Through the bars, Joshua still held her hand, his breath warm upon her cheek. “I cannot bear being parted from you,” she said, “but I’ve so much to do to try and stop the hanging, and if not, work somehow to help you escape. I know you have been accused as a spy and by that foul Snapes. I tried to tell my cousin the truth of him. He will not listen.”
His fingers threaded through hers, and she drank in the feel of him.
She raised her head and he met her lips in a searing, demanding kiss.
“Do not get involved, Juliet,” Joshua warned her.
“I’m already involved. I am your wife.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Juliet followed Edmund as he burst into his father’s office, soldiers stumbling and murmuring apologies to their commander for allowing him to enter unannounced.
“Father,” Edmund said, his voice deep and edged with deadly calm. I have come from the jail. There is an Indian…a mirror image of me. I demand an explanation and I want it now.”
In an instant, Edmund loped to his father’s desk and for a moment, she though he might jump over it to reach his father. But he stopped short, his thighs touching the wood, his hands clenching. Juliet glanced from man to the other.
Faulkner raised a flaccid hand and waved off his soldiers, waiting until the door clicked shut. “You’ve not been invited into my office, Edmund,” said Faulkner, his expression passive…as uninterested in Edmund as he was in the half-eaten breakfast on his massive desk. He shoved aside the pewter plate. Studied his fingernails.
A tick vibrated in Edmund’s jaw, his body rigid, as if holding back a rage so great it might explode if he allowed it. This was a side she had not once witnessed in her cousin before.
The air grew heavy and the humidity pressed down. The wool of her gown chafed and sweated against her breasts. A stillness fell over the office, and in the silence, came a low crackle of thunder, rolling across the rooftops.
“I’m not waiting for an invite. I want an answer.”
The colonel stood, his chair scraped across the floor, smacked the wall behind him. “You are tired, and your mind is playing tricks on you.”
“He is my brother. Do not deny it.”
It was the first time Juliet had seen the colonel speechless. With his hands behind his back, Faulkner sauntered to the window, looked out, seemingly lost in thought.
The ominous clouds that had threatened crept in quickly. The atmosphere lay suffocating. The scent of rain wound dark and heady. Even the wind held its breath. A streak of hot silver split the sky and a downpour began.
Huge heavy raindrops pattered on the roof, then the wind picked up, slashing the rain against the windows and muddying the yard below, the storm spilling its wrath upon the earth.
“You are right, Edmund. I am not your real father although Emmaline and I are your parents in every sense of the word.
“Your mother was weak with the loss of several babes. I loved her. I had to bring her back from the madness taking hold of her. She delivered another stillborn and the doctor dosed her with laudanum. I dreaded her awakening to find she had lost another babe.
“To clear my head, I took a ride in the forests. I happened to come by an Oneida Indian woman who had given birth in the woods. As was their custom, they delivered babies away from the village.
“You were born on the cold ground from a savage woman. There were twins. One was dark and the other, peculiarly light. The savage woman lay unconscious from her ordeal. I rode back to the fort, took my dead child and replaced it with the whiter baby of the Indian woman’s twins. I figured she had a son left to her, and my Emmaline would have a son.”
Edmund rubbed the back of his neck. “All my life, I’ve known. I can’t describe it…couldn’t touch it…couldn’t feel it, yet something tangible was there.”
The colonel pivoted. “Stop your theatrics at once. You are not a savage.”
Edmund stilled, a low hum of fury escaped his lips. He slammed his fist on the desk. The dishes, ink bottle and quill jumped. “You stole me from my mother?”
“It was a decision I made for you and your mother’s benefit.”
“You are confused, Father. Emmaline is not my real mother.”
“How can you say that? She gave you great love. You were educated and given every advantage of a gentleman.”
“I was denied my real mother and brother. And whatever your thoughts are of Emmaline, she was mad. The things she did to me. As a child, she locked me a dark closet for days, starving me, laughing when I begged her to let me out. How she lived to mock and ridicule me and make me cry because it was titillating for her.”
Edmund tore his shirt from his waistband, lifted his shirt. Raised white leathery scars rioted across his back. Nausea rolled in Juliet’s stomach and she turned away, her heart aching for her cousin. She thought back to when they were children. No wonder he wanted to hide in the garden with her. He was afraid of his mother.
