The Calhoun Chronicles Bundle: The Charm School

“Then let her go, Mama. That’s the only way to love her.”

The tears overflowed then, coursing down her cheeks as her shoulders shook. “I’m so frightened. Everything’s changing so fast.”

“Some changes are long past due.” Ryan found a handkerchief and Lily dried her cheeks with meticulous care.

Isadora blinked, astonished and elated. “I know you shall miss her, Lily. We all will. But it’s for the best.”

Lily took a nervous sip of her coffee. “A noble thought, but naive. Fayette was better off with me. She claimed to love Edison, but love can’t fill an empty belly, nor keep the world at bay. The quilombos are horrid places. One of the housemaids told me that a runaway is in danger from the police, as well as from other fugitives.”

“Can the slave patrols arrest her?” Isadora asked anxiously. The Fugitive Slave Law, that legislative abomination, had been in force in Boston for several months now. The law had created terror among the city’s African people, free or not. Tension tore apart families, made neighbors distrust neighbors. She wondered if Brazil had a similar law.

“There is no extradition to the United States,” Ryan said, leaning back laconically in his chair.

“But she could be forced into service here.” Lily’s voice rang hollow with baffled hurt. “She is in more peril as a free woman than she ever was as my servant.” She pushed back from the table, clearly too agitated to sit still. “There’s an epidemic of yellow fever in the city. What if she falls ill? Or starves? Or is harmed by criminals? What if—”

“You can help by setting her free. Legally. I’ll see that the papers are drawn up for you,” Ryan said. “That way, she won’t be considered a fugitive. Fayette is not a child. And she’s not yours. She was never yours. Her will is hers and hers alone. So if she chooses to go off with Carneros, your only choice is to allow it.” He rose from the table and gently kissed her on the cheek. “She knew the risks, and she chose freedom.”

He went to the door. “I have to go to the city to see about her manumission papers.” He bowed, the gallant gesture at odds with his unkempt appearance. “Ladies.”

Isadora stared after him. He was the strangest man, rude as a longshoreman even as he helped free a slave woman. Capricious, that’s what he was. He had probably already forgotten last night’s embrace. How many times did the lesson have to be hammered into her? It was only a kiss, she told herself. She was far too old to romanticize a mere kiss, and far too proud to admit that it might mean more to her than it had to Ryan Calhoun.

She knew her heart shone in her eyes, knew Lily was watching her curiously, but she couldn’t help herself. Last night had meant nothing to Ryan. He probably didn’t remember it at all. Didn’t remember dancing with her, holding her, kissing her until she saw stars.

She couldn’t blame him, not really. What man alive would admit to kissing the spinster of Beacon Hill?

Ryan hoped his display of nonchalance had been convincing. He’d awakened the morning after the masquerade with a throbbing headache and a profound feeling of thwarted desire.

Thoughts of Isadora Peabody plagued him during the trek to the harbor and nagged at him when he was supposed to be concentrating on bribing an official for a carta de alforria for Fayette. He delivered the letter of liberty to Edison Carneros, who thanked him with tears in his eyes.

But once he returned to business, Ryan’s thoughts wandered to Isadora again, when he should have been formulating the correct tonnage for ballast. He snapped at the men, made errors in his figuring and broke a half dozen pen nibs.

Journey shooed him off to his quarters, where he took the ship’s cat in his lap, scowled out the stern windows at the jangadas plying to and fro and thought about Isadora some more.

He had no doubt he could rouse her ardor; she’d certainly responded eagerly enough. But it was a false emotion, one based on physical need. Ryan had no right to steal her heart.

He supposed he could make her forget all about Chad Easterbrook, given the time and temperament for seducing an inhibited woman. But Ryan occupied a precarious position, balanced uncertainly between unimaginable success and devastating failure. He had picked the worst possible time to pursue the daughter of Boston’s most prominent family.

He should go on pretending the kiss had never happened.

But God. She kissed like an angel.

It was true, painfully true, and he had the experience to know the difference. Isadora’s kiss brought back all the wonder and yearning and innocence and hope of youth. Her kiss reminded him of why the kiss was invented.

Yet he had learned to do without love in the past. His father had taught him that. Ryan decided to do what he had always done when his heart threatened to steer him toward a course of disaster. He’d throw himself into his work, spend the next week in feverish labor alongside the crew and avoid her until they set sail.

The voyage home was a different story; he didn’t even want to think about that. Didn’t want to think about seeing her relaxing on deck with a book or hauling in sheets alongside the men or fishing off the stern with the Doctor. Didn’t want to think about her lying alone in her solitary berth, a single candle burning down to midnight while she dreamed of…what? Chad? Good God, not him. Ryan shouldn’t know or care about Isadora’s dreams.

For the next few days, he worked long and hard, sleeping on shipboard and taking his meals with other skippers on their vessels in the harbor. But shortly before they were to set sail, he knew he could no longer put off the trek to Tijuca. He went back up the mountainside to his aunt’s villa.

“Hello, Mama,” he said, finding her on the patio, looking serene and relaxed as she and her sister shelled beans into a carved wooden bowl. As he bent to kiss her cool cheek, he couldn’t help admiring how adaptable Lily was. She switched roles from plantation mistress to world traveler to genteel houseguest with amazing ease. “I thought I’d find you packing your things.”

Lily and Rose exchanged a glance, then his mother said, “Son, I’ve decided to stay with Rose.”

“For how long?”

“Permanently,” she said.

Ryan gave a low whistle. “But what about Albion?”

“That place hasn’t been my home since Hunter inherited it. Now, don’t scowl like that—Hunter has been a perfect angel, letting me know I have a home there for the rest of my life if I so choose.” She set aside the bowl of beans. “Albion isn’t my home anymore, nor my life. My travels on the Continent left me a changed woman. Seeing Rose again and losing Fayette only made the future that much clearer to me.” She beamed at her sister. “My home is with my family, and these days, my family is Rose.”

“I think that’s fine, Mama,” Ryan said, and he meant it. There was something both comforting and appropriate in the image of the two sisters gracefully growing old together in the middle of paradise.

“And you’ll visit often, of course,” she said, leaning forward anxiously in her chair.

“I will,” he said, and he meant that, too.

“We’ll be sending a crate down to the harbor,” Rose said. “Lily and I picked out some fripperies for Isadora. She doesn’t seem the sort to buy things for herself, so we took the liberty of choosing some mementos of her time with us.”

“Where is she?” Ryan hoped his voice sounded nonchalant. “Packing?”

“Oh, I’m quite certain she’s already done that. I believe she’s gone exploring again,” Lily said.

He narrowed his eyes. “Exploring?”

“She’s been going off by herself constantly,” Rose said. “She insists on taking in as much sightseeing as she possibly can. I believe today’s expedition was to sketch some of the local flora and fauna.”

He felt a twinge of irritation. “She shouldn’t go off by herself.”

“There hasn’t been anyone for her to go off with these past several days,” Lily said pointedly.

“So were did she go today?” Ryan demanded.

“Into the rain forest. She wished to visit the Springs of Our Lady of Gloria do Outeiro.”

“And she went alone.”

Rose nodded. “The walk is not a demanding one. But I fear she didn’t take anything to eat or drink with her.” She patted a basket covered with a red embroidered napkin. “Angelica had this all fixed for her, and she forgot it.”

Rose and Lily exchanged a glance that made Ryan think immediately of conspiracy. “Mama,” he warned.

“Perhaps you could take her the basket,” Lily suggested, all innocence.

Ryan swore under his breath. He should let her starve in the jungle.

But he knew damned well he wouldn’t.

Isadora stopped to sketch an orchid she saw hanging from a huge, smooth-barked tree. Curling her feet under her, she sank to the spongey floor of the rain forest and studied the spray of deep pink blooms. According to her field guide, it was a moth orchid. The orchids and bromeliads intrigued her, for they seemed to be born of air and mist rather than earth and water, hanging from tree branches or liana vines as if they were butterflies that might take flight any moment.