The Marshal's Pursuit (12 page)

She touched his arm, concerned. “Frank?”

She looked up at him with such tenderness, such...

Love.

He didn’t move. Their bodies weren’t touching—thank God for that—but he could feel her warmth radiating off her skin, breathe her simple clean scent from the Ivory soap his grandmother insisted be placed in every washroom. She was so close he could reach out and pull her into his arms and kiss her senseless. His mind raced with images of it. He growled under his breath. His duty was to protect her, not compromise her.

She caught her lower lip between her teeth, an innocent action stemming from her sincere concern, yet it only made him want her more. Frank grabbed the counter with both hands, his palms pressing down onto the cold soapstone. He pressed his eyes closed.

He tried to keep his tone light. “You were saying?” He didn’t have to open his eyes to know she was watching him.

“You sound odd.”

“I’m fine,” he ground out.

After a soft “hmmph,” she said, “I asked, ‘What is his motive?’”

“You, Malia,” he snapped. “You are his motive.” He knew because he felt the same. Like Giovanni, he would do anything to protect her, even if it cost him his life. And she wasn’t even his; she would never be his. Frank grimaced at what he had to say next.

The truth was going to hurt.

He opened his eyes, met her confused gaze. “This is all part of Giovanni’s plan to force you out of his life because he knows you won’t go willingly.”

* * *

Malia shook her head, unable to breathe from his verbal punch. She refused to believe Giovanni wanted her out of his life. He loved her. They were family. They had only each other.

“Giovanni would never—” She growled under her breath. She wasn’t even going to argue the point. “You’re wrong, Frank, and I’m not leaving my brother. Ever.”

He didn’t answer.

He didn’t look right. He certainly hadn’t sounded normal. Although, he wouldn’t have said what he had if his intentions hadn’t been good. Frank was the type of person to point out food in your teeth, not to embarrass you, but to spare you from a worse embarrassment of knowing thirty other people saw you. He was considerate like that. Because he cared.

“Maybe you should sit down,” she suggested. “Take the weight off your foot.”

The stubborn man didn’t move. Fine. He could stand there all day, if it made him happy, or miserable. To each his own. She had cookies to bake.

Malia reached around him to grab one of the baking sheets. On top was a package wrapped in butcher paper and tied with twine, and with a comedic pencil drawing of an ice-cream bowl filled with colorful, smiling hearts with faces. “What’s this?”

His gaze shifted to the package. “Oh that...ehrm. It’s for you.”

She blinked. “You bought me a gift. How sweet.” And then, because of his sassy words yesterday when she’d been giving her first dog training lesson to his grandmother, she teased, “You did say you were in love. Is this a token of your affection?”

“No,” he blurted. His face reddened. “While you were being Grandfather’s social secretary this morning, Grandmother asked me to drive her to Wren’s Ice Cream Parlor and Sweet Shoppe. It’s in the village. The owner is collecting books and donations for the new library. I saw—” he nodded to the package “—that in the box and thought you might like to read it before you leave.”

Malia wasn’t sure if she should laugh or be mortified. “You stole a book from a donation box? Frank!”

He ran a hand through his hair. “I didn’t steal it, all right? I explained to Mr. Wren that a friend of mine was visiting and liked the book, so I asked permission to borrow it. Mr. Wren said it’d be fine. The wrapping was his idea. He likes to draw,” he said, tapping the quirky drawing. “I have to give the book back before we leave. In five days. Maybe sooner. You should read quickly.”

She looked up at him, assessing his rambling comments. Something ailed him, because...this awkwardness wasn’t Frank.

She rested the baking pan atop her mixing bowl. From the corner of her eye, she could see him. He looked everywhere but at her as she untied twine and removed the paper to expose the green cover:

The WONDERFUL WIZARD OF OZ

She pressed her lips together, still looking down at the cover. She brushed her hand across the image of the Scarecrow and Tin Woodman, and the red Lion behind OZ. Frank borrowed this because he’d been thinking about her. And it embarrassed him for her to know. Such a simple gift, and yet she couldn’t think of one she treasured more, despite that she had to give it back.

Malia felt herself warming inside. “I don’t know what to say.”

He shrugged. “A mere ‘You are the most considerate man who has ever lived’ will suffice.”

“Oh, will it?” She couldn’t school her smile. “In light of the thoughtfulness of your gift, Mr. Louden, I must confess my reading skills are...well, they aren’t expeditious.” With both hands, she held the book out to him. “Perchance the most considerate man who has ever lived would read it to me as I finish baking? Chapter four, please.”

His head was shaking, but he was grinning. “Sometimes you make me want to—”

“To what?”

Frank snatched the book. Without a hitch in his stride, he walked to the table under the kitchen’s middle window. Whatever had been bothering him hadn’t been his splinted toe. He took a seat and opened the book.

Malia set the baking pan on the counter as he loudly flipped through pages like a ten-year-old boy being forced to read in front of the class. Giggles bubbled inside. She wouldn’t laugh, and risk ruining the moment. In five days, she would return to New York and walk out of Frank’s life. Until then, she was going to enjoy every second they had left together.

Using a spoon, she scooped out walnut-size pieces of cookie dough. She rolled each piece of dough into a rope then shaped it into a loop. She laid it on the pan.

“Finally!” he exclaimed. “I was about to think this book was missing a chapter.” He cleared his throat.
“When Dorothy awoke the sun was shining through the trees and Toto had long been out chasing birds around him and squirrels.”
Something between a snort and a chuckle burst from his chest.

She scooped and formed another cookie. “Care to tell me what’s so amusing?”

“Squirrels aren’t worth chasing. Toto should have known better.”

“Would you have known better?”

He just looked at her.

She looked at him back. “Of course you wouldn’t have known better.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It’s inherent in a male’s nature to pursue.” She smirked. “Just as it is a female’s to want to be caught. Didn’t you know birds and squirrels are all female?”

Of all he muttered, she caught only one word: “Women.” He resumed reading.

Malia finished rolling the cookies as she listened to Dorothy and the Scarecrow meeting the Tin Woodsman. While the cookies baked during chapter five, the chef and Mary, the kitchen maid, returned to prepare lunch. Malia made coffee and joined Frank at the table for chapter six.

“‘That is a first-rate idea,’ said the Lion,”
read Frank.
“One would almost suspect you had brains in your head, instead of straw.”

“Yes, one would,” Malia muttered, cutting in. Then she frowned. “How often do you think we desperately strive for something only to find that, well, we had what we wanted all along?”

He gave her hand a placating pat. “Darling, don’t spoil the ending for me.”

“What?” she blurted, eyes wide. “You aren’t supposed to tell me I figured out the ending.”

“What makes you think—” His gaze turned to the door, to the voices growing in volume in the corridor. Frank dropped the book. “Go,” he ordered the chef and Mary, and they immediately fled. He stood. “Malia, get up.” He grabbed her hand, pulled her around the table and shoved her behind him, shielding her with his body, holding her there with his left arm. His right hand gripped the hilt of his gun.

She didn’t have to touch him to feel the tension in his body.

Chapter 12

It is impossible to play any game without a thorough knowledge of the laws that govern it.

—Emily Price Post,
Etiquette

T
he door opened partway.

“Perhaps that is true, but I would love to see him,” came a cultured female voice, and Malia released the breath she was holding. Whoever the woman was, she wasn’t here for her.

Malia peeked around Frank’s shoulder. The door swung open. Inside walked a stately woman, her white hat cocked at an angle over her honey-colored hair; her tightly corseted black dress with vertical white stripes and umbrella skirt defined an hourglass figure. In her right hand, she held an ebony cane with a silver cap handle. Every exquisite inch of her decried High Society. This woman, unlike Malia, hadn’t had to read an etiquette book to know to look like a lady. It had been bred into her.

“Hello, Frank,” she purred, yet her heavily lidded eyes were on Malia.

His arm lowered, hand released his gun. “Rose.” Simply said yet Malia could hear the underlying hostility. Whoever she was, Frank wasn’t pleased to see her, which brought Malia a flittering of pleasure.

Mr. and Mrs. Grahame entered, both looking nervous, along with another exquisitely dressed female in an orchid day dress with an ivory lace overlay. She moved past the Grahames to stand next to the other blonde. She looked peeved.

“Katie,” Frank drawled in that easygoing voice of his. “It’s good to see you.”

“I can’t say the same, brother dear,” she quipped. “What are you doing in the kitchen, and why are you hiding that maid?”

“Miss Leah Carr is Worth’s governess,” Mrs. Grahame put in. “She is training him. And me, for that matter. Rose, Kate, let’s return to the parlor.” Lips pursed, she tipped her head to the door with a
you’d better obey me
glare. “Frank, do join us. Rose has returned from England and had the kindness to visit on her way home to Chicago. Has it been seven years already?”

Seven years? Frank’s divorce was that long ago. Malia opened her mouth, but Mr. Grahame gave a quick shake of his head, warning her to close it. And she did.

“Come along,” chimed Mrs. Grahame.

The woman called Rose kept staring at Malia, as if Malia had shown up to a ball uninvited.

Kate’s censorious gaze shifted from Frank to the table with the empty plate, coffee cups and open book. She then looked from Malia back to Frank. Her eyes flared. “Wait, I see what this is,” she said icily. “We’ve interrupted your romantic tête-à-tête.”

“Katherine Louden Rainier,” implored Mrs. Grahame, “not in front of—”

Kate gave a dismissive wave of her hand. “You and your religious piety have nerve judging me,” she said to Frank, “when here you are dallying with a servant. If I had known you were in Tuxedo, I would have never agreed to accompany Rose to see Grandmother. You...are...a...hypocrite.”

“Katie, that’s enough,” Mr. Grahame snapped.

Frank twisted his neck, and Malia heard a pop.

The woman called Rose looked as if she had an epiphany. She grabbed Kate’s wrist. “Katie, that’s no maid. She’s the D.A.’s missing fiancée, the one whose picture is in all the papers. The one for whom the reward has been upped to ten thousand dollars.” She chuckled. “I bet someone would pay more than that to know she’s here.”

In two strides, Frank was standing in front of Rose, his bearing that of a military man. Malia couldn’t see his face, but his sister blanched and took a step back. His grandmother gripped her husband’s arm.

“You will not tell a soul where she is.”

Rose flinched.

His words—they were harsh, no doubt about it—held a power that reminded Malia of the story in Acts when the Apostle Paul confronted Elymas the false prophet for perverting the straight ways of the Lord. But this wasn’t a spiritual battle. This was...well, it wasn’t a battle at all. She wasn’t the prize. Nor did her honor need defending.

There was perfect silence.

Then a curve grew on Rose’s lips. “Impressive.”

“We need to talk.” Frank grabbed his sister’s arm and one of Rose’s and pulled them out of the kitchen.

Mrs. Grahame looked to Malia, eyes filled with compassion. “Will you be all right?”

She nodded.

Mr. Grahame hesitated. With a sigh, he clenched his wife’s hand and left Malia in the kitchen. Alone.

Grahame Library
Later that afternoon

With the tip of her little finger, Malia smeared the charcoal cloud in her sketch for Mr. Grahame. A man who treasured the memory of flying a kite with his grandchildren should have a picture to remember it. Especially a man who had personally searched the house to find his oldest grandson’s sketchbook and charcoals because his youngest grandson had mentioned she enjoyed drawing. As she sat on the window seat listening to the lively orchestra music softly playing from the Gramophone, she glanced at the lake resting peacefully on the other side of the glass. Since Frank’s sister and ex-wife arrived, she’d seen little of him, or of his grandparents. She missed them, and it had been only four hours.

That she missed them didn’t mean she was lonely.

She wasn’t lonely. She had a brother. She had a dear friend, who was also her lawyer, and she had artists she sponsored. She knew practically everyone who volunteered at the Museum of Art. She couldn’t ride down a Manhattan street without seeing someone she knew. Her life was full of people she spoke with daily. She had events to attend, charities to aid. She wasn’t lonely.

This is all part of Giovanni’s plan to force you out of his life because he knows you wouldn’t go willingly.

Frank wouldn’t have said that if he hadn’t thought it was true. But why would Giovanni want her out of his life? He loved her—of that she had no doubt. When she visited him in the jail, he’d specifically said everything he was doing was to protect her. She trusted him to do just that. She would stay in New York during the trial. She would visit him in jail. She wasn’t leaving him. Ever. Because when you loved someone, you didn’t leave.

A knock resounded on the door frame.

Malia looked up.

Frank stood there, smiling. “Might I have permission to ruin your solitude?”

She nodded. “Where are Mrs. Rainier and Mrs. Swaine Louden Bingham?” Two weeks ago, she’d desperately wanted to be accepted by Society women like Frank’s sister and ex-wife. Something in her had changed. Wealth did not make one part of the Best Society of people. Good character did. She’d rather join the working class than go back to that world.

“They just left to take Grandmother and Grandfather into the village for an ice-cream sundae.” He walked to the Gramophone, turned the hand crank, and moved the needle to the beginning of the record. “I’m sorry for earlier.”

“I can think of worse unexpected arrivals.”

He, strangely, didn’t smile. “Katie hates me.”

Malia nodded. Really, what did one say in response to that?

“I’ve never lectured or condemned my sister for her indiscretions,” he said, walking to Malia. “Accusing me of doing so is easier than accepting that the shame she feels is from her own conscience.” He sat on the other end of the window seat.

“After the divorce, my family tried to console me.
It’s not your fault. The affair was Rose’s choice. She was the one who left.
None of that mattered. I ignored my family, focused on finishing my law degree because...”

He turned and gazed out the window, his blue eyes lightened by the bright afternoon sun.

Malia closed the sketchbook’s cover and returned the charcoal to the box. In the past four hours, she’d been so selfishly wallowing in her own woes that she had not given a thought to how his ex-wife’s arrival made him feel. She couldn’t feel any lower.

He turned back to her. “For years whenever I looked at people who knew about Rose and me, I saw the same judgment in their eyes—
unclean.
”

His words cut deep. When he’d walked into the special prosecutor’s office, that’s how she’d felt. Had he truly looked at her as if she was unclean, or, as with his sister Katie, had her own shame done the accusing?

She grabbed a cloth and wiped her coal-tipped fingers. “One of the artists I sponsor is a divorcée, whom none of the other patrons wanted. Her church even asked her to leave.” Malia laid the cloth atop the sketchbook. “She said she felt like a leper. People she thought were friends treated her like she was contagious.”

“I felt like I’d lost a part of my soul. Divorce left me broken, but that broken part of me is what let Jesus in.” He spoke so matter-of-factly that she ached over his pain. His frown deepened. “While Rose, Katie and I were talking earlier, I knew I needed to tell Rose I forgave her.”

“That must have been difficult.”

“It felt like my soul was being ripped in half.” He rested his head against the wood-paneled wall. His voice tightened. “Then I realized that pain was God stitching me whole. I wished her well, and meant it.”

“Everybody needs grace.”

He shifted on the bench. That familiar smile of his returned. “Some people find grace easier to give than others do. I’m trying to be more like you.”

This man—this God-fearing, family-honoring man—was what she used to dream of marrying.
I want a good man,
had been her prayer for years. She wasn’t in love with him, not that she knew what being in love felt like. She’d never been in love before. But if she let herself fall in love, if she let Frank into her heart, he was a man she would love until the day she died.

The bitter medicine was that he couldn’t love her. No, he could, but he wouldn’t. She wasn’t the best thing for him. Frank had all the opportunities to live her dream of the perfect life with the right spouse. He had career aspirations with the marshal service. He’d practically glowed when he’d told her about the possibility of becoming chief marshal of the Southern District of New York. He had family he loved and who loved him. Malia Vaccarelli would never be welcomed in his world.

“You’re a good man, Frank Louden.” She paused. “I pray one day you find a woman who treasures what Rose tossed away.”

He looked at her with some surprise. Then his gaze grew warm, hot, and for a moment, she almost believed he wanted...her. It couldn’t be. It was only her own desire making her see what she wanted, which was...him. She wanted him to be her protector, not as a marshal but as a husband and a friend. And she wanted to protect him too because she—

Her breath caught. Because she loved him. Because she had let him into her heart.

And it hurt.

Eyes blurring, Malia rested her head against the windowpane. Five days. All she had to do was get through the next five days without letting him know, without ruining the friendship they’d built. She could do it. She closed her eyes and breathed deep as her racing pulse slowed, as the sun warmed her face, as she accepted her feelings and what could never be.

She opened her eyes. The day was made to be outside. Run through the grass. Lie in the sun. Skip rocks in the lake. Chase squirrels like Worth. Worth!

Malia shifted onto her knees, palms flat on the glass, panicking. She’d assumed Mrs. Grahame had taken him with her. What was he doing outside?

“Frank, Worth just ran into the woods!”

* * *

Before Frank could tell Malia she’d probably seen a rabbit or fawn enjoying the spring day, she dashed from the library. He looked out the window. Nothing but trees, rocks and foliage. No white Pomeranian thinking it was a fox with the skills to catch a squirrel, which was only logical because he’d seen his grandmother get into the Studebaker with the dog in her lap. Hadn’t he?

He left the library, asking each person he saw which way Malia had run. By the time he stepped out the summer entrance, he could not see Malia, the dog nor any other animal.

“That way,” the footman said, pointing to the west woods.

Frank took off jogging in that direction. He maneuvered around several shrubs on the hilly woodland and over a half-knocked-down, moss-covered rock wall. Malia was not to be seen or heard in the forest. He took care descending the first slope. Brace hand against bark. Step over wedged rock in the ground. Don’t slide on composting leaves. His last adventure in these woods—chasing after Worth, who had been chasing after a squirrel—had resulted in a broken toe. It was bad enough Malia was chasing the wrong animal, but considering the underbrush, her chances were good for finding a poisonous snake or—

The faint pounding of hammers pulled him up short.

Immigrant workers. Italians. Slavs. Hundreds of them were working on the cottage up the hill. Hundreds with access to the dailies. His mind reeled. Any one of them could recognize her.

Frank took off running. He scrambled up the embankment and through the thick woods, his pulse racing, mind besieged with fear. Why hadn’t he warned Malia to stay out of the woods? Rose was right. With a ten-thousand-dollar reward being offered, anyone who had Malia would be wise to keep her hidden until the reward was doubled. Tripled, even. Her life meant nothing to a kidnapper.

Not again. He couldn’t go through that again.

Frank exited the woods. His feet froze, but his pulse raced.

She wasn’t here.

A score of men next to a wagon full of boards spoke loud and in Italian. One looked Frank’s way. He tapped the man next to him, and then the group parted. Malia stood in the middle talking to a worker and Charlie Patterson, who held Worth tucked snugly under his arm. Frank felt himself choking. All his precautions ruined by a dog. It was everything he could do not to raise his gun and demand they all step back, but he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t do anything to arouse their suspicions that she wasn’t just a servant from a neighboring estate chasing after a runaway pet. He couldn’t let them know that he was chasing after her.

His palms fisted to stop the trembling, to stop the shaking inside. Breathe. He had to breathe.

Charlie yelled to the men to get back to work. Before they did, each one took turns gallantly shaking Malia’s hand. Charlie finally pulled her away from the group. That’s when she looked Frank’s way. The color in her cheeks drained from her face.