Evermore: A Saga of Slavery and Deliverance (The Plantation Series Book 3) (10 page)

She tossed the magazine aside. She touched her hair. It was
a lovely color, everyone said so. Her nose was good, not sharp or stunted or
long. She pooched her mouth. That’s how it looks when you’re going to kiss
someone, she thought.

He was going to kiss her good bye, surely. They were
engaged, after all. And she was going to kiss him back, this time.

At last, Marcel came to her. For a moment, he simply stared.

“You’re lovely, Miss Deborah Ann.”

She laughed, a little nervous. He took both her hands in his
and looked into her eyes. He does love me, she thought. When he kissed her
knuckles, she felt her lips tingle.

He led her to the sofa and sat so his long thigh stretched
beside hers. The thought of their legs side by side, only layers of fabric
between them, made her breathless.

“Do you understand, dear, why I’m going? Is there something
you would like me to explain?”

Of course she understood, but all she cared about was that
he look at her as he was right this minute. “No, Mr. Chamard. I admire a man of
courage.”

Marcel looked at the floor a moment. He’s a modest man, she
thought, gazing at the dark lashes displayed against his cheek.

“The wedding, Miss Deborah Ann. Considering the present
climate, perhaps we need to discuss it. I will do my best to be here on January
the twelfth, but we are none of us in control of these events.”

He looked at her to see if she understood. She’d never seen
eyes so beautiful. Marcel’s were somehow richer, clearer than any other brown
eyes. And framed by perfect dark brows. She imagined tracing her finger along
the arch of those brows.

“What would you think of foregoing a wedding involving
musicians, caterers, dressmakers, and all the thousand preparations normally
involved? I think only to spare you the disaster of an absent groom on the day
of the grand occasion.”

A whisper of panic fluttered in her chest. No wedding? He
was looking at her, expecting an answer. “An absent groom?”

“Consider, Miss Deborah Ann. If the fighting took me to the
Red River. Or if I found myself at Vicksburg come January. I could not leave a
battlefield to come home for the ceremony. We could postpone the wedding until
it’s reasonable to plan a grand event, if you’d prefer. Or we could wed in a
modest way, on short notice, when I am able to return in the fall.”

Air filled her lungs again. “Of course. A modest wedding.”
She laughed, her panic melting.

But the occasion should be wonderful! Everyone in New
Orleans should be there. Her gowns. The flowers, the banquet. Seven courses, at
least, and the ball. How could she make it modest?

But a lady does not argue with a gentleman. Of course, he
was correct. They were in the middle of a war. She’d manage it somehow.

“We would be just as married, would we not!” she said gaily.

“Good. That’s very sensible of you, Miss Deborah Ann.”

He lightly slapped his hands on his knees as if to announce,
There, that’s done. Then he was leaving?

Impulsively, Deborah reached her hand to touch his arm.
Surely he’d kiss her before he left, when he’d be gone so long. Who knew when
she would see him again?

He raised her hand and pressed a kiss to it. It wasn’t
enough. It wasn’t what she wanted. She leaned into him, shamelessly. Her
balance was off. She caught at his lapel.

He looked at her a moment, questioning. Yes, she told him
with her eyes, kiss me. He stood, raising her with him.

Holding her hand at his chest, next to his heart, he bent to
her. He brushed his lips over hers, smiling at her.

Did he think she was a child!

She pressed her mouth against his, hard, feeling his teeth
behind his lips. That’s how she wanted to kiss, with all the fervor in her
breast.

He broke away. Her face turned crimson. She had done it
wrong.

Then he showed her how, kissing her strongly, but softly.

Oh, God, she thought, struggling to breathe under the tight
corset. But she was willing to cease breathing if only Marcel would kiss her
again.

Oh bliss. One more real kiss. Please.

He kissed her nose and touched a curl hanging at her ear.

“Be well, my dear. I shall write to your father when I can,
and to you if he allows it.”

“Do, Mr. Chamard. Do write.”

Deborah Ann watched him leave the room, hoping for a last
lingering look. When he didn’t turn at the door, her doubts rose again. She
touched her lips. Why only one kiss? She’d have kissed him from now until
forever.

It was simply they were so different. He always cool, she
always hot. He calm, she excitable. There would be kisses enough when they were
married, she told herself, and pressed her hand to her mouth so as not to cry.

In the hallway, Marcel took his hat from the butler and left
the Presswoods’. A sweet girl, he said to himself. She’ll make a good wife.

He dashed through the rain to his carriage waiting at the
curb. “Elysian Fields,” he told the driver.

On Lucinda’s street, he hopped eagerly from the carriage at
the well-kept yellow cottage with the orange shutters. The new bridge he’d had
built to span the rushing gutter still shone of new wood.

He tapped on the door with his cane, then entered, stooping
a little for the doorway.

“Lucinda?”

His beloved rushed into his arms. He lifted her off her
feet, burying his face in her neck. She smelled of cinnamon and vanilla, of
smoke and jasmine all at once. He kissed her, tasting her, loving her, gladness
filling his heart. His hand slid up her back to the lavender tignon covering
her wealth of wavy black hair. He jerked the silk free and ran his fingers
through her tresses, caressing her neck. His other hand pressed her body tight
against his.

“Papa!” Charles Armand rushed at him, grabbing his legs.

One hand on his son’s head, he gazed into Lucinda’s eyes,
marveling at the love he saw there. What had he done to deserve her? He kissed
her again, then bit at her earlobe. “Later,” he whispered.

He hauled Charles Armand upside down and grinned at his
cascade of giggles.

The baby, Bertie, slept in his cradle, his mouth a pouty
rosebud. Gently, Marcel pushed aside the mosquito net to touch his babe’s plump
cheek.

“Look, Papa,” Charles said. “The gray soldiers have killed
all the blue coats.”

Marcel adjusted the netting and lowered himself to the
floor. “Set them up again, Charles. Show me how you won the battle.”

“A glass of wine?” Lucinda asked, her fingers playing with
Marcel’s hair.

He looked up at his beloved, her smile as open as her heart,
as loving as her arms. It was good to be home, one more night.

Marcel watched the shoreline for his first sight of Cherleu,
the Chamard plantation. Marcel’s father had bought the run-down property cheap,
invested every cent he could get through mortgage and marriage, then poured his
own sweat and brawn into it to develop the place into a model of profit and
beauty.

Marcel supposed lots of plantation homes were graced with
breezy galleries, moss-draped oaks and dozens of camellia bushes, but only
Cherleu was home. He’d grown up here with Mother, dead long ago, Father, and
his brother Yves, who’d chosen to embrace the North. He and Yves used to sneak
half a mile upriver to Cleo’s small country home to play with their
half-siblings, Gabriel and Nicolette, swimming, fishing, sharing books and
games. Those had been good times, summer on the river.

He tightened his grip on the steamboat railing. It could all
go up in smoke if Lincoln’s army spread its tentacles north from New Orleans.

The boat stopped at the Cherleu dock long enough for Marcel
to disembark with his valet. He and the boy climbed to the top of the levee to
survey the old home place. “Glad to be back, Val?”

“Yes, sir. I love it better here than anywhere.”

Marcel thought of his boys and Lucinda back in town and
couldn’t say the same. But he loved the old place. The river breeze freshened
the air, the plowed black earth lent its loamy scent. Even from the bank, he
could hear the rustle of the cane stalks shifting in the wind.

The sweet voices of the men and women working the fields,
singing through their hours of toil, carried across the plantation, reminding
him of the peace and plenty of childhood, days without loss, without war. Peace
and plenty for him and his family at any rate. Marcel was not blind to the woes
of a slave’s life, but Papa had at least created a stable home for these people
on Cherleu.

Val carried two valises and Marcel picked up the third.
Together they walked through the alley of live oaks to the house. Val went
around back. Marcel climbed the front steps.

The door opened for him, and there stood Val’s father,
Valentine. “Mr. Marcel. You here in good time for dinner. Come on in and I’ll
fix you a cool glass of water.”

Marcel gave Valentine his hat. “Water would be good. Papa in
the house?”

“He down at the creek fishing. May be we’ll have a mess of
catfish for dinner.”

Marcel shrugged out of his coat. Valentine followed him to
his bedroom, carrying the coat. Val was already there unpacking the valises.

“I’ll do that, son,” Valentine offered. “You go on and get
the travel dust off you so you can serve dinner.”

Marcel glanced at Valentine as he pulled off his collar.
“Time for my report?”

Valentine sat himself on the boot bench. He took such
license pretty much whenever he felt like it. He’d been Marcel’s father’s
playmate in childhood and then became his valet when they were both striplings.
Marcel had long ago figured his father and Valentine to be half-brothers, like
he and Gabriel were.

“What that rascal been up to?” Valentine asked. “He cause
you any trouble?”

“Here’s the thing,” Marcel reported, his face grave with the
bad news. “Since you saw him last month, Val managed to get the upstairs girl
pregnant, which made the downstairs girl run off with a broken heart. He
cracked three of ma mère’s Chévres plates. He burned
a hole in my best dress shirt. He spent the nights gaming and wandering the
town. And then he slept all day. A worthless boy if I ever saw one.”

Val’s weathered face split into a grin. “Two gals, huh?
That’s my boy.”

Marcel laughed. “He’s doing well, Valentine. He’s earnest
and eager.” He tossed his sweaty clothes on the bed. “He did scorch my best
shirt though.”

“I’ll whup him for you. Let me get
you that cool water now.”

Marcel washed at the pitcher and bowl, then put on a cotton
shirt and loose cotton trousers. One of the joys of being home, not having to
dress up like a starched linen peacock.

Val clomped into the room with a decanter of water and a big
smile. “Daddy says tell you he done whupped me good.”

“ ‘Has whupped me well,’” Marcel corrected. “Good. That
saves me the trouble. Listen, I’m going to need extra socks.”

“Yes, sir.” Val thumped the second valise on the bed to
finish unpacking. “I figure, you take your two valises and I take one, my horse
can handle all three just fine.”

Marcel stared at the boy. “Val, I told you. You’re not
going. I don’t need a valet in the field.”

Val’s face fell into a pout. “Yassuh,”
he said.

Marcel shook his head. Every time Val didn’t get what he
wanted, he lapsed into slave talk, when he knew perfectly well how to speak
properly. “Say that again, please, as it should be said.”

Val risked a glance at him. “Yes, sir,” he articulated.

“Socks,” Marcel reminded him, and left him to it.

They’d spoiled him rotten, Marcel reflected. Grew up with
everybody fussing over him, petting him. The most privileged kid on the place.
Valentine senior was light, but he’d bedded one of the darkest girls on the
place. She’d been a beauty, still was, and Val had her darker skin, high
forehead, and bottomless black eyes.

“What is he, fourteen?” Marcel muttered. “Not taking him.”

Out at the creek, Marcel found his father with his shoes
off, his feet in the water, and a straw hat on his head. Biscuit, his favorite
hound, lay stretched out beside him.

“They biting?”

“Hey, son. Take your shoes off.”

“Think I will.” Marcel sat on the bank and started unlacing.

His father handed him the pole and lay back in the grass.
“Just going to close my eyes a minute,” he said, and settled the straw hat over
his face.

Marcel re-baited the hook with a
tiny crawdad from his father’s bucket. Over the next half hour, all the kinks eased
out of his neck and shoulders. The overhanging trees filtered the sunlight
right through the clear water to the ripples on the creek bed. Down a ways,
blue jays dived and squawked at a hapless squirrel. The war seemed a long way
off from this time, this place.

If only a body could stop time, he thought. Could hold on to
what’s good. Last night, with Lucinda and the boys. This moment, here with
Papa.

They could lose it all. Cherleu. Everything.

He felt like a pebble being ground along on the bottom of a
mighty river. Helpless to change the course. Helpless to stop the flow. The war
was sweeping them all to ruin.

He’d do what he had to. He’d do what he could. That’s all
any man could do.

When Papa roused from his nap, Marcel gathered the pole and
the bucket and the string of catfish. On the way back, they dropped the fish
off with Bella at the cook house.

After supper, they took their coffee to the upstairs
gallery. While they watched the river roll by, Marcel brought his father up to
date. “Word is, Butler plans to target Lafourche next. He wants all that sugar
wealth, and if he can’t get it, he plans to burn it.”

Bertrand scratched behind Biscuit’s ears. “Where you joining
up with General Mouton? Houma?”