Angel of Ash (33 page)

“If it’s a girl, Glory, after my mother. I have not thought of it was a boy.”

“Glory, I like that. I wish I had known her, your mother.”

“Oh, Hunter, you would have loved her. I do miss her. But we shall speak no more of the drear of the past. She is in my heart forever. I will remember her smiles and laughter and how she protected me.”

“As a mother should. As you will your own child. And Asher, have you given any thought to him?”

“Too much thought,” Angel admitted wearily. “I have resided here for days and already I have forgotten some of the abuse. If it were not for the babe resting beneath my heart sometimes I would think it was all a dream. And the worse thing is that I still love him. That I wish beyond with that he would come to me and tell me everything will be alright and he has changed and softened and grown to love. Oh, Hunter, how I wish that, how I pray for that. How I pray for his soul for him to forgive. For whatever happened in his past, he must forgive his part and the part of whoever did him such wrong.”

“He never told you?”

“No. Never. We never spoke. Unless he was…cruel, mean, belittling, sarcastic, and hurtful. That is when he seemed to enjoy to speak to me. Or when he ignored me so thoroughly it was as if I was no more than a speck of dust upon the floor. Those were two extremes. I can remember no other, except that last night, before I left.”

“What happened?”

“He called me so many names. Chattel, slave, dog…even worse, but I shall not repeat it. He relished in calling me those names. I’d never known husbands to treat their wives so. I’d never thought that I would be married to a man who told me I was no more than a dog in his eyes. Told me that he would gladly chain me and no one could do anything about it.”

Hunter gasped horror. “My God.”

“I fought as I had never fought before. I was so tired of being mistreated. Afterwards, I told him I deserved more. I wouldn’t take any more of his abuse. And it was that night that he apologized and he said that he was riddled with demons that would not leave him. It was that night that he let me go. After he apologized I thought it had finished then, but I had threatened him with divorce, he said he willingly give it to me. Oh, but Hunter, how I wish it were all so different. I am a fool to love a man who hates me so.”

“He doesn’t hate you,” Hunter said quietly. “Far from it. He pretends and lies so that you will not know how intensely he feels for you. Asher is a changed man. The demons of his past haunt him in ways in which I can only guess at. Since you have arrived Anthony sends correspondence. Asher rarely leaves his household. Has given powers of his business to many of his solicitor’. His demons battle away at him.”

“I wrote letter after letter and yet I have not sent any to him.”

“Then perhaps, it would be for the best for you to do so. The baby is due any day. Trust me, Angel; life is too short to not make amends. I know it is up for Asher to apologize and ask for your forgiveness but I believe if you give him one more chance he will make right what he destroyed. But it is not utterly destroyed, is it?” Hunter asked.

“No, never. Yet, in this, I must stand firm. I will send him my letters and ask that he comes home for the birth of his child and for us to make amends. The power of our relationship will be in his hands and by God’s will, no other, Hunter, I have done all I can, I am still walking in faith, still believing that my marriage can be saved. If he cannot change, if he makes no attempt at reconciliation there is little more that I can do, Hunter. I will return to America, with my child in tow, to my father, to the family I have there for support. I will not let him belittle me one day or hour more. I will not allow him to hurt me anymore than he already has. I have grown up in the months since I came here, my father urges me home with each letter he sends. I’ve become a woman. In less than two years I have fallen in love, married, carried a child and been abused. My life will never be the same again. I will never be the same again.”

“I hate that, I hate this of you, I hate that I brought these problems upon you-” Hunter said with vehemence.

“No, never, how could you think that any of this was your doing?” Angel asked.

“Because if you had not come you would still be the innocent you once were.”

Angel laughed. “But perhaps it was my time to grow up. Oh, do not worry, I do not wish that one thing would be changed. It was my fate, Hunter, it still is. For through all that, I have a child. I’ll be a mother, soon. A precious gift was entrusted to me and that is one thing no one will ever take away.”

Hunter walked towards her, hugging Angel, sadness in her. “I love you, Angel. For whatever role I played in this sad state of affairs, forgive me. I pray for your happiness and the happiness and health of the child that is soon to come.” Abruptly she pulled away, braving a smile. “Come; let us get you home and my little Ethan to the nursery. It would not do well for you to have the baby right next to a lake.”

She managed to turn the mood light and airy as Angel laughed and they collected the child and the blanket, striding back towards Hunter’s parents’ house. It stood warm and large wrapped with ivy and roses, the gardens they soon entered tranquil and peaceful.

They were perturbed at the amount of flurry once they entered, however, servants bustling around, whispering to each other. Hunter looked quizzically at Angel. “Whatever is occurring?” She asked, before shooing Ethan to his nursemaid whom took the sleepy child in her arms.

Angel shrugged in ignorance as the two young women made their way through the kitchens and into the front hall. She could hear male voices and one voice stopped her cold.

“Angel?” Hunter asked quizzically.

Her eyes wide, Angel gazed at Hunter, her mouth trying to form words. “It is he, your brother, Asher. He has arrived,” she whispered, her heart beating heavily in her chest in surprise, anticipation, and anxiety and there, at the bottom of her heart, hope.

“But-” Hunter began. Noticing Angel’s pale look she grabbed her hand. “Do you wish to see him, now, Angel? You can go through the back stairs if you have not the strength, you are pale. Your child you must think of your child, I will speak to him.”

But Angel shook her head, placing her hand on the hard bundle beneath her heart, the baby kicked so. “No, I will not put this off. If not now than when, thank you Hunter, your kindness knows no bounds.”

“Then I will walk you to him and smite him mightily with the glare of my eyes.” Hunter commanded and Angel could not help but smile as Hunter laced her hand through Angels’ arm and it did not go unnoticed by either of the beautiful women that it was Hunter who led more then walked Angel to the front hall.

She saw him before he saw her and was surprised at the gauntness of his frame. Asher looked as if he had not slept, eaten little in the days since she had left. His hair was still a wild mane of jet black curls. His cheekbones stood out prominently in his now pale face, his lips thinned and eyes harsh, wild. She faltered but Hunter held her. He was speaking with Caleb the two not quite arguing, but not polite, either. It was Caleb who saw them first and halted what he had been about to say.

“My ladies,” he began, forcing a smile to his face, anger overtaken him, or wanting to.

Asher turned, his heart beating rapidly in his chest. One glance at her, one look and he was completely undone. How beautiful she was, he thought, how he had missed her every single day and moment since the time she had left him. Her stomach was large, swollen, but she had not put on that much weight, her skin as golden brown and beautiful as he had remembered it. Her gray eyes shone and he wanted to lose himself in them, lose himself in her.

He barely managed to pull himself together. For the first time in years he felt somewhat alive, not shipwrecked, anchored. And even though Caleb had cursed at him splendidly he had not minded because he knew that he deserved his family’s railings for leaving his wife of less than two years alone. He’d abandoned the only woman who had offered him her heart.

“Sister,” he began politely.

Hunter turned a blind eye to him.

“Angel,” he said quietly.

She paused.

“May we speak?” He asked.

“No you may not,” Hunter interjected. “For you to come here as proud as you please and expect everyone to leap at your command is absolutely galling, you bastard-” she hissed at Asher, within one foot of him.

“Hunter,” Caleb interrupted. “Let Angel answer,” he warned, pulling his sister away from Asher, she looked as if she was ready to cock him in the eye.

“We may speak,” Angel said interrupting the conversation between Caleb and Hunter. “If you two will excuse us.” She began and turned away for Asher to follow. He did. She could think of nowhere more private then her room and led him upstairs, feeling the eyes of Caleb and Hunter upon her. She kept her head held high and walked sedately towards her room; serene on the outside, but inwardly she quaked. Millions of thoughts, questions running through her head.

The walk towards her room seemed all too short and before Angel knew it as Asher was shutting the door behind them as she walked towards the window, more than ten feet away from him when all she wanted to do was fling her arms around him and kiss him and ask him to please give them one more try.

“You look very well,” Asher began, nervous, feeling like a school aged boy. As well as he should, he’d been lifeless once Angel had left him. Staring from the uppermost window in his house as she’d walked out of his door and climbed into the carriage. He’d wanted to run to her, yell, scream, take her in his arms and ask for forgiveness. All that he’d managed to do was clench his jaw to keep from speaking and clutch his hands to the windowsill to still himself from running to her. No, it had been for the best. The way he’d treated his very own wife was abominable, beyond all horror. He’d never known he was capable of such cruelty to such an innocent.

Looking at her now, he felt the past days of forced isolation melt away as if it had never existed, he knew, as he’d known from the day he laid eyes on her that Angel was his forever. He could not exist whole without her, could not live entirely unless she was there, next to him, loving him, giving herself to him. Yet, how he had come to this realization had been a hard journey to travel.

Asher had to say goodbye to past’s mistakes and horrors long buried. He had to or risk his very sanity.

She stood still upon his perusal. Her heart thudding heavily in her chest. The baby kicked and she unconsciously placed a hand upon her mound.

His eyes followed her movement. “Are you in good health?” He began. “With the baby, I mean. Will all go well?”

“As well as it should,” Angel returned quietly. “The doctor believes I will deliver within the week.”
“It doesn’t hurt?” He asked.

She laughed softly, shaking her head. “No, not now. I am well expecting it will, however, soon. But I’m looking forward to having the little one in my hands.” She ended, a soft smile still playing upon her lips.

His breath paused in his chest. The vision of Angel and a small baby in her arms hurt him beyond anything he had ever realized. He had to battle the demons; he had to make her understand why he’d been so upset and angry over their marriage and the news that she was to quickly give birth.

“Angel, I-” he began but was interrupted by a loud knock on the door.

He turned anger in his stride and swiftly opened the door a few inches. It was his meddlesome brothers, Michael and Luke. They nodded in one accord, twins, virtually impossible to tell apart except for a small mole that stood on opposite sides of their faces. “Father wishes to speak with you, immediately, he will not wait, he is in his study.”

Asher nodded, closing the door as they walked away. It would have to wait. He turned towards Angel who had sat upon her window seat, looking all too lovely, serene and other worldly. “I will see you at dinner, Asher, if your intentions are to stay until the birth of the baby.”
“Dinner it shall be,” he said, feeling dismissed and small as if he was a lowly jester in a queen’s court. “My intent is to stay for the baby’s birth.” He said and walked out of her room, closing the door behind him.

He jogged lightly down the stairs; the twins had long since vanished. Ignoring the many looks from his family’s servants, he opened the door to his father’s study without knocking, interrupting a heated conversation among his father, mother, Caleb, Hunter and Gabe.

Not surprised at the small grouping, he walked in nodding in general greeting towards the men and then placing a soft kiss upon his mother’s cheek even though she stared stony eyed at her second oldest child.

It only took seconds before Ethan, his father, began grilling him.

“What are your intentions towards your wife, Asher? You have acted the lowliest of bastards; I have raised you better than this. You have treated your wife miserly, entrenched her and this family in scandal after scandal. You have abused your position in this family and added dishonor upon us all. Her father entrusted us with her care, he sails to England even as we speak. And what shall I say to him once he arrives?
Forgive us for allowing my second eldest son to seduce your daughter, impregnate her and then abandon her, would you care for a glass of port?
How can you be so callous and cruel? Angel was an innocent who came upon the wishes of Hunter and Gabriel. You have destroyed that innocence due to your narcissistic selfishness. Out of all the women in England, why her? You will answer me!”