River Lady Read online

  Wesley’s “not much to tell” turned into an hour of extended rapture. Wes had fallen for the beautiful Kimberly instantly, but so had twenty or so other young men, and he’d had a two-year courtship battle to win her. He talked about how pretty Kim was, how gentle, delicate, how sweet-tempered, how she loved beauty, books, and music.

  Leah’s hands gripped the pewter mug so hard her knuckles turned white. “And you’re soon to be married?” she whispered.

  “Early spring. April. Then the three of us, Steven included, are traveling to the new state of Kentucky. I’ve bought land there.”

  “You’ll leave Virginia?” She gasped. “What about your plantation here?”

  “I don’t think Virginia is big enough for my brother and me. For all my thirty-four years, I’ve been called Travis’s little brother. It’s made me want a place of my own. Besides, starting all over in a new land with a beautiful woman appeals to me.”

  “You won’t return?” she whispered.

  “Probably not,” he answered, frowning at her intensity. In spite of her looks and her smell, he found himself drawn to her. “The rain’s stopped and I better get home.” He stood. “It was a pleasure meeting you.” He tossed coins on the table for the drinks. “See you next week, Bess,” he called as he started out the door.

  Leah was after him in a second, but Bess caught her arm. “Are you sure you know what you’re doing?”

  Leah jerked away from her sister. “I always thought you wanted me to enjoy men.”

  “Enjoy them yes, but I’m afraid you’re obsessed with Wesley Stanford. You’re going to get hurt and hurt worse than from Pa’s blows. You know nothing about men! All you know is how to plow and scrounge wild plants for food. You don’t know—.”

  “Maybe I can learn!” Leah hissed. “I love him and he’s leaving soon and I have this one chance and I’m going to take it.”

  “Please, Leah, please don’t go after him. Something awful will happen, I know it will.”

  “Nothing awful will happen,” Leah said softly and was out the door.

  Wesley was just mounting his horse.

  “Will you give me a ride?” Leah called, stumbling along the path in the dark.

  Wes stood still, watching her in the moonlight and wishing with all his might that the girl would go away. There was something about her that was almost frightening, as if it were fate that had brought them together, as if what was going to happen were inevitable. And damn! He’d been so good, faithful to Kimberly since they’d become engaged, and he’d planned to remain celibate until they were married. But it wasn’t worry of tumbling the girl that bothered him but her intensity, her seriousness. Why in the world had she kept that coin all these years?

  “Let’s walk,” he said, holding the horse’s reins, not wanting Leah’s thin little body near his on the horse.

  Leah had never felt so alive in her life. She was with the man she loved. Here and now was what she’d dreamed of since she was a child. With one hand on the coin in her pocket, she slid her other arm through Wesley’s.

  He looked down at her and, whether it was a trick of the moonlight or the concealing darkness, she looked downright pretty. The bruise and scratches, now hidden, had kept him from noticing her full lips and that her eyes were large, seductive. He gave the groan of a man lost and started walking with her.

  Leah’s heart was pounding rapidly by the time they left sight of the tavern. Her conscience, dulled by three mugs of beer, was telling her that Bess was right and she had no business here. Yet a part of her was saying that here was her one and only chance for love and she was going to take it. Later, when Wesley was in a faraway place and she was still toiling for her family, she could remember tonight. Perhaps he’d kiss her again.

  With her thoughts in her eyes she looked up at him, and Wesley, with no thoughts at all, bent his head and kissed her.

  She melted against him, her body feeling delicate and breakable in his work-hardened arms, but she kept her lips closed in a childish way. He drew back, his eyes twinkling. The girl was a mixture of accomplished whore and virginal innocence. With her eyes still closed, she moved her lips against his, put her mouth on his again, and Wesley nudged her lips open. He had a thought that she was a quick learner but soon no more thoughts crossed his mind.

  The girl gave herself to him as if she’d been hungering for him, and Wesley responded with months of pent-up desire, his head pushing hers back, his hand burying in the gummy mass of her hair and turning her to better reach her lips. He withdrew, his eyes glazed, his breath coming hard. Her hair had come untied and hung to her waist; her lips were reddened.

  “You’re beautiful,” he whispered and went for her mouth again as his hands tore at her dress top.

  “No!” Leah said, suddenly frightened. A kiss was what she’d dreamed of, a kiss and no more, but as his hands sought her bare flesh, and even as she told him no, she knew she’d never actually deny him. “Wesley,” she whispered as her hands ceased to fight him. “My own Wesley.”

  “Yes, love,” he said distractedly, his mouth traveling down her throat.

  The fabric of the coarse dress was old and tore away easily. Within seconds Leah was standing nude in the moonlight. Her thin body showed every bone, every muscle. The only sign of her womanliness was her full breasts, proud and perfect.

  With great care Wesley lifted her in his arms, then lay her on his cloak, which had fallen from his shoulders.

  Leah, not knowing what to do, how to return the pleasure she was feeling, lay still as he ran his hands over her and unfastened his clothes at the same time.

  When he entered her, she screamed in pain. Wesley lay still a moment, touched her hair, kissed her cheek.

  Leah opened tear-filled eyes to look up at him, and a wave of great love came over her. This was her Wesley, the man she had always loved, would die loving. “Yes,” she whispered, “yes.”

  Wesley continued quickly and only at the end did Leah feel even a tinge of pleasure. And when he finished with a hard thrust, he grabbed her shoulders and whispered “Kimberly” in her ear.

  It was several moments before Leah understood exactly what had happened to her. Kimberly, he’d said.

  He rolled off her, tired for the moment, his eyes half-closed, while Leah stood and pulled on the shreds of her old dress.

  “Good girl,” Wes said drowsily as he reached into the pocket of the pants he hadn’t fully removed. “For your trouble.” He flipped a gold coin toward her and it landed at her feet. “We keep meeting, you’ll have a trunk full of those things.”

  Stunned, Leah watched him stand, fasten his pants, and pick up his cloak and hat. Reaching out, he touched her chin. “You, little girl, are going to get me in trouble.” He drew back. “I hope some of you was clean.” With that, he mounted his horse and rode away.

  It was some time before Leah could move. What an absolute, total fool she’d made of herself, she thought more in amazement than anything else. She felt as if she were a child who’d just learned there were no fairy godmothers. All these years she’d been able to resist the horror of her life because at the end of the rainbow was the great god Wesley. But in the end he was just a man who’d taken what was freely offered to him.

  “Free!” she exclaimed, stooping to grab the coin at her feet. Holding it for a moment, feeling how cold it was, she thought of all the food and clothes she could buy with the money and what it had cost her to obtain the coin. With a laugh at her years of childish dreams, she did what may have been the first totally impractical act of her life: she drew her arm back and threw the coin as far as she could, down toward the blackness that was the river, and when she heard a splash, she smiled.

  “Not all the Simmons are whores!” she shouted at the top of her lungs.

  Feeling better, willing herself not to cry, since she’d learned long ago that tears were useless, she started toward the place she called home. Her body ached and she moved slowly, knowing she’d never make it back before