“You’d best start talking, Madeline. My patience is wearing mighty thin.”
Madeline noted the muscle working in his jaw, and she grimaced at the fierceness of his gaze. He could certainly be a dangerous man; there was no debating that. And what about that dark side of this man? He fought it now, but what if in years to come evil defeated the goodness in Brazos Sinclair? Madeline dared not ignore the possibility that someday, a different Brazos might use Rose’s secret for his own gain. “Brazos, it’s a long and involved story,” she said as a way of delay.
“Get on with it then. I’m all ears.”
Her gaze swept his naked body, and a giggle that bordered on hysterics escaped her, “No, actually, you’re not.”
Pinning her with an expression both glacial and unwavering, Brazos reached for his denims. The look in his eyes was bad enough. The way he donned his pants in a such a casual manner—as if, she imagined, it were a whore’s bed he’d arisen from, rather than her own—didn’t help matters at all. Neither did the disgust she read in his face when his gaze lit on the section of sheet stained with her virgin’s blood. But Madeline could have handled all of those. It was the muttered comment she overheard when he sat on the edge of the bed to don his boots that drove her to recklessness.
“Dad-fool woman is as dumb as a box of rocks,” he said beneath his breath. “Doesn’t she know that females pretend to be virgins and not the other way around? What did she think, I wasn’t gonna notice?” Standing, he grabbed up his shirt from the floor and slipped it on. As he worked the buttons, he snidely asked, “What’s ol’ Emile gonna think about all this, Madeline? I just took his bride-to-be’s virginity. Will he be comin’ after me with a gun? I know that’s what I’d do. Of course, aimin’ at the guilty party might be a bit confusin’ for the man in this instance.” Accusation narrowed his icy blue eyes as he said, “I want answers, Madeline, and I want them now.”
Guilty party
. Wasn’t that just like a man? He’s the one who came here looking for…for…
Sitting up, she snapped, “I don’t give a bloody hell what you want.”
He froze, his eyes growing wide with disbelief. “What did you say?”
“I said, Mr. Sinclair, that it matters little what questions you ask, because I’m not providing any answers. I don’t see that I owe you any at all. You’re a fake, Brazos Sinclair.” The longer she spoke, the more shrill her voice became. “You pretend to care, feign affection, when it is but your own needs you wish to serve. You wanted a hand to hold to ward off your demons, so you come to me, appealing to my dearly held beliefs. You alleviate your boredom by taking advantage of my Rose, plying her with toys and buying her affections, unmindful of how she’ll hurt and yearn for you once you are gone from her life.”
Madeline rose to her knees, a Valkyrie proud and sure, as she said, “You want a woman on whom to slake your lust, so you choose the one who has seen you less than a man. Are you proud you demonstrated your manhood on me, Brazos Sinclair? Are you reassured that you are no longer impotent?”
His mouth was a tight, angry slash across his face. At his sides, his fists clenched, then released, then clenched again. “You know, Madeline,” he said, his voice so full of studied indifference that she felt a slice of cold fear. “I don’t know whether to hit you or throw you back down on that mattress and show you just how unimpotent I am.”
Bravely, she lifted her chin. “Leave here, Brazos. It’s over. The marriage, the lies, the game.”
His granite gaze raked her nakedness. “Yeah, you’re right about that much.”
From the other bedroom came the sound of a child’s tearful cry. Brazos and Madeline both hurried to Rose. He reached the baby first, lifting her from the crib and laying her against his shoulder. He patted her back and crooned comfortingly as Madeline tucked the trailing end of the bed sheet securely around herself like a toga.
“Give her to me, Brazos,” she said, lifting her arms and trying vainly to disguise the trembling. “She needs me.” Brazos ignored her, and as Rose continued to whimper; he pressed a gentle kiss to her golden curls, then said, “Too bad she doesn’t have a mother to comfort her.”
“
I
am her mother,”
He looked her directly in the eye and whispered, “
Bullshit
.”
Madeline blinked back the tears that had suddenly pooled in her eyes. “Her mother died. I’m her mother now. That’s all you need to know. The rest of it doesn’t matter.”
“It damn sure does. I love the little squirt; I figure that gives me all the rights I need. Who is she, Madeline?
Who are you
?”
“She’s my daughter. Give her to me.”
She could see in his expression that a new thought had occurred. He watched her closely as he asked, “What about her father? Is this missing Emile her father?”
Madeline flinched. This was a subject she wished desperately to avoid. “Rose’s father is dead, too,” she snapped too loudly. The baby let out a wail.
Brazos swayed slowly back and forth, clicking his tongue and saying, “Shh, Miss Magic. It’s all right.” His gaze, however never left Madeline. When Rose had quieted again, he softly said, “I remember that day on the quay in Antwerp. You were desperate. You were running from him, weren’t you? That’s what the hurry to get out of Europe was all about.”
Memories rushed back, and she shook her head, denying both them and his words. In a harsh, angry whisper he said, “My God, woman, did you kidnap this poor child?”
“Think what you want,” she hissed through gritted teeth. “It matters not. I love Rose, Brazos. You know that, and you know I’d never do anything to hurt her.
Never
.” She held out her hands, steady this time. “Now, giver her to me. Sometimes she has nightmares, and she’ll need me close by.”
“Nightmares, huh. Well, I guess it’s a night for ‘em.” Gently, he returned the sleeping baby to her bed. Straightening, he looked at Madeline. Her heart plummeted as she witnessed the iron determination reflected in his eyes. “I guess she’s safe enough for now. I know that in your own way, you love her. Guard her well, Madeline, while you still can. I suspect your nightmares are only just beginning.”
At the door he paused and promised. “I’ll find my answers. I’ll discover who you stole her from. Rose deserves better than a mother who’s a thief.”
Softly, the door closed behind him.
STEAM ROSE from the horses’ nostrils like a cloud of cigar smoke with every blow. The air was wet with early morning fog that could chill a man to the marrow were the flames of anger not burning inside him. Mounted on a sturdy buckskin, Brazos ran no risk of being cold.
The tide lapped at hard-packed sand as Brazos and Tyler followed the edge of the surf toward the sparsely populated southern end of the island. Brazos rode hard, the exercise providing an outlet for the emotions he’d locked within himself during the endless, sleepless night just past. He’d spent long hours thinking and making decisions, and when he’d banged on his brother’s front door just after dawn, he’d known what course his actions must take.
And he hated it like hell.
Tyler reined in his horse and dismounted. An unbroken sand dollar lay at the edge of the surf, and he bent to pick it up. “A lady friend of mine collects these,” he explained apologetically when Brazos lifted a brow in inquiry.
Leather creaked softly as Brazos swung from the saddle. “Better than collecting diamonds, I suppose.”
As the sun climbed higher in the sky, burning off the fog and toasting the air, the two men walked their horses in companionable silence. Then Tyler ruined the peace by saying, “I’ve been amazingly patient up till now, little brother, but I think it’s time you told me a bit about this marriage of yours.”
“Yeah, I know. I’ve been working up to it.” He grimaced and said, “My dear, former wife, Madeline.” Her name tasted bitter on his tongue. “Tyler, I discovered last night that my sweet little bride stole that baby from its father. I want to hire someone to investigate Madeline Christophe, and I’m gonna need your help.”
Tyler dug his boots into the sand. “A kidnapper! I don’t believe it.” A slow, anxious look dawned across his face. “Tell me it isn’t true, brother. She seemed like such a nice young woman.”
“Yeah, she’s nice, all right,” Brazos drawled. “Kinda like the oleander bushes blooming here around town. Nice, pretty, soft blossoms—makes you want to pick ‘em. Smell ‘em.” He sneered as he added, “Give the oleander a taste, though, and its poison will kill you deader’n hell.”
His brow wrinkled in worry, Tyler quizzed, “Brazos, are you certain of this? I spent some time with her in my office. She was so very congenial, under difficult circumstances, I might add. Ladylike, sincere, and she certainly seemed to dote on that baby.” He shook his head. “No, it can’t be. Besides, the girl looks just like your Madeline.”
“She’s not my Madeline!”
Tyler took off his hat, scratched his head, and winced as he said, “Well, actually…”
Brazos shot him a sharp glance. “Actually what?”
Shoving his hat back onto his head, Tyler resumed walking. Briskly. Brazos frowned as he caught up with his brother. “Ty, is there some sort of problem here? I’m dead set on hiring a man to look into this, so there’s no sense trying to talk me out of it, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
“I can hire someone for you,” Tyler said, waving his hand. “That’s nothing.”
“Well, what is it? I can tell you’ve something stuck in your craw.”
Both brothers stared at Tyler’s horse when he snorted. Tyler stroked the roan gelding’s nose, then asked, “How do you know Madeline kidnapped that child? What did she do, come right out and tell you?”
“In a manner of speaking, yeah.”
“What did she say?”
“Actually, she kinda yelped.” He noted his brother’s confusion, but decided enough had been said on the subject. After all, a fella shared only so much about his personal life, and Brazos had already confessed to having been married to a kidnapper. Tyler didn’t need to know any more.
Brazos tossed Tyler his horse’s reins and strode back up the beach, where a slender piece of driftwood lay. He lifted the tree branch and shook it, testing its weight. Then he reached into his jacket pocket and withdrew a small leather ball. Setting the ball upon the sand, he eyed a long scrub some fifty yards up the beach. “Listen, Tyler I’m wanting this information as fast as I can get it. What kind of time would you expect we’d be looking at, sending to Europe for it and all?” He took a swing at the ball. When it hooked right of the bush, he grimaced and started walking. “It purely worries me to think of a father somewhere grieving over his lost baby.”
Tyler followed him. “It’ll take some time, Brazos. I’d say five, six months at the earliest. But I’ll get started on it first thing. Well, second thing. I’ve something important to see to first.”
Brazos stood over the ball, preparing to roll it toward his target, and shook his head. “Nothing’s more important than this, Tyler.”
Tyler shut his mouth, started to speak, then abruptly shut it.
“Ty?”
He replied in a rush. “What are you doing with that stick?”
“This is great, Tyler. I’ve discovered the best game.” Brazos lifted the ball from the sand and handed it to his brother saying, “You’re gonna have to play it with me. I met an old Scot who spoke of nothing else. He taught me the game on a course on the west coast of France, a place called Pau. In my trunks, I have a set of the sticks you use to play the game with—those and three dozen of these balls. Spent a pretty penny on the balls, too.”
Tyler studied the smooth leather sphere. “I’ve never known another man so obsessed with toys,” he mused.
Brazos glanced up at a pair of screeching gulls. “This isn’t a toy. It’s a sport. Like fox hunting in England, only nothing dies. He grabbed the ball, set it on the sand, and took a wide swing at it with his stick. It sailed up and over the top of a dune. He started after it.
“Brazos, about the woman,” Tyler said, climbing the dunes behind his brother. “Do you remember when we were kids and went to visit Cousin Reece out in Pine Bluff?” Brazos nodded. Tyler kicked at a tuft of grass, helping to search for the ball, and continued, “You recall the church social, when you were suppose to take Mama’s pecan pie down and enter it in the contest, only you made it about halfway to church before deciding to eat it instead?”
“There’s my ball.” Brazos pointed toward a bare spot some twenty yards away. As they walked, he said, “I ate the whole thing—made me sicker than a big dog. Can’t stomach pecan pie to this day.” He sighed with disgust. “Damn, she curved to the right again. I wonder why.”
They reached the ball, and Tyler laid his hand on Brazos’s arm. “Do you remember what you told Pa when he asked you why you did it?”
“Before or after the woodshed?”
“Before.”
Brazos frowned thoughtfully as he drew lines in the sand with his stick. “I remember now. He gave me an extra set of lickin’s because I told him I’d done it just to stir up trouble.” A slow smile of remembrance inched across his face. “Couldn’t sit down for three days.”
Tyler took the stick from Brazos’s hand and gave a whack at the ball. It missed a pelican by inches, then landed in the gulf. Tyler tossed down the stick. “Stupid game, chasing after a ball with a stick. What do you call it.”
“Golf,” Brazos replied.
“I guess all the other four letter words were taken.” Tyler watched the ruined ball wash ashore and confessed, “Brazos, I’m afraid that last night I indulged a craving for pecan pie.”
Brazos gave him a sidelong look. “What did you say?”
“No harm done, really,” Tyler hastened to say, pasting a sickly grin on his face. “I can take care of the matter just as soon as we get back to town.” He ran nervous fingers through his hair. “I thought she was a nice woman, you see. Didn’t know she was a kidnapper. Thought to pay you back for that mess you caused me with Lilah May McPherson.” Nothing his brother’s granite expression, Tyler added prayerfully, “Please, Brazos, tell me you didn’t bed her last night.”
Brazos shut his eyes.
Tyler didn’t file the damned papers
. Nightmares, hell. Looks as if one of his own just reached up and bit him square on the…“I’m going swimming.” He began to peel of his shirt.