The Bride Fair

Chapter One (#ud208ba78-8df1-59c1-b4a9-94c462232e66)

Chapter Two (#u8f1870b7-8cc9-56a2-817f-b29044811729)

Chapter Three (#u0a682830-ee06-5bfd-a7e9-ef17be846757)

Chapter Four (#uc973e95a-b13e-5ac6-90c1-ddc83f344a53)

Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)

Author Note (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter One

Salisbury, N.C.

June, 1868

Who is this woman?

Colonel Max Woodard watched as the train conductor pointed her in his direction, then stood waiting for her to make her way across the crowded railway platform. The question stayed in his mind as she approached, and it became more and more obvious that she was not happy about having to seek him out. Four years of war and two subsequent years of occupation duty among the vanquished Southerners had made him more than adept at recognizing their barely veiled contempt. Her enmity didn’t surprise him in the least. The fact that she was about to speak to him in broad daylight and in clear view of any number of the townspeople did.

“You are Colonel Woodard?” she asked without hesitation. She was wearing black—most of the women in the South seemed to be in a kind of perpetual mourning. Or perhaps it was a matter of economics. Perhaps there was nothing but black cloth available to people who had little money to buy even the necessities.

The woman’s voice had a slight tremor in it. Not enough to disarm him, but enough to pique his curiosity as to the cause.

Anger? Fear?

More the former than the latter, he decided. He took the liberty of staring at her. She was too thin and small-breasted for his taste. And she was probably younger than she looked. He had found that to be the case with many of these Rebel women, and he knew from personal experience that near starvation did little to preserve the bloom of youth.

She had ventured out without her bonnet or her shawl, and she was slightly damp from the intermittent rain that had come in fits and starts since his arrival. But she seemed not to notice her missing garb or the weather. He was her focus.

“I am,” he said, meeting her gaze. She looked away, but not quite quickly enough to keep him from seeing the antipathy she worked so hard to keep hidden.

“If you would come with me, Colonel.”

“Why?” he asked, making no effort to do so.

“My father couldn’t meet the train. I have come in his place.”

“And who might your father be?”

“He owns the house where you will be billeted,” she said, clearly determined not to give any more information than she could help.

“I see. And the numerous soldiers who are supposedly under my command. Where would they all be, I wonder?”

Ordinarily, he never objected to spending time in a pleasant and accommodating woman’s company—but this one was neither. And there were certain military protocols to be adhered to. He was the new commanding officer in an occupied town, and no one from the garrison had bothered to meet his train. Indeed, but for a few of his fellow travelers, he didn’t see any of the military about at all.

The woman took a quiet breath. “Some of the soldiers are maintaining the military headquarters. The rest of them are fighting another fire.”

There was a slight emphasis on the word “another.”

“What is burning?” he asked, noticing for the first time a plume of smoke off to his left.

“The school.”

“The children are safe?”

“There were no children there,” she answered, moving away from him. “As you well know.”

“Now how would I know that?” he said reasonably, and he still didn’t follow after her. “I only just arrived.”

She stopped and looked at him. “The United States Congress has seen to it that we here are no longer allowed the luxury of public education—but a fire has somehow started in the school building. It is in real danger of spreading. Every able man is required to put it out, lest the whole town go up in flames.”

He considered it a just fate for this particular town, but he didn’t say so. He glanced skyward. “Perhaps it will rain again,” he said instead.

It was clear from the expression on her face that she had no intention of discussing the weather.

“And perhaps the wind will change in time to spare your army’s storehouses.”