Page 5 of The Winter Husband
Her frankness hit him between the eyes. It kicked up the kind of thoughts he shouldn’t be having.
“If there’s a child,” she persisted, “there’s no annulment. Or didn’t you think of that?”
Of course he’d thought of it. He’d spent night after night planning how to avoid the complications that would inevitably arise. Now, since Chepewéssin wasn’t the ice-glacier he’d been told to expect, he’d have to toss out all those strategies and think up some new ones. Right now she smelled so good, he had to resist the urge to press his nose into her throat.
“Consider those conjugal rights forfeited.” He braced his feet a few inches wider. “And if it eases your mind, know that I’m a man who doesn’t take what isn’t freely given.”
Her laugh rippled with disbelief. “What a paragon you are, Captain. Are we to live apart, then?”
“Living apart isn’t possible.” He gestured toward the brunette. “Her husband and many other men have been inventive about wriggling out of their obligations over the years, so now Talon knows the tricks. He’s tasked with settling this land, like the English have settled theirs, not have our men disappear into the wilderness to hunt furs every winter. If this plan is to work, the marriage needs to look real for a lot more than a few weeks. I have to take a King’s Daughter to my cabin.”
“To your cabin?” She grasped her chest. “And your bed, I suppose?”
He imagined her curled under the linens, one plump thigh stretched across the furs.
Damn it.“In my cabin, there’s a bolt on the inside of the bedroom door.”
“No bolt can hold back a man of your size.”
He exhaled hard, his ribs tightening. His most rebellious ensign would know better than to test him this way, but this girl was no underling he could command. And she wasn’t wrong about the bolt. One good kick, and he could crack open that bedroom door and steal the pleasure he shouldn’t be thinking about. He wouldn’t do that—but she couldn’t know. He imagined his size wasn’t doing him any favors. Nor was the fact that he’d spent too many years in a wilderness fort with fellow soldiers, Huron scouts, and fur traders. Rough company, rough men, rough words.
“I’ve given you my word.” He swung his hands behind him and clasped a wrist tight. “In this country, a man keeps his word, or his word is wind.”
She made a strangled sound. “A fine sentiment, sir. But forgive me if I keep my own counsel.”
“Then ask me better questions. Like where and how we’re going to live.”
“Enlighten me, Captain.”
“The landholding is miles from here, accessible only by canoe. It’s rustic, hardly fitting for a lady. Parts of the forest that surround it are impenetrable. You’ll hear wolves howling at night. Moose roam the thickets.” This land would never let a man forget how remote he was from the old world. “You’ll see no other soul—”for months“—except for a passing Abenaki tribe traveling between hunting grounds.”
“Is this how you woo a woman?” Her voice had gone reedy. “By telling her tales meant to keep children abed?”
You don’t know the worst.“The place is not without its comforts. The cabin is furnished, the fireplace big. There’s plenty of game, we won’t starve. But a Quebec winter is a fierce thing, and because of that—” he couldn’t lie “—we’ll be living together until the ice breaks in spring.”
She splayed a hand against her throat. “Untilspring?”
“Yes.” It’ll be a battle to protect her from a thousand threats of a wilderness winter. But he couldn’t fail, he already had too many payments to make in the hereafter. “I’m telling you this because you have a right to know what you’ll face.”
She rubbed her fingers below her throat, leaving scratches with her nails. It was good that she was scared—sheshouldbe scared. But he’d put the fear in her, and that made him a monster. Damn Talon for forcing him into this situation.
But Lucas needed the land, and he’d made a plan. “I’m a stranger to you. You’ll want assurances that I can be trusted.”
“What assurances can you possibly give me? There are only two people on this side of the world whose advice I trust.” She winced and pressed a hand against her brow, as if to will away a headache. “Both are King’s Daughters who arrived last year from my orphanage. Genny is deep in the wilderness. We’ll never find her. As for my friend Cecile…” She sighed. “No one will tell me where she is. All I know is that she’s married to a man by the name of Timbre or Tremblay or something similar.”
“I know an Eduard Tremblay.” Lucas hoped this girl Cecile wasn’t married to the dissolute fool, who spent most of his time drinking in Montreal. “He lives in Trois-Rivières.”
“Thank you, Captain.” She pinched the bridge of her nose. “Now I know where to run, if I ever escape jail.”
Was this courage on her part, or just ignorance? “Forget escape. Forget running away. In a week or two, ice will close the river to canoes, and six-foot drifts will make walking impossible.”
“Are there no horses in Quebec?”
“Few enough. You’re planning on breaking out of your cellandstealing a horse?”
“Captain, I’m already an outlaw.”
Had it been foolishness like this that had landed her in jail? “And if you found your Cecile, do you intend to spend the winter sleeping in the same room as her and her husband?”
