Words Spoken True (29 page)

She raised up then and leaned over him until he had to look in her eyes. “And is that why you married me? To rescue me.”

He met her eyes. “I told you, Adriane. I married you because I love you. No other reason.”

“But you have rescued me.” Adriane touched his lips softly with her own. “And for that I’m grateful.”

Blake quelled the passion that made him want to grab her and leave all words behind. “You may not think I have pulled off much of a rescue when Coleman Jimson sets us out on the street later today.”

She surprised him by smiling a little. “We’ll be on the street together.” Her smile grew wider. “With Beck and Duff, of course.”

“And Joe,” Blake said with an answering smile.

A blush warmed her cheeks as she took a quick glance at the sun streaming through the window and then at the door. “Whatever will they think of us still in bed with the sun full up.”

His smile became a soft laugh. “I’m thinking they will guess the truth.”

“And what truth is that?”

He pulled her down on top of his chest and whispered into her soft hair. “That if there is never another day, this day will be enough.”

A
driane surrendered herself to his touch again and rejoiced that her body responded so naturally to his. After their passion was once again spent, she laid her head on Blake’s chest. Everything was forgotten except his fingers in her hair and the sound of his heart slowing its mad racing.

The soft knock on her door surprised her, as if she’d forgotten there was anyone else in the world besides them. “Addie,” Beck called. “Addie, you awake?”

Adriane stiffened and started to jerk away from Blake, but he smiled and held her closer while he whispered in her ear, “We’re married, Adriane. Married people sleep together.”

“Surely not all day,” she whispered back, her face burning hot.

“If they want,” he said with a lazy smile.

But he let her sit up and pull on her wrapper before she answered Beck. “What is it, Beck?”

“I was just some worried about you, seeing as how the morning’s half spent. And then there’s the paper, and ain’t none of us seen hide nor hair of Blake all morning. Joe figures he must have gone down to the riverfront to try to dig up some news about the murders.”

Blake looked at Adriane with a smile and raised eyebrows as he waited for her to answer Beck. Adriane stood up and smoothed her hands over her cheeks as if she could rub away the hot color flooding them. “No, he’s here with me,” she said.

There was a silence on the other side of the door then, and Adriane imagined Beck’s cheeks might be turning red to match her own before he said, “Then I reckon I’m double sorry to be bothering the two of you, but you know I ain’t never been no hand at writing out stories, and if we’re gonna get another issue of the
Tribune-Herald
on the street before Jimson throws us out, we’d best be at it.” Beck’s voice changed a bit. “He sent a note around a bit ago.”

Blake got out of bed, pulled on his pants, and in two steps was across the room to pull open the door. “What did he say?” he asked Beck.

Beck didn’t answer right away as he looked between them without the least sign of embarrassment and grinned so big that his eyes were nearly lost in the explosion of wrinkles. When he did finally say something, it had nothing to do with Coleman Jimson. “I’m feeling like somebody’s give me a Christmas gift seeing the two of you like this.”

Adriane pulled her wrap tighter, very conscious of her lack of clothes under it. “Oh hush, Beck, and stop looking like you just scooped the headlines for a week. It’s not as if we’ve been doing anything uncommon.”

“Now that’s a fact, Addie, but all things considered, I figured as how it’d take the two of you a heap longer to get around to it.”

“Adriane and I haven’t been considering much of anything except ourselves this morning, but I suppose it’s time to be getting down to business again.” Blake’s smile disappeared. “What did Jimson’s note say?”

Beck turned serious as well. “He’s coming around to meet with Addie at three. I figured if we hurried, we could have tomorrow’s paper most done by then.”

“And Duff, where is he?” Blake asked as he pulled on his shirt.

“He took his papers out, but he’s back now. I told him the press had been running a tad rough and he’s taking a look at it. The boy’s got a knack for the machinery, but some problems are hard to put your finger on. I figure to keep him busy with it most of the day.”

Blake paused in tucking in his shirt and looked up at Beck. “Good. I’d just as soon he wasn’t on the streets today.”

Adriane felt the flush draining away from her cheeks as suddenly all their problems pushed back into the room to surround her. “We could print a retraction. Say we were misinformed and there is no witness.”

Blake turned to her and laid his hand softly on her cheek. “Beck and I won’t let anything happen to Duff, Adriane.”

“That’s right, Addie. Don’t you worry none about it. You just stay here and rest up.” Again Beck grinned.

Adriane was opening her mouth to say she was quite rested enough when without looking up from pulling on his shoes, Blake said, “She’ll have to rest tonight. We need her to get out the paper now.”

“I reckon you’re right as rain about that.” Then with another grin and a wink at Adriane, Beck backed out of the room shutting the door behind him.

Blake turned to look at her. Slowly he reached out and ran his hand softly along her cheek. “I’m not sure I care whether we put out another issue or not,” he said as he reached for the tie to her wrapper.

Adriane pushed his hand away. “We’ve been quite scandalous enough already. I daresay I won’t be able to look at Beck without blushing for days as it is.”

Blake laughed and grabbed her close before she could step away from him. It only took the touch of his lips on hers to make her abandon all resistance, but even as the fire of passion rose inside her, he pulled back and smiled down at her.

“Till tonight, my darling.” He kissed her one more time before he turned her loose and yanked open the door. “Don’t be long,” he said. “We’ve a paper to get out.”

After he shut the door behind him and his footsteps clattered down the stairs, Adriane sat down on the edge of the bed and put her head in her hands. She wavered between wanting to say a prayer of thanks for Blake to thinking she should ask forgiveness for her wantonness. Surely it was indecent for her to have felt such happiness with Blake so soon after her father’s death.

It was all too confusing. Too much had happened too fast. Some part of her found it impossible to believe her father was gone forever. Scraps of arguments kept coming to mind to make him change his mind about Blake. Arguments she’d never get to use, but somehow she needed to believe that with time she could have convinced him.

With a deep breath, Adriane sat up straight, forcing herself to face the truth. Her father had run out of time. There would be no convincing him. The best she could do for him now was to save the
Tribune
, and time was running out for that as well.

Adriane stood up and poured water from the pitcher into the washbowl on her dresser. She needed to be ready when Coleman Jimson came.

She stared at her image in the mirror. She felt stronger than she had in months. No longer was she being carried along in a flood of what other people wanted for her into a life she wouldn’t be able to bear. She was Adriane Garrett now, and Blake loved her the way she was.

For a second Henrietta’s dour words of warning came back to make her uneasy. “We’re all Eves. Every one of us no more than nine months from suffering and death.” And now Adriane had been with a man. Even now she could be beginning that nine-month journey.
And the light shineth in the darkness.
That was what she had to think on. The light shining in the darkness. The Lord had helped her bear the darkness of Henrietta’s closet until her father could rescue her.

Now her father was gone, but the Lord hadn’t left her in darkness. He’d sent Blake to her. Together they could be strong enough to face anything. Together. Side by side. She didn’t have to worry about Blake trying to shove her into a small dark closet of conformity.

She smiled a little. In fact he was throwing open doors to parts of herself she’d never even dared to dream about. And even as a new blush climbed into her cheeks, she found herself looking forward to his promise of the night.

“Adriane Darcy,” she whispered to her reflection. “What’s come over you? Thinking such wanton thoughts.” She tightened her mouth to erase the smile and splashed more cool water on her face. But the smile stayed curled deep inside her, waiting without fear or shame for the right moment to uncurl and find its way back to her lips. And she remembered Grace’s awkward explanation of what happened between a man and woman in the marriage bed.
It’s by God’s design. He gave us love. He made us this way for a purpose.

A prayer came unbidden to her lips. “Thank you, Lord, for letting Blake love me.”

Downstairs, Adriane threw herself into the work of getting out the paper. The hours passed swiftly with words and the clatter of type in the galleys. Blake, with Duff safely in tow, had gone down to the riverfront, but they’d come back with little new information.

Blake wrote an editorial calling for accountability for those who had done the shooting, but there was little real fire in his words. As he told Adriane after she read it over, the police could hardly arrest the whole town. Or even all the Know Nothings.

“But mark my words,” he added. “The Know Nothings have killed their cause with these riots. Thinking men will leave the party.”

“But what about their candidates who won in the election?” Adriane looked up from the paper at him.

“Men like Jimson will be smart enough to note how the wind lies and make new alliances.”

At Jimson’s name, Adriane felt a cold dread settle in the pit of her stomach as she looked at the clock. It was almost three.

“Don’t worry, Adriane.” Blake put his hand on her arm. “Jimson may be able to take the building and the press, but he can’t take our words. We’ll find a way to get those words in front of the readers.”

“How?” Adriane asked. She had spent part of the morning going through her father’s accounts to try to determine exactly how much was owed to Jimson, but she could find no record of any deal he’d struck with Jimson.

For a brief moment she had thought that if Coleman Jimson had no written proof of money owed him, they would not have to give in to his demands. Then she knew she couldn’t do that. She would honor her father’s debts.

Besides, even before Jimson came at three and pulled the paper bearing her father’s signature out of his pocket, she had known he would have the proof. He was not a man to let such a thing as money owed ride on handshakes and friendship.

“Adriane, my dear, you must know how distasteful all of this is for me,” Jimson said, a look of genuine sorrow in his eyes.

Adriane had steeled herself for the confrontation, prepared for anything but sincerity from him, and for a moment she was at a loss for words. She stared down at the paper to regain her composure and went pale when she saw the listed amount. Then she smiled a bit at herself as she realized an amount ten times less would have been just as impossible for them to pay.

Without a word, she handed the paper to Blake, who stood beside her in the front hall. He read the amount impassively and handed it back to her.

Adriane looked from the paper to Coleman Jimson. It was strange how it was almost as if she’d never seen him before this moment. Always before when she had looked at him, Stanley had been in his shadow. Now as she thought about what Stanley had done, she began to wonder which shadow was darkest and just how much Coleman Jimson actually knew about his son.

Adriane laid the paper on the hall table without taking her eyes off Jimson. “You know, of course, that we can’t pay you the full amount today.”

“I feared as much.” Jimson again sounded as though the truth of that gave him no pleasure. “I would have never called in the note as long as your father was living, my dear, but things have tragically changed.” He glanced over to Blake before he looked back at Adriane. “We do seem to have somewhat of a dilemma.”

Adriane kept her eyes steady on the man in front of her. “Do you know who shot my father?”

He looked at her with a puzzled frown. “My dear, how could I? It was a shot fired at random from a mob of crazed men.”

“And how many men in your pay were in that mob?” Adriane stared at him.

“My dear girl, grief has caused you to lose all reason.” His surprise was evident. “What possible motive could I have for wanting to harm your father? It was my fondest hope that we would soon be related through your marriage to Stanley. I knew nothing of the broken engagement until after the riots.”

“Perhaps not, but Stanley did. He came to the
Tribune
Monday and threatened my father’s life if I persisted in my refusal to marry him.”

Now it was Jimson’s turn to pale, but he pulled himself under control quickly. “Stanley was no doubt distraught when he was here. Normal enough, considering he’d just been rejected by the woman he loves, but anything he said was no more than words. Stanley is much better with words than actions.”

“Perhaps you don’t know your son as well as you think.” Even as Adriane spoke, she realized that Coleman Jimson knew his son very well. Beads of sweat were popping out on his forehead. Even so, she had no proof for her accusations.