She stopped in her tracks. “I beg your pardon?”
“He came down, rather late, saying he needed some air.” The butler shrugged.
Ada stood stock still, her mind racing. A Confederate was on the prowl in New York City. Whatever was he doing? “And he didn’t return?”
“Uh, no ma’am.”
“We need to search for him!”
“No, Ada, we do not.” It was Will. He waved the butler away and took her arm, leading her back to the table. “I told you I’d find a way to get him returned. I have fulfilled my promise.” He stole the biscuit she’d been carrying and took a bite.
Stunned, she glared at him. “You sent him back to prison?”
“Ada, please. Let us not go further…”
The rest of the day was a blur. The longer she mulled in her mind what had happened, an incredible loss swept over her. It was like she missed him. She shook her head. He was a slave-owner! He represented all she hated! But her arguments fell on faint ears, because somehow, along the way, the man had managed to find a way into her heart. Perhaps all the lovemaking might have added to it, and she should’ve stopped that, but how? He had seduced her and she’d devoured him, like a starving woman looking for love.
That realization only made her mad. In retaliation, she kicked Will out.
“…don’t be irrational. You knew we needed to be covered for that indiscretion,” Will said softly.
Wiping her hands, exasperated and tired, she cocked her head. “So you told him to run away in the night, after making sure he’d aggravated me so badly, I wouldn’t notice anything till morning, when I finally cooled down, right?”
“No, of course not. I’m not that good at orchestrating things and you know that.”
“Yes, so I’ve noticed in your practice.” The words slipped from her mouth before she could stop it. Her mouth dropped open and she covered it with her hand as the color washed from his face but his eyes inflamed. “Will, I’m so sorry. That’s really not what I meant.”
Color flooded back into his cheeks. “You knew that was a dangerous game we were playing. I got my end covered at the prison. You left too many threads open, going to balls and rallies with him.”
“No one knew he was a rebel,” she retorted.
“Regardless, he is back where he needs to be.”
“In prison?”
“No. The South.” And on that note, he wheeled to his right and walked out of the army hospital.
Ada sank to the chair, all energy sapped. Her heart fell into the pit of her stomach and she wondered if she’d ever see him again. With a snort, her other half snapped back, “Only if you see him on the battlefield…dead.”
A flood of emotion slammed into her. Grief, anger, frustration, irritation, lack of sleep and a broken heart, all rolled into one. She bent over and cried for the first time since the war began.
Virginia
Clarks Mountain
Francois shifted in the saddle. His ankle wasn’t hurting, but then, he’d been in the saddle all day. Rose needed a rest from him and he needed to relieve himself. With that in mind, he slowly swung his leg over the saddle and tried to lower himself to the ground without a big impact on his feet. Success was there for a moment, for he wasn’t as cautious when he tried to clear himself of the horse tack. A shot of pain raced up his calf. He did note it wasn’t as sharp as before, or perhaps he was deluding himself. With a snort, he ignored that thought and grabbed the stick he’d adapted as a cane, he steadied himself before he limped to the bushes.
It was there, right as he readjusted his trousers to close, that he heard the cocking of a gun.
“Don’t move.”
He scanned the landscape but it was dead until he saw the gleam off a rifle muzzle. When he remained still, there was a rustle of the winter-dead plants as the soldier revealed himself. Francois hoped for a Confederate, and with the appearance of a mud-covered ragamuffin, with a gingham shirt and beat-up shell jacket, the guardsman fit any regiment in the Confederate Army to a T.
“Where you be goin’, boy?”
Francois couldn’t help but chuckle. The soldier was younger than him! “Back to my unit, the 9th Louisiana.”
“The Tigers?” The boy’s voice held a bit of longing at the edges.
“Yes. I’m Corporal Fontaine, returned from Yankee capture.”
“Oh, we heard you all was a comin’!” The boy screamed with glee.
That intrigued Francois. There was a release from being shot? “Yes, well, sir, perhaps you’ll point me in the right direction?”
Ada finally could expel the breath she’d been holding for a long time. “It’s affirmed? We are finally leaving?”
Will laughed. “I find it rather interesting how you get excited to return to the front, when the bulk of the army would rather leave.”
She grabbed more supplies and put them in the box. “You know me too well. I grow tired of this stagnation. I want to see us win!”
He grabbed her hand. “You seek that so the bloodshed will stop? Or is it to punish every slave-owner?”
She shot him a narrow gaze, yanking her captured wrist free.
“Ah, both, I’d gather.”
She continued to stare at him before she snapped out of it and returned to packing. How was she to explain the bitterness she held for Francois’s words, and his abandoning her? Thankfully, she wasn’t with child, and for that, she was grateful, but it didn’t cover the loneliness the nights had brought. Nor the driving pain of reporting to work as a nurse to a ward full of men sick and dying and her unable to truly help. She’d been pulled aside once for redressing a wound without the doctor’s permission, which had made her want to scream but to stay, she bit her tongue.
Her time with Richard was too short as well. He was at that dance, smiling and chatting, but
