Eternity (Montgomery/Taggert 17)

“I’m not sleeping with you tonight,” Josh said. “I’m sleeping in the big bed.”

“With Carrie?” Dallas asked.

“With Carrie,” Josh said, as though it were the most common thing in the world.

When the children were out of sight, Josh turned to her.

“I’m not sure…” she began, but she didn’t know what else to say. Should she say she wasn’t sure they should spend the night together? Was she afraid that she’d fall more in love with him and his family if they spent a whole night together? It wasn’t possible to love them more than she already did. Was she afraid that she’d cry more when she left them? Couldn’t happen. If she spent the night with Josh, would he want her to stay in the morning?

She looked across the room at his eyes, dark eyes hot with desire for her and all thoughts left her mind. She opened her arms to him. “Josh,” she whispered.

Moving swiftly toward her, he swept her into his arms and carried her into the bedroom.

Chapter Eleven

When Carrie awoke the next morning, the sun was already up, and she immediately felt a bit of panic. She should already be out of bed and dressed, but then, smiling, she lay back against the pillows and thought about last night. Josh’s hands had been all over her. He had hands like a musician’s that wanted to touch all of her, caress her. And he had kissed her and showed her how to kiss him.

They had made love all night. They had made love with enthusiasm the first time on the river-bank, but in bed they’d taken their time and looked at each other and touched each other. Carrie had been fascinated by Josh’s body, at the strength of it, at the play of muscle under his dark skin. She asked him about scars here and there, and sometimes he’d answer her and sometimes he refused. After a while she realized that he’d tell her anything about himself up to the age of sixteen, but after that he kept his life a secret.

Touching her and looking at her as he made love to her body, he didn’t ask her any questions, and Carrie tried not to think that it was because he thought he knew all there was to know about her. For one night she was content to live in the present, to not question what was going to happen in the future.

At one point during the night she had said, “Josh, I love you.” But he hadn’t said anything, merely held her to him tightly, as though he were afraid to let her go.

Now, Carrie was stretching luxuriously when the bedroom door burst open. Josh was standing there, dressed and as stern looking as she’d ever seen him. “What is it?” she asked. “Are the children all right?”

“I have taken the children to my brother’s house. Your trunks are loaded and ready to go, and I’ve hired a driver who will take the wagon back to Maine for you. You have to get dressed so we can go.” With that he shut the door again.

Was this the man she’d spent the night with? Was this the man she’d said she loved?

Getting out of bed—her marriage bed—she began to dress, but her hands shook on the buttons. Last night had changed nothing, and he wasn’t going to allow her to say good-bye to the children. But then, what could she have said, that she wanted to go? And she couldn’t tell them that their father was forcing her to go, because she didn’t want the children angry at their father. Altogether, maybe her leaving this way was better. If she had to say good-bye, she would have only cried and she would never be able to explain something she didn’t understand herself.

When she was dressed, her toiletries in her bag, she went outside, where Josh was on the wagon seat, and sitting in the back was a man who tipped his hat to her. Josh’s horse was tied to the back of the wagon—not his beautiful stallion, for that had gone back to his brother, but his old workhorse. When he saw her, Josh came around to help her onto the seat, but he didn’t speak to her.

Once they were on their way, she spoke. “Is there anything I can say to make you change your mind?”

“Nothing,” he said flatly. “Nothing at all. You deserve more than I can give you. You deserve—”

“Don’t you dare tell me what I deserve and don’t deserve,” she said in fury. “I know what I want.”

His face set rigidly, Josh stopped speaking.

Carrie held onto the wagon bed and thought that if he could be silent, so could she. But it wasn’t easy to stop her thoughts, thoughts of last night and of the days she had spent with Josh and his children.

“Tell Dallas I will write,” Carrie said softly. “Tell her I will send her more books and tell Tem I will send him things about the sea. He wants to see the sea. He says that he wants to be a sailor, and I’m sure Dallas will grow out of wanting to be an actress. All little girls want to be actresses until they grow up so I don’t think you have to worry about her. She’s a good child. She’s the best child. And so is Tem. He won’t have reason to get into trouble again now that I’m gone. Tell him that if he ever sees his Wild Girl again to thank her for me and tell her—”

She stopped babbling, because tears were beginning to close her throat. When they reached the stage depot, Josh helped her down. She searched his face, but she could see no sign of grief or of reluctance on his part. He may as well have been delivering one of his wormy corn crops to the corn merchant as sending his wife off to never see her again.

“You don’t care, do you?” she hissed at him. “You had your fun, and that’s all you wanted. You knew what you wanted from me the first moment you saw me and you got that, and now you can send me away without feeling anything.”

“You’re right,” he said, giving her a lascivious smile. “From the first moment I saw you, I wanted my hands on your shapely little body. It took me a while to manage it, but I did, and now that you’re going I can go back to the happy existence I had before you came.”

If she’d just heard his words, she’d not have believed them, but his face made her know that he wasn’t lying. No one on earth could look as uncaring as he did and be lying.

She slapped him. Slapped him hard, and he made no attempt to stop her. In fact, she thought he might stand there and allow her to slap him repeatedly.

She turned away while she still had some dignity left. “Go on, go back to your miserable little farm. I don’t need you here with me. I don’t want you here. I don’t want to ever see you again.”

She didn’t hear him move, but she knew when he left, and it was as though a part of her was taken away when he moved. She had to grab the wheel of the wagon to keep herself from running to him and begging him to take her with him. She could imagine herself grabbing his stirrup and pleading with him to allow her to stay.