will help us," Dev replied.

      
"Do not fear. We have survived war. We will survive the peace as well." She turned from her son to welcome Alex, smiling and opening her arms as he strode toward them, Poc at his side. Hugging her grandson fiercely, she noted the tight haggard lines about his eyes and mouth yet did not remonstrate. "You are safely returned. My heart is glad," she said simply.

      
"Oh, there is mail for you. It arrived while you were gone," Devon said as they walked to Charity's house. "Mostly letters from your mother and sisters, Aunt Madelyne and amazingly, one from London."

      
Having heard repeated exhortations from the female members of his family to take care of his health and avoid foolish bravery on the battlefield, Alex was little interested in their well-meaning remonstrances, but the missive from London was another matter.
A link to your past life...to Joss
. His heart clenched as he forced the thought aside. "The one from London—is it from Uncle Monty?" he asked as they entered the house and climbed the ladder to Charity's quarters. The dog scrambled unaided after them.

      
"I'm not certain. I've had little opportunity to familiarize myself with my brother-in-law's handwriting," Devon said wryly as he picked up a bundle of letters and handed them to Alex. Oh, yes, and there was one curious one. The writing is so water smudged I was surprised it found its way to you. It must have come a great distance, judging by its condition."

      
"This one's from Drum," Alex said as he plucked the London letter from the pile, little noting his father's comment about the mysterious travel-stained missive.

      
Devon smiled at the animation in his son's face as he read his friend's entertaining narration. A bit of the old Alex showed through the grim soulless air that had settled over him the past seven months since Joss's death.

      
"He bribed a French wine smuggler to get the letter to an American ship," Alex said with a fond chuckle, reading Drum's amusing anecdotes about the ton. The latest gossip, the peccadilloes and foibles of the Quality seemed a million miles from the grim reality on the Georgia frontier. For a brief moment, Alex escaped back to happier days in that faraway place.

      
Of course Drum did not know of Joss's death. Since the outbreak of hostilities, there had been no way to reach him or their family members and business associates in England. Considering the gravity of the situation on the frontier, neither Alex nor his parents had taken time to think about London. So much had happened since they set sail nearly a year ago.

      
He set aside his friend's letter with a bittersweet smile. Perhaps he would read it again while he was out in the wilderness sitting beside a lonely campfire. Shuffling through the other correspondence, he paused when he reached the weather-stained letter his father had mentioned. Then he froze. "It can't be... What sort of ghoulish trick is this?" he murmured to himself as he clutched the missive in his shaking hand, staring down at it as if he expected it to burst into flames at any moment.

      
"What's wrong, son?" Devon asked, perplexed.

      
"It's Joss's handwriting."

      
"You must be mistaken," Dev replied gently, peering at the blurred writing.

      
"I'd know her hand anywhere, Papa. When could she have...it must have..." Any logical explanation for the letter eluded him.

      
"You'd best open it, Alex," Charity said sensibly.

      
His hands shook so badly he almost tore the fragile sheets extracting them from the bedraggled envelope. Having no idea what to expect, Devon and Charity stood silently in tense anticipation as Alex began to read.

      
"It's dated February twentieth, 1813," Alex said in hoarse disbelief. "Joss is...Joss is alive!" Trembling he swiftly scanned the lines as his father and grandmother exchanged worried looks.

      
"What is it?" Devon responded.

      
"Joss bribed a French voyager to smuggle this letter out. Chamberlain has her. She's been a prisoner in Mobile since last fall...and I will shortly be a father," he finished in a stunned, awe-filled voice.

      
"You had better sit down," Charity said, guiding him to the chair he had vacated earlier while reading Drum's letter.

      
He sank weak-kneed onto it, blinking back the tears that obscured his vision. "She's alive," he breathed reverently, his fingers tracing over the familiar signature in her bold yet precise penmanship.
Your loving wife. Joss.

      
"It would seem you've been given a second chance, son," Dev said, his own voice none too steady.

* * * *

      
Alex crouched behind the trunk of a huge old live oak a few dozen yards from the walls of the old Spanish fortress that guarded Mobile Bay. He and Joss's faithful dog had made the long canoe journey from the Muskogee town alone in spite of his father's and uncle's remonstrances, explaining that a larger party would attract attention. His best hope for rescuing his wife was to slip in and out swiftly and quietly. Alex circled the perimeter of the high stone walls, finding that the best way to gain entry without notice was via a small gate at the back of the fortress. It looked old. Perhaps he could break the lock.

      
Joss, are you inside? Are you well?
All he had been able to think about on the long dangerous trek downriver was seeing her again, hearing her voice, feeling the soft touch of her healing hands. And holding their child in his arms. If her calculations were correct, the babe was due any day now. What would he do if she'd been brought to bed when he found her?

      
Cross that bridge if you come to it, Blackthorne
, he said to himself, steeling his concentration to get into the fort undetected. He had left Poc at the edge of the swamp with a firm command to stay. When the sentry on the terreplein overhead turned his back and paced in the opposite direction, Alex dashed to the wall below, flattening his body to it, then edged along until he reached the gate. To his wary amazement, it swung open with a slight creak when he pushed on it.

      
Alex froze, hoping no one had heard the sound. The soldier's footfalls did not alter their steady pace. No one cried a warning. Stealthily Alex slipped inside, then eased his way into the shade of a low-growing honey locust to get his bearings. He began a furtive yet methodical search of the fort, beginning with what looked like the officers' quarters.
 

      
When he heard Cybill's voice angrily berating a servant, he knew he'd found the right place. He went from room to room, but Joss was nowhere to be found. If Chamberlain were before him now, he would flay him alive for taking her. Rupert was gone but Cybill was still here. Surely the colonel would not have sailed off and left his own wife behind. Surely she knew something.

      
The lady in question sat at her dressing table sipping a cup of chocolate while a subdued maid brushed her long black hair. The mauve satin robe she wore gaped open, revealing the heavy curves of her breasts, which sagged pendulously without the artifice of stays to hold them up. At length she dismissed the maid with instructions to draw her cool bath water.

      
As soon as the servant closed the door and walked down the hall, Alex slipped from his hiding place on the open balcony and entered the room noiselessly. Cybill remained unaware, reclining against the high back of her chair with a scented cloth pressed to her forehead. He slipped over to the door and slid the lock, then approached her.

      
"Is that you, Isolde? Pour the water quickly. I am dying of heat and the headache," she said petulantly.

      
"Make a squeak and you'll have far worse than a headache, milady," he said as his hand curved around the milky column of her throat.

      
She sat up abruptly and the cloth fell from her forehead. Her large violet eyes blinked incredulously at the reflection in the mirror. "Alex," she barely whispered.

      
"I'll remove my hand," he said, raising the gleaming blade of his knife menacingly, "but if you attempt to sound a warning, you'll learn firsthand how the Muskogee scalp their enemies."

      
A flush of excitement bloomed in her cheeks and glowed in her eyes as she nodded. He released her, asking, "Where is my wife?"

      
She smiled slowly with her lips but her eyes were the cold purple of a Russian sunset. "La, I had hoped you came to rescue me from this hellhole."

      
"Don't play, Cybill," he gritted out, grabbing a fistful of ebony hair and pulling it tight against her scalp. "I know Kent brought her here and she's carrying my child. Do you have any idea how a Muskogee values his woman and his firstborn—do you?" He tugged harder and raised the knife, slicing off a large chunk of her hair.

      
She gasped in outrage but the blade at her throat kept her silent. "You'd do it. You would actually kill me, wouldn't you?" she whispered.

      
Her terror was mixed with a sick surge of excitement. He could feel her trembling and was revolted by the smell she gave off, fear and musky arousal. "In a heartbeat," he replied. "Do not try my patience further. We savages are reputed to have little of it."

      
She licked her lips nervously. "I helped her escape." At his look of incredulity she went on, speaking in fast disjointed sentences. "Rupert wanted her—and worse, he wanted the child she carries. That's why he did not rape her. He planned to use the child to enforce her complaisance."

      
At his snarled oath, she insisted, "No! 'Tis the truth—if the child is a boy, he intended to raise your son to hate the Blackthorne name, and if tis a girl...she was to be your wife's replacement in his bed. I could not permit that," she added petulantly.

      
"When did she leave? How?"

      
"At dawn with a French voyager I hired to spirit her north to safety."

      
"If you're lying to me—or if I find harm has come to her..." He raised the blade and ran the flat of the cool silvery metal across her cheek. "I can be very, very savage, milady. Now, you are going to ring for your maid and cancel that bath. Your headache has of a sudden gotten much worse. You do not wish to be disturbed until further notice. Is the message very clear?"

      
He released his painful hold on her hair but held the knife ominously close to her face. She nodded and raised the bell. When the maid knocked breathlessly a moment later, he whispered, "Make it convincing."