Elizabeth Grayson (28 page)

Chase slipped his arm around her and pulled her close. Ann turned her face into his shoulder, accepting the comfort he was offering, though she knew she ought to be comforting him.

“I was used to tending little ones.” His breath stirred her hair. “But Rue just kept hollering.”

“That hasn’t changed, has it?”

Ann hadn’t realized how tightly Chase was holding himself until he laughed. More of that terrible energy burned away.

“He was so noisy, I took him out onto the porch so he wouldn’t wake the others. I rocked him—and rocked him and rocked him.” His voice wavered a little more with every word. “I rocked him until it was light, rocked him so long that when Ma came to take him back, I really did think he belonged to me.”

Ann splayed her hand across his chest and felt his warmth melt into her palm. He covered her hand with his, as if he relished her touching him.

“From then on,” Chase said, “when Rue cried only I could quiet him. Once he was able to toddle, he followed me everywhere. I did my best to teach him things, and I kept him out of trouble when I could.

“I was a pilot myself by the time he decided to sign on as a cub, and since then I’ve taught him everything I knew about the river. Everything I learned from my own master, from the pilots I’d partnered with, and everything I picked up on my own.”

He turned to her and she could see his eyes had gone liquid with tears. “Oh, Annie! What will I do if Rue dies?”

Ann gathered him up in her arms and bound him close. He was a strong man, a brave man, but even the bravest men crumbled when it came to losing someone they loved.

“He’s young, Chase,” she murmured, smoothing his hair. “He’s healthy and he’s strong.”

“I can’t imagine being on the river without him.”

“He’ll be all right.”

Ann had never had much reason to believe in things, but she believed in this man. She believed in his family’s power to heal and hold onto their own. She also believed that if Rue was hurt so badly that they had to let him go, this family would find a way to accept his loss.

And they’d recover afterwards,
even her husband.

At least she was here tonight to help Chase endure the wait. “It will be all right,” she whispered, and knew in the ways that mattered most she spoke the truth.

They lay curled together there in the hollow at the top of the bluff as if they were cupped in God’s own hands, blessed by the silence and the solitude. By being together.

Ann had never lain like this with a man, never nestled her head in the crook of his shoulder, never savored his warmth along the length of her, never pressed her hand against his heart and felt it beating.

She never realized how tall Chase was lying down. How big, how broad and powerful.

How small she was beside him.

From the black ooze of another night months before came a swell of unbidden memories—of rough hands binding her wrists, of her clothes being torn away, of a man thrusting hard between her legs. Of peril and helplessness, pain and degradation.

Ann fought the haze of red that fogged her brain, the dread that gripped her chest and belly, the rime of fear at the back of her tongue. She squeezed her eyes closed and did her best to crush the memories.

There was no room for fear between Chase and her tonight, so she drew in one long breath and then another. She concentrated on the splendor of the bluffs and the trees and the sky. She focused on what Chase needed from her.

Lying so close beside him, she sensed the last of his frantic energy burn away, felt him nestled against her as he drifted toward sleep.

Ann knew she should be sleeping, too. Instead she lay vividly aware of Chase beside her—of the solidity of his shoulder beneath her cheek, of the protective arc of his arm around her, of how well she fit against him. No matter what the future held for them, tonight Chase was hers to claim and hold, soothe and protect. Tonight as he slept she could touch him without fear of consequences.

Tempted by the unexpected opportunity, Ann gently traced her fingers over that rugged face: the high, hard ridge of brow, the turning of his jaw, the column of his neck. While he was lost in exhaustion, she tracked the wide yoke of his collarbones and his broad, hard chest; the pleated arch of his ribs and muscle-banded belly.

He was so dense and substantial beneath her hands, so strong and darkly masculine. Ann turned her face into the whiskery hollow beneath his jaw and breathed him in, the sweetness of woodsmoke, the hint of Lydia’s lye soap and his father’s whiskey, the musk of Chase himself.

At those innocuous intimacies, something akin to awe or exhilaration stole through her. A strange, delicious warmth swelled beneath her sternum. It seeped to the base of her belly, pooled in the hollow of her hips and melted between her legs.

Ann hesitated in astonishment. Never had she felt so breathless and aware, so beguiled and enticed. Drawn to him, she stretched along the length of his body and pressed her mouth to the pliant, beard-roughened column of his throat. Her heart thumped loud in her ears as she tasted the bristle with the tip of her tongue and savored the salty tang of his skin.

She pressed even more intimately against him, close enough to feel his chest expand, close enough to feel his breath feather over her skin. A slow, unfurling thrill moved through her, a shiver of delight and daring and recklessness.

Bit by bit she began to understand that the mysterious warmth flowed not from him—but from her. It flowed from the deepest well of her own femininity. It sprang from her own curiosity and appreciation, from her own feminine need to respond to all that was male in him.

And it was lying with Chase and touching Chase that set things simmering inside her.

Because this new sensation abided in her, Ann wasn’t afraid. She was emboldened enough to push up on her elbow and nibble the sharply angled turn of his jaw. She nuzzled the crest of his cheekbone and the hollow beneath it. Barely able to believe what she was doing, Ann kissed the corner of his mouth and swept the bow of his upper lip with the tip of her tongue.

She might have done the same with the lower one if Chase hadn’t shifted, hadn’t stirred. He mumbled in his sleep, flexed his arm reflexively and bound her closer.

That left Ann sprawled over him, dizzy with a mixture of her own impetuousness and his nearness. How hard and trim he was against her, how manly and solid. How safe she felt, tucked up tight in the crook of his arm.

How trembly and curious.

What might Chase do if he awoke and found her curled so intimately against him? A shiver moved through her at the thought. A blush sluiced across her chest and throat. Her nipples stiffened. Her belly fluttered. The muscles between her thighs drew taut. Responding instinctively, Ann curled closer, pressing that tightness against Chase’s hip.

She rubbed against him and the feeling of pleasure grew even more compelling and sensual. She discovered a slow, sinuous rhythm that seemed so much a part of her she might have known it all her life. She recognized a yearning within herself she never dreamed existed.

This
was why men and women came together.

This was why a woman’s eyes shone when she looked at her husband. It was why a man cherished and protected his wife to his last breath. It was the reason two people chose each other and spoke their vows—to savor this strange and mysterious alchemy.

Ann shut her eyes, stunned by her discovery. She hadn’t understood that relations between men and women could be more than demand and submission, pain and degradation. She hadn’t known that women could want, that women could need. But now she saw a wondrous possibility in coming together.
Of making love.

A flood of goose bumps rippled warm across her skin.

The notion of making love with Chase teased her imagination. What would he do if he awakened now? Would he take her in his arms and return her kisses? Would he touch her in ways that would heighten these new sensations? Would he want her to be a wife to him?
And now that she’d begun to feel this fascination, would she
be able to ...

Before she’d completed the thought, the memories swooped in, terrorized and overwhelmed her. She turned from Chase and began to weep in the thick, sweet grass.

Now that she’d begun to understand what loving was, why shouldn’t she be able to lie with her husband if that’s what she wanted? Would she always be haunted by what Boothe had done to her? Had he ruined her as a woman?

Ann balled up tighter, hating that Boothe’s cruelty was denying her everything she wanted for herself. She cursed him for the children she’d never have, the love she’d never be able to share. The life she was being forced to forfeit because she couldn’t give herself to the man she loved.

She shivered with silent sobs, longing to put what Boothe had done, behind her—and knowing she could not.

Then, as if even in sleep Chase sensed how much she needed him, he rolled toward her, wrapped his arm around her, and snuggled her close against his chest.

She must have fallen asleep there in Chase’s arms, because the next thing she knew he was bending over her.

“Annie,” he whispered, trailing one finger from her brow to the corner of her mouth.

His eyes were bright and his touch both delicate and beguiling. She stared up at him, gone warm and weightless inside. She held her breath, needing to see what happened next.

“Lovely as it’s been to sleep with you, sweet Annie,” he went on as he climbed to his feet. “It’s time to go.”

Ann saw that high above the stars were fading and the sky had lightened to the color of chambray.

“We need to stop at the house and get Christina,” he said as he helped her to her feet. He didn’t say a word about Rue; he didn’t have to.

Ann rose stiff and damp, and more than a little rumpled, then let him lead her back along a path that skirted the edge of the bluffs. They were a good deal closer to the house than she’d imagined, and the sight of it standing stalwart in the dawn cheered her.

Lydia met them at the door. “He’s better,” she whispered.

Chase brushed past his mother, needing to see his brother for himself.

Ann slid her arm around her mother-in-law. “I knew if anyone could pull him through, it would be you.”

“Last night I wasn’t so sure,” she confessed and leaned into Ann, letting her weariness show, confiding the doubts and fears she hadn’t dared to share with anyone else.

Ann treasured the moment, feeling honored that her mother-in-law had turned to her, had trusted her and relied on her to give her the comfort she needed. Now that Ann was preparing to say her final good-byes, Lydia had made her her confidante, made her truly one of them.

“It was a near thing with Rue,” Lydia sighed and conceded, easing back a little. “He only stopped coughing blood an hour ago. But praise the Lord, he’s finally breathing easier.”

“He has a hard road ahead,” Ann murmured in concern.

“His leg is badly broken,” the older woman agreed, “but Rue’s young and strong—and one of the scrappiest human beings God’s ever created. In the end he’ll be all right.”

She let out another long, deep sigh. “I thought this would get easier once the children were grown.”

Before Ann could consider how to answer, Evie came bounding down the stairs with Christina tucked in her arms.

Ann and Lydia stepped apart, but as they did their hands lingered on each other’s elbows and forearms and wrists. An instant of affection unlike anything Ann had ever known, passed between them. It was filled with pride and resolve—and a kind of grief so deep it tore her heart.

Ann felt the tears well up and turned to claim her daughter so Lydia wouldn’t guess what she was feeling.

“Christy was such a good girl,” Evie cooed. “She slept right through the night, but I think she wants her breakfast.”

Ann settled Christina in the crook of her elbow and wrapped her opposite arm around the younger girl. “I want to thank you, Evie, for coming with us this summer. I don’t know how I would have managed Christina without your help.”

Evie tossed her curls. “I liked doing it. I liked seeing the river and all the towns. I’d be glad to stay on with you, except for Rue.”

“Except that school is starting,” her mother reminded her.

Evie nodded, resigned.

Just then, Chase and Enoch came out of the room at the end of the hall. “Rue’s still sleeping,” Chase reported, “but he looks so much better.”

“He’s going to be fine,” Enoch confirmed, though Ann could see the toll the night of worry had taken on him, too.

“Now, boy,” he went on, addressing Chase, “haven’t you got passengers waiting and a schedule to keep?”

It was time to go. Suzanne and D’arcy came out of the parlor to hug both Chase and Ann.

Then Lydia wrapped her arms around Ann and the baby one last time. “You did well by Chase last night.”

“I did what I could.”

“I’m so glad he found you,” her mother-in-law said as she let Ann go. “I think you’re the perfect wife for him.”

Ann couldn’t say a word. She didn’t dare acknowledge what Lydia’s praise had meant to her. Not when she knew she was leaving the
Andromeda
in St. Louis, not when the woman who’d trusted her and been so kind to her would discover on Chase’s next run how wrong she’d been.

chapter thirteen

EVERY MAN STORES UP MEMORIES, FLICKERS OF TIME that crystallize in the chambers of the mind, instants of beauty and simple truth that warm him when the world goes cold. Images that resonate as long as he draws breath.

Chase paused on the wheelhouse steps, staring down at where his wife and child sat in one of the
Andromeda
’s big, rush-seated rocking chairs on the deck below. The sun caught in the soft honey-brown drape of Ann’s hair as she cooed over the baby in her lap. He drank in the rosy perfection of her features, the glow of love in her eyes. He savored the burble of Christina’s laughter. The moment soaked into him and stained his soul.

They were his. No matter how they’d come to him, no matter what had passed before, Ann and Christina belonged to him.

Nearly losing Rue had reminded him how fragile life really was. It made him realize the time had come for Ann and him to build a future for themselves. For so long, Ann seemed reluctant to do that. But since the night at the point, the night she’d consoled him and slept in his arms, she finally seemed ready to move ahead.

And if she was ...

Just then, Ann looked up and saw him on the stairs. She smiled at him, and her smile made the sun shine brighter.

“So,” she called, “have you finally managed to entrust the wheelhouse to Lucien Boudreau?”

“Boudreau’s hardly the steersman Rue is,” Chase grumbled as he made his way to where she and Christina were sitting. “But now that there’s a bit more water under us, I’m leaving the man to his own devices.”

Steamers universally extended the courtesy of bed and board to officers between one assignment and the next and, because of that goodwill, Boudreau had been in the wheelhouse when Rue went overboard. He had volunteered to stand Rue’s watches for the rest of the run, probably in hopes of securing a berth on one of the Gold Star boats when they reached St. Louis.

Thinking about Rue made Chase remember something Cal had mentioned the night before, something that made him unaccountably curious. He hunkered down beside Ann’s chair and took a moment to stroke the baby’s fluff of dark hair.

“Why didn’t you tell me,” he asked, “that you were down on the main deck when Rue went overboard?”

Ann glanced up at him. “What with everything else, I didn’t think much about it. It was the day Nate Ogden and Billy Martin got burned. I was down there looking after the two of them when Rue came by.”

“Did he say why he was down there?”

“I thought you’d sent him with a message for Cal.”

Chase didn’t remember doing that. “I suppose he could have gone down to pay Cal the money he’d lost at checkers.”

“They bet on checkers?” Ann asked incredulously.

“Men’ll bet on pretty much anything.”

“Like Frenchy.” Ann frowned and lifted the baby against her.

Chase knew Ann was worried about Frenchy, worried that he gambled too much. Especially for a man who had a family in—Dubuque or maybe it was New Orleans—to support.

“So what did Rue say when he talked to you?” he persisted.

She looked up, and he could see the concern in her eyes.

“There’s not a thing you could have done to change what happened,” she scolded. “You need to stop tormenting yourself.”

He wished he could. But until he found out how Rue had ended up in the river, Chase had to keep nudging people and asking questions.

“Just tell me what Rue said,” he insisted.

Ann slanted him a sidelong grin. “Mostly he teased me about the burn ointment I was using on Nate and Billy.”

“The one that smells like ten-year-old socks?”

“Rue told them I’d made it from bear grease, scorpion gizzard, and horse piss.”

Chase gulped with laughter. “I suspected that!”

“Though you know,” she went on, frowning a little, “Rue did seem kind of preoccupied with what Joel Curry and Jake Skirlin were doing.”

A shiver feathered up Chase’s neck. “And what was that?”

“Just moving boxes.”

Chase went still inside. “What kind of boxes?”

Ann shrugged, patting Christina. “Big boxes. Heavy boxes.”

Boxes of guns.
Certainty squeezed his belly. Chase had to wrap his hands around the arm of Ann’s chair to keep his balance.

“What were Curry and Skirlin doing with the boxes?”

“They were handing them up out of the hold.”

“As if they were getting ready to deliver them somewhere?” He could hear the escalating pitch of his own voice.

“I suppose.”

The
Andromeda
was only a day and a half into their homebound run when Rue was hurt. Things to be delivered that early in the trip should have been stowed on deck. So why had Curry and Skirlin been manhandling big, heavy boxes out of the hold? And why had they been doing it themselves when hauling cargo was the rousters’ job?

The only reason those boxes would have been down there, Chase figured, was to keep them out of sight.
Or
because they’d been aboard since the upstream run.

His gut tightened.

When they’d off-loaded that first set of suspicious boxes, Skirlin said they’d missed making the delivery on their way upstream. Was that how he meant to explain landing these boxes, too? Or was delivering the contraband on the downstream run a way to hide that the shipments of rifles had really been loaded in St. Louis?

Of course it wasn’t illegal to transport firearms. All the steamers in the Missouri River trade carried guns at one time or another. Either they came as private consignments from gunsmiths back East, or as part of regular orders to the shops and mercantiles in the towns along the river. The larger shipments of rifles were earmarked for the western forts, and a detail of soldiers usually accompanied them.

Chase could see only one reason to be delivering those big boxes,
those crates of guns,
to the Nebraska shore: so they could be sold to the Indians.

He rubbed his hand across his mouth.

Could the guns possibly have come aboard in St. Louis without him realizing what they were? Had they been stowed in the hold for over a month, without him catching wind of it?

If that was so, what kind of a captain did that make him?

Since the
Andromeda
had headed directly to Hardesty’s Landing after Rue was hurt, and Chase was certain they hadn’t delivered the boxes Ann described to any of the stops they’d made since then, the guns should still be aboard.

The realization rocked Chase back on his heels.

If he searched the boat and found them, he’d have the proof he needed to charge Curry and Skirlin with running contraband. He’d be able to stop at least these guns from reaching the Indians, and he might even discover who was behind the smuggling.

It wouldn’t make up for what had happened to Rue, but he might be able to sleep through the night again.

Chase pushed resolutely to his feet. He’d start by checking the manifest and bills of lading to see if he could discover how the guns had come aboard. Then he’d search every crate and box and barrel on the
Andromeda
until he found the rifles.

Impulsively he bent and pressed a kiss to Ann’s forehead.

“What’s that for?” Ann called after him as he strode toward the steps.

He could hear the curiosity in her voice and didn’t want to explain himself. He clattered down the stairs without answering.

ONCE ALL HIS OFFICERS HAD GATHERED FOR THEIR EVENING meal, Chase excused himself and went to search the
Andromeda
for the crates of rifles.

As he descended into the hold by the forward hatch, the air grew close and fetid. The reek of the hides they’d shipped down from the mountains had permeated the wooden beams and mingled now with the sweetness of fresh-picked apples and the dusky bite of cured tobacco. If there were guns and ammunition hidden anywhere, they’d be here amid the bales of short-fiber cotton and sacks of grain.

Chase began at the bow end and searched his way back. Setting his lantern aside, he shifted a few boxes of goods from one side of the hold to the other so he could look beneath them. He prodded under sacks of grain with a sounding pole and listened for the
thump
of something solid.

Once he’d carefully searched from front to back, he climbed out of the hatch at the stern and inspected the cargo on the main deck with the same dogged thoroughness. But as diligently as he looked, Chase could find no sign of the boxes Ann had described to him. No sign of what he was growing more and more certain were guns bound for the Indians.

But where had the boxes gone? He’d checked the manifest against the bills of lading and found nothing suspicious. He’d searched every inch of the hold and hadn’t discovered a thing. Surely the contents of those boxes were too valuable—and too damning—to abandon indiscriminantly.

Were the guns and ammunition hidden somewhere Chase hadn’t thought to look? Had Curry and Skirlin found a way to deliver their contraband in spite of the change in plans? Who else aboard might know about the guns besides the two of them?

When he was done looking and thoroughly thwarted, Chase washed his face and hands. He tidied his clothes and returned to the salon in time for dessert. As he forked up a helping of Frenchy’s pecan pie, he wondered what Skirlin and Curry would make of what he’d done.

The deckhands and the roustabouts had seen him climb into the bow hatch and emerge from the stern. He’d searched the cargo on the main deck in full view of a score of crewmen and several dozen deck passengers.

If there were conspirators aboard, Chase had declared himself. Now all he had to do was wait and see what happened.

NOTHING HAPPENED.

No one let on that Chase’s search of the hold in the midst of a run was in any way unusual. Curry didn’t ask him why he’d done it. Skirlin spoke not one word of complaint when Chase reviewed his records for a second time, and as far as Chase could see, there wasn’t one discrepancy.

When they arrived in St. Louis four days later, Chase stood on the levee and watched the rousters unload every barrel, box, and bale. The crates Ann described, the ones Rue had taken such an interest in, never turned up. Chase walked the empty hold from end to end before he admitted defeat.

What in the name of God had become of those boxes?

Furious and frustrated, Chase decided he ought to see the commodore and report what he suspected. He hopped a horsecar to the Rossiter town house and arrived mere minutes after Ann and Christina had left.

As Chase entered the commodore’s study, Rossiter looked up from the papers spread out across his desk. “I’ve just been going over the
Andromeda
’s accounts,” he greeted him, “and I’m very impressed!”

Though Chase nodded in confirmation, he noticed Rossiter didn’t so much as ask after Rue—as if one pilot more or less, one brother more or less—didn’t matter much.

The commodore pushed to his feet instead and strode to the ornate mahogany sideboard. He poured two glasses of brandy and offered one to Chase. “You’re proving yourself to be a very resourceful and competent captain.”

“I’m glad you’re satisfied with my efforts.”

Though he didn’t usually hold with taking spirits in the middle of the day, Chase welcomed the heat of the brandy in his belly to bolster his courage. It chaffed at him that someone had managed to load contraband aboard the
Andromeda
without him knowing, especially after the assurances he’d given the commodore. What bothered him more was to have to admit that two of his senior officers were running guns and might well have tried to kill his brother.

Chase set his glass aside and turned to the commodore. “There’s a matter of some importance I need to discuss with you.”

“Keeping Lucien Boudreau on in your brother’s place?” the commodore guessed. “Ann told me about the accident. It’s just short of miraculous that Ruben survived. How is he faring?”

Chase wished he knew. “When we left Hardesty’s Landing a week ago, Rue seemed to be holding his own.”

“Well, the young heal fast,” James Rossiter said, swirling the brandy in his glass. “Now, about Boudreau ... If you’re satisfied with his work, perhaps you should keep him on for the rest of the season. I don’t have another pilot available who—”

“I didn’t come here to talk about Boudreau.”

Rossiter must have recognized the gravity in Chase’s tone, because he gestured him into one of the armchairs and lowered himself into the other.

Chase took a swallow of brandy. “I believe,” he began, “that Jake Skirlin and Joel Curry are part of a conspiracy to smuggle guns to the Indians.”

“Are you on about
that
again?” the commodore burst out.

In spite of the older man’s evident exasperation, Chase forged ahead. As he did, the commodore’s mouth drew tighter and tighter. When he was done, Rossiter sat for a moment and stared at him.

“When you first came to me with allegations that the Gold Star boats were running contraband, you swore that the
Andromeda
would never be involved in anything illegal,” the older man chided him.

Heat rose in Chase’s face. “I’m afraid I was wrong.”