Tender (The Trelawneys of Williamsburg Time Travel Romance Book 1) Read online

  “Oh, yes! If Rachel is here, I should never wish to leave.”

  Angry at Grey for bringing her into this tangled mix, Rachel strove to keep her voice steady. “I don’t know, Emily.” The words fell to a bleak whisper as appalling tears stung her throat. “I won’t be here forever, I’m afraid.”

  And that was the grim reality. Her purpose here was not to fall in love with the child whose imploring blue gaze beseeched her to stay forever. Nor had she meant to fall in love with Emily’s father. Yet fallen she had, on both counts.

  “But you’re here now.” Stubbornly, he reined his horse alongside hers. “Look at me, Rachel.”

  She blinked and swallowed, then lifted cool hazel eyes, refusing him the glimpse he craved of her heart.

  “None of us knows the future. Life is a fragile and tenuous creature.”

  But indeed she knew the future; it was her home. Not this—this quaint time when children frolicked with fathers on sweet spring mornings, unburdened by haunting memories of days that were lost. A time when a determined young man made his fortune off the land and then sought a well-born English lady for his bride. A time that wasn’t hers, no matter how she was coming to love it—or those who belonged in it.

  No longer able to fight the tears, she abruptly pressed her heel into the horse’s side, spurring him into motion.

  Given his rein, the animal leapt forward. Down the path he raced, stretching out his legs in easy familiarity. He knew the land and loved it, and she bent low over his neck, ignoring Grey’s calls for her to stop. The tears blinded her and the wind whipped at her as she urged the horse on, and she was soon lost. She slowed the horse to a gallop as he emerged into a wide clearing. She wiped her eyes, nonplussed at the scene before her.

  Row upon row of tobacco plants crossed the countryside. At each mound knelt a man, woman, or child, tending the plants.

  “Stand there, Rufus. Bind him to the pole, McGee.”

  A huge man on a chestnut mare barked the gruff command, and a tall, lean black man stood with silent pride. Another man grabbed his shirt in one fist and ripped it from shoulder to waist. Wounds not quite yet healed crisscrossed his back in a macabre tapestry.

  The overseer climbed down from his horse and pulled a whip from his waistband. A leather thong secured his black hair, and a beard covered a tanned, cruelly handsome face. With almost sensual relish, he let the cat-o’-nine-tails fly, as if testing its supple strength. The corded muscles in the black man’s neck hardened; he refused to flinch against the overseer’s torture.

  She dismounted and raced toward them. “No! Stop!”

  The overseer ignored her, letting the first blow fly. The man named Rufus bore it in stoic silence, and a bland smile hooked the overseer’s mouth as he raised the whip again.

  “Stop it!” she screamed, grabbing his arm.

  “Begone!” he snarled, slinging her aside with startling ease. She fell to the ground and scrambled to her feet again.

  “Manning.” Grey’s voice was a quiet rumble of thunder. He drew his galloping steed to a shuddering stop just short of the overseer, leaning to wrest the whip from him.

  Manning’s gaze glittered. “How am I to get ’em to work?”

  “Not with the lash.”

  She spotted Emily at the end of the path, and she gathered the child in her arms, burying her head against her breast.

  “No bondsman is disciplined without an inquiry and Mr. Hastings’ consent, as you’re well aware.” Grey’s eyes were cold.

  “Hastings knows Rufus is a troublemaker.”

  “What’s his crime?”

  “He raped a wench.”

  “Is this true?” Grey asked Rufus.

  The man stared at rich, tilled earth. “No, sir,” he spat.

  “I saw it with my own eyes,” Manning growled.

  “Rufus?”

  The man remained silent.

  “If it’s rape we’re talking about, he’s due far worse than a flogging,” Grey said.

  Rufus’s head shot up. Eyes a startling shade of hazel—nearly green—burned with pride and sullen anger. High cheekbones held subtly carved, princely elegance and bronze skin bore the evidence of a white ancestor. He raised his chin and met Grey’s eyes.

  “There was a rape that occurred. And Mr. Manning was there. But I wasn’t doing the raping.”

  “Why, you lying nigger!” Manning exploded, lunging at him.

  The cat-o’-nine-tails hissed near Manning’s ear. A strip of leather snapped against his black hair. He went still with fear. Grey’s deft expertise with the whip stunned her.

  “Touch him and you’ll taste the lash yourself.”

  Manning’s face reddened with rage and humiliation, and his eyes flashed pure hatred.

  “Return to your work, Rufus,” Grey said, his gaze locked on the overseer.

  Rufus squared his shoulders and walked silently between the rows of tobacco plants. A trail of blood streaked his tattered shirt.

  With deliberate slowness, Grey wound the whip. “Since arriving home, I’ve heard nothing but tales of your cruelty. I won’t suffer the mistreatment of my bondsmen, Manning. Heed my counsel: abuse another, and you’ll be prosecuted.”

  “M’lord, you hired me to drive your slaves.”

  “Mr. Hastings hired you. And that’s a decision I’ll discuss at length with him.”

  “Rufus thinks he’s smart, fills the other blacks with crazy notions. And that last one you brought back, that Sassy, she’s the devil’s own hell. Where’s she from?”

  “That’s none of your concern.” Grey settled the coiled whip over his saddlehorn. “But as it happens, this cargo was from Jamaica. And it was a bad journey. Of 184 bondsmen, including those from Sierra Leone, 47 died on the trip. There was illness aboard the Swallow.”

  Dread crept over Rachel, along with memories. She remembered Grey’s unnerving ability to wield the whip; she remembered the morning on Market Square, when he’d refused to interfere with the selling of the slaves. She listened once more in her memory to the indisputable facts he’d tonelessly recited moments ago, along with details she’d ignored until it was too late.

  This cargo was from Jamaica … including those from Sierra Leone … 47 died on the trip …

  The Swallow was no tobacco merchant vessel, simply carrying the exotic plant to foreign shores. It was the ship of a man who dealt in human flesh, and it belonged to the man she had come to love.

  A slave trader.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The trio started back to Rosalie in a pensive silence.

  “Why did you run away?” Emily asked at last.

  “I … simply wanted to give the horse a good ride.”

  The scene in the tobacco fields had seemingly little effect on the child. What must she have seen in her young lifetime? Rachel couldn’t bring herself to look at Grey.

  How kind he had seemed. How tender with his daughter, and with Rachel; how ruthless a beast, to enslave men and women and children no older than his own daughter. She didn’t know which was worse: that she had fallen in love with a married man, or that she had fallen in love with a slave trader.

  They rode back to the house and dismounted, and she passed her reins into the waiting hands of the groom.

  “Will you be wantin’ to ride tomorrow, ma’am?”

  She met the eyes of the boy; about seventeen, he seemed to want to smile but knew better.

  Will you be wanting to ride tomorrow?

  The simplest question, a matter of choice.

  Suddenly, each black face she saw reminded her of her folly. In the nervous eyes of the boy who took her horse she saw a teenager who didn’t know how to read, and never would; who didn’t own the clothes on his back, and never would; who hadn’t the freedom to walk to town of his own free will. And he never would.

  Will you be wanting to ride tomorrow?

  Did he even know what freedom was?

  The thought chilled her. Of all the people she’d ever known
and all those she had yet to know, none could hold more precious nor understand more profoundly the idea of freedom, than this boy.

  “I don’t know. Thank you.” Turning away, she summoned a smile for Emily. “I enjoyed riding with you today.”

  “Won’t you join us in the gardens for a while?” Grey asked. “I thought we could do our lessons outside today, it’s such a lovely day.”

  She saw his surprise at her anger—he truly didn’t know what upset her. Even now, the boy was leading the horses away, and her gaze settled on his dusty, bare feet.

  “No.” Wearily, she headed toward the house. In the dining hall, she found a servant polishing silver.

  “Bess, can you tell me where Mr. Hastings is?”

  “Abovestairs in his office, ma’am.”

  She took the stairs to his office and entered without knocking, closing the door behind her.

  Hastings glanced at her. “The civilized occasionally knock.”

  “But we aren’t exactly civilized here, are we?”

  He leaned back in his chair calmly. “Is something amiss?”

  “Grey Trelawney is a slave trader.”

  Unperturbed, he nodded. “Yes.”

  Rachel’s jaw dropped. “You have no qualms at all about it?”

  “Qualms?”

  “A slave trader! Why didn’t you tell me?”

  He hesitated, as if attempting to understand her. “Lord Windmere’s profession is entirely legal, and I fail to see why it concerns you.”

  Why indeed. Because she’d recognized in him a gentleness that she’d never known in another man? Because she’d believed him to be a man of conviction? Because these traits, and countless other noble qualities in him couldn’t blot out the deplorable part that committed such atrocities?

  Forty-seven had died on the trip. Forty-seven human beings, taken from their homeland, had then perished at sea. Husband torn from wife, daughter from father, sister from sister.

  “What happens to these people if they die on a voyage?”

  “They’re buried at sea.”

  “Are they given … Christian burials?”

  “They are not Christian,” he replied, confused.

  Rachel thought of Camisha’s mother, Helen Carlyle, who’d spirited her away to church when Max Sheppard wasn’t looking. Any faith Rachel had was to be credited to Helen.

  She shuddered. Forty seven, thrown overboard like so much rubbish, their bodies left for the scavengers of the sea. She knew despondent rage for the unmourned, their souls no more than a number signifying lost profits. For the luckless survivors who were forced to begin their lives anew—No. Who were forced to accept that their lives were over, their days to be spent toiling to line the pockets of the wealthy. Like Grey Trelawney.

  Her rage mellowed into an impotent despair. Who was this man—this monster who routinely committed the unconscionable; could any love live within the heart of such a man?

  “Miss Sheppard … Rachel.”

  “How can you tolerate this? You’re the most principled man I know, and it’s … abominable.”

  For the first time she could remember, Hastings’ face reflected discomfort. He rose, gently touching her arm. “So there are no bondsmen in your time?”

  “No! But we still feel the anger and pain of their children.”

  His lips tightened as the agony of it pierced her. He awkwardly gathered her into his arms, patting her. She no longer knew what brought her pain. The plight of those lost and damaged lives blanketing these colonies? Or her own loss?

  “It cannot improve your opinion greatly, but his trade is completely respected in this time. Only to a handful is the negro as valuable as we are.”

  “And you, Hastings?”

  “I am not paid for my opinions, dear.”

  She raised her head at the familiar phrase. Once, she had been the one with no opinion.

  “Is there anything I can do for you?”

  “Find Malcolm Henderson. I want to go home.”

  Her chin trembled, and his eyes were kind as he examined her. He nodded at last. “As you wish.”

  She turned away.

  “Rachel?”

  “Yes?”

  “You’ve become quite dear to me, child. It pains me to see you suffering.”

  She glanced back at him, blinking the tears away. “Then … let me go home.”

  In her room, she was drawn to the window, which stood open to let a breeze through. The sound of laughter wafted up from the gardens below, where Emily daintily rolled a small ball toward a cluster of wooden pins. One or two pins fell over, and she scampered toward those left standing, hastily kicking them over.

  Her lips curved slightly.

  He shouted a protest against Emily’s cheating, and he quickly snatched her up. “I shall toss you in the river!”

  Emily giggled gleefully. “I love you, Papa.”

  And I love you, my sweetest darling daughter.

  The words echoed within her memory, and her heart swelled almost painfully. She squeezed her eyes shut, forcing the memory to last.

  And as the tears came, she saw him at last—her father.

  He was young—not much older than she was now. Hair as black and softly curling as her own. Kind, brown eyes that crinkled when he laughed. A generous mouth that loved to laugh, and that pressed a warm kiss on her forehead. His words—words Max Sheppard had never said—played on her mind with quiet sweetness, and she cherished the memory, hers for all time. His eyes smiled at her from behind bookish glasses that only made him more handsome. Mama said all his female students were in love with him. He was a teacher.

  The rush of details that had washed over her abruptly stopped. Melancholy, she dried her tears and watched Grey settle his daughter into her lessons. How many men in this era were the kind of father he was? For that matter, how many in her own time?

  Once, he glanced up and caught her watching them. He gave her a quizzical half-smile and lifted his hand, and she turned away.

  Damn him for awakening in her a wealth of sweeter memories she’d never thought to know, for creating a myriad collection of new memories, then staining all of that with pain, making it impossible to love him for any of it. After a time, the chatter on the lawn faded, and the gardens were silent.

  Where the hell was Henderson?

  She left her room to find Hastings. Emily entertained a parlor maid in the hall.

  “Papa says you aren’t feeling well, Rachel. What’s wrong?”

  Emily was the first child she’d ever known well, and she loved her. A pang went through her; she would miss this child who’d shown ingenuous affection since the first moment she’d ever seen her, waving at her from another home in another time.

  And one person was responsible for having created this happy, inquisitive, intelligent child. How could a man who had raised a child like Emily be beyond redemption?

  “I’m fine. Where is Mr. Hastings?”

  “I saw him go out past the stables a while ago.”

  “Thank you.”

  She left the house. As she passed the stables, she heard Grey’s voice and saw him inside, crooning to his horse as he groomed the animal. His gentleness irked her, and she entered.

  His eyes rested on her in quiet scrutiny. “Hello.”

  “You treat your horse with a great deal of respect.”

  “I’m rather fond of the animal. He serves me well.”

  “Yet human beings aren’t worthy of that same respect.”

  His long, luxurious strokes stopped. “What do you mean?”

  “You enslave men and women.”

  “I hold a number of bondsmen, yes.” He placed the brush aside and led the horse into the stall. “What of it?”

  “And you trade in these human beings as a commodity.”

  She realized that until she asked the question, she hadn’t accepted Hastings’ confirmation. A part of her adamantly denied the possibility of his involvement in such a heinous endeavor.


  He gave a slow sigh and left the stall. “Yes.”

  She turned away. Instantly he was at her side, resting his hands on her shoulders. His palms were warm and soothing, his fingertips urgent. “Rachel—”

  She angrily shrugged off his touch—his comfort belonged to another woman. “Don’t touch me.”

  “What’s the matter with you?”

  “Me? How can you—how can you sleep at night? When you trap and abduct innocent people from their homes and sell them in a strange land?”

  “I abduct no one. I pay a fair—even generous—price for the bondsmen, from men of their own kind who hold them for that purpose.”

  “And without you, do you think they’d capture their own?”

  His mouth went taut. “Dear God, you’re one of those.”

  “One of who?”

  “This land is breeding men who are free and strong enough to do as they choose, unencumbered by the harping of those who would force their opinion on others.”

  “Force my opinion! I’m speaking for those who have no voice. For a group who loudly rails about freedom, you’re selective in choosing who gets the freedom and who has somebody else’s choice inflicted on him.”

  His eyes searched hers with a mixture of anger, wariness, and yearning. “If you believe I’m taking them from a life of ease, you’re mistaken. They are better off here.”

  “It’s a lucrative business, your mission of mercy.”

  He raised his hand to her face, his fingers slowly extending, tracing her cheekbone. “If I thought less of you I would take you along on my next journey, to see the lives of these people. They’re scarcely civilized—”

  “If you thought anything of me, you’d never have lied to me. You let me believe—let me hope—”

  She stopped, appalled. Abruptly she turned, but he caught her and forced her to meet his gaze, his eyes searching hers with regret and yearning. “Is that what this is about? That I deceived you? That I let my own desire for you—”

  “No,” she whispered, afraid to let him finish.

  “You cared little about my slave-owning last night.”

  His gentle reminder was damning. And it was true.