“Of a gutless man that uses a woman? No. What else do you offer him?”
Hot coals of anger burst into fiery flame inside Rachel. She slapped him across the face.
They stared at each other in the deafening silence, his face a bright red where her hand made contact.
His eyes darkened. “My apologies,” he said. “I deserved that.”
He took her hand. Her breath hitched. His fingers were tapered, conveying warmth in the strength of his grip. An electric sensation passed between them, from his hand to hers. She tugged her hand away, but he held fast, gazing at her, eyes narrowed, unsmiling, and then glancing at their clasped hands, cleared his throat.
Rachel studied their joined fingers, too. He was a man of contradictions. Harsh, yet gentle. Smart and yet not entirely aware. At least not where she was concerned. Or maybe he was too aware?
“What does the Saint look like?”
“Tall, handsome, blue eyes.”
He narrowed his eyes, as if distrusting the truth of her words. “Could be half the men in the north.”
“Colonel Rourke, it is important we keep affairs on a professional basis.”
“Your affairs are my business.”
He rubbed his thumb over the back of her hand. The contact sizzled…as if he’d trickled hot oil there and rubbed it in.
Rachel snatched back her hand, determined to guide their association to a semblance of propriety. “We need to discuss getting you back to Washington…once the manhunt dies down.” The sooner she delivered him behind Union lines, the sooner she’d get back her sanity.
Chapter Five
Rachel had seized upon Lieutenant Washburn’s invitation to the Rutherford ball and had easily slipped away unnoticed into the Confederate’s private office. Footsteps rained down the hall. So close. She darted her eyes around the room. Where could she hide?
On the table, she smoothed the papers into their original placement and dashed to a cupboard, her ladies fan swinging from her wrist. Pushing aside coats, she crawled in the cramped space, crushed in her hoops and tugged in the remainder of her gown. Damn. The door would not close all the way. No time to get out and reconfigure. She used the hooked end of a hanger to keep it shut. A half-inch crack was exposed. If anyone looked closely, they’d be capable of seeing her.
Several men filed into Rutherford’s office, the strains of aLa Dorsetquadrille played in the outer ballroom followed. The men were an eclectic mix, some she identified as high-ranking Confederate officers, government officials and some civilians she didn’t recognize.
A light-haired man entered the room and closed the door. Her hands fisted around the hanger keeping the door shut…and keepinghersafe. Shadows fell on the sharp angles of the ferret-faced man. Oh, how he’d be forever stamped in her memory.
“Captain Johnson, an honor to see you again,” said Secretary of War Seddon.
The men surrounding him stood in awe. Or was it fear? Accustomed to the platitudes, Johnson moved to the table and began to orate. “We must be responsible as the choice of our target will not be an easy matter and our collective responsibility is a heavy one. It is not the question of blowing up a building or kidnapping a general, such horseplay is not significant enough. We must be delicate, refined and aimed at the heart of the Union. It must be grave damage done and so loud it will create a hue and cry across the north. They will marvel at our cleverness,” he boasted.
Johnson took a proffered cigar, lighted it, and puffed until a fiery red appeared. “They will tremble. Traitors and possible defectors will change their minds. The heartbeat of the South will be stimulated and encouraged to greater efforts by our strength and genius. But of course, our plans must be kept top secret. It is of paramount importance that the Union is in complete ignorance of our arrangements.”
“Hear, hear,” the men cried, stirred by his fervor. Johnson preached a baptism of blood to purge the evil. Wasn’t his blood, that was for sure. The men listened with the penitence of little children before the pulpit to embrace the truth.
Rachel’s foot cramped.The cupboard grew hot and stuffy, and her stomach churned with the cigar smoke and expensive liquor permeating the air.
“I must have your opinion,” said Seddon. “What do you think is the most dangerous? What will do the most damage?”
“As leader, I have been in New York for the past eight months, doing reconnaissance and became well-acknowledged with our Copperhead strengths.”
Rachel’s grip on the hanger slipped, but she caught herself and held even tighter. Johnson, head of the Copperheads? His status explained so many things about him, his long absences, civilian attire at times. No regular assignments in the army when every available male yielded to enlistment.
Her fan stabbed into her hip. He commanded the biggest spy operation of the Confederacy, conspiring to secretly organize and disseminate the government of the United States. How powerful he’d risen with an alliance of dangerous and anonymous Rebel collaborators in the north ready to wreak destruction.
“I narrowly escaped capture returning on a blockade runner,” said Johnson. He gritted the cigar between his teeth and unrolled maps across the table.
The men bent their heads low over the maps, whispering. Rachel strained to hear.
“Get us another whiskey,” said Rutherford, angling his bushy head to her cupboard. “In yonder cabinet is my inventory.”
