Midnight Flame Read online

  “I’ll summon Doctor Fusilier,” she said out loud.

  “Doctor Fusilier won’t come for the likes of us,” Delphine spoke harshly. “He didn’t come when my husband was dying of the cough, though I went to his house and begged on bended knee. The man caters only to the rich, not to people with no money.”

  “He’ll come if I tell him,” Laurel stated emphatically.

  “No! Roselle shall not be in the care of such a man.”

  Delphine’s eyes glittered, and for the first time Laurel noticed color rising to her pale cheeks. Yet such a slight outburst seemed to sap Delphine’s strength because she took a long, sighing breath.

  “Please don’t send for Fusilier. If anyone must help Roselle, there is a woman who lives near the Dauzets. Lulubelle is her name. She delivered my third child and is a kind person who doesn’t look down upon us.” Delphine lifted her eyes to Laurel. “You may send for her.”

  “I remember her,” Laurel said, her mind being unwillingly drawn to the night of the Mardi Gras dance when Lulubelle had helped her dress in the gypsy costume and to what had happened afterward. “I’ll send one of the servants to her.”

  Laurel softly laid Roselle’s hands on her swollen abdomen and then left and ran from the cabin. She went to Essie’s where she entreated Essie’s husband, Malcolm, to fetch Lulubelle and bring her to the old cabin in the clearing. Then she made her way back, with Essie beside her, to Roselle.

  The night wore on, and by the time Lulubelle arrived, Roselle lay weak and gasping for breath. Lulubelle’s dark eyes immediately took in the situation and ordered the children away. After Essie had departed with them, she examined Roselle who shrieked in pain. She turned to Laurel and Delphine.

  “The feet are coming first, mesdames.”

  Delphine uttered a little cry. “Is that bad?” Laurel asked.

  Nodding, Lulubelle got up and poured some water into a kettle, which she placed in the fireplace to boil, her wide girth entirely obscuring Laurel’s view of the flames licking at the pot’s bottom. She turned and faced them. “You know what must be done, Delphine.”

  Delphine’s hands shook, and she glanced at her gasping daughter with pain-filled eyes, “Oui.”

  “Then let’s begin. I need your help, Madame Duvalier, because Delphine is much too weak to hold onto Roselle.”

  “I’ll do anything you ask,” Laurel said, “but what is going to happen?”

  “I’m going to save this baby and Roselle, but there will be much pain for the girl. I hope you’re strong enough to hold her down, madame.” Lulubelle eyed Laurel warily, not entirely convinced Laurel would be able to do the job.

  Laurel mutely nodded at Roselle, who seemed oblivious to what was going on. With Lulubelle’s instructions ringing in her ears, Laurel positioned herself at Roselle’s head and, linking their hands, brought them high above Roselle. Roselle’s fingers lay limply in Laurel’s until Laurel felt them tense when Lulubelle situated herself before the girl’s straddled thighs and began to probe.

  Lulubelle’s voice was gentle. “I’m going to turn the little one, Roselle. You’ll feel pain, but soon this shall all be over, chérie. Soon your baby will be in your arms, and this will seem like a bad dream. Don’t fight me though, it will hurt. It has to hurt, and I am sorry to do this to you.”

  Though Laurel could tell that Lulubelle was being as gentle as she could, Roselle began to whimper and try to pull away from Laurel. As each whimper became a scream, Roselle tugged more vigorously at the hands that held her pinned. Laurel had thought Roselle was exhausted, but now she writhed and moaned and then shrieked in such excruciating pain that Laurel didn’t know if she could hold her grip. Her fingers felt crimped from the pressure she exerted on Roselle’s. Then an agonized scream, unlike anything Laurel had ever heard, ripped through the room and momentarily deafened Laurel, and all grew quiet except for the ringing in Laurel’s ears.

  “Push, Roselle.”

  Lulubelle had spoken, and Roselle obeyed. Without another sound issuing from Roselle’s mouth, she forced her son into the world.

  When Laurel left the cabin, Roselle’s baby was sucking contentedly at her breast. The sight of the infant’s fuzzy head nestled at his mother’s bosom was one that Laurel would carry with her for the rest of her life. Tears misted her eyes at the beauty of birth. For the first time she realized what the future held for her and knew that her own child would more than make up for the pain of birth and the pain of Tony’s deception.

  Few stars sprinkled the heavens as she hurried back to the main house. She had been gone for hours and wondered if she had been missed. Turning her head toward the fields, she saw a flickering light in the distance, then other orange-red spots gathering into a group.

  Something was happening on the prairie.

  Voices were raised in loud shouts and then stilled by the sound of a gunshot. Tony! Tony! Her mind beat out the name her lips weren’t able to form. Had Tony been hurt? She remembered him returning to the house one night with a torch in hand. Her only thought now was to discover if he had been shot, if he needed her.

  Her feet flew across the grassy expanse of fields, her eyes on the torchlights in the dark night. In her chest her heart felt about to explode. Her legs seemed wooden, and she wondered if she would ever reach the circle of men who bent over a man’s prone figure on the ground. As she rushed forward, no one noticed her except for one man who stood a few feet away.

  With a sudden lunge, the arms of Jacques Jeanfreau ensnared her against his chest and held a knife against her throat. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t utter a sound. The men before her didn’t see what had happened. All she heard was the voice of Leon Rabelais say, “He’s dead.”

  An agonized wail ripped from her throat for fear the man meant Tony. She felt herself being pulled backward into a copse of trees, the knife cool and sharp against her flesh. Tears now blinded her eyes, and she no longer thought of her own safety. She struggled to escape to see if the prone figure was Tony.

  Twenty pairs of eyes glanced up in shock, and more than one man went for his gun. She heard Jeanfreau’s voice scream in her ear. “Come after me, and I’ll kill her!”

  Out of the shadows strode the tall broad-shouldered figure of Tony Duvalier. Through her teary eyes Laurel saw him in the light of the torches, and a shudder of relief swept through her. But her relief was short-lived. Jeanfreau’s knife at her throat was an ever-constant threat to her own life. She mouthed Tony’s name, but he didn’t appear to see. His attention was solely on Jeanfreau.

  “I guess you have me at a disadvantage, Jacques. You have my wife in your power. I know how good you are with a knife. I’ve seen you skin animals, and I admit you know how to wield a blade.”

  “Oui, that I do,” Jacques uttered proudly. “I know also how to wield something else that your pretty wife might find quite interesting before I kill her.”

  Laurel felt sick at Jacques’s words. It was clear to Laurel that his cattle-thieving days were at an end, and he wasn’t above using her as a hostage or for anything else he had in mind. Her eyes implored Tony to save her, but once again, he was watching Jacques, not her. Tony had stiffened an imperceptible degree, Laurel saw, but Jacques didn’t.

  “Don’t you care what I might do to your wife, Duvalier? Or is it that your tongue still hangs out for Simone Lancier? Such a way you have with the ladies.” Jacques’s arm tightened around Laurel’s waist, and the blade teased the soft flesh of her throat. Just a slight movement of Jacques’s wrist and he would slice into her. She would die, she knew it.

  Tony shrugged his shoulders and shot Jacques a rather amused look. “You always were jealous of my prowess with the ladies, weren’t you, Jacques? I used to catch you staring at me, and any lady I happened to be entertaining from the bushes by the house. Evidently you needed tutoring in the art of love, my friend.”

  “Shut up, Duvalier, or I slit her throat right now. I will unless I get a horse to escape from here. I’m not going to end
up like my stupid brother over there, lying dead on the ground before your polished boots.”

  “I’m not giving you a horse,” Tony said stubbornly.

  “Then I’ll kill your wife.”

  “If you kill her, Jacques, and I know you can, you won’t escape me. Before God, I swear I’ll track you down, and you won’t die as quick a death as your thieving brother. Have you ever seen cowhides tanned? I know you have, and you know what a tedious process it is. One must add saltpeter, hot water, and various other salts to the skin, which is then left out for a few days to dry. I pride myself on making the finest leather in the area and shipping it to New Orleans. Now, if you harm my wife in any way, I assure you that I’ll find you, and your hide will be a cushion for some rich man’s carriage. Maybe even one of my own.”

  Laurel had never seen Tony’s eyes so black, so hard, or had heard his voice filled with such uncompromising vengeance. Jacques’s hand on his knife shook a bit, and she heard him mutter a low curse. Before she was aware of what was happening, she found herself being pushed to the ground.

  “Get him!” Tony waved his men toward the retreating figure of Jacques Jeanfreau. The men mounted their horses and galloped off and within seconds they surrounded Jacques.

  Tony’s arms encircled Laurel in a protective ring. She was crying as he picked her up and held her against his chest. Hippolyte stepped forward suddenly and inquired if she was all right.

  She nodded she thought she was, then she told him in an unsteady voice that Roselle had borne him a son. Hippolyte immediately rushed away to the cabin.

  “Are you really all right?” Tony asked her over and over.

  She rested her head against his chest as he carried her home. She was so tired that she didn’t care that she should be hating him. It felt so wonderful to be held by Tony again that she had stopped crying before they reached the house.

  ~

  Gincie, roused from sleep by all the commotion, insisted that Laurel be served tea and a warm bath be prepared. Laurel smiled gratefully to Gincie when the teacup was in her hand and leaned her head against the back of her chair. Dawn was breaking, and soft strands of gray light stroked the interior of Laurel’s bedroom. “My poor baby,” Gincie repeatedly intoned and saw to it that the water Pauline poured into the copper tub was just the right temperature.

  Seth knocked on the door and inquired about Laurel with a worried frown, but once she had assured him that the whole ordeal hadn’t harmed her, he nodded and left.

  “That man’s been hangin’ round here long enough,” Gincie flatly stated and helped Laurel off with her gown. “It’s time he left for home.”

  “Yes, I suppose so.” Laurel settled herself into the warm water and sighed in contentment. She should have felt keyed up and overwrought by the events of the last few hours. Instead a delicious languor had taken hold of her, and all the tensions of the last weeks had disappeared. Was it because Tony had come to her rescue, held her in his arms once again? She knew she should hate him for what he had done to her, but her heart didn’t.

  Lathering herself with a lilac-scented soap, she watched as the golden beams of dawn warmed the room and touched her skin with a golden cast. She rinsed off as Gincie lay out her nightgown. Her eyelids were growing heavy, but the abrupt opening of the door caused her to come instantly alert.

  “I should wring your neck.”

  Tony stood before her. His hands were placed on his hips, and his stance was spread-eagled. An ominous black cloud hovered in his eyes, replacing the warmth and concern she had seen earlier. He motioned to Gincie to leave the room, and when they were alone, Laurel gazed innocently up at him.

  “Have I displeased you?”

  “God, Laurel! You could have been nearly killed tonight. Don’t pretend you don’t know what danger you were in. Jeanfreau would have killed you if I hadn’t frightened him about the consequences of such an action. Do you have any idea how shocked I was to see you appear from nowhere? I thought you were in bed, not gallivanting around the plantation. Hippolyte told me you’ve been hiding Roselle and her family, after I told you to stay away from the Jeanfreaus. I know they needed protection, but it wasn’t up to you to do it, Laurel. Hippolyte also admitted the truth to me about the cattle thefts, that he was the one who was stealing and that you knew it. Don’t get that questioning look in your eyes. I’m not going to turn him over to the sheriff. He’s suffered enough. But, you, walking into the trap we’d laid for the Jeanfreaus … Well, you acted like a muddleheaded fool.”

  “I was helping Roselle deliver her baby.” She hated sounding defensive, but Tony was beginning to anger her. What right did he have to barge into her room and say such an insulting thing to her? “I hope you’ve unleashed all your anger, Tony, because I’m not going to listen to you another minute. I’d appreciate it if you left now so I can finish my bath and go to sleep.”

  “Sleep!” he exploded. “You could have been killed, and you’re worried about sleeping.”

  “Yes, I want to go to bed.”

  The cloud in his eyes disappeared, and a flame flickered in their black depths. “I want to go to bed, too. But not to sleep.”

  Tony’s meaning was clear, and a becoming pink blush suffused her face and traveled to the ivory globes that gently bobbed beneath the surface of the water. Laurel had no idea of the enticing picture she presented to Tony, with a green ribbon tied around her long tresses and wisps of hair framing her face. The tips of her nipples, barely concealed beneath the liquid surface, beckoned to him. An ache grew in his loins to think of suckling them, and more than anything he wanted to taste her flesh with his lips, to feel her satiny legs wrapped around his waist as he took them both to their private paradise. It had been so long since he had made love to her that Tony couldn’t restrain himself.

  Barely aware of what he was doing, he reached out for her and pulled her wet, slick body from the tub.

  One of his arms wrapped around her waist, and a hand massaged the gentle swell of her buttocks as he pinned her against him. “Don’t fight me, Laurel.” His voice was a seductive whisper against her cheek. “I want you so bad I think I’m going to go crazy if I can’t have you again. You’re all I think about.”

  “Put me down.”

  Her voice pierced through his passion, but he didn’t intend to let her get away from him again. “No. You’re mine right now. I’m not letting you go.”

  “I know, Tony,” she breathed, and her hands began to fiddle with the buttons of his shirt. “Your clothes are getting wet.”

  Tony groaned in a purely animal fashion and held her tighter. “Damn the clothes!”

  A liquid current, fast moving and hot, coursed through Laurel’s body. No matter what this man had done to her, she couldn’t deny that she wanted him with a fierceness that surprised her. By the time he had laid her across the bed, she was helping him pull off his shirt and pants, urging him to hurry. No preliminary kisses were needed between them this time. Just the feel of Laurel’s silken flesh against Tony’s body, which felt as hard and hot as freshly forged steel, sent them both into a passionate frenzy of wanting. Soft, warm breasts met a fur-planed chest. Tony’s hand pulled the green ribbon from her hair, and Laurel’s tresses fell thick and wild about her shoulders.

  “I love touching your hair,” he whispered into her ear as his hand became entangled in the mass of dark brown curls. “I love touching every part of you.”

  Satin fingertips trekked the length and breadth of Tony’s chest before snaking over his hip to his powerful thighs and hovering dangerously close to the center of his pulsating shaft. He grasped her wrist before she could move further. “Another movement could get you in trouble, lady.”

  Laurel licked his ear. “I hope it does.”

  “Wanton woman,” Tony intoned and guided her hand to his heated manhood. With gliding motions Laurel pleasured him until quickening gasps issued from Tony’s mouth. Pulling her up to him, he grabbed a handful of hair and brought her lips to his, sea
ring her in a fiery kiss that shot through Laurel like an arrow. She moaned against his mouth when his hands massaged the roundness of her buttocks. Laurel writhed on top of him until the throbbing peak of her femininity was positioned against Tony’s desire.

  His hands cupped her breasts, and Laurel moaned with mounting passion. “Love me, Tony. Love me now.”

  Her legs parted and she straddled him, bringing him into her with an unashamed eagerness. Tony filled her with an urgency that only Laurel could quench. They rode the exquisite path of ecstasy, reaching higher and higher until both of them thought they would burst. In one swift motion Tony rolled her onto her back as he thrust into her. Laurel clung to him, reveling in the sudden explosion of his passion, feeling her own body careen over the edge of sanity. Slowly, Laurel and Tony became aware of the tick of the clock, the birds chirping outside the window sill.

  Drained of desire and emotionally spent, Tony pulled the covers over them, and they fell asleep in the circle of each other’s arms.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  “It must be past noon,” Laurel mumbled and buried her face deeper into Tony’s shoulder. The midsummer sun streamed into the bedroom and, with it, heat, which caused Tony to pull back the sheet. Laurel clutched at it in a vain attempt to cover herself again, but Tony held it fast and grinned.

  “I’ve seen you naked before this, chérie. You don’t have to be embarrassed.”

  Her face lifted at the sound of his voice until she found herself staring into the ebony pools of his eyes. “I feel so wicked to be in bed at this time of day.”

  “Wicked, is it?” His finger stroked her chin. “Nothing we do together is wicked, nor is when we do it. I love you, Laurel. I’ll always love you.”

  Laurel’s heartbeat speeded up. Tony’s touch always caused her body to respond. She knew that if she didn’t get out of bed, they would make love again, that she would disgrace herself and beg him to make love to her. But she couldn’t will herself to sit up, to leave him. No matter what had happened in the past, she hoped this might be a new beginning for them. Had she forgiven him for what he had done to her? She wasn’t certain. All she knew was that, without Tony, she was incomplete.