Ever Bound (5 page)

I stepped around the partition. “I’m just concerned. I don’t want to see you hurt. You’re right. It’s not my business.”

“No, it’s not. And I’m not the kind of girl to go further than, well, you know.”

“I know you wouldn’t, which is why—nothing.” I turned back to my work.

“Why, what?” She stepped nearer to me.

“Drew can be charming when it works for him, but when it’s just the guys, he’s not as nice. Just don’t get yourself in a place where he could take advantage of you. Please.”

Without another word, Annabeth walked away, leaving me staring at a bare spot I’d chopped in the rose maze wall. Annabeth turning her back on me after a small spat bothered me more than everything that had happened with Grace.

* * * *

Later that day, Mr. Rollins appeared behind the maze and nodded his approval at my handy work.

The bushes were lush, climbing their boundaries, creating a rounded wall at the top, except for the bare spot I’d mutilated. I kept him from going down that path. So, other than the tragic death of one rose bush, the rest of the maze looked like a work of art.

“Well done, son. Well done. I’m sure you’re curious as to my interest in speaking with you today?” he asked.

I nodded.

“I’ve only ever had your father under contract here. I’ve seen the value you are as an employee as of late. Your eighteenth birthday is coming soon, and I thought it would only be proper to hire you under contract too.”

“A little more income would be nice,” I agreed. There were so many things we could do if we had more money. Mama might not have to work so hard, Pop might be able to buy a piece of land, and eventually we could have our own home.

“I realize your family works very hard, and that an increase in pay is well overdue. It’s time to give your father a raise, and give you the same pay he was formerly making to begin with. Is that an acceptable offer?” Mr. Rollins clasped his hands around his protruding stomach.

I nodded.

“Then it’s done. I’ll draw up the papers.” His ruddy cheeks pinched into a smile.

As I towered over him, he offered me a stubby hand. After a firm shake, the deal was sealed. When he left to see to other business, I almost did a stupid dance right where I was.

I wanted someone to tell, but I had no friends. Annabeth hated me, and if I told Grace, she’d probably want to celebrate by fornicating. It was probably her pastime of choice.

* * * *

The next morning on the walk to school, Grace wasn’t there due to some last minute illness. I took the opportunity to catch up to Annabeth.

As I fell in beside her, I walked with a skip in my step. “Can I walk you to school? I was hoping to talk to you about something.”

Telling her the good news her father had given me would be a great way to take the place Drew Cobb normally did. So, even though she stared straight ahead, I didn’t give up.

“I’m perfectly capable of walking myself to school.” She moved on past me.

My chest deflated, but as I regarded her, I noticed something about her I’d never really allowed myself to. No other woman was as beautiful as she’d become. Not even my mama when she was young.

Annabeth’s long, soft, brown hair was pinned up in an elegant mound of curls, and her neck was milky white. The soft curve of her shoulders led to a neckline I’d have done anything to…

Whoa. This was a girl I could never have.

Those thoughts had to stop.

In a few minutes, we would pass Drew Cobb’s plantation, and he would surely waste no time making sure the spot beside Annabeth was filled.

“Good morning, sunshine.” He took her book and speller.

I sped up and cleared my throat.

“Oh, hi there, Colby. I didn’t see you back there,” he said in his best gentlemanly voice.

Clenching my teeth under a fake smile, I nodded. “Good morning, Drew. I just thought it would be in Annabeth’s best interest to have a chaperone. Have you ever heard her Daddy’s hunting stories? He is a great marksman.”

Annabeth’s jaw dropped. With an icy tone and clenched teeth, she said, “Your assistance is kind but very unnecessary.”

“You heard the lady. I’m sure her father hardly assigned you, a lowly farmhand, the job of chaperoning.” Drew offered Annabeth his arm. He tugged her along.

Annabeth glanced back at me, and where I thought there’d be a triumphant smile, a frown blemished her normally rosy complexion. She quickly jerked her head around. She pulled her arm from Drew’s and straightened her long, yellow skirts.

With some distance between us, I kept Drew’s hands in my sights all the way to the schoolhouse.

The whole school day long, I watched Annabeth and Drew so closely I got little else done. When the bell tolled from the steeple, I left a few steps behind them. I trailed them out the doors of the schoolhouse.

“Colby,” Mrs. Peachtree called after me. “May I speak with you?”

Annabeth and Drew had already made a good distance down the lane.

“Yes, ma’am, but I need to hurry.”

“Without Grace here today, it’s the perfect time to speak with you. I know you and she were good friends in the past and that as of late, something has happened to trouble her. Her marks are suffering, and she is nearly always causing a ruckus in the classroom. I just don’t understand. She’s such a bright girl. I couldn’t help but notice your distance lately, and wonder if it could have anything to do with the way she’s acting out?” She stared at me through spectacles.

“To be honest, we were never that close. When she started acting strange at the plantation, I’m sad to say, I severed all ties with her myself. There’s really nothing I can do to help I don’t think.”

“That’s unfortunate. But if you felt led to do so, I can’t advise you differently. I just wish there was a way you could talk to her and work things out so at least she can focus again. She’s headed down the wrong path. I’m afraid it’s going to be a dark one if things don’t soon change.” Mrs. Peachtree dipped her head.

“I’ll see what I can do, but I can’t promise anything. May I please be excused now?” I looked out the window. “I have some things to look after.”

Mrs. Peachtree raised a brow. “It really is dangerous to be caught between two sisters, Colby. Be careful. A woman’s heart is a deep, dark place when she feels she’s been slighted.”

“Oh, no. I’m just protecting her is all.” Even as I said it, I believed it about as far as Mrs. Peachtree could throw me.

She smiled and pressed down her simple skirts. “Be excused. And be careful. Oh, to be young again.”

I hurried out the door and down the lonely tree-covered lane.

Was Mrs. Peachtree right? Had I allowed myself to have feelings for someone who was even more impossible to be with than Grace?

Annabeth’s father would never allow a lowly farmhand to be with the only hope his family name had at survival.

Sure, I’d used it in joking as a way to get Grace’s hands off me for years, but I’d never really considered how true the concept was.

At my turn-off, an archway of greenery bordered the property. Around the corner of the last fence post, I collided with Annabeth.

“Are you spying on me again?” She shoved away from me.

“Spying? What? No, you aren’t so important that I spend all day worrying over your whereabouts, Miss Rollins. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have lessons.” The thought of her being over there in the woods with that horse’s ass made me want to rip his—

I rushed past her, but something stopped me a few steps away. “You and that boy are going to end up in trouble. If you can’t do your courting in front of a chaperone, then you don’t need to do it at all.”

“Well, Mr. Man of the Cloth, is that it? Are you done preaching to me now?”

“For now, until I see you making another mistake, and then I’ll be obliged to put my two cents in, then too. You’re turning out just like your sister.”

Annabeth swung a flat hand toward my cheek.

My hand went up, catching her wrist with a speed I didn’t know I had.

She stumbled and fell against me.

I gathered her in my arms.

The flash of heat in her cheeks and our proximity sent shards of hot glass all over my body.

Loose spiral sprigs fell from the crown of braids and curls on her head. The creamy curve of her neck and her bared shoulders led my gaze downward.

I shook it off and pulled away.

This was why she couldn’t be alone with that sorry bastard. He didn’t have a gentleman’s bone in his body.

“Don’t you ever compare me to my sister. I don’t go into the woods with every boy I’ve met since I was twelve years old.” Her chin lifted indignantly. “Grace Rollins is an abomination. A Jezebel, really. I only hope you were as respectable and honorable as you expect me to be.”

My blood thickened to molasses, and my tongue was as heavy as an ox yoke.

I could only stare down at her golden brown eyes. I couldn’t tell her that I agreed. That her sister was something worse than everyone thought she was. Nor could I admit that I had been less than honorable. I had been weak. No it hadn’t been my fault, but maybe I could have done something more to stop her sooner. I couldn’t stare into an angel’s eyes and tell her I’d fallen into the clutches of the devil.

“Well, you’re probably the only person to deny her. She’s stooped to atrocious levels I would never in a lifetime imagine stooping. She doesn’t care who she hurts, and she’s not at all above hurting family or friends.” A single tear trickled down her cheek. Annabeth brushed past me.

Feeling half numb, I walked the rest of the way to the cottage.

Not saying anything when Annabeth had given me the chance was worse than any usual white lie. Like it was going to snowball into something…something really bad.

Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor,
came from everywhere and nowhere, bugging me as I poured feed into the horses troughs.

Okay. I wasn’t supposed to lie to my neighbor, but when I told her, I suspected her sister of some form of witchery, she was sure to call me a liar. It wasn’t possible to tell her I’d been defiled and the way of how it happened in the same story and not make myself look like a tramp. And a lunatic.

I scooped more feed.

Love thy neighbor,
came from that same everywhere/nowhere place not too long after.

Yes, I knew what that meant, but I couldn’t help but laugh a little. And the more I thought about it, the more I did.

I sat down in the barn floor and literally guffawed.

Good one, God. Love her?

I was pretty sure that was one of the most impossible things he could have asked of me.

But I wondered if there shouldn’t have been some commandment such as, thou shalt not strangle thy neighbor even if he or she angers you to insanity.

I found a straw broom and swept the floor so hard some of the bristles began to fall out. I swept up the dirt onto a flat board and turned to find Mama in the barn doorway. I put the dust just past her and stopped. “What?”

“We only have one broom. You should go ahead and admit your feelings,” she said with a smug sound in her tone.

“I’m just as mad as I was a few days ago, only now a different girl is the source of my anger. This girl. She makes me crazy. Every time I try to help her, she lashes out at me, and when she tries to help me with soothing words, I end up lashing out at her. It’s like this explosive…” I paused out of frustration at the loss of words for it. “She’s like a tornado meeting a hurricane. She’s a force of nature I don’t know what to do with. When I’m near her, I want to grab her, and throttle her into reality because I see her doing things I know will only lead to heartache. She just—she acts like I’m the enemy. I don’t know. I can’t explain it. She frustrates me so bad. I feel like I should help her, but we just can’t communicate without arguing. All I know is nothing about us makes any sense.” I tossed the broom against the wall.

Mama stared at me with a far-off look. “It makes perfect sense.”

I stood there dumbly staring at her.

“I’ll be preparing the kitchen for dinner.” With a grin, she hummed as she started for the cottage.

“Don’t start that humming stuff. You women act like us men are supposed to know exactly what you’re thinking. What am I supposed to do now?”

“You have to see for yourself.” She turned to me and planted a firm kiss on my forehead. “I love you. You aren’t my little boy anymore.”

“I’ll always be your little boy, Mama.” I felt bad for my outburst. As I approached her for a hug, little wrinkles around her eyes crinkled with her smile.

My reflection in the glass panes revealed something else. My cheeks were flushed and I looked…happy?

As frustrated as I was, there was no way.

Annabeth walked with Drew to school again.

I ignored them.

Mostly.

They shot each other googly eyes and acted all lovesick.

Couldn’t she see he was full of manure?

I could. Plain as day.

And she was falling deeper and deeper into his trap.

Throughout the day, they passed notes behind Mrs. Peachtree. After about the tenth pass, I almost jerked one from his hand and tore it to shreds, but I folded my arms and stared out the window.

A gasp jerked my attention back to Annabeth.

Her face twisted as she read the little folded paper. She tossed it back to him without writing anything in return. She sat erect, facing the chalkboard, and didn’t look at him for the last hour of school that day.

The more my gaze stayed on Drew and Annabeth, the louder and more openly Grace flirted with every boy in the class.

At one point, she got so loud Mrs. Peachtree called her out. “Miss Rollins, though you are plenty old enough to control yourself, if you continue to disrupt my lessons, I’ll have your father come here and spank you in front of the entire class.”

“Daddy probably wouldn’t mind to do that, I’m sure.” Grace stood eerily still and stared at Miss Peachtree.

The classroom was quiet, all but a chair scraping on the wooden floor.

“If you continue on this plight to destroy yourself and hinder my pupils from learning, I’ll have no choice but to remove you from the school.” Mrs. Peachtree’s bright young face reddened.