Silver Moon (9 page)

Brace held her gaze for a moment. “It’s too dark to be riding back. Wait until morning. I’ll have a room prepared for you.”

Colleen laughed. “Don’t you sound just like all the other grand planters! ‘I’ll have a room prepared for you. . . .’ No, thank you!”

“Colleen, it’s dangerous to ride at night.”

“It’s dangerous to love someone and it’s dangerous to spurn her!” Colleen stepped off the veranda and disappeared into the night.

Brace gazed into the darkness where she had fled; even as he heard her mount the horse, her voice, tense and shrill, reached his ears.

“Brace Denham, you’ll regret this night for as long as you live!”

C
harles Denham stood, stretched, and stepped into the tropical night. He loved this special time, just after he had finished the day’s accounts. Ann was readying herself for bed, but no matter how long he took before he joined her, he knew she would be awake and waiting for him. For thirty years, regardless of how tired they were, they never ended the day without each other.

Charles smiled to himself. As a boy, he never would have imagined the life he was destined to live. If it hadn’t been for Ann, he might not have survived it—Ann, and Harlan Louden.

Charles drew on the pipe’s stem, and let the tobacco smoke roll across his tongue. As he exhaled, he heard a horse ride up and he turned toward the sound.

He saw the shadowy form of his son dismount, unsaddle his horse, and lead the gelding into the stable. It had been two days since Brace had gone to check on his own plantation, and in those two days, Charles had given much thought to what was happening at Devonairre. He knew he needed to speak with Brace, and that it must be soon.

*****

Troubled by his confrontation with Colleen, a sleepless night, and his angry feelings, Brace had spent the morning inspecting the coffee crop with his overseer, but by late afternoon, was riding toward Devonairre, still trying to sort out his thoughts.

During the five-hour ride, he had wrestled the thoughts of Elyse from his mind. His efforts were only partially successful, and whenever he relaxed his guard, feelings of passion and love rose to torment him. When he arrived at the sugar plantation, night had come with a darkness that was bright, compared with the shadows filling Brace’s mind.

The only light in the main house came through the open balcony doors of the upper hallway. The rest of the windows were dark. He dismounted, unsaddled his gelding, and put the horse in its stall. When he came out of the stable, he noticed that a light shone through his parents’ bedroom window.

Pausing for a moment, Brace considered disturbing them to say hello, but decided against it. He would speak to them in the morning.

Nodding to himself, Brace started toward the east wing and his room. Halfway there he saw the coal-red, hazy glow of his father’s pipe.

“Good evening, Brace,” Charles greeted him.

“Good evening, Father.”

“How is your land coming along?”

“Nicely,” Brace replied, aware of the stiffness of their conversation.

Charles smiled at Brace and lifted his hand, pointing the pipe’s stem toward the garden. “Walk with me?”

Brace nodded. For the most part, he and his father had always enjoyed a good relationship, as long as the conversation did not turn to Devonairre and obligations. They walked silently until reaching the garden, and there, Charles picked a stone bench to sit on and motioned Brace to do the same.

When they sat, Charles took another draw on his pipe. He had always been able to sense his son’s moods and tonight he knew that Brace was troubled.

“This garden has always been a calming place,” Charles began. “We’ve had many a long talk here.”

Brace smiled. He knew that whenever his father began in this manner, he wanted to talk about something delicate. The first time had been about women. That one had been tough.

“And we’re about to have another one, aren’t we?” Brace chased away the blackness in his mind for a moment.

“I hope so,” Charles replied honestly. “I know you disliked returning here from America, but you did so, anyway. I’ve never thanked you for doing so.”

“It was an obligation, wasn’t it?” Brace asked in a tight voice.

“We both know better. You could have refused.”

“Not really.”

“Yes, really, and that is a fact. You inherited my sense of responsibility—which is not a bad thing, although a burden. Legally, you were within your rights to stay in America. Morally, the decision was one of conscience.”

“Whatever it was, I came back, and I’m still here.”

“And I thank you for that. Brace, in the past six years I’ve watched you mature into an intelligent man. When you returned from America, you were angry and bitter, but you overcame that, or at least I thought you had until recently. What happened?”

Brace took a deep breath in order to stop his first rush of words. His father’s question hit him hard, and he’d been unprepared for it. A moment later, he spoke in slow, measured tones.

“What happened is very simple. She came back.”

Charles shook his head sadly. “As we knew she would. Devonairre is Elyse’s home.”

Brace’s anger burst its bonds. “How can you sit there and speak like that? How can you? You, Mother, and I have given our lives to this place, cared for it as if it had been our own. And we’ve done this only to have some stranger who was raised among the spoiled fops of the world come and tell us what to do!”

Charles almost leaned away from the force of his son’s anger, but held himself straight, not a flicker of emotion showing on his face. Instead, he placed his hand on his son’s thigh and gently squeezed the hard muscle. When he spoke, his voice was low, but emotions flowed powerfully through it.

“You must not think that way.”

“Why must I not?” Brace asked, anger making his words stiff. “She left sixteen years ago, and not even when her father died, did she have the courtesy to come home. Did she ever once write to us to find out how Devonairre was doing? What reasons could there be to not make me think the way I do?” Brace paused for just a moment. When he spoke again, his voice was still angry. “When she finally returned, it was as a lordly high lady! No, Father, you have given me no reason not to think this way.”

Charles sighed wearily. “For more reasons than you could ever know, we owe to Harlan Louden everything that makes life worthwhile, and through him, to Elyse, too. What we have now, your mother and I—and you, too—is more than I could ever have hoped. If not for Harlan, I would have nothing, not even you!”

Charles, even as he spoke, knew the truth of his words. Harlan Louden had given him the chance to live a life of self-respect and worth, and for Charles, nothing that came after that meant more.

“Brace,” Charles said, lifting his hand from his son’s leg, “it is because of Harlan Louden that you are what you are today, and have the education and home that you do.”

“Don’t you think I know that?” Brace shouted, his frustration growing out of control. He stood quickly. “Good night, Father.” He turned and walked stiffly toward the east wing.

“Brace,” Charles called from the stone bench, but Brace would not turn at his father’s call, and Charles knew better than to chase after him. Brace was much as he had been as a young man, hotheaded and determined to do himself harm. Yet Charles prayed that somehow his son would see through the irrational curtains that covered his eyes and come to terms with the man he was, and the man he one day would be.

*****

Elyse stood on the balcony, breathing the cooler night air. Her life was settling in to a semblance of normalcy. England was becoming a thing of the past and so were the memories she tried her best to suppress.

She wanted to be happy here, but she was finding it difficult. She loved Devonairre, and loved Jamaica. Yet there was still one thing missing from her life—the ability to give her love to the one person who refused it.

I will survive this, too. The dreams will stop. The aching will leave
, she added in her silent dialogue, but found her words hard to believe.

Then she saw Charles Denham step into the courtyard, and was about to call to him when she heard a horse approaching. Intuitively, she knew that it was Brace returning from wherever he had been. Not wanting him to see her, she retreated into the hallway and returned to her room.

She stayed there, pacing restlessly, until she grew angry with herself.
Why am I hiding in my own home?
With that thought, Elyse left her room and went back onto the small balcony. The courtyard was deserted, and she began to relax.

Ten minutes later, she heard footsteps and saw Brace enter the east wing. She stared at him for several seconds before he was gone from her sight, conscious of the way her heart raced and her mind spun.

Where were you? Why did you go away without saying anything?
Elyse shook her head. She had no right to ask those questions of him, for it was in her mind alone, where her love dwelled. Yet, even as she found herself mired in these painful thoughts, a hidden sense rose up to challenge her.

From a far place deep within the core of her mind, a voice spoke to her, telling her that Brace loved her, and for her to see it as the truth. There was no basis for this knowledge, no reason. Yet she accepted the thought and allowed it to grow free.

Why does he treat me so disdainfully? How can he love me and act the way he does?
With the insistent inner voice blending into her thoughts, a myriad of newer memories, acquired since she had returned to Jamaica, assaulted her. She remembered Brace’s first, hostile greeting, and remembered, too, the look in his eyes. It was not a look of hatred, but of something else.
Desire? Love?

She relived, for the moment, their one heated, passionate kiss, which had shaken her to the very center of her being. Closing her eyes, Elyse realized that so much had happened in so short a time that the relationship between Brace and her wavered like the leaves of a tree in a storm.

Once again, since that afternoon at the aqueduct, their relationship had changed. Brace had turned sullen, speaking only when she asked a direct question, and the next day, the minute the sugar processing had ended, he’d disappeared without a word.

After a sleepless night, which she knew well was because of Brace, she had grown afraid he had left forever. She feared she had triggered the cause of Brace’s hatred, and that he left so that he would not have to be reminded of her again.

She’d spent the night staring out at the phosphorescence of the moonlit waves, praying that Brace was safe, admitting her love for him, even as she accepted the fact that he was gone and might not return.

Elyse shrugged away her thoughts of last night while she watched Charles cross the courtyard and enter his apartment. When Charles and Ann’s window darkened, Elyse felt as though she were alone in the world.

The night sounds grew loud; insects called, an old owl hooted madly, and a sudden, strange chill raced through Elyse’s body.
What’s happening to me? I was supposed to be happy when I came home. Why can’t I be? Will I ever be?

All the anger of the past years, at her inability to do with her life what she desired, welled strongly within her. Her escape from imprisonment and her return home had not helped to ease her mind; she was still a prisoner, this time captive to her emotions.

A single tear fell from her eye and rolled down her cheek. She closed her eyes, fighting the sadness trying to claim her and to make her surrender. “No!” she whispered fiercely, drawing on the anger she’d felt earlier. “No, you won’t do this to me!” As she spoke, Brace’s taunting face rose before her, laughing at her, making sport of her love for him. The same face that had shared her dreams each night.

“Do you hate me or do you love me?” she asked the ghostly apparition. The hazy smiling face laughed at her
. Is your love in my mind only?
“Damn you, I will have the truth!” Suddenly she knew what she had to do. Leaving the balcony, she walked purposefully down the left staircase and out the rear of the house. Her feet moved of their own volition, carrying her toward the east wing.

At Brace’s door, she raised her hand and rapped sharply on the dark mahogany. The scent of night orchids grew strong while she waited. Her breathing was tight and forced. Then the door swung open and she found herself staring into his face.

“Which is it?” She asked the irrational question in a forced, sharp voice.

Brace stared at her for a moment, drinking in her beauty, breathing in the womanly fragrance that radiated from her, her strange question a puzzle to his mind. “Which is what?”

“Do you hate me or do you love me?” she demanded, knowing with the logical part of her mind that she had no sane reason to ask the question. Now that she had, she couldn’t stop herself from going on. “The other day I asked you why you hated me—I don’t think you do—I think you love me. Answer me, Brace—do you hate me or love me?”

Brace held his breath as her green eyes bored into his very soul. Slowly, forcefully, he strengthened the barriers he had erected and shook his head. “The answer is as pointless as the question.”

“The hell it is!”

“Perhaps that’s the answer—it is hell.”

“Please, Brace,” Elyse whispered, unable to stop herself from staring helplessly at him. “Tell me.”

“There is nothing to tell, Lady Louden,” Brace said in a stiff voice.

“If there were, would you?”

Brace remained silent, gazing at her with distant eyes.

Her legs were trembling from the strain of her tight muscles. Elyse closed her eyes. When she opened them again, she sighed and took a backward step. “I…I’m a fool.” She turned and went back to the house, unable to stop her tears from flowing.