Elizabeth Grayson (34 page)

Ann looked up at her stepfather. “It’s you, isn’t it?”

She recognized the smug curl of his lips and a chill of certainty swept through her.

“How could it be me, Ann? I haven’t left St. Louis. I’m not delivering rifles to the Indians.”

“No, but you’re behind the men who are. Nothing happens aboard the Gold Star boats without you knowing.” That certainty grew in her. “Nothing goes on you don’t control.”

His black eyes raked over her. “Is that what you think?”

“You and Skirlin fabricated the evidence against Chase, didn’t you?”

The commodore gave a low, gruff laugh. “My poor, dear, Ann,” he said. “I didn’t have to fabricate a single thing. Your husband might not have been with us at the start, but he’s as deep in this now as everyone else.

“He knew full well what he was carrying. He took delivery of the guns on this last run himself. I’ve just received confirmation he delivered them just when and where he was supposed to.”

Ann understood now why Chase hadn’t been able to look at her this morning. In spite of his assurances, he was guilty.

She sank back into her chair. The commodore had proof against her husband, enough to convict him, to send him to prison for years and years. But why would an honorable man,
why would Chase,
agree to something he didn’t believe in?

But then Ann knew: He’d done it to protect her and the baby. He’d done it because the commodore had given him no choice.

“But you—” Ann shook her head, still trying to make some sense of what had happened. “—you arranged for Chase to marry me. You gave your own granddaughter into his care.”

“For a time,” the commodore conceded.

“You gave Chase the
Andromeda.”

“He never truly owned the
Andromeda.”

Ann’s eyes widened. “What do you mean?” she demanded. How else had this man cheated her honorable husband?

“According to the marriage agreement Chase signed, the
Andromeda
doesn’t come to him until he’s completed the shipping season. He has one more run to make.” The commodore leaned toward her as if he were confiding in her. “I don’t think he’s going to make that final run, do you?”

Rossiter shrugged, clearly pleased with himself. “Besides, I promised the
Andromeda
to Boothe.”

Ann shot to her feet. “You’re not going to help me get Chase out of jail, are you?”

“No.”

“You’ve arranged for him to be tried and convicted of running contraband while everyone else goes free.”

“Exactly.”

“But certainly Chase will expose you,” Ann cried. “He’ll tell the provost marshal what he knows about the smuggling!”

“Chase won’t say a word.”

“Why?” That single word seemed to take all of her breath.

“He’ll own up to this because your husband is a noble fool. He’ll admit his involvement because he believes he deserves to be punished. He’ll hold his peace to protect you and Christina.”

The certainty in him terrified her. “Protect us?”

“Why, Ann,” the commodore said almost kindly, reaching out to clasp her hand. “Chase knows that while he’s in prison, I’ll be providing for you and Christina. He wants to be certain you’re treated—well.”

Ann jerked away from him.

“I’ve already begun making plans for you. Would you like to hear them?”

Ann backed away.

“Once the furor of his trial dies down, you’ll divorce Chase Hardesty,” he went on anyway. “Then we’ll find you a more suitable husband. I have several alliances in mind that might be good for business....”

Ann stared at James Rossiter, repelled by the cold, meticulous workings of his mind. To him, people existed to serve his purpose, each as expendable as a pawn on a chessboard, each a chit he’d used to further his own ends. Odd as it seemed, Ann didn’t think it was malice that drove him. It was expedience and the pleasure he took in controlling other people’s lives.

Ann shivered in spite of herself.

To accomplish what he’d set out to do, he’d cheated Chase at every turn—in his marriage to her, in claiming Boothe’s child, and with the captaincy of the
Andromeda.
Her stepfather had ruthlessly duped and corrupted him, stolen the honor of one of the most honorable men she’d ever met. Now the commodore meant to turn Chase’s own guilt against him
—but she wasn’t about to let him succeed.

“I can see,” she said, turning on him with icy civility, “I’ll have to find another way to prove my husband’s innocence.”

She sailed across the study toward the half-open door into the hall. The commodore caught her wrist before she reached it.

“Don’t be a fool, Ann. Let him go. Let Chase Hardesty make this sacrifice for everyone’s sake.”

That he thought she’d agree to this, side with him against the man she loved, made her angry. She jerked out of his grasp and stepped back panting. “I’m not going to allow you to betray my husband the way you’ve betrayed me!”

For an instant he hesitated, seemed genuinely taken aback.

“Betrayed you?” he finally bellowed. “Goddamn ungrateful girl! I
protected
you. I protected you and your bastard!”

“Protected me?” she raged at him. “The way you protected me when Boothe tried to kill me that day in the stable?”

“Of course I protected you! I had plans for you. Even then it was clear you were going to grow up to be a lovely woman, a woman with connections back East and a flawless pedigree. With those kinds of attributes, there was no limit to the kind of advantageous marriage I could make for you when the time came. So I sent you out of harm’s way.”

Tears sprang to her eyes. She had been a commodity to him, to the only father she’d ever known. “You made me feel as if what happened was my fault!
As if I deserved the
way Boothe treated me!”

“He was only teaching you a lesson.” There wasn’t a shred of humanity in those black eyes. “Perhaps you
did
deserve the scare he gave you.”

“No,” she cried, outrage rippling hot beneath her skin. “I didn’t deserve that then, and I most certainly didn’t deserve what Boothe did when I came back to this house! You knew very well I was afraid of him, but you did nothing. You never restrained him or tried to prevent him from threatening me. Because you turned a blind eye to what your son was doing
—he raped me!

“Boothe raped me right here in your house! He got me with child—and the only thing you could think about afterwards was protecting the Rossiter name. You were so desperate to conceal what he had done that you sold me—”

“For not an inconsiderable amount,” he reminded her.

Ann punched him. She hit him as hard as she could and felt his nose mash flat beneath her fist. James Rossiter staggered back a step, blood coursing down his chin.

Ann gasped in astonishment. She’d seen the rousters fight amongst themselves more than once, but she’d never imagined she was capable of hitting anyone. She never thought she’d feel such a rush of satisfaction at doing it. She’d never once imagined how much her hand would hurt afterwards!

“ ‘For not an inconsiderable amount,’ you say?” she shouted at him. “You promised Chase Hardesty a steamer you knew he’d never own, a captaincy he couldn’t possibly sustain once his boat was gone, and a woman so sullied she might never be able to be a wife to him!

“You didn’t offer him one thing of value in exchange for his good name. And now you mean to take his freedom, too. Well, I won’t let you do that!” She wheeled like a warrior queen and strode toward the door. “Chase Hardesty might not tell the authorities who’s been running guns to the Indians, but I will!”

Ann tore open the door into the hallway and saw her husband standing just outside. From the sick horror in Chase’s eyes when he looked at her, she knew he’d heard every word.

ANN’S WORDS PIERCED CHASE LIKE A BLADE OF STEEL.

“Boothe raped me,” he heard her shout, “right here in your house! He got me with child—and the only thing you could think about afterwards was protecting the Rossiter name.”

Chase stumbled back from the half-open door and braced himself against the wall. A swirl of sickness took him. His ears rang and his mouth went sour. He couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t think about anything but what Ann had said.

Boothe raped me.

Chase clamped his eyes shut, trying not to see, trying not to imagine, but the visions swirled through his head. Boothe’s long-fingered hands tearing at Annie’s clothes, bruising her skin as he held her down. Boothe’s cruel kisses crushing her mouth, his body...

Chase’s throat seared with bile.

He’d seen the shadows in her eyes, recognized the vein of fear in her, and been convinced that someone had taken her against her will. She’d all but confirmed it when they made love. He just hadn’t known who it was or understood how terribly she’d been betrayed by her own family.

How had his Annie borne what these men did to her?

“ ‘Chase Hardesty might not be willing to tell the authorities who’s running guns to the Indians’ ”—Ann’s voice carried out into the hall—“ ‘but I will!’ ”

Ann tore open the study door and saw him standing there. She stopped dead in her tracks. Her face paled. Their gazes held for a moment that seemed to verge on forever.

Seeing him standing there seemed to strip the final shreds of Ann’s veneer away, her final fragile layer of defense. In that instant he saw all the way to the core of her, her half-healed scars, her tattered faith in a world that had been so cruel to her.

He saw the steel-spined courage it had taken for her to survive, to become the kind of woman she was, the kind of mother she’d been to Christina. He realized how much she’d overcome to allow herself to care for him, open herself to him.

He could never change the past, change how her stepfather and brother had misused her. Because he hadn’t known the truth, he’d been powerless to help her heal what they had done.

Chase was powerless no more. A fervent, fine-grained fury drove through his blood. It prickled along the surface of his skin, collected bitter and hot in the pit of his belly. He saw only one redress for what the men in Annie’s own family had done to her.
Had done to his wife.

The law was going to punish the commodore; he’d seen to that. Now he was going to find Boothe Rossiter and pound him into dust.

“Chase,” Ann whispered and reached out to him, as if she knew what he meant to do and was trying to sway him. “Chase.”

He refused to give her a chance to change his mind. He turned without a word and strode away from her.

ANN PRAYED HE WAS AN APPARITION.

She prayed Chase wasn’t standing just outside the door to her stepfather’s study. Prayed he wasn’t staring at her as if she was someone he didn’t know. She prayed he hadn’t overheard what she’d said about Boothe.

But she could tell by his expression he had.

Cold peppered through her. She raised one trembling hand, palm extended in entreaty. “Chase.”

His mouth narrowed; his eyes went hard.

“Chase.”

He turned from her without a word.

Ann stood frozen, hollow, staring after him as he blazed down the hall and tore open the front door. She clapped her hand over her mouth to hold back the cry that spiraled up her throat.

He was leaving her—
doing exactly what she was afraid he’d do when he learned the truth.

After what happened with Boothe, Ann had felt tainted, unworthy of accepting the love of the steady, honorable man Chase Hardesty had proved himself to be. But in these last months aboard the
Andromeda,
Ann had changed. Becoming Christina’s mother had changed her. Admitting her love for Chase had changed her. Offering herself to him had changed her.

The woman she’d become had had courage enough to confront Boothe after years of cruelty, to break his hold on her and Christina. The Ann she was now had been powerful enough to stand her ground against the commodore. After she’d fought so hard and accomplished so much, how could she watch Chase walk away?

How could she give up the dreams he had made her believe in?

Ann picked up her skirts and ran down the hall after him. But Chase couldn’t seem to get away fast enough.

When she yanked open the door at the front of the house, he was already down the steps. Though she called to him, Chase banged out the iron gate and stepped onto the street. He strode right past the squad of soldiers clustered around a wagon parked in front of the town house.

Ann would have done that, too, except Richard Follensbee stepped in front of her.

“Mrs. Hardesty,” he said.

Ann did her best to get around him. “Please!” she implored, but Follensbee refused to let her pass.

She watched helplessly as Chase stalked off down the street, knowing that he’d heard the truth and he was repelled by it, repelled by her. Wasn’t he putting as much distance as he could between them?

“Mrs. Hardesty,” Richard Follensbee’s voice was insistent. She turned to him, suddenly drained and sagging with resignation.

It was a moment before she noticed the change in him. He stood taller, seemed tougher, more determined and in command.

“Why are you here, Mr. Follensbee?” she wanted to know.

“It’s Colonel Follensbee,” he corrected her. “I’m afraid I misled you about who I am. I was aboard the
Andromeda
to look into allegations that Gold Star boats were running contraband.”

“Chase had nothing at all to do with that!” she declared in a rush, needing to clear her husband’s name. “The commodore was the one behind the smuggling.”

“We know that, Mrs. Hardesty,” Follensbee assured her. “We’ve come to take your father into custody.”

Was that why Chase had come to the town house? Had he meant to warn James Rossiter that the provost marshal was after him?

“What I’d like, Mrs. Hardesty, is for you to let us in voluntarily,” Follensbee went on, “and give us permission for a search.”

“Is there an alternative?”

“We could break down the door.”

Ann let the colonel and his men into the house, but the commodore was gone. A trail of papers strewn down the back stairs seemed to indicate how he had escaped.