“Why?”
Kit shoved his hands in his pockets and stalled. He looked everywhere but at her. Finally, he opened his mouth to speak, but a commotion captured their attention.
Duncan, the blond giant, was walking toward them. He carried Dagny, lying limp and frail, in his beefy arms.
Hallie raced to him, with Kit and the others right behind. Dagny’s face was marked and puffy and her lips were crusted with dried grains of blood. “Oh God, what happened?”
Duncan’s pale eyes turned a colder blue when he answered. “Abner Brown nabbed her. I tried to catch him but... I... I would have had to leave her. I couldn’t, so he got away. I don’t know what he did...”
He looked past her to Kit, and Hallie saw the look that passed between the men. She read the gaze and looked at her battered sister.
Rape. They thought he might have raped her. Hallie grabbed her sides as she fought the urge to vomit. Then she turned, stunned and drained, to Kit. “Get a doctor. Please, Kit, hurry.”
An instant later he was gone. Hallie grabbed Duncan’s arm. “Bring her this way.” She pulled him toward the captain’s cabin, and then remembered the children. “Liv, bring your brothers along.” Hallie opened the door for Duncan and turned back to her little sister, brushing back the girl’s straggly bangs from her worried eyes. “I need your help. Can you keep the boys busy out here while I see to Duggie?”
Liv bit her bottom lip and nodded. Hallie entered the cabin and closed the door. Duncan had laid Dagny on the bunk, and his huge gray sack coat still covered her pale sister. Hallie went to the basin and poured some water, taking it over to the shelf by the bunk. She paused, afraid of what she might uncover, then pulled back the coat.
Dagny’s neck was marked, and though the bodice of her dress was torn, Hallie noticed that all Dagny’s underthings appeared untouched. She checked her sister’s petticoats and drawers and beneath and was hopeful no rape had occurred, then she covered her up, bathed Duggie’s battered face with cool water and whispered soothing words to her.
Duncan knocked on the door.
“Come in.”
Inside, he came to Hallie’s side, his eyes on Dagny’s face. “I’m so sorry. Dagny... She should not to have to go through something like this.”
“I know.” Hallie wiped off the dried blood. “Why would he do this? It’s insane.”
“Heisinsane.”
She always thought of Abner as only a strange priss.
“Something snapped. The fire left him devastated. The last time I saw him, he was kneeling in the ashes of the funeral home, screaming and carrying on something fierce. I don’t know where he’s been since the fire, but...” Duncan tightened his powerful hands into fists. “I’ll find him. I promise you, I’ll find him.”
Kit arrived with the doctor, the same man who had tended her burn. While he examined Dagny, Kit and Duncan waited outside, and Hallie joined them. She shut the door quietly and glanced down the companionway to where Liv was confusing the twins with a game of cat’s cradle. Hallie sat on a wheel housing. “The doctor said she wasn’t molested.”
Duncan slumped back against the wall with his eyes closed.
“But clearly she’s been beaten hard, and he’s concerned because she’s been unconscious for so long.” Hallie rubbed her hands over her burning eyes.
Kit squatted down beside her. He took her hand, and the shock of his warm fingers against her icy ones made her thread her fingers through his. “Hallie?”
She heard him but didn’t answer. She stared at his hand. It was so hard and strong, yet it had held her own so gently. Oh, why was everything so confusing? She wasn’t sure if he was her enemy or her friend. Would he hurt them or help them? He spoke her name again, and his voice was as gentle as his hold. It made her instinctively tighten her hold around his. Her gaze met his, needing to see if those deep green eyes betrayed the kindness of his tone. They didn’t.
“I think you need to get off this ship and someplace safer. My offer still stands. It makes sense, now more than ever.” Kit nodded toward the others. “Maddie’s great with children, and she can help with Dagny, too. It would be best, for all of you.” He gave her hand a reassuring squeeze.
He was right. And now, it didn’t matter what her confused feelings were for Kit. Her family needed a stable home, and she was failing with them. She couldn’t protect them. Just thinking about Dagny made her want to fall to her knees and just sob. She needed some help. Nothing but bad, horrible things had happened to them since Da had died. She hated the tears she felt but she couldn’t stop them.
His fingers touched her chin, lifting it upward so she was forced to look at him again. His image was blurred. She wiped her eyes and looked away.
“Hallie,” he said.
When she looked back, the honest concern in his face was her undoing. She nodded. “We’ll move.”
15
Hallie studied the parlor. No one, not even Maddie, could find one speck of dirt in here. The dark walnut furniture glowed from Maddie’s polishing concoction, a mixture of candle wax and oil of almonds, and the rich, nutty fragrance made the room smell delightful, like Christmas marzipan.
She stretched her tired arms high over her head. Her muscles ached like the very dickens. She rolled her shoulders to work out the kinks. Pressing her hands against the small of her back, she arched backward until a satisfying crack eased her tight spine.
