The Wedding Bargain

Yet though he told himself that all would be well, he was filled with a feeling of depression he could not shake off.

So what was bothering him? That the woman had shown kindness and compassion to a known rogue? Or that the courage of a woman determined to hold her own against insurmountable odds stirred long-forgotten feelings? Why read into her motives some sinister meaning?

Charity. The name meant giving, or Christian love. It was a good name for her. He wished her well, but, hell, he wanted out. He wanted his freedom—not further complications.

He heard a gentle movement—felt it, really, as one catches the whiff of a scent—and his body knotted from throat to thigh. A new fear washed over him.

She was coming! He trembled. His gaze moved beyond the end of the couch to the open door. It was not her.

Isaac Frey stood by the door, one hand on the knob, as if about to flee. How Rafe knew it was Isaac when the twins were alike as two peas in a pod, he could not say. He just knew.

“You are awake?”

Isaac pressed his back against the door, working his fingers around the handle. He tilted his head gravely, his blue green eyes watchful, as if he was waiting to see whether Rafe dared to lie to him.

Rafe’s limbs were so stiff from the effort he had made to control himself that at first he could not move. He could not understand why the thought of facing Charity Frey again distressed him—had he not faced greater hazards? Lying quite still, he inclined his head politely and smiled.

The boy hesitated. After a moment he left his place by the door and inched toward Rafe, sidling, stopping, never taking his eyes from the bondman’s face. “You have been asleep a long time.”

How long was a long time to a nine-year-old? Where was Charity Frey? Playing for time to think, Rafe pressed his fingers against the bridge of his nose.

There was a long silence.

Isaac glanced at Rafe from the corner of his eye and bit his lip. He shuffled his feet and frowned, crinkling his brow. “Does your head hurt very much?”

Rafe shook his head. “No. Not much.”

“Oh.” Isaac seemed disappointed. Warily he edged over to the middle of the room. “Mama sent me to keep watch on you. She’s real cross.” His small chin jutted and the frown became a scowl. “Betsy Ann was in the henhouse again.”

Rafe’s body tightened for a second, but years of discipline kept his body language neutral and controlled, his expression blank as he repeated, “Betsy Ann?”

The boy grinned, a tiny mischievous lift of his lips, then sobered immediately. More boldly now, he approached until he stood directly beside the couch. “Our pet raccoon. It steals the eggs. That makes Mama mad.”

Rafe began to smile inwardly. It seemed idiotic in the extreme, a schoolboy pleasure, but he wanted to see Charity Frey all cross and angry, her Puritan cool ruffled. Energy, renewed by sleep, flowed through him, clearing his mind.

“Something of a dilemma. Seems your mother needs a hand.”

From utter stillness, he shot up on one elbow, throwing back the sheet. He halted halfway, his dark hair falling over his forehead. His whole body went hot as he realized he was naked under the covering—and how he must have got that way. “Christ Almighty! She’s not mad! The woman’s a raving bloody lunatic!”

There was a moment of silence. Isaac fidgeted, edging away. His eyes were wide, his mouth open slightly. “You lie! The tithing man says Mama is simply im-imimpetuous.”

Rafe flushed a little, pulling the linen to his waist, hugging his knees. “That’s putting it mildly. What’s she done with my clothes? Where are my pants?”

“Mama burnt them.”

“Bloody hell! What a foolish woman!”

Isaac took Rafe’s statement at face value. His stick-thin body straightened, and his pint-sized hands balled into fists, his very stance transmitting to Rafe the fact that Charity had a small protector, that she wasn’t alone.

“Mama is not a fool! She burned your clothes that were mal-mal-malodorous. Same as she washed you all over ‘cause you stunk worse’n a skunk when it lifts its tail.”

Rafe swallowed hard. A muscle twitched at the side of his mouth. She had seen him mother naked—washed him all over!

As if he could feel the touch of her fingertips, Rafe shivered with a tingle that slid the length of his spine. In an effort to dispel the sensation, which was rapidly radiating into his loins, he launched a verbal attack. “No need for chains of brass or bars of iron at Mystic Ridge. Charity Frey finds it easier to keep the beast naked—he’ll not wander far.”

The words would hardly come out. To Rafe’s mind his voice sounded somewhat breathless. An awkward silence followed his outburst.

Isaac slanted a look at him, as if unsure what to do next. Rafe returned the look evenly, unblinking. It would be easy to stand up, shove past the boy. It would be easy to escape. The idea gnawed at him.

Isaac chewed his lower lip, straightened his shoulders and shifted his feet, as if the steady gaze made him uncomfortable, the uncertainty almost too much to bear. The floorboards creaked.

A bolt of alarm shot through Rafe. He swore under his breath. This wasn’t going to do at all. The boy would scuttle off in a minute. Distract his attention. Reassure him. Get him talking. Ease his fears.

Rafe laid a hand over his heart. “I’m not about to leap on you and break your neck. I’m after bigger game.” He allowed a slow smile to curve his mouth. “What are your orders, lad?”

“I’m s’posed to call Mama if you wake.” The boy gave a very faint answering tilt of the lips. “But if your head does not pain you overmuch, perhaps you would prefer to dress first?” Isaac’s unease had vanished, and he chattered on. “Mistress Arnold called by on her way to meeting, es-es-especially to bring some clothes that would make you decent.”

Charity Frey should quiver in mortification at the prospect of her rash and imprudent trick being discussed over the teacups. The idea cheered Rafe. Some perverse sense of childish revenge made him want to laugh. His lips twitched. It took every bit of will to keep his voice even. “‘Twas very kind of Mistress Arnold, I am sure.”

“Mistress Arnold said that she would ask the meeting to cast an eye away from the im-impro-impropriety of Mama’s actions, but there were more ways to kill a flea than burn the blanket!” The blue green eyes lit with mischief. “I think she was trying to say that Mama had fallen overboard.”

“Gone overboard.” Amused at the boy’s innocent gossip, Rafe quietly corrected Isaac’s grammatical error.

“Yes. That’s what I said. I’m glad Mama cleaned you up. You are not so fearsome now.”

Rafe rubbed absently at the dark shadow of his beard. “A razor and some hot water and I’ll be a new man.”

Head on one side, the boy examined him for a moment. Then, as if a sudden, momentous decision had been reached, Isaac grinned. “Will Sutcliffe says that if a man attends to his external self first up, then he can spend the rest of the day attend’n to his inner needs.”

“Isaac! I have told you not to associate with Will Sutcliffe and his scandal-mongering tongue. ’Tis not seemly!”

Rafe’s head jerked up.

Dressed in prim gray, with the strings of her bonnet falling untied about her shoulders, Charity managed to look like a veritable hoyden. Her face was flushed, much of her hair had escaped its confining coif and bits of dried grass clung to her skirt.

“As for you, Master Trehearne, I will not accept that you are still incapacitated when you can lay abed and gossip. I have paid good coin for your indenture—seven years of fair labor. After which you will be a free man and able to lay about in indolence if you so desire. Until then I expect a fair day’s work. Get up, sir!”

Rafe’s heart beat with sudden violence. The humiliation was galling. Surely she was not going to ask him to parade his nakedness. He watched her, waiting.

Charity opened her mouth as if to say something else, then shut it again, her expression suddenly wary. Rafe pulled at the sheet. He swung his legs to the floor and sat on the edge of the couch, the linen draped across his thighs.

“I’m hardly in a fit state to…” He lifted his eyebrows a little, as if to ask if she wished him to continue.

Charity set him straight. Her tone would have done justice to a sergeant-at-arms. “I don’t expect you to stand up in your present condition, Master Trehearne. I will give you ten minutes. When you are decent, I will be in the kitchen.”

Isaac sidled toward the door. “Mama says it’s a wise chicken that runs for cover at the first clap of thunder!”

Rafe closed one eyelid in a wink. “Your mother is a very wise woman.”