A Bride Most Begrudging (44 page)

A raw and primitive anguish seeped into his soul. He had tried to tell her. One should never, ever allow himself to get too close to the children. The odds were too high against you.

But Connie had scoffed at such advice and now look at her. So torn up with grief she didn’t even recognize the peril her own life was in this very moment.

This was why she must go back. This was why she couldn’t stay. He would not have her go through this again with her own children. And she would. As sure as the sun, she would.

And it would rip her sweet, tender heart from side to side, top to bottom, corner to corner. He knew it for a fact, for his at this very moment lay in tatters. Again, curse it all.
Again
.

“Drew,”
Connie screamed, grasping Sally’s face and rapidly patting her cheek. “Oh, sweet saints above! Did you hear that?” She snapped her head up to look at him. “Did you? I think she moaned!”

But, of course, she hadn’t. Connie was delusional. Still, it would be more expedient to recheck Sally than to try to convince Connie otherwise.

He moved closer and held Sally’s wrist with one hand while placing his other hand against the lifeline located in her neck.

Connie stilled, waiting for his reaction. Sitting back on his heels, he slowly shook his head. “I’m sorry, love. I feel no heartbeat. Now, we really needs go. The wind is blowing this way, and we need to keep moving.”

He looked down again at Sally, then ceased to breathe. Had her little chest risen and fallen, or had it been a trick of the wind?

“But I
heard
her, Drew. I know I did!”

He grasped Sally’s wrist again and leaned over her inert body, lifting one eyelid and then the next. He could neither feel nor see any sign of life whatsoever, yet he heard it too. As soft as a butterfly’s wings, it was. The slightest of whimpers.

Oh, my Lord! Have you spared her? Have you?

Eyes wide, he looked up at Constance. “Yes! Yes! I heard it!”

“Mary! Check Mary!”

He rushed over to Mary, checking her and checking her again. “No. We’ve lost her, Connie. I’m sure of it. But we must move now, quickly. We must get Sally to the creek.”

He scooped up Sally and laid her in Connie’s waiting arms.

“You’re sure you can manage her?” he asked.

“Yes, yes. Get Mary. Make haste! Make haste! Oh, hang on, Moppet. Hang on.”

By the time he picked Mary up and laid her over his shoulder, Connie had already started scurrying to the creek, Sally held tightly across her breast.

The fire was gaining ground. He could hear it. Smell it. Feel it. He knew Constance’s pace was awkward and slow not only from fatigue, but also to keep from jarring Sally too much.

The wind whipped, picking up momentum. Fiery sparks floated all around. Thick smoke chased their heels. The braying of the fire sounded menacingly close. They had to reach the water. And quickly.

He hastened his steps, prodding Connie from behind. She increased her speed.

The wind surged, flattening their clothes against their backs. Flames leapt ever toward them, gaining so fast the smoke and heat soon became overpowering.

He opened his mouth to tell Connie to run. Smoke swirled into his lungs. He swallowed and tried again. “Run, Connie.”

She didn’t respond. He moved past her and turned around, jogging backward. “Run.”

Mary’s body jostled against his shoulder while Connie’s eyes conveyed a message of heartbreak and commiseration. She couldn’t run. Her skirts would trip her for certain. He opened his free arm.

She grasped Sally’s waist and lifted her up to him. Folding the child into his embrace, he tried to bore a message of urgency into Connie. “Run.”

She glanced back, then lifted her skirt, picking up speed.

He increased his backward lope.
“Run!”

She ran. He whirled around, keeping pace beside her. The wind rose yet again. A swelling of fire crashed at their heels. They weren’t going to make it.

At that moment, when the heat became unbearable, when he realized they were going to perish in nature’s furnace, when he thought of all he still had to live for, an indomitable desire to survive burst upon him. Mary was gone, and maybe even Josh, Grandma, and Nellie too. And Sally’s life still hung in the balance. But Connie was alive, and he wasn’t ready to give her up.

God forgive me
. Without ever breaking stride, he released Mary to Him, allowing her to tumble to the ground. His heart lurched, his breath caught, then he repositioned Sally and called out to Constance.

She turned to him. He swooped down, flung her over his shoulder, and sprinted. Sprinted toward the creek. Toward life. Toward salvation.

chapter
T
WENTY
-
N
INE
   

THE WIND CHANGED. And with it, the fire’s direction. One minute it nipped at their heels, the next it receded into the distance. Drew kept running.

They reached the water. He plopped Connie down onto her feet, handed Sally to her, and splashed into the creek, swimming toward the raft.

He swiftly untied it, swam back, and pulled it up onto the shore. “Quick!” The two of them laid Sally onto the raft. Connie flopped down next to her.

He pulled the raft back into the water, wrapped the tie cord around his hand, and scissor-kicked his legs, pulling them downstream. His leg muscles prickled, his lungs labored, his head throbbed. He concentrated solely on moving them farther and farther from the fire. When it became too much, he veered to the water’s bank.

His feet finally touched bottom, the mud suctioning each step. Constance jumped off the raft, went completely under, then popped back up, holding tightly to the bound logs until her feet touched and she could help pull the craft in.

The water shallowed, and they fell to their knees, tugging the raft behind them. Flopping back over onto the grass, arms flung above his head, he closed his eyes and sucked in air.

“She’s alive, Drew,” Connie said between breaths. “She twitched once and moaned twice.”

When he could summon enough energy, he lifted one lid. By trow, Connie was a mess. Her cap had long since fallen off, leaving her hair plastered to her head in a wet tangle. Her face was pale, her clothes sodden, her posture dejected. But she was alive. Alive. Never had a sight been so sweet.

He reached for her hand, gathering it into his, their water-shriveled skin finding solace together. He gave a slight tug and she tumbled over, half on top of him, half on the grass.

“I love you.” It was all he could manage at the moment, though he wanted to tell her more. Much more. But he needed to save his strength, for it was a good distance yet to the bay.

“Did you hear what I said about Sally?”

“Yes.” But he was afraid to dwell on it, for at any moment her life could be snuffed out.

More minutes passed, and he knew they’d tarried as long as they dared. Forcing himself up, he rose. “We need to keep going. The fire’s still spreading.”

She shook her head. “You and Sally go ahead. I think I’ll stay right here.”

He bent down on one knee, combing a swath of hair from her eyes and hooking it behind her ear. “We needs must go, Connie.”

Her weary gaze traveled over the water. Heavy clouds billowed overhead, darkening the sky.

He rose again, helping her to her feet. “Come.”

She crawled back onto the raft, collapsing onto her stomach next to Sally instead of sitting. Connie groped around with one hand until she found the child’s, then clasped it within her own. He swallowed, then pushed the crude vessel into the water. Kick, pull, breathe. Kick, pull, breathe. They were making progress, but it seemed so slow. So very, very slow.

Images of leaving Mary behind hammered against the periphery of his mind. Her hair uncovered and matted, her body contorted. He shoved the images away, forcing himself to concentrate on moving downstream.

He lasted longer this time before having to move to the water’s edge. He was no less exhausted, though.

Not so Connie, for she found her voice as soon as he pulled the raft to shore. “What are you going to do?” she asked, sitting next to him on the bank.

About what, he wondered. Sally? Mary? The fire? Her? Their lives together? He slid his eyes closed. “Sally and I are going back to England with you. You can be the king’s accountant for all I care, but if you go, I go.”

When he’d made that decision, he didn’t know. Somewhere between the fire and this creek bank, he supposed.

Surprise lit her voice. “But you’re a tobacco farmer. We grow not tobacco in England.”

He rubbed the muscles in his legs. She pushed his hands aside and took over the massage. Sweet saints, how could something feel so good and hurt like the dickens all at the same time? “I’ll be a factor, like Josh. The O’Connor Tobacco Agency. And you can just forget about that ‘young, wealthy aristocrat’ who’s waiting for you. I’m not sharing.”

“What young, wealthy aristocrat?”

“The one your father’s contracted for you.”

“Oh. Well, that’s good, for I want him not anyway, whoever he is.” She paused in her labors. “Drew, do you really want to go to England?”

“I want to stay with you.”

“Forever?”

“Forever.”

She started to work on his other leg. “I want to stay with you too.”

Such simple words, yet they sluiced through his system, restoring energy where moments before he’d been flagging. He peered at her from beneath his lashes, but she was concentrating on her task, her tongue captured between those pretty white teeth.

Her brow furrowed. “If we stay here, would you have to fight in a war against the Indians?”

He winced, and she lessened the intensity of her massage. “No. Usually the second and third sons, or those who lost everything, do the fighting. The rest will stay and continue to cultivate tobacco, thus ensuring permanence in the colony.”

She moved her attention to one of his arms, kneading it like a roll of dough. “I want to stay here.”

He fully opened his eyes. “Stay here? Why would you want to do that?”

She pressed her thumbs into his palm, then worked the joints in each of his fingers. “I like it here. No, I
love
it here.”

He closed his fingers over hers, halting her administrations. “We just went through a massacre and you
love
it here?”

She looked at him, crystals of the creek’s water still dancing on her lashes. “I want to stay.”

His heart pounded. “What about that editing work of your uncle’s?”

She swallowed, tears springing to her eyes. “It’s a bit insignificant when you consider what’s taken place these last few hours, think you not?”

A seed of hope buried within struggled to burst forth. He suppressed it. “Connie, it could happen again, along with any number of other things. Have you considered the well-being of our children?” His eyes darkened. “For there
will
be children.”

“And?”

“And their chances of survival would be much better in England.”

“Horse dung.”

He blinked.

She moved to his other side, setting to work on his right arm. “There are hard times in England. Disease. Why, even a war.” She shook her head. “I want to stay here.”

He pulled himself up to a sitting position and scanned the band of forest around them. “Connie, look at it from a mathematical point of view. I come from a family of nine, and Sally and I just might be the only ones left today. You come from a family of twelve. Eleven of you are left.”

“Uncle Skelly died.”

“That doesn’t count.”

She cocked a brow.

He ran his fingers through his hair, rivulets of water collecting between them. “Okay. So he counts. Still, the odds are better in England.”

Her expression drooped, disappointment evident within her eyes. “Oh, Drew. You are not God. Think you if the Almighty has need of one of our offspring, He will not be able to find them in England?”

He rested his forehead in his hands. He didn’t want to think about God right now. What kind of God allowed a child to be savagely attacked? He stood. “It’s time to go.”

Without resistance, she returned to the raft, checked on Sally, and lay down, once again entrusting her life to him. He splashed into the water.

The skies rumbled, and a hint of smoke drifted across the water. The fire had not spread this far as yet, but its smell still clung. He hated to think of the damage the fire would do, for in spite of his words to Connie, he loved it here too.

Still, to raise a family in this primitive land was another matter. Foolhardy at best, a death wish at most.

“Drew?”

He grunted, pulling them through the water.

“I’m with child.”

All motion stopped. Had she grown wings he’d have been less appalled. With child?
With child?!
He spun the raft so that she lay next to him instead of behind him. Only when she glanced down, frowning, did he realize he was paddling neither his legs nor his arms but was standing upright. They’d hit a shallow.