Bartered Bride Romance Collection Page 6

  “My son.” Mama touched his shoulder. “We will find her. We must believe.”

  “I do not know why I should. Le bon Dieu has taken from me once again my joy.”

  “You cannot make Josée your joy. Ah, she is joyful, but she is just a woman.” Mama ran her hand on his hair, a gesture which used to comfort him when he was a bébé. “Even if you have her safely in your home, you know she will disappoint you at times, and you her.”

  Edouard nodded at that. Mama had probably been talking to Papa. Fresh memories of Edouard and Josée’s silly fight from the day before swam through his head.

  “Trying to make her your joy is like trying to catch a fish with your hands. The harder you grasp, the more it struggles to get away.”

  “I must find her.” Edouard grabbed a lantern. He did not have time to stand talking. Why did women try to talk everything into the grave when a man could be doing something?

  “You will.” Mama nodded. “And I will wait up with warm blankets and hot coffee.”

  Edouard set out with Papa and Jacques to the bayou’s edge. Oh, my sweet Josée, I am so sorry to have caused you pain. Please, bon Dieu, do not take her away from me.

  Chapter 9

  A pirogue. The boat smelled of fish, but at the moment Josée could not think of a better thing to find. She did not know whose boat it was or how it had come to be in her path in the water. She tore the encumbering skirt from the bodice and leaned onto the side of the pirogue. With a heave, she swung her legs in their waterlogged pantaloons onto the floor of the boat.

  She was out of the water, no longer feeling at its mercy as the rain drummed down. In the dark, she reached around to see if she could find an oar or even a pole she could use to maneuver to the shore. Nothing.

  Battered by rain, Josée hunkered in the bottom of the pirogue and cried.

  A wild thought struck her. You could float away to the next town. Start over…. She could go far away and teach in a school. Stop it.

  Acadians, with their language, were not welcome everywhere. If she stayed among her people, Edouard would find her. Did she want to be found? Oui, except …

  Le bon Dieu had let her marry Edouard. If He was all-wise and all-knowing, He knew this would happen, this fiasco with Celine. Josée found no joy in that knowledge. Despite their troubles and childish disagreements, she had begun to look forward to her future with Edouard. Until now.

  What had happened with Edouard and Celine? She could remember seeing Celine about to kiss him. She closed her eyes and turned on her side to keep the pelting rain from hitting her eyelids. Think harder. Edouard. He’d had his hands on Celine’s shoulders, his arms straight out in front of him.

  He’d been trying to hold her away.

  Josée sat up straight at the realization then screamed when a drape of Spanish moss touched her neck. She slapped at the air around her head and yanked the end of some moss from whatever tree she had passed under. The coarse, fuzzy moss made a shawl to block out the chill. Wind moaned in the trees as the storm roared on. She did not know how long she lay there in the dark, begging le bon Dieu to let the storm end.

  Bone-jarring shivers set in as Josée recalled her anger at Edouard. Tonight she had not let him explain himself, but when had she ever let him speak? She always wanted him to listen. She realized she needed to apologize. She huddled down in the pirogue to find relief from the storm’s chill.

  The wind and rain lessened, and Josée sat up again and squinted through the darkness. She would never tell a scary tale to the younger LeBlancs again, should she ever get the chance to tell them another story.

  A rustling, close at the edge of the bayou made her freeze, yet her pulse hammered in her throat.

  Edouard held the lantern aloft and his rifle over his shoulder. Papa and even Jacques tromped along farther down the bayou and called out for Josée. But the rushing water and occasional clap of thunder covered up the sound of their voices.

  He would find her. Not Papa, and especially not Jacques.

  Josée was probably frightened, cold, and unsure of where she was. Edouard refused to think of the water claiming her like it had claimed a child one spring. He would not imagine a gator dragging her under in the dark. That had happened to him before, and even with daylight shining into the muddy waters, Edouard had felt like he was dying. He had been strong enough to fight the animal off and get away. Josée was not.

  Le bon Dieu would take care of her. Edouard refused to believe that God would turn his life upside down with a wife only to rip her away from him when he learned to love her. The darkness did not scare him, because he knew this bayou well.

  Then Edouard stopped a dozen paces or so from the bayou’s edge. Shallow water from the brimming bayou swirled over his boot tops. He thought he heard a scream.

  “Josée!” He ran, spraying up water that sparkled in the lantern’s light.

  Edouard saw her inside a pirogue tilted against the stump of a cypress. A gator growled, mere footsteps away from her, likely disturbed by the water and a pirogue drifting into his shallows.

  “Edouard!” She squinted at him where she hunched in the pirogue, just beyond the circle of the yellow light. Then she glanced into the shadows. He saw her reaching for a broken-off cypress branch, thick as a man’s leg and just as long.

  “Don’t move!”

  She grasped the branch with both hands, not taking her gaze off the gator. The animal’s tail started to curl. Edouard took a step toward them.

  “Ooo-eee! Brother Gator!” He moved the lantern in an arc, hoping the gator would turn this way. “I am here! Come, fight me! It will be more to your liking.”

  “No, Edouard!” Josée crept from the pirogue as the gator turned to face him. The gator’s head cocked to one side, as if it were unsure of whom to approach first.

  Edouard set the lantern down on the nearest patch of grass that peeked over the water. “Josée, don’t move.” He readied his rifle. When he moved his foot, he kicked something solid. He glanced down. The lantern had fallen onto its side.

  In a flash, the gator came for him. Josée screamed like a wild woman. Edouard fell onto the mud. The gator whipped its tail around and clubbed him with it. Gasping for breath, Edouard reached for his gun. He glimpsed Josée, hitting the gator with her cypress branch as if she were beating a rug.

  The gator whipped its tail again, knocking Josée to the ground, before the beast fled to the water and disappeared.

  Edouard crawled to Josée, who had rolled onto her side. “We were more than he wanted to fight with tonight.”

  She nodded, her normally sun-browned skin pale by lantern light. She sat up and wrapped her arms around her waist. Tears streamed down her cheeks along with the rain.

  “Mon amour, I am so sorry.” He reached for Josée, pulled her onto his lap, and held her while she cried. Even with her matted hair and torn clothing, he thought her beautiful.

  “I’m sorry, too.” She leaned back and caressed his face. “I didn’t mean to fall in and worry everyone. I was going home, and then this wagon came, and—”

  “Shh.” He placed his hand over her mouth, a mouth he very much wanted to kiss. But he would wait until they were back inside the cabin and warm once again. “Let us thank le bon Dieu for saving us and go home.” After signaling to Papa and Jacques with a shot from his rifle, Edouard picked up the lantern, and they started on their way.

  Josée never wanted to let him go. She did not know how far they walked through the night to get to the cabin. She waved at Papa LeBlanc and Jacques, who headed to the big house. Edouard told them to tell Mama LeBlanc that he would take care of Josée.

  He whisked her into the cabin and lit the fire while Josée slipped out of her wet clothes and into her chemise. Her breath caught in her throat. When they had left for the fai do do, she knew they had grown closer, in spite of their bickering like rooster and hen. Tonight, safe at home, her stomach quivered at the thought.

  “Warmer?” Edouard approached with a
blanket.

  “I’m better now.” She tried not to let him see her shiver.

  Edouard took her hand. “I am sorry about what happened earlier. I did not realize it was Celine under that tree….” He glanced at the fire, and Josée made herself wait for him to continue.

  “Then she kept comin’ towards me. I had to hold her off like a gator. I was trying to get Mama or someone else to help her, and then you appeared.” He pulled the blanket around her shoulders.

  “I am sorry that I did not let you explain. I only knew how bitter it must taste for one’s heart to break—”

  He fairly crushed her in an embrace and gave her a kiss that she never wanted to end. This was what she had longed for while out in the darkened waters. The shelter of her husband’s arms and knowing he loved her with his whole heart. Edouard kissed her again, something she knew she’d never tire of now that she knew what a kiss was like.

  They sat before the fire and shared the blanket. Edouard poured coffee for them, and Josée sipped hers at first. Then she hurried and burnt her tongue, so she waited until the brew cooled.

  “Edouard, I must ask you something. What did you mean earlier, when you said le bon Dieu saved you?”

  “When you were missing, I was angry at the thought of losing you. I do not always understand you, but you are my world now.” His eyes glittered in the firelight. “Then I realized I had been wrong ag’in, as I had been about Celine. When I lost her, I thought I had lost my world and had no reason for joie de vivre. Not that I love you less than I once loved her, but I hope to love you better, my sweet Josée, and love our bon Dieu most of all.”

  “He is good to us, isn’t He?” Josée ventured another sip. “Even with the bad that has happened, we can trust Him to watch over us.”

  “That is true.”

  Josée set the cup on the hearth. She stroked the scar on Edouard’s cheek with one finger and shook her head. “I also meant to say, when I had time to think on that bayou, I realized you were doing nothing except trying to keep her away from you. I grew so angry because I knew how you had loved her a long time ago. I should have known how you truly felt now, though, because of how you held me on your lap on the way to the fai do do.”

  Then she stopped talking, because Edouard covered her lips with his. After the kiss, which ended too soon, she sat there, saying nothing.

  “Well, that’s one way to quiet you.” His dark eyes twinkled.

  She smiled at him. “In that case, mon amour, I’ll make sure I always have something to say.”

  Epilogue

  Josée sat back on her heels after pulling a handful of weeds from her garden and watched her enfants playing in the sun. Francois and Mathilde giggled and clapped. Francois, happy and singing; Mathilde, quieter like her papa. They kept their mama busy.

  Edouard had been gone for three days on a gator hunt. Josée touched her growing stomach. Another bébé to feed soon, but le bon Dieu would take care of everything. That, and help Edouard get a good gator to trade for more lumber. The bayou cabin seemed to be shrinking.

  She hoisted herself to her feet, not as easily as a few weeks ago. “Children, let’s eat dinner, and then I will tell you stories.”

  They clapped again then grabbed each other’s hands and ran ahead of her to the cabin.

  Josée made them wash their hands before they ate. A familiar journal lay on the table. She would teach her children to read and write and love the language of their people. For now, her time of writing in this book was over. Josée no longer needed the recipes to help her remember. Edouard was starting to get a bit round like Papa from her cooking.

  She touched the book’s cover. One day, another LeBlanc might read these pages and learn from her as well as Capucine.

  “Bon soir, journale,” she whispered. Josée rose and placed the journal with the other books in the trunk to keep until her children were old enough.

  The sound of a pirogue moving over the waters made Josée look toward the doorway. The children scrambled to their feet and ran.

  “Papa, it’s Papa! He’s home!”

  Josée moved as quickly as her feet would let her. The familiar face and form she knew and loved so well came into view. “Oui, he’s home.”

  Lynette Sowell is an award-winning author with New England roots, but she makes her home in Central Texas with her husband and a herd of five cats. When she’s not writing, she edits medical reports and chases down stories for the local newspaper.

  BUTTON STRING BRIDE

  by Cathy Marie Hake

  Dedication

  Dedicated to two of my greatest joys,

  Kelly Eileen and Colin James.

  May you each wait on the Lord

  and seek His choice for you—in life and in love.

  Whatever joys or trials lie ahead on the path,

  walk with the Lord and let Him light the way.

  Love,

  Mom

  Chapter 1

  Miss Davis, the trail master ordered us to combine wagons if we want to continue on to Oregon. Otherwise, they’ll leave us behind when we reach Fort Laramie.” Ethan Cole shifted his weight more firmly into the heels of his scuffed cowhide boots as he broke the news. “We’ll try to make the best of it. A single lady like you shouldn’t be stranded among all of the soldiers, and to be perfectly frank, I need help with my young’uns.”

  Miss Davis wet her lips and whispered, “I’m willing to watch your children, sir. I just don’t see how you can do more …”

  From the way her voice trailed off, Ethan knew she didn’t understand exactly what the order entailed. He cast a quick look to the side. Banner Laswell had come along to lend the soothing support of her presence. She stayed silent, so he softened his voice and strove to break the news gently. “The plan is for you to put your essentials in my wagon. We’re to leave your rig behind.” Every speck of color seeped out of Miss Davis’s cheeks, and he feared she might keel over from the revelation. Ethan cupped her elbow and coaxed her to sit on a nearby log.

  Other than knowing her ma was the first to die on their trek due to a snakebite and her pa’s heart gave out a few nights ago, Ethan knew virtually nothing about Charity Davis. He’d been too busy with his own troubles to mind anyone else’s business. For a few moments, he silently studied her and tried to take her measure. Most of the women set out on the trip in simple, full gowns made from calico feed sacks; but quality bolt goods draped artistically over Miss Davis’s hoops, and her outfit boasted more frills and doodads than any gown he’d ever seen. Small and fine-boned, she looked hopelessly out of place in this wilderness. All it took was a bit of bad news, and she was nigh unto swooning. Ethan barely disguised his grimace. He feared he’d been saddled with a temperamental, helpless female.

  “I’ll mind your children.” She wrapped a fancy shawl about herself more tightly. “If you hunt for us, I’ll do all of the cooking and still keep my own wagon. Wouldn’t that suffice?”

  Something in her voice tugged at him. Poor gal. She’s lost her folks, and now she’s losing everything else. Sympathy replaced his concerns. It felt wrong to hover over a vulnerable woman, so Ethan hunkered down to stay at eye level. “Miss Davis, we set out knowing each wagon had to be self-sufficient. Betwixt the two of us, we can’t drive both wagons, care for all of our beasts, do our fair share of guard duty, and mind the kids. By leaving behind one wagon, we’d halve several obligations. We’re both in a fix, and the council ruled we either join up or fall out. I can’t go on without your help.”

  Though he paused to allow her an opportunity to speak, she said nothing. Ethan cleared his throat and added, “I know it’s an awkward situation, but I’ll bedroll beneath the wagon, and you can sleep inside with the kids.”

  Tears glossed her wide blue eyes, but she didn’t shed a single one. He had to hand it to her. Though both shocked and embarrassed, she didn’t indulge in an emotional show. Instead, she looked at Banner and quavered, “I can’t pack tonight. It’s my turn to stand gu
ard.”

  Banner quietly offered, “One of the other men is covering for you tonight. I know you’re heartsore, but Mr. Cole is a fine man. The council felt it was for the best. For what it’s worth, I agree.”

  “I see.” Charity smoothed back a strand of fiery hair with an unsteady hand. “Please let me know who took my guard shift. I don’t want to be beholden to anyone.”

  Ethan grabbed her wrist and turned her palm toward the flickering campfire. No calluses dared mar her dainty hand, but a prime crop of new blisters showed she’d done hard work—man’s work—in the past few days. “Do you have salve for these?”

  “Yes, sir.” She slowly pulled her hand free and rose. “Please pardon me. I have a lot to do before morning.”

  “Best thing you could do right now is turn in for the night, Miss Davis. The train is staying put tomorrow so some of the men can go hunting. We’ll have a full day to do what needs doing.” He paused then softly added, “Come morning, you’ll see the wisdom of this.”

  She gave him a woeful smile and shrugged. Tired, aghast, and heartbroken as she was, he figured he ought to be glad Miss Davis wasn’t sobbing or pitching a fit. Poor thing’s so shaken, she probably can’t react, he thought. He offered her his arm. “I’ll walk you to your wagon.”

  “I thank you for the offer, but I need to be alone.” After whispering those timid words, she fleetingly squeezed Banner’s hand then walked toward the edge of the campfire’s light to reach her wagon. This would be the last night she’d spend in it.

  Ethan watched her go. Banner Laswell filled a chipped enamel cup with scorched coffee and handed it to him. “Don’t fret. She’s got a lot of polish, but that gal is pure hickory straight through.”

  “No one told me her age,” he said grimly. “She looks young.”