Kathleen E. Woodiwiss(251)

“The bastard,” Ruark grunted.

“What shall we do?” Shanna asked, worry in her voice.

Ruark caressed her cheek with his lean knuckles. “Do not fret, love. We’ll see our way clear of this yet.”

Kissing her lips again, he stepped back and, lifting his head, gave a soft, cooing call. A movement in the brush behind the cabin caught Shanna’s attention, and a moment later Jeremiah came into view. He, too, bore a long musket and was garbed much as Ruark, in soft buckskin breeches, waistcoat, and linen shirt.

“Mister Ruark,” Jeremiah called, his voice strangely heavy with laughter. “I think I’d better go fix that break in the fence before the mares find it. It’ll take me a while.”

With that he hefted the ax and set off with a strange shuffling trot across the field. Shanna could have sworn she heard a chuckle drifting in the air behind him as he left.

Ruark watched him go, a twinkle in his eyes. “Bright lad, that one. Always ready to do more than his share.”

Shanna frowned slightly, feeling as if something had passed between them that she had completely missed. But what did it matter as long as she and Ruark could be alone?

He gathered the back of her habit in his hand and lifted the hem from the damp grass. “You’ll need a pair of breeches to wear if you’re going to wander around up here. Let me put Jezebel away before she strays. Then I’ll show you around.”

Holding her skirts high, Shanna followed along. At the corral Ruark removed the bridle from the mare, looped it over the saddle, then loosened the girth. The mare followed him like a trained dog as he led her to the gate and let her through.

Happily Shanna ran ahead into a dark bower of shadows beneath a tall pine. She danced and kicked at the thick carpet of pine needles. Then returning to Ruark, she came into his arms like a young girl freshly in love. Her laughter rippled through the glade. Raising her arms, she stretched them high above her head, arching her body in sheer rapture before throwing them about his neck and leaning forward to let their lips meet as one.

“Do you want to see the cabin?” he asked huskily against her mouth.

Shanna nodded eagerly and slipped her hand into his, letting him lead her back to the clearing. In front of the cabin Ruark swung her up into his arms and carried her through the low door of the place. It was simple within, dimly lit by the fire that blazed in the hearth. Setting Shanna to her feet, Ruark let her look about as he bent, lifted a glowing brand from the fireplace, and puffed his pipe alight. Intrigued with the sturdy comfort of the interior, Shanna rubbed her hand across the surface of a hand-hewn table and peered inquisitively into a great iron pot that swung away from the fire. She bounced playfully on the huge down tick spread over the bed, felt the rich fur robe that covered it, then turned about in the middle of the room.

“Oh, Ruark, wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could have something like this?” she exclaimed enthusiastically.

He looked at her dubiously through the wreath of smoke that curled from his pipe and smiled. “Now, Shanna, would you really be satisfied here?”

She pouted winsomely. “Do you doubt that I could be? I am of sturdy stuff, Mister Beauchamp, and given a challenge I will make the best of it. I will learn to cook. Perhaps not as well as the cooks in papa’s kitchen, but then I don’t like fat husbands.” She patted his lean belly then smoothed the velvet over her own. “Will you still love me when I’ve grown fat-bellied with child?”

“Oh, Shanna,” Ruark chuckled, folding her in his embrace. “I will love you on my dying day.”

She clung to him and answered his warming kisses. “How long will Jeremiah be gone?”

Ruark reached behind him to latch the door. “Until I call him.”



The stark branches of the oak tree scratched forlornly at the panes in the bedroom window as Shanna gazed out into the star-glazed night. Her afternoon with Ruark in the cabin had made her intensely aware of the fact that she wanted a life with him, whatever hardships or happiness it might contain. Her mind was already set on its course, but she felt lonely beyond belief. It was as if she stood alone in the world and all the weight of her folly rested on her shoulders. What she was about to do might well leave her with no one—Ruark, her father, no one. Would the Beauchamps really receive her in all her shame, as Nathanial had said?

Shanna rested a hand on her belly and was vividly awake to the life that blossomed there. Suddenly she knew she would never be alone.

Orlan Trahern sat in a leather chair in the guest chamber and pored over a sheaf of charts and ledgers. The produce of this land was rich enough to tweak his merchant’s heart. In fact, he had begun to see the advantages of obtaining property here himself, perhaps on the James River where his fleet of ships could come and go.