It Happened in the Highlands(29)

His hand reached for hers and their fingers entwined. He always knew  when she needed him. Whether it was in a ballroom when malicious rumor  was destroying her or in the ward of an asylum when she found herself  faced with the Barton family's hostility.

"Over the years," she said, "I've looked carefully at my own actions and  my own character. In the eyes of my family, I was the person injured,  the one left behind, the victim. But as I've searched my soul, I've come  to realize that I was greatly responsible for bringing an end to our  engagement."

Wynne started to deny her assertion, but this time Jo silenced him.

"I was timid, ashamed of my past. And I allowed the rumors and the  innuendo and the slander to affect me. I withdrew rather than  challenging the hateful people who spread the poison." She met his  troubled eyes. "My excuse was that I had no firm ground to stand on. I  didn't know what was true myself, so how could I fight the lies?"

Long after their breakup, Jo continued to avoid confrontation with the  rumormongers. In her mind, she always found a way to diminish the  insult, back away, and retreat into silence. It pained her now to know  that she'd forced the men in her family to become that much more  protective. To this day, no one dared whisper a word about her in the  presence of Hugh or Gregory or her parents. But when they weren't  present, the behavior of many others of their acquaintance was quite  different.

"I know that in my hesitation to fight the insidious backbiters so  prevalent among the ton, I hindered you from defending my honor and  speaking up for me. I wasn't strong enough myself, and I rendered you  helpless too." She spoke the truth that had taken her years to see. "I  know now you could never stand by and allow that. I asked you to be  something you could not be. In doing so, I pushed you away."                       
       
           



       

His hands were warm when they closed around her icy fingers.

"You can say all you like, but the blame still lies with me," he said.  "I was young and impatient. I was nearly mad with thoughts of war and  dying, and I couldn't think past tomorrow. When the orders came that I  would soon be sailing, I panicked. My duties would not bring me back for  some time, that I knew. What would happen if we married and you found  after I left that you were with child? I certainly didn't trust my  parents to treat you as they should. And what would happen if I died at  sea? I had more questions and insecurities than I could convey."

"We were both so young."

"But rather than giving you a voice in what our decision should be, I  chose for both of us. I decided that our marriage would be a disaster."

And yet, Jo thought, she would have made it work, even in his absence.  She loved him and what she wasn't willing to do for herself, she would  have done for him. But there was no point in saying any of that now.

"I wanted everything to be ideal," Wynne continued. "In the rashness of  my youth, I thought if I couldn't make things perfect, I couldn't  subject you to what I was certain would be a harsh reality. It took  years for me to realize that the ideal is a goal, but falling short of  it is not always disaster. To be honest, I still struggle with it when  it comes to Cuffe and his life here in Scotland. I had to learn all over  again who my son was. I needed to remember his mother and what she  would have wanted for him."

He sat back.

Jo kept her eyes on his face. Wynne's apologies had been on behalf of a  youth who'd proclaimed his love to her and then faltered. Since that  time, another woman had helped him grow into someone better. What she  saw now was a man firmly in control of his own destiny.

"Will you tell me about Fiba?"

He stirred in the seat. A moment of unease darkened his expression.

"Pray forgive me. I'm not asking to pry into your life. I shouldn't have-"

"No. You should know," he told her, relaxing. "When we met, Fiba had  been married to an English naval officer but was recently widowed. I was  taking command of the Carnatic, which was being fitted out for duty at  the time."

Wynne's gaze moved to the window, and Jo almost felt the groundswell of  memories rushing back at him. Cuffe was an extremely handsome child, and  she could only imagine how striking his mother must have been.

"She came from a Maroon family, and in spite of being part of English  society during her marriage, she maintained her allegiance to her  people."

Jo knew that the number of those like Fiba in Jamaica was only a fraction of the multitudes enslaved there.

"Cuffe comes about his fighting nature honestly. After Fiba and I became  involved, I realized she had another life from the one she lived  openly. I closed my eyes to what I saw. She was relaying to the Maroons  living in the Cockpit information about the traders and the plantation  owners."

"She was so brave," she said admiringly. How different her life had been  from Fiba's. How meaningless her aspirations were to a champion like  Cuffe's mother. "I can understand why you would turn away from your  family to marry such a special woman."

His intense blue eyes found and held her gaze.

"Marriage was not part of our plan. Neither of us wanted or needed it.  Fiba was financially independent after the death of her first husband,  and she cherished her newfound freedoms. And my duties would rarely  bring me back to Jamaica. To be honest, I had a very difficult time  convincing her to marry me after we found out that she was with child."

Jo would have expected nothing less from him. His sense of honor had  never changed over the years. In their own relationship so long ago,  he'd never taken advantage of Jo.

"Carrying your child didn't influence her to marry you?"

"Fiba's refusal wasn't about me. For the first time in her life, she'd  been able to help her people. Marrying another English officer only  complicated matters. As far as our child, she planned on raising him  herself, and argued that the island had a large number of mixed-race  children."                       
       
           



       

How sad that Cuffe lost a mother of such strength before having a chance to know her.

"How did you finally convince her?"

"I told her about you."

"About me?" she asked, confused.

"I told her about a child who grew up searching for answers. About a  young woman who couldn't fathom the value her own qualities and  character simply because of questions about her origins. I told her I  did not want a child of mine to suffer as you had suffered."

Jo thought of all he'd said about Fiba. A rival. A woman she should  dislike, perhaps even hate. She'd married the only man Jo ever loved.  She should envy Fiba for the multitude of days she'd had to spend with  him. She had so many reasons to feel the deepest antipathy toward her.  And yet, she could not. They'd loved the same man, and what Jo felt  instead was nothing but kinship.





Chapter 15


Garloch had more to offer than the vicar had suggested.

The rough Highland road they'd been following descended into a valley  town, protected from the north winds by a rugged ridge of mountain. A  coach road, no doubt built by the army for moving troops during the  Jacobite Rising, followed the shore of a long, narrow loch that  stretched to the west, and a number of shops, cottages, and a venerable  coaching inn clustered around the market cross in the village center. A  second river converged here at this end of the town, cascading from the  higher elevations and flowing beneath a stone bridge that appeared  fairly new. The small stone church, the object of their journey, sat in a  shady flower-studded glen below the confluence of the waters.

Going directly to the church, Wynne got out to speak to an old man bent over a well-tended plot in the kirkyard.

"That'd be Mr. Kealy," the villager said in response to his question  about the priest. "Ain't here but once a fortnight, but yer in luck,  sir. The young fellow's arrived for the service tomorrow."

After a few more questions, Wynne was able to ascertain that Kealy was  the curate who divided his time traveling between two churches in area,  the rector of the large parish keeping to a single church in a distant  village.

"If ye've a mind to stretch yer legs along the river path or take some  refreshment at the inn, he should be back bye 'n' bye. Off visiting one  of the parishioners, he is," the older man suggested.

Wynne conveyed this information to Jo as he assisted her out of the  carriage. He admired her profile as she raised her face to the sky and  closed her eyes, taking in a deep breath.

A great deal had been said between them. She finally allowed him to  speak of the past, and she asked about his wife, but that wasn't where  her questions ended. Among other things, she wanted to know if Fiba had a  chance to hold Cuffe and for how long she lived after delivering him.