Chapter Nine

Chapter Nine

“He’s very attractive.” Ciara said, obviously trying to put her at ease.

Leona grinned. “He’s the closest thing to a father I’ve ever had. I don’t know what I would do without him.”

“Is your husband here?” Ciara asked with a bluntness that shocked Leona.

“I don’t have a husband.”

With a nod of understanding, Ciara responded, “Just tell me if I’m too pushy. Lucien, that’s my husband, says I really need to learn how to curb my tongue.” With a grin came, “That’s one of the main and many things he complains about in regards to me.”

“The other, princess, would be your perchance for running off without me.” A deep and authoritative voice broke into their conversation.

At the interruption, both women spun around to witness a man sitting on a horse staring down at them. A handsome man on a horse that looked like it had been running for a while. The man had a stern look on his face but, as he put his stunning blue eyes that were hardened with displeasure upon his wife, they softened to fill with love and more than a little exasperation.

He dismounted and Leona ran her gaze over him with awe. Tall, broad-shouldered, with black hair, blue eyes, a tan, and he was white. He had a good tan, but he was white. Leona’s stunned gaze moved between them for a moment before she caught herself.

Her only experience with this type of thing had been with Jackson and her mother, and she’d thought they were crazy for letting others know how they felt about each other. Aside from the master on the plantation using his female slaves how he wished to, though with that there was never any emotion involved between them. Jackson and her mom had never cared what others thought. Apparently neither did the marquess and his wife. Still, it amazed her.

The marquess’ eyes narrowed as they fell to his wife and in two strides he had reached her, pulled her into his arms and kissed her. Their kiss was so passionate Leona began to feel the heat, so she turned away out of respect.

“We’ll talk later. Don’t even begin to think that this is resolved.” The deep voice crossed the air, so Leona turned slowly back around to see if it was safe.

Those piercing blue eyes were on her. Assessing. Evaluating. Then he strode over to her, shaking his head.

“I am pleased to meet you, Miss O’Neill. I am sorry about the interruption, but my wife tends to go where she wants, when she wants.” He reached out a hand, and as Leona took it, she trembled with the power that this man exuded.

“Not…not a problem. I am very pleased to meet you. I’m sorry.” Her face scrunched up with embarrassment. “How am I supposed to address you?” Leona knew her face showed her shame but the marquess did nothing to bring attention to it.

“You will call me Lucien. I can imagine that we will all become very good friends.” That statement gained him a radiant smile from his wife. “I will now go and reacquaint myself with Jackson and leave you two ladies to discuss whatever it is you discuss.” He gave his wife a quick but thorough kiss before he too headed for Leona’s new home.

Leona watched as he strode off. His lazy masculine stride reminded her so much of someone she needed to forget. Trace. She had to forget how he looked, smelled and made her feel.

“Who is Trace?” Ciara was looking at her with a question in her eyes as well as on her lips.

“Pardon?”

“Trace. You just mentioned his name. Is he a friend?”

Unwanted tears filled her eyes. “He’s a part of my past. That’s all.”

The women walked toward one of the benches that overlooked the seas below.

“Tell me how you started to paint.”

Leona took a deep breath and began her story. “I was always interested in wildlife. How the animals could come and go as they wished. They were free. I loved to look at them and wanted some way to keep their images around me forever. Since I was a sl…since where we lived we couldn’t have that, I began drawing in the dirt.”

She rubbed her arms, searching for the words. “One day my mom brought home a piece of paper and a piece of charcoal. I thought I had gone to heaven, I was so excited. I drew her a picture that I had memorized earlier that day. It was of a deer and her two fawns. She kept it close to her chest. When she died I buried it with her.”

The women stopped walking and stared out over the cliff.

“Having used my first piece of paper, I wanted desperately to paint. But I wasn’t allowed.” Bitterness tinged her tone. “I had one friend growing up and he used to get me old pieces of paper and charcoal to draw, but everything always had to be destroyed afterward.

“He taught me how to read and write. I would draw scenes that meant something to me. I used to draw my mom with a smile on her face. I think that was the one I wish I could have given her. She died before I painted one of her with a smile. Growing up, there wasn’t much call for her to smile. Not until…well, until she met Jackson. And even after that it took a while.”

The whitecaps shimmered in the light as they slammed into the rocky crags below. “After I got good with the paints, Jackson began to hang them in his store on the island. People wanted to buy them, so I kept painting, and they kept buying. I paint because for the longest time it was the only way for me to express myself. I can’t hide my feelings in paintings. I’m free to transmit my emotions.”

Leona glanced at the woman listening raptly next to her. As she turned her gaze back to the sea below, Leona noticed there were some animals around them that hadn’t been there before. They were sleeping in the sun and ignoring her so she just gazed at them, committing them to memory.

“What type of picture were you thinking of?”

“Well, Lucien and I have two children and all of our animals. We would like one of the four humans in our family. I don’t think we can have one with the animals for the hallway, something about propriety nonsense, but I would like ones of the animals as well.”

Ciara rubbed the head of the large gray wolf next to her. “I think that Lucien would like something serious. I don’t know. Tell me more about you.”

“There really isn’t much to tell. I paint, that’s about it. Oh, well, I like to cook, and I do some healing with herbs.”

“Really? So do I. What types of herbs do you use?”

The rest of the afternoon was spent getting to know each other and the group of animals that the marchioness had with her.

* * * *

Hawk’s Cove

“Well that’s it.” Trace looked around at his home. Everything was ready. Looking at his butler, a tall black man named Ben, Trace smiled. It was a good day. The local law was due to arrive soon then he could be on his way.

“Ben, I’ll leave the place in your capable hands. You and Smythe will be in charge.” Smythe was his accountant, a man who had served with Trace in the war and had lost his leg. A well-trusted man who understood what Trace needed to do.

“Yes, sir, Master sir.” The distinguished man nodded his white-haired head in deference.

“No, I’m not your master anymore. Call me Trace, or Mr. Morgan if you wish.” Trace had freed all his slaves. Those who wished to stay could and would be given wages for their work, while those who wished to leave could.

His divorce from Bethany had finally gone through. She had screamed and denied all the charges against her, but still, now she sat in a women’s prison for her crimes. Trace had made sure that even her family couldn’t get her out of this one.

He had been so angry when he had finally caught up to her in hiding at her parents’ ancestral home, when he had stormed in with the authorities and demanded her arrest and a divorce. Her parents were now living a quiet life after having sold most of their slaves to try to pay to get her out of her sentence.

Trace, being an officer and richer, had pulled strings of his own. With the army behind him he had prevailed and gotten what he wanted—his freedom and his son.

His son, whom he had found living with some slaves who had kept him hidden from his mother and her lover so they wouldn’t keep beating him.

Trace had had to do a lot of asking before they would even tell him where his son was. Some begging, when threats had only solidified the slaves into a bigger wall. The slaves had protected him and fed him, an act for which Trace would never forget nor ever be able to repay.

Now, being a single man with a child, Trace had one more piece of unfinished business. Leona.

“Papa, where are we going?” The voice was timid, as if Garrett expected to get beaten for speaking.

Trace looked down and saw his son standing close to Ben, as if for protection, with his lower lip caught between his teeth. A flash of rage flew through him as he thought of the horrors his son had faced while he was gone.

Summoning up a smile, hopefully a gentle one, he glanced into his son’s haunted eyes. “We are going on a ship to another island. Do you like ships?”

A small white hand entwined itself into the darker one of the butler. “Don’t know, never been on one. Is Ben coming with?”

“No, son. It will be just the two of us.” At that his son, Garrett Hawkins Morgan, grew even paler. Flicking a glance at Ben, Trace spoke, “Leave us for a moment, will you please, Ben?”

“Yes, sir.” Ben gently pried off the little hand that was in his and walked a respectable distance away.

Trace took his son’s trembling hands in his own larger, stronger ones. “Garrett. Listen to me, son. I’m sorry that I was away for so long and for what your mother put you through. I will never hurt you. No matter how angry I get, I will never raise a hand to you. No matter what happens. Okay? I’m your father and I love you very much.” Trace stared directly into those brown eyes that were so much like his own as he made his declaration to his son.

Garrett stared back without so much as a blink. Finally he stopped worrying his lower lip and spoke. “I don’t like the name Garrett. Momma always called me that before she or Uncle Steve beat me. Can I have a different name?”

Tears flowed into Trace’s eyes as he nodded. “Of course. What name do you like?”

His son scrunched up his face in fierce concentration as Ben walked unbidden back over. Garrett looked at Ben and asked, “What was that bird that you kept showing me and told me I was like?”

A gentle smile came to the older man’s face. “A falcon, young master. You are like the falcon. Small, yet strong and powerful.”

With a deep breath and a squaring of his small shoulders, Garrett glanced back to his father and spoke in a very sure tone. “Falcon. I want to be called Falcon.”

“Very well. Falcon it is. And like the falcon, you and I shall take flight to find our own adventures.”

“Right. I’m ready now, Papa.”

“Flight of the falcon. And flight of the hawk. Very fitting.” Ben spoke to them both. “Sir, here come the authorities.”

Trace smiled at his son then Ben. This was becoming easier, smiling. He liked it.

The setting of the sun found the two Morgan men boarding a ship to sail out with the tide to another distant island in the Caribbean.

The trip took three weeks with all the other port stops they made. Finally, the day came that they pulled into the port town. Trace was so full of excitement he could barely contain it.

His son, Falcon as he was now known, picked up on his enthusiasm and bounced around. The trip had done wonders for Falcon. His skin had gone from a pasty white to a healthy tan and he had filled out. No longer scared of his papa, he ran with the other boys on the ship all day and slept hard all night. No more nightmares.

As soon as his feet touched the ground, Trace headed for Jackson’s shop. The town had grown and prospered. Walking up the street with his son, they both took in the scene.

People of all colors worked side by side. Street vendors shouted their wares and smells intertwined. Finally he saw the sign for ‘Jackson’s Woodworking Shoppe’. Stopping before the door, Trace felt nervous. He took a deep breath and he felt his son’s hand slip into his and give an encouraging squeeze. Together they opened the door and stepped inside.