Counterfeit Lady Read online

  “But you didn’t?” Nicole said with hope in her voice.

  “I have you to thank for that. Even though I say I didn’t hear Bianca, I think that some part of my small brain must have. All I knew was that I didn’t want to return home at night, that I was working harder than I ever had in the last year. But when you were living in the house, I wanted to come home. When Bianca was at the house, I preferred the fields, especially the fields closest to the mill.”

  Nicole smiled and kissed his chest through his shirt. His words were the most wonderful she’d ever heard.

  “It took Wes to knock some sense into me,” he continued. “When Wes first saw Bianca, I could see how he was affected. I felt justified then for having her in my house and not you. I knew Wes would understand.”

  “I don’t think Wesley likes Bianca.”

  Clay chuckled and kissed the tip of her nose. “That’s a polite way of putting it. When he told me he thought she was a vain, arrogant bitch, I hit him. It made me sick, and I didn’t know if I was sick from hitting my friend or from hearing the truth. I left the house and didn’t return for two days. I had a lot of thinking to do. It took me a while, but I began to see what I’d done. And I made myself face the fact that Beth was dead. I’d tried to bring her back through Bianca, but that couldn’t work. What I had, but had ignored for the most part, was the twins. If James and Beth still lived, it was through their children and not some stranger. If I wanted to give Beth anything, it would be a good mother for the twins she loved so much, and not one who knocked Alex in the water because he tore her dress.”

  “How did you know about that?”

  “Roger, Janie, Maggie, Luke,” he said with disgust. “Everyone seemed to think it was his duty to tell me about Bianca. They’d all known Beth, and I guess they could sense that most of my attraction to her lay in that resemblance.”

  “Why did you ask me to the party?” she asked, holding her breath.

  He laughed and hugged her tightly. “When it comes to brains, I think we have equally small ones. When I realized that I was trying to replace Beth with Bianca, I also knew why I spent so much time staring at the mill wharf—which needs repairing, I might add. There’s a sawmill on the other side of the Backes’s plantation.”

  “Clay!”

  He laughed again. “I love you. Didn’t you know that? Everyone else did.”

  “No,” she whispered. “I wasn’t sure.”

  “You nearly tore me apart the night of the storm when you told me about your grandfather and said you loved me.” He paused for a moment. “You left me the next day. Why? We spent such a night together, then the next morning you were cold to me.”

  She remembered clearly the portrait in Clay’s office. “The portrait in your office is Beth, isn’t it?” She felt him nod against her. “I thought it was Bianca, and it looked like a shrine. How could I compete with a woman you worshipped?”

  “It’s gone now. I put the portrait back over the fireplace in the dining room. The pieces of garment I locked in a trunk to be stored with the others. Maybe Mandy will want them someday.”

  “Clay, what happens now?”

  “I told you. I want you to marry me again, publicly, with lots of witnesses.”

  “What about Bianca?”

  “I’ve already told her that she’s to return to England.”

  “How did she take it?”

  He frowned. “She wasn’t what I’d call gracious, but she’ll obey me. I’ll see she is paid. It’s a good thing I came to my senses as soon as I did. She’s already run up enormous bills.” He stopped suddenly and laughed at her. “You’re the only woman I’ve ever met who is so considerate of her enemies.”

  Nicole moved away from him and looked up in a startled way. “Bianca isn’t my enemy. Maybe I should love her since she was the one who gave you to me.”

  “I don’t believe gave is the proper word.”

  Nicole giggled impishly. “I don’t believe it is either.”

  He smiled down at her and caressed her temple. “You’ll forgive me for being blind and stupid?”

  “Yes,” she whispered before his mouth closed on hers. The knowledge that he loved her made her especially passionate. She wrapped her arms about his neck and pulled him very close to her. Her body arched against his.

  Neither of them noticed the first cold drops of rain. Only when the sky split with a slash of lightning and opened with a pure sheet of icy rain did they break apart.

  “Come on!” Clay yelled as he stood up and pulled her with him.

  She turned toward the path to the sloop, but Clay pulled her in another direction. They ran toward the side of the clearing opposite the river. While Nicole stood in the rain, rubbing her cold upper arms, Clay withdrew his knife and slashed at some hedges.

  “Damn!” he cursed loudly when he couldn’t seem to find what he wanted. Suddenly, the bushes broke away and revealed what looked to be a little cave. Clay threw his arm around Nicole and nearly pushed her inside.

  She shivered. Her dress was soaked from the cold rain.

  “Just a minute, and I’ll have a fire going,” Clay said as he knelt at one corner near the opening.

  “What is this place?” she asked, kneeling beside him.

  “We found this little cave—James, Beth, and I—and it’s what caused us to plant the hedges and trees. James had one of the bricklayers show him how to build a fireplace.” He nodded toward the rather crude structure where he was now working to build a fire. He sat back on his haunches as the fire took hold. “We always thought this was the world’s most secret place, but when I was older I realized the smoke was as good as a flag. No wonder our parents never objected to our ‘disappearances.’ All they had to do was look out a window to see where we were.”

  Nicole stood up and looked around her. The cave was about twelve feet long and ten feet wide. Along the walls were set a couple of crude benches and a large pine chest, its hinges rusty and broken. Something glittered from a niche in the wall. She went to it. Her hand touched something cool and smooth. She withdrew it and held it up to the light from the fire. It was a large piece of greenish glass, and embedded inside was a tiny silver unicorn.

  “What is this?”

  Clay turned and smiled up at her. For a moment he was serious, then he reached out and took the piece of glass as Nicole sat beside him. He studied it as he spoke, turning it in his hands. “Beth’s father bought the little unicorn for her in Boston. She thought it was so pretty. One day we were here in the cave, James had just finished the fireplace, and Beth said she hoped we would always be friends. Suddenly, she took the unicorn off the chain around her neck and said we were going to see the glassblower. James and I followed her, knowing she was up to something. She got old Sam to work up a ball of clear glass. Then the three of us touched the unicorn and swore always to be friends. Then Beth dropped it into the hot glass. She said that was so no one else could ever touch it.” He looked at the glass one more time, then handed it back to Nicole. “It was a silly, childish act, but it seemed to mean a lot then.”

  “I don’t think it’s silly, and it certainly seemed to work,” she smiled.

  Clay wiped his hands together, then looked at her, his eyes dark. “Weren’t we doing something interesting before the rain started?”

  Nicole looked at him in wide-eyed innocence. “I have no idea what you mean.”

  Clay stood, went to the dilapidated old chest, and pulled out two of the dustiest, most moth-eaten blankets that had ever been seen. “Not exactly pink silk sheets,” he said, laughing at some joke Nicole didn’t share. “But better than the dirt.” He turned and held out his arms for her.

  Nicole ran to him, hugged him close to her. “I love you, Clay,” she whispered. “I love you so much that it scares me.”

  He began pulling the pins from her hair, dropping them to the floor. He stroked the black, silky mass of her hair. “Why should you be frightened?” he said softly, his lips playing along her neck. �