The Beloved Woman (34 page)

Overcome by all the emotions churning inside her, she threw herself into his arms. “I’m glad you’re back.”

He lifted her off the floor and kissed her. “I’ve been gone only since the mornin’.”

“I know, but—”

“I bet your flux has ended. You’re too happy to see me.” He looked resigned but not angry. “That blue dress suits you, Mrs. Blue Song Gallatin. It’s your color. Are you feelin’ more sprightly today?”

“Yes.”

“Want to read this letter to me?”

“Yes!”

The mail between New York and the Georgia frontier
was neither reliable nor fast. She’d written Rebecca and Sam only twice, once as soon as she and Justis had arrived in New York, to let them know Justis’s whereabouts and plans, then again later, to assure them that everything was going well. Rebecca had written once to bless her for saving Justis’s life—a comment Justis refused to explain when she mentioned it to him—and to say that all was well in Gold Ridge.

Katherine took the packet of paper from Justis’s hand as he set her down. He stretched out on a sofa and crossed his booted feet on the arm. “Let’s hear the news.”

Her fingers trembling, she broke the seal and unfolded several pages filled with small, neat script. “It’s Rebecca’s writing. ‘Dearest Justis and Katherine, we are desperately in need of your help—at least, we must have Justis back for a short while. Poor Katherine, I know you cannot return to Gold Ridge. Can you spare your man for the sake of mine? Sam was pinned when his wagon turned over last week, and only yesterday did the doctor offer hope that he would live. We think he may not be back to health for at least four months.’ ”

Dazed, Katherine stopped reading and looked at the date. “This is only three weeks old. She must have paid someone to carry it up the coast by ship.”

Justis was already up and pacing, his hands on his hips. “Read the rest.”

She continued, but it was all just elaboration on the first shocking part. Sam was nearly crippled right now, but in time he’d recover fully. He had assistants to run the mine and the other businesses, but they were an uninspiring lot.

“I’ll have to go, then,” Justis said. He halted and looked at her grimly. “But you’ll go with me.”

“No.” How could she travel, nauseated and tired half the time, without him realizing the truth right away? If she stayed in New York, at least she would have a temporary
reprieve from telling him. Plus Vittorio and Adela were going back to California in two or three months. Perhaps they’d be gone by the time Justis returned.

“No?” he echoed, frowning.

“I can’t go back. I’m a Cherokee, remember?”

“You can go to visit.”

“And be scorned.” She went to him and pried his hands away from his hips, holding them tightly. “I’ll simply wait here for you. Let the people in Gold Ridge think you’ve been in New York alone all this time.”

“You want to be rid of me. Say so.”

She jerked on his hands. “Damn you! Nothing I can say will make any difference to you. I want you to come back. I’ll be waiting. And in the meantime I’ll keep track of your business dealings. I can do it very well—you know that—if your associates don’t faint at the thought of working with a woman and an Indian!”

“You’ve got no one here to keep an eye on you. What if you get sick or something?”

“Adela won’t be leaving until after New Year’s. Surely you’ll be back before then.” She cupped his face between her hands. He looked as unhappy as she felt. “I think you’re worried about your investments, not me. They’ll be fine under my care.”

He swore viciously. “And you’ll be happier left alone. What’s been wrong with you lately? Why are you moping?”

She stepped back, her hands clenched. Fear demanded a quick bluff. “Sir, you have never expected me to be satisfied with this life, any more than I expect you to be. I will never stop missing my home and grieving for my family. There are days—such as lately—when they are all I think about. Don’t you ever think about going home to Gold Ridge?”

“All right, I do. I miss it damned bad sometimes.”

She nodded sagely, but his admission frightened her.
He’d never said anything before about wishing he could go back to Gold Ridge. “Being a New York businessman galls you terribly? I’ve suspected as much.”

His expression became guarded. “I’ll make a go of it. Don’t write me off.”

Katherine trembled inside. “I’m not. But tell me the truth. You’d like to go back to Gold Ridge for good, and as soon as you accomplish what you want here, that’s where you’ll head. Is that right?”

He watched her carefully. “What difference does it make to you?”

“I just want to know how to plan my future once we separate.” She knotted her hands together behind her back and squeezed until her knuckles hurt.

“Fine, then. Yeah, I’ll be goin’ back to Georgia to stay.”

“Will you live on the Blue Song land?”

“The
Gallatin
land. Probably. I’ll never sell it, I know that much. No harm’ll come to it.”

Tears stung her eyes. Katherine knew that the changes in her pregnant body were putting a strain on her emotions, and she struggled to keep them in control. She whirled, her manner brusque, and crossed to the writing desk in one corner of the room. “You’ll enjoy this visit home, then. I’ll send a letter with you, for Rebecca. She’ll like hearing about life in New York. Perhaps it will take her mind off her worries about Sam.”

Katherine sat down and busied herself setting up her writing supplies, but she could feel Justis gazing angrily at her. Suddenly he strode across the room. “Damn you,” he said, and dragged her out of the chair. He held her arms in a harsh grip, nearly pulling her off her feet as he scrutinized her tear-filled eyes. “After all we’ve been through together, don’t you care a little that I’m goin’ away for only God knows how long?”

She made a ragged, anguished sound.
More than you’ll ever know, my love
. “I shall miss you,” she whispered, her voice choked. “Please come back.”

Amazement tinged his eyes. His hands tightened. “I will,” he promised hoarsely. “You don’t know how I—” He struggled for words. “We have a deal, remember? I’ve always kept my word to you.”

“Your word. A deal. Yes.” He would honor their agreement whether he wanted to or not. She put her arms around his neck and hugged him. “Thank you.”

He picked her up. Katherine knew that signal—it invariably meant he would carry her to their bed, where he could show her affection but disguise it as desire. She had come to understand that much about him during their months together, and it made her kiss him desperately, begging for every bit of affection he had for her.

Much later, when they lay satiated and still in each other’s arms, she gazed into his troubled eyes. “I think you’ll miss me too.”

“As much as you’ll miss me,” he said wearily.

She rested her forehead against his and shut her eyes. If only that were true, she thought.

The next morning he dressed in his old clothes—a worn wool shirt, coarse trousers held up by braces, and heavy boots—and packed others in a valise. A subdued Thomas carried the valise downstairs, where Watchman was waiting outside. Justis planned to take the stallion aboard a steamer bound for Charleston, on the coast of South Carolina. From Charleston the ride to north Georgia would be relatively easy and quick.

While Justis made his preparations, Katherine hurriedly dressed and fixed her hair. “You goin’ out somewhere?” he asked, frowning.

She swallowed a knot of sorrow in her throat. He had never understood that she wanted so much to please him. “No. I just didn’t want your last image of me to be a sleepy-looking hag in a dressing gown.”

“Not a hag,” he corrected her gruffly. They walked to the door together. He turned to her and slipped his arms
around her waist. A muscle worked in his jaw. “Still the most beautiful woman I’ve ever known.”

“I shall certainly miss your flattery.” She leaned against him and pressed her face into the crook of his neck. His body was like hers—taut with restraint. He probably felt embarrassed, she decided. “Take care of yourself,” she said lightly, nuzzling him.

His lips brushed her temple. Slowly he slid a hand under his shirt collar and withdrew the gold nugget. “An early Christmas present,” he said as he eased the leather necklace over her head. “Since I may not be here to give you one.”

She laughed shakily. It was the only sound she could make without bursting into tears.
Come back. Dear God, please let him come back
. She’d be swollen with their babe by then, and she’d tell him why she wanted it, half-breed or not. If forced, she’d admit that she loved him. Perhaps he wouldn’t mind.

“Well, there’s no point wastin’ time,” he said, and stepped back with a formal attitude.

“No. Of course not.” She helped him into a heavy wool coat and retrieved his battered, beloved hat from the parlor sofa. “Ugly thing,” she muttered, but her hands lovingly brushed a bit of dust off the wide brim.

He set it on his head at the jaunty angle she had seen so many times, and she wanted to dissolve onto the floor with longing. She casually pressed a hand over her stomach. If she didn’t have their babe inside her, she would forget caution and go with him to Georgia.

Justis opened the door to the hall. Then he caught her chin in one hand and lifted her face to his for a slow, thorough kiss. She stroked his cheeks with her fingertips and feathered one over his mustache as he drew back. “Let no harm come to this.”

His gaze was somber, but he almost smiled. “Stay well and safe,” he murmured.

Their eyes met and held. Katherine felt as if he were
searching for something, then realized she must look the same way to him. Finally he turned away. His hand still cupped her chin. He trailed his fingers over her lips, and was gone.

CHAPTER 16

A
MARINTHA
folded the much-read letter carefully and hid it back in her bureau drawer. Then she dressed in her prettiest winter dress, a dark pink with tiny roses embroidered on the bodice. She parted her hair in the center and fixed it in masses of long red-gold ringlets over each ear.

Bundled in a short white cape and matching muff, she marched out of her father’s house without bothering to glance toward the square to see whether court had let
out. Let her father wonder where she’d gone. His tyranny didn’t matter anymore. She had confidence for the first time in her life.

She climbed into the hired buggy and told the driver to take her to the Gallatin mine. Once she arrived, she told him it wouldn’t be necessary for him to wait.

She knocked firmly on the door of the cabin that served as the mine’s office. When Justis answered the door, looking surprised and disgusted to see her after all these months, she breezed past him with only a curt hello. He was sickening, like all men, and she didn’t have to pretend otherwise anymore.

She fluffed her skirt, eyed him in haughty silence, and lowered herself into the chair he brought her. “Welcome home,” she said finally.

“Just visitin’,” he told her. He went back to his desk, which was covered in paperwork, and dropped into its big leather chair without much show of patience. “I’ve got no time to talk to you and no reason to want to.”

“You’ll make time and you’ll find reason. Or you’ll lose everything you own, including your wife’s land.”

He stared at her in silent shock. Fury crept into his eyes, though he tried to appear nonchalant. “I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about. I’m not married.”

“Oh, stop it,” she ordered. “I have a letter she wrote to Rebecca Kirkland months ago. I was at the courthouse the day it arrived in the mail. I offered to carry it over to the hotel. Then I kept it, of course, and read every word. It’s very frank and quite detailed about your marriage. Your wife’s handwriting is excellent. Her full signature is at the end. ‘Katherine Blue Song Gallatin.’ How proud the squaw must have been to take a white man’s name. All in all, she provided me with a very tidy legal document.”